Harvesting The Soul: The Necessity Of Hermeneutics To A Valid Theological Method

By Kenneth R. Cooper [1]

[Kenneth R. Cooper, M.A., D.D., Ph.D., author and lecturer, Biblical Faith Ministries, Fort Worth, Texas]

“Good theology provides the vision that guides and motivates those who desire God. Good theology fosters the love of God without which no one becomes good. . . . God will satisfy their deepest longings for love and belonging, for meaning and significance—to the praise of God’s eternal glory.”[2] Doctrine has assumed a vital role among evangelicals throughout their existence. According to Clark, “[E]vangelicals commonly assume that the essential defining characteristics of evangelicalism are theological in nature.”[3] Consequently, they should be theological in nature since doctrine also assumed a vital role in God’s church from the very beginning.

On the day of its birth, for example, Luke said that the early body of believers “were continually devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship and to the breaking of bread and to prayer” (Acts 2:42).[4] Significantly, doctrine (or the apostles’ teaching) lies first on the list of the objects of devotion. They devoted themselves first to doctrine so that the fellowship, the breaking of bread and prayer were based upon the foundation of sound teaching. Perhaps it is no coincidence, therefore, that, when Paul reminded the young pastor Timothy of the inspiration of the Word of God and its value to his ministry, the Apostle also put doctrine at the head of the list of the benefits of the Word. “All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness” (2 Tim 3:16). The first benefit of the Word of God is sound doctrine so that reproof, correction, and training would also be based upon the solid foundation of biblical teaching.

The Significance Of Evangelical Theology

Whether one calls it teaching, doctrine, or theology, it is evident that theology assumed a significant role in the growth and development of the early church. The Apostle Paul felt it sufficiently important that his letters to Timothy stressed the value of doctrine in every aspect of his ministry and personal life as a believer, as well as his position as a pastor. “Until I come,” the Apostle admonished, “give attention to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation and teaching” (1 Tim 4:13). Within a few sentences, Paul further admonished the young pastor to “pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching” (1 Tim 4:16). Indeed, Paul placed such value on doctrine that he told Timothy: “The elders who rule well are to be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who work hard at preaching and teaching” (1 Tim 5:17).

In the light of these passages, one might ask what was the apostles’ teaching that led the way for theology to form the heart of the early church? In its simplest form, that teaching consisted of all the things Jesus taught His disciples. Not only did Jesus command His followers to make disciples of all the nations, but He also told them what to teach those new disciples: “teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you” (Matt 28:20). To “observe all things” seems to indicate a vital link between one’s beliefs and one’s behavior, but at this time, this article will focus upon the beliefs. The important thing to note here is that Jesus provided the content of the doctrine, if only in embryonic form or a form that may have needed further illumination and elaboration under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. The content consisted of what He had taught them. Furthermore, to several of them, He taught everything the Old Testament had to say about Himself (Luke 24:27, 44).

The Body Of Evangelical Theology

While this is a rather simplified description, it does indicate that from the beginning, theology formed the content of the church’s instruction: a theology with Christ at its center and Scripture as its source. As the church’s theology developed, it was all but simple in its expression of the doctrinal content of the Scriptures. Early theological expressions were not only built directly upon the Word of God itself but also consisted of explanations of the content of the Word as it reflected the nature and character of God (this is not surprising since doctrinal issues arose early in the church’s development as new situations were confronted and new questions arose).

Elmer A. Martens noted, “From the first, it was the community of believers through its representatives that engaged in formulating doctrine (Acts 15).” Martens elaborated upon the issue first encountering the community of believers when he noted, “They moved from Scripture to doctrine in debating whether Gentiles needed to convert to Judaism to become ‘real’ Christians. Around the table were missionaries and church leaders, biblical scholars such as James, theologians such as Paul. The community of faith was the locus for decision-making about theology and ethics.”[5] In making their decision, this body of leaders turned to the Scriptures and based their doctrinal decision upon the teaching of the Scriptures they had at their disposal, which in this case were the Old Testament prophets. Consequently, they set a precedent for beginning, developing, and establishing a theological system. Any such theological system should be based upon the Scriptures, and should be developed from and explain the message of the Scriptures.

