Early-Christian-Hermeneutical-Constraints

In the second and third centuries, the church worked under several different hermeneutical constraints, including: canonical development, community boundary definition (vis-à-vis Judaism, Paganism, and heretical, “Christian” sects), and hermeneutical method. Although this period of biblical interpretation has long been closed, being aware of the natures of these respective constraints can help us understand the early church’s hermeneutical environment and gain better access to some of their thoughts about scripture. Regarding canonical development, within the patristic period the text of the Jewish canon was essentially closed, but what has become known as the New Testament was not yet a distinct collection. In this period, the church sometimes used certain documents as scripture, although these documents like Shepherd of Hermas or 1 Clement were not eventually canonized, and the church sometimes refrained from using as scripture other documents like Hebrews and Revelation, which were eventually canonized. Additionally, the early church seems to have viewed the Old Testament as having a higher status than the Gospels [including the Diatessaron ( ANF 9:43–130)] and Paul’s epistles, although a somewhat more egalitarian view was also feasible (cf. 2 Pet 3:15–16). For instance, when the Epistle of Barnabas cites the New Testament, the references seem to be mainly incidental to the main line of thought (e.g., Epistle of Barnabas 5:9; 4:14; 13:7), whereas the Old Testament seems to be used as though it held more weight for Barnabas’s author. In the earliest part of the patristic period, it was also possible for Papias to say that he preferred the “living voice” (of oral testimony) to what was written. By contrast, in Justin Martyr’s Dialogue with Trypho (ca. AD 165; ANF 2:194–270), Justin explicitly cites the New Testament as scripture (e.g., §43, 100). Justin’s use of the New Testament as scripture typified a growing trend out of which the Muratorian Canon list (ca. AD 200; see Westcott 557–64) came and which culminated in Athanasius’s Easter letter of AD 367 ( NPNF2 4:551–52). In this letter, Athanasius demarcated what he saw to be the boundaries of the New Testament canon, which have remained until the present day. ...

A corollary problem to the tension between the old and the new was the tension between the absolute and the relative. No one would have dared relativize the words of the Highest, but some heretical sects thought parts of scripture (notably the Old Testament) were products of a lesser god. This position allowed them safely to relativize portions of scripture. Although the rabbis had relativized scripture, to some extent, in halakah, they had limited the operational extent of that halakah by the oral law. In competition with these other positions, the orthodox, Christian position received slightly different articulations based on which factors pressed heaviest on a given author’s context. For example, the Epistle of Barnabas applied whatever method necessary to arrive at a distinctively Christian interpretation of the Old Testament. In contrast to the general, orthodox emphasis on the use of the Old Testament, Ignatius used the New Testament more frequently than he used the Old Testament. Where he did use the Old Testament, however, he took Jesus as the starting point for his interpretation of the Old Testament. ...

The second century saw several, very live issues about hermeneutical method, such as the necessity to actualize scripture (i.e., to interpret scripture in a manner consistent with its supreme importance), the necessity to actualize according to rules (e.g., the rule of faith), and the reality that the actualizations are largely determined by community contexts. Therefore, within this context, what shape did the early Christian community’s hermeneutics take? Ireneas fully affirmed scripture’s divinity (as did the rest of the orthodox Christian tradition) and, because of its divinity, its perfection. In the ancient world, however, one assumption and test of divine literature was that it could be allegorized. Hence, when Celsus argued that the Old Testament was not divine because it could not be allegorized, Origen responded by seeking to defend the divinity of the Old Testament by proving that it would yield allegorical meanings [Origen, Against Celsus 1.20 ( ANF 4:404)]. Similarly, in polemicizing with pagans, Athenagoras applied the Old Testament directly to his own situation. Moreover, even some heretical, Gnostic groups (e.g., the Valentinians) had a hermeneutic that allowed for the Old Testament’s divine origin, but Marcion and his followers completely rejected idea that the Old Testament originated with the father of Jesus Christ. Interestingly, however, contrary to the willingness of orthodox Christians to allegorize the Old Testament, Marcion generally argued for a literal approach to interpretation. ...

Last in the series of challenges for boundary definition of the early Christian community is the work that orthodox Christianity had to perform to define itself in relation to its various, heretical offshoots. Particularly, orthodox Christians faced a significant struggle with heretical groups over the problem of the old and the new, which includes, but is not limited to, the problem of the relationships between the Old and New Testaments. This issue grew especially large in the 2nd and 3rd centuries, and it encompassed problems of sociology (the relationship between Israel and the church), Christology (Jesus’ messiahship), theology (Jesus’ divinity), and eschatology (understanding prophesies of Israel’s scripture in light of Jesus). Moreover, the church had to sort through tensions along canonical-hermeneutical lines by defining how the Old Testament constituted specifically Christian scripture and how Jesus should affect one’s interpretation of it. ...

The early church also had to struggle to define itself in relation to Paganism. The church had to decide what degree of cultural syncretism was acceptable and how much its members had to form their own subculture. One example of this dimension of definition is the staunch, orthodox Christian refusal to participate in the Caesar cult, for which reason Polycarp was burned ( Mart. Poly. 9:2). Moreover, Christian monotheism (albeit in Trinitarian form), in a pantheistic society, opened Christians to the charge of atheism (e.g., Pliny of Flavia Domitilla and her husband Flavius Clemens; see Wilken, Christians as the Romans Saw Them, 25‒30). Thus, the central defining point for the church vis-à-vis Paganism, as in relation to Judaism, was Jesus, but Jesus in his identity as the κύριος ( lord) who ruled over all, including Caesar (cf. Priene inscription). ...

Somewhat similar to the question of canonical development is the question of the boundaries of the Christian community. The orthodox early church had to work to define these boundaries over against Judaism, paganism, and heretical, “Christian” sects. Scholars have sometimes seen the struggle of Christianity to define itself in relation to Judaism as beginning in the mid-second century, but this effort had really already begun within the first century (cf. Acts 15; Galatians). It was crucial for the church to define itself correctly in relation to Judaism because, at the beginning, Christians did not want to say that they were a new religion. Instead, they preferred to view themselves and to be viewed by others (not least the Romans, who afforded the Jews special religious privileges) as the continuation of Judaism, which Israel’s God had planned. Moreover, Christians wanted to claim Jewish scripture as their own and borrow some of Judaism’s interpretive methods. Even the Christological method of interpretation, which the church developed, might be regarded as merely a Jesus-oriented application of other methods, which the Jews had already applied to their scriptures. Orthodox Christianity did not adopt all Jewish interpretive methods, but more than which methods the early church did or did not adopt, the central defining point for the church in relation to Judaism was really the church’s commitment Jesus’ messianic status. Therefore, Christian interpretations of scripture differed with Jewish ones at certain key points because of how the church’s a priori acceptance of Jesus as messiah impacted its hermeneutic. ...