History and Hermeneutics

What is the relationship between history and theology? How does our understanding of history suffer in not having a theological account of history? And vice versa, how does our theology suffer when we go about carrying out our theology ahistorically? These are the questions that Murray Rae, theology lecturer at University of Otago, seeks to answer in his History and Hermeneutics (London: T&T Clark, 2005).

Rae begins in the 1st two chapters by covering the overview of the history and current status of the relationship between theology and history as it is in the areas of historiography and theology. He summarises the thoughts and contributions of Descartes, Spinoza, Hermann Reimarus, G.E. Lessing, Hegel, D.F. Strauss, Ernst Troeltsch and the Jesus Seminar under the field of historiography, and the thoughts of contributions of Martin Kahler, Rudolf Bultmann, Karl Barth, Ernst Kasemann, Oscar Cullmann, Wolfhart Pannenberg, Hans Frei, and N.T. Wright under the field of theology. His conclusion is that largely, there has been a divorce between historical and theological study, and that this divorce takes two forms –

“The first seeks to protect theology from the alleged vagaries of history, while the second seeks to protect history from the allegedly ephemeral and speculative claims of theology. Both strategies are premised on the conviction that history and divine action are mutually exclusive categories and that it is improper, therefore, at least in academic circles, to speak of God’s participation in the unfolding nexus of historical life.” (p.4).

The divorce is seen especially in biblical studies, where in the first form, the Christian faith is sought to be set free from the historical narratives of the Christian faith such that its essence is not dependent on the truth or falsity of the New Testament’s historical claims (e.g. Bultmann and his account of resurrection). The second form is the reverse where history is sought to be set free from faith such that the Gospels must be purged of their dogmatic content in order to lay bare the truth of who Jesus really was (e.g. the Jesus Seminar). Rae suggests that even those who attempt to bring historiography and theology together in their prolegomena risk establishing one on the other, and hence in that way actually rendering them asunder (e.g. N.T. Wright who privileges and founds his study of historiography-theology in the fields of ‘autonomous’ historical enquiry alone; or Hans Frei who commits the ‘opposite’ error in not extending far enough the results of his historiography-theology study to give critical attention to ‘what history is’, even reworking the concept of history if necessary).

That is the task Murray Rae undertakes in chapter 3 – to give a theological account of history. And to begin to do so, Rae turns to the Bible, for “the Bible is a theological account of history. It is an account that is shaped by the conviction that all that takes place does so within the context of God’s providential care [and may I add, God’s involvement] for the created order” (p.49). While the tradition of Western historiography which privileges a secular account of history and dispense with any divine involvement of God may lead one to think that Rae’s starting point is ill-founded, Rae is right in stating that there is no a priori basis upon which to decide whether God has or has not acted. Rather, we should reckon with the conviction of Israel that ‘its own history as a people is inaugurated by God and is shaped throughout by God’s action’ and not just simply dismiss this claim in advance! (p.50).

With the above working assumption in place, Rae turns to consider the opening move of creation ex nihilo and its implications for our understanding of history. Here, he refers to the work of Colin Gunton and states three implications: Firstly, that the world was brought forth by God ‘out of nothing’ implies that God creates with some purpose in mind and that the world is invested with a telos. History, then, can be understood as the ‘space and time opened up for the world to become what it is intended to be’ (p.51). Secondly, the idea of creation out of nothing means the world is fully God’s world. A Manichean view where history is seen as a struggle between opposing forces is thus ruled out, and instead history is ‘confessed to have an overall coherence under the creative, providential and redemptive care of God’ (p.51). Thirdly, the creation of the world should be seen as the act of the Triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and ‘because God is already, ‘in advance’ of creation, a communion of persons existing in loving relations, it becomes possible to say that he does not need the world, and so is able to will the existence of something else simply for its own sake’ (p52 quoting Gunton). The further implication flowing from this truth is that human action is given value in its own right and is not simply the necessary unfolding of God’s own being. History and human responsibility go hand in hand, and conversely this means that human action requires some notion of the purpose of history as a whole to evaluate it ethically. But human action does not negate God’s sovereignty. That creation is a triune act enables us to speak of God’s continuing action in the world via His son becoming incarnate in the midst of history and His Spirit poured out on all flesh. At the same time, God’s sovereignty also does not negate human action – human agency in history is directed toward the fulfilment of the divine purpose. Rae states it well:

“We have observed […] the biblical conviction that God enlists human participation in the working out of his purpose. Again, it is in Jesus Christ that such participation reaches its fulfilment – his human life of obedience to God, his death, his resurrection and his ascension, is the series of events that truly make history. It is through Christ that God restores the world to its true purpose. By sending then his Holy Spirit, who bestows gifts and fruits for truly human life, Christ ensures that our own human action may become, under the impact and empowerment of that Spirit, a like participation in God’s purpose.” (p.54)

God himself is bringing creation to its goal, and that lays the foundation to our theological understanding of history where history is seen as the time and space opened up for creation to be what God intended to be. It is the action of God that gives history its purpose and directs it towards its goal. The actions of God are seen in the divine promise given (Gen 12:1-3) and climaxed in the incarnation and resurrection of Christ, and it is from Christ that history defines its meaning and telos. Rae again on this:

“The resurrection of Jesus from the dead is God’s vindication of this man and his history as the means through which participation in his coming kingdom is opened up. We may say therefore that through the death and resurrection of Christ God’s action makes history. It is through the series of events that make up the life of Jesus of Nazareth that creation’s destiny is secured and its meaning revealed. [... It is] the event in the midst of history that secures the fulfilment of God’s promise and brings creation to its goal.” (p.61)

And that’s what Murray Rae goes on to do in chapter 4 – to look further into the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Against the common thinking in historiography that belief in the resurrection renders the evidence of the Gospels problematic one way or another, Rae advocates the opposite: “The resurrection is that which enables us to see the history of Jesus aright.” (p.67) But yet Rae concedes that ‘seeing’ the resurrection is not possible within the prevailing canons of historical-critical enquiry, not because the resurrection is not an historical event, but because historians have construed history as a causal series from which God is excluded. Instead, seeing the resurrection is only possible by faith – under the impact of the reality of the risen Christ himself. In another words, ‘seeing’ the resurrection is only possible by grace, and is dependent upon the self-disclosure of the risen Christ himself (Rae himself provides an insightful exegesis of Luke 24 in p.80-84 to substantiate his point). But seen in light of that reality, the resurrection is seen as a definitive event – it is the decisive clue in understanding who Jesus is. Taking the lead from Pannenberg, Rae contends the resurrection not just reveals what is true of Jesus anyway, but the resurrection itself is constitutive of Jesus as the Messiah – constitutive of Jesus as the one in and through whom God brings about his new creation. “Only the Easter event determines what the meaning was of the pre-Easter history of Jesus and who he was in relation to God.” (p.76 quoting Pannenberg). More than that, the resurrection is also transformative and eschatological – transformative in the sense that resurrection bursts the bounds of the present order and transforms our understanding of history itself. And eschatological in the sense that right now in the midst of history, there is a foretaste of what is to come. And not only foretaste, but an actual participation in that reality and making of history.

“For it is the Spirit who unites us with Christ and enables our life now to be a participation in the making of history. The history that we now live matters because if lived in the power of the Spirit, or not, it is gathered, or not, into that final consummation of all things that is the kingdom of God.” (p.79).

