Adolf Schlatter (1852–1938) found himself time and again caught in the crossfire between the opposing camps of fundamentalist Pietism and liberal historical-criticism. This article suggests that Schlatter, by avoiding the pitfalls of both extremes, provides a unique way of uniting faith and scientific criticism through his creative reinterpretation of classic attributes of scripture, namely, (1) inspiration as organic and historic-pneumatic, (2) unity as Christocentric, (3) scriptural authority as evoking discipleship, (4) infallibility as relational-volitional, and finally, (5) perspicuity as catholic. In times where there still seems to exist a big gap between ‘evangelical’ and ‘scientific’ approaches to scripture, Schlatter's focus on scripture not only as a means to know God (Erkenntnismittel), but primarily as a means to receive God's grace (Gnadenmittel), remains valuable, helping us to do away with possible misunderstandings and stereotypes and enabling us to recalibrate our perspective on scripture.
