Arts and Humanities Commons^™

The Incomprehensible God Who Wants To Reveal: Exodus 40 And Sirach 24, Gilbert Perez

Obsculta

God's transcendence above everything is present in many theological traditions, who recognize and answer in a diverse number of ways the question of how to approach the incomprehensible. Using the Historical Critical Method of exegesis with examples from the works of the recently deceased Walter Brueggemann, two completely different contexts in the Old Testament: Exodus 40 and Sirach 24, are presented to show how scripture itself often responded to the question of how God is made comprehensible.

Theology As A Form Of Prayer, Melissa Tovar-Guerrero

Obsculta

This piece reflects on the essential tasks of theology to foster practical expressions of prayer, to establish a fruitful and transformative dialogue with the Trinity through Christian meditation.

Human Freedom And God’S Image In Undocumented People, An Nguyen

Obsculta

This article explores the relationship of human freedom in the theological perspective and undocumented immigrants in the United States: how immigrants embody the divine image, Imago Dei, despite legal and social constraints. I will begin with the theological foundation—freedom as a distinguishing characteristic of God’s image in humanity—and analyze the complex nature of freedom as both a divine gift and a human responsibility. Additionally, I will demonstrate that the Church has a special responsibility to recognize and affirm the inherent dignity of undocumented people by drawing from Catholic social teaching, migration studies, and theological anthropology, ultimately calling for pastoral practices …

Omnipotence And Modesty: The Still, Small Voice Of God In 1 Kings 19, Scott Cooper

Obsculta

This article examines the sovereignty of God’s self-revelation to Ezekiel in a still, small voice on Mount Horeb and considers the difficulty of reconciling competing scholarly assessments of the prophet as faithful priestly servant of YHWH or disobedient free agent. This author considers Ezekiel’s experience as a site of spiritual union with God, inspired by the exegetical work of 14th century German Dominican priest and mystic Johannes Tauler.

Five Scriptural Reflections On Grief, Patrick Russell

Obsculta

This is a piece that looks at grief through a close reading of different texts of the Old Testament. While each reflection is its own, they are one paper that gives the reader a chance to see and reflect on grief by sitting with Genesis 11:1-9, Exodus 8:20-32, Ruth 1:1-22, Job 2:11-13, and Psalm 13.

The Impact A Lack Of Racial/Ethnic Diversity Has On Spiritual Formation And The Key Actions Necessary For Resolution, Kimberly Janelle Baker

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The problem this research addresses is that New Community Church, a local church ministry, lacks a racially/ethnically rich and diverse spiritual formation experience. A lack of racial/ethnic diversity within churches nationwide is a pervasive issue. While some churches are not more diverse due to location, there are many, including the specific church chosen to be included as part of the problem statement, that are located in diverse communities but still do not adequately reflect the racial/ethnic make-up of their respective communities.

Martin Luther King Jr., once said that “It is appalling that the most segregated hour of Christian America is …

البيان من أجل لاهوت من المتوسّط

Horizons et Conjonctures

أبصر هذا النصّ النور من رحم تجارب لاهوتية حيّة تكشّفت على ضفاف البحر الأبيض المتوسط، ومن مسار بحثٍ ونقاشٍ امتدّ لسنواتٍ عدّة. وها هو اليوم يُسلَّم بصيغة بيان إلى كلّ من يهمّه الأمر ويرغب في الانخراط، بطريقةٍ أو بأخرى، في المسار الناشئ. وبحسب المعنى الاشتقاقي لكلمة "بيان"، فإنّ نيّتنا هي تقديم نصّ للكنائس والمجتمع الأكاديمي، ولكلّ من يرغب في التفاعل مع عملنا، يعلن بعض المكتسبات النظرية والثوابت التي نعتزم الارتكاز عليها للعمل من أجل "لاهوت من المتوسّط". ولذا، فنحن أمام نصّ مفتوح وديناميّ شأن المسار الذي نأمل أن يتبلور إثر تقديم هذا البيان. ولهذا السبب، يجسّد هذا البيان كذلك التزامنا …

More Than My Own Understanding, Danielle Gonzalez

be Still

This reflective essay explores the intersection of faith, community, and medical training through the lens of a medical student navigating imposter syndrome, academic pressure, and clinical rotations. Through personal narrative and patient experiences, it examines how spirituality and shared human presence shape resilience, meaning, and belonging in medicine.

