New Testament Criticism after Schweitzer
--Lecture Notes for Topic 2.2.3- Religion 492

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Go directly to topic: 2.2.3.0 Introduction 2.2.3.1 Mid-Twentieth Century 2.2.3.2 Advancements in  Historical-Critical Method 2.2.3.3 Development of Literary Critical Methods Bibliography

        The period of time, 1918 - 1975, experienced perhaps the greatest flowering of interpretive methodology for the study of the New Testament of the entire history of Christian interpretation. In Europe and Britain, rapid expansion of the historical approach took place and experienced diversification into a large array of different procedures. Historical methodology birthed a large number of derivative methods, especially form criticism and redaction criticism. A grandchild coming into its own in the early 1970s was Social Scientific Exegesis, based on the application of sociological models to interpreting ancient texts. These interpretive children and grandchildren of the historical method also began gaining respectability in more conservative evangelical Protestant traditions, although at times they were viewed as illegitimate children who had no rightful place.
        This period also witnessed the coming into its own of the American contribution to interpretive methodology. Protestant scholars in North America began contributing to the historical approach. But more than this, with the emergence of literary criticism in literature in the 1930s the American interest gradually began shifting to literary approaches in making sense out of the New Testament. By the late 1960s literary criticism began to explode on the North American scene. This in turn would give rise to derivative forms: Structuralism, Narrative Criticism, Reader-Response Criticism, Rhetorical Criticism among others. To be sure, literary approaches have roots that reach across the Atlantic to both Britain and Europe. These approaches have begun finding acceptance there, but during the last quarter of the twentieth century, literary based approaches to both Old and New Testament study have become a North American contribution primarily. Also, some very prominent evangelical NT scholars have been in the forefront of advancing some of these literary methods, including a few Southern Baptists such as Alan Culpepper and Edgar McKnight.
        Also, closely connected especially to the literary approaches for the most part are the theological agenda oriented approaches to NT interpretation. Feminist theology, liberation theology, black theology etc. have played off both the literary methodology and the Social Scientific methodology. Most of these approaches begin with a contemporary viewpoint and then attempt to read the text of the Bible to find defining or shaping insights from the scripture text for the individual theological starting point. Typically, the contemporary starting point grows out of some ethnic, gender, or other social issue in our world, rather than in the biblical world. These approaches will be examined more detailedy in the next topics since they have come into their own in the last quarter of the twentieth century. But for many of these, their beginnings lie in the post World War II era.
 

2.2.3.1 The Mid-Twentieth Century
Assigned Readings for This Topic:
Gerald Bray, Biblical Interpretation: Past and Present, pp. 376-379

Resource Materials to also be studied:

