Category: Brevard Childs

Brevard Childs’ rational for a canonical approach (Part II)

Yesterday I listed several reasons why Brevard Childs’ argued that a canonical reading should be seriously considered (see here). Today I well venture further into his thought. We must begin with his defensive remarks that the canonical approach (over against the historical-critical approach, at least as the primary means for pondering church doctrine and life) does not lead into “uncontrolled subjectivity”. Rather, “the term canon designates an established body of literature which the early church recognized as both authoritative and fixed in scope.” In other words, the hermeneutical control is the canon itself. (The New Testament as Canon, p. 37)

For Childs “the collecting and reordering of once independent writings into an authoritative corpus of scripture” resulted in “a new dynamic…which profoundly influenced the interpretation of the parts.” (p. 38) No longer do we have the literature that guides only Matthian, Johannine, Pauline, or other communities. We have the catholicism of the canon.

To begin exegesis from this “catholic” perspective is “to work within a received context of faith” (p. 39), which provides guidelines for how the church reads and uses Scripture. This does not mean that the canon is a “frozen deposit of tradition or doctrine”, but rather “a living vehicle through which the will of God is perceived.” (p. 40) Canonization doesn’t end Christian thought any more than sidelines and endzones end a football game. Rather, it provides the boundaries within which much creative can occur without becoming absurd, chaotic, and unruly as the church thinks about doctrine.

This means we must take the final form of the text seriously. Those who do any textual criticism will emphasize that there is no real “final form”, but we must think in broader categories and not about minute details. This would mean, for instance, (and this is where it become problematic for me) that the long ending of the Gospel of Mark should be take seriously within the canonical context. While the “author” of the gospel did not say what we find in vv. 9-20, the church added this editorial gloss as part of the canonization process and this should be taken seriously.

This does not mean historical criticism is dispensable. Childs says it is “here to stay”. He writes, “Exegesis performed without its aid seems naive”. But he doesn’t think it should have the final word. He writes, “To allow the theology of the church to add a homiletical topping after the basic critical work has been done is small comfort. The theological battle has been surrendered at the outset.” (p. 45) In other words, if the historical-critical approach is the final authority on the meaning of the text, and the church only contributes to how this is shaped for sermons, then the church has surrendered the theological upper-hand to an approach to reading Scripture that it outside the bounds of the church’s designation for how Scripture should be read; namely, in canon form.

Do you have anything to say in support of this approach? Anything critical? Do you think it is good for the church to seek a hermeneutical approach that is exclusively Christian? If so, do you think the canonical approach qualifies?

Brevard Childs’ rationale for a canonical approach (Part I)

I have been slowly reading through Brevard S. Childs’ The New Testament as Canon: An Introduction. It has been stretching my thinking forcing me to ask if there is multiple approaches to reading Scripture as well as if there is any way to reconcile the historical-critical approach with a parallel approach to Scripture that uses the canonical context as the locus from which the church draws her doctrine. In the third chapter of this book, which is titeled “The Rational of a Canonical Approach”, Childs provides reasons for why he thinks a canonical reading should be taken seriously. Let me share them and then you can tell me what you think.

First, Childs criticizes the idea that the historical-critical approach is “suitable, indeed, mandatory for every correct reading of the Bible.” He insists that “different uses of the text require different approaches”. In Childs opinion the historical-critical approach cannot be universal. (p. 35) It is implicit here that there may be another more suitable way to read Scripture as Scripture when it comes to the life of the church.

Second, Childs points out that the there is no real uniform “historical-referential reading” of the text. (p. 36) Many introductions to the New Testament would seem to indicate this. It is important in his estimation that we let “secular historicism and ecclesiastical dogmatism” participate in a “subtle dialectical approach”. It seems to me that he sees the truth as lying somewhere in between these two.

Third, Childs is skeptical that the text “means” only what it meant in its historical origin. Sometimes the journey to find the authorial intent in the historical context brings forth fruitful insights. At other times it may actually hinder accurate interpretation.

Fourth, Childs argues that this approach from either liberal or conservative groups doesn’t do justice to “the New Testament in its function as authoritative, canonical literature of both an historical and a contemporary Christian community of faith and practice.”

