This morning John C. Poirier (who really needs to start blogging!) said the following in some comments to another post:
Scripture’s authority properly derives from the fact that it preserves the apostles’ testimony, and *not* from any sort of inspirationist or revelational aspect. [...] This is what scholars (e.g., Koester) mean when they refer to the second-century Church fathers affirm the authority of the OT prophets as *persons* rather than as *books*.
I just read the following:
James Barr has observed that in the Old Testament “the writers do not reckon with a written ‘scripture’ as a totally dominant, known and acknowledged factor and force in the life of Israel.” He goes on to argue that even the prophets who say, “Thus says the Lord,” are not speaking on the basis of an already existing text. Almost nothing in the Old Testament suggests that there were sacred scriptures to turn to when guidance was needed. Neither David, Solomon, nor Hezekiah had any focus or emphasis on any sacred books current and normative in the life of Israel. Rather, as Barr has observed, the Old Testament individuals related to God more through persons (priests, prophets) and institutions (tabernacle, temple) than through sacred writings.1
B”H
_________
1 Lee Martin McDonald, The Canon Debate (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2002), 9. Bold mine.
Nick, I think John Poirier and McDonald are saying two different things. John is making a theological-hermeneutical statement about how we should read our Bibles today, whereas McDonald is making a simple historical statement about the development of Israelite religion.
John makes an indicative statement about where Scripture’s authority is derived from. It’s about today and how we should read the text. In the comment thread, he admits that the NT is diverse on the issue of the nature of Scripture (I’m not an NT man so I can’t say, unfortunately), so it is not the case that the NT authors only thought in terms of prophets somehow disconnected from the messages associated with them (I can imagine they would have found the dichotomy odd). Nevertheless, this strand also represents John’s own position, and so he emphasises it. The hermeneutical result is a form of historical criticism that wishes to peal away layers of textual development to get back to a historical core, the objective facts. The text is like a waste bin in which we have to fish around for the real revelation, which, as far as I can tell from other debates, consists in historical events. In other words, based on a strand of NT perspective and certain stages within the history of Israelite religion, his wishes to subject the bible to a theological Sachkritik.
McDonald, at least in this quote, is making a simple historical observation, i.e., at one point in the development of Israelite religion (“in the Old Testament”), people related to God through real people. At least in your quote, he doesn’t draw any theological-hermeneutical conclusions from this and so we (along with canonical interpreters like Childs) can heartily agree with him.
The reality is a bit more complex, as my comments and John Hobbins’ have indicated. The growth of tradition involved a growing awareness of a canonical heritage which came to play an increasingly significant role in the history of religion. The historical Isaiah was incorportated within a larger literary framework, itself informed by intertextual dialogue with other written texts. This entire process was concerned to fathom the depths of God’s ways (hence, e.g., the typological editing of Assyrian and Babylonian prophecies), and its aim was to make these ways known to further generations by hermeneutically shaping the text. This is all part of the history of religion and an element within the intenionality of the historical tradents, prophets in their own right.
Given these facts, it would seem that the church ought to take a different stance towards its inherited literature. If our interest is in the referent of the text/prophetic proclamation (God and his ways), and if that reality has progressively revealed itself over time (a standard Biblical view), and if it was the function of the canonical process to witness to that reality by reconfiguring earlier witnesses within a broader theological and hermeneutical matrix, then then it makes sense that we take the final product with utmost seriousness and not attempt to abandon it in a question for the historical Moses or the actual splitting of the dead sea. In this scheme, James Barr’s observations are interesting and relatively important, but partial and of only relative hermeneutical significance (though still siginficant all the same!). This, in my opinion, is Childs’ view and I think it makes sense. I’m happy to be told otherwise!
Phil: Perhaps you’re correct, but I know that Barr has been highly influential for John so that might stand behind some of what he was saying in his comments on the other post.
I’ll tell you otherwise after I’ve read Childs! Since this is my ‘canon year’ I’m sure I’ll be reading quite a bit from him.
Nick, I’d love to hear what you think of him. I’m lacking intelligent input on Childs from New Testament scholars, in particular those with a taste for trinitarian theology. Have you read his posthumus book on Paul?
As for The Canon Debate, I’m not sure any of it represents Childs’ position. He distinguished himself quite sharply from Sanders and again, I think I find him the more convincing.
Phil: I’ve not yet read his book on Paul but Eerdmans sent it along for review last month. I’m going to read the little ‘facets’ version of his book on Biblical Theology first and then probably his essay in Canon and Biblical Interpretation before diving into that one.
His essay in the second volume is good. Seitz’s essay in the same volume is a masterpiece. I think it represents the best elucidation, presentation, and defence of Childs’ approach that there is.
I wrote to Eerdmans for a review copy of the same book, but they ignored me. What’s the magic formula? Or do you just have to have a great blog that loads of people read?
Phil: To make a long story short, Eerdmans ignored me for quite some time as well but the owner of Dove Booksellers told me to drop his name to them and after doing that they sent a few books which I promptly reviewed and they’ve been flooding in ever since.
Plus I have a great blog that loads of people read. ;)