The next post is a guest post by a much-respected friend-of-a-friend who blogs here:
http://www.shermankuek.net/ ... to clarify, I'm not at all sure if he's a TE or not, and by posting this here I am not trying to say that he is a TE. But I feel that what he has to say is relevant within the ongoing series of articles about Scripture.
================
In the academia, there sometimes seems to be a strange sense of competition among scholars of different fields. It is a rivalry for dominance and primacy, each claiming his field of expertise to take a position of greater significance than the rest.
This is true not just of all fields, but also particularly of the field of theology. Even in talking about God, a very human tendency can sometimes overwhelm. We eventually come to hear overtones that seem to claim my field of study to be of greater significance than yours. In fact, such claims are most often made in the absence of the other accused parties so that they are not around to defend their rightful legitimacy in scholarship. This is most unjust and unethical for the spirit of healthy scholarship.
Theology, as it stands today, consists of various fields of specialised expertise: biblical theology, philosophical theology, historical theology, practical theology, and various other such fields.
Take, for example, the biblical theologian who claims dominance and self-sufficiency, thereby ignoring the legitimate contributions of the other fields of theological scholarship. She may claim, Scripture is our rule of faith, hence, biblical theology is sufficient for engaging the needs of the world today. We do not need to articulate anything that goes beyond the confines of scripture. We are Christians, hence, the bible to us is all sufficient. Anything more than that is unnecessarily erroneous. Underlying this claim for significance are some very telling assumptions embraced by the claimer.
Firstly, there is the assumption that the contents of scripture pertain to every dimension of life. In that case, then what does scripture say about stem cell research and human cloning? Absolutely nothing. Even when scripture does contain seemingly synonymous situations to those of contemporary situations like, say, war, one cannot take for granted that warfare in scripture is entirely synonymous to contemporary warfare; such a naïve assumption would require too big a leap and may lead to too simplistic a conclusion. In order for us to engage the contemporary realities of the world, more needs to be said than mere scripture-quoting; and this is the task of the
theological ethicist. Scripture says much, but it does not say
everything. It provides sufficient knowledge to bring humankind to an enlightened understanding of Gods story, but it does not exhaustively present ethical prescriptions for the community of faith that seeks to be a continuation of Gods story in the here-and-now. The theological ethicist brings the task of scriptural interpretation towards contemporary relevance, thereby emerging with more informed prescriptions of life in the present order. Whenever the biblical theologian tries to undertake the task of the theological ethicist by prescribing what scriptural principles mean for the ethical faith community
today, she does so deficiently, for she is not trained to take into consideration various other non-negotiable factors.
Secondly, there is an assumption that doing biblical theology is the safest way to prevent one from pandering to hermeneutical bias. For a scholar to claim that the only trustworthy answers are to be found in scripture is already to betray her own culturally conditioned understanding of scripture. Where does the scholar acquire her hermeneutical lenses from? Or is the scholar ignoring the reality that there is no hermeneutical effort that can exist in a truly objective cultural vacuum? Because this assumption itself stems from an era of Christian history when it was thought that the epistemological enterprise could take place devoid of subjective cultural passions; this in itself was a
culture dominating the scholarship of that era. Today, it is the
contextual theologian who alerts all readers that no hermeneutics exist in a state of undisputed objectivity. The establishment of a science of interpretation that assumes the possibility of having no bias in ones hermeneutical endeavour is itself a bias! And this is a bias that a contextual theologian readily admits to; perhaps the biblical theologian should do the same.
Thirdly, there is an assumption that doing biblical theology is simply about returning to scripture without having to take into due consideration the voices of other interpreters throughout the history of the faith community. It is thought that returning to scripture preserves the purity and simplicity of the faith. But it is purely and simply naïve. History has evidenced how the Protestant Reformation eventually broke out into a plethora of split after split because groups of people wanted to return to scripture without taking into consideration the scriptural interpretation of the church fathers and contemporary scholars. To continue uncritically in that tradition is to not have learned from our painful past. It is the
historical theologian who rides upon the foundational interpretive task of the biblical theologian and brings to light the wisdom of past voices. It is the historical theologian who tells us what scripture says today in the light of what our church fathers have witnessed together
with scripture.
In theological scholarship, we must never say, No, I! Humility is a most fundamental and non-negotiable component of theological scholarship. When the community of scholars gathers in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, we acknowledge the intertwining of our spirits and minds as a Trinitarian community. In that attitude, we confess, I cannot do without you, and we cannot do without the voice of the Spirit. Then this will truly reflect the beauty of theology in all its abounding fullness.
Yes, we.