All Interpretation is Contextual Interpretation – in the Past and Today: Towards an Analogical Hermeneutic
Abstract
The debate about “context” in Hebrew Bible / Old Testament scholarship often centres around the question: “Which context: ancient or contemporary?” Depending on whether the scholar answering the question comes from a Western educational background or from a global southern (including African) background, the question might – with some exception – be answered differently. Because of their training in historical models of understanding, Western-minded scholars will often emphasise that the context(s) within which the texts were produced is (are) our primary focus in biblical interpretation. Scholars from the Global South who are often exposed to all kinds of life interests of Bible readers, would mostly give primacy to the contemporary contexts of appropriation. Who is right? In this contribution I want to argue that it is not a matter of “either …. or” but rather “both …. and”, and that the dynamic of re-interpretation should also be brought into our discussions on this matter.Downloads
Authors retain copyright and grant the Journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this Journal.
This is an open access journal, and the authors and journal should be properly acknowledged, when works are cited.
Authors may use the publishers version for teaching purposes, in books, theses, dissertations, conferences and conference papers.
A copy of the authors’ publishers version may also be hosted on the following websites:
- Non-commercial personal webpage or blog.
- Institutional webpage.
- Authors Institutional Repository.
The following notice should accompany such a posting on the website: “This is an electronic version of an article published in Scriptura, Volume XXX, number XXX, pages XXX–XXX”, DOI. Authors should also supply a hyperlink to the original paper or indicate where the original paper (http://scriptura.journals.ac.za/pub) may be found.
Authors publishers version, affiliated with the Stellenbosch University will be automatically deposited in the University’s’ Institutional Repository SUNScholar.
Articles as a whole, may not be re-published with another journal.
The following license applies:
