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The text discusses Thomas Joseph White's book on Trinitarian theology, which argues that God's triune nature is known through God's acts in history. White critiques twentieth-century Christian theologians and suggests that theology should focus on the missions of the Trinity, such as the ministry and death of Jesus. The author of the text, a Protestant in the Reformed tradition, questions whether White's proposal aligns with scripture and emphasizes the caution expressed by Church Fathers and Protestant Reformers in speculating about God's essence. The text also discusses the work of the Cappadocians and suggests that a Trinitarian perspective should be applied to the doctrine of divine attributes. [Extracted from the article]

Isaiah 8:1–2 is an elusive text, in regard to both its interpretation and its import. In these verses, YHWH commands Isaiah to write למהר שלל חש בז on a large גליון with a חרט אנוש. The writing surface, writing tool, and message are obscure and contested. However, I argue that the puzzle of Isaiah's writing materials has not yet been persuasively solved, as scholarship has failed to consider Judah's Egyptian scribal heritage. With this context, the prophet's writing surface (גליון) can be correctly understood as a section of papyrus, and his tool (חרט אנוש) can be read as a red rush pen. These proposed identifications of Isaiah's tools harmonize with comparative, etymological, epigraphic, and art-historical evidence for scribalism in the Levant and Egypt. Moreover, they illuminate the purpose and genre of YHWH's message. It appears that Isaiah was borrowing the format and tropes of royal decrees, which were transcribed on large pieces of papyrus in front of witnesses. The use of red ink also hints at the text's significance. The scene described in Isa 8:1–2 thus indicates that prophecy had taken on the garb of written record. The word of God was becoming not just an oral message but an authoritative document. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to achieve ecumenical unity, the church catholic must settle the question of authority. In this essay, I propose the concept of Sola Apostolica. I argue that the sole infallible norm and source of doctrine for the church catholic is the apostolic teaching—the joint teaching of the prophets and apostles in their integral unity. First, I sketch the history and theology of the Word of God. Next, I define and defend Sola Apostolica by situating it within the theology and domain of the Word. Then, I argue that Prima Scriptura follows as a logical consequence alongside a robust view of the evidential weight of tradition. By coordinating Prima Scriptura and the evidential weight of tradition with Sola Apostolica as their foundation, I hope to move the dialogue forward. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we consider one of the most remarkable post-Reformation revivals in Scottish Church history. It concerns what happened at the General Assembly of the Scottish Reformed Church in 1596. It is little known by Christians today, even in Scotland. Yet one contemporary historian, David Calderwood (1575-1650), was to write that "This year [1596] is a remarkable year in the history of the Kirk of Scotland."1 We do need to bear in mind that the Word of God is the same, that the Lord Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, and today and forever, that sin is the same, essentially, in every generation, and the overwhelming need for sinners to be saved is the same in the twenty-first century as it was in the sixteenth. It is a modern arrogance that because we are in such a supposedly advanced society, we have somehow left such things as religion behind. We are in a secular world which holds out no hope for eternity, and has no recognition of answerability to God, or serious thought of judgement to come. We should therefore be moved by the experience of the Church even as far back as 1596 and, after all, the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity, is undiminished in His power to quicken those who by nature are dead in trespasses and sins. We are always invited to believe that what He did then, He can do again in His sovereign grace. Besides this, here is a vital tenet for the Church to maintain: Christ, who has all authority in heaven and earth, is building His church so that the gates of hell will not prevail against it (Matthew 16:18). In this reconnoitre in Scottish Church history, we can therefore learn many things of timeless value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The grounds of Christian confidence that no disability can cut a human being off from hearing God's voice is the miracle of God taking on the babble that is human speech. This is a tune worth elaborating, Leidenhag thinks, proceeding to do so by asking how autistic people's participation in the call and response structure of Christian worship enriches the Christian understanding of God and God's purposes in particular church contexts. What if instead the church welcomed autistic people into their midst not by first scrambling to reshape worship according to their disabilities, but by trying to understand how autistic people are seeing the church, and with it, God?. [Extracted from the article]