At this point, the discerning reader may realise that Rae’s theological account of history is circular – it requires one to be under the ‘reconstrued’ reality of history brought about through the resurrection event before one can appreciate the theological account of history! In another words, a theological account of history requires faith! And this is the premise that Rae goes on to defend in the next two chapters – to defend his prolegomena of the theological account of history given by him. In chapter 5, he challenges the common view in historiography that telling the truth about history is merely a reporting of what would have been apparent to the naked eye, and instead advances ‘an account of ‘seeing’ that has less to do with ocular perception and more to do with comprehending what has taken place’ (p.86 his emphasis). Rae contends that all interpretation of history require historical judgements, and that all historical judgements are selective, approximate and provisional in nature, and are conditioned by one’s background beliefs about the way the world is constituted. In another words, the perception of historical reality is ultimately a hermeneutical activity. Belief helps us to see. And because the resurrection does nothing less than call our existing worldviews into challenge by presenting a new conception of history and God’s involvement in our world, we will never see the resurrection rightly unless God first enables us to. By our natural selves and on our own, we will be kept from recognising the risen Christ because that reality is one which contradicts our entire natural conception of how the world is constituted. “What is required is conversion, a new way of seeing that takes its starting place from the reconfiguration of things brought about through the incarnation, and through the life, death, and resurrection of Christ.” (p.103) In chapter 6, Rae confronts the widespread contemporary prejudice in theology and biblical studies against the reliability of testimony and the authority of tradition, suggesting that such prejudice originates from rationalism. Instead, he rehabilitates and infuses confidence back into an epistemology derived from testimony and tradition, suggesting that the testimony itself is the fruit of sustained critical reflection on the meaning and implications of Jesus of Nazareth, while the passing on of the testimony through tradition in turn validates the authority of the testimony (p.130).

In the final chapter, Rae discusses the topic ‘The Ecclesial Reading of Scripture’. While seeming to stand apart from the rest of the argument of the book thus far, my guess is that Rae includes this chapter as a means of rounding up his argument – if a theological account of history depends on Scripture, which in turn is influenced by how we read Scripture within the realm of faith against the backdrop of testimony and tradition, then the community of faith will be the primary and normative locus for the interpretation of the Bible. Rae begins by discussing the concept of ‘meaning of the text’, advocating neither a determinate meaning (the form of interpretation which sees only a single meaning inherent in the text) nor an indeterminate or anti-determinate meaning (the form of interpretation which seeks to deconstruct established interpretive certainties in the name of the excluded ‘other’), but instead going for a definition of meaning where meaning is not reducible to a property of the text independent of its relation to context, but rather arises out of that text’s relationship to the context, and more rightly so contexts which the text finds itself speaking in. Because the people receiving the word ultimately is one community – the church, be it the Jew or the Gentile, there is only one common community as the receiver of the word. But this community spreads across time and space, and hence arises for the multiple level of contexts the text speaks in, all of which are integrated and interdependent in some way (p.131-134). In another words, Rae’s definition of meaning is dependent upon the text’s relation to its context or circumstance. While this leads some to wonder if there are any limits and controls to Rae’s definition of ‘meaning’, and how we can know if a reading is legitimate or not, Rae answers his own question by stating that any meaning in order to be legitimate has to be answerable and accountable to the ‘role played by the text in question within the book from which it is taken, within the collection of books that is the canon, within the community that has bound these books into its Bible, and within the worldwide community that is constituted precisely by the acceptance of and participation in the biblical story of God’s dealings with his people’ (p.135). In another words, the legitimacy of the meaning of a text is determined by its relation to the divine economy – the singular reality that constitutes the unity of the Bible! This is why readings of the bible which justify apartheid or national socialist readings are erroneous – they cannot conform and are irresponsible to the divine economy. This is also the controlling factor that distinguishes Rae’s definition from the anti-determinate definitions – such anti-determinate readings have no such control! But Rae is realistic – he recognises that such a definition does not serve as a method to avoid errant readings, but rather for identifying them when they occur. Ultimately, the different contexts should really be seen as different levels of an ever-broadening context showing the unfolding story of the relation between God and his world. Rae states:

“In the end, God defines himself through this story, and supremely so through the incarnation of his Word. It is in the event of incarnation worked out through the life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus of Nazareth that the meaning of the story, and thus of the diverse partial telling of the story, is once and for all disclosed. […] The meaning of the text is thus a matter of the role it plays in this story of the God who goes his way among his people and who, through His Word and Spirit, gathers all things and successively embraces countless ‘others’ into reconciled communion with himself. This is the overarching context in which the meaning of the text is to be discerned.” (p.139-140)

This is why ecclesial reading of Scripture is normative, rather than just one among many options. For it is in the community of the church that we are not just the readers of the text, but we are actually participating in the reality of which these texts are speaking about! This is why the church is privileged in our reading and interpretation, not because we are any smarter or more enabled in our own resources, but because we the church exists and does all our reading of Scripture ‘predicated upon the grace and faithfulness of God’ (p.150).

Overall, Rae’s History and Hermeneutics is a book worth reading, and one which commends much to reflect upon. Though it is relatively brief (about 160 pages), it is packed with ideas and discussion on prolegomena, the concept of historiography, doctrines of creation, Christology, eschatology, and hermeneutics, all held together by the truth of this God who has created the world and who continues to be involved in providential care of it, and whose involvement reaches its climax in the incarnation, life, death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus, and the pouring out of His Spirit which genuinely grounds the authenticity of human action under the sovereignty of God, and opens our eyes as the church to see this reality as the world heads towards God’s intended purpose for it. This is what gives history and existence meaning.

Robert Jenson and 5 perspectival points on reading Scripture

In his essay ‘Scripture’s Authority in the Church’ in The Art of Reading Scripture (ed. Ellen Davis & Richard Hays; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003), 27-37, theologian Robert Jenson offers 5 perspectival points for reading Scripture. I shall try to summarise them:

1) The church needs to remember that our attitude and approach to the Bible will be very different from that of the world. It is only the church that gathers together to hear what is said in the Bible and submit herself under its authority. Jenson states, “What Christians call the Bible, or Scripture, exists as a single entity because – and only because – the church gathered these documents for her specific purpose: to aid in preserving her peculiar message, to aid in maintaining across time, from the apostles to the End, the self-identity of her message that the God of Israel has raised his servant Jesus from the dead.” (p.27) Therefore, the church needs to be blatant and unabashed in reading Scripture for the church’s purpose and within the context of Christian faith and practice - a reading guided by church doctrine (p.28)

2) We need to recognise the narrative unity that is present in the Bible. The gospel is a message about an event – the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus – and so itself has the form of a narrative. In another words, what is present in Scripture as a unified whole is narrative unity, and the church should read Scripture recognising ‘the single plotted succession of events, stretching from creation to consummation, plotted around exodus and resurrection’ (p.29). This means that ‘in the church any passage of Scripture is to be read for its contribution to the telling of Scripture’s whole story’ (p.29).

3) Not only is there a narrative in Scripture, it is an over-arching narrative. “Scripture’s story is not a part of some larger narrative; it is itself the larger narrative of which all other true narratives are parts.” (p.34). As Jenson highlights, this means that ‘not only is Scripture within the church, but we, the church, are within Scripture – that is, our common life is located inside the story Scripture tells.” (p.30). This in turn means that certain ways of construing scriptural authority is not right. We must not think of Scripture as an information base for some entity outside the story – be it God or classical religious experiences or theological history of Israel or the primal church – since we are living in that story, there is no position from which such a ‘third-party outside view’ can be conducted. This also means that we must not think that before we can apply the Scripture passage to us, we first have to grasp it insofar as it is not about ourselves. While a proposition of Paul or the story of Samson happens in its community, we stand on the same line of continuity as the common community of interpretation. Positively, Jenson advocates a playwright analogy of understanding Scriptural authority. He suggests: “Scripture is authoritative for us, as characters in the story that it tells, somewhat as the existing transcript of an unfinished play is determinative of what can be true and right for its characters in the part that remains to be written.” (p.32). Sounds Vanhoozer-ish at this point? But there are differences. Jenson suggests that the third act is not written, but ‘when he does, he will do it as the same author who wrote the first two’ (p.32). I believe Vanhoozer would not agree with this or he would put it in a different way – the Script is complete, the final act is penned down and the whole drama is awaiting its final end and conclusion, though the performance is still going on and heading towards that direction. But both Jenson and Vanhoozer agree on this – The grand story told in Scripture is not only the story of the characters created by the author but is also the story of the author as a character in his own play. The story is also fundamentally God’s story. The end state of this hermeneutical perspective – “Scripture is not a set of clues from which to figure out God, for the story it tells is itself the truth of God.” (p.33)


