Richelle / Recalcati / Beukenhorst Do We Still Need Inspiration?

Scriptures and Theology
1. Auflage 2023
ISBN: 978-3-11-129759-0
Verlag: De Gruyter
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, Band 24, 213 Seiten

Reihe: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam ? Tension, Transmission, TransformationISSN

The concept of inspiration is part and parcel of the theological tradition in several religious confessions, but it has largely receded to the background, if not vanished altogether, in the discussions of biblical scholars. The question "Do we still need inspiration?" might well reflect the perplexity of many exegetes today. Systematic theologians, for their part, often further their own reflections on the subject independently of developments in the field of exegesis, with the risk of remaining purely theoretical. Biblical research in the last decades has been marked by new insights about the nature of the biblical texts, stemming from the study of their inner plurality (insofar as they combine and sometimes intertwine conflicting theologies), of their textual fluidity, and of their reception. Can these new insights be integrated into a theological reflection on the notion of inspiration? These questions are often explicitly raised about the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, but they also prove increasingly relevant for Qur’anic studies. This volume addresses them through contributions from exegetes of the Bible and of the Qur’an and systematic theologians.

Zielgruppe

Scholars in the fields of Biblical, Jewish and Quran studies and

Autoren/Hrsg.

Richelle, Matthieu

Recalcati, Camilla

Beukenhorst, Martijn

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Christentum, Christliche Theologie Systematische Theologie
• Geisteswissenschaften Religionswissenschaft Religionswissenschaft Allgemein Vergleichende Religionswissenschaft
• Geisteswissenschaften Religionswissenschaft Religionswissenschaft Allgemein Religionsphilosophie, Philosophische Theologie

Leseproben

Introduction

This volume is the result of a conference held in Louvain-la-Neuve (Belgium) on May 16-17, 2022, organized by the Scriptures & Theology research group of the Université Catholique de Louvain.1 The purpose of this interdisciplinary and interreligious research group is to explore the interaction between the exegetical study of scriptural texts and theological reflection on the same texts. To that effect, the group is composed on the one hand of specialists of the Hebrew Bible / Old Testament, of the New Testament, and of the Qur’an, and on the other hand of systematic theologians. It is the conviction of the members of this group that all can learn from a conversation between those who scrutinize the texts and those who try to think theologically on the basis of these texts within a religious tradition.2

Paradoxically, if there is one subject that exegetes and theologians rarely discuss together, it is the “inspiration” of the very texts that both of these kinds of scholars study according to the specificities of their field. In particular, the concept of inspiration is part and parcel of the theological tradition in several Christian confessions, but it has largely receded to the background, if not vanished altogether, in the discussions of biblical scholars. The question “Do we still need inspiration?” might well reflect the perplexity of many exegetes today. Systematic theologians, for their part, often further their own reflections on the subject independently of developments in the field of exegesis, with the risk of remaining purely theoretical.

There are reasons for this situation. On the one hand, academic biblical studies as we know them have been shaped by a move “from Scripture to text.”3 It is because the object of academic study is the text itself, not the text invested with its religious status, that it can be subjected to discussions by scholars of various religious persuasions or none. Moreover, a biblical scholar who also happens to be religious may well privately believe that the texts he or she is studying are inspired, but this does not change anything in his or her own academic work (although, of course, practitioners of exegesis are not immune to unconscious bias). As far as exegesis is concerned, the Bible is studied academically just like any other text.4 Belief in inspiration is a matter of faith; it is not empirically observable by means of exegesis. That being said, scholars have been so successful in practicing this methodological bracketing of inspiration in the last few centuries, that they have often forgotten inspiration altogether as a theological notion, and they do not know what to do with it anymore.

Moreover, exegetes may find it difficult to square the theoretical notion of inspiration with the practical complexity of the texts they study. Biblical research in the last decades has been marked by new insights about the nature of the biblical texts, stemming from the study of their inner plurality (insofar as they combine and sometimes intertwine conflicting theologies), of their “materiality” (the textual fluidity observed in the divergences between manuscripts), and of their reception (now regarded as an integral part of the “life” of the books). Can these new insights be integrated into a theological reflection on the notion of inspiration? These questions are often explicitly raised about the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, but they also prove increasingly relevant for qur’anic studies. Furthermore, recent years have seen increasingly sophisticated discussions by theologians on the notion of revelation, and it remains to be seen how they can be connected to the concept of inspiration.