Whether one develops a systematic theology or a biblical theology, one needs to follow the apostolic example. The Scriptures should form the foundation of any theology or theological system. Alister E. McGrath, in his analysis of the evangelical theological method, emphasized this clearly. “One of the most distinguishing features of evangelicalism,” McGrath noted, “is its emphasis on the authority of Scripture. Scripture is to be seen not simply as a repository of Christian theology, but also as a God-given resource for nourishment in the Christian life,”[6] again joining belief and behavior.

Other contemporary theologians agree. Stanley J. Grenz, for example, declared, “The Scriptures are the sole primary source for theology.”[7] Although Grenz acknowledged other sources for theological content, he noted, “Scripture must remain the primary norm for theological statements.”[8] Finally, Grenz concluded, “Theologians have always viewed their discipline as in some way connected to revelation.”[9] Christian experience, tradition, philosophy, and history have exerted influence upon theology. Nevertheless, in the final analysis, Scripture must function as the confirmation of theological expression.

Nearly half a century prior to Grenz, Lewis Sperry Chafer identified the responsibility of the theologian as one engaged in

arranging and exhibiting the positive truth the inspired Scriptures set forth. The Bible being the chief source of all the material which enters into his science, the theologian is called upon to arrange the God-given material in its logical and scientific order. He is a Biblicist, namely, one who not only regards the Bible as the sole rule of faith and practice, but as the only dependable source of information in realms where divine revelation speaks.[10]

Basic to Chafer’s theological method was a clear understanding of the source of theology, the Word of God. In his analysis of Chafer’s theological method, Bruce A. Baker noted, “There can be no doubt that Chafer held to the supremacy of the Bible over every other academic discipline or form of knowledge. He had a fundamental precommitment to the truth of God’s revelation and placed it above everything else.”[11]

Whether one considers older theologians, such as Luther and Calvin who were excellent expositors of the Bible, or contemporary theologians such as Grenz and Chafer, it is obvious that the primary source of their theology was the Scriptures themselves. To summarize and relate the Scriptures to method, Gerhard F. Hasel offered a comment. In an article addressing methodology and theology, Hasel noted, “The Biblical theologian must claim as his task both to discover and describe what the text meant and also to explicate what it means for today.”[12] Essentially, therefore, theology focuses upon the message from God as revealed in Scripture and the significance of that message for today’s world. While other disciplines (e.g. history, tradition, and culture) may clarify the message or assist in deriving its meaning, the Scriptures are the message God wants His people to have.

Nevertheless, in deriving Scripture’s message, some theologies moved “from Scripture to doctrine” by incorporating the methods and concepts of Greek philosophy prevalent in the culture of their day. Theologians may have incorporated these Greek ideas in an attempt to understand and/or relate Christianity to their own culture for whatever reasons. The best example of Greek influence is the allegorizing method of Philo and Origen. Allegoricism began in early classical Greece prior to Socrates and somewhat infiltrated the writings of Plato. According to David S. Dockery, “[T]he allegorical tradition began in the pre-Socratic period of classical Greece, which eventually influenced much of pagan, Jewish, and Christian philosophical and religious expressions.”[13] In Greece, the tradition consisted of ideas of philosophy in the language and imagery of myth. Philo attempted to combine his Jewish beliefs with Greek philosophy to be a “modern person of his time and a philosophical sophisticated man.”[14] Indeed, Philo used allegory to attempt to derive the philosophical message of the Bible. Whatever the reason and whatever the goal, Plato and others influenced the thoughts and hence the theology of the writings of some of the church fathers of, at least, the second century onward, perhaps influencing not only their theologies but also their theological methods. Fortunately, by the twentieth century, allegorizing ceased to be a primary model of interpretation, according to Dockery. Instead, Dockery noted three primary models comprising contemporary hermeneutical approaches, two of which relate to the method addressed in this article: (1) “author-oriented” perspectives; and, (2) “text-oriented” perspectives.[15]