4) Since we now live the story Scripture tells, Scripture does not merely inform us, but when we read Scripture in the church, Scripture addresses us. And the voice that addresses us is the Word of God, the Logos, the second identity of the Trinity. Jenson goes on to suggest, rather interestingly, therefore that the voice that speaks in the Old Testament is that of the pre-existent Christ, just as the New Testament is the voice of his continuing prophetic activity. Jenson gives the example of Isaiah – when the prophet describes the servant as a “man of sorrows and acquainted with grief”, it is really Christ’s own testimony to his own character, given by the mouth of his prophet. Hence, we should not be afraid to ‘find Jesus in the Old Testament’. I have to admit this is a somewhat controversial point, but one that is definitely food for thought.

5) In the light of all this, the best way to experience the authority of Scripture is to see how Scripture is privileged in the life of the church – privileged in such a way as to fundamentally shape its life. As Jenson wittily says, “To experience the authority of Scripture, this is the chief thing to do: Hang out with Scripture, on a particular corner, the corner where there is a little crowd gathered around someone telling about the resurrection.” (p.36)

Moving Beyond the Bible to Theology

I know the very title of this post might discomfort some: “What do you mean by ‘moving beyond’ the Bible? Are we supposed to ever move beyond the Bible?” But this is really the title of a book I’ve just finished reading – Four Views on Moving Beyond the Bible to Theology (ed. Gary Meadors; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2009). In this book, a power packed cast of writers provide their different understandings of how they move from the Bible to theology or how they take the words or message of the Bible and apply it to modern day contexts and situations which the writers of Scripture never had to contend with - the most popular situations as presented in the book being the issue of abolition of slaves, women teaching, and (as presented by one contributor) transsexuality.


The first contributor is Walter Kaiser with the Principalising model, where Kasier states that we in fact don’t have to move beyond Scripture in the sense of taking the words of Scripture off on some trajectory to enable it to meet our present day contexts and situations. Rather, Scripture itself already has to full capacity to address these issues. What is needed, rather is to move through what he calls the ‘Ladder of Abstraction’ to sieve out and state ‘the general principle that embodies what is seen in the specificity, culture, and times of the text’ and then to ‘apply (that principle) to our day in corresponding specifics that elaborate on the same general principle’ (p.50). In a somewhat convoluted essay, the second contributor Daniel M. Doriani presents his Redemptive-Historical model, which seems like the standard grammatical-historical method, except that a much greater weight and attention is given to the location of the passage within salvation history. In another words, it is biblical theology resulting in a stronger Christocentric focus. So far so good, except that at this point Doriani introduces other factors such as allowing narrative to have its say in directing us in theology and ethics (p.87); casuistry (p.100), and asking ‘questions the Bible endorses’ (p.102), which really serve to confuse rather than illuminate his presentation. Third up is Kevin Vanhoozer, who presents his (curtains up and to no surprise) Drama of Redemption model. In this model, Christian living is seen as a fitting participation in God’s Theodrama, which He has graciously invited us to be part of. The Bible, in this case, serves as the script for a fitting participation, but yet a fitting participation is not just merely performing out the Script as it is, but rather it requires improvisation – which involves knowing how a portion of the Script fits in with the wider whole (what Vanhoozer calls ‘canon sense’: “To read with canon sense [...] is to read figurally or typologically, which is to say with the conviction that there is an underlying theodramatic consistency and coherence that underlies and unifies the whole.” (p.180)); and to see and learn from the previous performances of other saints and to understand the context ones is in (what Vanhoozer calls ‘catholic sensibility’ p.181). In another words, a faithful performance is when one performs or inhabits not so much the ‘world behind the text’ or even ‘the world of the text’, but rather ‘the world in front of the text’ or ‘the world implied by the text’. In another words, a fitting performance is when one cultivates theodramatic vision – when we ‘move beyond the script and become faithful performances of the world it implies by cultivating minds nurtured on the canon’, when our minds, hearts and imagination are trained and disciplined to think, desire, see – and then do – reality as it is in Jesus Christ’ (p.170). It is hence not surprising that doctrine, for Vanhoozer is largely formative – to so shape our thinking and imagination that we become people who habitually make good theodramtic judgements as to who God is, what He is doing, and hence what we must do in response (p.178). The final contributor is William Webb, who presents his Redemptive-Movement model, which is mainly concerned to find the ‘trajectory or logical extension of the Bible’s (or passage’s) redemptive spirit that carries Christians to an ultimate ethic’ (p.217). Due to this model’s frequent association with other more ‘out there’ hermeneutical theories which involve launching the meaning of the passage off on a trajectory which often ends up where the reader’s whims and fancies lead them to, Webb has to spend a proportionate time responding to the misconceptions and defending his model. Webb does not deny the NT as final and definitive revelation, but ‘understanding the NT as final and definitive revelation does not automatically mean that the NT contains the final realisation of social ethics in all of its concrete particulars’ (p.246). In another words, I think it is the ethical application of the passage that Webb allows for a trajectory to an ‘ultimate ethic’, one which may or may not be seen within the pages of the Bible itself. What makes this book worth it’s price is an additional three reflections from Mark Strauss, Al Wolters (who provides an interesting argument for general revelation which together with special revelation helps us to move ‘beyond the bible’ in these contentious issues p.317-19), and Chris Wright (who suggests that a further perspective that needs to be taken into account is that of a missional hermeneutics – since Scripture is about mission or since Scripture is to be read with a missional hermeneutic, then the direction and paradigm in which we go beyond Scripture in thinking through issues must also have a missional direction).

I conclude with three comments. Firstly, it is comforting and encouraging to know that all four writers are thoroughly convinced of the nature and authority of Scripture. While they may be convicted to varying degrees over the sufficiency and perspicuity of Scripture , all four writers recognise the need to submit oneself to the Word of God. Perhaps the deeper question discussed here is not Is Scripture authoritative but rather How is Scripture authoritative? Secondly, the answer to the How question varies, but each polarity is not without its own difficulties. For example, Kaiser’s principlising model states that there is no need to move beyond Scripture – Scripture contains (timeless?) principles that are more than sufficient to answer any situation in any context (he shows this by considering women leadership, euthanasia, abortion, stem cell research, slave abolition etc.), but the deeper question that remains (as pointed out by the other contributors) is whose principles? i.e. what is there to guide me to ensure that I draw out the right principle, or what is there to prevent two people from drawing out contrary principles? Kaiser would answer, “Solid exegesis!”, but the exegesis of certain passages can be tricky at times and not as simplistic as Kaiser makes it out to be (for e.g. his exegesis of 1 Tim 2:12 to justify his egalitarian position). As David Clark (To know and love God) puts it, “principlizing obscures the fact that any articulation of the allegedly transcultural principles still reflects the culture of the translators.” There is no such thing as propositions free from cultural bias or worldview (p.276). On the other polarity, someone like Webb faces the same criticism. How do we determine the ‘ultimate ethic’ of the text? Webb would answer, “By the redemptive spirit of the text!”, but whose spirit? Isn’t it of the reader at the end of the day? Or the Holy Spirit? Either way, Webb (as Strauss points out) runs the risk of being unable to provide a definite answer by labelling “meaning” as ‘something not part of the human author’s communicative intent as expressed through speech-acts (p.290). Even Vanhoozer cannot escape this difficulty. What is the measure by which we use to define faithful performance? What is the measure of faithful improvisation? (Questions asked by Wolters p.316) Though I think Vanhoozer provides us a hint of his answer in his essay - It is the rule of love, the way of wisdom. A faithful performance, a fitting improvisation is one which corresponds to the dramatis personae himself – God as revealed in Jesus – full of love, full of wisdom. As Vanhoozer himself states, “The way forward is the way of wisdom – to walk in such a manner that one corresponds in one’s whole being-in-act to God’s prior-in-act. The wise disciple is the one who discerns, deliberates, and does the truth, goodness, and beauty that is the love of God in Jesus Christ.” (p.186). My third and final comment is this book is really a mistitle. I was expecting to learn how one can move beyond the Bible to Theology, thinking doctrine and systematic theology. But that does not seem to be the main emphasis here. Instead, a more accurate title should be ‘Moving Beyond the Bible to Ethics’.

