Hermeneutics is a very important issue for us today in light of the rise of postmodernism. I got the feeling from the Christian attacks on modernism over the years that if modernism would just be shown to be false, then Christianity would be the victor. Instead, what we get is modernism dying and postmodernism rising to take its place, with Christianity still on the sidelines. How does the Christian respond to postmodernism? Is it good? Is it bad? Is it relevant? From what I hear, postmodernism is already passe in the French university system where it had its "point of birth". But I think that it is still alive and well here in the States and it has points to teach us. For the uninitiated, Vanhoozer's work is an excllent place to start. I've written a short review here, but clink the link to slog through a more detailed critique of the work.

 Vanhoozer divides the book into two: the first part is a study of modernism and postmodernism, while the second is a constructive study of how he thinks the author, the text and the reader should be viewed. If you want a helpful starting point for the thought of Derrida or the flaws of postmodern thinking, this is a good place to read. Here are just a few of the helpful thoughts from the book.

1. While Vanhoozer rejects postmodernism as a system, he accepts part of the postmodern critique, especially in the area of certainty. He says that Cartesian certainty is neither possible nor Christian. Hence, we should be more humble and tenative in our claims. But he says that while certainty is impossible, we can still be reasonably sure about claims to live by them.

2. He argues for a basic level of theological interpretation, in which one's theological beliefs affect one's reading of the text. The key point here is theism: whether one is a theist or not will dictate where you find meaning or if you think there is meaning at all. If you kill off God, you end up killing the human author of any work of literature and locate the meaning in the reader. He actually argues for a trinitarian reader, but I do not find myself as convinced of that, although that might just be due to my own inability of a reader of Vanhoozer's argument.

3. In contrast to the emphasis of Hirsch (and most of evangelicalism) on authorial intention, he places the focus on authorial action, a model that I think works better. This is built on the ideas of speech act theory. So we look not at what the author intended, trying to get behind the text and into the psychology of the author, but we look at the action of the author in what the author actually did.

Should you read this book? Well, it depends. It is the book about hermeneutics today. If you want to be a part of the discussion at all, you need to read it. Everyone quotes it and refers to it in some way when the topic is discussed. But, it is quite the book to get through. I only got through it on my second try and I had to read it for a class. It is dense writing and it is a big book. But it is so big because he takes his conversation partners so seriously.  

How does a postmodern read the Bible? A. K. M. Adam has given us a very helpful view for how a postmodern can read the Bible and use it in their life. The largest step which Adam makes (in my opinion) is that he moves away from determinate meaning and away from an overarching universal criterion for interpretation. But he does not thereby move to  complete relativism, since he says that some interpretations are only possible while others probable. The way that he draws this line is to bring in local criteria. For example, if he gave a bizarre interpretation of a particular text, then those around him would censure him in various ways, either directly or through ignoring him. Hence, this will define what can be a possible or a probable interpretation. But even with a bizarre interpretation he says that there would be some who would probably accept it, and then presumably it would be a valid view among that local group. He says that we should welcome a variety of interpretations because it reflects the diversity of creation: we should not try to stifle interpretations that are different than ours, because that just is a blatant power play, but we should glory in these various interpretations. Quoting Stephen Fowl, he says that texts do not have ideologies, but we bring our ideologies to the text. Hence, Matthew is not anti-Semitic for Adam because it cannot be anything. He does not like the imitation idea from Jesus and Paul, especially Paul, because he sees the command to imitate him as another power play. In its place he proposes the idea of repitition, where we repeat what others have done, but adjusted to our own context. Somewhat predictably, he ends the book with a strong defense of homosexuality in the church.

While the book is a fascinating and easy read, there are several unanswered questions for me. The first I will call the "stop sign" problem. Adam discusses the stop sign several times in the book. He notes that drivers stop at an octagonal red sign only because of a local concept: because in this culture that kind of sign signifies that one needs to stop. But if the sign was different and written in Chinese, then the American would not be held culpable for not understanding the sign. But then Adam adds that they would be held culpable for denying the  underlying command exists. This seems to go against Adam's whole thesis: the red stop sign might need to be translated, but the idea behind it is absolute for all. So why can't there be an ultimate meaning for a biblical text? The closest that Adam gets to explaining this is that the Bible is a literary text and different from a stop sign, which is more simple. But I think that there is more of a parallel between these two types than Adam grants. He could state that the stop sign is a single incident, which is different than the complex literature which we find in the Bible. But there is no text without a context: there is no abstract stop sign without contextual clues.

