Symposia: Dialogues Concerning the History of Biblical Interpretation

By bringing the key people in the history of biblical studies to life in a series of short stories, this book provides an alternative introduction to and engagement with Hebrew Bible studies. It seeks to explain, contextualise and critique key moments in the history of these studies. However, in contrast to the usual dry textbook, it does so by means of an approach that will engage, entertain and hopefully excite students over against the usual dry textbook. The model for the stories is the ancient Greek idea of the symposium, a sitting down together for the purpose of drinking. In Platos writings, the symposium becomes a genre of writing with Socrates at its centre, a character who perpetually questions in order to develop the pursuit of knowledge. This is the model I follow in this book, where some of the main figures of biblical studies become the central characters in the stories. Here we find people such as Julius Wellhausen, Hermann Gunkel, Martin noth, Brevard Childs, Norman Gottwald, Phyllis Trible and the Bible and Culture Collective engaged in various discussions with a range of other characters who seek to bring out the essential arguments, contexts, contributions and problems of their innovations in biblical studies.

Roland Boer is Senior Logan Research Fellow in the Centre for Studies in Religion and Theology at Monash University, Australia.