Re: Reading Genesis literally

I just read a really excellent essay by John Jefferson Davis,
"Genesis, Inerrancy, and the Antiquity of Man," in "Inerrancy and
Common Sense," a volume published in 1980 (apparently out of print but
you can get it used on Amazon). Davis surveys, within the context of
inerrancy, various ways in which the Genesis accounts have been read
non-"literally," and offers some interesting suggestions. Very good
stuff.

On 4/25/06, gordon brown <gbrown@euclid.colorado.edu> wrote:
> Concerning valid interpretations other than what the author had in mind,
> there is an interesting passage in John 11:49-52 in which Caiaphas makes a
> comment about one man dying for the people. We might think of it as
> ironic, but John says that it was prophetic. Interestingly Caiaphas was
> not an author of Scripture or even on the right side of the issue.
>
> Gordon Brown
> Department of Mathematics
> University of Colorado
> Boulder, CO 80309-0395
>
>
> On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 cmekve@aol.com wrote:
>
> > George is correct (as usual!) As C.S. Lewis said [perhaps quoting someone else] "Thoughts beyond their thoughts to those high bards were given."
> >
> > But I also was thinking of some of the 'critical' approaches to Scripture. The traditional "literal" sense (i.e., the meaning of the original authors) would imply that detailed "critical" study is both necessary and a good thing. But historically (from the 19th century book Essays and Reviews to the Jesus Seminar) the overriding approach is that the meaning of the original author is the only legitimate meaning. This is clearly not the case for any written text (think Shakespeare) and certainly not for Scripture -- as the Church has always recognized. Even though non-literal uses can be abused, as the Reformers pointed out rather vociferously, that doesn't mean we have to toss out the baby with the bathwater. Scripture authors themselves were constantly expanding and building on and reinterpreting earlier Scripture, e.g., Ezekiel on part of Genesis, Jesus (as presented by the Gospel writers) reinterpreting the Law, etc. And for a modern approach to retrieve the "typ!
ol!
> ogi
> > cal" interpretation of Scripture (which was prevalent for well over a millenium in the Church), see theologian Ephraim Radner's book Hope Among the Fragments.
> >
> > Karl
> > *************
> > Karl V. Evans
> > cmekve@aol.com
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: George Murphy <gmurphy@raex.com>
> > To: cmekve@aol.com; williamehamiltonjr@yahoo.com
> > Cc: asa@calvin.edu
> > Sent: Mon, 24 Apr 2006 16:44:50 -0400
> > Subject: Re: Reading Genesis literally
> >
> >
> > Karl's last sentence below refers (I think) to what has traditionally been called the sensus plenior of a text. There can be such a "fuller sense" of a text even from a merely human author. (Dorothy Sayers gives a good example from her own work in The Mind of the Maker.) & if we believe that the Holy Spirit is involved in a distinctive the development of biblical texts then we shouldn't be too surprised if there is sometimes more in them than their human authors intended.
> >
> > Shalom
> > George
> > http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: cmekve@aol.com
> > To: williamehamiltonjr@yahoo.com
> > Cc: asa@calvin.edu
> > Sent: Monday, April 24, 2006 3:15 PM
> > Subject: Re: Reading Genesis literally
> >
> >
> > It's important to keep in mind that what the Church (including Augustine) has traditionally meant by "literal" is the meaning that the original authors intended. This is very different from what American evangelicals (both YEC and non-YEC) mean by the term. Note also that the full meaning of Scripture can and does exceed the "literal meaning".
> > ....................
> >
>
Received on Tue Apr 25 20:40:10 2006