Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 January 2009
“Religion is poetry plus, not science minus” is a bon mot that I find not only charming but perceptive. Taking a cue from that way of putting things, let me develop a suggestion that an accurate historical awareness will add to, not subtract from, our understanding of in this case scripture. At one time, the historical or historicist interpretation of religious matters was seen as subtracting; as leaving something out. It was called “reductionist”; and was contrasted with theological, or with phenomenological or other, assessments. I will contend, rather, that a true historical view enhances, rather than reduces, our apprehension of humanity's spiritual life. I hope to show how this is so.
This essay was the presidential address to the 1978 annual meeting of the Middle East Studies Association of North America.Google Scholar
1 “The Study of Religion and the Study of the Bible”, Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 39 (1971), 133.Google Scholar