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Scripture and interpretive method: why read scripture as Canon?
Biblical Theology Bulletin, Winter, 2003 by Kenneth G. Stenstrup
Groups select and appropriate varied traditions for their own respective identity/ethos. And groups may exhibit a preference for some traditions (for example, John 3:16) more than others (for example, 1 John 3:17), a canon within a canon so to speak. However, Scriptural traditions are seldom explicitly segregated into "pearls of wisdom" or "timeless maxims" vs. "other less important stuff." The canon can be carried whether or not it is consistently (let alone equally) read. Beyond specific chapter and verse, even themes can be received more specially by different groups. For example, consider how many churches in America would embrace or value justice and peace. But these contemporary Western values may not be characteristic of all of Scripture. Indeed, reading all of Scripture can lead to certain tensions. Looking for a biblical precedent on the value of justice within the First Testament might lead one to compare honestly the calls for justice in Isaiah (for example, 1:17) with the assertion of Qoheleth (a.k.a. Ecclesiastes) 3:16-19 that there may be wickedness in place of justice and that justice--like everything under the sun--is a vanity. Likewise, looking for insights on the value of peace in the Second Testament, readers could honestly contrast Matthew's portrayal of Jesus declaring: "Blessed are the peacemakers ... " (5:9) with the portrayal of Jesus declaring: "Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division ... " (Lk 12:51). Understanding how traditions have provided identity and ethos may be most fully appreciated, then, by paying attention to the context(s) and hermeneutic(s) that allowed for the manifestation of a specific tradition. Thus, a task for understanding Scripture is to move beyond the pericope-based study and identify how various Scriptural traditions might have related or differed in their perspectives of, for example, justice or peace. The following overview presents briefly a method that effectively assists such a scope of tasks.
Interpretive Method
The method developed by James A. Sanders is based on Comparative Midrash (Sanders 1961, 1976a, 1976b, 1977, 1984; Callaway 1986, 1999) and has been more recently articulated to a broader audience through the language of Intertextuality (Sanders 1995a, 1999). While the 1992 edition of the ANCHOR BIBLE DICTIONARY entry discussing Sanders' contributions to "Canonical Criticism" states that Sanders' method is "less a formal criticism than an approach," Sanders' method is like many other methods or more popularly received formal criticisms that employ a conceptual framework including both (non-testable) assumptions about Scripture (an approach) and theories that are testable. While based upon a stance that seeks to appreciate Scripture as it functions in the groups of communities that it serves, the method goes beyond stance to assess critically how it has functioned.
More specifically, Sanders' method seeks to compile manifestations of a tradition and then critically define these as products of a respective context and the hermeneutics that underlie each manifestation. A broader objective is to bring an interpreter to an appreciation of the processes embedded in Scripture. The manifestations of a tradition, he points out, taken together, "provide a paradigm in sequence for seeing how the traditioning process moves from the earliest to the latest literature in the Bible" (Sanders 1993: 16). By seeking to describe both a series of texts and then, ultimately, how Scripture functions, the method goes beyond an exegetical approach that would assume interpretation is best served through study of how a particular pericope was perhaps initially understood by its earliest audiences.
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