The purpose of this article is to demonstrate the importance of spiritual status for understanding God's revelation, aiming in particular to highlight the role of passion in the writings of Saint Maximus the Confessor. Revelation is a dynamic and progresive process which implies both Divine Logos and human being. The apprehension of Revelation is conditioned by the spiritual state and progress of the person. In this movement, passion has an essential role, acting as a veil which covers or reveals the mystery. God makes Himself known in direct proportion with human deification. Human deification is also a dynamic process which implies action, will and good disposition; in other words an ascetic progress. The person is not simply a neutral recipient of a proportionate revelation, but a continual and progressive movement from flesh to spirit, from praxis to theoria in co-operation with divine intiati [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This approach is at odds with the radical nature of the 1933 rally, where Dr. Reinhold Krause's dismissal of Jewish morality with its "stories of cattle traders and pimps" was deliberately combative and resulted in the withdrawal of many German Christians from the movement.[58] The noticeably more conciliatory approach taken by Müller and Kinder at the 1934 rally therefore reflects a degree of flexibility in the German Christians' approach to dealing with dissent and conflict with the Protestant churches. On February 28, 1934, about 20,000 members of the various German Christian movements and their supporters gathered at Berlin's Sportspalast to hear speeches given by theologians and clergy who supported Hitler and the Nazi movement. Contrary to the frequent depiction of Kinder as a representative of the German Christians' more moderate faction, his introductory words appeared to intend continuity with Hossenfelder's more extreme leadership style, and he described the former leader as an "active and combative leader in the movement."[43] As one of the rally's keynote speakers, Kinder's speech is lengthier than Müller's and offers a broader snapshot of the contemporary situation facing the German Christians. This is likely to have reaffirmed Hitler's growing sense that Müller was incapable of the strong leadership required to unite the churches.[25] After expressing his gratitude for being asked to address the gathering, Müller's speech begins with an acknowledgement of the inseparable nature of the Nazi Party and German Christianity. [Extracted from the article]

This article suggests three ways that the psalm advances a biblical approach to epistemology. First, this psalm implies that some kinds of truth may be learned through careful observation. Psalm 19 as an invitation to seek the truth through scientific study in the form of disciplined observation, discovery, and analysis. If creation is speaking, then we must learn how to listen and hear its voice. Second, this psalm declares that truth can be learned from the Torah, the revealed word of God. Torah is a kind of knowledge that cannot be discovered; it must be revealed (Job 11:7-8; Romans 11:33). God’s self-revelation is a gift of God to humanity, discerned relationally; therefore, it cannot be discovered by searching, even if the search is enhanced by microscopes, telescopes, or microwave kinetic inductance detectors. Third, Psalm 19 invites us to discover ourselves. Moral and spiritual progress requires self-examination and transformation. Beholding God’s glory in creation and hearing God’s word through the Torah provide the orientation that is necessary for us to face the truth about ourselves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Google Scholar Google Preview OpenURL Placeholder Text WorldCat COPAC 17 Hooker Thomas, "The Application of Redemption." I And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, and to know what was in thy heart. i - Deut 8:2 KJV Edward Abbey, born and raised in the early twentieth century in an evangelical family in rural Pennsylvania, is understandably placed not in the traditions of Christian literature but as a Western or Southwestern or Environmental writer. Google Scholar Google Preview OpenURL Placeholder Text WorldCat COPAC 2 Barth Karl, The Word of God and the Word of Man. London, 1928. Google Scholar Google Preview OpenURL Placeholder Text WorldCat COPAC 14 Edwards Jonathan, "Treatise Concerning Religious Affections.". [Extracted from the article]

The article examines that shining of the eternal Light, the Word of God became incarnate of the Virgin Mary when she responded "here I am" to the angel's announcement. Topics include reports that the day on which the liturgy celebrates this ineffable mystery is also significant in the historical and literary vicissitudes of the great poet Dante Alighieri, prophet of hope and witness to the thirst for infinity that is in the heart of man.

One inescapable reality of our connected and globalized world is the diversity and plurality of the human situation into which the Word of God speaks. This diversity arises from the living matrix within which each individual is nurtured and is evidenced in the learning and cognitive structures used to build understanding. This article investigates ways to deal with these realities and create cognitively contextualized theological education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to examine Barth's ontology of holy scripture by appropriating the latest nomenclatural analysis of Barth's usage of Wesen and Sein. Given the difference between the Wesen and the Sein of the Bible, and the claim that the Sein-in-becoming of the Bible is determined by its Wesen-in-act, it follows that for Barth the Bible is ontologically the Word of God in the sense of Wesen, which underlies the Bible's becoming the Word of God in the sense of Sein. In short, the Bible ontologically becomes the Word of God in the sense of Sein because the Bible is the Word of God in the sense of Wesen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines how pastors engaged an online presence to preach the Word of God and address the needs of their congregations, during the crisis of the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown in South Africa. This is set against the Biblical instruction of Jesus Christ to Peter, to "feed my sheep" in John 21: 17, as it is the very same instruction that holds for pastors in churches today. However, the normal operations of the ministry have changed since the COVID-19 pandemic. The Christian church, a close-knit group of believers to whom social and physical distancing are foreign concepts, has had to adapt. Worship sites have been abandoned, and the absence of worshipers has become the norm. Pastoral ministries have been disrupted and call for pastors to embrace new technology to ensure that they have a digital presence with their congregation through social media. This paper argues that these circumstances give the church of God a unique opportunity to rethink how to continue ministry without physical contact. It adopted a mixed methods (qualitative and quantitative) approach, using an online questionnaire and telephonic surveys to engage pastors. The paper utilises the Two-way Communication Model (TCM) and the Uses and Gratification Theory (UGT). It concluded that pastoral care and spiritual counselling are essential in crises, that pastors have embraced social media in their mission, and that there is support for digital technology. The article recommendations that there should be a balanced communication strategy for Pastor's ministries, and that government partners with faith-based organisations in different ways in a joint effort to combat the virus, while encouraging and supporting congregants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accad, Martin, Sacred Misinterpretation: Reaching across the Christian-Muslim Divide, Grand Rapids, Eerdmans 2019 (ISBN 978-0-8028-7414-6), xxx + 370 pp., pb $38 Harshaw, Jill, God Beyond Words: Christian Theology and the Spiritual Experiences of People with Profound Intellectual Disabilities, London, Jessica Kingsley 2016 (ISBN 978-1-78592-044-8), 210 pp., pb $50 30 Harshaw, Jill, God Beyond Words: Christian Theology and the Spiritual Experiences of People with Profound Intellectual Disabilities, London, Jessica Kingsley2016 (ISBN 978-1-78592-044-8), 210 pp., pb $50 44 Leget, Carlo, Art of Living, Art of Dying: Spiritual Care for a Good Death, London, Jessica Kingsley2017 (ISBN 978-1-78592-211-4), 224 pp., pb $15. [Extracted from the article]

There is a collection of speeches that indict or reward eight of Israel's leaders: the high priest Eli and Israel's kings Saul, David, Solomon, Jeroboam, Baasha, Ahab, and Jehu. These speeches share a common form and respond to something significant the leader has just done. In most cases, this action was evil, and so the speech predicts dire consequences for his house. However, in two speeches the leader is rewarded for doing good. Each speech plays a pivotal role in the narrative's structure, initiating a transition from the ruler being addressed to his successor. This pattern--an evil or good deed, followed by a speech predicting the rise or fall of the ruling house, and the accounts of how those predictions are fulfilled--unifies the narrative of Samuel and Kings. But it is precisely this pattern that has been eliminated from the parallel passages in Chronicles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While many interpreters of the Enochic Parables have recognized a connection between the Enochic Son of Man and personified wisdom, this article argues that the Enochic Son of Man should be primarily identified as God's wisdom as well as God's word. To this end, the article argues that (a) the Son of Man is best understood as a divine being rather than an idealized human being, (b) a prominent word and wisdom theology existed in the late Second Temple period, and (c) both similarities between the Enochic Son of Man and word/wisdom as well as the narrative of the Parables support the conclusion that the Enochic Son of Man is an apocalyptic embodiment of God's word and wisdom. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the biblical-theological theme of vocation by proposing a vocational reading of the Johannine figure of the «Beloved Disciple» in the context of the preparatory document of the XV Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, Young People, the Faith and Vocational Discernment (January 1, 2017). This article is composed of three chapters: (1) the relevance of vocation in Benedict XVI's Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Verbum Domini; (2) the importance of the «stories of calling» in the Bible; (3) the «Beloved Disciple» as a young icon of vocational discernment. This study shows that a profound reflection on the reality of vocation allows one to better interpret the relationship between God and man. In the course of the Fourth Gospel, the figure of the «Beloved Disciple» particularly assumes an interesting revelatory and pedagogical role in relation to the youths' life decisions and to vocational discernment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We will be exploring the way in which, in the philosophy of Emmanuel Lévinas, the primordial Saying, as unique word, God, signifies as trace in the face of the Other. If the manifestation of the Face is the first discourse, then the infinity that reveals itself in the Face implies that, in the relation to the Other, in the primordial addressing of the Other, language is not anymore a place of the meaning, but instead it is the meeting with the Other that sets the condition of possibility of any meaning, because this meeting is not a fact of the subject, but is primarily provoked by an appellation originating from the Highness. The relation between the original Saying and the Said that introduces the meaning is analogous to the irreversible translation of the Septuagint, being in a first time a translation of the unsayable, and secondly a call to responsibility. Greek is worked from the inside by the word of the Other, that is, the word of the Hebrew, and what gets translated into Greek is merely the trace of the Infinity. The translation is a movement without return, just like the voyage of Abraham who leaves behind his homeland and his possessions in order to follow the word of God. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Review of Pr. Ioan Chirilă, Scara cuvântului. Eseuri omiletice [The Ladder of the Word. Homiletic Essays], (Cluj-Napoca: Editura Școala Ardeleană, 2017). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 500th anniversary of the Reformation offers the occasion for reconsideration of the meaning of the Reformation not only for its time but for today. Following the classic theological affirmations of the Protestant Reformation (solus Christus, sola scriptura, sola gratia, and sola fide), this reflection proposes an understanding of the Reformation as the permanent movement of the Word of God. Seen through such a lens, “reformation” can be affirmed from an ecumenical perspective. It also can be a critical message of hope for the present church in a period of instability and decline in the West. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This contribution reconsiders the rejected but often overlooked “Malines text” (September 1963) as the missing link in the redaction history of Gaudium et Spes and as a key witness to the document’s Christian anthropology. Applying the three hermeneutical principles of content, style, and “pastorality” (pastoralité) to this text and its redaction history, a basis is laid for a reading of Vatican II that respects its embrace of diversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the role of storytelling in Christianity, particularly in its relationship with creation. It mentions how storytelling provides access to the word of God and its importance in the environmental movement and the limiting of consumption, which would lead Christians back to the moment of creation.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various articles within the issue on topics including the dynamics between Word and Spirit, book reviews of Psalms, marriage and divorce.