For Childs the “meaning of the text” cannot be found by trying to separate what it “meant” to its audience and what it “means” now. Childs argues that “what is needed is a new vision of the biblical text which does justice not only to the demands of a thoroughly post-Enlightenment age, but also to the confessional stance of the Christian faith for which the sacred scriptures provide a true and faithful vehicle for understanding the will of God.” The theological issues that he sees as being at stake is “the Christian church’s claim for the integrity of a special reading which interprets the Bible within an established theological context and toward a particular end”. (p. 37)

Tomorrow I will say more on where he goes from here but for now let me ask two questions: (1) Do you share Childs’ concern that the historical-critical approach is both (a) not sufficient for church doctrine and life an (b) not an approach that allows the Bible to be the unique property of the church? (2) Do you think there is any way to approach Scripture with two different colored shades? The first being historical-critical, asking the questions historians ask and the second being a canonical-theological, taking Scripture seriously as the book of the church through which God speaks even now?

The function of a normative canon

According to Brevard S. Childs, “The function of a normative canon is to encompass the significance of the process within the contours of a normative text, and this multi-layered text this becomes the vehicle for the theological witness to the gospel.” For Childs the canon provides “a flexible framework” within which the church can continue to do Christian theology. This avoids the lack of flexibility found in “the historicist’s rigid model”. (The New Testament as Canon, 24)

A normative canon provides the arena in which Christian theology can be done. I think this is something that the church will do well to maintain. Too often we feel our theologizing much move to and fro with historical studies and secondary sources. But the canon has already been provided as that which stabilizes Christian doctrine and thought. Anything done outside a canonical context is ministerial to our understanding of the canon itself, not magisterial determining her meaning.

Theological debates regarding the canon

Brevard S. Childs

I have begun reading Brevard S. Childs’ The New Testament as Canon: An Introduction. Of this book Childs himself wrote, “There were few reviews that invariably turned to a defense of the historical critical method that appeared to these reviewers to be threatened, but the substance of my New Testament proposal was seldom addressed.” [1] There is something exciting about revisiting the argument of a book that the “scholarly consensus” ignored.

Toward the beginning he notes five areas of “theological debate regarding canon” that were taking place when he wrote the work (1984):

(1) Diversity of perspectives within the NT. What do we do with these? How can we discuss a canon that guides the church as Scripture if there seems to be internal tension?

(2) The usefulness and necessity of a “canon within a canon”. If we think Paul gives greater insight into the gospel that James is it OK to consider Paul’s canon within the great canon to be superior? What about within the Pauline corpus? Do the so-called “authentic” epistles gain place over the so-called Deutero-Pauline and Pastoral epistles?

(3) “How much theological authority can be attributed to the canonical decisions of the early church?” Do we see the canon as having any value in the books selected and the order decided?

(4) How does this impact our view of tradition? If tradition had any role in shaping the canon is there any sense in which we can continue to affirm sola scriptura with the Reformers? Childs asks if we need to go back toward sola traditio.

(5) How should canonicity impact exegesis?

These are excellent discussion starters! [2] I intend on sharing here the general conclusions reached by Childs as I move through the book. At this stage here is how I would tentatively approach answering:

(1) I would let the voices stand while seeking a sort of “harmony” that derives from the tension. I have addressed this in blog post prior to this one (e.g. here and here). My “model” is a choir or orchestra. No, the sounds are not the same but together they make something greater (more truthful) than the sum of their parts.

(2) I need to think on this one further. For instance, would I see Pauline theology as normative with the rest of the canonical witness needing to conform to this center? The Gospels? I don’t know. I think we are have a subconscious “canon within a canon”, but I don’t know if we should intentionally seek one.

(3) I think the early church should be given as much authority as regards canon formation as it has been the doctrine of the Trinity or the various Christological creeds and so forth.

(4) I think there may be a way to preserve sola scriptura (not solo scriptura) using the model of a constitution. A constitution is birthed due the the decisions of a evolving nation. So the tradition of the nation at that point has its hand in the formation of a constitution as well as various amendments. Nevertheless, the constitution, once formed, stands above the nation that made it and can in return reshape her. We may see an analogy in how the church relates to Scripture.

(5) As concerns canonical impact on exegesis let me provide two approaches. First, if someone is seeking to do historical-grammatical exegesis, then no, the canon doesn’t have impact on that task which I am beginning to see as more the historian’s task than the theologians. Second, if someone is trying to do Christian theology, then yes, the canon informs our reading of the text. Intercanonical and intertextual readings take precedent over the historiographical approaches when it comes to doctrine/dogma.

I know this is a random, here-and-there post addressing some preliminary concerns to a canonical reading, but if you have your own thoughts on the situations Childs mentions, or some thoughts on any of my preliminary answers, I welcome your comments!

