Keith Stanglin’s Letter and the Spirit of Biblical Interpretation: Some Reflections
Keith D. Stanglin, The Letter and Spirit of Biblical Interpretation: From the Early Church to Modern Practice (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2018). 274 pages.
Presentation at the 2019 Christian Scholars Conference in Lubbock, Texas.
I welcome this book on several levels.
For me, and for others who have worked vocationally in historical theology, it is a welcome reacquaintance with past figures. I found myself renewing friendships with Gregory of Nyssa, Erasmus of Rotterdam, Calvin of Geneva, and even the Dutch Remonstrants whose influence was much greater than their numbers.
In addition, the purpose of this nostalgic journey is the rehabilitation of the spiritual sense of Scripture or theological hermeneutics. Stanglin, following Paul, calls it the “letter” and the “spirit,” or the literal and spiritual, senses of Scripture. The spiritual sense seeks theological understanding beyond, though not irrespective of, the literal sense, especially where the literal sense is equated with the authorial intent of the human writer.
Both of these concerns are germane to my own work, and I noted a kinship between Keith’s interest and my teaching over the past thirty-seven years. This interest commits Stanglin to an exercise in “retrieval exegesis” (211) or “retrieval theology” (11). By this, he intends to “provide critical understanding of and appreciation for both premodern and modern exegesis” in search of “a balanced and fruitful interaction between the letter and the spirit” (11).
I applaud this goal, and in pursuing it, Stanglin highlights the spiritual while not vacating the literal sense. In other words, one agenda of the book is to sanction theological interpretation and propose it as a healing balm for the woes of the splintered and chaotic practice of modern historical-critical exegesis.
My old friends appear one after another in Stanglin’s analysis. Such a survey is, of course, selective and Keith acknowledges this. I have no significant misgiving about his choices. Irenaeus, Origen, Aquinas, Erasmus, Luther, Calvin, Spinoza, and Lessing are obvious and important, even necessary, choices. I found three particularly significant because they intersect with my own interests.
First, Irenaeus is foundational to Stanglin’s reading of the patristic tradition. A central conviction, which lies at the heart of a theological hermeneutic, is present in the bishop. Keith characterizes it in this way: “the Scriptures display a fundamental unity that allows this kind of typological and intertextual play within the bounds of this grand story of redemption” (31). Irenaeus knew that everyone reads the text against the background of a hypothesis, which norms what the text can mean or gives boundaries to the meaning of a text. Received through catechism, baptism, and liturgy, the church wears the Regula Fidei as a set of glasses through which Scripture is read, and with this lens even the illiterate are able to discern between the illegitimacy of the Gnostic hypothesis and the truth of the received narrative (34). Irenaeus, then, establishes two key principles that are part of Stanglin’s ultimate conclusion about theological hermeneutics: analogia scripturae and analogia fidei (206, 222-3).
Second, though seemingly a minor character in the narrative (three pages in the text, 141-144), Stanglin’s attention to William Perkins—arguably the primary influence on seventeenth century English Puritans—is important for several reasons. On the one hand, Perkins represents Reformed scholasticism, and, on the other hand, anticipates a modern reading of Scripture through a rational lens, though that rationality serves a different purpose than critical exegesis. As Keith notes, Perkins believed there was only one sense of Scripture, the literal one, but he subsumed other traditional senses under that rubric. For Perkins, the literal sense, with his attendant use of typology and allegory, served the theological agenda of Scripture, that is, to deduce a system of theology. Perkins practiced a theological hermeneutic that accentuated the unity of Scripture through an eminently rational lens. Assuming a theological system as part of the text, Perkins employed positivistic distinctions between generic and specific, between explicit and implicit teachings of Scripture in order to deduce that system. Later, mid-20th century leaders among Churches of Christ, as heirs of the Puritan Reformed tradition, would do the same with generic and specific, with explicit and implicit distinctions, though they sought an ecclesial pattern more than a systematic theology. In this way, Perkins is like a hinge upon which the church swings from premodern to modern exegesis but without being fully committed to either.
Third, I cannot fail to comment on Alexander Campbell, who takes up four pages in Stanglin’s narrative (169-172). I think Keith is fundamentally correct. Campbell embraced nuda scriptura, which seems to undermine the Irenaean function of the Regula Fidei. Campbell does not have a regulated reading in the sense of a Rule of Faith external to the text of Scripture, but he does read Scripture with a hermeneutic regulated by an inductive sense of God’s narrative which Campbell thought was helpfully summarized in the Apostles Creed. For Campbell, the rule of faith is the internal dynamic of the narrative itself. This inscripturated narrative functions as a canon within the canon and renders the Rule of Faith as an external summary unnecessary, though it might be helpful as a rehearsal of facts. In this sense, we might say, he read Scripture through his own inductively inferred rule of faith.
Also, Scripture, according to Campbell, is subject to “all the rules of interpretation which we apply to other books” (Millennial Harbinger, 1832, 111). He follows Moses Stuart on this point, who—more than any other writer—shaped Campbell’s historical-grammatical consciousness. Campbell published Stuart’s article entitled, “Are the same principles of interpretation to be applied to the Scriptures as to other Books?” (Millennial Harbinger, 1832, 64.) It was a rhetorical question. For Campbell this is rooted in the nature of language itself, and if one wants to understand the “doctrine of the New Testament,” one must understand the “proper meaning of words, whether literal, allegorical, typical, or parabolical.” In other words, as Campbell says, “The Bible means what it says.” (Millennial Harbinger, 1831, 490.) And, we might add, only what it says. This hermeneutical commitment, along with his linguistic and hermeneutical optimism, grounded his pursuit of the restoration of the ancient order towards the goal of ecclesial unity.
