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16. Rivalry: Between Sacred Scripture and Human Tradition
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16 Rivalry: Between Sacred Scripture and Human Tradition One of the key phrases of the Reformation was Sola Scriptura: “Sacred Scripture alone!” “Let the Word stand,” and let none of one’s own thoughts be added to it! This principle was to be respected in the interpretation of Sacred Scripture, and also as regards the relevance of Sacred Scripture, which is not to be obscured by added traditions or diminished in any other way. This is a difficult proposition today, for a twofold reason: a great many of our contemporaries do not warm up to Scripture, or to religious traditions either. Contemporary Questions Critical questions are asked today both about what the Christian churches regard as tradition and about the Bible itself, which is also perceived as traditional material. Tradition as such has acquired a bad reputation; new knowledge advances humankind! Traditions from the past are considered more of a hindrance than a help; they can only prove helpful if they lead to new knowledge and yield to it. Innovation trumps tradition. With Descartes and the Enlightenment as a whole came the reversal whereby not traditions, but new and ongoing insights and experiences came to be regarded as contributing to progress. This view still dominates the attitudes of many people, even though here and there a certain rehabilitation of older customs may be in progress. But if we want to rely on traditions at all we are immediately confronted with the problem of what traditions are useful. In the present age a challenge is posed by the traditions of non-Christian religions. Can Luther’s theology be of any help in this situation? In this regard not even the various Christian confessional traditions see eye to eye. Luther may have found it easy to polemicize against the tradition as he found it; in the meantime, however, 429 430 The Theology of Martin Luther even the Lutheran churches have assembled an impressive total of traditions of their own. It also appears difficult to separate Sacred Scripture from broader traditions , since it owes its own existence to a traditional process. Besides, there are standards of confessional interpretation from which Sacred Scripture is scarcely able to disentangle itself and that have what amounts to credal status: in Roman Catholicism, for example, the interpretation of the words to Peter in Matthew :; in Protestantism the emphasis on the Pauline message of justification in contrast to what is said in the letter of James. This problem leads to the further question of the textual basis to which the Confessions actually appeal: does the Christian canon of the Old Testament contain only those Hebrew books that are regarded as canonical, as Protestant theology generally holds, or should we also include the late writings included in the Greek Septuagint, as in the Orthodox and Roman Catholic tradition? What is the role of translations? To what extent may a translation be responsive to theology and thus also confessionally colored, as the Luther Bible undoubtedly is? Would not, instead, a truly ecumenical unified translation be desirable, like the unified texts of the Our Father and the Apostles’ Creed? What role should belong to biblical translations with different theological accents, such as the Bibel in gerechter Sprache (“Bible in Inclusive Language”)? Most difficult, finally, is the question of a clear and appropriate interpretation of the Bible. There is no such thing as Sacred Scripture “alone”; it always stands within the context of a particular socio-cultural constellation. Its interpretation takes place in a dialogue between the text and the particular recipients. To what extent should the biblical text be able to liberate us from the prejudices we bring with us, and to what extent do particular prior understandings help us to grasp the meaning of the text? Will the Bible still be emancipatory after it has been amalgamated with a culture like that of the West? How can it be liberated from traditional forms of inculturation and made available for other and different inculturations? How and from what points of view can we attribute a normative significance to Sacred Scripture in the face of all these questions? What should be the guidelines for interpretation? Can a biblicist fundamentalism be justified—or how do we establish that there is no justification for it? What about the legitimation of historical-critical exegesis? For Luther the clarity and relevance of Sacred Scripture were obvious on the face of it, in contrast to the traditions that surrounded it and...