Childs and Brueggemann: Canonical Text or Canonical Interpreter?

I’ve appreciated much of Brevard Childs’ work in terms of biblical theology and his discussion of the canon.  I’ve also enjoyed reading some of Walter Brueggemann.  In an adaptation of Childs’ Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments, namely Biblical Theology: A Proposal, Childs notes Brueggemann’s criticism of his canonical proposal.  This is pretty fascinating, but also rather involved, so I’ll do my best to summarize it in clear terms (the quotes are from Biblical Theology: A Proposal, pages 40-44).

First, Brueggemann says that Childs focuses on the theological aspect of Scripture using only the text as the authority instead of the theological content.  Brueggeman says the authority should be in the theological context rather than the text itself.

Second, Brueggemann parts ways with Childs by suggesting that the “canonical interpreter” is the decisive thing that hands over (tradent) the theological norm.  In other words, Brueggemann says the interpreter is engaged in the ongoing process of actualizing the text to recover the freeing concerns God has in the world.  Childs would disagree.

Third, Brueggemann emphasizes the need to read the theological substance of the Bible from the point of view of the oppressed in society, like Israel often was (or those within Israel were).  Basically, the theological substance of the Bible has to do with the oppressed being freed from alternative power structures.  Childs, of course, wouldn’t highlight this the way Brueggemann does.

Childs says that Brueggeman, in these critiques and differences, misses his main point: “The whole point of focusing on scripture as canon in opposition to the anthropocentric tradition of liberal protestantism is to emphasize that the biblical text and its theological function as authoritative form belong inextricably together” (p. 42).   Sharply, Childs notes that though Brueggemann would cringe at this suggestion, his (Brueggemann’s) hermeneutical move is identical to that of the Enlightenment.

Why or how?  Because, writes Childs, Brueggemann separates the text and the norm (content).  Brueggemann focuses on the norm or content within a certain community in which the text begins to work.  Childs describes Brueggemann’s method: “The inert text…receives its meaning when it is correlated with some other external cultural force, ideology, or mode of existence” (p. 42).  Childs says this  proposal of Brueggemann is radically different than his own.

Here’s Childs’ punch line, so to speak.  “The saddest part of the proposal is that Walter Brueggemann is sincerely striving to be a confessing theologian of the Christian church, and would be horrified at being classified as a most eloquent defender of the Enlightenment, which his proposal respecting the biblical canon actually represents” (p. 44).

Wow! That’s pretty significance.  If you’re interested on some background layers of this discussion (the “text v norm” or “text v interpretation”) you’ll have to voyage through Hans Frei’s Eclipse of Biblical Narrative .  Also, let me note, I’m pretty sure the serious student of the OT would find bigger sections of Brueggemann’s Theology of the Old Testament helpful, as I have, though some of his methodology  might make you scratch your head (if you agree with Childs as I do).

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Frei on Precritical Biblical Interpretation

I’ve been reading Hans Frei, The Eclipse of Biblical Narrative (New York: Yale, 1974) for the past few weeks.  This book is quite deep and thick and rich – I know for sure I’m only tracking with the main points that Frei is making.  I enjoy it, but it’s going to take one or two more readings for me to fill in all the blanks.  The Eclipse of Biblical Narrative is not for sissies!

In this book, among other things, Frei notes the huge change/morph in biblical interpretation from the pre-critical to the critical period (roughly speaking, before and during the enlightenment).  Here are two elements of biblical interpretation that changed radically.

First: In pre-critical hermeneutics “if it seemed clear that a biblical story was to be read literally, it followed automatically that it referred to and described actual historical occurrences.   The true historical reference of a story was a direct and natural concomitant of its making literal sense.  This is a far cry from taking the fact that a passage or text makes best sense at a literal level as evidence that it is a reliable historical report.  When commentators turned from the former to the latter interpretive use of literal meaning or used the two confusedly, it marked a new stage in the history of interpretation – a stage for which deistic convictions, empirical philosophy, and historical criticism form part of the technical intellectual background” (p. 2).  If I can reword this or comment on it, I think the difference Frei is pointing out is that in the pre-critical era, the text made sense because it described history accurately.  In the critical era, the shift is huge: the text made sense in so far as it described history accurately.  Hence historical criticism grew like a weed.

