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One Method of Interpreting Scripture

The document outlines a five-step method for interpreting scripture: 1) Clarify the interpreter's assumptions and how they approach the text, 2) Study the text in its original context, 3) Relate the text to Christ's mystery, death, and resurrection, 4) Consider the text's ecclesial dimension and tradition, 5) Return to the present situation to find authentic connections between the text and contemporary issues or experiences. The goal is to either confirm or modify the interpreter's initial assumptions.

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57 views

One Method of Interpreting Scripture

The document outlines a five-step method for interpreting scripture: 1) Clarify the interpreter's assumptions and how they approach the text, 2) Study the text in its original context, 3) Relate the text to Christ's mystery, death, and resurrection, 4) Consider the text's ecclesial dimension and tradition, 5) Return to the present situation to find authentic connections between the text and contemporary issues or experiences. The goal is to either confirm or modify the interpreter's initial assumptions.

Uploaded by

toujourspours
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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One Method of Interpreting Scripture

1. Clarification of the horizon of pre-conditioning which the interpreter and his/her audience bring to interpretation. Thus one must explicitate how we today approach the issues addressed by the text. This is not necessarily a denial of the assumptions we bring, but a clarification of them, so that they can be reviewed and confronted by the message of the text. Actualization is, in one sense, either the confirmation of the pre-conditioning I bring to the text or its criticism. 2. Study of the text in its own Sitz im Leben, that is, the situation of the author and his/her audience, the literary form, the structure of the whole document. But then one has to set the text and its message in the context of the successive re-interpretations that were carried out in scripture before and after this utterance. 3. Explicitation of the larger context of the mystery of Christ, that is, the correlation of the text or message with the person and work of Christ, with his paschal mystery, with his death and resurrection for the salvation of many. One asks both how the text helps interpret the mystery of Christ and how the mystery of Christ helps interpret the text. 4. Explicitation of the ecclesial dimension, by noting how the living tradition of the Church has actualized the text or message at the different stages of its unfolding of the mystery of Christ in history. 5. Returning to the present situation, where under the influence of the Holy Spirit, one can seek out an authentic typological reading, or an interpretation in relation to a contemporary event (which either the text interprets or which interprets the text), or dimensions of personal experience which the text interprets (or which interprets the text) in the context of an authentic Christian spirituality. Finally, one must ask whether the initial assumptions are confirmed or whether they must be modified. Source: F. Dreyfus, "L'actualisation de l'ecriture," Revue biblique 86 (1979): 376-79.

One Method of Interpreting Scripture


1. Clarification of the horizon of pre-conditioning which the interpreter and his/her audience bring to interpretation. Thus one must explicitate how we today approach the issues addressed by the text. This is not necessarily a denial of the assumptions we bring, but a clarification of them, so that they can be reviewed and confronted by the message of the text. Actualization is, in one sense, either the confirmation of the pre-conditioning I bring to the text or its criticism. 2. Study of the text in its own Sitz im Leben, that is, the situation of the author and his/her audience, the literary form, the structure of the whole document. But then one has to set the text and its message in the context of the successive re-interpretations that were carried out in scripture before and after this utterance. 3. Explicitation of the larger context of the mystery of Christ, that is, the correlation of the text or message with the person and work of Christ, with his paschal mystery, with his death and resurrection for the salvation of many. One asks both how the text helps interpret the mystery of Christ and how the mystery of Christ helps interpret the text. 4. Explicitation of the ecclesial dimension, by noting how the living tradition of the Church has actualized the text or message at the different stages of its unfolding of the mystery of Christ in history. 5. Returning to the present situation, where under the influence of the Holy Spirit, one can seek out an authentic typological reading, or an interpretation in relation to a contemporary event (which either the text interprets or which interprets the text), or dimensions of personal experience which the text interprets (or which interprets the text) in the context of an authentic Christian spirituality. Finally, one must ask whether the initial assumptions are confirmed or whether they must be modified. Source: F. Dreyfus, "L'actualisation de l'ecriture," Revue biblique 86 (1979): 376-79.

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