5 Hermeneutical Horizons when thinking about Eschatology

In the last chapter of his The Hermeneutics of Doctrine, Anthony Thiselton provides 7 hermeneutical horizons we should consider when considering eschatology. They are:

Promise. For the Christian, the expectation and hope of the future acts of God and hence our human destiny is grounded on a perceived gap between what God has promised and what has so far come about. It is this very gap that forms the basis of the fundamental of “not yet” of biblical and Christian eschatology. It projects hope toward the future (p.541).

Community. The second horizon of community stands in contrast with the common individual focus or horizon which we often bring to our thinking on eschatology. We often think of the four traditional “last things” – namely death, judgement, heaven and hell, from an individual focus and reduce the foreground of biblical eschatology that focuses on the cosmic, world events of the Parousia, the last judgement, and the resurrection of the dead to the background. Biblical eschatology more often than not has the world, creation and community as its immediate loci of discussion.

Resurrection of the dead. Our hermeneutical horizons on eschatology in turn are confirmed by this one – the resurrection of the dead. As Thiselton puts it, “The ground for belief is the infinite resourcefulness of God as Creator to create anew a mode of existence appropriate for resurrection life, and the act of God in raising Jesus Christ, as evidenced by witnesses (1 Cor 15:3-6; 35-44).” (p.543).

Apocalyptic. Thiselton contends further that the three hermeneutical horizons mentioned above come together as major features of apocalyptic thought within eschatology. Thiselton suggests, despite scholarly opposition which he defends against, that the apocalyptic pattern of thought has influenced the eschatology of Jesus and Paul, as well as other material in the New Testament. Thiseton also has an interesting section discussing the often perceived differences between Moltmann and Pannenberg in their utilisations of apocalyptic patterns of thought, with the view that Moltmann places a stronger emphasis on the contrast and discontinuity between the old creation and the new, while Pannenberg stresses their continuity and coherence. Thiselton’s assessment is that both Pannenberg and Moltmann complement rather than contradict each other. They both ‘stress the possibility of novelty and surprise as God’s promises come to be fulfilled in unexpected ways. But each also stresses divine faithfulness as God remains true to His promise.

Thiselton has separated the last three horizons, but I prefer to see them as one grouped together. They all have to do with the formative effects on us as we think about eschatology. We are led to the discipline of waiting coupled with eager expectation for the future, something we modern people don’t really know how to do very well anymore! An excellent quote from Thiselton:

“This hermeneutic of understanding is far removed from the drive for immediacy, instantaneousness, and instant gratification of desire generated by the combined effect of socio-economic consumerism, the availability of massive financial credit, and an increasingly “postmodern” turn of mind. Almost unlimited credit draws upon, and uses up, the uncertain future for the desires of the present moment. [This is] a short-term philosophy of “enjoy it now; pay it later.” Such horizons do not relate readily to an eschatology of “not yet” in which waiting is characterised not by resentment but by eager expectancy concerning what lies ahead. Postmodern consumerist cultures regard “waiting” as intolerable, and as a source of resentment or at best disappointed resignation.” (p.546-47)

This act of waiting in turn will sharpen our appreciation of what Thiselton calls the conceptual grammer of expectation. Thiselton’s main point here is that the grammer of expectation is not so much linked with believing propositions about chronological duration, but more about practical action. Just as what it is to believe in bound up with attitudes, behaviour, and disposition, so also to expect is embedded in a situation from which it takes its rise. The New Testament writers rejected the notion that expecting had anything to do with chronological calculation, but rather the logical currency of expecting the eschaton is shown by how Christians live. All this leads us to the last horizon of time. Thiselton in following Pannenberg’s lead states, “Faithfulness to promise manifests itself only over a period of time. Neither God’s proven faithfulness nor the readers’ tested faithfulness can acquire working currency other than through time.”

Overall, I have thoroughly enjoyed reading The Hermeneutics of Doctrine. Thiselton has showed us his view of the nature of doctrine – that doctrine is best viewed as practices of life; that it is built on the biblical writings defined in terms of canon; has continuity with an ongoing developing tradition; is formative in nature in that it generates habits that generates performance, and has a temporal logic of narrative embodying a coherent plot (p. 77). He has succeeded to varying degrees in showing how his understanding of the nature of doctrine informs our hermeneutical horizons to the different doctrines – having a fairly generous exegesis of the related Scriptural passages, a respectful treatment of historical theology (including a charitable treatment of theologians whose theology we might not find ourselves readily agreeing with), and at all times, a constructive and innovative idea or insight in between.

Hermeneutical Guidelines for thinking about Charismatic Revival Theology

As you can tell by now, I have been ploughing through Thiselton’s The Hermeneutics of Doctrine (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007) and posting on any gems I can find. In his chapter on the Holy Spirit, Thiselton explores and advocates that our understanding and communication of the doctrine of the Holy Spirit should derive primarily from Old Testament traditions, which become modified in the light of Christological, corporate, and eschatological horizons in the New Testament (p.416). The Old Testament Scriptures portray the work of God’s Spirit or breath as one of empowering individuals for special (and often salvific) tasks; and towards the later portion of the OT comes to be a marker of the eschatological age where the Spirit is shown as a communal gift for empowerment for transformation and renewed life. This gets carried forward into the NT, but with ‘Christological and eschatological extensions and qualifications’ (p.419). Thiselton’s one statement sums it up well: “The anointing by the Holy Spirit that becomes the gift of all Christians corporately is derived from the Christological anointing of Christ by the Spirit to bring in the reign of God.” (p.419). Thiselton then traces the thinking of the church fathers on this matter and shows how their thinking conforms and in fact develops the NT teaching into a stable doctrinal tradition. This tradition is then “challenged” by Pentecostalism and the Charismatic Revival (he does an excellent job in summarising the history of the charismatic movement including the three ‘waves’ of it from p.436-440). The main “challenge” is that the movement raises new questions which bring new horizons to our understanding of the doctrine.

Rather than providing simplistic answers, Thiselton carefully engages these new horizons with the ‘older’ established horizons. The result is a list of excellent hermeneutical guidelines for thinking about the charismatic revival theology (p.442-444).

1) An emphasis upon the ministry of the Holy Spirit reflects NT and Christian doctrine, provided that it is not abstracted and isolated from its Trinitarian frame. This is the firm and stable tradition which the church fathers have placed us on – they spoke of the Holy Spirit from a Christological and Trinitarian context. In this regard, Thiselton suggest that perhaps we should speak of Trinitarian renewal rather than Spirit renewal.

2) We have to be careful that our experience of vitality, dynamism, power and energy associated very often with charismatic revival theology does not lead to a loss of the dimension of pilgrimage, waiting, and self-discipline. To fall into this danger would be to compromise on the horizon of eschatology by relegating things to an over-realised eschatology.

