The Dead Letter

On Tuesdays I often go over to Southeastern to make use of the excellent library facilities. It is an attempt on my part to stay abreast...or to keep my fingers in critical scholarship. I am especially interested in the history of the church. I once had a professor describe his interest in church history, “I decided to spend my time in the great thoughts of others, rather than in my little thoughts.” I try to read broadly in all of the major disciplines. I find the least amount of interest in Biblical Studies. Please note I am not saying nor do I would to intimate that I find the Bible uninteresting. It is the current approach in Biblical studies that I think enervates theological discourse. I locate the problem in the tendency to approach the Holy Scripture as one would approach any other ancient document. I think this approach is shared both within “conservative” and “liberal” circles. Certainly within the traditions that affirm the inerrancy and authority of the scriptures there is deference to the contents of scripture, but the approach to reading the Bible is the same. Find out what the author meant and then one can extrapolate what that means for us today. This is not the way the Holy Scripture has been read by our predecessors in the faith. The authorship of the Bible has always been thought to be God (no doubt through human agents). One frequently finds that ancients refer to the Holy Oracles. God is still speaking through the scriptures. I do not know how our modern rut may be changed. But I feel that it is not simply in a turn to the conservatives. For the preacher the commentaries of previous generations written largely by ministers are often the most theologically provocative. I think there is a reason for this. I think it is because those expositors were reading a living Word not attending to a dead letter.