Fortress Press

Excerpt from Introduction

Over the past century, biblical studies has hosted an array of methodological approaches. The succession tale of this methodological parade is a familiar one. Up until thirty years ago, historical studies held sway in the biblical field where the factors external to the text were considered integral in production of meaning. Authorial intention, context, sources, editorial process, and literary form constituted the locus of study. Methods developed that systematically analyzed these factors in the service of interpretation. Many of these approaches are still practiced today. Form critics classify individual literary units and search for their probable "setting in life." Tradition critics study the origins, composition, and transmission of the biblical writings. Social science critics study the cultural matrix extrinsic to the texts. Redaction critics detail the theological interests and intentions of the compilers.

Under the aegis of historical critical studies, specialization has continued to grow while reaping important gains. Biblical studies has been liberated from parochialism. Study of the biblical text is now a respected and funded enterprise within the public sector. Biblical scholars regularly collaborate with colleagues in other areas of the humanities. These exchanges across academic disciplines have been especially apparent and productive in literary studies of the Bible.

In recent years this appropriation of methods from schools of literary criticism has created what some have called a "paradigm shift" and what others have labeled as a "revolution" in the biblical field. Instead of referring to the Bible as Scripture as was common in historical studies, the Bible is spoken about as literature. Meaning once tied to text in relation to context is now often consigned to the text alone. Analysis of the biblical stories for literary coherence, rhetorical elements, narrative design, deep structures, poetics, and all other kinds of literary pursuits have challenged the sovereignty and reign of the historical critical inquiry. Mark Powell's anthology of modern literary studies on the Bible attests to the burgeoning status of the field. Cataloging research during the past twenty years, Powell lists well over 1,000 studies on biblical texts that employ literary methods. These studies are matched in number by other explorations that discuss the theoretics of literary approaches to the Bible by biblical scholars and literary critics alike.

Evidence of this shift is not confined to the kinds of research being produced. Changes in the curricula of degree programs in biblical studies bears witness. Students in pursuit of doctoral degrees across the country often bypass historical study of the traditions and, instead, are being trained in literary theory and approaches. The work and identity of many scholars themselves tends to be yoked less with areas of the biblical canon and more with the literary approaches they employ.

This shift in the biblical field away from historical studies and toward the full-scale embrace of literary approaches makes a group of literary critics called New Historicists especially strange if not intriguing. Given the direction of the development of approaches during this century, is a literary approach called "New Historicism" not a contradiction in terms? Still, as I began my reading, I wondered if New Historicism might be a means to cross over the sharply drawn border that currently separates historical studies from literary studies in the biblical field. Thus began my journey. My pilgrimage from East to West marked the beginning of a sojourn in a vast academic terrain where a rendezvous with the New Historicists proved frustrating as well as exhilarating.