The other problem is what I call the "Nazi problem". The Nazi's are the whipping boy of ethical discussions, but they do provide a nice example because virtually everyone says they acted in a wrong manner. The problem is what happens when the local criteria are wrong, as in the Third Reich. An interpreter could present a strongly anti-Semitic viewpoint and be encouraged by his community and pass the local criteria. How does the local criteria function work when it is broken? Adam never addresses this issue in the book, and I think that this problem is the Achilles heel of any pure community or local model. One possible way around it is to say that the interpreter should have moved away from purely German criteria and brought in more criteria from other countries. But this moves us ever closer to universal criteria, which is exactly what Adam tries to avoid.  When he talks about his bizarre interpretation, he says that it would be accepted by some, so presumably the interpretation is valid as long as some accept it, so it cannot be rejected simply because it does not conform to a larger circle than the local circle. Presumably Adam would also respond to this charge with a call to ethics: the Nazi reading is not an ethical reading. But this simply creates another problem: What is an ethical reading? The Nazis certainly thought that they were being ethical, and if we say that they were wrong then we are simply executing a power play, in postmodern terms. I simply do not see any way that an indeterminate view of meaning can handle the Nazi problem.

The second session I went to at SBL was dramatically different from the first. This was the “Theological Hermeneutics of Christian Scripture.” The specific topic under discussion was “Christ in/and the Old Testament”. It was moderated by Christopher Seitz and consisted of ten minute presentation by Kathryn Greene-Mccreight (St John's Episcopal Church), Robert Wall (Seattle Pacific University), John Goldingay (Fuller Theological Seminary), Christopher Wright (Langham Partnership International), and Murray Rae (University of Otago) followed by forty five minutes of discussion. In my opinion the presentations themselves were not that interesting, as the panelists simply repeated key basic ideas from their work, and ten minutes was not enough time to give much that was interesting. But when the questions started coming in the discussion became much more interesting. There was a fairly strong divide on the panel between those more in tune with theological interpretation of Scripture (Seitz, Greene-Mccreight, Wall, and Rae) and those opposed (Goldingay and Wright).

There seemed to be two main issues getting discussed. One was a metaphor that had been made by Wright in his presentation. He said that when he was on a train to Edinburgh, he was heading towards Edinburgh but the scenery was not Edinburgh. Similarly, while the OT is christotelic, heading towards Christ, Christ is not found in every OT text. When one looks back, the scenery makes sense as going towards Edinburgh, but that is only a small glimpse and only in hindsight. In response, Murray noted that the voice of Jesus is waiting for us Edinburgh and we shouldn’t be too concerned about the scenery, and Greene-Mccreight said that we are in Edinburgh, not on the train anymore. Wright later said that we need to read the OT not just in light of the Gospel but also in light of Revelation: The first advent is not the end of the story. So, in a sense, (my spin here) we are in not Edinburgh yet, but we passed a key via point on the way to Edinburgh. There was discussion about how to preach OT stories, with Goldingay and Wright wanting us to focus on what God was saying through those texts to the Israelites, while the other panelist wanted to see more of a Christocentric perspective. Wright noted that Luke 24 says that Jesus began with the Scriptures, not himself, when he talked with his disciples.

The other major topic was the role of the rule of faith. Goldingay bluntly stated that “the rule of faith is a disaster”. No beating around the bush here! He didn’t explicate much what he meant, but it seems that he didn’t want later meaings being read as the meaning of the earlier text. He explicitly said he wanted to stay with the meaning/significance bifurcation, not what the text means today. Seitz said that we should get rid of the terminology of the rule of faith since all it does is cause confusion and that in his ears the rule of faith does not mean creed. Greene-Mccreight said that the rule of faith was useful for ruling out false interpretations like Mormonism, which is a mistake (after saying this she apparently realized she was at SBL and one does not say things like this at SBL and so backtracked a little bit to tone down her rejection of Mormonism). All in all, this was a fascinating discussion and I only wish that all the SBL sessions could be so interesting.

