Vittore Carpaccio, "Saint Augustine in His Study," 1507. A biblical reconsideration of the views of Augustine and Calvin By Rod Benson I’ve been reading Rutger Bregman’s 2019 New York Times bestseller, Humankind: A Hopeful History, and it has me questioning my views about human nature and Christian anthropology. Of course, this is a good thing because engagement …
The Marrow of Theology and the Marrow Controversy
The Marrow Controversy and the “Marrow Men” are frequently confused with the theological work The Marrow of Theology, but the two are historically and conceptually distinct, despite sharing the word “marrow” in their titles. The confusion is understandable because both emerged from the broader Reformed and Puritan world and both sought to articulate the essential substance …
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The Doctrine of Election
John Calvin, The Doctrine of Election (trans. from the French by Robert White; Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 2022). 224pp + indexes. ISBN 9781800402652 Reviewed by Dr Rod Benson The biblical doctrine of election is fraught with controversy. The reasons for this are not hard to discover: there is, firstly, an apparent tension between determinism …
Isn’t theology supposed to be prescriptive?
Welcome to The Theology Whisperer, a series of short blog posts on theology and theological education. The task of theology has to begin somewhere, and a good starting point is description – or, as I noted in my last post, the task of clarifying the content and practical implications of the Christian faith. But …
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