Bible Books

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The People Called: The Growth of Community in the Bible

Paul D. Hanson
(San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1986) 576 pp., $31.95

Attempts to write biblical theology have traditionally moved in one of two general directions. In some cases authors have abstracted general theological principles from the Bible and then arranged them according to some sort of logical system. This approach has the advantage of presenting the material in an intelligible way so that it can be used by the modern church or synagogue, but it runs the risk of imposing on the text theological concepts that are not biblical and ignoring the historical settings in which the Bible’s theology grew. In other cases authors have tried to take seriously the Bible’s claim that God is revealed through historical events and have traced the historical growth of theology during the biblical period. This approach has the advantage of being true to Jewish and Christian views on the historical character of revelation, but it runs the risk of becoming simply a historical study of ancient religion that has little relevance for modern communities of faith. In The People Called, Paul Hanson combines these approaches, drawing upon the strengths of both while avoiding their most serious weaknesses.

To organize his massive and detailed study, Hanson focuses on the idea of community in the Bible, an idea that is important, although not omnipresent, in biblical writings, and that is also a central concern of modern Jewish and Christian groups. He then traces the Bible’s views on community from the beginning, when God created the community by calling the people of Israel in the Exodus, through the intertestamental and New Testament periods. Hanson deals with his sources more or less in chronological order, so along with his study of community he also provides a schematic history of Israelite religion. This history is a valuable scholarly contribution in its own right, primarily because it provides an unusually detailed treatment of the diverse theological perspectives and communal conflicts that existed throughout the biblical period. Noteworthy too is the refreshing stress that Hanson places on the importance of worship in Israel’s communal life, a dimension of biblical faith that modern theologians often overlook.

However, in spite of Hanson’s historical interests, his theological focus is never blurred. At each stage of the Bible’s history he probes for the theological implications of the writers’ views on community. This becomes particularly clear in his treatment of the New Testament sources, where his book adopts a specifically Christian perspective, and he concludes his work with a lengthy reflection on the relevance of biblical views of community for modern communities of faith.

Scholars will of course want to challenge some of Hanson’s conclusions about the development of Israel’s religion and are likely particularly to question whether or not he has accurately portrayed the complexity of Israel’s religious life. However, the fact remains that Hanson’s book is a major achievement that will influence the modern discussion of biblical theology for some time to come.

Beginning New Testament Study

Bruce Chilton
(Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1986) 208 pp., $9.95, paper

Keeping his eye on key issues, Bruce Chilton avoids the overworked format of standard New Testament introductions. The standard approach consists of a few general preliminaries followed by a detailed book-by-book study. Chilton, by contrast, offers an introductory discussion of the basic issues that everyone must confront in the course of New Testament study.

The chapter titled “Fact and Fiction in the Gospels,” for example, uses a case study of the account of an exorcism in Mark 2 to suggest the various literary and historical issues that the passage raises. Chilton then discusses the eschatology of Jesus and the early Church and the challenges that those teachings present. The precise character of Jesus’ teaching about the intervention of God in human history at the “end of days” has long been a controversial issue in New Testament scholarship. Chilton’s treatment is balanced and perceptive.

A chapter on English translations gives a lucid account of the problems inherent in any translation and of the philosophies of translation that underlie some of the widely used, modern English versions. Another case study, this time of Romans 13:10b, is deftly employed to illustrate the various approaches to translation.

In “Worlds of the New Testament,” Chilton concisely reviews the Jewish and 009Hellenistic environments in which the Christian movement arose and grew. Two final chapters discuss, with balance and sensitivity, the New Testament’s contemporary meaning and an assessment of its theological claims.

Chilton, who has written important scholarly monographs on the New Testament, knows the exegetical and historical disciplines well and presents them engagingly. He is also aware of the theological implications of his work and takes seriously the variety of theological stances that are possible towards the New Testament. This gracefully written and clearly presented work will make excellent reading for anyone seeking a basic introduction to the contemporary study of scripture.

Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel

Michael Fishbane
(Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press, 1985) 613 pp., $49.95

There is today a veritable industry producing interpretive aids to help Bible-reading members of practically every denomination. Jews have the Hertz Pentateuch and dispensational Fundamentalists the Scofield Reference Bible; Catholics use the Jerome Bible Commentary, and liberals the Interpreter’s Bible. This practice of relying on an “authoritative” interpreter to clarify Scripture’s meaning goes back at least as far as the ancient rabbis, who believed that their own interpretation had come from God.

In his impressive Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel, Michael Fishbane shows that this process was already at work within the Hebrew Bible, where authors of later texts interpreted earlier writings or concepts. Fishbane describes four categories of interpretation found within the text of the Bible itself. Two of them—scribal and legal interpretation—are described in his article, “The Earliest Biblical Exegesis Is in the Bible Itself,” BR 02:04. Homiletic interpretations are a third category, exemplified by Deuteronomy’s statement that “man does not live by bread alone” (8:3)—a response to the earlier tradition that God provided the Israelites with manna in the wilderness. Fishbane’s final category includes interpretations of divine revelation, by dreams or omens or by prophecy itself. An example is the explanation in Daniel that Jeremiah’s prophecy of a 70-year exile (Jeremiah 25:11–12) actually means 490 years, or 70 “weeks” of years (Daniel 9:2, 24).

The book’s main point—that the beginnings of biblical interpretation can be found within the Bible itself—is thus clear enough. Although Fishbane carefully observes that similarities to later forms of interpretation do not prove that these developed directly out of biblical practice, his caution is somewhat mitigated by his use of terms that are drawn from classical Jewish and Christian interpretation to describe their biblical prototypes.

Despite the clarity of Fishbane’s thesis, this book is technical and often difficult, replete with foreign terms and jargon. Introductory statements are called “introits,” and topics are topoi. Obscure words and coinages (for example, “dignification” and “transvaluate”) are common, and the syntax is frequently awkward. A minor, but confusing, matter is the inconsistent way Hebrew words are treated. Translations (which are not always provided) may precede or follow the Hebrew word itself, with either one in quotation marks or parentheses. Such variety, sometimes even on a single page, makes it difficult to follow Fishbane’s arguments; for those who are not familiar with Hebrew, it is often impossible. There are also several digressions into related, but nonessential, issues; even sections dealing with interpretation per se are not always what one would have expected. These characteristics enhance the book’s value for its intended scholarly audience, but may be frustrating for others.

For all its idiosyncrasies, this book is immensely important. Valuable explanations are offered for many passages (the index contains 30 double-columned pages of biblical citations). The collection of these passages, and their well-structured arrangement, facilitates comprehension of the various types of interpretation, even though the style sometimes hinders it. Fishbane’s demonstration of interpretation within the biblical text not only proves his fundamental thesis, but also draws our attention to something we should have seen all along: The rabbis, the Dead Sea sect and the early Church were within the biblical tradition they had inherited when they tried to ground their own, sometimes novel, ideas in its words. It will henceforth be impossible to discuss the history of biblical interpretation without considering the material that Fishbane has gathered and inconceivable for such a survey to begin with the rabbis or Church fathers, without at least some explanation for the biblical period’s omission.

The People Called: The Growth of Community in the Bible
Paul D. Hanson
(San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1986) 576 pp., $31.95