Robert Hill: Reading the Old Testament in Antioch

A central part of the history of the early church is the dynamic between Antioch and Alexandria, a dynamic which exists to this day, albeit under different names. But as useful as this handle is for speaking in broad terms, does it accurately reflect the situation? This book sets out to present how the Old Testament was viewed in Antioch, specifically in the commentaries of the primary Antiochenes. 

            Wright wrote this book due to his concern for missions and its relation to the Bible. While growing up, he heard missions proclaimed using proof-texts such as the Great Commission. He became discontented with this approach, especially when he did his academic studies in Bible and did not talk about missions at all. This book is an attempt to relate God, his people, and missions in a more biblical fashion. Wright argues for the basic idea of the Bible being missional: namely, God’s mission, not our mission (Wright uses missions for cross-cultural missions and missional for anything relating to mission). He shows through this book how God’s mission can be used as a basic hermeneutic to read the Bible, not as an alien hermeneutic imposed on the text but as a natural hermeneutic arising from the text itself. Since this is an excellent book, I have included a short overview of the argument of the book. The book is well worth reading. 

Some friends of mine played this youtube clip for Doug Moo on a break in our class (it is about five mintues long). If you want to know what is wrong with America today, why the NIV and NKJV are bad translations, and, most importantly, what it means to be a man, this is the sermon you need to watch. It also serves as an excellent "argument to absurdity" of how some evangelicals treat the Bible. One part of the text the speaker misses, however, is that the text says "wall" quite specifically, which would have an effect on his interpretation of the text. This has been traveling around the blogosphere, I picked up the address from Ben Witherington's blog. The youtube clip has been viewed over 130,000 times. 

As funny as this video is, the issue he brings up is a problem, although not how he thinks. See Codex Blogspot for two posts (1 and 2 ) about this. The Hebrew text does say "him who urinates against a wall."  But the modern translations all say "male." They certainly get the referrent right: it does refer to males. But this is not speaking about males in a positive light: this is fairly crude and derogatory language, which "male" does not communicate. This is the classic problem of translating both the literal meaning as well as the way the literal meaning would have been understood or felt. If it is correct that this refers to an action of dogs, then a modern equivalent would be urinating on a fire hydrant, something (at least in my mind) more closely connected with dogs doing their thing. But one cannot simply introduce fire hydrants into an ancient text.  My best shot would be some kind of combination: all the males, all the ones who urinate against a wall like a dog. Or something like that. 

I received the happy news this morning that my proposasl for a paper at ETS in Boston has been accepted. Here is the title and the abstract. I'll probably post the full paper in a few months.

THEOLOGICAL INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE:

REFLECTIONS FROM AN EVANGELICAL BIBLICAL STUDIES PERSPECTIVE

The Theological Interpretation of Scripture (TIOS), focusing on the importance of the hermeneutical significance of the canon and reading the Bible in a theological manner, has been gaining popularity recently, giving rise to a variety of articles, books, and commentaries. But there has been little reflection from evangelical biblical scholars. Should evangelicals embrace TIOS? Should it cause them concern? This paper will give a short history of TIOS, present the beneficial aspects of TIOS for evangelical biblical scholars, discuss some potentially unbalanced directions taken by some TIOS advocates, and briefly evaluate the recent TIOS commentaries in the Brazos and Two Horizons series from the perspective of evangelical biblical studies.

I am presenting a paper at ETS this year on the theological interpretation of Scripture from a biblical studies viewpoint. I'll be including most of the paper (minus the footnotes) over the next few posts; naturally, I would love to hear any feedback you might have! Follow the link below to see the bibliography.

