The Greeks who knew the “unseen things” of God

The group of people criticised in Romans 1:18-32 is said to have known the truth about God and to have known God but also to have departed from that knowledge by worshipping and serving the creature rather the creator. Jason Staples has argued that this can be said only of Israel, not of the gentiles because only Israel has known God.

I want to have another look at this conundrum, because it occurs to me that there may be a very straightforward way to explain how this may be said of the Greeks. I will suggest that Paul was aware of Greek philosophical traditions that intuited, from reflection on the nature of things, the existence of a supreme and perhaps sole deity, but he bemoaned the fact that this enlightened view was swamped by the dominant religious culture of idol-worship.

Read more...
N.T. Wright and Paul’s eschatology (with coloured beads)
In Paul and the Faithfulness of God N.T. Wright locates Paul’s eschatology firmly in a Jewish hope, rooted in scripture, “not just for an individual future after death, but for a restoration and renewal of the whole nation, and perhaps even for the entire created order” (1043). It… ( | 5 comments)
Is suffering part of God’s plan for us?
A couple of recent tweets from The Gospel Coalition raise the question of the place of suffering both in the New Testament narrative and in Christian experience. The first is an unattributed quotation, though I’m betting it’s John Piper: “Suffering is actually part of God’s plan (and so necessary)… ( | 7 comments)
Some observations about divine Sonship in Hebrews 1
What is primarily said about Jesus in Hebrews 1 is that he is the Son whom God has “appointed the heir of all things”. After making purification for Israel’s sins—not the sins of the world—he “sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high”, which of course invokes Psalm 110:1-2 and the… ( | 1 comment)
Is the “eternal generation of the Son” a biblical idea?
As much out of morbid curiosity as anything, I have been following the intra-Reformed debate over the eternal subordination of the Son rather closely. Posts, counter-posts and counter-counter-posts from some hard-hitting theologians have been proliferating at a great rate. For no very good reason—… ( | 5 comments)
Trinity, subordination and narrative in Hebrews 1:1-2
Following on from yesterday’s piece on “The subordination of the Son, and why it has nothing to do with gender”….In response to accusations that his subordinationist Trinitarianism is a departure from orthodoxy Bruce Ware, who is Professor of Christian Theology at the Southern… ( | 4 comments)
The subordination of the Son, and why it has nothing to do with gender
There has been a furious flurry of posts (see below) from various directions this week laying into the argument of some neo-Calvinists (Wayne Grudem prominent among them) that the eternal subordination of the woman to the man is directly underpinned by the eternal subordination of the Son to… ( | 1 comment)
Craig Keener and the fallacy of mutual submission
Craig Keener, who certainly knows a thing or two, has written a piece on Jesus Creed reaffirming the common egalitarian argument that Paul prefaces the instructions to husbands and wives in Ephesians 5:22-33 with an exhortation to mutual submission. I count myself a dyed-in-the-wool egalitarian,… ( | 1 comment)