Philip Friesen

What Does It Mean for Us to Be Human?

Thoughts on the Incarnation God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness, and let them have dominion….So…in the image of God he created them, male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:26-27). In ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt the king was called ‘the image’ or ‘the likeness’ of a god.1 The king ruled by the power of overwhelming, violent force and claimed...

Philip Friesen

Sin and Forgiveness – for Christian/Muslim Dialogue

In the Bible sin has two dimensions as follows: 1. Sin is a personal offense against God or another person. 2. Sin is a transgression of the law. The first definition relates directly to East Asian thinking. In the Chinese language, for example, there is originally no word for the Biblical concept of sin, but the concept of personal offense is well understood. The second definition should be most useful in...

Philip Friesen

If God Is In Charge, then Is Not God to Blame?

The morning on the radio program, Family Life Today, Dennis Rainey asked his guest to explain the earthquake tragedy in Haiti to a 9 year old child. The answer was that we can’t explain, but we can know God cares.  The guest went on to say that unless one holds a Christian world view, this explanation will be rejected. I agree, but I’m not sure I like the world view approach for discussing...

Philip Friesen

THE VIOLENT JESUS OF REVELATION

Dear FF You asked what I thought about Jesus leading his followers into bloody conquest of God’s enemies in the Book of Revelation. I’ll try to demonstrate a “hermeneutic of the cross” as applied to this question. By that I mean the conscious attempt to relate the teaching of Revelation back to the cross in a meaningful way, working with the assumption that the cross ultimately governs everything...

Philip Friesen

Greg Marsh: “The Ontological Roots of Western Science.”

Title: Greg Marsh: “The Ontological Roots of Western Science.” Location: Bordertown Coffee 325 16th Avenue SE Minneapolis, MN Description: This gist of my thesis is that ontology is a factor more fundamental than either reason or environment–factors necessary but not sufficient– for determining the likelihood of the natural sciences developing in a given culture. Many advanced...