When doing theology must we start with God, the Bible
or hermeneutics? For postmodernism we must start with herme-neutics. God and the
Bible as his Word are not seen as objective realities but only as realities
with can only be discussed in the context of faith- and reading-communities.
Already some years ago Kevin VanHoozer in a book with the title God,
Scripture & Hermeneutics: First Theology argued that questions about
these three issues belong together.
Kevin VanHoozer unashamedly identifies the Bible with
the Word of God. When we do that, hermeneutics is governed by the self witness
of the Scripture and can never be an activity that can be undertaken apart from
this self witness. Reading the Scripture as the voice of God shows that our
view of God is dependent on the Scripture and our view on Scripture is
dependent on our view on God. God is not the construct of a faith-community and
Scripture has a real and fixed meaning that is related to authorial intent.
In the context of the canon and the development of the
history of revelation we can speak of an extended meaning in comparison with
the original meaning. The extension is always in the line of the original
meaning. I would say that we know more about the referent of Old Testament
passages that readers or hearers could know under the Old Testament dispensation.
According to postmodernism there is nothing outside
the text. According to the classical view on the Scripture and of God, the
triune God really exists and is not dependent on the Christian community of
faith. The text of Scripture cannot be really under-stood apart from the
conviction that the triune God really exist and he speaks in and through the
Scripture. The Scripture is the source of real and objective knowledge about God;
knowledge that is not dependent upon the person who knows, but upon God who has
revealed himself.
VanHoozer rightly argues that postmodernism is a
radically new suspicion of hermeneutics itself. He completely disagrees with Stanley
Hauerwas who maintains that the whole endeavor to interpret the Bible on its
own term is vain nosense. VanHoozer defends a theological hermeneutics and a
theological inter-pretation of the Scripture. This means that hermeneutics and
interpretation is based on the view that God transcends the play of language in
writing.
VanHoozer ends his study with the statement that a
Christian theologian must be a truth-teller, truth-deer and truth sufferer. A real theologian makes Christian truth claims.
Real truth complains always surpass the community to which the person who makes
this claim, belong. Truth requires evangelical passion. The willing-ness to
suffer is an indispensable element of this passion.
Kevin VanHoozer, First Theology: God, Scripture & Hermeneutics (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2002), paperback 384 p.,
price $40,-- (ISBN 978-0-8308-2681-0).