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Joe MacDonald

Historical Criticism - 0 views

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historical criticism

shared by Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10 - Cached
  • Historical criticism is the art of distinguishing the true from the false concerning facts of the past. It has for its object both the documents which have been handed down to us and the facts themselves. We may distinguish three kinds of historical sources: written documents, unwritten evidence; and tradition. As further means of reaching a knowledge of the facts there are three processes of indirect research, viz.: negative argument, conjecture, and a priori argument.
  • The critic must now make the best possible use of the written sources at his disposal, i. e. he must understand them well, which is not always an easy matter. His difficulty may arise from the obscurity of certain words, from their grammatical form, or from their grouping in the phrase he seeks to interpret. As to the sense of the individual words it is supremely important that the critic should be able to read the documents in the language in which they were written rather than in translations.
  • In general, whenever there is occasion to verify the exactness of a quotation made in support of a thesis, it is prudent to read the entire chapter whence it is taken, sometimes even to read the whole work. An individual testimony, isolated from all its surroundings in an author's work, seems often quite decisive, yet when we read the work itself our faith in the value of the argument based on such partial quotation is either very much shaken or else disappears entirely.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • What is now the value of a text rightly understood? Every historical statement or testimony naturally suggests two questions: Has the witness in question a proper knowledge of the fact concerning which he is called to testify? And if so, is he altogether sincere in his deposition? On an impartial answer to these questions depends the degree of confidence to be accorded to his testimony.
  • Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10
     
    This is a Catholic work dated in 1908. One can see the negotiation of science and faith in the writing. While Kantian terms such as a priori and a sence of evaluating data, there is a space for accepting unquantified data as part of the author's definition of historical criticism.
Joe MacDonald

Historical Criticism | where are you coming from? | collaborative theology for the emer... - 0 views

www.opensourcetheology.net/...648

historical criticism

shared by Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10 - Cached
  • Historical criticism attempts to find the world the text is set in and the world the text was written in. Historical criticism wants to know where the text is coming from.
  • It’s probably useful at this time to notice the intertextuality of the Bible. By this, I mean that the people writing were aware of everything that was written beforehand. This is especially noticeable when New Testament authors quote Old Testament sources. When we come across this in our reading we should take note of how the author echoes his source and how he re-interprets it.
  • Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10
     
    This is a basic analysis of historical criticism. There is also a basic approach to understanding the process by which historical criticism might be utilized.
Joe MacDonald

What is Historical Criticism? « Messianic Jewish Musings - 1 views

derek4messiah.wordpress.com/...what-is-historical-criticism

historical criticism

shared by Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10 - Cached
  • Alan Cooper spoke basically to say that for Jewish readers it is not difficult to uphold historical critical views of the text at the same time as upholding Torah as sacred authority.
  • Peter Machinist defined historical criticism as reading the Bible from its human side and seeing it as rooted in historical realities.
  • Francis Watson
  • ...7 more annotations...
  • Francis Watson of Durham University gave a provocative lecture. He said we should abandon the term historical criticism altogether for the following reasons: (1) Biblical scholars are not historians and should not imply that we are. (2) Historical criticism is not a neutral characterization. In its origin the term referred to textual criticism, which is about restoring texts. Historical criticism, by contrast, has been about doubting them. The historical critical movement has had an agenda to criticize, in the harsh sense, other views of the Bible. (3) Historical criticism has claimed that its methods are objective, neutral, and not about dogma. This has been shown to be a farce. (4) The real issue has been modernity and rationalism versus tradition. (5) Historical approaches to a text are far from the totality of the work we do. Much Biblical scholarship is not historical but interpretive. (6) The distance historical critics claim to put between themselves and the text is illusory. (7) Therefore, we should talk about biblical studies or scholarship and make the term historical criticism defunct.
  • Historical criticism, simply put, is the idea of studying the Biblical texts scientifically, which has led to dissecting the Bible into many alleged source texts.
  • First, it is important to know that historical criticism has fallen on increasing disfavor. The whole project is so rationalist and assumes the possibility of so much knowledge and the superiority of the modern over pre-modern cultures, that in this post-modern age, the enterprise is looking more and more imperialistic.
  • Legaspi traced the history of historical criticism and its move from seeing the Bible as scripture to seeing the Bible as simply a text.
  • One step in this journey was the Reformation, in which there arose a question for the first time about which version of the Bible and which selection of Bible books was valid.
  • The death of scripture in the West was solidified in 18th century German universities.
  • H-C was successful for a time, quite a long time in fact. My point was simply that it is no longer in a position to function as it once did. I don’t believe it is in an epistemological position inferior to that of confessional modes, i.e. regarding objectivity or tradition. But I believe that the discourse that it has framed is not a promising one for actual religious communities functioning now, in a post-Christian–not simply post-confessional–society.
  • Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10
     
