Biblical studies

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For other uses, see Bible study (disambiguation).
"New Testament studies" redirects here. For the journal, see New Testament Studies.
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Biblical studies is the academic application of a set of diverse

mythology, and comparative religion.[1]

Many secular as well as religious universities and colleges offer courses in biblical studies, usually in departments of

Judaic studies, history, or comparative literature. Biblical scholars do not necessarily have a faith
commitment to the texts they study, but many do.

Definition

The Oxford Handbook of Biblical Studies defines the field as a set of various, and in some cases independent disciplines for the study of the collection of ancient texts generally known as the Bible.[1] These disciplines include but are not limited to historical criticism, archaeology, hermeneutics, textual criticism, cultural anthropology, history, the history of interpretation, sociology, theology,[1] and patristics.

Academic societies

Several academic associations and societies promote research in the field. The largest is the

American Schools of Oriental Research, and the Catholic Biblical Association
.

Biblical criticism

Main article: Biblical criticism

Biblical criticism is the scholarly "study and investigation of biblical writings that seeks to make discerning judgments about these writings".

canonical gospels. It also plays an important role in the quest for a historical Jesus
.

It also addresses the physical text, including the meaning of the words and the way in which they are used and its preservation, history and integrity. Biblical criticism draws upon a wide range of scholarly disciplines, including archaeology, anthropology, folklore, comparative religion, oral tradition studies and historical and religious studies.

New Testament and Old Testament rhetorical analysis differ because if the context in which they were written. The New Testament was written during a time that had many new Greek and Roman ideas on literature and rhetoric, which provide an avenue on what is known and gives additional resources on to study New Testament texts in those contexts.

Old Testament texts were not written in the same context, and due to their ancient nature have few additional resources to refer to for common themes in rhetoric and literature. There are many abstract text styles in the Old Testament, including historical accounts, proverbs, poetic texts, praise texts (such as psalms) and prophetic texts. The New Testament is different in that it has primarily two styles present: the gospels, which are mostly historical accounts, and the letters, or epistles.[4]

When it comes to textually analyzing and criticizing the New Testament, there are a couple of eclectic approaches to understanding the text on a deeper level. External criticism in the context of biblical studies involves understanding the who, what and when of New Testament texts. It does not analyze within the text itself, which is referred to as internal criticism. External criticism focuses on the source and dates of text and what type of text it is (in the New Testament, that is mostly a gospel account or a letter to a church or person). Internal criticism focuses specifically on the content and nature of the texts. Things like the literary style and the theology of the author may affect how one reads the text. That may require some external criticism knowledge since who the author is will shine light on what they may be saying what they are saying.[5]

Biblical exegesis

Biblical exegesis is the explanation or interpretation of the scriptures traditionally known as The Bible. Much biblical exegesis is founded upon historical-literary dynamics, either using scripture to interpret history and science, or using science and history to interpret scripture.

This is particularly important when applied to the person of Jesus Christ and the Gospels in the New Testament. Many people agree that Jesus was a real historical person, but whether he was truly the Son of God is debatable among many people, and this distinction proves to be important for one's interpretation of texts and whether the Gospels should be read literally or symbolically.[6]

The Book of Revelation is very different from the other books of the Bible, drawing need for additional analysis to determine whether it should be read literally or symbolically. The goals of the author of the book (John) also have implications toward how one reads the book. If one reads Revelation as a literal unfolding of the end times vs reading Revelation as a highly symbolic book, there will be different outcomes in the interpretation of particular sections.[7]

Additionally, one's view of the scriptures as sacred and written by God or as a historical text has implications on one's interpretation of text.[8]

Textual criticism

Main article: Textual criticism

Textual criticism is a branch of textual scholarship, philology, and literary criticism that is concerned with the identification and removal of transcription errors in texts, both manuscripts and printed books. Ancient scribes made errors or alterations when copying manuscripts by hand. Given a manuscript copy, several or many copies, but not the original document, the textual critic seeks to reconstruct the original text (the

urtext, archetype or autograph
) as closely as possible. The same processes can be used to attempt to reconstruct intermediate editions, or recensions, of a document's transcription history. The ultimate objective of the textual critic's work is the production of a "critical edition" containing a text most closely approximating the original.

There are three fundamental approaches to textual criticism: eclecticism, stemmatics, and copy-text editing. Techniques from the biological discipline of cladistics are currently also being used to determine the relationships between manuscripts.

The phrase "lower criticism" is used to describe the contrast between textual criticism and "higher criticism", which is the endeavor to establish the authorship, date, and place of composition of the original text.

Biblical history

Historical research has often dominated modern biblical studies. Biblical scholars usually try to interpret a particular text within its original historical context and use whatever information is available to reconstruct that setting.

Pentateuch
was compiled from four different written sources, and different reconstructions of "the historical Jesus", which are based primarily on the differences between the canonical Gospels.

There is much controversy around using the Bible as a historical source. The Old Testament is supposed to serve as a continuous account of the establishment of

ancient Israel. While many historians agree that figures like King David and King Solomon are real historical figures, there comes trouble when seeking to affirm or deny events like the creation of the world and the flood of Noah.[9] The use of terms like "myth" vs "history" also creates controversy due to some connotations that each word has. Oftentimes "myth" or "mythical" texts are seen as not true stories, where as "history" or "historical" texts are seen as fact. Mythical stories can also sometimes be seen as stories which serve some sort of religious or moral lesson, but are not necessarily true, however this does not mean that true historical stories do not have religious and moral lessons that accompany them.[10]
These views on myth and history are examples of a few difficulties when it comes to analyzing the Old Testament as a historical text.

New Testament historical analysis is also difficult due to the nature of the original texts that we can analyze, specifically their translatability as well as how oral tradition had effects on written tradition during the formation and canonization of gospel texts and the teachings of Jesus.[5]

Original languages

The Hebrew Bible, the textual basis of the Christian

seminaries
with strong programs in biblical studies.

There are few original Old Testament/Hebrew Bible manuscripts, and while the ancient translations (such as the Septuagint) are available, there comes a problem with comparing the translation to the original Hebrew (because we have it). This may lead to problems of establishing the reliability of translations like the Septuagint. In order to overcome this, researches have come up with methods to use the very few manuscripts we have and continually draw conclusions and compare to original texts using those conclusions to provide more reliability to available texts.[11]

See also

References

  1. ^
    ISBN 0199254257
    page xvii
  2. ISBN 0567083977
    pages 11–12
  3. ^ Harper's Bible Dictionary, 1985, p. 129
  4. ISSN 1535-8593. Archived
    from the original on 2023-04-15. Retrieved 2023-05-11.
  5. ^
    ISSN 0006-2278
    .
  6. ISSN 2046-5726. Archived
    from the original on 2023-04-21. Retrieved 2023-05-09.
  7. ISSN 0033-5630. Archived
    from the original on 2023-04-15. Retrieved 2023-05-09.
  8. ISSN 2375-3234
    .
  9. ISSN 0001-2793
    .
  10. ISSN 0901-8328. Archived
    from the original on 2023-04-17. Retrieved 2023-05-11.
  11. ISSN 0901-8328
    .

Further reading

External links

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