N. T. Wright I think - and perhaps others - talks about a “hermeneutic of love”.
I’m not sure what that means. But can I guess:
When a couple are so in love, and a lover says something to his beloved (or writes something to her), more than just his language and grammar, she also gets where he’s coming from, what he’s talking about, why he’s saying it, his unique way of saying it, his nuances - she can ‘get it’ in a way others mightn’t: because she gets 'him' so well - and because he also gets her and knew what she's facing and what she needs to hear and how she takes things and how he needs to put it in order for her to get it the way he intends it.
So when we overhear his conversation with her (or when we come across his written note to her) we understand it best when we allow for all that - when we try to put ourselves in the picture - in their roles - rather than just take it strictly grammatically.
Otherwise our boast of being 'consistently grammatically historical' in how we take it could (certainly would!) inadvertently involve a lot of anachronisms (would impose meanings from our own time-frame and from our translated-language and our mindset and point of view and worldview and sense of nuance and issues and solutions back onto and into the text).
So maybe that’s what is meant by a “hermeneutic of love”? I’m really only guessing.
But if it is, notice that that is a different hermeneutic also to just simply taking everything allegorically or symbolically instead of grammatically. In the hermeneutic of love you would only take something symbolically if it was originally intended symbolically.
And if it was intended symbolically you would be careful to allow the symbol its intended meaning, not the meaning such imagery has to us nearly two thousand or more years later.
So in the hermeneutic of love (and this should always be true in literature studies anyway, I would imagine) taking a text ‘literally’ doesn’t mean to always take it physically or concretely, nor always strictly grammatically: it means to take it whatever way the literature itself intended it to be taken, according to the literary method used in the literature itself, in its time, by its author, with its author’s own intent.
Instead of then proudly thinking that our own perception, and grammar, translated into our own language, nearly 2000 or more years later is going to give us a more accurate grasp of a text’s meaning than putting the text in its own world would - like lovers do. That should just be common sense when reading ‘anything’ really!
How’s that? Is that kind of like what is meant by the 'hermeneutic of love'? or have I just invented something on my own - lol
Another thing about the 'hermeneutic of love' - is that there can be an intended message which mightn't always be spoken or written - but that is meant to be grasped by what is spoken or written, and even by what is not spoken or written.
Like in the Book of Acts. The incidences Luke choose to include; and the details he mentions about those incidences - and the combined narrative it strings together - illustrates something which Luke didn't in Acts take upon himself to teach didactically as a teacher would - but as a historian only. Yet you can tell there is design.
Same with John's gospel.
And same with Romans. You could take Paul's statement's wrongly, if you don't grasp where he was going in Romans, and how each statement fits in where he was going.
That's reading three-dimensionally rather than two-dimensionally.
As we hear from Wright, "There's no such thing as a point of view which isn't a point of view".
So unless we grasp the Bible's own point of view, we're actually reading our own into it!
I’m not sure what that means. But can I guess:
When a couple are so in love, and a lover says something to his beloved (or writes something to her), more than just his language and grammar, she also gets where he’s coming from, what he’s talking about, why he’s saying it, his unique way of saying it, his nuances - she can ‘get it’ in a way others mightn’t: because she gets 'him' so well - and because he also gets her and knew what she's facing and what she needs to hear and how she takes things and how he needs to put it in order for her to get it the way he intends it.
So when we overhear his conversation with her (or when we come across his written note to her) we understand it best when we allow for all that - when we try to put ourselves in the picture - in their roles - rather than just take it strictly grammatically.
Otherwise our boast of being 'consistently grammatically historical' in how we take it could (certainly would!) inadvertently involve a lot of anachronisms (would impose meanings from our own time-frame and from our translated-language and our mindset and point of view and worldview and sense of nuance and issues and solutions back onto and into the text).
So maybe that’s what is meant by a “hermeneutic of love”? I’m really only guessing.
But if it is, notice that that is a different hermeneutic also to just simply taking everything allegorically or symbolically instead of grammatically. In the hermeneutic of love you would only take something symbolically if it was originally intended symbolically.
And if it was intended symbolically you would be careful to allow the symbol its intended meaning, not the meaning such imagery has to us nearly two thousand or more years later.
So in the hermeneutic of love (and this should always be true in literature studies anyway, I would imagine) taking a text ‘literally’ doesn’t mean to always take it physically or concretely, nor always strictly grammatically: it means to take it whatever way the literature itself intended it to be taken, according to the literary method used in the literature itself, in its time, by its author, with its author’s own intent.
Instead of then proudly thinking that our own perception, and grammar, translated into our own language, nearly 2000 or more years later is going to give us a more accurate grasp of a text’s meaning than putting the text in its own world would - like lovers do. That should just be common sense when reading ‘anything’ really!
How’s that? Is that kind of like what is meant by the 'hermeneutic of love'? or have I just invented something on my own - lol
Another thing about the 'hermeneutic of love' - is that there can be an intended message which mightn't always be spoken or written - but that is meant to be grasped by what is spoken or written, and even by what is not spoken or written.
Like in the Book of Acts. The incidences Luke choose to include; and the details he mentions about those incidences - and the combined narrative it strings together - illustrates something which Luke didn't in Acts take upon himself to teach didactically as a teacher would - but as a historian only. Yet you can tell there is design.
Same with John's gospel.
And same with Romans. You could take Paul's statement's wrongly, if you don't grasp where he was going in Romans, and how each statement fits in where he was going.
That's reading three-dimensionally rather than two-dimensionally.
As we hear from Wright, "There's no such thing as a point of view which isn't a point of view".
So unless we grasp the Bible's own point of view, we're actually reading our own into it!
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