Reading Old Testament Narrative as Christian Scripture

Douglas Earl sets out a fresh perspective on understanding what is involved in reading Old Testament narrative as Christian Scripture. Earl considers various narratives as examples that model different interpretive challenges in the form of exegetical, ethical, historical, metaphysical, and theological difficulties. Using these examples, the significance of interpretive approaches focused on authorial intention, history of composition, canonical context, reception history, and reading context are considered in conjunction with spiritual, literary, structuralist, existential, historical-critical, and ethical-critical approaches. Christian interpretation of Scripture as Scripture is shown to be an inherently ad hoc task, understood as a rule-governed practice in Wittgenstein’s sense: an established goal-directed activity for which no method, hermeneutical principle, or critical perspective discovers ”meaning” or generates good interpretation. Good interpretation involves exploration of various construals of the “world of the text” using “hermeneutics of tradition” and “critique of ideology” (Ricoeur). The interpreter’s task is to discern faithful readings and develop their significance in a given intellectual or cultural context. The interpretation of Scripture and its appropriation is seen to involve wisdom in forming judgments on a case-by-case basis, learned through examples and experience, on what constitutes good interpretation and use. Earl shows how traditional hermeneutics and contemporary critical resources suggest that history, ethics, and theology can rarely be “read off” Old Testament narrative, but also how Christians can appropriate ethically and historically problematic books such as Joshua, faithfully adopt a “minimalist” approach to 1-2 Samuel, and embrace a Trinitarian reading of Genesis 1.

“A thorough work that is robust in its research and scope. In many ways, Earl will be a good reading and conversation partner to scholars and advanced students.”—Daniel S. Diffey, Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society

“For readers seeking to engage seriously with theological interpretation of the biblical narrative, especially as construed within recent hermeneutical strategies and in light of the recent movement of theological interpretation of Scripture, this is a rich and thought provoking work.”—Benjamin J. M. Johnson, Review of Biblical Literature

Preface

Abbreviations

1. Prologue

2. Genesis 34: Analysis of Why an Old Testament Narrative Has Failed to Find Christian Significance using Literary Poetics and Neo-Structuralism

3. Joshua 1–12: Myth, Symbol and a Proposal for the (Christian) Significance of חרם in the Book of Joshua

4. The Joseph Story (Genesis 37–50): The Hermeneutical Significance of the Reception History and the Literary Horizons of Three Theologically Problematic Texts

5. The David Story: The Hermeneutical and Theological Significance of 'Minimalism'

6. Rahab and Dinah Revisited: 'Reading as' Scripture through Possible Construals of the 'World of the Text' in Christian Contexts

7. The Story of Ruth: Relationships between the Reader, Christian Ethics and Old Testament Narrative

8. Genesis 1:26: Christian Theology, Metaphysics, and Old Testament Narrative

9. Salvation History: A Framework for Old Testament Interpretation? The Second Naivete, the Patristic Concept of Oikonomia, and Myth

10. Epilogue: Reading Old Testament Narrative as Christian Scripture as a Task Best Left Jagged

Bibliography

Index of Subjects and Authors

Index of Scripture