HISTORICAL EVALUATION OF HIGH CRITICISM METHOD
HISTORICAL EVALUATION OF HIGH CRITICISM METHOD
Introduction
Until the beginning of the 18th century, for the great majority of exegetes, theologians and faithful Catholics, Anglicans and Protestant Churches, the Bible was the word of God, and that the truth of God was present in every word of the Scriptures. This scriptural idea is inherited from patristic and medieval exegesis, and is based on the role attributed to the divine author in Biblical Scripture without almost worrying about the role of the human writer
But from the nineteenth century, a lively controversy was raised on the authority, the inerrancy and the content of the Bible. This controversy has its origins since the 15th century, during the great rapid progress of the natural sciences and its discoveries. This current which was born contradicts certain affirmations of the Bible printed since Gutenberg and threatened the biblical authority.
Towards the beginning of the 17th century, philology, which was based on ancient languages, also looked in this same view that the Bible is a document. However, criticisms and contestations around the authenticity of the Scriptures increased and then gained momentum. Because it was a period of explosion, revolution and the intellectual emergence of scholars. Critics who were born every day favored the use of reason in approaching the interpretation of the Bible.
God's inspiration and faith were set aside for the benefit of these rational, philosophical and secular methods. And this leads us today to ask the following questions: If the Bible is a human invention, how can we explain the saving change it's making in the life of those who read it? How to explain the mystery that those who read it with faith and humility come into contact with God? If the Scriptures are not an inspiration of God and of His will, how we will to explain its particularity and its exception among the other human literatures?
A-Early View (1541-1698)
The use of the superior critical method appears for
the first time with modern biblical and philosophical scholars such as Bacon
(1561-1626) and Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679). It was then taken up in Holland by
Spinoza (1632-1677). Spinoza published his Tractatus Theologico-Politicus in
1670 which attested that the Bible must be studied like any other book with a
clear, rational and essentially non-theological method after having questioned
the authorship of Pentateuch (Moses).[1] Grotius opened the way to studies of comparative
religion by analyzing the New Testament texts in the light of classical, Jewish
and early Christian writings.
During this period, philosophy and natural theology
were their center of interest in the interpretation of the Scriptures.
Therefore, the study of the historicity of the biblical text appealed to reason
and rationalism. For them, miracles in the Bible are the result of Jewish
custom. Later in France, Richard Simon, faithful to the Church, wrote in 1678 a
Critical History of the Old Testament. He was quickly condemned by the Church
and Bossuet[2].
German Lights: Towards a Liberal View (1750-1860)
German pietism played a role in
the rise of biblical criticism by supporting the desire to break the grip of
religious authority. Rationalism had also become an important influence in the
development of biblical criticism. this is why the triumph of reason over
revelation had reached its peak. The question of Inerrancy was also at the
center of high criticism. Therefore, all treated the Bible with freedom. For
some liberals "reason is a natural revelation" from God. Hence for
Kant (1724-1804), the criticism of reason with freedom will become the basis of
historical-critical thought. Thanks to this freedom, the philosopher Hermann
Samuel Reimarus (1694-1768), classical writer, Hebrew and free-thinker of the
Enlightenment will be the first scholar to separate the historical Jesus from
the theological Jesus[3] and
Lessing (1729-1781) invented the synoptic problem[4]. The sources criticism marked this period.
Postmodern View
(1870-1970)
After being positively influenced by the German enlightenment, biblical
criticism will reach its peak this time with British deism. It was
revolutionized by the discovery of ancient manuscripts. This ancient discovery
of manuscripts contributed to the rapid development of redaction criticism and
traditional criticism. Biblical criticism was also divided into two parts: high
criticism and low criticism. The highest criticism focuses on the composition
and history of the Bible, while the lowest criticism concerns the
interpretation of its meaning for its readers. The first “quest for the
historical and apocalyptic Jesus”, which consisted mainly of writing versions
of the “life of Jesus”, was born. On the quest for the historic Jesus, Adolf
Von Harnack (1851–1930) wrote ‘‘The Essence of Christianity’’ in 1900, where he
described Jesus as a reformer. In contrast, Karl Barth (1886-1968), Rudolf
Bultmann and others moved away from concerns about the historical Jesus and
focused instead on the kerygma[5]:
the New Testament message. Wilhelm Bousset (1865-1920) and Hermann Gunkel
(1862-1932) contributed to traditional criticism by founding a school of
religions.
Contemporary View
(1970-2020)
After 1970, biblical criticism began to change radically and omnipresent. A
new criticism has developed: literary criticism. Biblical criticism began to
apply new literary approaches such as structuralism and rhetorical criticism,
which focused less on history and more on the texts themselves.[6]
By the beginning of the 21 first century, biblical criticism was no longer
primarily a historical discipline but had become a group of disciplines with
often conflicting interests. New perspectives from different ethnicities,
feminist theology, Catholicism and Judaism have revealed a "untapped
world" previously overlooked by the majority of pre-critics. other
academic fields such as Middle East studies, sociology and anthropology have
also become active in biblical criticism. These new views have made it clear
that the Bible can be rationally interpreted from many different angles.
B-Methodology of High Criticism Method
Historical criticism includes four disciplines: Form Criticism,
Sources Criticism, Redaction Criticism and Traditional Criticism.
Form Criticism
Form criticism is a method of biblical
criticism which classifies the units of Scripture by literary model and then
attempts to trace each type until its period of oral transmission. In other
words, form criticism seeks to determine the original form of a unit and the
historical context of the literary tradition. Hermann Gunkel (1862-1932),
Martin Noth, Gerhard von Rad and other researchers initially developed this form
criticism for Old Testament studies. Rudolf Bultmann and many others later
applied to the Gospels[7].
