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Factors in the Development of Modern Biblical Study

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Donald Wayne Riddle
Donald Wayne Riddle
Affiliation:
The University of Chicago
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Extract

The impression which is likely to be derived from the reading of a history of biblical interpretation is that modern criticism is a goal which has been attained by an evolution in which the curve of progress is fairly steady and constant. There seems to be a tacit assumption that such adjectives as “modern,” “critical,” and “scientific” as applied to biblical studies are synonymous and equally deserved. The occasional appearance of a critical judgment in the work of ancient worthies is regarded as an “anticipation” of modern views. In most histories of interpretation the beginnings of modern criticism are found in the Renaissance and the Reformation, so that Luther and Calvin are regarded as biblical scholars; the importance of New Testament studies in the work of Erasmus is exaggerated, and processes of scientific criticism are pictured as in effect before the impact of discovery brought a new world-view into being.

Type
Articles
Information
Church History , Volume 2 , Issue 4 , December 1933 , pp. 211 - 226
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1933

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References

1 Extant histories of biblical interpretation are inadequate in a number of respects. In view of the necessity of a restudy of the entire field, a Research Project in the History of New Testament Interpretation has been organized by the Department of New Testament and Early Christian Literature of the University of Chicago.

2 The Cambridge Medieval History, VIII: 768f.Google Scholar

3 This is the estimate of Preserved Smith, in his Erasmus: A Study of His Life, Ideals and Place in History (New York, 1923).Google Scholar

4 Cf. Breen, Q., John Calvin: A Study in French Humanism (Grand Rapids, 1931).Google Scholar

5 McGiffert, , Protestant Thought Before Kant (New York, 1911)Google Scholar; cf. the article “Confessions” in Hastings, Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics.

6 The reference is to the grammatical work of Ibn Ezra and Kimchi; the estimate of their influence in Newmann, , Jewish Influence Upon Christian Reform Movements (New York, 1925)Google Scholar is, however, too sweeping.

7 The Cambridge Medieval History, VIII: 759f.Google Scholar

8 Reuchlin also wrote a Latin Grammar; even earlier Valla had produced his classic Elegantiae latinae linguae in 1479 which had 59 editions by 1536.

9 Cf. the article “Universities” in the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

10 One may go farther, and remark that competence in linguistics enabled what permanent value obtained in the biblical scholarship of the reformers. While it is clear that the distinction in Luther's Bible lies in the genius for effective vernacular which it exhibits, it is also plain that the superiority of Calvin's commentaries inheres in their author's ability to handle the sources as a linguist. Such a scholar as Tyndale may be compared to Luther; it was Tyndale's genius for language which made his work of such enduring influence upon subsequent English versions.

11 Kenyon, , Textual Criticism of the New Testament (London, 1912), 274–286.Google Scholar

12 Compare Hort's judgment: “… a name which we venerate above that of every other textual critic of the New Testament,” in Westcott, and Hort, , The New Testament in the Original Greek (London, 1882), ii:185.Google Scholar

13 Locy, , Biology and Its Makers (New York, 1915), p. 35.Google Scholar

14 Cf. Weiss' posthumously published work (edited by R. Knopf), Das Urchristentum (Göttingen, 1917).Google Scholar

15 E. g., the important work of Preisigke, Wilcken, W. Bauer—and, indeed, several others. It will be remembered that important contributions in papyrology were made by other than German scholars, e. g., the British scholars Moulton, Milligan, Grenfell, and Hunt, in America by Prof. E. J. Goodspeed, and by French and Italian scholars.

16 The new discipline of Formgeschichte, with chief contributions by Professors Dibelius, Bultmann, and K. L. Schmidt.

17 Sanday did not hesitate to put his own repugnance into words; see his reference to Prof. Bacon's German study in The Criticism of the Fourth Gospel (New York, 1905), p. 24.Google Scholar

18 The reference is to the work of Professor Burkitt; the quality of his Evangelion da-Mepharreshe and of his The Old Latin and the Itala contrasts strangely with his work on the Gospels and Acts.

19 A new study of the Dutch radicals has been made by Dr. Harry G. Hager, and incorporated in his (unpublished) dissertation, The Dutch School of Radical New Testament Criticism (University of Chicago Libraries, 1933).Google Scholar

20 The best statement of the story of Catholic Modernism in English is that of Sabatier, Modernism (London, 1908).Google Scholar