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109
Pentecostal Postmodern
Hermeneutics
and
Literary Theory
Hannah K.
Harrington
and Rebecca Patten
In the
previous
issue of Pneuma several scholars addressed the issue of Pentecostal Hermeneutics in an effort to
explain
it in terms of critical literary theory.
The work of such
postmodernists
as Paul Ricoeur and Hans-Georg
Gadamer has
provided
a new
way
of
approaching
texts
by focusing
on the world the reader
brings
to the text as well as the world of the text.
Explanation
of the data is
necessary,
but the frame of reference of the reader is also an
important
consideration because it shapes
his or her
interpretation
of the text and is in turn
shaped by
the text. The
subjectivity
involved in the reader’s
appropriation
of the text is considered not
only legitimate by postmodernists
but indeed inevitable in the
reading
of any text.
Ricoeur’s
presentation
of
reading
as
composed
of both
explanation (which analyzes
“the world of the
text”),
and
understanding
or appropriation (which attempts
to “actualize the text in the world of the reader”)
is attractive to
Pentecostals,
because when the latter reads Scripture
it is not
merely
to increase
knowledge
of biblical facts but to seek
understanding
which will
impact daily
life.’ Richard
Israel, utilizing the ideas of
Gadamer, explains
the act of interpretation well:
is the experience of understanding when the horizons of the
text and Interpretation
interpreter
are fused. The act of
interpretation
is not the
abandonment of either horizon, nor the submission of one to the other; it is
the formation of a new understanding that leads to new and different
of
ways
“being-in-the-world.”‘
Indeed, limiting
the
meaning
of the text to
only
what the ancient authors intended to
convey
to their audiences
may
cause the reader to miss the creative work of the
Spirit
in making the text relevant to life.
Thus,
it
appears
that there is a niche in postmodern literary criticism for Pentecostal
hermeneutics,
a
scholarly apparatus
for
explaining
the Pentecostal
process
of
reading Scripture. However,
this
hypothesis must be tested. Is Pentecostal hermeneutics to be considered a subset of
literary
criticism? Are the theories of Ricoeur and Gadamer compatible
with the Pentecostal
appropriation
of
Scripture?
If
so, where are the
parameters
of this
merger?
Certain issues need to be addressed. In
response
to the scholars
published
in the latest edition of
I Richard D. Israel, Daniel E. Albrecht, and Randal G. McNally, “Pentecostals and Hermeneutics:
Texts,
Rituals and
Community,”
PNEUMA: The Journal
of
the Society for
Pentecostal Studies 15 (Fall 1993): 137-161.
2 Israel,
Albrecht and McNally, “Pentecostals and Hermeneutics,” 142.
1
110
Pneuma,
we will comment on the
following
three
aspects
of the relationships
between the theories of Ricoeur and Gadamer and Pentecostal hermeneutics:
1)
the definition of the term
“text,” 2) literary
vs. historical
criticism,
and
3) the notion of a fixed text.
The first issue concerns the definition of the term “text.” In the article
by
Richard
Israel,
Daniel Albrecht and Randal
McNally,
the term “text” is used in a broad sense to include
Scripture,
rituals and community.
The bases for the inclusion of rituals in the definition are the
provocative
works
by
Victor Turner’ and Paul Ricoeur’s groundbreaking essay,
“The Model of the Text:
Meaningful
Action Considered as a Text.”4 In these
works,
Turner and Ricoeur demonstrate that a
key
to
understanding
a
specific culture,
in addition to its written
texts,
is its rituals. These
meaningful
actions reveal what the
society
considers
important enough
to
repeat habitually and, thus, what is central to its self-definition.
Socio-anthropologists
have
long understood the
importance
of ritual as a determining factor in analyzing cultures. Ritual is studied
for,
not
only
the external actions
themselves, but the
symbolic meaning
behind each action.
Nevertheless,
can ritual as “text” be
equated
in Pentecostal terms with sacred text? Can Pentecostalism be defined on the basis of “what we do?” This
approach
to
ascertaining
Pentecostal
self-understanding seems to be a
misleading
one because it focuses on
description
of behavior rather than
prescription by
sacred text. That is to
say, Pentecostals are
being
defined
by
their
behavior,
which in
many
cases may only
be the result of a
particular
church’s traditions and not a central
component
of Pentecostal definition.
