Response to Reviewers

I am particularly happy that not only did the respondents engage with Engaging Scripture (henceforth, ES), they also advanced their own concerns and interests as a way of keeping a conversation going. In that spirit, I will try to avoid simply repeating or defending parts of ES, but instead I will take up the various ways they have honored my work with their attention.I am as grateful for Brad’s exceedingly generous reading of ES as I am for his own work around the relationships between Scripture, theology, and theological interpretation. I always learn a great deal from reading his work. He is a wonderful conversation partner.To the extent that we want to think of the theological interpretation of Scripture (TIS) as a movement, I believe Brad’s assessment of its mixed bag of successes and failures is accurate, if not a bit generous. I would only add that from my perspective the greatest success of TIS has been to bring theologians like Brad and others into closer sustained conversation with biblical scholars. That may not be a lot, but it is something. Brad’s response raises specific questions—such as, How weird am I willing to be?—as well as some implied questions. I will try to respond to them.The first question is more implied than directly stated. I would formulate it like this: Why have I continued to maintain some level of engagement with the conventional practices of professional biblical scholars? I phrase the question this way because I think it is important for all of us to recognize that there is no inner coherence to the practices that go under the name of historical criticism. I am not sure it is coherent enough to be called a “tumor” as Brad suggests. As a result, I think we should avoid all-or-nothing judgments about these practices. I find this fragmented incoherence means that, from time to time, there are interpretive insights emerging from this work that are theologically useful.Another underlying question Brad raises concerns the genuine benefits of TIS as a body of work or set of practices so far. I really could not agree more with Brad’s assessments here: “One of the happy byproducts of TIS, then, has been the dedication of enormous attention and energy to the doctrine of Scripture.” I know that my colleagues on the biblical studies side of things have genuine reasons for hesitation about entering this discussion, but I think it is necessary and important for us to do so.Brad closes with some more explicit questions. He notes both the headwinds facing seminaries and theological education as well as the pressures facing church life in the United States more generally. In the light of those challenges, Brad wonders whether some sort of shock to the ecology of theological education might “push biblical studies into the arms of theology?” I might not describe things in exactly this way, but as we launch a brand new MDiv curriculum at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific, we are clear that all our faculty will need to participate in each other’s courses. You may have a specialty in Old Testament, but you will be expected to contribute to courses in theology, homiletics, pastoral theology, and the like. To my mind at least, the flourishing of TIS depends on knocking down the silos and disciplinary boundaries that have marked our patch of the academy for so long. I suspect many would agree to this. My further conviction, however, is that this can only happen in places that undergo substantial institutional change and reorganization. I am less sure that many of us are willing to undergo that.The second question concerns sola scriptura. I will leave out the Barth part of that question for now. It is clear that sola scriptura is not simply a conviction that stands on its own, it demands a particular ecclesiology that situates the church and scripture in a particular sort of relationship where Scripture stands as an entity distinct from the church and with its own voice. Although there are adherents of this view within my own Anglican tradition, I do not hold this view, nor do I think it is typically Anglican. I should also say that I believe there are some significant challenges to be addressed by those whose doctrine of Scripture leads them to position Scripture as a prophetic voice outside the church.Further, I believe that the development of extensive theories about the literal sense of Scripture with the idea of corralling and narrowing appropriate interpretive options simply replicates the problems related to determinate theories of meaning in another key. The church has happily embraced a literal sense that allows for pluriform, noncompetitive literal interpretations of texts while also sustaining nonliteral forms of reading the same text. I am not sure why one would want to limit that.Finally, Brad wonders how weird we are willing to be? I want to offer a qualified yes to Brad’s figural maximalism. I also want to recognize that I am not particularly gifted in reading this way. Moreover, I think that we should not assume that it is at all easy or straightforward to interpret well in this way. Figural reading seems like a difficult skill to practice and master. I think a lot of work needs to be done in this area before this