Scruples Before Religion: Muslim Waraʿ Of The Formative Period, Omar Laaroussi

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis studies the conceptual history of waraʿ and its role as a normative paradigm existing in the formative centuries of the Islamic world. To do so, I consider the Hellenic concepts that ground Near Eastern understandings of virtue and piety before the rise of Islam. This, I then use to contextualise a focused discussion on the textual history of waraʿ before moving on to discuss its properties in a ascetic social-world through the analysis of those very texts. I attempt to place those properties in conversation with modern philosophers’ work on disciplinary regimes and their impacts upon the self. …

Philosophia From Dialectic To Dying Before Death: Traces Of Plato’S Spirit In The Encounters Between The Falāsifa, Mutakallimūn, And Sūfiyya, Fadhil Yunus Alsagoff

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis offers a fresh approach to the question “What is philosophy?” by reconsidering Plato’s vision of philosophiaand seeking its traces in the encounters between the Falāsifa, the Mutakallimūn, and the Sūfiyya of the classical Muslim world. I argue that Plato’s true legacy lies in a vision of philosophia as dialectical inquiry that ultimately leads – due to the inextricable limitations of propositional language – to aporia and what he called “practicing for dying and death.” I then argue that this vision of philosophia finds resonance in the classical Muslim world in the embodied encounters between …

Otherness And The Trinity: Toward A Critical Reimagining Of Christian Divinity From A Postcolonial Ethos, Taylor Muma

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, I address the Trinity’s potential as an emancipatory relational archetype in the philosophy of religion, while at the same time recognizing the complicity of Christian doctrine in colonial conquest. My dissertation will be a reimagining of trinitarian theology as an ecotonal paradigm of multiplicity and alterity that provides a generative means of moving beyond the enmeshment of divinity with constructs of mastery.

The post-structuralist and postcolonial methodologies in this project emerge from the work of such scholars as Homi Bhabha, Jacques Derrida, Emmanuel Levinas and Gloria Anzaldúa. They foreground critical ideations of otherness and multiplicity in ways …

Jesus-Centered Preaching: A Christocentric Approach Based On The Hermeneutical Implications Of The Gospels As Βίοι., Mark Palmer

Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to discover the implied hermeneutic of the Gospels as βίοι and to propose a congruent homiletic. The study addressed the following research questions: What is the genre of the Gospels and the resulting hermeneutic? Does current Christ-centered preaching account for his hermeneutic? Does Christological research account for intrinsic characteristics? What is the intrinsic Christology of Mark’s Gospel? What homiletical process is needed to align with the genre-based hermeneutic of the Gospels? The methodology of this study followed a four-step process: Genre research confirming the Gospels as βίοι, Christological research including the development of an …

Grapho 2026, Simon Niemtschk

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

Grapho’s theme this year, “One Body in Christ”, encourages us to meditate on the ways our faith unites. By our Lord’s sacrifice, all believers are bound together with the resurrected body of Christ. Inspired by the great love God shared with the church as seen in Paul’s letters (Romans 12:4-5; 1 Corinthians 12:12-13), we are freed from sin, death and the power of the devil, and empowered to a life together. Our theme this year invites Christians to consider how our unity is found scripturally, sacramentally, and liturgically.

Sisters Separated: The Past, Present, And Future Of The Relationship Between The Lcms And Wels, Peter Ross

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

There are two prominent confessional Lutheran synods in the United States, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod and the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod. Yet these two groups are not in altar and pulpit fellowship. It often comes as a surprise to many younger members of Missouri Synod congregations that there was a time when the two synods were in altar and pulpit fellowship. As time has gone on however, there seems to be a general warming in the relationship between the two synods. In light of this warming relationship, it is good to look at the past relationship of the two synods, …

The Broken Body, Benjamin Wagner

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

I remember sitting on the dugout bench wishing that I could play the same way the other kids did. They did not need to labor with such great exertion that their lungs might collapse—but I did. I was born with several chronic conditions that made all physical activities exceedingly challenging. For me, sports, exercise, or even playing with other kids always came with complications. I knew, deep down, that something was wrong with me. My body was not as it was meant to be.

One Body?, Christopher Genzler

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

By Christopher Genszler “One Body, In Christ”. This is a great theme. Biblical. Staunch. Solid. But when I read this, I had a small twinge in my heart. I remembered the youth groups. I remembered the summer camps. I really couldn’t help myself in connecting the two because they have become so very similar. The parents drop the child off for some good, Christian education, but then go elsewhere. Parents everywhere have an option to be as unengaged with their child’s walk with Christ as they see fit. I know I don’t know all of the situations they may be …

An Ode To The “Free Book Shelf”, Henry Eising

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

It is rumored the younger generation does not know those solid joys and lasting pleasures in those ancient treasures. O tempora, O mores! — William Dallmann, My Life When a new mound of books begins to accumulate in some obscure corner of our campus, it is as though new life is stirring. There is excitement when it is brought to our attention that some seminarian of uncommon fortune has been given a set of the Ante-Nicene Fathers. Our ears prick up at the hushed mention of some Ancient Christian Commentary volumes that have been acquired, which have also—blessedly—been made available …

“One Body”, Rory Fry

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

Often when people talk about the church, they talk about a building. They will say things like, “I will see you at the church,” or “It is our month to clean the church.” They speak of the church as though it were one specific place in time and space. Yet the church is so much more than that. It is more than a building, more than a single location.

