Hermeneutics – Evangelical Theological Society

Creedal Christianity Hermeneutics: From Nicaea to Now

The benefit of hindsight—historical observation and related reflection—provides opportunities for assessing and revising our thought and practice today. Hermeneutical hindsight is no exception. What have we learned from Nicaea, hermeneutically? What assumptions, authorities, crises, and criteria informed and shaped the Creed’s substance, scope, and stability? Which hermeneutical concerns fueled the Creed’s defenders and opponents? What … Read more

Written to Be Heard: Toward a Comprehensive Oral Hermeneutic

To the credit of Walter Ong (Orality and Literacy, 1982), and Werner Kelber (The Oral and the Written Gospel, 1983)—along with other recent scholars who have advanced the study of biblical orality—the oral culture of the biblical world has become more widely known. But the full implications of orality studies (now expanded to media studies) … Read more

Menu or Venue? Toward Reconciling Prohibitions in Acts15 with Permissions in 1 Corinthians 8-10

This paper addresses the apparent contradiction between the prohibitions established by the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15, which forbid eating meat sacrificed to idols, and Paul’s seeming allowances of it in Corinth. The Council’s prohibition against idol food, alongside Paul’s discussions in 1 Corinthians 8:1-11:1 suggests that the issue of food dedicated to an idol … Read more

Can AI Detect Intertextuality? Evaluating the Use of Large Language Models in Biblical Studies

Artificial intelligence, particularly large language models (LLMs), holds significant potential for advancing biblical studies. As these tools become more prevalent, scholars must address two questions: What are their most beneficial applications, and what best practices ensure reliable and meaningful results? This paper explores one specific application—using LLMs to detect intertextual connections in biblical texts—and evaluates … Read more

A Doctrine of Scripture for Evangelical Feminist Interpretation of the Bible

Our assumptions about what the Bible is impact how we read it and why. The central challenge for mainstream feminist Biblical interpretation is the Bible’s traditional status as the authoritative Word of God: that men’s words become God’s law and patriarchy gets the divine stamp of approval. Many feminists therefore reject the Bible’s status as … Read more

Unlikely bedfellows? Theological Interpretation of Scripture and Feminist Hermeneutics

Despite widespread growing interest in Theological Interpretation of Scripture (TIS) and the commitment of leading scholars in the field to a centred yet broad construal of evangelicalism, one voice which is not readily engaged in TIS is feminist interpretation. For example, a search of article titles across 34 issues and 17 years of the Journal … Read more

A Critique of Egalitarian Hermeneutics of Liberation: Hannah’s Song as Test Case

As the debate between egalitarians and complementarians continues, many evangelical churches are adopting the egalitarian stance. Considering the growing number of female pastors and women preachers in evangelical churches, Jon Woodyard comments that, “we live in an egalitarian moment.” In an article published in The Oxford Handbook of Feminist Approaches to the Hebrew Bible in … Read more

Mimetic Christian Hermeneutics: A Once-for-all Rejection of the Fourfold Sense

My intent in this paper is to respond to recent works by Kevin Vanhoozer (Mere Christian Hermeneutics, 2024), Patrick Schreiner (The Transfiguration of Christ, 2024), and Richard Blaylock (JETS 67.3) concerning validity in biblical hermeneutics and biblical theology. This paper will proceed in two parts. First, I will summarize and critique the “transfigural reading” proposed … Read more

Affect Theory & Scripture: Toward an Embodied Hermeneutic

Every interpretation of Scripture has come from a human body. The cultural, ethnic, and contextual aspects of embodiment are frequently considered in most modern hermeneutical approaches. However, what is often overlooked—and what frequently operates beneath, as a response to, and in light of these varying contextualized bodies—is affect. Affect theorists typically define affect as encompassing … Read more

Genesis 1 as a Proto-evangelium

In 1924 Dr Arie Noordtzij, 1871-1944, neo-Calvinist theologian and Professor at Leiden, published God’s Word and the Testimony of the Ages, which subsequently was deemed to inaugurate the so-called Framework Hypothesis. He did not, in fact, coin this term, but did advance a framework structure for Genesis 1 which was the basis of a novel … Read more