Furthermore,
a
particular ritual
may
be
completely
absent in a given Pentecostal church and
may even be considered
by
the latter
unscriptural
or at least
peripheral.
These rituals are not sacred
texts; they
are
interpretations
of Scripture. By elevating
behavior to
text,
one is placing an
interpretation on a
par
with
Scripture
itself It is not the existence of the ritual which is
important
but whether or not it is
truly
derived from
Scripture.
If Scripture
does not
support
the
ritual,
the ritual cannot be considered part
of Pentecostal definition.
The
community
is also removed from the
category
of sacred text. While
McNally
is correct that the
“underlying
condition for communicative
competence
is an orientation toward
reaching understanding,”
it is unclear how the
community
itself is on a
par
with sacred text. The same concerns mentioned above with
regard
to ritual
3 Among Victor Turner’s
writings, see especially his Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure
(Ithaca.
NY: Cornell University Press, 1974) and From Ritual to Theater (New York, NY: Arts Journal Publications,
‘ Paul Ricoeur, “The Model of the
Performing 1982).
Text: Meaningful Action Considered as a Text,” in Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences, ed. and trans. John B. Thompson (New York,
NY: Cambridge University Press, 1981), 197-221.
Israel, Albrecht and McNally, “Pentecostals and Hermeneutics,” 157.
2
111
apply
to
community.
There seems to be a great
danger
in
ascribing
to behavior,
whether in rituals or
relationships among
members of theommunity,
the status of sacred text. All Pentecostals
presumably would be
willing
to be defined
by Scripture,
but how
many
would be willing
to be defined
by
the behavior or rituals of another Pentecostal community?
On
occasion, McNally
refers to the
community
as a “context”:
.
First, community is present
as a context for
to
interpreters…. [PJarticular
persons belong particular
communities that
provide
a context for
interpretations…. Second, community is present as a goal for interpreters.
[T)he
text needs to be
appropriated by the community of which the is
interpreter .. part.”
Here we
agree entirely;
the
community
of the
interpreter
influences the interpretation
and the
community
must also
appropriate
the fiuit of that interpretation. However,
the context is not the text. The
community
is the context for
interpreting
the
text,
it is not the sacred text.
Otherwise, the
process
becomes circular: we
interpret
the biblical text as a community
and then
interpret
the
community
as a text.
Thus,
we need to ask the
question,
in what sense are rituals and community
texts? How are
they
commensurate with the biblical text? Evidently
for Turner and
Ricoeur,
the biblical text carries no
sanctity,
it is a
piece
of evidence
informing
a
given
culture as do rituals and relationships. However, adopting
in toto this social-scientific
approach to
religion,
Pentecostals can become
merely
cultural
anthropologists rather than
interpreters
of a sacred text. In our
opinion, Scripture
is the only
sacred tool for definition of the central
components
of Pentecostalism and constant recourse must be made to it. Traditions and even rituals of
particular
communities are not sacred text.
Only what
Scripture prescribes
can be considered a definitive
component
of Pentecostalism. We would
encourage
a
study
of the rituals and relationships
found in the New Testament and use the results to inform current situations.
The next issue concerns the
repeated
statement in
many
of the articles that there is no such
thing
as
objectivity
and hence the work of historical criticism rests on a fallacious base.
Timothy
B.
Cargal quotes Robert M.
Fowler,
“The modernist dream of
disinterested, objective, distanced,
abstract truth is
fading rapidly.”‘
Several
examples
from recent
studies, including quantum
mechanics and theoretical mathematics, 8
are cited which demonstrate that
pure objectivity
does not exist.8
.
I Israel, Albrecht and McNally, “Pentecostals and Hermeneutics,” 160.
B.
Cargal, “Beyond
the Fundamentalist-Modernist
Pentecostals and Hermeneutics in a Postmodern
‘ Timothy Controversy:
Age,” PNEUMA; The Journal the of a Society for Pentecostal Theology 15 (Fall 1993): 182. Cargal, “Beyond the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy,” 171.