       The period from 1918 to the middle 1970s is one of the most turbulent times historically in all of western civilization. World War I was intended to be the "war to end all wars." For the first time in human history countries from all over the globe became engaged in military conflict at the same time. The development of modern means of warfare enabled the infliction of harm and injury to massive numbers of people never witnessed before in human history. The sometimes blind optimism of science being able to solve all human problems, which had increasingly dominated western culture through the 1800s, was now beginning to be shattered. Science had largely served to create monster war machines of mass destruction.
        The impact on religious thinking was profound. All across the Protestant theological landscape on both sides of the Atlantic, postmillennialism had dominated up to World War I. At its heart was the idea that Christians, through their obedience, can "bring in the Kingdom of God" on earth. In the more conservative side that included most Baptists, faithful proclamation of the Gospel "to the ends of the earth" would lead to the second coming of Christ.  This would mean the literal establishment of the thousand year reign of Christ on earth as taught in the book of Revelation. The indescribable suffering of Europe during World War I shattered this optimism on both sides of the Atlantic since American soldiers had both suffered and witnessed the massive suffering in Europe for the first time in our history. Postmillennialism would give way to either Amillennialism or Pre-Millennialism in the eschatology of most Protestant Christians. This shift would lay important foundations for how the Bible was to be studied, especially in the conservative non-critical approaches.
        The period between World War I and World War II saw an exploding contradiction on both sides of the Atlantic. Initially after W.W.I an economic boom period took place and the middle class and working class of people shared in its benefits as never before. Scientism, although now viewed at times with skepticism, still served as a powerful influence in society. A society entirely based on it suddenly emerged in eastern Europe with the creation of the Communist state of the Soviet Union with Russia as its cornerstone but engulfing countries from eastern Europe all the way to the Pacific Ocean. Reconstruction Germany saw the creation of its first experiment with a democratic form of government in the Weimar Republic in the 1920s. But the German experiment was not a positive one and with the bursting of the economic bubble in the late 1920s central Europe began quickly turning away from democracy to the older dictatorial patterns of government. The era of the Great Depression on both sides of the Atlantic during the 1930s saw enormous suffering and social turmoil. The working class of people had already begun organizing themselves in efforts to better their work environment and their standard of living. The unionization of the work place was met with oftentimes violent reaction from the corporate world. But the Great Depression created an atmosphere where government became deeply involved in the daily life of all its citizens in brand new ways. Patterns of what would come to be called Social Democracy emerged, sometimes in part as a response to the Marxist approach in eastern Europe. Various forms of social democracy would take root more in Europe and Britain than they would in North America, except for Canada and Mexico.
        On the eastern side of the Atlantic the emerging forms of social democracy would link up with Christianity, operating largely as the official state sponsored religion, to create religious based concerns for government providing medical services, retirement services, educational benefits etc. to all citizens for very minimal personal cost to the individual. In eastern Europe the governmental structures assumed total responsibility for nearly all aspects of life for its citizens, with everything being made available free or virtually free of charge. Religion played no role in this, since it had been officially banned in almost all Communist countries. The United States moved much more cautiously in this direction under the political leadership of Franklin D. Roosevelt, who was elected president for an unprecedented four terms.
        With the explosion of the second world war first in Europe in the late 1930s and then with Japanese expansion in China and elsewhere, society all over the planet underwent profound change. The entire world was caught upon in a gigantic war effort. The only places largely escaping this were South America and sub Sahara Africa. Christianity became concerned during this time with supporting the war effort, on both sides of the European war theater. Most every able bodied young man, even those studying for ministry, went off to war. Thus, developments in interpretive methodology came pretty much to a standstill until after World War II was over in the mid-1940s.
        The post-WW II era experienced unprecedented material prosperity and economic growth as the world began recovering from the massive destructive effects of the war. This prosperity would be sustained through the end of our period of study here, 1975, with but momentary interruptions, none of which had the negative impact that the Great Depression had created earlier. Two major wars would be fought during this period, first in Korea in the 1950s and then in Vietnam in the 1960s. But Europeans would only be minimally involved in these wars. These two wars were largely the battle ground between the United States and the Soviet Union, fought over the issue of rapidly spreading Communism. These two super powers were locked in an ongoing conflict that at times threatened to engulf the entire world in a nuclear holocaust that had the potential of destroying virtually every human being on planet earth. I can well remember school drills conducted in the 1950s while I was a school kid in west Texas; these were intended to prepare us for facing an atomic or a nuclear bomb being dropped nearby and how to avoid the effects of the anticipated radiation assuming we survived the explosion of the bomb itself.