The Theological Interpretation of Scripture (TIOS), focusing on the importance of the hermeneutical significance of the canon and reading the Bible in a theological manner, has been gaining popularity recently, giving rise to a variety of articles, books, and commentaries. But there has been little reflection from evangelical biblical scholars. Should evangelicals embrace TIOS? Should it cause them concern? This paper will give a short history of TIOS, present the beneficial aspects of TIOS for evangelical biblical scholars, discuss a few potentially unbalanced directions taken by some TIOS advocates, and briefly evaluate the recent TIOS commentaries in the Brazos and Two Horizons series from the perspective of evangelical biblical studies. My contention is that evangelicals should sympathize with much of TIOS, but the TIOS critique is not badly needed by evangelicals.

Short History of TIOS

While TIOS is very old, its recent incarnation arose in a very specific context. Ever since the Enlightenment, theology has been banned from exegesis, or at least relegated to the back seat. The result is that “ideal exegesis” entails studying the passage scientifically with no interference from dogmatics, which would prejudice one against the true meaning of the text.This kind of exegesis is clearly seen in scholarly commentaries written during the first part of the twentieth century. Theology could only be done after the text was thoroughly studied, and so much discontinuity was seen in the Bible that most thought a coherent theology was impossible for the Bible as a whole. This style of atheological exegesis has brought a variety of reactions in the past few decades. Some have focused on literary methods. Others have looked to biblical theology to hold theology and the Bible together. TIOS is another reaction against the historically dominant critical method. Advocates of TIOS strive to return the Bible to the church from the academy and to connect the Bible to theology once again.

The relationship between TIOS and evangelicals is somewhat ambivalent. In a sense, evangelicals as a whole are bystanders in the debate between the historical-critical method and TIOS. TIOS has mainly reacted against a strict view of the historical-critical method and the study of the Bible as it is conducted in the university rather than the evangelical seminary.⁴ Evangelicals have traditionally emphasized linking exegesis and theology, and many of the critiques of the historical-critical method from TIOS have already been articulated by evangelicals.

Trying to define TIOS is somewhat like eating ice cream with a fork: it is possible, but it is very slippery. TIOS advocates cover a wide swath of theological territory, as illustrated by A. K. M. Adam and Kevin Vanhoozer. Adam represents the postmodern edge of TIOS and rejects a determine meaning in the text, relying instead on local criteria to interpret the text. Vanhoozer, on the other hand, defends a determinate meaning connected more closely with the author. Adam (along with Stephen Fowl) argues for the acceptance of homosexuals in the church, while Vanhoozer would presumably not come to the same conclusion. But in spite of their differences, Adam and Vanhoozer both claim to be doing some form of TIOS.

For the purposes of this paper I will list a series of important principles which most of the TIOS advocates hold. Not all TIOS advocates would subscribe to all these principles, and the sum of these principles does not equal TIOS, but this listing is an introductory way to grasp the essence of TIOS. I will begin by listing some principles which I think are helpful to evangelicals before moving on to a few principles that can become more problematic.

Helpful Principles of TIOS

Breakdown of Barrier Between Biblical Studies and Theology

One of the primary goals of TIOS is to bring exegesis and theology back together again. The university has pushed these two fields into two different disciplines which rarely intersect, resulting in theology-less exegesis and exegesis-less theology. The emphasis on the combination of theology with biblical studies is an important aspect for evangelicals and one that plays an important role in many evangelical seminaries, not to mention the churches of evangelicalism. In my own training (as well as the training of my classmates who went to evangelical schools) the two disciplines were engaged. In our exegesis classes we discussed theology and in our theology classes we did exegesis, a pattern that I think should be common. Naturally, a divide still stands: we have professors of theology and Old Testament, for example. But the link between exegesis and theology is one that should be affirmed by evangelicals, especially as we train pastors for ministry. A few pastors have the idea that if they just exegete the text well their job is done, and the reminder from TIOS of the importance of theology in exegesis is helpful for them. One possible idea to further the connection between theology and exegesis would be to have more interaction between professors in different departments, perhaps even team-teaching classes on occasion (an OT theology class taught by an OT scholar and a systematic theologian, for example).

