Over the past few days, I've been reading the Prolegomena of Childs's 700+ page volume on Biblical Theology. Childs has a way of writing that is almost nourishing to the mind. I'm only 16 pages into the book and can't help but feel refreshed every time I pick it up. Thus far, he has been outlining sort of a history of approaches to Biblical theology while providing thought-provoking commentary along the way. The section he has just dealt with is the "History of Redemption" (i.e the Heilsgechichte) approach. This approach to a certain degree has been fairly popular within Evangelicalism, and I think one of Childs's critiques can appropriately address the Evangelical approach to "History of Redemption." I'll try to be brief and at the risk of being wrong, propose a couple of solutions that may help to mitigate these problems with the Heilsgechichte approach.
We should continue to contend that Christianity is a historical faith. If we do not, if our faith is not firmly planted in the truth, in the fact that the events of the Bible actually happened, we risk falling into subjectivism. We should continue to fight the battle of the veracity of Scripture. When Biblical theology is the matter at hand, we need to be careful how we factor history into interpretation. One of Child's critiques is that the Heilsgechichte approach, because it seeks to unify the OT and NT by tracing the thread of God's unfolding plan of redemption, can in some circles focus too much on the event rather than the text itself. While I think Childs is directing his criticism against a type of critical scholarship which depends upon the reconstruction of the event behind text, Evangelicals should be careful not to read the text of Scripture as a superficial retelling of an event. This approach can obfuscate the meaning of the text because it's not paying attention to the way the author puts the text together. What I find interesting is that we can focus on what Jesus or David say but spend less time trying to understand what Luke or the author of Samuel are doing with their texts.
The other side of this critique is that we pitch our tents of interpretive focus at the end of the history of God's plan. Our time spent in the New Testament by far outweighs our time spent in the Old. Could this partially be due to our view of the Bible as the "History of Redemption?" The entire Biblical story certainly points to Christ. The Old Testament eagerly anticipates the redemption wrought through Christ. Once we see Christ's face on the pages of the New Testament, how do we evaluate the value of the Old? Is it merely a prequel to the main story? I think the answer is that the Old Testament fills the New with meaning. While the New reveals Christ's face, the Old provides a depth to Christ's character and person. We know what redemption, messiah, salvation, sin, etc is because the Old Testament teaches us how to think of those terms properly. The New Testament does as well, but as I have read the New Testament, I have come to realize how thoroughly fluent it is with Old Testament language. The New assumes you know the Old, and so we should work hard to understand the Old.
I'm not saying we should throw the concept of the "History of Redemption" under the bus. I am saying that the unity between the testaments is at its base the text of Scripture - not the events it reports. As we learn how the authors are using their texts, we will grow in our knowledge of the depth of God's wisdom that the Old and the New Testaments together provide us.
3 comments:
Nathaniel,
While I am unclear about what you are getting at in your first point, your second is a good reminder. I just had Greg Beale for the book of Revelation and one thing is for sure--he is not afraid of going to the OT to help him interpret the NT.
Seeing it in practice was very profitable, and convinced me of the necessity of reminding myself to look to the OT in my exegesis of the NT.
Thanks Mike (or Michael I'm not sure which you prefer)! One thing I do like about GK Beale is that he seeks to incorporate the Old Testament into his exegesis of the New. I read his book that critiqued Peter Enns's approach to myth and the Old Testament. Although I don't always agree with Beale, I definitely appreciate his approach.
As to the first point, all I'm saying is that it's important to see what pictures authors are painting with their words. The events of Jesus's life and the words that he spoke are important, but it's also important to see what Jesus says in the context of Luke's Gospel. Luke is doing something specific with Jesus's words that Matthew or Mark may not be doing. If we focus on the event alone, we will miss what Luke is saying.
Well said Nathaniel. I would agree that there is something to be said about why the Old Testament isn't read as much as the New Testament by Christians. I admit, I read the New Testament more. Perhaps it is because it takes some work to understand the Old Testament. What I mean is, reading the Old Testament, for me, requires more study as I am not familiar with many aspects of Jewish culture which are relevant to my understanding of the text. While I feel this is true, I certainly shouldn't use it as an excuse.
I appreciate what you mean by suggesting that the Old Testament fills the new with meaning. The more I grow as a Christian the more this makes sense to me. For example, I was at church the other day and we were discussing Hebrews and what it means for Jesus to be a High Priest. The Pastor used this as an opportunity to go into the background of the priesthood as laid out in the Old Testament. I learned a lot from this, and I firmly believe, that the impact of Hebrews would have been diminished, had the Pastor not taken the time to take us back into the Old Testament.
Post a Comment