3) Likewise, the delight that arises from an intimate and personal relationship with God through Jesus Christ in the Holy Spirit should not lead to an inward-looking pietistic individualism but to a shared concern for the church and for the well-being of society and the world.

4) The experience of newness of life, an awareness of the present and future, of surprise and creative novelty often expressed in a moment-by-moment “walking in the Spirit” must not lead to a disregard of tradition and history – The Holy Spirit acts in continuity with his own past work in earlier centuries.

5) The Holy Spirit renews the whole person. This includes the mind (which tends to be downplayed in charismatic renewal) as well as the emotions and bodily action (which tends to be overemphasised). Charismatic Revival must not lead to a mood of anti-intellectualism.

6) Healing happens “when and where God wills it.” Thiselton questions whether the terminology of the “miraculous” is the most accurate way of conveying God’s almighty sovereignty to act in or through causal processes or otherwise, as God chooses. He states this further: “Too weak an emphasis upon healing diminishes trust in the sovereignty of God; too strong an emphasis upon healing increases the anguish of the problem of evil and suffering for those (and their loved ones) who do not receive healing by other than medical means” (p.443), and can I add, who may not even receive healing in the end.

7) There is a need to distinguish between using a term like “baptism in the Spirit” on an exegetical basis to describe the authenticity of the experience denoted by that term. As Thiselton states: “it would be presumptuous to deny that sometimes Christian believers “catch up” on an experience of Pentecostal power and holiness at a stage subsequent to their initial coming to faith. But if the term “baptism of the Spirit” is used to describe this, this is not Paul’s use of the term. Such a claim would entail a misleading hermeneutic, based on a mistaken exegesis.” (p.444)

Thiselton ends off his whole chapter with this deep hermeneutical paradox – the more we engage with signs of the Holy Spirit, the more we risk losing the very goal of the Spirit’s work, namely to illuminate Christ, the cross, and the future resurrection as the heart of the gospel (p.450).

Excellent hermeneutical guidelines for us to evaluate Charismatic Revival theology, not only as a whole movement, but also as individuals who may have had varying points of contact with it!

Christology in Hebrews

Anthony Thiselton (The Hermeneutics of Doctrine, 2007) laments the fact that in discussions of Christology, we either end up with the age-old debate of ‘high’ Christology or ‘low’ Christology; or if not end up employing a form of discussion not focused on the “two natures”, but instead the “two languages of man-language and God-language”, which ends up ‘reducing ontological truth-claims into a contrived dualism between empirical events in history and “myth”’ (p.387). He instead recommends a hermeneutical model where we search within the New Testament for the highest possible Christology (including an explicit definition of Jesus Christ as God) while cohering within the same writing with the fullest possible explanation of the humanness of Jesus (one that fulfils in every respect what it means to be truly human). Such a Christology, Thiselton suggests, is found in the book of Hebrews. He states:

“Clearly John and Hebrews are major sources of “high” Christologies. But what is remarkable about Hebrews is that in comparison with other New Testament writings it has both the highest and most deliberate expressions of the humanness of Jesus Christ. [...] It is essential for the writer’s theology of priesthood, representation and mediation that Christ is portrayed as genuinely human, and thereby able to represent humankind in priestly mediation to God, and equally portrayed as sharing in deity to represent God to humankind in prophetic mediation and address. Jesus Christ is both “ascending” Mediator on behalf of humankind and “descending” Mediator on behalf of God. Nevertheless, in effect anticipating the later creeds and Chalcedon, this writer nowhere suggests that Jesus Christ is half-man and/or half-God.” (p.391)

Thiselton goes on to provide examples in Hebrews which reflect the perfect representation of man to God in terms of Jesus’ humanness, and the perfect mediation of God to man in terms of his deity. And this leads in to Thiselton’s key point in this chapter – the hermeneutical horizons in considering Christology are far much more anchored in the “home” horizons of the New Testament itself than in horizons of historical speculations about the development of a “two-stage” Christology into a “three-stage” Christology, or, still less convincing, of the effect of pressures from the Greek world to transpose narrative of the earthly Jesus into mythological or metaphysical terms (p.395). In another words, the ‘home-langauge’ when it comes to discussing Christology still lie in the New Testament Scriptures.

Thiselton on the hermeneutics of the doctrine of Atonement

In chapters 14-16 of his The Hermeneutics of Doctrine (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007), Thiselton explores some of the hermeneutical horizons which lead to the doctrine of the Atonement. The following is an attempt to summarise and evaluate some of his thoughts.

Thiselton begins by stating upfront that ‘the search for hermeneutical starting points for the Christian proclamation of the cross has never been easy’ (p.309). We need to be first aware that when we think about the cross or about atonement, we are really engaging at two different kinds of horizons of understanding. The first concerns the initial preunderstandings or readiness to understand on the part of those who seek to understand. This means being aware of or discovering our preunderstandings which will find a point of overlap or engagement with that which has yet to be understood. The second horizon of understanding concerns what the ‘otherness of the subject matter demands’; it is concerned with discovering the appropriate horizon of understanding where ‘the subject matter assumes its proper context for a fruitful understanding that does not distort it or impose inappropriate questions upon it’. In another words, it is about “hearing the other” on its own terms without imposing our prior conceptions on it.


With that in mind, Thiselton moves on to explore three interpretive issues which engage the two horizons stated above – i) the role of human experiences to which a theology of the cross has spoken (and especially in view of the New Perspective), ii) the need to approach our entire hermeneutics of the cross from the standpoint of divine grace, and iii) the recognition of the variety of imagery used to interpret the work of Christ in the New Testament.

With the New Perspective, the challenge has been whether to think of the cross as reflecting a situation of human plight to solution, or one of solution to plight. While Thiselton admits that this contention remains controversial as with regards to the second horizon of understanding – that demanded by the subject matter itself; it is clear that within the first horizon, our understanding of the cross has been shaped by our human experiences of struggle, guilt, or alienation from God. “There is a correlation between specific aspects of the human experience of sin, bondage, or alienation, and aspects of the saving work of Christ.”But Thiselton adds further:

If sin is seen in structural or corporate terms as characterising collective humanity fallen “in Adam”, then the work of Christ is perceived as that of the last or eschatological Adam who brings about believing “in Christ” (Rom 5:12-21; 1 Cor 15:22, 23 and 45-49). Experiences of bondage or vulnerability to forces beyond human control find a correlation with Christ as Victor over such forces (Col 2:15). Notions of facing divine wrath or judgement are matched by a theology of reconciliation through the work of Christ on the cross (Rom 5:1-11). (p.315-16, his emphasis)


