Biblical Theology

Retrospect and Prospect

Scott J. Hafemann

On April 6-8, 2000, the ninth annual Wheaton Theology Conference brought together a mix of younger and senior scholars from inside and outside of evangelicalism to think together about the history and future of biblical theology. This book represents some of the fruit of this labor. In the essays that follow, there is a lively and serious discussion concerning the contours of biblical theology. Nevertheless, all are convinced that although the biblical theology movement of the mid-twentieth century ran its course, biblical theology as such is not a movement. Indeed, as James Smart observed, to call biblical theology a “movement” in the first place was “the kiss of death.”1

Movements are temporary answers to abiding issues. Thus, by definition, movements come and go. In stark contrast, biblical theology is an abiding response demanded by the subject matter of the biblical text itself. At the descriptive level, biblical theology recognizes that the authors and editors of the biblical texts understood themselves to be preserving and interpreting the significance of God’s redemptive acts in the history of Israel, Jesus and the church. At the prescriptive level, biblical theology will and must last as long as the Bible is held to be God’s Word about himself and his relationship to his creation. The Bible is not merely a witness to revelatory events or theological ideas but is itself an expression of theological activity and affirmation. To do biblical theology is to go where the Bible leads us, since the Scriptures are a record of historical events interpreted in terms of their theological significance. Thus biblical theology “is an enlargement of the dimensions of biblical science to make its character and methodology commensurate with the contents of the documents which it is its task to interpret.”2

As a result, biblical theology attempts to ascertain the inner points of coherence and development within the biblical narrative and exposition. It does its work inductively from within the Bible in an attempt to bring out the Bible’s own message. It is well known, however, that students of biblical theology disagree over its methodology, not to mention its structure and content. In view of this diversity, the purpose of this collection of essays is to look at the way in which biblical theology has been done in the last century in order to think about how it ought to be done in the next. This retrospect and prospect have made it clear that several salient issues now confront all those who desire to follow the biblical text wherever it may lead them theologically.

BIBLICAL THEOLOGY AND THE QUESTION OF DIVERSITY

Several of the studies (and much of the discussion at the conference) are a response to the fact that the diversity of Scripture preserves within its pages unresolved tensions. In the past, biblical theologies have taken this tension to be the remains of competing ideological viewpoints that have been imperfectly combined in the historical development of Scripture. Hence, as Gerald Wilson points out, the tension was often neutralized by trying to ascertain the best among many voices or by allowing the diversity to stand “as unresolved heterodoxy.” Neither option, however, is acceptable. In what follows, we will be challenged to consider whether the unity of Scripture consists in living in the midst of its (apparent?) tensions as poles on a spectrum, as mutually interpretive lenses in a prism, or as the expression of an enlarging history of redemption. We will also be called to think through whether Scripture presents a collage of theological loci or one overarching and integrated center. The fact that no consensus has been reached concerning the theological heart of the Bible makes these questions all the more pertinent, albeit daunting, especially when we take seriously the task of integrating every corner of the canon into our biblical theology, from the Wisdom literature to the Johannine literature and James. Readers will be spurred on in this task by the creative, integrative work presented in the essays that follow by those in the earlier stages of their scholarly careers and by the seasoned reflections of Professors Dumbrell, Sailhamer, Wilson and Stuhlmacher. The volume before us makes clear that a compelling biblical theology must speak with a cohesive voice concerning God and his covenant relationship with his people in order to address God’s people about their Creator, Sustainer, Redeemer and Judge. At the same time, the historical framework posited by the Scriptures must be taken into consideration, since God has revealed himself as King in the history of Israel and in the kingdom of the crucified Messiah. To that end, Daniel Fuller and James Scott remind us that we cannot avoid raising anew the age old questions of the law-gospel contrast on the one hand and of the roles of Israel and the church in redemptive history on the other. When all is said and done, are there two or more fundamental messages and peoples of God in the Bible or one? How this question is answered determinesone’s understanding of the history of redemption, personal justification and eschatology, which together lie at the heart of biblical revelation.

BIBLICAL THEOLOGY AND THE QUESTION OF THE CANON

The essays in this book and the passionate disagreement during the conference also call attention to the fact that biblical theology cannot make substantial progress in the decades to come unless it takes up the questions being raised in biblical scholarship concerning the literary unity and structure of the canon. Does the fact of the canon bespeak its own perceived unity theologically, thereby offering essential clues to its structure and meaning? If so, which canon and how? The programmatic work of Brevard Childs on the one hand and the Tübingen school on the other makes it clear that the Bible’s theology cannot be developed in the abstract as if the canon in its various forms (!) and the history of its traditions do not exist.3

If context is king when it comes to theological exegesis, we cannot escape the fact that the context of Scripture also includes its developing canonical shape as the depository of tradition history. This becomes equally true for the NT, if in fact the NT writings did not come into existence in isolation from one another and if the NT canon is the product of an early editorial design rather than of a long, slow process of collection and evaluation.4

However, biblical theology is just now coming to grips with the complexity and intentionality of the formation of the canon(s). This is illustrated by the questions and proposals raised concerning the tripartite Hebrew/OT canon and its significance for the doing of biblical theology in a world dominated by the Septuagint’s influence on the ordering of the Christian Bible. Does the Tanak in its final form exhibit an explicit, editorial canon consciousness that provides exegetical and theological clues to its meaning? Does the Hebrew canon help us solve the problem of the interrelationship among the Law, the Prophets and the Writings? In pursuing these questions, we must be clear regarding the historical reconstructions and exegetical methodology that we bring to bear in answering them, especially as they revolve around the so-called canonical seams and programmatic conclusions within the OT.

At the same time, the conference brought home to many the pivotal question of whether the OT canon was closed prior to the coming of the Christ, so that in the doing of biblical theology we are faced with two distinct Testaments (see especially the essay by Christopher Seitz). Or was the content of the canon still open in the first century A.D., with the formation of the NT as the literary and theological-historical continuation of Israel’s ongoing heritage, so that biblical theology is the study of one “history of tradition”? And what is the significance of the fact that there is no one, unified ordering of the books within the Hebrew or Septuagint tradition, not to mention the differences between the Masoretic Text and the Septuagint themselves? At what stage in the formation of the biblical canon do we do our biblical theology? These are difficult and pressing questions that biblical theology cannot relegate to the province of historical studies.

BIBLICAL THEOLOGY AND THE QUESTION OF CONFLICT

The work in this volume on the unity of the canon and its theological trajectories reveals that there is a strong impetus to overcome the conflict theories that have dominated biblical theology in the past. In order to remain faithful to the message of the biblical text, this volume encourages us to rethink the dichotomies so often posited in the past between the Law and the Prophets, priest and prophet, Jesus and Paul, creation and redemption, the kingdom of God and the church, as well as the interrelated theological systems of covenant theology and dispensationalism that have grown out of them.5