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[1] Brevard S. Childs, The Church’s Guide for Reading Paul: The Canonical Shaping of the Pauline Corpus. 1.

[2] Brevard S. Childs, The New Testament as Canon: An Introduction. 20-21.

Multiple Approaches to Reading Scripture?

Is meaning in the canon?

Ever since the day that I read Brevard Childs’ The Church’s Guide to Reading Paul: The Canonical Shaping of the Pauline Corpus (Amazon.com) there has been a tug-of-war within me. There is something important about the historical-grammatical approach to Scripture, but there are times when the influence of historicism seems to lead to mere speculation that has no bearing on the thought and life of the Christian church. On the other hand, we have a canon of Scripture that has been handed to us by the church as a standard for such things. It is the canon of Scripture as chosen by the church through the guidance of the Holy Spirit that is Scripture for us (we can save the discussion on “who’s canon” for another time since there is a basic unity amongst major orthodox Christian tribes). Yet we do not want to de-historicize Scripture so that it becomes some sort of ethereal book.

The early church spoke of reading Scripture as literal/historical; allegorical;  moral; and anagogical/eschatological. I am a novice of interpretive history, but this seems to have been a dominate model until the Reformation. At that point it was “back to the sources” in an attempt to here the original authorial intent. This hermeneutic climaxed with F.D. E. Schleiermacher. For many this is the method that has been adopted. The text means what it meant through authorial intent.

Is there any sense in which the meaning can morph from being locked into static “history”? Is there a way in which we can approach Scripture from another angle? Let me say it this way: Can we read biblical text both from a historical perspective and from a canonical/dogmatic perspective?

If not, why not? If so, where to these two paradigms meet and how do these two paradigms influence the church?

This Year’s Christmas Books!

This year I got a great collection of books for Christmas (because, unlike some people, I have priorities). Let me share with the blogosphere!

David Alan Black. (1998) It’s Still Greek to Me: An Easy-to-Understand Guide to Intermediate Greek. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books. (Amazon.com)

I bought a used version of this little book. I want to make sure that I am thinking about my Greek Testament from more than a mere pragmatic “reading” approach. Often I do not think hard enough about the grammatical-syntactial aspects and that is no way to do scholarship. Along with several other books on my shelf, including the other book by Black mentioned just below, I will probably use a large part of January making sure I am thinking Greek when reading Greek rather than thinking English while reading Greek.

_______________. Learn to Read New Testament Greek: Expanded Edition. Nashville, TN: Broadman and Holman. (Amazon.com, Third Edition)

I think this will be a helpful book to work through in order to accomplish what I mentioned above. Is there anyone out there who has used this book much? If so, what do you think of it?

Peter C. Bouteneff. (2008) Beginnings: Ancient Christian Readings of the Biblical Creation Narratives. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic. (Amazon.com)

Since my Th.M. thesis is going to be titled, “The Creation Waits: The Epistle to the Romans as Pauline Interpretation of the Book of Genesis with Emphasis on 8.2-23″ it is going to be my goal to think deeply about the reception history of Genesis. Yes, the so-called “original context” of Genesis is interesting, but the Pauline reading is more important for what I am doing. While this book does not address the Pauline reading it does show a wide array of Christian readings which will be helpful in both (1) seeing how the church, since Paul, has read Genesis and (2) in helping create awareness of what is Pauline and post-Pauline as regards reading Genesis so that I do not transfer to much back into Paul. Bouteneff is an associate professor of theology at St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary so I expect a wide and solid knowledge of Christian interpretive history to be presented.

Brevard S. Childs. (2004) The Struggle to Understand Isaiah as Christian Scripture. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. (Amazon.com)

My only “in-class” class this upcoming semester will be on the Book of Isaiah. Child’s book traces the reception history of Isaiah from the early church to the modern era. As you may have noticed from the above paragraph one of my concerns is reception history, in part because, since reading Gadamer, I do not have much faith in so-called “objective, grammatical-historical” exegesis. We should aim for it, yes, but we should not be ignorant of our influences nor of those who have read the book before us. Child’s guide will people like Origen, Aquinas, Calvin and others, which I find helpful.

C. Kavin Rowe. (2006) Early Narrative Christology: The Lord in the Gospel of Luke. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic. (Amazon.com)

As I understand it, Rowe is an up-and-coming star as regards scholarship in Luke-Acts. Luke-Acts has been very influential in my own thinking, mostly because of my Pentecostal background. In a time when the Christology of the Synoptics has been lowered at an alarming rate  in modern scholarship this should be a challenging read to that flow. Rowe examines how Luke changed various Markan passages that related to “the Lord” in his own gospel and in doing so examines the unique Christological contribution of Luke.

