Sir William Blackstone is often praised for laying the groundwork for American jurisprudence with his Commentaries on the Laws of England.  Blackstone's Commentaries were one of the most widely read books in the colonies, and his views of the laws of England were often incorporated into the laws of America.  One portion of Blackstone's Commentaries that has largely been forgotten by modern legal scholars but which played a significant role in forming the thought of founding fathers like James Wilson was Blackstone's answer to the question of where laws come from.  What follows is a condensed version of Blackstone's somewhat loquacious answer to that question.

I have many Catholic friends, and from time to time, one of them will attempt to persuade me that the books of the Apocrypha are just as much Scripture as the Old and New Testaments.  After studying the Apocrypha itself, I've developed the response of pointing out that even according to the Catholic church's own criteria, the Apocrypha does not make the cut. 

One of the common arguments brought against the traditional understanding of Leviticus 18:22 is the claim that the Hebrew word “toebah” (abomination) only refers to pagan temple practices and not things that are revolting in and of themselves.  I was recently presented with an opportunity to respond to this argument, and I took the time to look up every occurrence of the word “toebah” in the Bible.  I found that the above claim cannot be supported by the facts and that the English term "abomination" is an accurate translation of the word "toebah." 

Evan Minton of the Cerebral Faith Blog recently asked for my opinion of his article "Why The Calendar Day Interpretation Of Genesis One Is Exegetically Untenable."  Evan presented four problems that he saw with the young earth view of Genesis, and I thought that my responses to his problems would be helpful to my readers.  Go ahead and read through Evan's article and then check out my response below.

I was listening to Dr. James White’s podcast the other day and heard him defending the Calvinist TULIP and criticizing other floral acrostics attempting to provide a contrasting view of salvation.  I’ve always disagreed with the doctrines of Calvinism, but I’ve never attempted to organize my disagreement into a simple acrostic which could stand toe-to-toe with the TULIP.  That is, I’ve never done so before now.  While listening to Dr. White’s podcast, I came up with a simple acrostic that I think defeats the TULIP with ease.