maximalism is weird in an edifying way, rather than weird in a simply weird way.I will not devote much space to recognizing with Liz the numerous points at which our work intersects and overlaps. So many of the initial musings that led to ES arose from long conversations with Gerald West and subsequent visits to South Africa to engage in dialogue about the work of the Ujaama Center. One of my hoped-for outcomes from ES was to offer theoretical support for spaces in academic conversations for things like Africentric approaches to Scripture as serious intellectual and theological endeavors that should have a place in any ongoing discussions about theological interpretation.It appears that the basic point of difference between us hangs on our views of theories of textual meaning. From my perspective, the space that ES tries to open for things like Africentric readings is contingent upon some version of underdetermined accounts of meaning. Although I have little doubt that biblical scholars will continue to try to understand the communicative intentions of specific biblical authors even if they do not describe their work this way, I also want to say that there is no non-question begging argument for privileging that particular interpretive interest as “meaning” at the expense of other interpretive interests.The use of Speech Act Theory here does not really help. Neither would a full-blown reader-response theory of meaning. Indeed, if you do privilege the original author’s communicative intention as the meaning of a text, you end up with a host of negative consequences. For example, on this view, any form of Africentric interpretive interests will always be either derivative or subsidiary to some other interpretive interest that delivers “meaning.” Moreover, from a theological perspective this approach will make christological readings of the Old Testament and Trinitarian readings of texts like John 1 and Phil 2:6–11 also derivative or subsidiary.The great virtue of an underdetermined account of textual meaning is that it results in noncompetitive interpretive relations rather than competitive ones, while also enabling reasoned judgments about the quality of any particular piece of interpretive work. Such an approach also retains the importance of interpretive conversation rather than trying to bring it to an end. I am happy to support each of the interpretive moves in Mburu’s four-legged stool. I would resist, however, the claim that any one of them, or all of them taken together, results in the meaning of a biblical text.Throughout the years since the publication of ES there have been some sharp reactions to underdetermined meaning. The reality, however, is that when it comes to examining my (or another’s) specific interpretation of a particular text, we manage to argue those matters out in relatively clear and successful ways. I take that to be one of the most telling pieces of evidence for the superiority of this view.On more than one occasion I have heard Erin Heim speak publicly with clarity, compassion, and courage about those who have been victimized by Christian interpretation of Scripture. She is right, I believe, to point out my failure to think through my emphasis on the cultivation of virtuous interpreters through practices of repentance and forgiveness from the perspective of these members of the body of Christ.But first, I want to pick up a comment from the beginning of Erin’s response because it allows me to say a bit more about my relationship to professional biblical studies. She cites (but does not necessarily agree with) a couple of reviewers who addressed ES as if it were written by someone in systematic theology. On the one hand, I take this as a compliment. On the other hand, I do not think anyone who has read my writings is in any doubt that I am on the biblical studies side of any divide between the two fields. Nevertheless, I should also say that I am, as a biblical scholar, extremely skeptical of the results of much biblical scholarship. Although some may say this skepticism is built into my DNA, it really came to the fore in my PhD research as I was looking at passages in Paul that were identified as early Christian hymns. The more I examined this identification, the more I came to realize that the evidence for it was scant to nonexistent. Over the course of my career, I have found time and again that settled arguments in biblical studies rest on extremely shaky, narrow, unstable evidentiary bases. This has put me perpetually on guard for claims that have little to no evidence behind them or for claims that are wildly disproportionate to the available evidence.The more significant parts of Erin’s response are related to my emphasis on the cultivation of virtue through the practice of forgiveness and repentance and especially how these practices might be embodied by those who have been victimized by various aspects of biblical interpretation.One thing I believe I unfortunately underplayed in ES was the role of confession and truth-telling in relation to repentance and forgiveness. I underplayed this in several respects. First, I probably relied too much on the prior arguments in Reading in Communion regarding the foundational nature of confession in the processes