An Ebook—and So Much More

Discover connections between this resource, others you own, and thousands more with Logos.

Hermeneutics: An Introduction

by Anthony Thiselton

Publisher:

Eerdmans

, 2009

ISBN: 9780802864109

Be the first to rate this.

Digital Logos Edition

Logos Editions are fully connected to your library and Bible study tools.

See Inside

$43.99

Qty:

Overview

Anthony C. Thiselton here brings together his encyclopedic knowledge of hermeneutics and his nearly four decades of teaching on the subject to provide a splendid interdisciplinary textbook. After a thorough historical overview of hermeneutics, Thiselton moves into modern times with extensive analysis of scholarship from the mid-twentieth century, including liberation and feminist theologies, reader-response and reception theory, and postmodernism. No other text on hermeneutics covers the range of writers and subjects discussed in Thiselton’s Hermeneutics.

In the Logos edition, this volume is enhanced by amazing functionality. Important terms link to dictionaries, encyclopedias, and a wealth of other resources in your digital library. Perform powerful searches to find exactly what you’re looking for. Take the discussion with you using tablet and mobile apps. With Logos Bible Software, the most efficient and comprehensive research tools are in one place, so you get the most out of your study.

Get this book and more in the Eerdmans Anthony C. Thiselton Collection (4 vols.).

Key Features

Surveys the history of biblical hermeneutics
Analyzes the development of hermeneutics in the twentieth century
Evaluates the contributions of feminist, liberation, and postmodern theology to hermeneutics

The Aims and Scope of Hermeneutics
Hermeneutics in the Context of Philosophy, Biblical Studies, Literary Theory, and the Social Self
An Example of Hermeneutical Methods: The Parables of Jesus
A Legacy of Perennial Questions from the Ancient World: Judaism and the Ancient Greeks
The New Testament and the Second Century
From the Third to the Thirteenth Centuries
Reform, the Enlightenment, and the Rise of Biblical Criticism
Schleiermacher and Dilthey
Rudolf Bultmann and Demythologizing the New Testament
Some Mid-Twentieth-Century Approaches: Barth, the New Hermeneutics, Structuralism, Post-Structuralism, and Barr’s Semantics
Hans-George Gadamer’s Hermeneutics: The Second Turning Point
The Hermeneutics of Paul Ricoeur
The Hermeneutics of Liberation Theologies and Postcolonial Hermeneutics
Feminist and Womanist Hermeneutics
Reader-Response and Reception Theory
Postmodernism and Hermeneutics
Some Concluding Comments

Top Highlights

“Finally, whereas exegesis and interpretation denote the actual processes of interpreting texts, hermeneutics also includes the second-order discipline of asking critically what exactly we are doing when we read, understand, or apply texts. Hermeneutics explores the conditions and criteria that operate to try to ensure responsible, valid, fruitful, or appropriate interpretation.” (Page 4)

“Hence many writers on hermeneutics distinguish between the two valid dimensions of explanation and understanding. The axis of explanation is more akin to the traditional flow of knowing; understanding entails a more personal, intuitive, or suprarational dimension.” (Page 9)

“Understanding in the fullest sense demands engagement and self-involvement.” (Page 8)

“An allegory therefore presupposes shared understanding; a parable creates shared understanding. There are two further differences. An allegory addresses insiders who are in the know; a parable attacks, or seeks to win over, outsiders. Further, it is crucial that on the whole a parable presents an entirely coherent narrative world; an allegory can contain a string of independent applications.” (Page 38)

“The Parables of the Kingdom he wrote, ‘At its simplest the parable is a metaphor or simile drawn from nature or common life, arresting the hearer by its vividness or strangeness, and leaving the mind in sufficient doubt about its precise application to provoke it into active thought.” (Page 35)

Praise for the Print Edition

Hermeneutics, although now recognized to be indispensable to biblical and theological study, has hitherto lacked an introductory textbook that is simultaneously lucid, comprehensive, and authoritative. This, at last, is it.

—Walter Moberly, professor of theology and religion, Durham University

This is that rare book that is simply a pleasure to read. An ideal textbook, it is provocative, wise, astonishingly informed, and scrupulously evenhanded in its handling of material. Elephants may swim here and children may safely paddle. It is truly Tony Thiselton’s legacy and the uncluttered distillation of a lifetime’s study of hermeneutics. I cannot praise this book sufficiently highly.

—Iain Torrance, president, Princeton Theological Seminary