3
112
Cargal
discusses the
emphasis
in biblical studies on historical concerns,
such as the intention of the
author, history
vs.
historicity,
and the
development
of the biblical text-which
parts
are
original,
which have been added or
redacted,
at what time
period,
in
response
to whom,
and other such concerns. He claims that this
quest
for
history ignores
the full
potential
of the text to be relevant and
meaningful
to the believer
through
the work of the
Holy Spirit. Opposed
to
source, form,
and redaction
criticism, Cargal aligns
himself with
literary
critics who focus on “the
system
of
meaningful relationships
constructed within the narrative itself
(e.g.,
semiotic and
literary criticism)
and how that
system
both was
shaped by
and
shaped
the social matrix in which it emerged (e.g., sociological analysis).”
He
says
these
literary
concerns seem “most
interesting
and
meaningful
to
interpreters.”9
While we
agree
that historical critics have in many cases
disregarded the
inspired
nature of
Scripture
and its relevance for
twentieth-century humanity,
two
thoughts
come to mind. The first is that
Cargal
at times seems to be
exchanging
one
type
of criticism
(historical)
for another (literary).
Biblical
literary criticism,
as he
correctly
describes
it,
is concerned with
“meaningful relationships
within the narrative itself.” However,
these
relationships
are not between the text and the
reader, but within the text
only. True,
scholars of this hue have
championed
the notion that the work of historical critics cannot tell us
everything meaningful
about a text and too often results in
unnecessary fragmentation
of a work of art.’°
However, they
have also been accused of
being
divorced from the socio-historical
background
of the
text, focusing only
on the text’s internal
literary structure,
and
dismissing
a large
amount of scientific and
philosophical thought.”
Cargal points
to function as an
important key postmodernists
use to unlock a text: “From a postmodern perspective, it is the issue of its
(a particular detail’s)
function within the
story
that is more
significant
than its historical
reliability.”‘2 Still,
too often the
emphasis
on function is merely
another search for the author’s intention. How does this
“Beyond the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy,” 186.
‘°Robert ‘ Cargal, Alter and Frank Kermode,
eds.,
The
Literary
Guide to the Bible (Cambridge,
”
MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1987), 25.
Burke
Long,
“Some Difficulties in the New Poetics of Biblical Narrative,” in Proceedings of
the Tenth World Congress of Jewish Studies (Jerusalem: The World Union of Jewish Studies, 1990), 63; Joe Sprinkle, “Literary Approaches to the Old Testament: A
Survey
of Recent
Scholarship,”
Journal
of
the
32 (September 1989): 303-304; Note too the
Evangelical Theological Society variety of of whom literary critics, many disagree on the basic approach to a text: cf., e.g., Mieke Bal, “Literature and Its Insistent Other,” Journal
of the American
57 (Summer
Academy of Religion
1989): 373-383; Edgar McKnight, “New Criticism and Old,” Journal of the
American Academy of Religion 57 (Summer 1989): 385-391; and Alter and Kermode, eds.,
12
The Literary Guide to the Bible.
Cargal, “Beyond the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy,” 185.
4
113
exchange
of a historical for a literary
analysis
further
engage
the world of the reader with that of the text?
The second
thought
concerns the
relationship
of historical
analysis
to the mediation of the
Spirit. Cargal
does not exclude biblical historical analysis
as irrelevant but
simply points
to the
experiential immediacy
of the
Holy Spirit
which
provides deeper significance
to the text
perceived through
the faith of the believer. He
urges
Pentecostals not to return to a pre-critical stance which
ignores
historical concerns
entirely:
Pentecostals must accept that while rationalism cannot tell us everything about the Bible and its meanings,
it can tell us a number of
about the historical and
important
cultural distance that does in fact things-especially separate us from the biblical texts.”
In
support
of this
statement,
while it is true that the work of the
Holy Spirit
is not to be taken
lightly
neither is the rational search for
history and truth. The fact that there is no such
thing
as
pure objectivity
does not excuse the scholar from the search. As
long
as we are
working
with a text that has been
given
to us
through
human
activity
in human language,
sometimes
through objectifiable channels,
it is incumbent on us to
study
it for
understanding
in all ways
possible.
While the
objective approach
is admittedly
partially subjective,
a
subjective approach
alone would not be assessable at all.