    This is a very nice summary of several SBL papers addressing the issue of historical criticism. Several different views are expressed in a very well framed and concise manner.
Joe MacDonald

historical criticism - Dictionary definition of historical criticism | Encyclopedia.com... - 0 views

www.encyclopedia.com/...1O94-historicalcriticism.html

historical criticism

shared by Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10 - Cached
  • The method involved an examination of the texts to check their authenticity and to establish their probable authorship. Comparison is made with documents from other sources and with external evidence provided e.g. by archaeology. Motives, tendencies, interests, presuppositions will all be taken into account. Vocabulary and style must be scrutinized.
  • It has always been important to determine both the date and authorship of each composition, which is done sometimes by indications within the text itself or, sometimes, by archaeological evidence.
  • Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10
     
    Very specific and informative overview of historical-criticism
Joe MacDonald

Jesus Crisis: The Inroads of Historical Criticism into Evangelical Scholarship, The | T... - 0 views

findarticles.com/...ai_n8894481

shared by Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10 - Cached
  • The book begins by tracing the various sub-disciplines of historical criticism and the effects of using them on hermeneutics, apologetics, and preaching. It then examines the impact of Bacon, Hobbes, Spinoza, deism, Hume, Kant, Schleiermacher, Hegel, Darwin, and Kierkegaard on the philosophical foundation of the historical-critical method and its users. A chapter by Robert Yarbrough, a colleague of several of the criticized scholars, treats Eta Linnemann, her contributions to scholarship, and her view of the (lack of a) a synoptic problem.
  • Chap. 2 examines the philosophical history of the development of the historical critical disciplines. The editors carefully show the dependence of these disciplines on anti-supernatural, rationalist philosophies of the Enlightenment. These philosophies resulted in a division between faith and reason. This division continues to this day, dividing the Jesus of history from the Christ of the worship and faith of the early church and providing the underlying philosophical foundation for historical criticism.
  • The chapter on the effect of historical criticism on preaching is the weakest in the book, focusing on the importance of proper hermeneutics rather than on preaching.
Joe MacDonald

Jesus Crisis: The Inroads of Historical Criticism into Evangelical Scholarship, The - p... - 0 views

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shared by Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10 - Cached
  • Thomas accuses Blomberg, among others, of holding that the Sermon on the Mount was not delivered on one occasion. Yet Blomberg (Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels, 295) offers that as one option among several. Thomas accuses several scholars of "questioning the historical accuracy of the Gospels" (p. 258). A careful reading of Blomberg's Historical Reliability shows that he does not believe that the gospels are not accurate. He argues just the opposite, but assumes for the sake of argument that some people have difficulties with perceived inaccuracies or discrepancies among the three synoptics. Blomberg then answers these skeptics from within their own framework, showing that even using their own methods, the gospels are trustworthy.
  • There is a difference in the way historical criticism is used by these evangelical scholars compared with Bultmann, Wrede, and others. These latter are usually anti-supernatural, and attribute much of the actual material of the gospels to the creation of the early church. Evangelical scholars typically use historical critical methods to examine the way that the gospel writers used the material for their own purposes. They do not believe that the early church invented the material. The editors discount the possibility that the gospel writers used certain material rather than other material because it was suitable for the Sitz im Leben of the early church (pp. 212).
Joe MacDonald

Jesus Crisis: The Inroads of Historical Criticism into Evangelical Scholarship, The | T... - 0 views

findarticles.com/...ai_n8894481

historical criticism

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  • Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10
     
    This is a very interesting article which compares historical critical analysis within the Christian context between progressive scholars and evangelical scholars.
Joe MacDonald

Historical criticism - 0 views

jmm.aaa.net.au/15048.htm

historical criticism

shared by Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10 - Cached
  • The approach to the text of Sacred Scripture known as historical criticism began as far back as 1678, when Richard Simon, a Catholic priest, published a "critical history" of the Old Testament (placed on the Index of Prohibited Books in 1682).
  • This critical approach was taken up and fostered throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries by liberal Protestant exegetes. In the late nineteenth century the assumption was firmly in place among these liberal scholars that the early chapters of the Book of Genesis were little more than a concatenation of myths and legends, and the search was under way for the history behind the fiction.
  • The historical critics eventually won the long and at times bitter fight for the ear of the hierarchy over the contested Replies of the Pontifical Biblical Commission, and the reason for this victory seems to have been a tactical error in the approach of the traditional Catholic exegetes who opposed them. Many of these traditional exegetes were able scholars, but they pitched their arguments against the historical critics more in terms of the questionable orthodoxy of the presuppositions and logical results of the form-critical method than by analyzing in detail and refuting the technical procedures of the method itself.
  • Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10
     
    This article introduces historical criticism in the perspective of Catholic exegetical approaches from Richard Simons in the 17th century to the present.
Joe MacDonald

LT108 - Rationalism in the Historical-Criticism of Hermann Gunkel - 1 views

www.rtforum.org/lt108.html

historical criticism

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  • Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10
     
