DESCRIPTION:

The course includes most or all of the following: Basic concepts of modern hermeneutics in Schleiermacher, Bultmann, Gadamer, and Ricoeur; the value for hermeneutics of archaeological and socio-historical research on 1 Corinthians; resonances with postmodern Western cultures today; audience-orientated, self-affirming, rhetoric in Corinth and the critique of the cross; theology and hermeneutics of selected texts (including the cross, ministry, love for the other, gifts of the Spirit, resurrection); symbol, parable, metaphor, narrative-world, narrative-time, and speech-acts, in other NT texts; tradition and reception-history of selected texts.

Objectives include achieving an understanding of how biblical texts, especially in 1 Corinthians, engage with modern and post-modern cultures in such a way as to transform them; comparing secular and Christian leadership-styles at Corinth; asking how a pre-modern Bible can address a post-modern world; exploring Paul's theology of the cross, ministry, ethics, worship, spiritual gifts, and resurrection, and its currency today; gaining or enhancing an appreciation of the range and function of diverse resources in biblical, literary, and philosophical hermeneutics.

Thiselton, Anthony C. The First Epistle to the Corinthians. NIGT. Eerdmans, 2000, assigned pages.

Thiselton, Anthony C. New Horizons in Hermeneutics: The Theory and Practice of Transforming Biblical Reading. Zondervan, 1992, pp. 31-46; 556-619.

Course Reader.

Fee, Gordon. The First Epistle to the Corinthians. Eerdmans, 1987.

Pogoloff, Stephen M. Logos and Sophia: The Rhetorical Situation of 1 Corinthians. Scholars Press, 1992, pp.129-72.

Ricoeur, Paul. "Toward a Hermeneutic of the Idea of Revelation." In Essays on Biblical Interpretation. Fortress, 1980.

Theissen, Gerd. The Social Setting of Pauline Christianity: Essays on Corinth. Fortress, 1982.

Thiselton, A. C. Interpreting God and the Postmodern Self. Eerdmans,1995, pp. 3-26; 121-52.

__________. "`Behind' and `In Front of' the Text: Language, Reference, and Indeterminacy." In C. Bartholemew and K. Möller, eds. After Pentecost: Language and Biblical Interpretation. Zondervan, 2001, pp. 97-120.

Thiselton, Anthony C. The Two Horizons. Eerdmans, 1980. 205-314.

Vanhoozer, Kevin. Is There a Meaning in This Text? The Bible, the Reader, and the Morality of Literary Knowledge. Zondervan, 1998, pp. 13-147.

Attendance is required at all sessions. (1) One paper on a specific topic either selected from a list of six options or negotiated with the approval of the Professor, to be completed by the end of the second week of the course (50% of weighting, approx. 10-15 pages with documentation in footnotes or endnotes); (2) A choice of an exam on the course or a further essay of 20-25 pages demonstrating application of one or more hermeneutical models to texts of the NT chosen by the student; either option under (2) to be completed by August 23.