Second: In the pre-critical era, “if the real historical world described by several biblical stories is a single world of one temporal sequence, there must in principle be one cumulative story to depict it” (Ibid.).  Frei goes on to say that this means the many smaller narratives fit into the bigger or main one.  Hence, interpretation in the pre-critical era consisted of figures/types (which were the smaller narratives and stories) which pointed to the bigger or main story.  “Without loss to its own literal meaning or specific temporal reference, an earlier story was a figure of a later one” (Ibid.).    The OT types and figures were promises that were fulfilled in the NT, which was one huge thing that held the Scriptures together.  What happened in the critical era of interpretation was that the literal and figurative (typological) reading of the narratives ceased to be allies and instead became almost foes.  “Historical criticism and biblical theology were different enterprises and made for decidedly strained company” (p 8.).

To summarize, Frei makes a strong case for the huge and paradigmatic shift from precritical to critical biblical interpretation.  The former (precritical, which includes the Reformers and their scholastic successors) viewed Scripture as historically reliable with types/figures as arrows that pointed to the overarching story of redemption.  When the enlightenment-critical period came, the figural and historical were divorced and almost at odds.  The BT guys focused on the figural, and the critical guys focused on the historical, which resulted in much hermeneutical hay.

More on this later.  For a great study in this, don’t forget to read Richard Muller’s Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics, especially volume two on Scripture.  Muller doesn’t fully chart the above shift, but charts the waters up to and a little into the shift.  It is fascinating to see how rationalism and deism hurt biblical interpretation.  It is also fascinating from our point of view to see how criticism can be done at a “faith seeking understanding” level; we can learn from the critics, even if we don’t adopt their methods.

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New Event, New Words, New Genre

I’m reading a powerful book called Night by Elie Wiesel.  No doubt many of you have read this and/or some other award winning book or play by Wiesel.  Though the content is well worth commenting on, I was very intrigued at Wiesel’s search for words to describe the hellish darkness he faced and saw in Nazi concentration camps.  In fact, one reviewer wrote “Wiesel has taken his own anguish and imaginatively metamorphosed it into art.”  Thinking linguistically, in terms of event and its interpretation, it is important to realize that often times an event can and does require a new grammar and genre.  Here are Wiesel’s own words.

“Convinced that this period in history would be judged one day, I knew that I must bear witness.  I also knew that, while I had many things to say, I did not have the words to say them.  Painfully aware of my limitations, I watched helplessly as language became an obstacle.  It became clear that it would be necessary to invent a new language.  But how was one to rehabilitate and transform words betrayed and perverted by the enemy?  Hunger-thirst-fear-transport-selection-fire-chimney: these words all have intrinsic meaning, but in those times, they meant something else.  Writing in my mother tongue – at that point close to extinction – I would pause at every sentence, and start all over again.  I would conjure up other verbs, other images, other silent cries.  It was still not right.  But what exactly was ‘it?’  ‘It’ was something elusive, darkly shrouded for fear of being usurped, profaned.  All the dictionary had to offer seemed meager, pale, lifeless…”

Indeed, Wiesel has done with language what few people have done: in this book, the language is so simple yet so complex that it forces you to read again, usually through the tears of Auschwitz, Buna, Birkenau.

This makes me wrestle over Scripture.  Are the Psalms – or some Psalms – examples of an event followed by a new genre, grammar, language?  How were Ezekiel, Daniel, or John bumping up against the limits of language, struggling for the right words?  Did the human authors of Scripture pause and wrestle over it as they wrote?  Did certain events stretch, tweak, and redefine their grammar, the syntax, the definition?  Did they hesitate to use certain words because, for example, the Babylonians “wrecked” them?  Of course, there are many other such questions, but in summary, books like Night help the reader become sensitive to language in a whole new way.  May we not forget the “humanness” of Scripture!

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Polycarp, Peter, and Pauline Presuppositions

I was recently studying 1 Pet 1.9, where the apostle says that the outcome of the Christian’s faith is the salvation of her/his soul.  While pondering how Peter would define faith there (and in the broader context of the epistle), one of my Pauline presuppositions kicked in: when thinking of faith and salvation I remembered that faith is not about working, but resting/trusting in Jesus.  Are Peter and Paul related?  I was leaning there, of course!

