James B. Jordan > Quotes

“The moon established which day was the first of the month, and which was the fifteenth. Such festivals as Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles were set on particular days of the month (Leviticus 23:5-6, 34; Numbers 28:11-14; 2 Chronicles 8:13; Psalm 81:3). The moon, of course, governs the night (Psalm 136:9; Jeremiah 31:35), and in a sense the entire Old Covenant took place at night. With the rising of the Sun of Righteousness (Malachi 4:2), the "day" of the Lord is at hand (Malachi 4:1), and in a sense the New Covenant takes place in the daytime. As Genesis 1 says over and over, first evening and then morning. In the New Covenant we are no longer under lunar regulation for festival times (Colossians 2:16-17). In that regard, Christ is our light.”
― James B. Jordan, Through New Eyes: Developing a Biblical View of the World

“Is the Reformed faith opposed to human rights? Yes, very much so. It is not human rights but Divine law which is the foundation of liberty and the safeguard against tyranny. It is not something proceeding from man (rights), but something proceeding from God (revealed law) which is to order Christian society.”
― James B. Jordan, The Failure of the American Baptist Culture

“The Christian is never to be motivated by a sense of his own honor, but rather by the honor of Christ. If pride was Satan’s original sin, humility and patient faith are the Christian’s primary duty. The Christian casts his own honor in the dust so that God may be honored, knowing that God and God alone can give him true honor. The Christian, thus, lives by obedience and submission, not by pride and honor and nobility.”
― James B. Jordan, Primeval Saints: Studies in the Patriarchs of Genesis

“It is only when we see just how wonderful and amazing man is that we can appreciate the magnitude of the Fall and the greatness of redemption.”
― James B. Jordan, Primeval Saints: Studies in the Patriarchs of Genesis

“Biblical religion teaches that God is a person, and that our relationship with Him is personal. He speaks and we hear, mouth to ear. What He says we are to believe and do. This is very practical and mundane in a sense. Philosophy, by way of contrast, regards God as something to contemplate, discuss, and meditate on. Philosophy, thus, always moves away from words into mystical experience, away from laws and commands into feelings.”
― James B. Jordan, The Liturgy Trap: The Bible Versus Mere Tradition in Worship

“when God says to do or not do some physical thing with our bodies, it is important that we pay heed because this is one of His ways of dealing with us in a total fashion. It shows a very superficial understanding of human existence to say, “Well, what matters is my heart attitude, not the posture of my body.”
― James B. Jordan, The Liturgy Trap: The Bible Versus Mere Tradition in Worship

“The Christian is never to be motivated by a sense of his own honor, but rather by the honor of Christ. If pride was Satan’s original sin, humility and patient faith are the Christian’s primary duty.”
― James B. Jordan, Primeval Saints: Studies in the Patriarchs of Genesis

“I know that the Reformers spoke of the sacraments as “visible words,” but this was an unfortunate choice of words. The Lord’s Supper is not a visible word but an edible one. Baptism is not a visible word but a tangible one. The only “visible words” are human beings, the images of God made after the likeness of the Word of God Himself. In other words, the only thing to look at in worship is other people.”
― James B. Jordan, The Liturgy Trap: The Bible Versus Mere Tradition in Worship

“Third, in coming to understand Biblical symbolism, we may receive some clues from other ancient literature, but we must always have clear-cut Biblical indication for any symbol or image we think we have found. We don't want to read the modern secular worldview into the Bible, but we don't want to read the corrupt worldview of ancient Near-Eastern paganism into it either.”
― James B. Jordan, Through New Eyes: Developing a Biblical View of the World

“If we look at Buddhism and other pantheistic religions, we see that they celebrate sterility, fasting, celibacy, virginity, and other anorexic, world-rejecting practices. The same was true of the religions of the Mediterranean at the time Christianity was born. It is not surprising that such world-rejecting counterfeit spiritualities infected the Church. The Reformation wisely and rightly returned to the world-affirming, earthy, joyous, musical-instrument-worship, wine-drinking, cigar-smoking, pro-marital worldview of the Hebrew Scriptures. The Reformation was profoundly correct; Rome and Orthodoxy are profoundly wrong. (I mentioned fasting. In the Bible, the goal of fasting is to break the fast when the Bridegroom arrives, just as the purpose of virginity is to get rid of it with the bridegroom. In anorexic religions, fasting and virginity are prized statically for their own sakes.)”
― James B. Jordan, The Liturgy Trap: The Bible Versus Mere Tradition in Worship