        The anti-communist mentality during most of this period, primarily in U.S. culture, shaped religious life profoundly. Christianity and American patriotism with hatred of communism often combined into a type of civil religion, which was neither good religion nor true patriotism. To be a true Christian one had to both hate communism and blindly love the U.S. Conservative Christianity was especially vulnerable to this civil religion and often embraced it whole heartedly. Not until the turbulent emergence of a Neo-Evangelicalism in the late 1940s with the establishment of Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California did conservative Protestantism began having options to move away from this civil religious approach to doing Christianity. Now conservative Protestantism would flow through two primary streams: Neo-Evangelicalism and Fundamentalism. These two streams of Protestantism distinguished themselves increasingly from what would be labeled Mainstream Christianity that included the larger, older denominations such as Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans etc.
        Southern Baptists during this period frequently debated whether or not they belonged to either Evangelicalism or Fundamentalism. The largeness of the Baptist group, coupled with its isolationist tendency, oriented most Southern Baptists away from clear identification with either group. That began changing in the 1980s with the dominance of the fundamentalist oriented side of Southern Baptists over denominational agencies, especially at the national level. Increasingly the SBC is aligned with the fundamentalist side of conservative Protestantism, while ironically labeling this stance as Evangelical. The civil religion emphasis has reasserted itself, although now mostly identified with one of the two major political parties in the United States.
        Theological controversies during this mid part of the twentieth century would play a dominating role in the development of interpretive methods. The modernist verses fundamentalist controversy exploded on the scene with the Scopes "Monkey Trial" in Tennessee in 1925 over the issue of the teaching of evolution in the public school classroom. This, coupled with the emergence of the New Princeton School forcing the Old Princeton School to establish the Westminster Theological Seminary in the early 1930s, would create a huge divide between so-called 'liberal' approaches to biblical interpretation often utilizing critical approaches and 'fundamentalist' approaches that vigorously rejected critical approaches and often reverted back to the pre reformation spiritualizing of scripture texts as its dominate way of studying the Bible. Mainstream Christianity typically was then identified with the critical approaches, while conservative Protestants mostly became identified with Fundamentalism and the rejection of critical approaches.
        The devastating aftermath of both world wars in the first half of the twentieth century created strong incentive toward developing some kind of international governing body that could help prevent national conflicts from erupting into world wide wars again. The League of Nations existed from 1920 to 1945, to be replaced by the United Nations organization, based in New York City. Closely paralleling this was the World Council of Churches. The ecumenical movement has sought to find ways for various Christian groups to work closely together, beginning with Protestant groups. Out of this and parallel to it has come various professional organizations for biblical scholars to exchange ideas and interpretations of scripture. In North America, the oldest and largest such group is the Society of Biblical Literature, begun in 1880 but playing a significant role in American biblical scholarship during the twentieth century. This group has been the primary channel through which American New Testament scholarship has helped shaped the way the New Testament is understood internationally.  Although more European in nature but yet still international in scope is the Studio rum Nova Testament Societies, that has contributed significantly to New Testament methodologies. Catholic New Testament scholars have found a home in the various Catholic Biblical Associations, with the North American organization being the largest and most influential. Increasingly, dialogue among the various groups and multiple memberships in these groups by New Testament scholars has fostered the advancement of interpretive methodology. For example, an annual meeting between the National Association of Baptist Professors of Religion and the North American Catholic Biblical Association has fostered exchange of viewpoints between Catholics and Baptists over a wide range of topics. Additionally, although mostly related to Old Testament studies, dialogue between Christian and Jewish scholars has encouraged exchange of ideas regarding the interpretation of the Hebrew Bible. New Testament scholars have often become a part of this dialogue with focus on the history of OT interpretation in later forms of Judaism and in Christianity. Interestingly, a growing number of Jewish scholars have emerged as serious New Testament scholars. Preeminent among these is Prof. amyl Leaven at Vanderbilt University Divinity School in Nashville, NT. Also Jacob Neusner has become a significant Jewish scholar on the New Testament. The tendency today among these scholars is ecumenical and positive.
        Although the era, 1918 to 1975, is complex and at times difficult to unsort, it nevertheless has been a major shaping influence on biblical studies in Christianity world wide. The continued development of the historical critical method took place, but also the emergence of literary criticism in biblical studies, especially in the United States, has been a major factor during this period as well.
 

