Morality of Literary Understanding

...With regard to the moralityof literary understanding, Augustine advocates what is for him the prime hermeneutical virtue, namely, charity. This is a far cry fromt eh typical modern appraoch that puts a premium on distrust and suspicion, a strategy best exemplified perhaps by an essay by W.K. Clifford entitled "The Ethics of Belief." Clifford argues that it is immoral to believe something unless you first have sufficient evidence or proof: "To sum up: it is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence." In contrast, Augustine's treatise On the Usefulness of Belief states that "nothing would remain stable in human society if we determined to believe nothing that we could not scientifically establish." With regard to reading, it "is most honorable to believe that an author was a good man, whose writings were inteded to benefit the human race and posterity." The first hermeneutic reflex, therefore, should be charity towards the author. If we come to a text believing that there is nothing in it, we are likely to go away as empty as we come. Augustine encourages readers to approach texts, paricularly the classics and especially the Scriptures, in the expectation that they contain something valuable and true...

...There is something in the text that is not of the reader's own making. The believing reader must not violate but venerate this "other." For readers come not only to knoweldge but also to self-knowledge when they allow the text to have its say. The interpretive virtues that I will commend throughout this work also figure among the cardinal virtues of Christian theology: faith, hope, love, and humility. These are the same virtues that make society possible. Life together is largely interpretation; good hermeneutics makes good neighbors. The Golden Rule, for hermeneutics and ethics alike, is to treat significant others--texts, persons, God--with love and respect.

Kevin Vanhoozer, Is There a Meaning in This Text? (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998), 32

Take the Power Back - Rage Against the Machine

In the right light, study becomes insight
But the system that dissed us
Teaches us to read and write
So called facts are fraud. They want us to allege and pledge
And bow down to their God. Lost the culture, the culture lost
Spun our minds and through time. Ignorance has taken over
Yo, we gotta take the power back!

Bam! Here's the plan************* Uncle Sam.
Step back, I know who I am
Raise up your ear, I'll drop the style and clear. It's the beats and the lyrics they fear
The rage is relentless. We need a movement with a quickness
You are the witness of change. And to counteract
We gotta take the power back

The present curriculum. I put my fist in 'em
Eurocentric every last one of 'em. See right through the red, white and blue disguise
With lecture I puncture the structure of lies. Installed in our minds and attempting
To hold us back. We've got to take it back

Holes in our spirit causin' tears and fears. One-sided stories for years and years and years
I'm inferior? Who's inferior? Yeah, we need to check the interior
Of the system that cares about only one culture. And that is why
We gotta take the power back

The teacher stands in front of the class. But the lesson plan he can't recall
The student's eyes don't perceive the lies. Bouncing off every ************** wall
His composure is well kept. I guess he fears playing the fool
The complacent students sit and listen to some of that**************** that he learned in school
Europe ain't my rope to swing on. Can't learn a thing from it
Yet we hang from it. Gotta get it, gotta get it together then
Like the ***************** weathermen. To expose and close the doors on those who try
To strangle and mangle the truth. 'Cause the circle of hatred continues unless we react
We gotta take the power back

Feminist Hermeneutics

If the Bible may be understood as deeply energized by the spirit of God then it can also be understood as limited by human perception and tainted by human sin (not necessarily but in accordance with the evidence therein)…With this understanding of the Bible, I can dismiss as tragic Paul’s apparent embrace of slavery and the subjugation of women.

Barbara S. Blaisdell

Feminist Hermeneutics

We must be prepared to accept the reality of aspect of the Bible with which we disagree. An example is the masculo-centric language and general male chauvinist attitudes we find in the Bible. The Bible must not be forgiven at this point; it must be defeated…for the present we must be firm in our argument against such evils or limitations as they are found in the Bible, for example, refusing to use any such offending passages in liturgical expressions without rewording them into language that shows full appreciation for women as well as men.

J.L. Hardegree

Subversive Reading

Let’s do a subversive reading on a popular children’s film. The movie Beauty and the Beast seems harmless to us – charming, vintage Disney, a story about the transforming power of love. But under postmodern analysis, the underlying oppositions create an entirely different picture. The heroine in defined by her physical appearance, “Belle.” Therefore, women are important primarily in terms of their looks, and, consequently, how they can please men. The film explains that Belle is responsible for her fumbling father. In other words, like all patriarchy, the father has the authority, but his wards are responsible to make things come out right. In love, the movie pictures a woman as giving herself wholly for the reform of the “Beast,” or man whom she loves. Indeed, his good is accomplished only through her love and sacrifice. Deep inside a man, as beastly as he might appear on the outside, is a gentle, loving prince. The responsibility to manifest this good side falls, not to the man, but to his servile lover. The story is made to appear to be a law of nature; as the theme song proclaims, “tale as old as time, song as old as rhyme . . .” In reality, according to the subversive reading of the script, a postmodern critic might see this film as a prescription for neurosis, abuse, and patriarchy.

Dennis McCallum, The Death of Truth (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1996), 92.

James Cone

See especially after 12:00

Postmodern Hermeneutics

"When did Christian narratives become meta-narrative? In whose eyes and for whom? Are we exaggerating the place of Christian narratives in a world where Christianity is not the dominant religion? Even though governments with strong military powers and rigorous warfare tactics are from Christian countries, Christianity is not the grand religion. Why do we imagine that Christian narratives are the only narratives that post modernity challenges? Given that we are Christians, we see our narratives as grand. They are grand for us, and we are many; but they are not grand for everyone, and they are more.

Havea, Jione, "Is There a Home for the Bible in a Postmodern World?" Journal of Ecumenical Studies, Fall 2007, Vol. 42 Issue 4.

Feminist Hermeneutics

A feminist reading of the Bile is a complex affair. We must deal, as women, with a very ancient text which reflects different cultures, customs, epochs, relations, languages, and grammars. Above all, we have to confront androcentric and patriarchal passages - and interpretations - that have accumulated over the centuries. A hermeneutics guided by a focus on gender social relations should, therefore, be daring and go beyond the traditional canons of exegetical science. We need a hermeneutics of suspicion which is operative in all areas: texts, interpretations, traditions, translations, and exegetical methods. Gender theories are analytical tools that allow us to deconstruct texts and reveal the structure of the relations on which they are based. We can then construct a new text that seeks to be liberating in nature, including with regard to gender relations. We believe that this is the wish of God who created men and women in God's own image and likeness.

Pereira, Nancy Cardoso, Revista de Interpretacion Biblica Latinoamericana (Journal of Latin American Biblical Interpretation) No.5, 1997