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Worldviews premodern, modern, postmodern, social critical
1. The Worldview Families
Evolution of Worldviews in the West
• Premodern - Catholic, Traditional Judaism, Islam, animist
• Modern - Rationalism, Naturalism, Deist, Empericist
• Postmodern - Relativist, Spiritualit, Constructivist
• Critical Theory
3. Pre-Modern Worldviews
1. Divine Revelation is the primary source of knowledge
2. Divine Revelation is NOT subject to inquiry or critique
3. Divine Revelation is mediated
4. Human authority has divine origins
5. All law has divine origin but is relative (ex. Sefardic v Ashkenaz, Western v. Byzantine)
6. No differentiation between Secular & Sacred
7. Super Natural Experience is Taken for granted
4. Pre-Modern Worldviews
Jewish Oral Torah • Roman Catholic Church Tradition
• Jewish Oral Torah passed down from Moses
• Catholic Church Tradition passed down from Peter
• Islamic Oral Tradition passed down from Muhammad
5. Model of Bible Interpretation
Text Reader
Writer Language Translation
Copyist
Errors
Writer’s
Cultural
Milieu
Reader’s
Cultural
Milieu
God
Inspiration
6. Model of Bible Interpretation
Text Reader
Writer Language Translation
Copyist
Errors
Writer’s
Cultural
Milieu
Historical
Events
Writer
Describes
Audience
Exegete
is
Addressing
Premodern: Meaning mediated by Authority
Religious
Authority
Meaning
God
Rabbinic authority Oral Tradition Papal Authority
8. Modern Worldview
1. Human reason became primary source of knowledge
2. Human authority originates from society not God
3. Human and Natural Laws are absolute and universal
4. Differentiation between the secular and sacred
5. Inexplicable phenomena have rational explanations
6. Scripture is accessible and subject to inquiry
9. Model of Bible Interpretation
Text Reader
Writer Language Translation
Copyist
Errors
Writer’s
Cultural
Milieu
Reader’s
Cultural
Milieu
Evangelical: Meaning Begins in Text
Meaning
God
10. Model of Bible Interpretation
Text Reader
Writer Language Translation
Copyist
Errors
Writer’s
Cultural
Milieu
Reader’s
Cultural
Milieu
Historical
Events
Writer
Describes
Rationalist: Meaning in Socio-cultural Milieu of Writer
Meaning
Meaning
12. Postmodernism
1. Meaning is determined by the person
2. Human authority is a social construct
3. Human Laws are all relative
4. Difference between secular & spiritual is relative
5. Reason cannot explain everything
6. Bible is one of many Sacred books
13. Model of Bible Interpretation
Text Reader
Translation
Writer’s
Cultural
Milieu
Reader’s
Cultural
Milieu
Audience
Exegete
is
Addressing
Postmodern Bible Interpretation: Reader Gives Meaning
Meaning
14. 2019 1994 2017 1949 2018 2021
1949 2014 1978 1987 1958 1918 1970
1917
Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
17. Give her a Hoover
and you give her the Best!
(Hoover Magazine Ad, 1937)
18. Critical Theory
Defined
A “critical” theory is a method of inquiry that seeks human
emancipation from slavery, liberation from oppression, and
works to create a world which satisfies the needs and self-
determination of individuals. This approach has been applied
to many disciplines such as social science, literary theory,
legal theory, theories of education, and most recently race
relations.
“Critical Theory”. 2005. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/critical-theory/
19. “The history of all…society is the
history of class struggles”
Karl Marx (1818–1883)
(Marx, Karl.1848/1913. Manifesto. p. 5)
20. • Theory of Psychoanalysis
• All text emerges from subconscious
• All text contains implicit bias
• We can deconstruct the text to
explode the bias
Sigmund Freud (1856–1939)
Whitebook, Joel. 2006. “The Marriage of Marx and Freud” Cambridge Companions.
21. Max Horkheimer
• Brought together: Freud, Marx,
literary theory, and philosophy
of education.
• Traditional & Critical Theory
(Horkheimer,1937)
1895—1973
22. Traditional Theory vs. Critical Theory
Traditional Inquiry:
“is content to describe existing social institutions more or less
as they are”
Critical theory:
Seeks to expose the social institutions’ false claims to
legitimacy, reveal their methods of oppression, and promote
truth and justice for those who are oppressed.