To make a longer study process shorter, I’ll skip ahead to the part where I checked the Scripture reference in The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations (3rd edition, ed. Michael W. Holmes).  I was more than a little excited to see what text Polycarp used to explain “faith” in the context of 1 Pet 1.8-9.  He used Eph 2.5 & 8-9!  Here’s the full quote from Polycarp’s letter to the Philippians (1.3; my translation), written in the early 2nd century AD.

“Even though you haven’t seen him (Jesus), you believe (pisteuo) in him with great and glorious joy – which many desire to have – while knowing that by grace you have been saved, not by works, but by the will of God through Jesus Christ.”

I understand that Polycarp may have simply juxtaposed the two and written them from memory (the Greek is somewhat close to the NT phrases), but the point remains.  In his thought – and pen – he wrote about Jesus (1.1-2) and faith in Christ (v3) – faith which is not working, but trusting in him whom we cannot see.  Anyway, I was thinking along those lines, and was happy to see Polycarp go where I went, or me going where Polycarp went.  Of course, other commentators go there as well, most notably perhaps Calvin (cf. his comm. on 1 Pet 1.9).  This is what “reading the Bible with the church” means, in part.

Read the Apostolic Fathers, and use the Scripture references in the back!

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Fokkelman on Hebrew Poetry

In seminary, we read parts of J. P. Fokkelman on biblical narrative and biblical poetry.  Recently, while studying the Shirat ha-Yam (the Song at the Sea) in Ex 15, I read parts of Fokkelman on poetry again to review several aspects.  I realize there are several different approaches to biblical poetry; I need to read some of M. O’Connor’s Hebrew Verse Structure sooner than later, but Fokkelman should be on your shelf if you’re studying Hebrew poetry.  Even if you disagree with some of his conclusions, there are good insights there.

Here’s what he says about poetry, which he later applies to biblical poetry.

“What a poet undertakes does have a lot to do with creating ‘density.’  Poetry is the most compact and concentrated form of speech possible.  By making the most of his or her linguistic tools, the poet creates an immense richness of meaning, and this richness becomes available if we as readers know how to handle the density: how we can cautiously tackle complexity, probe the various layers one by one, and unfold them.  The poet creates this abundance of meanings by visiting all the nooks and crannies of the language, and by being an expert at it” (p. 14).

This is true – I counted around 160 Hebrew words in the Song of the Sea in Ex 15; most English translations have around 430 or so.  Also, there are “layers” in the Song of the Sea – we have to recognize metaphor, simile, onomatopoeia, anthropomorphism, and so on.  In the Song of the Sea Yahweh is over the forces of creation, anti-creation, enemies, the sea-monster, false gods, yet in all this he is for the people he covenantally owns.  I like Fokkelman’s “nooks and crannies” and “abundance of meanings” – it is not a flat text, but a “3-D” one, if you will.  Not surprisingly, many scholars disagree on the divisions of the song in Ex 15.  Perhaps it is anachronistic to want to split up Hebrew poetry like we do our poems.

Fokkelman defines Hebrew poetry this way:

“A poem is the result of (on the one hand) an artistic handling of language, style, and structure and (on the other hand) applying prescribed proportions to all levels of the text, so that a controlled combination of language and number is created” (p. 35).

Sasson, from a different perspective, gave an alternative yet parallel explanation: the essence of Hebrew poetry is a departure from the constraints of prose (unfortunately, I cannot find the reference to this phrase, since I wrote it in the margins of Fokkelman’s book.  Any help here?).

In summary, Hebrew poetry is a different world than Hebrew prose.  It takes somewhat different interpretive rules and translating techniques, which of course affect the homiletical act of preaching poetry.  Fokkelman doesn’t talk about preaching a poem, but in my opinion, biblical poems scream out “preach me!”   Understanding that a poem is “thick” demands a different pulpit approach than does a narrative.  Consequently, preaching a poem is difficult – often like describing Van Gogh to a mathematician.

A final note: one way to think about biblical poetry couched in narrative (like Ex 15) is comparing it to a picture in the middle of a story book.  Pictures create a world synonymous to the text, adding depth – Ricoeur should be consulted here as well.  Poetry-pictures  are meant for both sides of the brain, and it needs to come out in homiletics.

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Childs on the Difficulties of Texts (esp. Exodus 11-12)

Exodus 11-12 – the famous Passover text (including the exodus proper and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, or Matstsoth) – has some difficulties that have to do with chronology and timing.  If you read through it, it is tough to get a firm chronology of when the things are instituted and when they are actually celebrated (see 12.28, 39, and 50 for example).   I don’t have the time to sum up all the difficulties, but in short, the text is pretty tough.  It’s so tough that Sarna writes, “Without doubt, the chapter is a composite of several strands of tradition” (Exodus, p. 53).

Childs is good here.  After he discusses some of the difficulties, he writes this.

There are some broader implications for understanding the passover pericope which arise from our literary analysis of the final form of the present text.  If an expositor takes seriously the final redaction, he can recognize an important biblical testimony to the relationship between word and event in the redactor’s manner of linking commands to narrative material.  The Biblical writer brackets the exodus event with a preceding and succeeding interpretation.  He does not see the exodus as an ‘act of God’ distinct from the ‘word of God’ which explains it.  In theological terms, the relation between act and interpretation, or event and word, is one which cannot be separated.  The biblical writer does not conceive of the event as primary or ‘objective’ from which an inferential, subjective deduction of its meaning is drawn.  The event is never uninterpreted.  Conversely, a theological interpretation which sees the subjective appropriation – whether described cultically or existentially – as the primary event from which an event may be reconstructed, is again introducing a theological scheme which has no warrant in the theology of the redactor.

Of course, this doesn’t wipe away all the difficulties, but it is a good reminder as we encounter this and other hard spots in the OT.  We’re not usually going to have bare, objective, uninterpreted “brute facts” in texts; rather, they are acts which are interpreted in the text, or by the text.  G. Vos said it this way: “Word and act always accompany each other…without God’s acts the words would be empty, without his words the acts would be blind” (“The Idea of Biblical Theology as a Science and as a Theological Discipline”).

The longer quote above was taken from page 204 of Brevard Childs, Exodus (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2004).

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The Reformers, Scholastics, and Hosea 6.7: Exegesis and Covenant

Richard Muller, in Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics (PRRD) volume II on Holy Scripture, uses Hosea 6.7 to show two things: first, continuity between the patristic and medival commentators and Reformation/Post-Reformation commentators.  Second, he uses it to show the Reformation development of the pre-fall covenant.

Does Hosea 6.7 talk about Adam breaking the pre-fall covenant (covenant of works in Reformed theology) or men breaking covenant in general?  Muller notes that the majority of patristic and medieval commentators concluded that the Vulgate was accurate here: ipsi autem sicut Adam transgressi sunt pactum (like Adam they transgressed the covenant) (p. 437).

In the Reformation and post-Reformation exegetical tradition, while a few argued for “like man” in Hosea 6.7, most commentators stuck with the prevailing historical exegetical conclusion that “like Adam” is the preferable translation.  Muller notes that though Reformation covenant theology did not use this text as the locus classicus (chief text) to prove the covenant of works, it was one of many places in Scripture that the federal theologians would use to describe and explain the pre-fall covenant.  In Muller’s words, “Hosea 6.7 was not viewed as crucial to the establishment of the basic doctrine of a prelapsarian covenant, but was nevertheless almost invariably cited as an indication that the fall into sin was the abrogation of a primal covenant” (p. 438).  As an interesting side note, the “minority” view of Hosea 6.7 (like man) was captured in the KJV.

As another interesting side note, Muller argues (well, in my opinion) that the “majority” use of Hosea 6.7 indicates the “ongoing relationship of English to Dutch and German Reformed theology, where the tradition of translation had long favored the translation ‘like Adam’” (p. 440).  It may also show the influence of the Dutch Annotations upon the Whole Bible on the Westminster divines.  In simpler terms, the agreement on the use of this text to argue for a pre-fall covenant shows how the Presbyterian and Dutch/German Reformed theologians were well on the same page of covenant theology.

Historical theology is a teacher.  First, it teaches the importance of the history of exegesis.  Second, it teaches that the Reformers’ use of proof-texts was not rationalistic.  This is a great humble and careful use of proof texts: we use them, but at the end of the day if they are debatable, we use other clearer parts of scripture to make the point.  We don’t base doctrines on a single, debatable text.  This is exactly what we mean by the analogia Scripturae: clear and unambiguous texts are the basis for interpreting unclear or ambiguous texts.  We don’t need the latter, nor bend and mold them to make our point, but we do rest on the former because they have bended and molded us to see the point.