We would take this matter one
step
further. Not
only
does the
quest for
objectifiable
truth inform culture and
history,
but it also
provides controls for
subjective interpretation.
It is important in hermeneutics to emphasize
the
parameters, using
Ricoeur’s
terms,
“where the text limits itself.” The Pentecostal
interpreter
claims that the
Holy Spirit
mediates between the reader and the
text,
but how is this assessable
by empirical means? How does someone other than the
interpreter
know if indeed the
Holy Spirit
has informed the
interpretation?
Nevertheless,
the student of
Scripture
will
recognize,
at
times,
that an
alleged
word of
inspired interpretation
contradicts the stated text because the student has
diligently
studied the text itself The student might accept
as valid
multiple meanings
of a text but will be able to recognize
an
interpretation
which contradicts the
explicit
or
implicit sense of
Scripture. Thus,
textual
analysis provides
controls on subjectivity.
The text has
limits;
it cannot mean
simply anything.
This observation leads to the final
point
which is embodied in the question,
“Do we need a fixed text of
Scripture?” Joseph Byrd presents an excellent
explanation
of Ricoeur’s hermeneutical ideas of
distance, explanation,
and
understanding.
He also
suggests
a viable
relationship between
preaching
and
re-experiencing
the
symbols
of a text and adequately
relates this to Ricoeur’s first and second naivete-that
“Cargal, “Beyond the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy,” 186-187.
5
114
or
appropriating
explanation
concepts appropriating for
exegesis.””
the text’s
symbols requires
ideas, Byrd applies these
an
example
of
“guide
“re-experiencing
or critical consciousness.” 14
Beyond
the clear
explanation
of Ricoeur’s
in an innovative
way by providing
Ricoeur’s h-ermeneutic. He constructs a model-a
This
process,
in
Byrd’s words,
“moves the
interpreter from an initial
understanding, through
critical
reflection,
to culminate in
text to a specific audience for the
purpose
of that audience
and
appropriating
the text.”‘6
reflects Ricoeur’s
obviously goes beyond
Ricoeur himself in
developing
need to be raised:
1)
Does
Byrd
assume a fixed text (first
naivete and critical
consciousness)
a fixed text more
presenting
a
‘understanding’
This model
adequately
but two issues
Pentecostals Affirmative warranted,
need to assume responses
to these
work of
socio-anthropologists through
interpretive
hermeneutic,
it is important to
keep
as
provide necessary Pentecostals, circumscribed
by
concepts, although Byrd
actual
questions,
more than
Ricoeur?,
and
2)
Do
than Ricoeur? questions,
which we
suggest
are
the direct use of Ricoeurian
of the text are
would call into
question
hermeneutic
theory
in developing a Pentecostal hermeneutic.
In
conclusion,
several
points
should be summarized.
First,
while the
is
helpful
in
describing
a
community
its texts and
rituals,
the
presuppositions
of both
they
and Pentecostals must not be
ignored.
It is necessary in any such discussion to
distinguish
between a sacred text and a text which is
only
an
derivative of that text.
Second,
while some
aspects
of literary
criticism
(e.g.,
reader
appropriation) may
inform a Pentecostal
in mind what is not
helpful, namely, the indifference of
many
biblical
literary
critics to reader
appropriation
well as to cultural and historical text
analysis;
the latter
might
well
controls on
subjective interpretation. Finally,
for
the
possibilities
for
interpretation
fixed
principles
inherent in the text itself. In
adopting Ricoeurian
theory,
one must
distinguish,
as Ricoeur does
not,
between a text which is
sacred,
and therefore fixed in very important
ways,
and a text which is not.
As a final
note,
the efforts of those who are both committed scholars and Pentecostal believers are to be commended. The work
represented in this
journal combining postmodern theory
and Pentecostal hermeneutics is evidence of the
compatibility
of faith and
scholarship.
14 Joseph Byrd,
“Paul Ricoeur’s Hermeneutical
Theory
and Pentecostal Proclamation,”
PNEUMA: The Journal
of the Society for
Pentecostal Studies 15 (Fall 1993):
210.
“Paul Ricoeur’s Hermeneutical Theory,” 212.
“Paul Ricoeur’s Hermeneutical Theory,” 213. ..
15 Byrd, “6Byrd,
6
