Carter, A. Craig. Interpreting Scripture with the Great Tradition: Recovering the Genius of Premodern Exegesis. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Academic, 2018. 263pp.

Introduction

Craig A. Carter (Ph.D., University of St. Michael’s College) is a Professor of Theology at Tyndale University College & Seminary in Toronto, Ontario. He also serves part-time as Theologian in Residence at Westney Heights Baptist Church in Ajax, Ontario. He is the author of four books, Politics of the Cross: The Theology and Social Ethics of John Howard Yoder, Rethinking Christ and Culture: A Post-Christendom Perspective, The Faith Once Delivered: An Introduction to the Basics of the Christian Faith, and Interpreting Scripture with the Great Tradition: Recovering the Genius of Premodern Exegesis. He currently has other books in the works, including Contemplating God with the Great Tradition: Recovering Trinitarian Classical Theism. For this book review, we will focus our attention on Carter’s book, Interpreting Scripture with the Great Tradition.

Summary

The purpose of this book is to help reform contemporary biblical hermeneutics. Throughout this work, Carter compares the hermeneutic methodology of interpreters from what he calls the “Great Tradition” to interpreters who have been influenced by the Enlightenment period. The first chapter of the book Who is the Suffering Servant? lays the foundation for his argument—there is a crisis in contemporary hermeneutics. Carter gives his personal experience of attempting to preach Christ from Isaiah 53, but not being able to do so with a clear conscience because of the hermeneutical methodology that he had been taught in seminary. He shows this crisis by observing the gulf between the way the academy does hermeneutics and the way the church does hermeneutics. Then, Carter explains how the problem arose—or how the gulf between the academy and the church became so large. Enlightenment influenced interpreters, and interpreters from the Great Tradition have different metaphysical assumptions. Carter’s purpose is to expose how the metaphysics of enlightenment influenced biblical interpretation and to recover premodern exegesis. He writes: “This book tries to restore the delicate balance between biblical exegesis, trinitarian dogma, and theological metaphysics that was upset by the heretical, one-sided, narrow-minded movement that is misnamed ‘the Enlightenment.’” (26).

In part 1, Carter moves the reader Toward a Theology of Scripture. He presents the doctrine of inspiration by examining both miracle and providence. He then grounds the doctrine of Scripture in the doctrine of God with two doctrines given emphasis: God is transcendent, and God is personal. Next, he establishes the Theological Metaphysics of the Great Tradition. He describes theological metaphysics as the “account of the ontological nature of reality that emerges from the theological descriptions of God and the world found in the Bible.” (63). By examining metaphysics, one can understand the reality of the world and the things in the world. Carter describes the theological metaphysics of the Great Tradition as Christian Platonism. To conclude part 1, Carter considers the History of Biblical Interpretation. Carter critically evaluates Brevard Child’s work, Struggle to Understand Isaiah, while presenting certain exegetical distinguishers of the Great Tradition. After presenting the distinguishers of Great Tradition exegesis, he presents the distinguishers of Modernity. Carter suggests that modern exegesis is an interruption to the Great Tradition’s correct method of interpreting Scripture. He furthermore suggests that the narrative of biblical hermeneutics needs to be revised to consider this rightly.

In part 2, Carter first emphasizes, Reading the Bible as a Unity Centered on Jesus Christ. Using premodern interpreters, he shows that biblical interpretation is a spiritual discipline, the Apostles are our interpretive model, and the Scriptures should be the interpretive basis for interpreting Scripture. Next, he moves the conversation to Letting the Literal Sense Control All Meaning. He uses interpreters from the Great Tradition to show that interpreters should seek the literal sense as the first priority and that sometimes there is a spiritual sense that is a fuller, Christological meaning, that organically grows out of the literal sense. By grounding the spiritual sense to the literal sense, an allegorical “free for all” is eliminated.  Lastly, Carter sets forth prospological exegesis in the chapter titled Seeing and Hearing Christ in the Old Testament. He uses Augustine’s exposition of the Psalter to show how Christ is speaking in certain chapters. Prospological exegesis answers the question of how Christ can speak through the Psalter before His incarnation.

To conclude the book, Carter examines 3 different commentaries on Isaiah 53. He commends Alec Motyer’s exegesis of the passage and shows how it is in the theological stream of the Great Tradition. He furthermore includes a sermon he preached in 2016 from Isaiah 53 to show Jesus Christ as the divine messiah sent by Yahweh to save His people. After presenting the sermon, Carter is able to answer some of the problems of the hermeneutical conundrum he presented in the first chapter. Finally, he critiques articles by Kevin Vanhoozer and D.A. Carson to commend the Great Tradition—and the progress of returning to premodern exegesis.

