Biblical criticism question

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How do you adress the issue of textual content vs. formative process?

Divine inspiration?

[phatcatholic]

i need you to elaborate more, if you don't mind, so that i know exactly what you are asking about.

what is the issue between textual content and formative process that you want to address? how do you define "formative process"?

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Sure.


Hardly an original take, and probably one for which you already have a stock answer (not to say false....just prepared.).

I am always curious about people who put faith in textually literal proclamations, in that we have records showing long, arduos, involved and contentious debates stretching over decades and more about textual inclusion/exclusion and interpretation, from the time of the text's formulation onwards. We also have records of secular influence, most notably Constantine, on some of the choices made.

So I am asking, is the assumption that the end result is the product of Divine will, irrespective of the route it took to get there? That, say, the Book of James was kept in and not reduced to 'so much kindling', whereas others were left out, because that was ultimately what God wanted?

If so, that leads to one set of follow-up questions. If not, another.

[Era Might]

I'm not sure exactly what you're looking for, but then-Cardinal Ratzinger gave an excellent talk entitled "Biblical Interpretation in Crisis", where he addresses the phenomena of skepticism in certain scholarly circles:

[quote]Certainly texts must first of all be traced back to their historical origins and interpreted in their proper historical context. But then, in a second exegetical operation, one must look at them also in light of the total movement of history and in light of history's central event, Jesus Christ. Only the combination of both these methods will yield understanding of the Bible. If the first exegetical operation by the Fathers and in the Middle Ages is found to be lacking, so too is the second, since it easily falls into arbitrariness. Thus, the first was fruitless, but the rejection of any coherence of meaning leads to an opinionated methodology.

To recognize the inner self-transcendence of the historical word, and thus the inner correctness of subsequent rereadings in which event and meaning are gradually interwoven, is the task of interpretation properly so-called, for which appropriate methods can and must be found. In this connection, the exegetical maxim of Thomas Aquinas is quite to the point: "The duty of every good interpreter is to contemplate not the words, but the sense of the words."

In the last hundred years, exegesis has had many great achievements, but it has brought forth great errors as well. These latter, moreover, have in some measure grown to the stature of academic dogmas. To criticize them at all would be taken by many as tantamount to sacrilege, especially if it were to be done by a non-exegete. Nevertheless, so prominent an exegete as Heinrich Schlier previously warned his colleagues: "Do not squander your time on trivialities."Johann Gnilka gave concrete expression to this warning when he reacted against an exaggerated emphasis by the history-of-traditions school.

[url="http://www.catholicculture.org/docs/doc_view.cfm?recnum=5989"]http://www.catholicculture.org/docs/doc_view.cfm?recnum=5989[/url][/quote]

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thanks much

[phatcatholic]

also check out this entry from the directory

The Bible: Hermeneutics and Exegesis
[url="http://www.phatmass.com/directory/index.php/cat_id/693"]http://www.phatmass.com/directory/index.php/cat_id/693[/url]

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I was less talking exegenic, and more historiographic, but I get your thrust.

The quotes are interesting, because, for example, Aquinas' words would affirm a tautology. If the essential thrust is to say that we need to put our faith in the process of arriving at the words which were then to be taken as scripture, that obviously leaves open questions when you know the history of the process.

Or, conversely, if they had tried to argue that the process itself had been divinely inspired, that leaves open others...or even an argument that tries to argue that the process itself was better than recorded from a secular POV, that too, would leave questions but at least be a position.

But Ratzinger seems (in the quote you highlighted, have yet to check link) argue no real position at all, merely to point out that all perspectives are open to skepticism, and that that can be solved by starting from a position grounded in a conclusion.

That might make sense if you are viewing the matter from an Our Posiition vs. Their Position perspective, which is usual for Catholics in my experience, but almost without worth to someone looking for answers with no preconception either way. I credit the Catholic Church with a great deal, but one thing I do not appreciate, as someone with an open mind, is how much of their position statements require an assumption of an agonistic approach to make any sense.

I realize that most of their positions nowadays are defensive ones, and this likely inspires a lot of that slant, but it makes it pointless to read anything when the assumption is that there is The Catholic View and The Non-Catholic view, and that all is ratinalized by showing how the Other could be/is wrong.


Does that make sense?

[Era Might]

[quote]That might make sense if you are viewing the matter from an Our Posiition vs. Their Position perspective, which is usual for Catholics in my experience, but almost without worth to someone looking for answers with no preconception either way. I credit the Catholic Church with a great deal, but one thing I do not appreciate, as someone with an open mind, is how much of their position statements require an assumption of an agonistic approach to make any sense. [/quote]

First, if I may take a charitable detour, I suggest that you stop speaking of the Catholic Church as though it were a foreign entity. You are Catholic. You are a member of the Catholic Church. You are not a member of any other Church or ecclesial community, because it is morally and canonically impossible. You may draw upon Protestant sources, spiritual and intellectual, but you are not a Protestant. I say this not to get into an argument with you, or with any animosity, but it just needed to be said, fraternally.

In the talk I referenced, the Holy Father does address the proposed "neutrality" of a Catholic exegete:

[quote]Finally, the exegete must realize that he does not stand in some neutral area, above or outside history and the Church. Such a presumed immediacy regarding the purely historical can only lead to dead ends. The first presupposition of all exegesis is that it accepts the Bible as a book. In so doing, it has already chosen a place for itself which does not simply follow from the study of literature. It has identified this particular literature as the product of a coherent history, and this history as the proper space for coming to understanding. If it wishes to be theology, it must take a further step. It must recognize that the faith of the Church is that form of "sympathia" without which the Bible remains a closed book. It must come to acknowledge this faith as a hermeneutic, the space for understanding, which does not do dogmatic violence to the Bible, but precisely allows the solitary possibility for the Bible to be itself. [/quote]

The Christian faith is not a subjective religion. It is a religion of factual Revelation. It does not rest on subjective thought, which is why an exegete cannot be "neutral". If he does not start from the premise of the Catholic faith (or the Christian faith in general, for non-Catholics), he is not an exegete or a theologian in any meaningful sense.

Edited December 6, 2005 by Era Might