From: gar@cltr.uq.oz.au (Greg Restall)
Subject: Reading the Bible.  
Organization: Centre for Language Teaching and Research, Uni of Queensland, AUSTRALIA.
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 00:01:32 GMT

chrisa@extro.ucc.su.OZ.AU (C. G. Albone) writes:

*Alas, after I posted I saw that I didnt quite complete the speil that I
*have quite often received, being that because it is so different from
*all other literature in that it is from God, the tools used to analyse the
*other literature simply dont work when dealing with the Bible. I guess a
*question arises here as to what it means for God to be an author of a book
*that is so clearly marked by the writing styles of human authors. If you
*would could you expand on this? Personally, I think that God is involved 
*with its generation, but i am not sure how active a role to give God. 
*Questions of how the cannon was arrived at and the like all need to be
*explored, as well as a proper analysis of the texts, concepts such as
*'original forms' (which in Jewish Scriptural studies are very problematic) 
*and the like. 

Yeah.  Good worries here.  I'm not sure I have the capacity 
to pin down exactly what it is for the Bible to be God's 
Words.  From my perspective it is at least this: the message
of the Bible is God's Message to Us.  (In contrast to the 
message of Mein Kampf.  God was involved in the production of
Mein Kampf in some degree, in that he was causally upholding 
Adolf Hitler at the time.  However, this does not mean that 
Hitler has the Divine Seal of Approval for what he has written.)

It is undoubtedly true that the writing styles of different
authors differ markedly.  I don't have a problem with this.
After all, Paul wrote Romans, and he didn't write Acts.  They're
very different.  However, God wrote both.  Now this doesn't
mean that Paul lost consciousness when putting pen to paper,
(or when he got Silas to put pen to paper) but rather, God
ensured that what he wanted to get across got across.  

The main reason I believe this is by analogy with Jesus'
treatment of the Jewish Scriptures.  Phrases like "God said..."
and "Moses said..." and "It is written..." are used interchangably,
time and time again.  Frankly, as a Christian, I take it that 
there's something to this practice.

Lots of interesting questions are raised by the issue of what
got recognised as canonical, and what didn't.  I'm no historian,
and I don't know all of the ins and outs of that scene.  

*>If we take the Bible to be Really Important, we should take
*>Extra Special Care when reading it.  It seems like this is
*>reason enough to use all of the skills we have been given
*>to make sure we have understood its message.  Of course, 
*>this is not to be taken as meaning that any procedure that
*>critical theorists give us going to yield Truth.  These 
*>things are to be tested on their merits.  

*While I am in general agreement with you here, I must ask about the
*testing that you mentioned.. How are you proposing we test something 
*according to its merits? what standard are you going to use as your
*yardstick in such an examination? 

Very good question.  Presumably its however linguists and people
in the hermenutics scene test these things.  Form criticism,
source criticism, redaction criticism, and the new hermenutics
all have their place, but have to be tested.  How?  Well, let
them run loose on other texts that we have access to, that we
know more about.  Enough exposure to the work of literary 
critics will inform you that while there is undoubtedly work of
value going on, conclusions are tentative.  I don't see that 
there's any qualitative difference between the issues involved
in interpreting a Biblical text and in interpreting a `secular'
text.  (Modulo, of course, the attitude that the Christian 
ought to have of taking this seriously as God's message to Us.)

Things like the book "Linguistics and Biblical Interpretation" 
by Cotterell and Max Turner (SPCK/IVP)  [Telnet to the UQ library:
`libsys.library.uq.oz.au' for further publishing details.] 
are of a great help.  They go over some of the exciting 
developments in the linguistic scene, and how they shape how
we ought to approach the Bible.  Very Good.

Anyway, I don't know how much more I have to say.

Greg


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<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><
>< Greg Restall      <> Philosophy Department, University of Queensland. <>  
<> gar@cltr.uq.oz.au >< Queensland, 4072.  Australia.		         ><
><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
The day logic stops being fun is the day it ceases to be my profession 
							   -- Bob Meyer
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