In his 2005 presidential address to the Evangelical Theological Society, Craig A. Blaising observed, “there are many works on theological method tracing the various elements that factor in the task. There are numerous proposals for tying theology to the shifting winds of cultural change, and there are many to lend the weight of scholarly theories and proposals for a vision of remolding the heart of the Church.”[16] Considering this observation, Blaising reminded his listeners that they are stewards of the written Word of God, which means they are to be faithful in executing this stewardship not only in prayer but also in admonition. Furthermore, it is the essential task of each evangelical who affirms the Scriptures as the inerrant Word of God to be certain that those sermons, Bible lessons, and theologies are derived from the inerrant Word of God. The Word of God, then, is the substantial core of the evangelical theological method.

The Heart Of Evangelical Theology

While Martens, McGrath, and others agree that Scripture is not the only factor in establishing Christian theology, they do affirm that it is the most important factor. Other factors, such as tradition and culture, have intruded into the theological process—whether appropriately or not—and have provided clarity of the Scriptures. Such factors may, and in fact often do, impact one’s understanding of theology; however, each one needs to pass through the test of Scripture prior to being incorporated into one’s theology or before influencing one’s theological method. Culture, tradition, geography, and history all have a part in helping one understand the Word of God, and thus have a part in helping one formulate his theology.

The Scriptures, however, are the standard that measures the validity of one’s theology. “The Bible, for the Christian theologian, “ said Mike Stallard, “is not only the starting point for theology but also the measuring rod by which the other sources will be judged.”[17] After all, what is theology, and what is the basis of one’s theology? In its simplest form, theology is the study of God (i.e. the knowledge of God, that is, the understanding of God to the extent that one can understand Him). The Scriptures are the special revelation of God, His way of revealing Himself so that one can know Him. The prophet expressed it succinctly: “Surely the Lord God does nothing Unless He reveals His secret counsel To His servants the prophets” (Amos 3:7). Commenting on this verse, theologian Bernard Ramm said:

The prophetic word is the secret of God whispered to the prophet and announced to Israel. These secrets are not available to the human race at large. There is no religious epistemology which can bring them to the surface. Only when the Person to whom the secrets belong speaks are the secrets made known! Special revelation is God whispering His secrets to His servants, the prophets.[18]

Those secrets consist of more than just information God wants His people to have; they involve reflections upon the person of God. They reveal His thoughts, His manner of thinking, His personality, and His behavior (i.e. the acts of God). They reveal God Himself, in other words. Ramm further noted, “Revelation is the autobiography of God, i.e. it is the story which God narrates about Himself. It is the knowledge about God which is from God. In the broadest sense revelation is the sum total of the ways in which God makes Himself known.”[19] Ramm differentiated between general and special revelation; but, for all practical purposes, Christian theology builds upon special revelation, that “autobiography of God” that leads one to a limited understanding of the heavenly Father and His will and His plans for humanity and His world.

The Soul Of Evangelical Theology

All this being the case, any valid theological method should begin with the Scriptures, build on the Scriptures, and then proceed, as Martens noted, “from Scripture to doctrine.” For Christian theology to be genuinely Christian, it must be a biblical theology, drawing its nourishment from that “God-given resource” so vital to God’s people throughout the ages. Consequently, to understand that resource and build a valid Christian theology upon it requires a comprehensible understanding of Scripture. The opening sentences of the revised version of Kevin Vanhoozer’s 2004 plenary address to the Evangelical Theological Society in San Antonio, Texas clearly expressed the importance of sound hermeneutics for Christian theology. “Biblical interpretation is the soul of theology. Truth is the ultimate accolade that we accord an interpretation. Christian theology therefore succeeds or fails in direct proportion to its ability to render true interpretations of the word of God written.”[20]

Vanhoozer identified doctrine as the main product of theology’s interpretation of Scripture. Although this almost sounds like a redundant statement, it is not. Doctrine is the substance of theology, and the fact that it is the main product of theology only reinforces the need for a sound hermeneutic, since the product of such a hermeneutic must be a sound doctrine and the source of that sound doctrine is the Scriptures themselves. Bernard Ramm wrote in his classic Protestant Biblical Interpretation, “Part of the task of hermeneutics is to determine the correct use of the Bible in theology and in personal life.”[21] Ramm’s statement merely reinforces the fact that a sound hermeneutic is necessary for a sound doctrine, since a sound doctrine must come directly from the special revelation of God. What then is a sound hermeneutic?

