Kant and Enlightenment Hermeneutics

For Kant practical reason provided the framework of categories for theology and also for christology. Anything "which is of no practical use" does not concern us. "Scripture texts which contain certain theoretical doctrines stated to be sacred, but surpassing every conception of reason (even of moral reason) may be expounded for the benefit of the practical reason, while those which conflict with practical reason must be so expounded." The doctrine of the Trinity "offers absolutely nothing of practical us...And the same is true of the doctrine of the incarnation of one divine person." Something similar can be said of the stories of the resurrection and the ascension. For "articles of faith do not mean what ought to be believed...but what for practical (moral) purposes it is practical and useful to accept, even though it may not be possible to prove it, but only to believe it." Thus the revelation of God can only be what is in agreement with what reason understands to be "appropriate to God." "In this way all expositions of scripture, in so far as they concern religion, must be made in accordance with the principle of morality intended in revelation, and without this are either in practice empty or even hindrances to good." For we understand only him who speaks with us through our own understanding and our own reason. Therefore "the God in us", i.e. the free conscience, is "himself the interpreter."

In Moltmann, The Crucified God (New York: Harper and Row, 1973), 93-94.

Multiple Perspectives

Should those of us interested in interpreting the Bible assimilate its texts to a series of equations? Doesn't the Bible point us in a different direction by telling us that we need four different interpretations of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus as well as epistles interpreting the Christ event by a variety of authors?

Westphal, Whose Community? Which Interpretation? (Loc. 768-70 Kindle Ed.)

Chastened Epistemology

We need not think that hermeneutical despair ("anything goes") and hermeneutical arrogance (we have "the" interpretation) are the only alternatives.  We can acknowledge that we see and interpret "in a glass, darkly" or "in a mirror, dimly" and that we know "only in part" (1 Cor. 13:12), while ever seeking to understand and interpret better by combining the tools of scholarship with the virtues of humbly listening to the interpretations of others and above all to the Holy Spirit.

Westphal, Whose Community? Which Interpretation? (Loc. 174-178 Kindle Ed.)

C.S. Lewis

"An author doesn't necessarily understand the meaning of his own story better than anyone else."

In a letter to professor Clyde S. Kilby about his novel Til We Have Faces. 10 Feb 1957

W.H. Lewis ed. The Letters of C.S. Lewis (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World Inc., 1966) 273.

Subjective Reading

Biblical scholars have been slow to awaken from the dream in which positivist science occupies a space apart from interests and values, to awaken to the realization that our representations of and discourse about what the text meant and how it means are inseparable from what we want it to mean, from how we will it to mean.

George Aichele in Grenz, Beyond Foundationalism (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001), 85.

Illumination and Subjectivity

A theology of Word and Spirit need not lapse into subjectivism, however. What leads to subjectivism is the articulation of such as theology in the context of a basically individualistic understanding of the event of revelation. In other words, the problem of subjectivism arises only when we mistakenly place the individual ahead of the community...We, in turn, acknowledge individually that the Bible is scripture because we participate in this listening and confessing people. And it is this corporate confession of the Bible as scripture taht forms the context for our hearing the Spirit voice in its pages as well. Our participation in the Spirit-illumined congregation facilitates our personal experience of the Spirit's illuminating work.

Stanley Grenz and John Franke, Beyond Foundationalism (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001), 68

Schleiermacher, Friedrich (1768-1834)

Schleiermacher’s system has two major factors, the grammatical and the psychological, which correspond to the two spheres of knowledge—the external linguistic codes and the internal consciousness. Grammatical inquiry attempts to develop the linguistic dimension by demarcating the meaning of individual concepts on the basis of the surrounding words. He was ahead of his time in demanding that meaning be seen in the whole, not in isolated parts. Yet he is best known for the psychological aspect. Schleiermacher taught that the interpreter should align himself with the mind of the author and re-create the whole thought of the text as part of the author’s life. The interpreter’s task then is to reconstruct not only the text but the whole process of creating the thought on the part of the author.

Grant Osborne, The Hermeneutical Spiral (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2006), 468.

Neo-Orthodoxy

The neo-orthodox view is that the Bible is a fallible human book. Nevertheless, it is the instrument of God’s revelation to us, for it is a record of God’s personal revelation in Christ. Revelation, however, is personal; the Bible is not a verbally inspired revelation from God. It is merely an errant human means through which one can encounter the personal revelation who is Christ. In itself it is not the Word of God; at best, the Bible only becomes the Word of God to the individual when he encounters Christ through it.

Norman L. Geisler and William E. Nix, A General Introduction to the Bible (Chicago: Moody, 1986), 175.

Gadamer, Hans-Georg

“To understand it does not mean primarily to reason one’s way back into the past, but to have a present involvement in what is said…Texts do not ask to be understood as a living expression of the subjectivity of their writers…What is fixed in writing has detached itself from the contingency of its origin and its author and made itself free for new relationships.” [According to Gadamer] the interpreter’s prejudgments interrogate the text and are interrogated in turn by the text. Thereby subjectivity and objectivity merge together, and interpretation becomes application as new horizons of possibility are opened. In short, both text and interpreter take part in the historical process of interpretation.

Grant Osborne, The Hermeneutical Spiral (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2006), 469-470.

The Role of Experience in Interpretation

The emphasis on Baalism was on psychological relatedness and subjective experience…The transcendence of the deity was overcome in the ecstasy of feeling…Baalism is worship reduced to the spiritual stature of the worshiper. Its canons are that it should be interesting, relevant, and exciting…Yahwism established a form of worship which was centered in the proclamation of the word of the covenant God. The appeal was made to the will. Man’s rational intelligence was roused to attention as he was called upon to respond as a person to the will of God. In Yahwism something was said—words which called men to serve, love, obey, act responsibly, decide…The distinction between the worship of Baal and the worship of Yahweh is a distinction between approaching the will of the covenant God which could be understood and known and obeyed, and the blind life-force in nature which could only be felt, absorbed, and imitated.

Eugene Peterson, “Baalism and Yahwism Updated,” Theology for Today (July 1972), 139-141.

The Role of Experience in Interpretation

Experience alone is too flimsy a base on which to rest the Christian system. The mere fact that a psychological event has taken place in one’s brain cannot establish the truthfulness of the gospel…Religious sensation by itself can only prove itself…However unique an experience may be, it is capable of a number of radically differing interpretations. It may be only an encounter with one’s own subconscious. Those who place all their emphasis on a subjective validating process…eventually reduce the content of revelation and fit it to their taste. The central thing becomes that which comes across to me, rather than what God has done and spoken. The reason some theologians favor the use of drugs to heighten religious perception is patent. Whenever the existential cart is put before the historical horse, theology becomes a synthesis of human superstitions, and putting LSD into the communion wine is fair play!

Clark Pinnock, Set Forth Your Case (Chicago: Moody, 1967), 69-70.