Sources Criticism
Source criticism is a method of Bible study that
refers to the attempt to establish the sources used by the authors and editors
of a biblical text. Its ultimate goal is to reconstruct the history of the
biblical text written by the author. It was with the Frenchman Jean Artruc in
the 18th century that the criticism of sources took its origin to respond to
important theological concerns such as the inspiration and inerrancy of the
Scriptures[8].
Redaction
Criticism
According to Perrin, redaction criticism is the study
of the theological motivation of an author or compiler as this is revealed in
the collection, arrangement, editing, and modification of traditional material,
and in the composition, of new material or the creation of new forms within the
traditions of early Christianity[9].
It started in Germany in the early 1700s with Hermann Reimarus, who was a
professor of oriental languages in Hamburg and will then be taken up by David
Friedrich Strauss (1808-74) showing that the gospels were changed, were the
expression of a myth and could not be interpreted as historical.
Traditional
Criticism
Tradition criticism is used to determine the
development of traditions from Jesus through the early church to the gospel
writer and forms the basis for form and redaction criticism. It is an attempt
to trace the evolution of the form and/or meaning of concepts, words or
sayings. It was developed by and Hermann Gunkel (1862-1932).[10]
C-Applications of High Criticism Method
The application of the
historical critical method in biblical studies explores the books of the Hebrew
Bible as well as the New Testament. In the Old Testament, it is mainly
concerned the Pentateuch and in the New Testament the Synoptic Gospels and the
Paul’s Writings.
Old
Testament (Pentateuch).
Historical criticism of the
Pentateuch studies his authorship and its formation. Although it was long
regarded by Jews and Christians as a work written by Moses, modern critics have
found it difficult to accept. The first to reject the idea that Moses wrote the
five books is Andreas Bodenstein Karlstadt. Other authors like Richard Simon,
in his work The Critical History of the Old Testament published
in 1678, or Baruch Spinoza in his Tractatus Theologico-Politicus (1670) will
declare that Ezra was the true author of the Pentateuch[11].
Regarding his training, some
raised the problem of Hexateuch (the book of Joshua is the sixth) and for
others the Ennateuch (from Genesis to the books of Kings). But the
Conservatives defended the Pentateuch.
New
Testament
In the New Testament,
the high criticism
method is no longer applied in the Synoptic
Gospels and the Paul’s Writings
Synoptic
Gospels
Speaking of the Gospels, the highest criticism relates the synoptic
problem. It assesses the relationships between Matthew, Mark and Luke. Several
elements are questioned: the personality of Jesus (historical Jesus and
eschatological Jesus), the authors, dates and places of writing books, the
description of events, miracles, supernatural events, cultures and societies,
inspiration etc.
Paul’s
Writings
Recent historical critiques of Paul's writings focus
on literary and dogmatic
criticism[12].
Literary criticism investigates the grammatical structure (the choice and
arrangement of words), the rhetorical characteristics of sentences and all the
dominant characteristics of the author's style. While the theological
investigation relates to the different theological statements that Paul uses in
the different epistles.
[1] Grant, ‘‘The Bible in the Church: summarizes the rules’’ (pp. 127- 128), Grobel, “Biblical Criticism,” the results (pp. 409-410).
[2] J. Pelikan, Whose Bible is it? A history of the scriptures through the ages, New York: Viking Penguin, 2005, 183.
[3] GroetschUlrich, Hermann Samuel Reimarus (1694–1768): Classicist, Hebraist, Enlightenment Radical in Disguise (Leiden: Brill, 2015), 52.
[4] Linnemann Eta, 20.
[5] Kerygma (from the ancient Greek word κήρυγμα kérugma) is a Greek word used in the New Testament for "proclamation" (see Luke 4: 18-19, Romans 10:14, Matthew 3: 1). It is related to the Greek verb κηρύσσω kērússō, which literally means "to cry or to proclaim as a herald" and is used in the sense of "to proclaim, to announce, to preach".
[6] Bühler Pierre, "Hermeneutics". At Hastings, Adrian; Mason, Alistair; Pyper, Hugh (editors), Oxford's Companion to Christian Thought (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), 152.
[7] Jr James Leo Garrett, Systematic Theology: Biblical, Historical and Evangelical, Vol 1., Fourth Edition (Wipf and Stock, September 16, 2014), 157.
[8] Ibid., 156.
[9] Norman Perrin, What is Redaction Criticism? (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1969), 1.
[10] Boring ME, "Weiss, Johannes", In McKim, Donald K. (ed.), Dictionary of principal biblical interpreters (Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 2007), 167.
[11] Baden Joel S., The Composition of the Pentateuch: Renewing the Documentary Hypothesis (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012), 275.
[12] Alfred Williams Anthony, ‘‘Some Recent Criticisms of the Pauline Epistles’’, Journal Chicago.edu, under ‘‘Setting’’
https://www.journals.uchicago. https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdfplus/10.1086/471072 (Access March 16, 2020).
Daniel’s 70 Weeks Prophecy by Chamcham Ch. Marakhttps://christianworldpress-indian.blogspot.com/2020/05/daniels-70-week-prophecy-by-chamcham-ch.html
Book Review: Five Views on Biblical Inerrancy (J. Merrick and Stephen J. Garrett are editors) by Jacob https://christianworldpress-indian.blogspot.com/2020/04/book-review-five-views-on-biblical_21.html
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