This paper discusses Cadamer's interpretation of Cusanus' concept of verbum focusing on three metaphysical problems: pantheism, the spirit as image of God, Being as the word. First, the understanding of God as creative word offers the right balance between transcendence and presence within creation. Second, the verbum envisions a subjectivity that mirrors the spontaneity and creativity ofthe divine word. Third, the concept of Being is wired with a theory of creation rooted in the divine dynamic interiority, which manifests itself in the emergence of the verbum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present volume revisits the medieval doctrine of Logos, which lays the foundation for the world In Cod's creative intelligence, at once substantiating and surpassing its two ancient sources (Platonist and Aristotelian). The relationship between creative word and created world grounds, on the one hand, the Intelligibility of finite being In general, and on the other hand the very language of human persons and their moral action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The theme of sight plays a central role throughout the book of Acts. While some scholars have identified this theme, especially with respect to visions, they typically overlook the intersection of sight and audition. This article argues that Luke pairs seeing with hearing and emphasizes the sense of hearing to an even greater degree. The article first addresses sight and visions in Acts and then focuses on Stephen’s vision in Acts 7. This is the one vision in Acts that does not involve divinely bestowed words, yet it still betrays Luke’s preference for hearing – and speaking – God’s word. The article then explores key themes that emerge from Stephen’s vision regarding the visual and verbal modes of perception in Acts as a whole. Overall, Luke’s emphasis on the spoken ‘word’ reflects his reliance on Jewish scriptural traditions that likewise highlight listening as a key epistemological posture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on philosophical aspects related to the Word of God in Christianity in Wittenberg, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Topics discussed include medieval practices related to the Word of God that impact human consciousness; German theologist Martin Luther's views on the God's restoration of human righteousness through his word of absolution; Luther's view that it was necessary for Christians to listen to God's Word, which helps in turning their attention to ultimate human trust.

The article focuses on the views of Lutheran theologian Hermann Sasse on the doctrine of Scripture. Topics discussed include the absence of any article on the doctrine of Scripture in the Lutheran Confessions, which exposes Lutheranism to fundamentalism and liberalism; orthodox Lutheran theologians who considered Scripture as the Word of God; and Sasse's development of a doctrine of Scripture that gives recognition to both the divine and human natures of Scripture.

The blackened landscape of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road (2006) suggests the possibility of a future restoration of the earth through the survival of the nameless boy, who is variously figured as a fire-carrier and more specifically, as the Word of God, a chalice holder, a tabernacle. McCarthy’s privileging of the bodies of the boy and father suggests how the body is the basis for our encounters with the dynamism of place. The sacrificial love of the father for the son exemplifies embodied, emplaced love and is finally Christ-like in its manner and tone. This relationship and the relationship of father and son to the earth, which can be thought of figuratively as God’s body, can be best understood through “deep incarnation,” a dramatic understanding of God’s sacramental presence and action in the world in which human beings build communities and reconsider their place in nature. Moreover, reading the novel through Gerard Manley Hopkins’s sonnet “God’s Grandeur” allows us to see how The Road might suggest both the earth’s capacity to regenerate itself and its potential supernatural restoration. The present ecotheological reading of The Road is the first to unite McCarthy’s intertwined environmental and Christian emphases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]