It is in order to discuss such questions and move beyond the current situation that the research group Scriptures & Theology convened a conference and invited specialists from various horizons (Emmanuel Durand, Konrad Schmid, Mark Elliott, and Benjamin Sommer) to provide their perpective on the discussion with professors and students of UCLouvain.

This collection of contributions is organized in two parts. The first part (“Inspired writing?”) focuses on two aspects of biblical books that make them more complex and multifaceted than was acknowledged in the past. Thus, the two first contributions reflect on the phenomenon of plurality that is inherent to the Bible (whether the Hebrew Bible or the Christian Bible). Is it still possible to find some principle of unity beyond this multiplicity? Can we still speak of a theology of the Bible?

In his important book “Jusqu’où ouvrir le livre?” Emmanuel Durand has already addressed this problem from the perspective of both the authors and the interpreters of Scriptures, within the framework of Christian theology. Responding to the invitation of the conference organizers, he offers an updated discussion, partly based on sections of his book that have been translated and adapted, thus bringing to the English-speaking world Durand’s profound theological thinking.5 By exploring the processes of kenosis, conversation and embodiment, he argues that we should not try to harmonize the textual pluralities of the biblical text, but that they are resolved in a “paradoxical synthesis” in the figure of Jesus Christ. Durand argues that the Bible exhibits a double kenosis: from divine word to human word and from oral to written tradition. Through the figure of Jesus Christ the Scriptures become reordered so that all point towards him. Thus the Scriptures should be understood as forming a system, an “organism” with an order and a limit. This is created through synergy between human action and the divine operator of inspiration via complex mediations. In the end, the plurality inherent to the biblical testimonies is a lesson of humility for believers; “the letter of Scripture should restrain interpreters and theologians from claiming the viewpoint of God.”

Second, Konrad Schmid uses case studies to bring to light elements of micro- and macro-theology that can be found in the Hebrew Bible. He shows that Gen 18 is literarily dependent on Lev 2 and that Deut 34 likewise depends on Gen 6. Based on such instances of intertextuality between texts from different books, he argues that we cannot speak of a theology of the Hebrew Bible, but that we should instead speak of a diverse set of different theologies. These theologies exist alongside one another and the various readings they create do not pose a problem but create fruitful conversations, as he shows with a case study from Prov 26. Only at a later stage were attempts made to create a uniform theology of the Hebrew Bible, but this has not impacted the existence of multiple theologies side by side in the text.

The second pair of chapters tackle another factor of complexity that looms large in current biblical research: the notion of textual fluidity. The latter points to the malleability of texts, especially at the hand of scribes during the Second Temple period, the result being that each biblical text exists in many distinct instances, and sometimes in multiple literary editions. What does it mean to speak of an inspired text when the manuscript evidence reveals that it is fluid? In other words, is textual fluidity a challenge to the notion of inspiration? Two contributions aim to answer that question, from the point of view of a biblical scholar and from that of a systematic theologian, respectively.

On the one hand, Matthieu Richelle explains why biblical scholars who are still interested in the notion of inspiration may find that some realities are not fully represented in classical formulations of that doctrine. Although the focus of systematic discussions on inspiration has recently shifted from book to text, this actually raises new questions insofar as the text itself proves unstable or elusive, in the light of textual fluidity. Some books exist in several literary editions; passages and verses appear or disappear depending on the textual witness one considers. Are the “supplements” that appear in only some manuscripts inspired? Should we consider the successive editions of a particular book as all inspired? Do such questions even make sense? Richelle assesses a number of possible approaches to these issues, pointing out their strengths and their weaknesses. Finally, he suggests that recent research on the conceptualization of books in Antiquity could provide a way forward for rethinking our own conceptualization of inspiration. The notions of “vitality of Scriptures” (Hindy Najman) and of “literary projects” (Eva Mroczek) represent fresh metaphors to approach the multifaceted realities of biblical texts.

On the other hand, Benoît Bourgine proposes a solution to the “maximal tension” that exists between exegesis and theology. Theology demands unity and contemporary relevance, which exegesis does not provide. Thus, Bourgine remarks, theology often disregards exegesis, especially when it comes to the possible challenges posed by textual fluidity to the notion of divine inspiration. Yet Bourgine argues that the inspiration of Scripture and textual fluidity are two “rigorously heterogeneous realities.” Moreover, he endeavors to solve the aforementioned tension by looking at exactly what inspiration means. He argues, with Karl Barth, that inspiration means that the text goes beyond its context and speaks to all generations. From this perspective, it is possible to observe an interplay between...

Über Autor(innen)

Matthieu Richelle; Camilla Recalcati; Martijn Beukenhorst, Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium.