Rowe: NT754 (c)
Daring To Reach Far Beyond Ourselves
Barth's Hermeneutical Conditions for Biblical Interpretation
NT754 – Dr. Kavin Rowe, April 3, 2013
Karl Barth is one of the most poignant theologians of the 20th century. Rebelling against the liberal assumptions that gave birth to the kind of arrogance that made Nazi Germany possible, he developed profound hermeneutical conditions for sensitive interpretation of the Bible. In an early and widely acclaimed commentary on Paul's Epistle to the Romans, he revealed his peculiarly dialectic method of interpreting scripture. After the first printing, he received enough criticism and praise that his preface to the second edition in 1921 was largely devoted to responding thereto. In that and later prefaces to that work, as well as the clues he leaves us in another work, we find that Barth's methodology was a direct rebuke to the heavily historical-critical interpretive instincts of his day. In this paper, I will begin by articulating how Barth viewed the critical interpretation of his day, how he insisted upon moving beyond mere 'steps toward' true commentary, and what is moved toward and the part religion has to play in Christian faith. To better grasp his interpretive method, we'll first briefly set the stage that constituted the strange, old world in which Barth developed his particular dialectic mode of interpretation. But before we can grasp his theology, we should first turn to the man and his times.
In light of what Barth insisted upon in interpretation of scripture, we must recognize the context within which he operated even though ultimately we must move away from hard and fast distinctions of time and place. Understanding his context, while not ultimate, is important, for "the understanding of history is an uninterrupted conversation between the wisdom of yesterday and the wisdom of tomorrow… always conducted honestly and with discernment."[1] The time and place that formed Barth are significant, for they shaped his theology, just as the times Paul lived shaped his own. If we are to move beyond the trappings of time and place, we must first discern their unique shaping effect on those we study. Barth wrote the first edition of his Pauline commentary, The Epistle to the Romans, in the midst of WWI and was published prior to the Armistice in November 1918. Revising his work for a printing that would come three years later, the second edition represented his most comprehensive revision of the commentary. Additionally including its lengthiest preface, in it Barth reflects that in the time between editions, he was influenced by 1) "continued study of Paul", 2) Franz Overbeck, 3) "closer acquaintance with Plato and Kant," and 4) "careful consideration of the manner in which the first edition of this book has been received."[2]
It is especially his second preface, written three years after the book's initial release in 1918, that Barth criticizes reigning interpretative methods, most notably the historical-critical school that emerged out of the Tubingen School, for being too shallow. He laments that too often commentators were not critical enough. All they seemed to do was to spin off lengthy treatises on words and phrases, conjugation and syntax. Too few (if any) dared to enter in to the world of the scriptures they claimed to be interpreting, as though grasping a thing could be done from a distance. "The critical historian needs to be more critical. The interpretation of what is written requires more than a disjointed series of notes on words and phrases... a wider intelligence than that which moves within the boundaries of his own natural appreciation."[3] The Enlightenment had placed too high a trust and dependence upon human reason, such that it became widespread belief that human intelligence was more trustworthy than Barth felt was prudent for Christian faith. Put another way, this lead to commentaries that failed to move beyond extrapolating what could be measurably produced from exploring texts themselves, no risks were taken in conjecturing what God might say to us in them, through what the authors themselves wrote.
The linguistic and historical interest overshadowed the theological work Barth insisted must emerge from a more emphatic embrace of the text and its author(s) as being actually inspired. Liberal theologians never went beyond paper and ink, taking the texts themselves as authoritative, instead of that which (and Whom) they pointed. Instead, Barth demanded that "Criticism... [is] the measuring of words and phrases by the standard of that about which the documents are speaking."[4] Instead of constantly focusing on what the texts say and how they say it, interpreters must also press on to the dangerous work of the subject of the texts, which is God. Not to be mistaken as being opposed to the historical-critical method per se, Barth agrees that it has its place, particularly in "preparation of the intelligence,"[5] but more importantly "the venerable doctrine of Inspiration... has a broader, deeper, more important justification... concerned with the labor of apprehending."[6] More than mere phraseology, inspirational interpretation leads commentators beyond simple intellectual knowledge and toward a more comprehensive attainment of not just the text, but also the meaning inherent therein. Here he sounds very sympathetic to his own teacher, Adolf von Harnack, who spoke of finding the kernel of faith within the husk of organized religion.
However, Harnack's signature on the "Manifesto of the Ninety Three German Intellectuals to the Civilized World," in 1914 signaled to Barth that his former mentor had not apprehended scripture at all, but had associated it too strongly with intellect and civilization, especially that of German origin. Such an oversight could only grow out of an atrophied faith too dependent upon factors external to God, to whom scripture pointed, who also pointed away from worldly cultures and contingencies. Loyalty to one's culture too quickly blinded one to loyalty to God and his Word. In reading Paul's letter to the Romans, Barth insists upon loyalty to its author, which involves "[thinking] and [writing] with Paul, to follow him into the vast unfamiliarity"[7] and persevere through hopelessly bizarre contexts foreign to our modern sympathies. Writing critically about Paul is to write against him, "to speak over his body, and that is to bury him finally, deeper and without hope, in his grave."[8] Barth's loyalty was not merely to the intellectual reward of the historical-critical method, but to the apprehensive reward of the doctrine of Inspiration, which provides a "way of penetrating the heart of a document... that its spirit will speak to our spirit through the actual written words."[9]
In interpreting Paul, therefore, Barth insists that to be true to Pauline intent is to read him sympathetically, despite anxieties we might encounter in his writings. Even today, with the issue of women in Church, some interpreters see in Paul problematic patriarchal assumptions and ascribe them merely to specific historical circumstances, thereby thinking they have read through his prejudices to a more friendly interpretation. In fact, in so doing, they actually fail to interpret Paul fully, to get at what he is pointing toward, focusing instead on the finger doing the pointing. Barth lambasts methods that amount to little more than "the mere deciphering of words,"[10] of dismissing "this or that passage as simply a peculiar doctrine or opinion of Paul... attributing what Paul has said to his personality."[11] Such a practice of relegating certain texts or concepts to the person of Paul instead of the canon we call Gospel is to "confine [oneself] to an interpretation of the text which seems... merely the first step towards a commentary."[12]
In order to better grasp his point about inadequate methods of interpretation, we must begin to incorporate Barth's ruminations from his The Word of God and the Word of Man. Though he fails to develop it more fully in his prefaces to The Epistle to the Romans, he does make the claim that "A perception of the 'inner dialectic of the matter' in the actual words of the text is a necessary and prime requirement for their understanding and interpretation."[13] He would become known for dialectical theology in particular, a method that embraces paradox and focuses especially on the mystery of the trinity, a paradox he discovered only by moving beyond "mere deciphering," by daring to believe that Paul's words were inspired Word, that theology required risk; it asked of its practitioners to "reach eagerly for an answer which is really too large for us... since it is a fruit which our own longing, striving, and inner labor have not planted."[14]
This daring is precisely what he identifies as the faith requisite not just of Christians generally, but especially of theologians, trusted with interpretation of the Word of God. It is this fact that draws him to react so strongly against pitiful deciphering of ancient foreign languages. To fail to risk by focusing on the quantifiable, theologians do the Church no favors. They amount to little more than clanging cymbals and crashing gongs. Only a selfless and earnest pursuit of the whole Gospel will bear theological fruit for the individual commentator and for the Church. "If we wish to come to grips with the contents of the Bible, we must dare to reach far beyond ourselves."[15] Anything less is merely languishing in the playful fields of happy abandon, which I am certain Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a contemporary of Barth's, would identify as cheap grace. For "there is a spirit in the Bible that allows us to stop awhile and play... but presently it begins to press us on... to the primary fact of whether we will or [not]."[16] That we dare to press on and be bold in interpreting Paul and the Gospels as gospel, as truly having a claim over our lives and above history, "this daring [to press on] is faith."[17]
If interpreters have to move beyond mere deciphering, then what is it toward which they must move? Contemporary answers that include the phenomenon of institutional religion would not satisfy Barth. A committed Reformed theologian dedicated to reinvigorating the principles of the Reformation, that Barth is not calling theologians to religion might be surprising. It certainly was for me. Any sensitive Biblical hermeneutic must eventually point not to religion itself, but toward God. Again sounding a lot like Bonhoeffer, Barth moves us toward a kind of religionless Christianity, especially if religion amounts more or less to practices of worship, which Barth compares to a "crust which must be broken through."[18] Christianity is about much more than the Bible after all, and "we have only to seek honestly and we shall make the plain discovery that there is something greater in the Bible than religion and 'worship.'"[19]
Instead, the careful interpreter of the Bible will not just find Paul in his letter to the Romans, but she will find no less than God. As she moves beyond simplistic and quantitative deciphering of text, what is discovered beneath the paper and ink is the lifeblood of the Church, which is the God who truly inspired the text and continues to inspire us. This is what Barth means when he insists that thinking and writing with Paul will orient us toward the same end which he is oriented toward. Doing so only about Paul will only direct us to a man who is directed elsewhere, for Paul does not write to or for us, but for God to an ancient Church. It is only by dissolving the gap of time and place that the doctrine of Inspiration requires that we can come to face God with Paul in his letters to the same Church into which we have been baptized. Reaching toward God with Paul means to orient ourselves away from confines of time and place, as God himself is free therefrom. This allows us to connect with scripture more authentically and helps us to see the triviality that religion can so quickly be consumed by. For "every form of religion, even the most perfect, is only a delusion and a snare."[20]
At best, religion helps us break down those boundaries of time and place to connect with God as our forebears did, who had first hand exposure to the good news they recorded and passed on. Therefore, for Barth, interpretation is "that creative energy… of [rethinking] the whole material and [wrestling] with it, till the walls which separate the sixteenth century from the first become transparent… until a distinction between yesterday and today becomes impossible."[21] Barth defines religion as "What we are to think concerning God, how we are to find him, and how we are to conduct ourselves in his presence."[22] Right religion is, in the words of Dean Richard Hays at opening convocation, "is about God, stupid." Not texts, not participles, conjugations, and tenses; but God! Furthermore, the Bible itself "is not the right human thoughts about God which form the content of the Bible, but the right divine thoughts about men."[23] Our interpretations of the Bible, therefore, must point not ultimately to Paul, but with Paul toward God. Interpreters that insist upon remaining in the fields to stop awhile and play fail to truly do the difficult work of interpretation, they miscarry the very task to which the Church entrusts them. Therefore, the grueling and risky work of sensitive and faithful interpretation is paramount; "The question of the true nature of interpretation is the supreme question."[24] The work of interpretation is always ongoing and evolving with our times, as they evolve and process toward Christ's second coming. We must follow the Gospels into "the vast unfamiliarity"[25] and persevere through hopelessly bizarre contexts "till I stand with nothing before me but the enigma of the matter; till the document seems hardly to exist as a document; till I have almost forgotten that I am not its author; till I know the author so well that I allow him to speak in my name and am even able to speak in his name myself."[26]
To conclude, I have shown how Barth viewed the critical interpretation of his day as being especially superficial and shallow. He accuses his peers in the field of failing to move from mere deciphering texts toward anything resembling Biblical interpretation. He emphatically insisted that moving beyond mere 'steps toward' true commentary required interpreters to take risks and dare to have faith. In so doing, they would discover that the Bible is not reducible to mere history. Finally, he suggests that what is moved toward in the interpretive task is not sterile religion, but God. To read Paul and other Biblical authors as they intended is to stand beside them looking toward the very object of their desire. By reducing the texts to syntax and grammar is to stand over the texts and their author(s) as though they were dead. I could not help but notice that despite his eloquence and obvious commitment to his task, that by the 6th edition, his "success" began to weigh heavily upon him and he seemed to struggle to find the strength to persevere in the face of his adversaries. Had he had any other view of God and scripture, I imagine he would not have proven capable of doing so, headed, as he was, into another World War. His proposals for sensitive hermeneutical interpretation are invaluable for his, and even our own and our children's, own time – a testament to the very dissolution of time and place that he insisted the Church needed in order to stand beside her theological forebears.
Footnotes
[1] Barth, Karl. "The Strange New World Within the Bible" in The Word of God and the Word of Man trans. Douglas Horton (Chicago: Pilgrim, 1928), 28-50. Hereafter referred to simply as World.
[2] Barth, Karl. The Epistle to the Romans, 6th ed., trans. Edwyn Hoskyns (New York: Oxford, 1929), 1. Hereafter referred to as Romans.
[3] Romans, 3-4
[4] Ibid., 8
[5] Ibid., emphasis added.
[6] Ibid., 1
[7] Ibid.
[8] Ibid., 18
[9] Ibid., emphasis added.
[10] Ibid.
[11] Ibid., 7
[12] Ibid., 6
[13] Ibid., 10
[14] World, 32
[15] Ibid., 33
[16] Ibid., 34
[17] Ibid.
[18] Ibid., 41
[19] Ibid., 43
[20] Ibid., 44
[21] Romans, 7
[22] World, 41
[23] Ibid., 43, emphasis added.
[24] Romans, 9
[25] Ibid., 18
[26] Ibid., 8