Max Horkheimer (1895—1973)
(Horkheimer, 1937/1972, p. 188)
23. • Response to WWI
• Response to upheavals in Germany
• Marriage of Marx, Hegel, and Freud
• German Marxism 1920s
• Shut down in 1933
• Continued at Columbia University
Frankfurt School (1918 - 1933)
24. Critical Theory
Premises
1. Oppressed v. Oppressor
2. Oppressors oppress through power
3. Oppressed conditioned to accept their oppressed status
4. First goal: Expose the structures of oppression
5. Second goal: Gain knowledge about the oppressed
6. Third goal: Dismantle the structures of oppression
Shenvi, Neil. 2019. “Critical Theory”. New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary
25. Critical Race Theory
Premises
1. Oppressed v. Oppressor
2. Majority races oppress through power structures in society
3. Minority races taught to accept subordinate social status
4. First goal: Expose the social power structures
5. Second goal: Understand their mechanisms
6. Third goal: Dismantle oppressive power structures
Shenvi, Neil. 2019. “Critical Theory”. New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary
27. Critical Literary Theory
1. Oppressed v. Oppressor
2. Oppressors maintain power through language
3. Oppressed have untold stories
4. First goal: Expose the language of oppression in the text
5. Second goal: Discover how the language led to oppression
6. Third goal: Deconstruct and revise the text
Shenvi, Neil. 2019. “Critical Theory”. New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary
29. Critical Bible Hermeneutics
Critical Interpretation
The Bible needs to be liberated from its captivity to one-sided white,
middle-class, male interpretation. It needs liberation from privatized
and spiritualized interpretations that avoid God’s concern for justice,
human wholeness, and ecological responsibility; It needs liberation
from abstract, doctrinal interpretations that remove the biblical
narrative from its concrete social and political context in order to
change it into timeless truths
Russell, Letty. 1974. “Introduction”. Feminist Interpretation of the Bible. Westminster Press, p. 12.
30. Model of Bible Interpretation
Text Reader
Writer Language Translation
Copyist
Errors
Writer’s
Cultural
Milieu
Reader’s
Cultural
Milieu
Evangelical Hermeneutics: Meaning is in the Text
Meaning
God
31. Text Reader
Writer Language Translation
Copyist
Errors
Modern
Audience
Audience
Exegete
is
Addressing
Critical Literary Theory: Expose Oppresser
Find the oppressed
Meaning
Women, homosexuals, slaves, racial minorities, immigrants, impoverished
Oppressor
32. Critical Bible Hermeneutics
Critical Interpretation
The Bible needs to be liberated from its captivity to one-sided white,
middle-class, male interpretation. It needs liberation from privatized
and spiritualized interpretations that avoid God’s concern for justice,
human wholeness, and ecological responsibility; It needs liberation
from abstract, doctrinal interpretations that remove the biblical
narrative from its concrete social and political context in order to
change it into timeless truths
Russell, Letty. 1974. “Introduction”. Feminist Interpretation of the Bible. Westminster Press, p. 12.
33. Critical Bible Hermeneutics
Queer hermeneutics
Then Jonathan made a covenant with David,
because he loved him as his own soul. And
Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was on
him and gave it to David, (1 Samuel 18:3–4 ESV)
34. Critical Bible Hermeneutics
Example
When two men come from a society that for 200 years had lived
in the shadow of Philistine culture which accepted
homosexuality…and one of them is the social superior of the
other, [and] the two meet secretly and kiss each other…we have
reason to believe that a homosexual relationship existed.
Horner, Tom. 1978. Jonathan Loved David. Philadelphia: Westminster Press. 27-28.
35. Critical Bible Hermeneutics
Example
• Oppressor: Ancient Israel’s society
• Oppressed: Jonathan, David, and the Philistines
• Oppressive structure: Biblical editor
• Goal: Expose oppression of homosexuals in the Bible
Horner, Tom. 1978. Jonathan Loved David. Philadelphia: Westminster Press. 27-28.
36. What are the weaknesses in
Critical Social Worldview?
38. Critical Worldview vs. Christian Worldview
• Critical Narrative
• Identities: Oppressed/Oppressor
• Objective: expose oppression
• Goal: Human self-determination
• End: There will always be
oppressors and oppressed
• Biblical Narrative
• Imago Dei, Sinful, Redeemed
• Objective: Reconciliation with God
• Goal: Glorify God & Enjoy Him forever
• End: Reign of God