With the second interpretive issue, Thiselton states that the presupposition of grace and the nature of divine love must be the axiomatic starting point (and may we add) the basis of all our hermeneutical thinking on the atonement. Throughout the New Testament material, there is no trace of any contrast between the wrath of God and the love of Christ. It is here that we discuss Thiselton’s view regarding which is the more appropriate term to describe Christ’s work – expiation or propitiation, which he discusses in detail in chapter 15. Three key factors lead to Thiselton’s conclusion that it is not a simplistic matter of ‘either-or’, but really one which encompasses both. First, all such discussion must arise out of a horizon of divine grace, i.e. we must not portray the notion of “appeasing God” as one that undercuts the initiative of divine grace. Second, what enables us to ground our thinking on this subject in a realm of divine grace is that of seeing the cross and atonement as a Trinitarian act. The concept of God’s “directing against his own very self” wrath or self-chosen propitiation can become intelligible only within a Trinitarian horizon of understanding. Third, Thiselton emphasises on the notion of divine integrity or “being true to oneself” as the key notion to hold the various concepts together. Divine integrity provides a balanced counter-perspective to the many accusations held against penal substitutionary atonement as being shaped by reading the Bible through the modern day lens of the criminal justice system. Thiselton states wisely, “[…] the nineteeth-century concern to place a heavy emphasis upon jurisprudence and theories of punishment should not lead us to exclude every issue about divine self-consistency and integrity, to which the model of propitiation may point, however relative it may be to other models that qualify it. The deeds of God are bound up with the character and reputation of God’s “name”.” (p.344). Divine integrity also helps us to understand God’s wrath as being “internal” (sin bringing its own consequences) but yet “personal” at the same time – the ultimate punishment is for God to turn from his jealousy for us and be calm (p.344-45). Overall, divine integrity serves to show us a God of grace who is not to be thought of like a vengeful headmaster seeking a scapegoat, but a God of grace that takes upon himself what it costs to stand by his promises and warnings, while reconciling the world to himself. Under such horizons of thinking, expiation and propitiation do not offer an either-or. If we do not totally exclude what propitiation (qualified by other models) points to, this will also presuppose the reality of expiation. Similarly, to just highlight expiation exclusively risks losing out the personal dimension of God’s action. It is also within this context of divine integrity that Thiselton discusses Anselm’s work (chapter 16). Thiselton suggests that rather than to understand Anselm’s work from the perspective of honour or jurisdically, it is better to understand Anselm’s work “ontologically” or “covenantally”. What is at stake is God’s own internal coherence and the consistency of his divine nature. Thiselton states, “What is at stake is the “order” of the universe. This is part of the horizon of understanding for a hermeneutic of the doctrine of the work of Christ alongside the priority, sovereignty, and initiative of divine grace.” (p.365). Coming back to the notion of divine grace, Thiselton draws on the work of Jurgen Moltmann and suggests that the notion of a God who allows himself to grieve and suffer provides the best horizon to work out the complicated questions and issues arising from the atonement today.

We turn now to Thiselton’s third interpretive issue – the variety of images and metaphors used to show the work of Christ. Here, Thiselton first suggests the usefulness of images and metaphors to convey a certain state of affairs. The juxtaposition of a variety of mutually qualifying images, symbols, analogies, metaphors sometimes work together to offer a coherent picture in place of the atomistic pieces which we first begun with. In this light, Thiselton explores in Chapter 14 what he terms as the explicit hard currencies of biblical language used to describe the atonement – redemption and salvation; and what he terms as other effective hard currencies of biblical language – reconciliation, mediation and approach. Interestingly, while Thiselton does not mention explicitly at any point in the three chapters, one wonders whether his statement that the substitutionary nature of the death of Christ as a sacrifice “for our sins” which formed for the subapostolic and early Patristic writings a core understanding (p.355) might be representative of his own thinking. What is clear is that Thiselton advocates a multi-model approach, all working together to qualify single models, or to cancel off unwanted overtones in other models. What is also clear is that ‘the Old Testament texts and life of Israel provide the public horizons of understanding in terms of which the vocabulary and language uses of the New Testament that relate to the work of Christ can be understood’ (p.324). We must not think of these images and metaphors as abstract theological formulae and lose sight of their role within the living, dynamic, dramatic narrative of the New Testament. Otherwise, their ‘hermeneutical currency becomes debased and reduced’ (p.340).

Thiselton has discussed much more and in far greater detail than what this writeup can capture. Perhaps the contours of his thinking are best summarised in his conclusion to the three chapters:
[…] Love and grace provide the overarching horizon of understanding for everything else about the work of Christ. But to stress this horizon is to take the first step without embarking further on the journey. Anselm and Calvin show that divine integrity and the divine governance of the world also form part of a necessary horizon of understanding. Today, in the early twenty-first century, Moltmann has enlarged that horizon in further needed directions. He writes, “I no longer asked what the cross of Christ means for human being, but also asked what the cross of the Son of God means for God himself, whom he called ‘my Father.’ I found an answer to this question in the perception of the deep suffering of God, which is bound up with the death of the Son in Golgotha and becomes manifest in him. It is the suffering of a boundless love.”

Here is the most fundamental hermeneutical horizon in both sense of the word “horizon”. It places the doctrine of the work of Christ fully within the doctrine of divine grace and within the doctrine of the Trinity, from which it derives its theological truth and intelligibility. It also provides a horizon of hermeneutical communication within which those who seek a fuller understanding may engage with “questions that arise” where they already stand. (p.375)


Overall, Thiselton’s three chapters are extremely stimulating in getting us to think deeper on the hermeneutics of the doctrine of the atonement. In particular, his two horizons of understanding listed at the beginning are particularly useful. We must not deny the presence of preunderstandings which we bring to approach on this topic, and sometimes which skew the direction of where we are led to in our investigation. Yet, we do not cast them aside or deny them, but seek to see how they overlap with the second horizon, where the subject matter speaks for what it is without any demands laid on it. Our end-point will always be a fusion of these two horizons. This will translate into two particular emphases in our consideration of the doctrine – we must consider what the whole biblical revelation has to say, and not just mere portions of it to support our preunderstandings which we first bring. In this regard, Thiselton has explored the New Testament language used to describe the work. A complementary approach would be to consider the whole of biblical salvation history in terms of its key moments and consider how that might shape our understanding to the context of how much of the New Testament language on Christ's work is used. The second emphasis would be to adopt a inter-doctrinal approach. The doctrine of the work of Christ cannot be considered in isolation and as a free-standing problem, but it will have bearings in relation to other doctrines, in particularly the doctrine of grace, of God, and of sin. Such an inter-doctrinal approach, as evidenced by Thiselton, will lead to a rich and deep consideration of the great work of Christ for us.

Interpreting the Ethics of the Sermon on the Mount

There is no or little denial that Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Mount provide a stirring ethical challenge to all, Christians and non-Christians alike. Even Mahatma Gandhi appreciated its teaching and the high morality found within. But a bigger and more pressing question remains before one can accurately apply the ethical teachings - how should we understand and interpret the ethics of the Sermon on the Mount in the first place? With what hermeneutical rule should we bear in mind as we read the Sermon?

Graham Stanton has presented what I think are the five key questions for a right interpretation or hermeneutical approach (from his article ‘Sermon on the Mount/Plain’ in Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels). I have rephrased the questions slightly, tweaked the order in which they appear, and provided some comments on each of them.

1) Is the Sermon directed to all people or only to Christians? Of the prominent theologians that I have read concerning their interpretation of the Sermon - Luther, Calvin, Wesley, Bonhoeffer and John Stott (and just in case you were wondering, this reading comes from a useful book The Sermon on the Mount through the Centuries (ed. Jeffrey Greenman, Timothy Larsen and Stephen Spencer; Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2007)), all agree that the whole Sermon or at least a majority of it applies only to Christians. This makes sense in light of the Scriptural text – Jesus sees the crowds, he goes up on the mountain, and (only) the disciples come to him, and he begins teaching them (Matt 5:1-2). The sermon is also bracketed by two sections of narratives which emphasise the theme of the calling of Jesus and discipleship (Matt 4:18-22 and Matt 8:18-22). This is a particular important point especially for Bonhoeffer, whose hermeneutical approach to the ethics of the Sermon could be summarised as an Ethics of Discipleship (The Cost of Discipleship – see my earlier posts on him here and here). This means that all hermeneutical interpretations of the Sermon belonging to liberalism – where the Sermon is thought to be the essential map for building a progressive and (moral) civilization – is blown out of the water. For a discipleship-approach presupposes that we need Jesus as our Saviour, whereas liberalism presupposes that we merely need Jesus as at best a transformer of our decaying morality. Nonetheless, I agree with John Stott, for whom the central understanding of the Sermon can be characterised by the term ‘Christian counter-culture’. While the Sermon pertains to Christians, it will bring us into contact and in fact abrasion with the wider world, simply because the Sermon is so counter-culture to the ethos of our day and age.