A sound hermeneutic is one that seeks to determine what God revealed to the reader, what God communicated to the reader. To be sound, a hermeneutic attempts to understand what the plain sense of the text means; it attempts to ascertain what the author of the text intended his readers to understand by the words of the text itself. Therefore, the first objective of a sound hermeneutic is to determine the author’s intended meaning.

Authorial Intent

Elliott E. Johnson, along with many others in the evangelical tradition, argued, “Within the tradition of the Protestant Reformation there is a strong heritage which affirms that a biblical passage has one meaning.” In connection with this affirmation, Johnson declared, “The first affirmation of this paper [on authorial intention] is that this single meaning is the author’s intended meaning.”[22] Johnson is not alone in contending for the importance of author’s intended meaning. E. D. Hirsch Jr., addressing interpretation in literature in general, as well as in Scripture, noted, “Whenever meaning is attached to a sequence of words it is impossible to escape an author.”[23] Johnson placed this principle in the Reformation tradition and rightly so. Calvin himself, for example, in discussing James 2, noted, “It is not possible to understand what is being said or to make any discerning judgment on the terms, unless one keeps an eye on the intention of the author.”[24] I. Howard Marshall explained the aim of a sound hermeneutic in similar terms. Marshall said, “our aim is to discover what the text meant in the mind of its original author for his intended audience.”[25] The aim extends beyond the academy into the pulpit. Not just in one’s theology but also in one’s sermons must one seek the author’s intent. David Platt noted, “Preachers must honor the principle of authorial intent, recognizing that the ultimate author if Scripture is the Holy Spirit, God Himself” [emphasis in original].[26] Consequently, from Calvin to the present, authorial intention is a primary concern for a sound biblical hermeneutic, biblical theology, and biblical sermon.

A question that arises almost immediately from this contention is which author? Evangelicals claim that God Himself, using human instruments, wrote the Bible. The claim itself is biblical, since Peter noted, “[N]o prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God” (2 Pet 1:21). Again, “All writing is God-breathed” (2 Tim 3:16, author’s translation). In 2 Timothy, Paul referred primarily to the Old Testament writing, but the point is made: God is the Author of the writing (as previously noted by Platt). He out-breathed the Scripture by His Spirit. Jeremiah provided a good Old Testament example: “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘Write all the words which I have spoken to you in a book” (Jer 30:2; see also, Jer 36:2, 6, 11).

Whether the words were dictated by God or not is of little consequence. The source of even the words is God. The Spirit of God can move on a man, whether he is prophet, priest, poet, or what, in such a way as to guide the human author to choose words from his own vocabulary to convey the message from God. In this way, the words themselves are God-breathed even though the human writer penned them using his own vocabulary. The point here, however, is not to explain verbal inspiration and how it may have occurred; it is about author intention, and the point is Scripture results from a “dual authorship by [reflecting] simultaneously both true humanity and true deity in the product of the text.”[27] J. I. Packer’s keen observation (noted by Johnson) with regard to dual authorship was “Scripture is as genuinely and fully human as it is divine. . . . In both cases [the written Word and the incarnate Word], the divine coincides with the form of the human, and the absolute appears in the form of the relative.”[28] Johnson concluded, “True divine authorship affirms that the content was originated with God (2 Pet 1:20–21), resulting in Scripture’s having a divine source. God then providentially shared the meaning with the human author.”[29]

The task of interpretation must take into consideration this dual authorship if one is to construct from the text a valid biblical theology; but for the text to make sense, the interpreter must also consider that the intention of one author coincides with the intention of the other Author. Walter C. Kaiser Jr. clarified this point beautifully when he noted, “The supreme rule of interpretation is to discover and to define exactly what the human writer had intended to express by the words he used as a result of receiving the revelation of God.”[30] Kaiser argued further that God’s intention does not exceed or differ from the human writer’s intention. While Kaiser called this the supreme rule of interpretation, it is only the first rule, although perhaps the most important. If one is to develop a sound biblical theology—a sound study of God—one must develop it from the text, that is, from a clear revelation of God in His Word. Moreover, it must concern itself with all that the Author/author intended to reveal about God.