Chapel Of Saints Timothy And Titus, Nathaniel Pekari

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

Chapel of Saints Timothy and Titus

Broad Table, Joshua Fields

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

Broad Table

At The First, O Word Incarnate, Jacob Moede

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

At the First, O Word Incarnate

We Believe In God The One, Jacob Moede

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

We Believe in God the One

Selections From The Milindapañha (Section On The Simile Of Fire), Maksim Astashinskiy

Faculty Papers and Publications

The Pāḷi text of 3. Tejaṅgapañha from the Milindapañha is anthologized in The Buddhist Era 2500 Great International Council Pāḷi Tipiṭaka: 40 Volume Edition in Roman Script B.E. 2548 (M.L. Maniratana Bunnag Dhamma Society Fund, 2005), https://suttacentral.net/ms. An English translation is available under Section 7.4.3: Fire in SuttaCentral; the translation is adapted from “The Questions of King Milinda,” trans. T.W. Rhys Davids in The Sacred Books of the East Vol. XXXVI ed. Max Müller (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1894), 311–312, https://www.sacred-texts.com/bud/sbe36/sbe3611.htm.

Letter From The Chairman, Simon Niemtschk

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

Grapho’s theme this year, “One Body in Christ”, encourages us to meditate on the ways our faith unites. By our Lord’s sacrifice, all believers are bound together with the resurrected body of Christ. Inspired by the great love God shared with the church as seen in Paul’s letters (Romans 12:4-5; 1 Corinthians 12:12-13), we are freed from sin, death and the power of the devil, and empowered to a life together. Our theme this year invites Christians to consider how our unity is found scripturally, sacramentally, and liturgically.

The Church Year: A Unifying Story For Christ’S Body, Travis Galle

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

Our postmodern world makes much of the diverse range of “human experiences” that subjectively shape the masses. Consequently, the contemporary task of the Church is to discern how best to comprehend and apply her proclamation to these varying experiences. Consider the experience of time. Human experience of time is something that is ostensibly common to all, yet cultural customs shape its perception. Some societies construct their calendars based on the cycles of the moon, others on the sun (such as the modern western calendar). Seasonal variations also universally impact all cultures, but to different degrees based on their respective climates. …

Liturgical Renewal And Mcdonaldization, Daniel Johnson

Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal

What is McDonaldization? Imagine with me that it is the 1950s, and you are going on a road trip down Route 66. You get hungry, so you decide to stop for food. You pull off the side of the road and park in front of a classic American diner to get yourself a burger and fries.

Beyond The Veil Of Modernity: René Guénon, Prophet Of The Metapolitical Imaginary, Frederic Colier

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Heralded by some as one of the greatest intellectuals of the 20th century, French metaphysician René Guénon (1886-1951) is also the controversial father of Primordial Tradition, a metaphysics designed to remedy the decline of Western civilization. Guénon viewed the West in the grip of a prolonged cycle of degeneration. He sought to implement a pseudo-authoritarian spiritual reset that required a total rejection of its Western intellectual heritage and an embrace of Eastern doctrines.

Focusing on his landmark book The Crisis of the Modern World (1927), the dissertation examines how Guénon implemented his controversial reset. After outlining the religious, cultural, and …

America's Founding Theology, Michael Payne

Bound Away: The Liberty Journal of History

Building off of Mark David Hall's thesis that America had a Christian founding, this paper seeks to explore the theology of this Christian founding. While acknowledging that Enlightenment and English Common Law also influenced American founding thought, the paper seeks to look specifically at America's theological outlook. It concludes that American founding theology was overwhelmingly Reformed but with some key influences from the Baptist, Quaker, and even Catholic traditions. These influences can be found in the writings of the founders as well as in America's founding documents such as the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. The point of the …

A Psycho-Spiritual Transformation In Covid-19 Crisis Narratives: A Comparative Study In Indonesia And Pakistan, Heru Prakosa, Nurlaela Widyarini, Johanes Seno Aditya Utama, Juan Carlos

Makara Human Behavior Studies in Asia

Although the COVID-19 pandemic ended as a global health emergency, its psychosocial legacy persists in many communities. This study examines how religion and spirituality support recovery in Indonesia and Pakistan by shaping crisis narratives. Faith-based language is treated as psychosocial data and interpreted through its functions in meaning-making, emotion regulation, social connection, value anchoring, and action commitment using Psycho-Spiritual Transformation (PST) as a guiding framework. Open-ended responses were collected from 274 participants via an online survey in July 2021 (Indonesia n = 236; Pakistan n = 38). Across both contexts, narratives typically moved from pressure and inner conflict toward spiritual …

The Image Falls Apart, Alexa N. Curran

Masters Theses

The Image Falls Apart is a phenomenological account of my collision with Rogier van der Weyden’s The Descent from the Cross (ca. 1435). In an ever-expanding landscape of visual stimuli, how do we make sense of images that are an encounter with the sacred? Of what use to a modern viewer is an altarpiece of the late medieval period that, in its miraculous rendering of each of its human figures, reflects the impending iconophobia of the Protestant Reformation? And what does falling have to do with it? With careful attention to the assembly of bodies in space, this multidisciplinary project, …