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Fact, Language, and Hermeneutic: an Interdisciplinary Exploration

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2009

Richard Batey  and
Jerry H. Gill
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Extract

The contentions of this essay are three. Our first thesis is that both contemporary philosophical and theological thought stand at an impasse. In philosophy the empiricists emphasise the significance of factual meaning to the exclusion of valuational meaning, while the existentialists stress the importance of valuational meaning to the exclusion of the factual. In theology the conservatives and liberals are united in stressing the historical (Historie) significance of Jesus so as almost to ignore his existential (Geschichte) significance, while the Bultmannians focus on the existential significance of Jesus and minimise the need for factual knowledge.

Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 23 , Issue 1 , February 1970 , pp. 13 - 26
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1970

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References

page 13 note 1 For a thorough presentation of this view of language, see Russell's, Bertrand ‘The Philosophy of Logical Atomism’, The Monist, vols. XXVIII–XXIX, 1918–1919Google Scholar; and Wittgenstein's, LudwigTractatus Logico-Philosophicus (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1961).Google Scholar

page 13 note 2 For an analysis and critique of Heidegger's philosophy of language, see Gill's, Jerry H. ‘The Language of Theology’, Encounter, XXVII, No. 3 (Summer 1966).Google Scholar This article includes a discussion of Heidegger's unpublished paper on ‘The Problem of Non-Objectifying Language’.

page 14 note 1 See his Philosophical Investigations (New York: Macmillan, 1953).Google Scholar

page 15 note 1 ibid., p. 88 (Nos. 241, 242).

page 15 note 2 See especially his How To Do Things With Words (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1962).Google Scholar

page 15 note 3 ibid., chapter X.

page 17 note 1 Personal Knowledge (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1964), p. x.Google Scholar In addition see his ‘The Logic of Tacit Inference’, Philosophy, XLI (1966).Google Scholar

page 19 note 1 The idealism of the Christ-myth theory was basically opposed to the philosophical naturalism of the ‘liberal’ lives of Jesus. The extreme criticism of Bauer's, BrunoKritik der Evangelien undGeschichte ihres Ursprungs, vols. I, II (Berlin, 1850–1851)Google Scholar, concluded that there was no historical Jesus. This thesis was elaborated by Drews, Arthur whose Die Christmythe (Chicago: 1911)Google Scholar met with strong opposition. See Schweitzer, Albert, The Quest for the Historical Jesus (New York: Macmillan Company, 1961), pp. 137–179;Google ScholarCase, S. Jackson, The Historicity of Jesus (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1912), pp. 32–61;Google ScholarAchtemeier, Paul J., ‘Is the New Quest Docetic?’ Theology Today, XIX (1962), 363.Google Scholar

page 19 note 2 Bultmann, Rudolf, Theology of the New Testament, translated by Grobel, Kendrick (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1955), II, 250–251.Google Scholar

page 20 note 1 Bultmann, Rudolf, ‘Neues Testament und Mythologie’, Kerygma and Mythos (Hamburg: Herbert Reich, Evangelischer Verlag, 1948), I, 23Google Scholar (English translation by Fuller, R. H. entitled ‘New Testament and Mythology’, Kerygma and Myth, New York: Harper and Brothers, 1961, p. 11).Google Scholar

page 20 note 2 Bultmann, Rudolf, Jesus Christ and Mythology (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1958), pp. 18–21Google Scholar; ‘The Case for Demythologization’, Myth and Christianity (New York: Noonday Press, 1958), pp. 58–71.Google Scholar Also see ‘Ist voraussetzungslose Exögese moglich?’ Glauben und Verstehen (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1960), III, 409–417Google Scholar (English translation by Ogden, Schubert M. entitled ‘Is Exegesis without Presuppositions Possible?’, Existence and Faith, New York: Meridian Books, Inc., 1960, pp. 289–296);Google Scholar‘Das Problem der Hermeneutik’, Glauben und Verstehen (Tubingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1952), II, 227–233Google Scholar (English translation by Greig, J. C. G., entitled ‘The Problem of Hermeneutics’, Essays Philosophical and Theological, New York: Macmillan Company, 1955, pp. 252–259).Google Scholar

page 20 note 3 See Jesus and the Word, translated by Smith, L. P. and Lanterno, E. H. (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1934), p. II;Google ScholarHistory and Eschatology (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1957), pp. 149–155;Google Scholar‘History and Eschatology in the New Testament’, New Testament Studies, I (September 1954), 13–16.Google Scholar

page 21 note 1 ‘Das Verhältnis des urchristlichen Christuskerygmas zum historischen Jesus’, Der historische Jesus und der kerygmatische Christus, edited by Ristow, Helmut and Mattiae, Karl (Berlin: Evangelische Verlangsanstalt, 1962), p. 233.Google Scholar

page 21 note 2 ‘Das Problem der historischen Jesus’, Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche, LI (1954), 152.Google Scholar Also see Robinson, James M., A New Quest of the Historical Jesus (London: S.C.M. Press, 1959), pp. 12–19.Google Scholar

page 21 note 3 ‘Proclamation and Speech-Event’, Theology Today, XIX (1962), 341–354.Google Scholar Also see the collection of his essays since 1932 published under the title, Zur Frage nach dem historischen Jesus (Tübingen: J. C. B, Mohr, 1960).Google Scholar

page 22 note 1 Theology Today, XIX, 351.

page 22 note 2 ibid., p. 350.

page 22 note 3 James M. Robinson has been critical of Fuchs' position stating: ‘For the focus upon Jesus’ conduct slides into a historical-psychological interpretation through considering that conduct perceptible to an objectifying view.' ‘The Recent Debate on the “New Quest”’, Journal of Bible and Religion, XXX (1962), 205.Google Scholar

page 22 note 4 Cobb, John B. Jr., ‘The Post-Bultmannian Trend’, Journal of Bible and Religion, XXX (1962), 3–11;Google ScholarAnderson, Hugh, ‘Existential Hermeneutics’, Interpretation, XVI (1962), 131–155;CrossRefGoogle ScholarOgden, Schubert M., ‘Bultmann and the “New Quest”’, Journal of Bible and Religion, XXX (1962), 209–218;Google ScholarOgden, Schubert M., ‘What Sense Does it Make to Say “God Acts in History”?’, Journal of Religion, XLIII (1963), 1–19;CrossRefGoogle ScholarFenton, John Y., ‘The Post-Liberal Theology of Christ Without Myth’, Journal of Religion, XLIII (1963), 93–104;CrossRefGoogle ScholarHerzog, Frederick, ‘Possibilities and Limits of the New Quest’, Journal of Religion, XLIII (1963), 218–233.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 24 note 1 Compare this understanding of Romans 7 with Bultmann, Rudolf, The Old and New Man (Richmond: John Knox Press, 1967), pp. 33–48;Google Scholar and Kümmel, W. G., Römer 7 und die Bekehrung des Paulus (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichssche Buchhandlung, 1929), PP. 139–160.Google Scholar