    While this article is strongly Catholic in its understanding of historical-criticism, it does pose several key issues when utilizing this method in exegetical studies.
Joe MacDonald

http://personal.georgiasouthern.edu/~etmcmull/ETA.htm - 0 views

personal.georgiasouthern.edu/...ETA.htm

historical criticism

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  • Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10
     
    This article lists a very biased approach to its critique of the method of historical-criticism.
Joe MacDonald

Yarbrough on the Failed Enterprise of Christianizing Historical Criticism - Justin Taylor - 0 views

thegospelcoalition.org/...brough-on-failed-enterprise-of

historical criticism

shared by Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10 - Cached
  • A final and poignant shortcoming of the book is that its vaunted center, historical criticism, is actually not amenable to Sparks’s deployment of it. He may try to Christianize it, but it is much bigger than he is and will recognize him as a scholar only to the extent that he bends the knee to its rules and internal logic. . . . Troeltsch, . . . did not invent historical criticism. But he codified its rules— criticism, analogy, correlation—and articulated its worldview. Historical criticism as generally affirmed by biblical scholars worldwide assumes those rules and requires that worldview.
  • The problem is that Troeltschian historiography rules the roost in mainstream biblical scholarship. That is what “historical critical” means, or even “historical” when used by “historical critical” scholars (Bart Ehrman is an excellent example). It means radical doubt of the (biblical) source, analysis using the tool of analogy, and reconstruction under the principle of correlation. It is a radically immanent enterprise—divine causation is not allowed. I think Sparks is instinctively sensitive to this; it may be a reason (see the first weakness above) why the concept “Jesus is Lord,” the most fundamental of all cognitive Christian affirmations, plays no active role that I can recall in the formation of knowledge in this book. Jesus’ lordship is irrelevant and must remain so for historical criticism to operate. Believe it privately as you wish, but the moment it affects your scholarship, you have left the nurturing bosom of historical criticism.
  • Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10
     
    Very nice struggle with the debate as to whether historical-criticism may or may not be appropriate in Christian scholasticism.
traci_shahan

Queer Theory - 34 views

queer theory
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Mary Price

Reader-response Criticsm - 24 views

Reader-response
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  • Joe MacDonald
    #7 Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10
     
    This approach is in direct contrast to the approach which I studied. I enjoy this approach much better, because there is room for theological interpretation. In historical criticism that is not the case.
Joe MacDonald

Historical Criticism - 1 views

historical criticism
started by Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10 no follow-up yet
  • Joe MacDonald
    #1 Joe MacDonald on 19 Feb 10
     
    Biblical historical-criticism is an exegetical approach to study that is mainly concerned with the factual evidence of the culture in which the text originated. Those who utilize this type of criticism attempt to understand the text in light of the society which produced the text. The issue of Divine authorship is excluded from historical-criticism. Scientific understanding replaced traditional interpretations of the scripture.
    The first person to publicly utilize historical-criticism was Richard Simon in 1678. This approach relied on a scientific approach to Biblical understanding that was void of theological interpretation. Historical-criticism was a manifestation of the Enlightenment and was further developed in the 19th century as Rationalism became the major trend in philosophy.
    Major representatives of this movement include: Richard Simon, Hermann Gunkel, Julius Wellhausen, Ernst Troeltsch,
Joe MacDonald

Biblical Research Institute - Historical Criticism - 0 views

biblicalresearch.gc.adventist.org/...historicalcriticism.htm

historical criticism

shared by Joe MacDonald on 17 Feb 10 - Cached
  • The historical-critical method assumes the autonomy of the human scientist from the Bible as the word of God. It assumes that one must start with the secular world as a norm for determining meaning and for deciding what has happened in the past.
    • Joe MacDonald
      Joe MacDonald on 17 Feb 10
       
      Good definition, but there must be some component of the scientific process to be complete.
  • The science of historical criticism is a new method based upon a secular understanding of history. In its basic intent it therefore differs radically from biblical studies which arose out of the Reformation. The Reformation assumed that the content and production of Scripture resulted by the will of God rather than the will of man, and that, although the prophet himself operated within a historical situation and within a particular language, culture, and thought form, that he was nonetheless guided by the Holy Spirit in such a way that the result was the Word of God.
  • The historical-critical method has been under development since the age of the enlightenment. It was popularized for biblical studies by Ernst Troeltsch at the end of the nineteenth century. He enunciated three basic principles to guide the historian: (1) the principle of criticism or methodological doubt indicates that all knowledge relies upon the judgment of historical science and receives a status or probability, (2) the principle of analogy indicates that present experience is the criteria of probability for that which took place in the past—all events are in principle similar, (3) the principle of correlation indicates that events are so interrelated that a change in one phenomenon necessitates a change in its causes and effects
  • Joe MacDonald on 17 Feb 10
     
    Review of Historical Criticism in 1981. While it is very informative, the article leaves the historical criticsim within the hands of the critic.
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