Higher View of Precritical Exegesis

In the common parlance used by biblical scholars a “classical view” tends to be a view from the 19^th or 20^th century. TIOS says this is far too myopic and we need to pay greater attention to interpretation from before the Enlightenment. This fits with the other beliefs of TIOS, since many of the precritical interpreters operated under other TIOS principles, such as the rule of faith. Similar to our American culture, evangelicals as a whole have little knowledge of history (even evangelical history, let along broader church history), and as a result we are doomed to repeat mistakes made by our ancestors. Paying attention to history is more than surveying the literature over the past two hundred years, or even making a nod to Calvin. We need more evangelical commentaries which engage the history of interpretation, even if we do not always agree with those who have gone before us. The Ancient Christian Commentary Series is a help in this, although the removal of the quotations from their context is unhelpful. I would love to have a series like ACCS which was more bibliographic, not necessarily giving the quotations, but extending coverage further through church history and listing more of the places where a biblical text is mentioned.

Views of Those Outside North America and Europe

While this focus has not received as much attention as other characteristics, it fits with the TIOS desire for multiple perspectives.  As I look at the commentaries and books on my shelf, very few stray from my cultural context. It is good for us as evangelicals to learn how others outside our culture are reading the Bible in order to see the blind spots in our own thinking.

Community

The rejection of “lone ranger” exegesis in favor of community exegesis is an important aspect for many in TIOS. TIOS sees one of its main goals as giving the Bible back to the church, a goal with which evangelicals should be in hearty agreement. While some measure of individualism is important in the Christian worldview, Americans are very unbalanced in this area. We need to read the Scriptures not only alone in our studies but also together: with others in the academy and others in the church. Perhaps pastors could have a mid-week Bible study based on the text for the following Sunday sermon, which would not only allow discussion but also give more ownership to the people of the church. Professors should be active in local churches, both to keep them in the real world and to bless the church with what they have learned.

Helpful but Easily Distorted Principles of TIOS

Embracing of Theological Lenses and the Rule of Faith

One of the ways that TIOS seeks to bring together theology and exegesis is to bring theology to the text. Instead of recognizing our theological lenses and then seeking to overcome them, we should embrace those theological lenses when we read the Bible. The clearest example of this is that TIOS advocates desire to return to using the “rule of faith” in interpretation. The content of the rule of faith is usually associated with the patristic summations of the faith, culminating in the Nicene Creed. The rule of faith serves two functions. First, it is a fence for interpretation: if an interpretation falls outside the rule of faith, then it cannot be accepted. Second, and more obliquely, it serves as a guide or a key to exegesis: It actively helps us to understand the text in a better and fuller fashion.

How extensive these beliefs should be is unclear, although most agree that they should at least be the general orthodoxy handed down by the early church. While Vanhoozer makes clear that “[t]heological interpretation of the Bible is not an imposition of a theological system or confessional grid onto the biblical text,”³ others explicitly argue for approaching the text with the theology of one’s tradition.⁴ Wall says that it even includes our own individual rule of faith, not simply the church as a whole.⁵

The rule of faith as a fence, while potentially revolutionary for scholars in a university setting,⁶ can be easily accepted by most evangelicals. But its usefulness is not that great because of evangelical statements of faith which already contain the rule of faith. How often does one hear outright Arian teaching among evangelicals?

But the rule of faith as a guide or a key is more difficult to understand. Treier gives one of the better presentations of the rule of faith as a key in a discussion of the Brazos Theological Commentary Series, edited by R. R. Reno.

If this approach [of Reno] is correct, then interpretation according to the Rule of faith does not simply involve coming to exegetical conclusions that cohere with Trinitarian orthodoxy; rather, it means stretching ourselves to explore imaginatively the classic Christians consensus about God, suspecting that the tradition can illuminate far more in the Scriptures than simply the doctrine of the Trinity or incarnational Christology, narrowly conceived. Beyond merely setting boundaries, the Rule of faith grants us true freedom by guiding us to pursue particular directions of interpretation.⁷

While helpful in showing what he is not talking about (finding the Trinity in every passage in the OT, for example), this is still obscure to me. How does it grant us true freedom? Does theology give us the correct questions to ask? Or does it gives us answers as well? Treier desires that theology play some role in interpretation, even if the Bible is ultimately authoritative. “The movement of theological reflection is multidirectional, even if in a sense the line of authority moves in one direction, from the Bible to contemporary theology.”⁸ Elsewhere Treier suggests that we begin the interpretative process (get the ball rolling, to speak colloquially) by using “our theological understanding of the scope of the Bible's teaching.”⁹

Further suggestions on using theology in exegesis comes from R. R. Reno (editor of the Brazos Theological Commentary Series). He is displeased with much of what passes as TIOS. The main reason is that most TIOS moves from the text to abstraction. As an example, he speculates as to what Augustine would say about Song of Songs 4:2 (Your teeth are like a flock of shorn ewes ascending from the pool, all of which give birth to twins, and there is not a sterile animal among them) before actually reading what Augustine wrote: “Indeed, like the shorn ewes, divine love is fertile and generative.” Instead, here is what Augustine actually said:

It gives me pleasure to contemplate holy men, when I see them as the teeth of the church tearing men away from their errors and transferring them to its body, breaking down their rawness by biting and chewing. And it is with the greatest of pleasure that I visualize the shorn ewes, their worldly burdens set aside like fleeces, ascending from the pool (baptism) and all giving birth to twins (the two commandments of love), with none of them failing to produce this holy fruit.¹⁰

Reno desires that we follow this pattern. Instead of thinking that theology means abstraction from the biblical text (divine love, God's power, etc.), he wants us to use the biblical idiom in a specific and concrete manner. Since he critiques much of TIOS, I wonder what other TIOS advocates would say about his proposals.

An unclear aspect in all this is whether this theological reading is the only way to read Scripture or not. Some advocate reading the text first without the theological lenses, and then using one's theology on the second reading.¹¹ But when it comes to actual practice, it seems that much of the first reading is done with the theology in mind (see below for my critique of some of the published TIOS commentaries).

In my mind the idea is clearest when TIOS is compared to other approaches to Scripture which bring outside ideas as heuristic models. For example, the principles of post-colonialism might help us see the conquest from a new perspective. What TIOS does is to take theology as that heuristic model and then tries to understand the text better based on that theology. On one level, this is clearly much more appropriate than many other models. How much more relevant can one get than theology in understanding the Bible? But on another level this also causes problems.

The reason that this characteristic is problematic in my mind is the lack of self-correction. Just as Lucy comes with her belief about the Brazilian origin of the butterfly and does not change her belief even when the butterfly is revealed to be a chip, if we bring our theology to the text, then it will be very difficult to change that theology to some other belief. Using theology as a heuristic model to understand Scripture can be problematic because theology itself comes from the Bible. If the authority for our theology is to be Scripture, how can our theology receive any kind of correction if our reading of Scripture already inherently contains our theology? We will simply find what we are looking for. To state it another way, we will end up imposing our theology on the text.

Fowl’s phrasing of the relationship between theology and Scripture helps to show the problem: “Further, rather than providing a set of proof texts for doctrine, we should study, interpret, and engage Scripture to deepen and enrich the agreements between Scripture and our doctrine, faith, and practice.”¹³ If our reading of Scripture simply enriches the preexisting agreement, there is little room for considering that the prior agreement might be a figment of our imagination. Instead of being determined by Scripture, our theology will instead be based upon our community or our desires. For these reasons, John Goldingay calls the rule of faith “a disaster.”¹⁴

There are some passing comments from TIOS advocates which address this concern. Hart says that we should read the Bible within the rules of our tradition. He appeals to a hermeneutical spiral to avoid being misled, but it seems to me that if one actively embraces one’s tradition then even a spiral will not do much good to correct an error, since one will not even consider other options.¹⁵ Instead of asking “Does my theology fit?” when reading the text, TIOS instead asks “What can theology teach me about this passage?” The first question is much more open to correction than the second.

A similar suggestion to counteract this problem is to read Scripture several times, each time with a different theological view. After we read the text embracing various theological views, we determine which reading fits most naturally.¹⁶ This is similar to the idea of the hermeneutical spiral just presented, but it has a wider base and a better chance of success. Another important feature would be that the staring theology is held with varying levels of certainty. Those explicitly contained in the rule of faith, such as the Trinity, would be held very strongly and never called into question. But non-creedal issues would be held with more corrigibility, with more openness to change. While this is an excellent suggestion, it is difficult and time-consuming to put into practice on a regular basis and to know other perspectives so well we can think inside of them. It also does not seem satisfactory from a TIOS perspective, since this seems to go against the very idea of embracing one’s theology: we are to use our theology to enlighten the text, and this suggestion returns to “proving” theology from the text.

Fowl also provides some guidance in this area, although he examines how we interpret the Bible to support our sinful habits, not interpreting in an incorrect manner. He argues that we (the plural “we” is as an important part of his argument) need to interpret the Bible with the constant recognition that we are sinners, with the result that our interpretations will have a certain amount of tentativeness and that we will always be seeking corrections from others in our community and other communities.¹⁷ This is certainly a helpful guideline for us as readers to keep us from becoming too dogmatic on our own readings of Scripture. But this suggestion once again takes extensive time and effort to interact with those outside our community. Further, how will we know when to listen to others who read differently than us? How do we know when they are being the sinful readers and not us?

In spite of these ideas for self-correction, the danger for TIOS is a real possibility. If the system encourages starting with the endpoint then it will be difficult to self-correct one’s theology along the way. Not only is self-correction difficult, the end result sometimes is an imposition of an external theology on the text. While there are glimmers of ways to reduce this problem, the problem seems to be mostly ignored so far by TIOS advocates.

As evangelicals I think we face a similar problem. Evangelicalism has historically been opposed to bringing theology to the text. Just as an example, Daniel Fuller rejects theological exegesis, which he defines as reading Scripture to conform to one's theology.¹⁸ However, even though evangelicals have been ideologically opposed to the practice, I think that it still happens much too frequently: it is just too easy to come to a text and find what we are looking for. I think that the thoughts just presented about guards in interpretation are good and should be followed as much as possible. For my part, my goal to read the Bible in a series of ways. I first read it trying to keep my theology out (although that is never entirely possible). Then I read it with my theology in mind and see how my theology (i.e., what I think the rest of the Bible says) helps me understand the passage, as well as what kind of questions I can ask the passage based on my theology. Then, to the best of my ability, I read it from other perspectives and see how it works in other paradigms in order to see my own blind spots more clearly.¹⁹ While the majority of my time is spent on the first step, the latter steps are important as well.

Unity of the Bible

One of the key characteristics of TIOS is the focus on the unity of Bible, in reaction to the breaking up of the Bible by historical critical views. Evangelicals certainly should affirm the unity of the Bible, since we believe the entire Bible is inspired and profitable. Frankly, however, this is not a reminder that evangelicalism as a whole needs. In my (limited) experience, I more often have to remind evangelicals that there is diversity in the Bible than that there is unity.

While the goal of focusing on unity is admirable, I think that at times TIOS is guilty of going too far in the other direction and flattening the Bible. Seeking to show how the Bible fits together, the differences between various parts of the Bible are sometimes ignored.¹ Trevor Hart presents a good case for how to recognize both the unity and the diversity in Scripture,² but I worry that in practice some TIOS advocates have pushed the pendulum too far in the unity direction. Beverly Roberts Gaventa has some helpful thoughts in a review article of a TIOS book by Angus Paddison.