2) Is the sermon for all time? Or only for an interim age, be it an age that has past us or is coming? (Question of eschatology and the application of the Sermon) There are further variations to the above question. Some view that the sermon is valid only for an interim age before the coming of the Spirit (which means we today have gone past that age). Others view it as an ethic of the interim age for Israel before the return of Christ, while others view it as an ethic for Israel for all time. But one thing is common. All these variations share a common mother thought – that of dispensationalism. Carson presents some compelling reasons why this is not the case (The Sermon on the Mount (Carlisle: Paternoster Press, 2001 ed.), 168-170). The main reason is that the dispensationalist approach to the Sermon relies so heavily on the larger dispensationalist theological framework that it obscures the reading of the text. In another words, rather than the Scriptural text of the Sermon leading to or confirming our theological framework, the Dispensationalist framework tends to ‘twist’ our reading of the Sermon in a certain way. I admit that the same accusation can be made of us who hold to a more ‘biblical-theological’ approach of reading Scripture. The challenge is to adopt (what one of the lecturers in College called) the heuristic approach to reading the bible – where we come to the bible with our theological systems, but in reading Scripture, we genuinely allow the words of Scripture to challenge our theological system and if need be, we are epistemically humble enough to change our theological systems. It would be straining our reading of the Scriptural text of the Sermon to suggest that either a temporal application of the ethics or an application applicable to only Israel is on view. Passages like Matt 5:17-20 and 24 with their emphasis on ‘anyone’ and ‘everyone’ more likely points to the direction that Jesus had in mind not only the hearers of the Sermon on that day, but also anyone who would eventually come to hear these precious words of his. The wider context of Matthew also does not support a Dispensationalist view (esp. Matt 28:18-20 where the disciples are told to go to the nations and where part of that includes teaching them ‘everything’ Jesus has commanded them).

Related to this point, even Kyle Fedler’s description of the ethics of the Sermon on the Mount as ‘kingdom ethics’ require careful qualification (Exploring Christian Ethics (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2006), 168-172). Fedler sees the Sermon as representing ‘a kind of “kingdom ethic,” a portrait of what ethics in the (future) kingdom of God will resemble’ (p.171). To his credit, Fedler disagrees with Reinhold Niebuhr’s analysis that in the Sermon Jesus holds up an impossible ideal for ethics; and he agrees more with Glen Stassen’s proposal that Jesus, while holding up a high ideal, nonetheless provided ‘practice norms’ or practical guidelines for transforming ourselves and our relationships such that we can start participating in this ‘eschatological deliverance that begins now’ (p.172). My discomfort with Fedler’s view is his presupposition that as Jesus was speaking the Sermon, he had in mind solely or even primarily the approach of the end-times. I think it would be more right to state that Jesus had in mind the kingdom of God (Matt 4:17 and the frequent reference to ‘kingdom’ in the Sermon) and what it means to follow him in this Kingdom (Matt 5:17-20, Matt 7:24). In another words, if we want to describe the Sermon as ‘Kingdom Ethics’, we need to qualify what we mean exactly in terms of the ‘eschatological horizon’ of the Kingdom. Otherwise, we might end up unintentionally weakening the ethical force of the Sermon by relegating it to the ‘not-yet’ eschatological horizon. My own preference and persuasion is that eschatology is not the sole or even primary consideration of Jesus as he spoke the Sermon. Something else is.

3) Is the Sermon meant to be taken literally in all that it’s saying? While many would jump at first response and say, “Of course not!” the answer is a bit trickier than that. Many in the Anabaptist/Mennonite tradition have taken seriously the words of Jesus here, and such seriousness has been manifested in their die-hard commitment to pacifism. I agree with Carson here that while being sympathetic to their views, two points lead me to stand on different ground. The first is that such a view fails to account or accommodate the rhetorical devices Jesus might have used in his Sermon to bring out his point – e.g. hyperbole or exaggeration to shock us hearers to the point or principle he’s making. While the shocking statements or hyperbole itself could be a possible application of the point Jesus is making, it would be wrong to confuse the application with the point or principle itself. Secondly, the Sermon by itself is not a final comment on issues such as war and capital punishment. Other biblical considerations that are derived from a reading of the whole corpus of Scripture need to be considered as well. It would also be good to familiarise oneself with the long Christian tradition of political reflection.

4) What’s the relationship of Jesus to the Sermon? Is he merely the speaker of the Sermon, speaking of an ethic external to himself? Is he radically presenting new teaching, or merely interpreting and clarifying the Law of Moses? The key passage to explore in this regard would be Matt 5:17-20, and a lot depends on the interpretation of the word ‘fulfill’. Does it mean to ‘confirm’? To ‘bring about something new by abolishing the old’? Or does it mean ‘to bring something to its full intended goal or purpose’? It is the third meaning of the word that is most likely on view. In another words, as Carson states, “Jesus did not conceive of his life and ministry in terms of opposition to the Old Testament, but in terms of bringing to fruition that toward which it points. Thus, the Law and the Prophets, far from being abolished, find their valid continuity in terms of their out-working in Jesus.” (Sermon, 42 (italics his)). The six examples Jesus gives from 5:21-47 all further work out this guiding principle.

But we must ask further – is that all there is to the Christological significance in the Sermon? Here, we wholeheartedly agree with the insights of Bonhoeffer who refused to separate the words of the Sermon from the preacher of the Sermon. “The one who preached the Sermon and the Sermon are one” (Bonhoeffer, Ethics, 231). He states, “the sayings of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount are the interpretation of his existence, and thus the interpretation of that reality in which history finds its fulfilment in God’s becoming human, in the reconciliation of the world with God.” (Ethics, 235). In another words, Jesus doesn’t just speak the words or the ethics of the Sermon as someone external to it, but he speaks as someone who embodies the ethics in his very own life. As the one who brings in the Kingdom of God, Jesus exemplifies in his own life what life and behaviour in this Kingdom will look like. And it is only because Jesus is such that we who follow as his disciples have any chance of living out the ethics of this Kingdom he has brought in. In another words, correct ethical interpretation of the Ethics of the Sermon must be necessarily first and foremost Christological.

5) What’s the relationship between the Sermon and Paul’s gospel of grace? Is the sermon intended to make the readers of listeners aware of their need of grace? Or does the Sermon presuppose God’s forgiveness and acceptance of the sinner and therefore set out demands for true discipleship? I am delighted to state that none of the major interpreters of the Sermon that I’ve read (Augustine, Luther, Calvin, Wesley, Bonhoeffer and Stott) interpret the Sermon in the first way. Even Luther, who would probably have been the prime suspect, interpreted the Sermon in terms of his two-kingdoms theology. As Susan Schreiner comments:

“According to Luther Christians always had to distinguish the two kingdoms [...] ordained by God. The two kingdoms correspond to the two relationships in which the Christian stands: the spiritual kingdom involves the Christian before God; the earthly kingdom involves the Christian before the neighbour. [Before God] the Christian stands in a passive or receptive relationship. Here the Christian receives only faith and justification by that faith. [...] [Before neighbour], the Christian is always active in works of love.” (The Sermon on the Mount through the Centuries, 114)

For Luther, the Sermon relates to the Christian before men in the earthly kingdom. We ‘cannot understand the Sermon on the Mount unless we are first grounded in the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Having been justified, the believer should then turn to the Sermon in order to find ethical instructions about living the life of faith’ (p.111). More than anything else, Luther’s interpretation comes closer to the second approach mentioned above than the first.

