CW HOMI 820 Book Critique Assignment
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Dec 6, 2023
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HOMI 810
LIBERTY UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF DIVINITY
Book Critique Assignment
Submitted to Dr. Dwayne Milioni
in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the completion of
HOMI820_B01_202230
Expository Preaching and Teaching and the Old Testament
by
Clarence Wilson, Jr.
May 22, 2022
HOMI 810
Introduction
This paper will focus on my thoughts on John Barton’s book Reading the Old Testament. Author John Barton is a biblical scholar and also a serving priest in the Church of England for the past forty-nine years. He was a professor at the University of Oxford and also Oriel College, both of where he taught Old Testament Theology. He has published articles in many areas, including Old Testament theology, Old Testament prophets, biblical interpretation and the biblical cannon in general. Summary Statement
As for the thesis on the book, Dr. Barton posits that much harm has been done by those in biblical studies who contend that there is truly a “correct” and “precise” method that can completely unlock the mysteries of an associated text. In looking at how the Old Testament should be studied, the author concludes that there is no set and proper way to read the Old Testament, but rather the strategy should be to read inductively and in a way that criticism and questions are welcome. Barton backs this claim by offering the study of Old Testament texts in a way that one will become competent as critical questions regarding the texts are answered as the reader goes further along in the book or the chapter. Competence, per the author, is completely different from proficiency at something, as competence in not about how good one is at reading a particular text or passage, but rather how one can apply the text in terms of its meaning, to everyday situations. In terms of literary competence, Barton posited that if a person could decipher
HOMI 810
the meaning of a sentence from a text, they he should also be able to garner meaning from an entire passage. The author states that the various methods of literary criticism differ across the levels of biblical competency on the part of the readers (p.5). Barton writes:
“My suggestion is that we can begin to understand all the methods Old Testament scholarship has been using and discover how they are related to
each other, if we ask in each case what their proponents are reading the Old Testament and its component books.” (p. 199)
Barton uses a three-step evaluation process which to evaluate literary criticism. The first step involves surveying the methods that are currently used in studying the Old Testament in order to understand how they are interconnected and what their end goals will be (p. 198). Secondly, Barton looks at Old Testament criticism versus the vast range of literary criticism. Lastly, he sets up an argument against pursuing the proper methods in biblical criticism.
Current Old Testament Methods of Criticism
From the onset of the book, Dr. Barton claimed that the Old Testament methods of
source, form and redaction are his “go to” for Old Testament critical methods. However, he goes into detail regarding the newer methods of canon criticism and biblical structuralism as well. In looking at source criticism, Barton proclaimed the relationship between source analysis and issues with genre-recognition are interrelated (p. 25). I tend to agree with Barton on this because critics in this area may not have adequately evaluated the criteria and quality of their sources. For instance, in Josephus’ time, there may have not been much debate over whether a text was fully accepted or not because of the amount of time it took to mesh books to form the Pentateuch. Barton stated that
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HOMI 810
Form criticism was the catalyst for genre in the Old Testament (p. 31).
In my opinion, Dr. Barton should have elaborated more on a few matters related to form criticism. Firstly, he did not sufficiently explain the concept of literary competence and how it ties into the more oral genres in Scripture. Bibliography