Authorial Content

The next step, therefore, focuses upon the content of the text. If one is to discern what the Author/author of the text intended, one need to examine closely the text itself. While this writer is not contending that one should ignore what others have learned from the text and shared in their writings, he is arguing that before examining the words of others, one examine closely the Word of God (i.e. His special revelation). How does one do this? To answer this, Donald K. Campbell noted, “We believe that [method by which we examine the special revelation] to be the literal method which approaches the Scripture in the normal, customary way in which we talk, write, and think. It means taking the Scripture at face value in an attempt to know what God meant by what He said.”[31]

Authorial Interpretation

The literal method that is being advocated here has suffered by misrepresentation and by misunderstanding, as well as in some cases, ridicule.[32] The literal method does not mean that one ignore symbols and figures of speech if and when they clearly appear in the text and the context supports them as symbols and figures. What then does it mean? Literal methodology means, according to Henry A. Virkler, “interpreting God’s Word the way one interprets normal human communication.”[33] Paul Tan added:

To “interpret” means to explain the original sense of a speaker or writer [authorial intent, again]. To interpret “literally” means to explain the original sense of the speaker or writer according to the normal, customary, and proper usages of words and language. Literal interpretation of the Bible simply means explaining the original sense of the Bible according to the normal and customary usages of its language.[34]

Clearly “the normal and customary use of the language” allows for symbols and figures of speech, but again only as the context indicates.

Perhaps the best expression of the literal method is the one penned in 1942 by David L. Cooper, known as the “Golden Rule of Interpretation.” Cooper wrote, “When the plain sense of Scripture makes common sense, seek no other sense, therefore, take every word at its primary, ordinary, usual, literal meaning unless the facts of the immediate context, studied in the light of related passages and axiomatic and fundamental truths, indicate clearly otherwise.”[35] The definitions, along with others not noted here, suggest the interpreter should explain a passage using the literal method even when the language itself or something in the context suggest a picturesque or symbolic meaning. Since Scriptures do not communicate nonsense, when one discovers the plain sense and it does not make sense as it stands, then one may look for a figurative or symbolic sense. Roy B. Zuck illustrated how this can work in a literal method. Zuck distinguished between what he called the ordinary-literal sense and the figurative-literal sense.[36]

Ordinary-Literal	Figurative-Literal
normal, plain, ordinary usage	picturesque, out-of-the-ordinary usage
plainly expressed, literal facts	figuratively expressed,literal facts
“Literal” (historical, grammatical) Interpretation

Therefore, whether the Scripture uses straightforward language or figurative language, the literal method of interpretation still applies.

The literal interpretation was one of the earliest methods on record, if not the earliest, used to interpret the Scriptures. For example, Nehemiah recorded an instance in which this method was applied. After the return from exile and the walls of Jerusalem had been rebuilt, Ezra and a group of scribes brought the Torah before the people for a public reading. Nehemiah wrote, “So they read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense, and caused them to understand the reading” (Neh 8:8, KJV). The passage clearly indicates that the scribes affirmed the text (“read in the book of the law of God distinctly”) and explained its meaning to the people (“gave the sense”) in such a way that the people could understand it (“caused them to understand the reading”). What better way to accomplish this than by the literal method?

Therefore, the literal sense of the Bible established a valid method by which to construct a theology that is truly biblical, that is, a theology that transfers into the pulpit effectively; and, “If we are going to understand God’s purposes, which are revealed in the Bible,” said James M. Hamilton Jr., “we need biblical theology.”[37] Hamilton further described the nature and content of the theology that one can construct from the text, as well as its purpose.

