March 14, 2006

context...textual concern...

Dasein has provided yet another interesting quotation to muse over.

. . . text, context, and interpretation all emerge together, as a consequence of a gesture . . . that is irreducibly interpretive. It follows, then, that when one interpretation wins out over another, it is not because the first has been shown to be in accordance with the facts but because it is from the perspective of its assumptions that the facts are now being specified.

Stanley Fish, Is There a Text in This Class?, 340.

What do you think? It is a chiken and egg kind of conversation, but it I think it is a worthwhile one to explore. We have relationships with text. All text is interpreted. All text speaks to and from existing relationships. I think it is interesting that the author suggests that text is appropriated by points of view. Is this the nature of interpretation? Some suggest that it is unavoidable.

John Calvin suggested as much. That was one of the fruits of his theological humanism. He even went so far as to say that the Church Fathers whom he so deeply loved fell prey to this. Thus the Church Fathers' interpretation is rife with Neo-Platonism. According to Calvin, they were too concerned with making the gospel relevent to the philosophy of the day...and in the process bent the text to fit the philosophical school.

Thus, sometimes we can appropriate on behalf of others. Such appropriation is common. Winning interpretations can be truth-telling and the results of popularity contests. Sometimes they are both.

Text can also be spoken. Let's not forget that. AKMA and Deep Weeds have both posted on this in terms of their own pedagogy. How one teaches is closely wed to how one interprets. Does not teaching also reflect the existing interpretation of the text? Sure it does.

This is why I like the podcast...and why I am working on podcasts of ancient texts for AKMA (Yes, I have not forgotten.). To read them is one mode of discovering interpretation. Hearing them is another. Our senses play a large part in how we interpret, how we are moved or not by a text. We learn in the process as much about ourselves as we do the text if we are self-aware.

Posted by tripp at March 14, 2006 08:07 AM
Comments

Thanks, Tripp; I was a little worried. . . .

Posted by: AKMA at March 14, 2006 08:59 AM

To me, one of the great beauties of classic texts like the Bible is that they are capable of being interpreted in the context of "now". They bridge the gap between how we see the world today then by revealing the humanity that informs our reactions to events. I think that can be extended to the interpretive texts of every era since then. We must try to understand context and biases, but then it still falls back to "What does this mean to me today?"

Bias is an inherent part of interpretation, particularily in matters of religion. The best we can do is try to acknowledge it. God chose for us to only wrestle with the truth - not to know it outright. Because of this, the "truth" can be relevant to the present and interpreted so that it is everlasting.

But I'm just a layperson with a biased opinion.

Posted by: Rich at March 14, 2006 09:34 AM