Pursuing Veritas

Reflections by Jacob J. Prahlow
  • Recommended Reading: November 29 – December 5

    If you read one article this week, engage Sex on Campus by R. R. Reno If you have time to read more, check out these suggested articles (from this week and late last week). As always, if you think there’s something else I should be reading, feel free to mention it in the comments.

  • Luther’s Two Kingdoms: Christian Passivity?

    This post is part of our ongoing series on Luther’s Two Kingdoms. To this point it seems that using Bornkamm’s understanding of Luther’s doctrine would allow for little passivity from the Christian when their neighbor was confronted with evil. On the breadth of secular authority, Luther’s concern was that temporal authority must not endeavor to…

  • Luther’s Two Kingdoms: Christ and Authority

    This post is part of our ongoing series on Luther’s Two Kingdoms. The differentiation between the jurisdictions of Christ and the temporal authority does not limit Christian activity to the spiritual sphere alone, but dictates the manner in which the Christian wields the sword and obeys temporal authority. Turning to the Biblical passages in question,…

  • Luther’s Two Kingdoms: On Temporal Authority

    This post is part of our ongoing series on Luther’s Two Kingdoms. Having considered context and terminology of Luther’s Two Kingdoms, let us now turn to his writing on this subject in On Temporal Authority: To What Extent It Should Be Obeyed. Luther begins Temporal Authority by outlining the Biblical basis for understanding the civil…

  • Luther’s Two Kingdoms: Applied Ethics?

    This post is part of our ongoing series on Luther’s Two Kingdoms. Scholars such as Porter have argued that one of the lasting implications of Luther’s construction involves a radical separation of temporal authority from man’s goals in the kingdom of God.[25] Further, Porter argues that “Luther’s radical separation of the ‘two realms’ or kingdoms—church…

  • Book Review: The Duck Commander Bible (Robertson)

    Chances are that amidst your Black Friday shopping (or today’s Cyber Monday spending spree) you somewhere caught sight of camouflage. T-shirts, DVD collections, hats, beards, coats—you name it, there’s a probably a Duck Dynasty version of it somewhere. The Robertson family and their hit show on A&E have taken the country by storm the past…

  • Recommended Reading: November 22-28

    If you read one article this week, engage A Moral, Not a Racial, Divide over Ferguson by Dennis Prager. If you’re got some time to kill between eating leftovers and taking another nap, check out the additional suggestions below. As always, if you think there’s something I should be reading, please let me know in…

  • Luther’s Two Kingdoms: Sword and State

    This post is part of our ongoing series on Luther’s Two Kingdoms Prior to writing Temporal Authority, Luther had rejected the Roman construction of the dichotomous application of the ethical, such as the imperative of the Sermon on the Mount, to commands and counsels,[15] as well as rejecting the view that the Church was the…

  • Luther’s Two Kingdoms: Context

    This post is part of our ongoing series on Luther’s Two Kingdoms Looking at the broader context of Luther’s theology, we should note several tenets of his theological program that are vital to understanding his church-state construction. As outlined in Freedom of the Christian, perhaps foremost in Luther’s reformation theology was the importance of sola…

  • Luther’s Two Kingdoms: Introduction

    “Modern church people and theologians have sharply attacked [Martin] Luther’s attitude [concerning the relationship between the Christian and temporal authority] from two perspectives. On the one hand, Luther is accused of having indirectly contributed to the glorification of the orders of creation and to that extent at least making it difficult for Lutherans to take…