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The Big Wide World of Authorial Intent and Allusion

In the book I’ve recently been reviewing here,  We Become What We Worship,  G. K. Beale argues forcefully that intertextual biblical allusions are always consistent to their historical and grammatical context (c.f. Beale’s The Erosion of Inerrancy in Evangelicalism, p.91-92, 105, etc.).  Perhaps in other words, the human authors of Scripture quoted other Scripture using the grammatical-historical method of interpretation.

This is a fascinating and fruitful area of study, one area which many have written about well.  One only needs to read E. D. Hirsch,  Richard Hays, Peter Enns, Kevin Vanhoozer, and so forth to get a variety of insights into the topic of interpretation, allusion, and authorial intent.

Vanhoozer charts out a nice path in Is There a Meaning in This Text?.  I’ll highlight a few of Vanhoozer’s comments below.

“…The ‘fuller meaning’ of Scripture – the meaning associated with divine authorship – emerges only at the level of the whole canon.”  Vanhoozer notes Pannenberg’s helpful emphasis that we only know the true meaning of an event at the end of history, when the whole is complete.  Of course we do not have this “end” yet, but in the canonical sense we do – Scripture is complete.  Or, as Vanhoozer implies from Pannenberg, “judgments about meaning always involve an implicit anticipation of the whole.”

Therefore, we cannot stop just at grammatical and contextual interpretation: “If we are reading the Bible as the Word of God…I suggest that the context that yields this maximal sense is the canon, taken as a unified communicative act.”  It is the canon “as a whole” that helps solve the problem of ‘fuller meaning.’  “That is, to say that the Bible has a ‘fuller meaning’ is to focus on the (divine) author’s intended meaning at the level of the canonical act.  Better said, the canon as a whole becomes the unified act for which the divine intention serves as the unifying principle.  The divine intention supervenes on the intention of the human authors.”  “The divine intention does not contravene the intention of the human author but rather supervenes on it” (pp 264-5, emphasis his).

These are some helpful considerations for the discussion of context, allusion, and interpretation.  To summarize Vanhoozer in my words, grammatical-historical interpretation must include more than simply the historical and grammatical “situatedness” of the text.  We also need to keep in mind the end result: Christ the fulfillment and “end” of the text.

I’ll end with some questions I’ve been asking while studying this topic.

1) Can the canonical context speak louder than the immediate context as we interpret texts?  Is this what fuller meaning is all about?

2) How much do we stake on possible allusions?  What are the pitfalls of being overly certain in this area?

3) Do we ultimately need to prove an allusion to make a biblical or theological point, or even to prove the unity of the Bible? [Note: there is a difference between allusion and citation/direct quote.]

4) Is our view of Scripture necessarily lower if we are hesitant to find an allusion and argue for authorial intent behind possible allusions?

5) Did the human authors of Scripture always know how their writing would be taken in later generations?  I.e. would Isaiah be angry with Paul for using some of his words as he did, or would Paul teach Isaiah, making Isaiah say “Oh, I get it now, that’s what I meant”?

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A Brief On Beale’s Intro in “We Become What We Worship”

I’m looking forward to Andrew’s next post, but since he and his wife are enjoying the presence of a new baby girl (congrats!!), I’ll attempt to fill his void with something he and I recently discussed: G. K. Beale and hermeneutics.  For now, I’ll do a small trek through Beale’s intro in We Become What We Worship (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2008).

In the intro, Beale basically lays his hermeneutical cards on the table for the reader to see.  Here’s my summary.

1) Scripture is divinely inspired – it is “all God’s Word.”

2) God’s “authorial intentions communicated through human authors are accessible to contemporary readers.”  We can’t exhaust them, but they can be sufficiently understood.

3) Scripture is organically progressive: Beale uses Vos’ metaphor of the OT as a seed and the NT as the plants growing and flowering from that seed.