Calvin, on the other hand, holds to the tension between gospel and law within the Sermon in his interpretation. He cleverly distinguishes between the two, but he does not make them antithetical. For Calvin, ‘the gospel of Christ cannot replace or alter [the] law without affronting the God who gave the law and sent Christ’ (Stephen Spencer, The Sermon on the Mount through the Centuries, 152). Calvin’s ethical hermeneutics involves him keeping law and gospel together.

For John Wesley, the emphasis of the Sermon was on what he termed ‘gracious holiness’ – holiness inspired by and born out of grace. As Mark Noll observes,

“The great marvel of Wesley’s thirteen discourses is how consistently they maintain both and exalted view of divine grace and a full dedication to active holiness – and without compromising one by the other. [...] [He has expounded] with rentless energy the bonded scriptural message of purity of heart bestowed by grace and sanctification of life pursued through works.” (The Sermon on the Mount through the Centuries, 179.)

Perhaps a hermeneutic of the Ethics of the Sermon will involve holding both law and gospel together. While not totally being able to articulate the clear and precise correspondence between the two (as presented in the Sermon), perhaps the more important thing is to ensure that our hermeneutic holds onto both components.

Finally, in pulling things to a close, what can we say as about the hermeneutics of Ethics in the Sermon? I’m suggesting the following:

Jesus, in bringing in God’s Kingdom, tells us what life, norms and behaviour in that kingdom looks like. He not only speaks it, but both speaker and speech are one. His own life embodies the Sermon and in that way, as his disciples and followers in this Kingdom, our interpretation of the Ethics must begin with him. And as we follow after him, we soon discover it is a journey of costly grace. Costly because obedience to the Sermon is called for; the requirements of the Kingdom are pressed upon our hearts; and discipleship and witness is intrinsic to the Sermon. But grace because it is Jesus we are obeying, the one who has first and foremost fulfilled the requirements of the Kingdom and the requirements of his own words! And it is also grace because in giving up our life, we actually find it, or more correctly, we actually find it being given to us.

Chris Wright on a Missional Hermeneutic of the Bible

In the 1st two chapters of his book The Mission of God: Unlocking the Bible’s Grand Narrative (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2006), Chris Wright suggests that instead of seeing the Bible as merely providing a basis for mission (e.g. from favourite passages like Matt 28:18-20), it might be more profitable to see that there is a missional basis for the Bible – i.e. the Bible is generated by and is all about God’s mission. In another words, he suggests and tries to define the shape of a missional hermeneutic of the Bible.

Wright first tries to justify the idea of a missional hermeneutic. One of his main reasons is that the Bible can be seen as the product of God’s Mission. He states: “The whole canon of Scripture is a missional phenomenon in the sense that it witnesses to the self-giving movement of this God toward his creation and us, human beings in God’s own image, but wayward and wanton. The writings that now comprise our Bible are themselves the product of and witness to the ultimate mission of God.” (p.48). The processes by which the Scriptural texts came to be written also arose often out of a missional context or situation. Wright further shows how this missional context or situation which resulted in writing can be seen in the New Testament and Old Testament documents. In short, ‘the whole Bible renders to us the story of God’s mission through God’s people in their engagement with God’s world for the sake of the whole of God’s creation’ (p.51).

As for the shape of how such a missional hermeneutical looks like, Wright states that we first have to shift our paradigm and understanding of ‘mission’ from ‘our human agency to the ultimate purposes of God himself; missions as “missions” that we undertake, to mission as that which God has been purposing and accomplishing from eternity to eternity; and an anthropocentric (or ecclesiocentric) conception to a radically theocentric worldview’ (p.62). He then proposes a shape for the missional hermeneutic under the following headings:

• God with a mission. The missional hermeneutic begins with us recognising that we have a ‘missional’ God. Wright cautiously agrees with the term missio Dei, often used to encapsulate this idea. The missional nature of God is seen in how the biblical narrative begins with a God of purpose in creation, moves on to the conflict and problem generated by human rebellion against that purpose, spends most of its narrative journey in the story of God’s redemptive purposes worked out in the stage of human history, and finishes beyond the horizon of its own history with the eschatological hope of the new creation (p.63). While not squashing out many of the smaller narratives that occur in the Bible, there is a general flow – the ‘affirmation that there is one God at work in the universe and in human history, and that this God has a goal, a purpose, a mission that will ultimately be accomplished by the power of God’s Word and for the glory of God’s name. This is the mission of the biblical God (p.64)’.
• Humanity with a mission. Chris suggests that the creational mandate (Gen 1:28) sets humanity and mankind out on a mission. It is out of this missional understanding that generates our ‘ecological responsibility, our economic activity involving work, productivity, exchange and trade, and our whole cultural mandate’ (p.65).
• Israel with a mission. Israel’s election, Chris contends, was for the sake of all nations. The universality of God’s purposes for the nations, but yet seen in this particular stage in salvation history in the particularity of God’s choosing of Israel, remains as one of recurrent themes in the Old Testament.
• Jesus with a mission. Jesus came with a clear understanding and purpose that he was sent, and that he was the fulfilment of the Servant figure in Isaiah and the Davidic messianic king (Isa 42:1 and Ps 2:7, both of which are affirmed in the voice from Heaven at Jesus’ baptism). Jesus had a clear understanding that his will was to do his Father’s will, his mission was determined by God’s mission. Wright states, “In Jesus the radically theocentric nature of biblical mission is most clearly focused and modelled.” (p.66)
• The church with a mission. Jesus in turn, entrusts to us the church a mission that is rooted in his own identity, passion and victory as the crucified and risen Messiah. (p.66).

In summary, Wright states that a missional hermeneutic means that we seek to read any part of the bible in the light of i) God’s purposes for his whole creation ii) God’s purpose for human life in general and all the bible teaches about human culture, relationships, ethics and behaviour iii) God’s historical election of Israel and the effect that has on the nations and their own national life in terms of obeying God iv) the centrality of Jesus v) God’s calling of the church to be the agent of God’s blessing to the nations in the name and for the glory of the Lord Jesus (p.67). He ends the chapter by suggesting how, like a map, this hermeneutical framework will not give an account of every single detail and landmark in the biblical landscape, but that it will provide a way of seeing the whole terrain, of navigating one’s way through it as one experiences the reality of the biblical landscape (p.68-69).

Overall, Wright has provided an interesting suggestion. He is right on how seeing how missions should not be viewed first and foremost as activity and in an anthropocentric way. If we do, our tendency would be to use the Bible to justify such activity and viewpoint. Rather, if we view missions as something integral to God Himself – something God does for the sake of his glory and purpose (and here, some would go further to suggest that missional is something God is) – then missions could be a key way of summarising what the flow of the Bible is about. In another words, there is some truth in Wright’s proposal that just as the Bible gives a biblical basis for missions, there is also a missional basis to the Bible. I’m not fully persuaded though that a missional hermeneutic (as Wright presents it as God with a mission; humanity with a mission; Israel with a mission; Jesus with a mission; and the church with a mission) actually serves to tell one what the Bible is all about – or in other words, what’s the content in this river of the Biblical story that is being told. Missions serves as a good and right way of describing the flow and direction of this river, but something else needs to be filled in to tell us what’s actually flowing in this river. Or to use Wright’s closing analogy of the map – I’m not too sure if his missional hermeneutic actually introduces us and connects the major features in the biblical landscape as we travel through it. Rather, I think the missional hermeneutic acts more like the vehicle we are sitting in as we navigate through the biblical landscape. We are heading somewhere with it, but we still need something else – another map – that helps to explain the major features of the landscape as we are carried along. As to what that map is, suggestions abound – the glory of God manifested in Christ (Schreiner); the Kingdom of God (Goldsworthy); or perhaps not the presence of any one main theme, but the inter-relation and connection of a few central themes (Carson? The writers of Central themes in Biblical Theology? My own view)