The classic is one new metaphor we can consider as we are looking for a way forward from the owner’s manual for life (OMFL) approach which seems to be boil the narrative down to stories encasing propositions we have to figure out how to mine.
David Tracy was one theologian who realized the problem we were having in our reading the biblical text. His proposal in 1981 in his winsome though dense volume, The Analogical Imagination, was that we might want to consider reading the text as a classic.
Now for those of you reading this from a more conservative perspective don’t panic. Classic doesn’t imply “not real” or even ‘not inspired’ for that matter. In fact let’s call it an inspired classic (some actually find that a redundant couplet…all classics are inspired some would say). We have to consider new paradigms with an open mind or we never really “hear” their power.
The shift Tracy is inviting is in how we read a classic. We do not read the classic story, looking for a character with whom we identify, noting their response to situations in life and then trying to emulate or avoid duplicating their life responses. The function of the “storying” feature of the classic is that it is much more insidious, subtle and yet complex. And yet what I just described is indeed how we approach the biblical text…well at least selectively.
For instance in the OMFL approach we read or have preached to us that Jonah is being called to be an evangelist. You as a Christian are also called. Jonah wasn’t excited about his calling, often we aren’t excited about sharing our faith… You see where this is going. In our reading, due to what we have heard in the formative time of faith development and in preaching, we start into the reading task with a “make a one to one correspondence” goal and a then “learn and live” accordingly. It is relatively neat, clean and quick. The problem as we have already mentioned though is that works much easier for applying the call of Jonah to go preach to the Ninevites than it does for the call or Noah to build a football field sized boat. You can be called to preach to pagans too but no one has ever thought you were called to build a boat of any size.
When we read a classic we actually don’t start into the reading enterprise looking for a one to one correspondence to emulate. So what happens? When you pick up a classic or what you know to be a great story how do you read it?
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Ron, my good friend is reading your book and it is on my summer stack… hope to get to it soon! Yesterday he was talking to me about your thoughts on classic and Scripture based on a chapter of your book. And now today I see this… hhhhmmmm… very good timing.
Ok, so I think that I agree with your calling the bible a classic. It is an ancient work (inspired by God, as you are careful to say)
that is written in various classical literary genres and employs various forms of rhetoric. It seems to me that this is the “great divide” so to speak between strict conservative folk-theology(ies) and those of us who approach the text from more post-conservative or perhaps moderate perspective. If we can begin to educate our church people and pastors about the language of classical literature possessing various genres/rhetorical devices, then perhaps the North American church would be liberated from its narrow-minded views of the bible. The difficulty comes with using language that builds bridges… which this post is a good attempt at doing.
Second, it sounds like you have read (which I know from listening to Velocity cd’s) NT Wright and have a deep passion for immersion and improv. The five act hermeneutic or your jazz music metaphor seem to fit hand in hand with the idea of classic. Great post and I look forward to reading more! Thanks Ron!
I’m in the Torrey Honors program at Biola, and this is how we study the Bible. We read it as a classic, among the other classics.