certainly can benefi t the church. Second, globally, even in the west and in
parts of the eastern and southern hemispheres infl uenced by the west, the
priorities of modern biblical studies have not undermined or decimated,
at least not in wholesale fashion, the church’s theological interests in and
commitments to Scripture. A great deal of theological work with Scripture
continues in all sorts of venues—sermons, prayer, hymnody, and Bible
studies among them. Some of this interpretive work is seasoned by the
disciplined study of the Bible sponsored by academic biblical studies, and
some of it would benefi t from being seasoned in this way.
In the past three or four decades, cracks in the foundation of modern
biblical criticism have appeared as a consequence of the slow, but growing
recognition that modern biblical criticism itself arose in a certain time (the
post-Enlightenment era) and place (in the West)—and, rather than pro-
moting neutral and objective interpretation, is itself contextually shaped. 4
Accordingly, an emerging phalanx of approaches to biblical interpreta-
tion that together challenge the basic essentials of modern critical study
is held together less by a common commitment to a certain method or
even constellation of methods, and more by shared critical sensibilities.
Three such sensibilities come immediately to mind. First, we recognize
that we have no objectively carved-out ledge of truth on which to stand
in order to make value-free judgments in the work of making meaning.
Interpreters cannot hide behind the veil of supposed neutrality. Second,
for many at least, “truth” does not exist as an abstract reality apart from
human knowing. Accordingly, for students of the Bible, “meaning” is not
simply a property of the text that the reader must discover or excavate, but
is somehow the product of the interaction of readers with texts. Third,
emerging approaches seem not to require, but actually work against, the
modern notion that the world of the text and the world of the reader are
and must be kept separate.
The hermeneutical shift implicit in these changes is remarkable,
its ripples far-reaching. One way to visualize it is to imagine “read-
ers” as pale and lifeless, like shades in Sheol, particularly in comparison
with the living-and-breathing, multi-textured, polychromatic, “history
behind the text” so fully studied in the modern era. 5 Hermeneutically,
we are experiencing the rebirth of the reader—or, better, the reanima-
tion of the readerly community. Although most agree that texts place
certain constraints on their interpretation, those involved in or inhabit-
ing this hermeneutical shift recognize that readers come in all sizes and
shapes, and from many cultural backgrounds; they are formed within
162 J.B. GREEN