Collection › LCMS Convention Workbook (St. Louis, Missouri) › 1973 · 50th Convention › Page 436
LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 1973, Page 436

Scan: The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod
Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

436

The Historical-Grammatical

(Traditional) View

Lutheran Confessional theol-
ogy teaches that God has
given men a revelation of
Himself in His works of cre-
ation. The self-disclosure
of God in the realm of na-
ture is called "general reve-
lation." The revelation of
God in nature is finally a
law revelation.

Ever since the entrance of
sin into the world, the
whole creation groans under
the bondage of corruption
(Rom. 8:19ff.). Our whole
physical environment wit-
nesses to the judgment of
God who visits death on
the works of His own hands
because of man's rebellion
against His maker.

Since general revelation
does not witness to the
grace that pardons but only
to the wrath that punishes
sin, the sinner responds to
the revelation of God in na-
ture by willfully suppress-
ing the truth to which it
witnesses (Rom. 1:18). He
either denies that there is
a God (Ps. 14:1; 53:1) or
he invents an idol whose
wrath can be appeased by
human devices (LC, I, 18-
23).

. The revelation in which God

makes Himself known as a

gracious God is called "spe-
cial revelation." While

special revelation cannot
simply be equated with Holy
Scriptures, since God spoke
to His people in many ways
even before any Scriptures
were written, and has spo-
ken to us in these last
times especially in His Son
(Heb. 1:1-2), it is never-
theless true that it is in
the Scriptures that the know-
ledge of these special reve-
lations of God's mercy has
come to us. The Scriptures
are, therefore, included
among the revelations of
Himself that God has given
us for our salvation.

I.

HOW DID THE BIBLE GET HERE?

CONTEMPORARY APPROACHES TO BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION

The Historical - Critical View

The Radical Position

The historian, qua historian,
must investigate and attempt
to explain the origin of the
Bible in the same way that he
accounts for any other histor-
ical phenomenon.

The tools of the historian's
craft are forged to deal only
with the human aspects of the
Bible. The historian can nei-
ther deny nor affirm a super-
natural dimension of histori-
cal phenomena since the super-
natural is not amenable to
investigation by the proce-
dures of his discipline. The
historian therefore limits his
studies to those aspects of
the Bible which can be inves-
tigated by his method.

In the absence of any direct
external evidence relative to
the origin of the Bible, the
historian turns his attention
to internal evidence. On the
basis of data gathered by
means of elaborate literary
analyses, theories are con-
structed which account for

the biblical literature wholly
in terms of processes analogous
to those which account for the
production of other similar,
non-Biblical literature.

. The following theory is pro-

b.

posed to explain the origin
and characteristics of the
Gospels:

Over a protracted period of
time, a series of situations
and the various specific in-
terests of the early Chris-
tian communities in differ-
ent localities gave rise

to separate traditions about
the deeds and teachings of
the central figure of their
cult.

Later editors combined these
disparate traditions ina
continuous narrative form.

. Thus the Gospel are compo-

sites of various independent

1.

Nh

The Mediating Position

The mediating view of the
Bible's origin takes serious]:
the "human side" of the bibli-
cal literature and regards th
Bible to be the product of a
history open to investigation
by the world. It acknowledge
in general the validity of th
radical historian's method

of studying the genesis of
the Scriptures.

The mediating view of the
Bible's origin affirms also
that for the Church of all
ages, the Bible is Holy Scrip
ture. Though the Bible par-
ticipates in the history that
produced it, in this history
God was active in a unique
way so that through the eyes
of faith there is a dimension
to Biblical literature beyond
that which is discernible by
historiographical research.
The historical dimension of
the Bible in no way detracts
from its divine dimension.

. According to this position,

the Bible came into being by
a special divine operation in
the ordinary course of the
history that produced the bib-
lical literature. The Holy
Spirit influenced the whole
process, from the formation
of the earliest oral traditio1
to the final draft of the re-
dactors (editors). This con-
nection between the Spirit an
history extends over the en-
tire range of steps by which
the biblical literature was
produced, so that the divine
control over the earliest
stages of the development is
the same in kind as the divin
control of prophets and apost.
at the "moment" of their in-
spired writing. The mediatin
view frequently stresses the
inspiration of the community
in order to include the whole
process.

. The Bible got here by divine

impetus and control over the
whole history of the formatio
and composition of its litera
ture. This history per se is