Biblical theology pushes us to understand the contribution individual books of the Bible make to the Bible’s big story. We might call the Bible’s big story its metanarrative. However we describe it, the point is that the whole Bible fits together to tell us God’s revealed story of where the world came from, what is wrong with it, what He is doing to fix it, where we fit in the program, and what we can expect in the near and distant future. But there is a greater end to all this information: God is revealing Himself to us. We need biblical theology to know God. Knowing God fuels worship. Biblical theology is for worship.[38]

What Hamilton said with regard to biblical theology also applies to systematic theology since both kinds of theology derive their content from the Bible. Since theology is a study of God so that one can relate to Him, get to know Him, and worship Him, one must turn to His revelation in the Scriptures to accomplish these objectives. When one does, he discovers reciprocity. Floyd V. Filson observed, “To deal seriously with the Bible we must speak of God, His Lordship, His working in history, His purpose, His dealing with human individuals and groups.”[39]

Conclusion

Whenever one opens the Scriptures, he is dealing with theology in some form or another because he is confronting God’s revelation of Himself, and some, or all of the items Hamilton listed. When one begins to construct a theology, for it to be valid and a true theology that represents the theos in theology, it must come from the special revelation of God in the Scriptures, and not go beyond the Scriptures for its content. Ramm expressed this point succinctly.

The theologian must not extend his doctrine beyond the Scriptural evidence. A scientist is at liberty to spin as many hypotheses as he wishes. In weeding out the true from the false he is guided by logic and experimentation. . . . What answers to this in theology? What is the control we use to weed out false theological speculation? Certainly the control is logic and evidence. The evidence is the Scriptures themselves. It is our conviction that many of our troubles in theology are due to the fact that theologians have extended themselves beyond the data of Scripture and have asked questions about which no answers can be given.[40]

The theologian, therefore, needs to confine himself to the biblical data to construct a valid theology that reflects a true expression of God’s character, His nature, and His message to mankind. Furthermore, to examine the biblical data effectively to obtain from it an accurate representation of its truth and content, one needs to use a valid hermeneutical method. Essentially, a valid hermeneutical method equals a valid theological method since both aim at extracting from the Scriptures God’s message for man. As such, the clearest, most effective hermeneutical method is the literal method. Since theology should tell one God’s revealed story and explain it clearly to humanity, the most effective theological method is again the literal method of hermeneutics. Ramm said it perfectly while also explaining why.

The only sure way to know the meaning of Holy Scripture is to anchor interpretation in literal exegesis. Literal interpretation is not the Charybdis of letterism nor the Scylla of allegorism. It is rather the effective, meaningful, and necessary control for the protection of the right interpretation of Scripture.[41]

Ramm made the admonition stronger by applying the literal method to the task of the theologian as well as the interpreter. He noted, “It is the theologian’s or interpreter’s responsibility to guard the use of Holy Scripture by the hedge of literal exegesis.”[42] When one returns to the basics and takes seriously a literal hermeneutic, then interpretation becomes, no, then interpretation is the biblical and living “soul of theology.”