Critical Evaluation

I was initially skeptical whenever I read the subtitle of this book. Without knowing the problems of Enlightenment influenced interpretation, as presented in this book, I wrongly assumed the author trying to present something novel, quoting from the fathers to prove the novel point. I confess and admit that I was wrong. Carter utilizes several church fathers to show how we should emulate their good interpretive choices that result in a Christological interpretation. Citations from Ambrose helped establish that biblical interpretation is a spiritual discipline—not a naturalistic discipline as understood by Enlightenment influenced interpreters. Citations from Justin Martyr affirmed that we should follow the interpretive model of the Apostles—not ignore their interpretive model. Irenaeus is cited to show how the patristics used the Scriptures to interpret Scripture—instead of limiting the meaning of a passage to human reason. Augustine is quoted to establish a spiritual meaning of a passage that develops from the literal sense. Origen, John Calvin, and Thomas Aquinas are used as examples of interprets who affirmed a sensus plenior. I learned that recovering the hermeneutics of premodern exegetes is good because it leads to a Christological interpretation.

There were two topics within Carter’s book that helped me understand the genius of premodern exegesis. The first is Christian Platonism. Carter describes the theological metaphysics of the Great Tradition as Christian Platonism. He carefully distinguishes between what he calls Christian Platonism and Platonism. Augustine is used as an example to describe some of these differences. Augustine, as a Manichaean, had a materialistic view of God. After reading some books of the Platonists and comparing them to John’s Gospel, Augustine was able to see that God is both a real thing (a being) and not material (spiritual). This was a teaching that Manichaeanism had blinded him to. Platonism allowed Augustine to see that reality has a material realm (earth) and a spiritual realm (heaven). It furthermore allowed him to see that nothing changeable can be the Supreme God and that God is the uncaused cause of all that is not God. Although Platonism helped Augustine, he still recognized its flaws. Platonism could help the Christian understand creation and that an unchanging creator exists. Still, Platonism did not know the truths that come from special revelation, like the incarnation, sin, redemption, etc. Platonism, by itself, is an incomplete philosophy. Christian Platonism affirms the metaphysical truths of Platonism and joins them with the theological account revealed through the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. Christian Platonism differs from Platonism in that it provides the necessary revelation to give proper worship to the one and true Triune God. Understanding the metaphysics of Christian Platonism helps me understand how some interpreters in the Great Tradition were able to perceive Christ through special revelation and metaphysical truths. Chapter 3, in my estimation, was the hardest to read, but it was also the most helpful.

The other topic addressed at length that helped me understand the genius of premodern exegesis was Letting the Literal Sense Control all the Meaning. Before reading this book and taking this course, I understood that all scripture is inspired by God and that all scripture points to Christ. I didn’t rightly understand how Christ could be preached from the Old Testament without over spiritualizing a passage. This chapter helped solve that issue. As previously mentioned, Carter cites interpreters from the Great Tradition (Augustine, Origen, Calvin, and Aquinas) to show how premodern interpreters developed a sensus plenior—or a spiritual meaning—or a deeper Christological meaning—that develops organically out of the literal or plain sense of a passage. Learning the premodern exegetical hermeneutic of interpreters from the Great Tradition has helped me understand how to preach Christ from all of Scripture without hermeneutical conundrums.

Carter quotes many people within this work to help us understand where he stands compared to others in this field. In chapter 1, under the subheading, Can This Gulf Be Overcome? Promising Developments in Recent Scholarship, he commends many authors like Michael Allen, Scott Swain, Geerhardus Vos, Brevard Childs, James Hamilton, Thomas Schreiner, and John Webster. Throughout the work, he also cites people whom he disagrees with, particularly because of their Enlightenment influenced thinking. Some of these include Friedrich Schleiermacher, Immanuel Kant, Baruch Spinoza, John Toland, Matthew Tindal, Herman Samuel Reimarus, and David Friedrich Strauss. Compared to others in this field, Carter stands with those who affirm biblical exegesis, trinitarian dogma, and theological metaphysics. He rejects interpreters who are rationalists, nominalists, materialists, skeptics, relativists. For Carter, modernity has produced faulty interpretations that often do not result in a Christological meaning. Recovering the genius of premodern exegesis helps us recover the interpretive method that leads to a Christological interpretation.

Conclusion

This book fulfills its purpose to establish the hermeneutical principles of the Great Tradition and expose the problem of Enlightenment influenced exegesis. Carter’s book contains the necessary content to help reform contemporary biblical hermeneutics. He is hopeful this will happen. We will see if the Lord Almighty will grant success to this admirable goal. Carter’s book has furthered my knowledge and interest in this field of study, and for that, I am thankful. This work will be helpful to me as I help others in my congregation consider biblical hermeneutics. It will also help me in the future when I need refreshing on this topic.