I do not fear that our [historical critics] reconstructions will be overlooked but that the cranky, minority voices of Scripture will be silenced—that Paul’s profound analysis of the enslaving power of Sin will be tempered by Luke’s more optimistic call for repentance and forgiveness, for example, or that the prophetic warnings about mingling with foreigners will overpower the book of Ruth, with its vivid tribute to a Moabite woman, or that Deuteronomy’s promise will mute Job’s witness that obedience does not always produce blessing. As I see it, the canon’s diversity is not an unpleasant historical fact that reflects varying religious communities in their varying historical settings; on the contrary, it is crucial to the very theological richness Paddison wants to recover. And I worry that a canonical interpretation of the sort that Paddison favors could easily produce a homogenized biblical theology void of taste or texture.³

My wife occasionally reminds me that just because all of the food she eats ends up in the same place does not mean that we should just mix all the food on our plate. While historical-critical methods have kept the food on different plates in different rooms, TIOS tends to mix all the food on the plate. We as evangelicals need to remember that there is both one plate (unity) and different kinds of food (diversity).

A good example of this problem is found in a TIOS essay by Robin Parry on Lamentations.⁴ He presents the idea of the ideal reader, who reads in the way expected by the text. Since the text does not know the NT, the canonical Christian reading will be unexpected, based on that definition. "Indeed, it is essential for a Christian theological reading of Lamentations that the reader is not standing in the shoes of the implied reader".⁵ But the Christian theological reading must have an organic relationship with the expected reading: the expected reading is an important and necessary first step, but only the first step. The primary key for a Christian reading of Lamentations for Parry is Isaiah 40-55 (postexilic for him, hence after Lamentations). Second Isaiah takes Lamentations and injects hope into the book, particularly through the connection of the man of Lamentations 3 and the suffering servant of Isaiah 53. From there it is only a short step to the NT and Jesus. Building on N. T. Wright's view of Jesus as true Israel, Lamentations is the equivalent of Saturday in the Passion week. Bringing in the rule of faith, Parry wonders how the Trinity plays a role in Lamentations. Yahweh and Jesus have already been discussed, but how does the Spirit fit in? Parry finds the connection in Romans 8:17, where the Spirit groans with the church and creation. The Spirit thus groans with those who are suffering in Lamentations. The essay ends with a response to the expected complaint: does this not rob Lamentations of its power? Lamentations is designed to be about bad news, not good news. The voice of Yahweh has been purposefully removed from Lamentations; how can we now insert that voice and still consider it a legitimate reading of the book? In response, he says that we must pay attention to both the canonical form and the canonical context: we must balance the good news and the bad news, in a sense. We must be sure to not move too quickly to Sunday from Saturday, but neither should we forget Sunday is coming.

For anyone interested in theological interpretation of Scripture, this is an excellent place to begin. Not only does he give a good example, he is self-conscious about what he is doing and helps the reader along the way with his thinking. But I remained somewhat bothered with his conclusion. The complaint he raises is precisely the complaint I have: Lamentations no longer lives up to its name. While I fully agree that canonically we have hope, I want to guard the places like Lamentations where that hope is not expressed. The author of Lamentations could have expressed that hope if he desired; in my thinking Second Isaiah already had been around for a few centuries, and even apart from that many of the other prophets had spoken of a future hope after exile. The author of Lamentations purposely does not include any hope because he wants to express the despair present at the time and hope would go counter to his desire. I agree with Parry's conclusions in a sense, although I get there a different way: I agree that we need to stay in Saturday for awhile but not forget Sunday is coming. But I would rather frame it as staying in Lamentations for awhile before moving on to Isaiah and the Resurrection. I do not want to level the various books of the Bible and make them all say the same thing; I want to preserve the diversity in them.

Conclusion

Since the historical-critical way of reading the Bible is not going to die out anytime soon, I am thankful for the positive influence that TIS is having in the guild. Its many beneficial aspects can cohere well with evangelicalism.[12] I am especially thankful for the connection between theology and the Bible being made by many more than in the past, and I hope that TIS has wide impact, particularly in the biblical studies guild. But in spite of its compatibility with evangelicalism, I remain concerned about some unbalanced directions TIS is being taken and unconvinced that TIS is desperately needed by evangelicals or that we should follow it in every detail

See below for comparison of TIS with other solutions. 

Whenever evangelical biblical scholars discuss TIS with theologians, one question always seems to arise: How is this different from what we have been doing? The difference between TIS and standard historical critical work is clear, but the border between TIS and evangelical thought is fuzzy.

Follow the link for more of my thoughts on TIS commentaries.