Notes

1. The author read an earlier draft of this article at the Southwest Regional of the Evangelical Theological Society, 18 March 2011.
2. David K. Clark, To Know and Love God: Method for Theology (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2003) xxxii.
3. Ibid. xxvii.
4. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are from the New American Standard Bible, 1995 updated edition by The Lockman Foundation.
5. Elmer A. Martens, “Moving from Scripture to Doctrine,” Bulletin for Biblical Research 15 (2005): 79.
6. Alister E. McGrath, “Evangelical Theological Method: The State of the Art,” in Evangelical Features: A Conversation on Theological Method, ed. John G. Stackhouse Jr. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2000) 20.
7. Stanley J. Grenz, Theology for the Community of God (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 1994) 18.
8. Ibid. 19.
9. Ibid. 22.
10. Lewis Sperry Chafer, Systematic Theology, 8 vols. in 4 (Dallas: Dallas Seminary Press, 1947; reprint, Grand Rapids: Kregel, 1994) 1:7.
11. Bruce A. Baker, “The Theological Method of Lewis Sperry Chafer,” Journal of Ministry and Theology 6 (Spring 2001): 58.
12. Gerhard F. Hasel, “Methodology as a Major Problem in the Current Crisis of Old Testament Theology,” Biblical Theology Bulletin 2 (1972): 196.
13. David S. Dockery, Biblical Interpretation Then and Now: Contemporary Hermeneutics in the Light of the Early Church (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1992) 76. See also, Gerald Bray, Biblical Interpretation: Past and Present (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1996) 82-86.
14. Ibid. 97.
15. Dockery, Biblical Interpretation, 182. The third method noted by Dockery is “reader-oriented” perspectives. The model, however, is almost exclusively subjective, and thus virtually useless in developing a truly biblical theology.
16. Craig A. Blaising, “Faithfulness: A Prescription for Theology,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 49 (March 2006): 16.
17. Mike Stallard, “A Proposal for Theological Method: Systematic Theology as Model Building” [article online] (Baptist Bible College & Seminary, accessed 9 January 2011) available from http://faculty.bbc.edu/mstallard/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/Method2.pdf.
18. Bernard Ramm, Special Revelation and the Word of God (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1961) 27.
19. Ibid. 17.
20. Kevin Vanhoozer, “Lost in Interpretation? Truth, Scripture, and Hermeneutics,” in Whatever Happened to Truth?, gen. ed. Andreas Köstenberger (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2005) 93.
21. Bernard Ramm, Protestant Biblical Interpretation, 3rd rev. ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1970) 163.
22. Elliott E. Johnson, “Author’s Intention and Biblical Interpretation,” in Hermeneutics, Inerrancy, and the Bible, eds. Earl D. Radmacher and Robert D. Preus (Grand Rapids: Academic Books, 1984) 410.
23. E. D. Hirsch Jr., Validity of Interpretation (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1967) 5.
24. John Calvin, Calvin’s Commentaries, 22 vols., trans. A. W. Morrison, eds. David W. Torrance and Thomas F. Torrance (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1972) 3:285, as quoted in Johnson, “Author’s Intention,” 410-11.
25. I. Howard Marshall, New Testament Interpretation (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1977) 15.
26. David Platt, “Introduction,” in Engaging Exposition, by Daniel L. Akin, Bill Curtis, and Stephen Rummage (Nashville: B&H Academic, 2011) 3.
27. Elliott Johnson, Expository Hermeneutics (Grand Rapids: Academic Books, 1996) 51. Johnson’s comments were made with regard to the following essay: J. I. Packer, “Biblical Authority, Hermeneutics, and Inerrancy,” in Jerusalem and Athens, ed. E. R. Geehan (Philadelphia: Presbyterian & Reformed, 1971) 141-53.
28. Packer, “Biblical Authority,” 145.
29. Johnson, Expository Hermeneutics, 51.
30. Walter C. Kaiser Jr., “A Response to Author’s Intention and Biblical Interpretation,” in Hermeneutics, Inerrancy, and the Bible, 442.
31. Donald K. Campbell, “Foreword,” in Roy B. Zuck, Basic Bible Interpretation: A Practical Guide to Discovering Biblical Truth (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1991) 7.
32. For an example of an attempt to ridicule the literal method, see Michael R. Gilstrap, “Dispensationalism’s Hermeneutic: Literal, except when Embarrassing,” Dispensationalism in Transition 1 (May 1988): 1-2.
33. Henry A. Virkler, Hermeneutics: Principles and Processes of Biblical Interpretation (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1981) 48.
34. Paul Lee Tan, Literal Interpretation of the Bible (Rockville, MD: Assurance Publishers, 1978) 15.
35. David L. Cooper, The World’s Greatest Library Graphically Illustrated (Los Angeles: Biblical Research Society, 1942) 17.
36. Zuck, Basic Bible Interpretation, 148.
37. James M. Hamilton Jr., “Biblical Theology and Preaching,” in Text-Driven Preaching, eds. Daniel L. Akin, David L. Allen, and Ned L. Mathews (Nashville: B&H Academic, 2010) 197.
38. Ibid.
39. Floyd V. Filson, “Theological Exegesis,” Journal of Bible and Religion 16 (October 1948): 213.
40. Ramm, Protestant Biblical Interpretation, 170.
41. Ibid. 125.
42. Ibid.