Jesus and the Politics of Interpretation

Bibliographic Data

ID20290668
AuthorsElisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza (corresponding author)
Year1997
Volume90
Issue4
Pages343-358
Publication date1997-10-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHarvard Theological Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0017-8160 • E-ISSN: 1475-4517
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s001781600003090x
OpenAlexW4300878256
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited9

I distinctly recall how excited I was to read Trajectories through Early Christianity some twenty-five years ago. In 1970 I had just finished doctoral studies and had begun teaching at the University of Notre Dame. One of the first lessons I received from a senior colleague at that time was: “Elisabeth, remember you are not teaching here as a theologian but as a critical exegete and historian. Consequently, never allow your students to ask what is the religious or theological significance of biblical texts and interpretations for today. If you allow this question your scholarship will flounder on the slippery slope of relevance.” I was puzzled and disturbed by such counsel—to say the least—because as a student in Germany I had not encountered such anti-theological positivism but rather had been reared in the hermeneutical-theological tradition. The exciting part of reading Trajectories , therefore, was the realization that epistemological, hermeneutical, and theological questions were also the cutting edge issues of American biblical scholarship. For Trajectories set out to initiate a critical discussion and revision of the categories and conceptualizations not only of biblical-historical interpretation, but also of the criteria for theological evaluation

Christianity · Epistemology · Interpretation (philosophy) · Political science · Reading (process) · Relevance (law) · Scholarship · Theology · American Constitutional Law and Politics · Biblical Studies and Interpretation · Classics · History · Law · Philosophy

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