J. Ross Wagner. (2003) Heralds of the Good News: Isaiah and Paul in Concert in the Letter to the Romans. Boston, MA: Brill Academic Publishers, Inc. (Amazon.com)

As noted above Isaiah will be one of my studies from January through April. I asked for this book for two reasons: (1) to assist in my study of Isaiah, so that I can understand the Pauline interpretation of this book and (2) it is similar to my forthcoming thesis work in that it will be tracing how Paul interprets a particular book from the Old Testament in Romans.

I am very excited about these reads along with a handful of others that I have mentioned to be on the dock.


Why Canonize the Pastoral Epistles?

Daniel Kirk has recently explained why he does not see the Pastoral Epistles as authentically Pauline (here). He presents these four major reasons which I will summarize here:

  1. The “theologizing” of the pastorals does not take the same approach as the rest of the Pauline corpus. Elsewhere Paul works from the Christ event outward. In the pastorals he works from principles and trust worthy sayings.
  2. Different theology proper and Christology.
  3. “The Greek is different.”
  4. “Theologically they are different, especially the ways that 1 Timothy and Titus reflect on the Law and Judaism.”

While I think these reasons are good it seems to me that there is so much more to the discussion that I remain unconvinced (though I recommend reading his full post before making any judgment since my summary is just that). As it can be seen in the comments there are problems with this theory such as the personal references, the dating of these epistles, the awkwardness of something this misleading being accepted so quickly into the Pauline corpus, as well as criticism of the reasons he has given. At the end of the day I don’t think we have enough evidence either way to make a definitive statement on the matter.

If these letters are not authentically Pauline it does very little to my faith. It doesn’t even seem that a huge impact would be made on Pauline theology. But I do question canonization.

I have seen Brevard Child’s reason for canonization in spite being pseudepigraphical but I find it unconvincing. This is not because I think (1) canonization is intertwined with inerrancy or even (2) canonization is intertwined with apostolic authority (e.g. Matthew may not have been written by Matthew the disciple of Jesus, the same with John). Rather, it seems that this is more than an issue of inerrancy. The content of the whole epistle is based on deception. That is the real problem that I would have.

Similarly, if the pastorals are as divergent from Paul as many say it makes me worry a bit about the content. It may be as small as the difference between Paul and James or Paul and Matthew, but neither of those works are written in the name of Paul. To use Paul’s name to say something that Paul would not have said is shady.

If the pastoral epistles are not Pauline we should drop them from the life of the church. At best we should give them the status of the Didache which gives us very useful insight into the early church without being authoritative. This is my humble opinion though.

Do you agree or disagree? If you are one who thinks the pastorals were written by someone other than Paul do you still find them useful for the life of the church in any meaningful way. If so, why?

Reading Paul Canonically and/or Historically

As I listened to Kevin J. Vanhoozer’s fantastic lecture from last week’s Wheaton Theology Conference (here) it struck me that he addresses a problem similar to that noted the day before by Richard B. Hays and Marianne Meye Thompson. Their criticism of historical Jesus studies was that this approach often creates a new “canon” through which we theologize about Christ. Rather than doing our Christology through the constitution of the church it is determined that it would be better to do it through the ever evolving rules of historical criticism. In the end we find that often we have lost the Christ of the church yet we have not gained any coherent Christ of the academy either. Instead, every Christ we find oddly looks a lot like our own face in the mirror.

It could be that we are in danger of doing this very thing with Paul. Vanhoozer mentioned the late Brevard S. Child’s The Church’s Guide to Reading Paul: The Canonical Shaping of the Pauline Corpus as the one important work on Paul with which he has not seen Wright interact. In this book, which I have read, Childs takes his canonical reading approach from Old Testament studies crossing it over into New Testament studies. It is Childs proposal that we read Paul as the church has intended us to read Paul which can be found in the “Pauline” works includes in the Pauline corpus and the greater New Testament canon. This leads to “Scripture interpreting Scripture” giving reason for the placement of the Book of Acts and the Book of Hebrews as well as the inclusion of the more contentious Pastoral Epistles. The goal is not to read Paul, per se, as an individual. Rather, it is to read Paul as he has been passed to us through the church in the order that the church believes his central theological message, in the context of the canon, is to be heard.

Childs’ proposal is scary because it demands an odd paradigm shift. It is a shift backward. It is a return to how the church has read the Scriptures for most of three quarters of her history. It is an assertion that the human authors find their voice not in individual theologies but an ecclesiastical choir that is orchestrated by Holy Spirit who led the church to include those voices that would harmonize (with some tensions) the grand theological scheme of Christianity.

I am not sure if I am willing to make this shift all the way. On one hand, it seems that a both-and approach to Paul may be necessary. We need to read Paul as Paul the historical theologian attempting to understand his own voice in order to prevent it from eventually being lost in this or that generations theological concerns. On the other hand, we do not have access to the mind of Paul nor the historical context within which he function. We do have his writings and we have them as the church has given them to us. The church gave them in a particular order to emphasis particular aspects of his thoughts that would be ecclesiastical–for the whole church for all times. This is, in part, what makes these writings “Scripture”.

While I am not sure how to navigate this tension as of yet it does seem that there is a sense in which we need to do (1) Pauline theology and (2) Christian theology with a Pauline contribution. I am not really sure what that means though.

Brevard Childs on The Elusive, Historical Paul of Tarsus

Let me know what you think of this quote from Brevard Childs’ The Church’s Guide for Reading Paul (pg. 256):

…the search for the historical Paul will remain elusive because of the very theological nature of the New Testament itself. The historical Paul of the first century has been transmitted by Christian tradents who have received and shaped their testimony into the form of the canonical Paul. This canonical image is not a fictional caricature, but a historical vehicle of the Christian gospel (geschichtlich)and was seen and preserved by a community of faith, the impact from which continued to shape their lives long after Paul’s death.

In other words, “the repeated frustrations of serious biblical scholars to reconstruct the theology of the historical Paul” is due to the fact that no matter how valuable our historical research has been for Pauline studies, it should be secondary to the passed down, canonical Paul, because the canonical Paul is who we have been given. Any attempt at finding the historical Paul will always be difficult because we have to find him through the Paul of the church.

Charlie Shepherd Interpreting Brevard Childs Interpreting the Apostle Paul

Nijay K. Gupta has called upon the expertise of a fellow Durham student by the name of Charlie Shepherd to help explain the complex hermeneutical approach of the late Brevard Childs as regards the Pauline corpus. If you have read Brevard Childs, or if you are interested in studying Paul, I think you will find Shepherd’s guest-analysis helpful. He provides an introduction the Childs’ methodology, which I wish I would have read before reading the book. To read the post, click here.

I recently read Childs’ The Church’s Guide for Reading Paul and I found it to be an enjoyable, complex read that at some points led me deep into the mind of the Apostle and at other times left me asking how in the world I was going to fit Childs’ categories into my own preconceived ideas regarding Paul and the New Testament canon. Of course, there were also other times where I had no idea what to think of what I had just read.

UPDATE: Gupta has written part two of this series. Read here.

The Canonical Function of The Book of Acts

Brevard Childs understands the function of the Book of Acts to be the following:

At a period in the early church at the beginning of the second century, long before the threat of Marcion, the book of Acts served to establish the legitimacy of the Pauline interpretation of the gospel, along with the other apostles, as the truthful apostolic witness to the crucified and resurrected, living Lord of the church. (The Church’s Guide for Reading Paul, p. 226)

Childs argues this because Acts did not circulate as early as the Gospel of Luke as an authoritative document for the church. While modern scholarship focuses on the connection between Luke-Acts (because it has the same author), Childs emphasizes that the canonical shaping of the New Testament first split Luke and Acts so that Luke could be included in the circulating four-fold Gospel (which along with the developing Pauline corpus begins the earliest authoritative “canons” that went from church to church). Acts meanwhile did not enjoy the same quick acceptance.

Acts therefore began to find its place in the canon not as Luke-Acts, but rather after the Fourth Gospel and before the Pauline corpus, as a means of connecting the authoritative Gospels of Jesus with the authoritative writings of Paul. Acts moves from Jesus to the apostle to most specifically the Apostle Paul as such:

Gospels (the Jesus stories) —-> Book of Acts (Jesus to Paul)
—–> Pauline Corupus

The Book of Hebrews and the Catholic Epistles that follow are also, according to Childs, effected by this canonical ordering which mentions those like James and Peter, and therefore validates those New Testament works attributed to them. As Childs says,

…the canonical function of Acts emerges with clarity. It consists primarily of presenting the apostles as the legitimate guardians of the Jesus traditions, strengthened by the connection with the catholic letters of Peter, James, and John, and the portrait of Paul in Acts as in agreement with that of his letters. (p. 231)