4) He combines “grammatical-historical exegesis with canonical-contextual exegesis.”  This means that  he utilizes literary and historical context as well as other allusions in Scripture to the passage being studied for interpretation. Scripture interprets Scripture is included here, Beale affirms.  The allusion from one text echoed in other subsequent texts is sometimes called “intertextuality” in scholarly circles.

There are a few other helpful notes by Beale concerning his methodology, but I want to “camp out” very briefly on intertextuality.  Beale notes there are minimalists (those who are leery of seeing allusions or literary connections, and if they see them, they hesitate to find any interpretive significance to a possible allusion).  There are also maximalists: those who are quite open to finding, exploring, and using allusions and letting the allusions shape interpretation.

Of course there is a tightrope to walk here, and Beale makes note of it.  Here are some reasons for maximalists to be careful (I’m using Beale’s examples here).  1) Eisegesis – one could read too much into an allusion.  2) All proposed intertextual allusions/connections have “degrees of possibility and probability.” 3) “Weighing the evidence for recognizing allusions is not an exact science but is a kind of art.”  He later says it does involve some “guesswork.”  4) He again uses the terms “possible” and “probable” when discussion allusions.  That is, the interpreter cannot always be certain that there is an allusion.  5) If there is an allusion, we cannot be sure if the author of later Scripture was “unconscious of making the reference” or “not necessarily intending” the reader to catch it. 6) The interpreter has to guard against reader-response types of “multiple meanings” and also allegory.

So far, I fully concur.  Also, to note, Beale labels himself in the “maximalist camp.”  However, he does admit that he may tip towards eisegesis, for which the reader will have to forgive him.  He says he is aiming for objectivity while expressing his thesis (that idolaters resemble the idols they worship) from texts that he thinks prove it. “At times this thesis becomes a lens through which to see some passages in a way not otherwise seen.  Therefore, eisegesis may happen in this book, but I have tried to be aware of this pitfall and have tried to step around such dangers in order not to domesticate the evidence.”

Beale then urges the reader  – even if he/she disagrees with certain interpretations – to at least appreciate the general approach and be both loving and cautious while reading, as he attempted to be cautious while interpreting.

I still agree thus far, but a few times in the intro it felt as if Beale was not exercising as much caution as he emphasized (see list above).  Perhaps there is a[n] “[over]confident maximalist” and a “cautious maximalist.” The latter seems what Beale wants to be, while he admits he may slide into the former.

Interesting stuff.  Of course my verdict is still not in; I’ll continue through the book and write more later.  Let me end by saying the introduction was lively and stimulating, well worth the read, as Beale usually is.

shane lems

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Exodus: Moses, Israel, and Jesus

Terence Fretheim (Exodus [Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1991]) makes several excellent observations concerning Moses, Israel, and Yahweh from Exodus 2.11-22.  Fretheim writes first that “Moses embodies Israel in his own life experience.”  How?  He 1) enters into conflict with the Egyptians, 2) becomes the subject of Pharaoh’s murderous edict, 3) has to flee from Egypt to the wilderness where God meets him at Sinai, and 4) testifies to having been/become a sojourner in a foreign land [his son's name means "foreigner"].  Notice that all four of these are true of Israel and Moses – Moses does it first in a real way.  He could not properly identify with Israel from birth, since he grew up in the courts of Pharaoh.  He had to first personally and intimately identify with the Israelites to be a proper deliverer and redeemer.  He did, as Fretheim notes, “become one of them by virtue of his own experience” (p. 42).   Of course this brings us to Christ, who became like his brothers in every way, sin excepted.  Moses is an OT “shadow” of Christ.

Furthermore, Fretheim also emphasizes how Moses’ action anticipates or foreshadows Yahweh’s soon-to-come actions.  Both Moses and Yahweh see and feel Israel’s oppression, both confront a wrong/injustice, both are rejected by Israel, both strike Egypt, both give water to thirsty people.  Moses’ own name means “draw out;” Yahweh will “draw out” his people as Moses was drawn out, as Moses drew out Israel, as it were.  Moses does these things in a creaturely, imperfect way, while Yahweh does them in the way of a Creator-Redeemer, perfectly.  Moses cannot do it; “God will have to become directly involved” (p. 44).  Again – Moses points us to the true Savior as his own life anticipates the mighty wonders of God in deliverance.

Stay tuned for more from Fretheim in the upcoming months.

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