While Scripture’s proper meaning is singular, it is sometimes “literal” and sometimes “figurative” (parabolic, allegorical, typological). Campbell is willing to name this “figurative” meaning as “spiritual,” but he fears the word carried the baggage of “Origen” where “every word” in the Bible had “a spiritual sense.” This gave the term “spiritual” a negative appearance (a “malem partem”) and thus it was “discarded even where it might have been tolerable.” (Millennial Harbinger, 1831, 491.) Stanglin is correct. “Campbell takes the classic Protestant angle of folding the spiritual sense into the literal” (171). There is no “double sense” (Millennial Harbinger, 1832, 111), but every text has a particular sense, which may be literal or spiritual (figurative). “We object not,” Campbell wrote, “to the allegoric, parabolic, and typical sense; or, to express it in one word, the figurative sense. But we do not expect to find any other than the literal sense except where figures are used.” (Millennial Harbinger, 1831, 491-2.). In other words, every text of Scripture has only one meaning or sense (he quotes both Luther and the Westminster Divines in support). If the literal does not yield that single sense, we look to the figurative (which is the spiritual sense). We can only move to the spiritual sense when the literal is non-sensical, or where there is a specific indication that a figurative meaning is in view. In other words, we cannot read the Old Testament the way the apostles read it. In this way, Campbell represented the rise of modern exegesis and expected to find no legitimate meaning in text other than what is accessible by its plain words.
Stanglin grounds the legitimacy of theological hermeneutics in the historic practice of the church that has lived under the Rule of Faith (analogia fidei) for almost two thousand years, the unity of Scripture (analogia scripturae), and the primacy of the literal sense to which any spiritual sense is tied. Keith also rejects several significant modern presuppositions, including (1) the neutrality of reader and (2) the single sense of the text limited to the intent of the human author. I wondered, however, whether he also rejected the modern assumption of the passivity of the reader. I don’t think so, but I want to press the point a bit.
For example, Stanglin suggests the spiritual sense of Scripture is not merely an application of the text but “in some sense meant to be found in the text” (217) and, at the same time, it is an interpretation or “appropriation” (217). I presume this meaning is intended by the divine author and discerned by the human reader. The reader is not passive but is the means by which God opens up new meaning so that a kind of “this is that” appears “when ’that’ is something new and apparently far removed from the original ‘this’” (217).
Theological hermeneutics, then, is where ecclesially-formed, believing readers co-create meaning with the text (1) within liturgical life of the church, (2) in the confidence of the sacramental function of Scripture, and (3) the transformative presence of the Holy Spirit. Such readers, inhabited by the indwelling Spirit, listen to hear how “this is that” and see what is not explicitly there. It seems to me that Stanglin’s proposal could use more emphasis on these three points, particularly the hermeneutical role of the Spirit. Though these three points are present in one form or another, his proposal is more epistemological than sacramental or liturgical. Nevertheless, the seeds of a fuller sacramental and liturgical picture are present in his work.
By way of illustration, permit me to probe one of Keith’s examples. Might “bread” in the Lord’s Prayer refer to Eucharistic bread? Tertullian thought so (On Prayer, 6).[1] In fact, Tertullian preferred what he called “the spiritual understanding”—Jesus is the bread of life who “authoritatively ranked” his body “as bread” when he said, “This is my body.”
Keith asks, “Did Jesus or Matthew intend” eucharistic bread? “Does it matter?” (240). I appreciate the controls Keith suggests on theological interpretation. They give theological interpretation a wide berth, perhaps too wide for modern historians. But I don’t think too wide for ecclesial theologians.
In terms of the Lord’s prayer, “bread” is literally present, and Eucharistic bread does not subvert or contradict the literal meaning. Further, “bread” is an important theme in redemptive history, which often has a double sense. Manna, for example, is both physical and spiritual nourishment since Christ is the spiritual food Israel consumed in the wilderness, according to Paul. Eucharistic bread in the Lord’s Prayer is not only consistent with the Rule of Faith but, given the liturgical context of its practice, points us toward the Eucharistic bread.
If we read the Lord’s Prayer in this way as part of the liturgy of the church where it is recited just prior to the distribution of the bread and wine, we see spiritual interpretation doing its good work. It illustrates how the church legitimately co-creates meaning that is beyond the explicit statements in the text. It illustrates how Scripture is multivalent and capable of new meaning in new situations irrespective of the human author’s intent.
But is the spiritual meaning in the text? In one sense, yes, because it is situated within a grand story that gives such meaning to bread. And we might surmise that the divine author intended it as a meaning inherent in the text. But in another sense, it is not, but that is okay. The church—as a faithful reader—is called to co-create meaning with the text for the sake of the formation of the people of God into the image of God. This is Scripture’s sacramental function within the liturgical life of the church. Given God’s history with God’s people and given the confession of the Rule of Faith and its practice within the church, the text itself gives rise to meaning beyond the human author’s intent. The church hears the word of God, understands its depth and profundity, and performs it liturgically and ethically.
Stanglin’s
contribution identifies an overlapping harmony between modern and premodern
interpretation though differences remain. There is a common ground between the
methods where they might mutually enrich each other. The exploration of this
common ground while recognizing how the differences entail quite distinct
hermeneutical practices will be an ongoing task of the contemporary church.
[1] E. Evans, Tertullian’s Tract on Prayer (London: S.P.C.K., 1953) 11-13.