Friday 27 November 2015

Hearing God in Scripture

South African Anglican priest Craig Bartholomew, who directs the St. George's Centre for Biblical and Public Theology (Burlington) and is H. Evan Runner professor of philosophy at Redeemer University College, has produced an important new book, Introducing Biblical Hermeneutics, A Comprehensive Framework for Hearing God in Scripture (Baker Academic, 2015, xiv-623).

Bartholomew spent a year at ICS in the mid-90s before he went on to achieve his Ph.D. at the University of Bristol (1997), United Kingdom. He has written numerous other books and articles.

This new book is incredibly rich in scholarship, teeming with apt comments by Augustine, Barth, Bavinck, Bonhoeffer, George Steiner, Gadamer, Habermas, Newbigin, Henri Nouwen, Magrassi and countless others, but the insights are digested and presented conversationally. The truly encyclopedic character of this “Introduction” is subordinated to its key point: biblical hermeneutic scholarly studies should be enveloped in the prayerful reading of the Bible.

Bartholomew challenges theologians and academic analytic interpreters of the Holy Scriptures to ground their work within the simple act of listening to God speak in Scripture and then, first of all, responding on their knees, as it were, while expositing the text. His book is dedicated to Cal and Ines Seerveld.

Craig Bartholomew
Cal Seerveld