2.2.3.2 Advancements of the Historical-Critical Method
Assigned Readings for This Topic:

Resource Materials to also be studied:

        During the first part of the twentieth century, the historical critical methodology continued to dominate NT interpretive methodology on both sides of the Atlantic. But the procedure was undergoing an evolutionary process in which significant modifications and refinements would take place. Important to these changes was the developing understanding of historiography taking place in historical studies generally. The so-called Imperical Historiography that first emerged in the Enlightenment gradually underwent refinement. This approach basically defined history as the exploration of factually verifiable, significant human events that took place in the past. Procedures of verification of past events became pivotal, and mostly revolved around corroboration of events from opposing viewpoints. Consistency of details played an important part in this process. How to determine what was significant became a point of concern and exploration. Gradually, after the influence of Georg Hegel, cause and effect connections between significant events became a major focus of historical exploration. In this often an underlying dynamic driving history was sought after. For example, Karl Marx was convinced that dialectical materialism was that dynamic.
        The impact of this on historical studies of the Bible were profound. The first quest for the historical Jesus in the 1800s was basically shaped by these early modern understandings of history. The methodology developed in 'secular' historical studies was then applied, usually rather rigidly to biblical studies. In regard to the NT, the focus was upon developing a historical understanding of Jesus utilizing these tools and procedures. At the end of the 1800s the portrait of Jesus emerging from this endeavor was largely that of an idealistically minded Galilean carpenter's son who was passionately committed to profound reform of his Jewish religious traditions and to social justice for the poor and abused, and ultimately paid the price of martyrdom for his convictions. This was the basic picture of Jesus in classical German Liberalism at the beginning of the twentieth century.
        A young German Lutheran scholar, trained in this stream of thinking, became convinced in the early 1900s that this way of thinking was a dead end street for Christianity. His deep love of Luther and the version of Christianity established by the great Reformer would not allow him to reject Christianity in favor of either agnosticism or atheism that was common in Europe at that time. Impacted by the hegelian dialectical understanding of reality, he sought in modern experience to find a driving key to history that would allow for a Christian faith that could be rationally explained and defended to a skeptical European mind. Rudolf Bultmann found in the emerging philosophy of existentialism the needed key. In linking this philosophical framework to the study of the Christian faith, and of the New Testament in particular, Bultmann found a way to come at the scriptural text and develop theological conclusions affirming key elements of his Lutheran faith and providing a basis for a theology of the New Testament. Many aspects of his deeply complex methodology relate to our concern for interpretive methodology.
        Most significant was his redefinition of history. Bultmann divided history into two categories and somewhat artificially assigned two German words as labels. Historie was the label for the older chronological historical exploration. Geschichte was the label for a new understanding of history that built on Historie but carried the exploration deeper to explore the psychological motives in the people making history. Thus real history was the exploration of "what made a person tick." Bultmann came to the conclusion that the gospels did not provide sufficient resources to establish a Historie of Jesus; therefore, the old liberal quest for the historical Jesus was doomed and a waste of time. Instead, what he found in the examination of Acts and the letters of the New Testament, especially of Paul, was not a high level concern for the Jesus of history. Instead, these documents of the NT placed central focus on the resurrected Christ as an object of faith by Christians. Thus the Christ of faith was the foundation for primitive Christianity, rather than a historical Jesus. This corresponded to his Lutheran heritage and blended nicely into his understanding of Luther's position. In order to get at that Christ of faith, who comes to the believer in a life changing existential encounter in a moment of faith expression, one must strip away the layers of church tradition that have accumulated on top of the kernel of theological truth embedded in the scripture text. Once this truth is uncovered in a universal, timeless expression, it becomes the basis for developing a modern Christian faith that can be successfully defended to modern man with his rationalistic and skeptical tendencies. Always, though, at its heart is going to be this dynamic encounter with the Christ of faith who transforms one's life forever. Faith expression is the key to this existential encounter. Thus a program of "demythologizing" the New Testament text was developed in order to get at this essential Christian truth. The working out of Bultmann's system took place from the 1920s to the 1960s during his active teaching career at the university at Marburg Germany.
 
 

2.2.3.3 Development of Literary Oriented Methods
Assigned Readings for This Topic:

Gerald Bray, Biblical Interpretation: Past and Present, pp.

Resource Materials to also be studied:
 
 

Check Bray's bibliography in appropriate chapter of the textbook.

Check the appropriate Bibliography section in Cranfordville.com

Lorin L. Cranford, "Modern New Testament Interpretation," Biblical Hermeneutics, pp. 147-163 (chapter 7). Rev. Edition. Edited by Bruce Corley, Steve Lempke, and Grant Lovejoy. Nashville: Broadman Press, 2002.    BS476 .B494 1996 (first edition)
 

"Historiography," Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historiography

"History," Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History

"Philosophy of History," Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_history

"The Historical Jesus," New Testament Gateway at http://www.ntgateway.com/Jesus/

"Existentialism," Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existentialism