leading through forgiveness and repentance toward reconciliation. Secondly, and more importantly, I did not reckon with how difficult such confession and truth-telling can be within ecclesial spaces that are not widely perceived as safe for all people to speak truthfully. My own position as a relatively powerful white man requires much more attentiveness to this than I understood twenty-five years ago.I appreciate and largely agree with Erin’s use of Rom 8 and the embrace of our creaturely status. One of the advantages of operating with an underdetermined account of textual meaning is that it provides a barrier against the view that one might master a text, that one might actually offer the last word on an issue. I also fully agree with her suggestion that virtue is cultivated relationally. Indeed, most virtues can only be displayed in relation to others.At the risk of seeming overly defensive, I do want to remind us that the primary target in this chapter of ES was the view that either a theory of determinate meaning or a particular construction of Scripture—particularly the idea that Scripture has a voice—is essential to provide guard rails against Christians’ well demonstrated proclivities to interpret Scripture in ways that underwrite some of their most sinful practices. Nothing I have said here makes such a view any stronger. It is still problematic in all the ways noted in ES. I do recognize that more theologically sophisticated versions of this view have been published since ES. However, I would maintain that they can be challenged powerfully.I want to thank each of the respondents for their charitable engagement with my book. They have exemplified what is best and sometimes all too rare in academic discussions. I look forward to further conversation.It is pretty clear that ES requires an ecclesiology that demands: churches capable of weighing in on interpretive disputes; churches able to make judgments about whether and how specific interpretations fit within the Rule of Faith; churches able to offer and embody faithful accounts of interpretive authority; and churches capable of offering wise direction to believers in specific contexts about the courses of their lives. I am painfully aware of the very strong challenge the anemic ecclesial lives of most churches pose for this view.An ecclesiology that posits Scripture as its own voice distinct from the church must argue that despite the obvious temporal and canonical priority of the church to Scripture, God has established Scripture as an independent witness over the church. The church, under the providential guidance of the Spirit, establishes the canon of Scripture and then sets itself under and distinct from Scripture. The appeal of this view is due to the abundance of cases in which churches act in ways that seem driven more by institutional self-interest than by Scripture’s directives.I want to point out a number of challenges this view should address. I will try to state them briefly with the aim of getting as many of these points out as possible. I am happy to discuss them further later.First, to the extent Scripture seems to speak about this issue at all, it would be to argue against the idea that Scripture is an independent voice over against the church. Scripture portrays the community of faithful worshippers of Christ as eternal. Doubtless, transformed and redeemed by God, but they are there singing God’s praises into eternity. Scripture is not eternal. It does not speak of itself that way, indeed, it seems to argue the opposite. Jeremiah 31 is probably the clearest statement of this, but Matt 19 and other texts can be brought in to support it.Secondly, if Scripture has an independent identity as witness over against the church, then we are also compelled to argue that it must have a clarity independent of any ecclesial interpreter so that it may speak with “its own voice.” Although I am happy to use language about the voice of Scripture in informal ways, should I find myself in an interpretive dispute with someone, claiming that my interpretation accords with the voice of Scripture is simply question begging or an attempt to rely on power over persuasion. Of course, each party in an interpretive dispute thinks their interpretation resonates with the voice of Scripture. Such disputes only find resolution in the light of some sort of teaching office (either ecclesial or academic) that helps identify which interpreters are speaking with Scripture’s voice and which are not. The only way to address such interpretive conflicts is to relocate scriptural interpretation back into the community of believers. This seems to sacrifice the gains achieved by setting Scripture apart from the community in the first place.Finally, if we are to invest a great deal in the view of Scripture as an independent witness, I think it is fair to ask whether we have any examples of Scripture ever functioning that way. I am not speaking about all of those times when our personal study of Scripture has led us individually to turn away from something or some practice and return to God. Rather, I am wondering whether there are any examples when a church body of any sort has repented of its views or practices by listening to the voice of Scripture.