In his introduction to Hermeneutics Reader: Texts of the German Tradition from the Enlightenment to the Present , Kurt Mueller-Vollmer gives us a very Hamannian Schleiermacher: “Man, the linguistic being, can be seen as the place where language articulates iself in each speech act and where . . . . Continue Reading »
In his classic study of Bible and the Liturgy , Jean Danielou asks how we are to interpret sacramental signs. Do they “possess only the natural significance of the element or of the gesture . . . water washes, bread nourishes, oil heals”? Or do they “possess a special . . . . Continue Reading »
Athanasius ends his treatise on the incarnation with this wonderful statement of the qualifications for the biblical interpreter: “But for the searching of the Scriptures and true knowledge of them, an honorable life is needed, and a pure virtue, and that virtue which is according to Christ; . . . . Continue Reading »
In his History and Spirit: The Understanding of Scripture According to Origen , de Lubac highlights the centrality of anagogy in Christian interpretation: “It will not be enough to ‘allegorize’ . . . the events and persons of the Old Testament so as to see in them figures of the . . . . Continue Reading »
Some early spring flowers from Danielou. “In the gradual unfolding of God’s design, there appears a system of analogies between his successuive works, for all their distinct self-sufficiency as separate creative acts. The Flood, the Passion, Baptism and the Last Judgment are closely . . . . Continue Reading »
A morning’s harvest from the de Lubac garden. “Under the opposition of the letter and the spirit, or of the shadow and the truth, in its varied and sometimes, for us, paradoxical expressions, there is always the opposition of two peoples, of two ages, of two regimes, of two states of . . . . Continue Reading »
Anatiolios offers this explanation of Athanasius’ defense of homoousios : “the meaning of the Nicene homoousios is contained in its function as a guide to a certain way of reading Scripture. An immediate hermeneutical consequence of this principle is that efforts to understand this term . . . . Continue Reading »
Does it matter whether we say the events recorded in the Bible happened? Couldn’t we draw the same “lessons” regardless? Not if one of the “lessons” has to do with the pattern of God’s action in history. Whether tropological or allegorical, “timeless” . . . . Continue Reading »
Jacob has gotten a bad rap over the centuries, not least because of the way his two wives have fared in the hands of the allegorists. For Philo, beautiful Rachel represents bodily beauty and Leah beauty of soul: “Rachel, who is comeliness of the body, is described as younger than Leah, that . . . . Continue Reading »
Herman Rapaport’s The Literary Theory Toolkit: A Compendium of Concepts and Methods is an impressive achievement. In less than 300 pages, he gives deft and up-to-the minute summaries of literary theories, describes available literary tools for analyzing narrative, poetry, drama, and for . . . . Continue Reading »
Subscribe
Latest Issue
Support First Things
