Reception in the Renaissance and Reformation

The retrieval of patristic exegesis made great strides during the revival of Renaissance humanism and the spread of European Reformations. While devotion to the recovery of the early Church writings was primarily an intellectual movement, it was shaped and motivated by distinct social, political, religious, and philosophical developments of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Europe. Humanists appreciated ancient Christian writings because they sought to combine piety with eloquence, which would reinvigorate religion for educated laity. When humanists, such as LeFèvre and Erasmus, offered their translations and interpretation of Scripture and the church fathers, others responded with their own interpretations from Lutheran, Calvinist, Swiss Reformed, Anabaptist, English, or Catholic perspectives. Although the development of confessionalization shaped the integration of Renaissance patristic scholarship, the patristic reception of Protestants and Catholics portrayed both respect and criticism of ancient exegetes because they struggled to define their theological positions among a plurality of interpretations.

Divine Discourse

This chapter focuses on the relationship of the Word of God inscribed in Scripture and Word of God incarnate in Christ, both being expressions of God’s revelation and constitutive of the divine oikonomia, and both involving God’s self-accommodation to creaturely limitations. The development of the Christological meaning of Scripture as a whole is traced from second-century debates about the continuing validity of the Jewish Scriptures to the holistic reading of Scripture in the light of the Rule of Faith, and from allegorical reading to the search for Scripture’s dianoia. Thus it becomes clear that God’s entire purpose and strategy is revealed in Scripture’s testimony to Christ.

Sermon on the Mount

This chapter discusses the three main things the early Christian writers found in Matthew 5–7. Those were, first, the Beatitudes with promises of spiritual goods made to what was considered to be a small group of special people, but with the application in city preachers to lay people gaining the goods of peace and order and much more in the life to come. Second, prayer, particularly the Lord’s Prayer with its eschatological orientation still very strong in the interpretations, along with trust in divine providence. Third, the Christian virtues and the nature of the relationship between the Testaments, as illustrated by Jesus’ ‘antitheses’: ‘But I say unto you …’ where there is a marked dialectic between penitential realism and inspiring idealism. The range of interpretations is diverse without being conflicting.

Scripture and Asceticism

This chapter surveys some interpretative techniques employed by early Christian writers to encourage ascetic renunciation, especially renunciation of marriage and reproduction. These authors, gearing their messages to different audiences, sought to mine passages from both the Old Testament and the New to advance their cause. By use of different exegetical techniques (e.g. intertextual exegesis; appeal to ‘the difference in times’; ‘close reading’), they wrested ascetic meaning from often-recalcitrant scriptural passages. The chapter concludes with some examples of ascetic exegesis from Syrian authors.

Scripture in the Christological Controversies

After its introduction on believing in Christ in accordance with Scripture, this chapter begins its treatment of biblical interpretation in the Christological controversies with methodological matters at stake in assessing early Christianity’s journey from biblical questions to scholastic answers. It then examines the era of the ancient ecumenical councils and select theologians of those times in their increasingly developed Christological scholasticism, with special attention to Christ’s suffering in their treatments of offering rules for reading Scripture rightly. Most influential is Cyril of Alexandria, whose exegetical arguments opposed Nestorius’ rejection of the Marian title Theotokos, a term symbolizing an exegetical method that seemed to Nestorius to insult God’s impassibility and that needed further clarification. It concludes by returning from John of Damascus’ intricate rules for biblical interpretation on Christ, after centuries of scholastic development, to the biblical questions that generated early Christian responses and continue to generate answers today.

Christians and Pagans

Before pagan philosophers such as Celsus became interested in Christianity, few pagan authors apparently read any of the Septuagint, if the existent evidence is reliable. Lucian of Samosata was aware of Christian traditions and texts, but probably had not read any of the New Testament. His accusation that Christianity was not based on careful proof reappeared frequently in the critics who followed him such as Galen and Celsus. Porphyry, considered by the Christians to be their most dangerous critic, wrote a denunciation of their faith that still reverberates in biblical studies. Hierocles admired Apollonius of Tyana but not Jesus. Julian, called the Apostate, had read much of the LXX and NT and attacked Christian texts using literary and philosophical methods. Macarius’ anonymous pagan philosopher read the NT closely, but his criticisms were not profound.

Christianity and Judaism

This chapter examines the ancient evidence for interaction between Jews and Christians on the Bible. It begins by noting how the motivation behind the investigation of this subject has changed over the past century. Questions relating to sources and problems of method are then addressed. An examination of the evidence follows. Initially an attempt is made to show how Christians in particular were influenced by Jewish interpretative traditions, Bible versions, and canon. Such evidence might be taken to imply contact between Jews and Christians but this is difficult to show. In fact there are very few references to such contact in the relevant literature and what evidence does exist is difficult to interpret. Relevant Christian texts, often of a polemical kind, are generally too repetitive and formulaic to prove contact; and the Jewish evidence is at best minimal, in spite of the efforts of some to show that on occasion exegetical traditions in rabbinic sources could be taken to imply opposition to alternative Christian interpretations. Instinctively, however, a reading of a work like John Chrysostom’s Sermons against the Judaizing Christians makes us think that interest in Jewish understandings of the Bible amongst Christians must have persisted, even if there is perhaps less evidence of such interest on the part of Jews.

Christian Apocrypha

This chapter focuses on the production of early Christian apocryphal writings as an act of biblical interpretation. Particular attention is given to the ‘parabiblical’ nature of many such writings—that is, the ways in which these texts often reflect parallel development of traditions that came to be included in the biblical canon. Many early Gospel traditions and Pauline apocrypha preserve independent, even rival versions of the earliest Christian traditions. For the historian, these texts frequently share equal importance with the canonical traditions in the effort to understand the earliest formation of the Christian biblical traditions. Other early Christian apocrypha relate to the canon in a more supplementary fashion. These serve to fill major gaps in the New Testament tradition, some having a more direct connection to the canonical texts than others.

Catenae

The term catena (Latin for ‘chain’) refers to an edited collection of excerpts from traditional exegetical authorities. Such collections are evidenced in various fields and forms in Late Antiquity, but the production of biblical catenae was an enduring and distinctive practice of Byzantine exegesis from the sixth to the sixteenth centuries. Procopius of Gaza (c.460/70–c.530/538) occupies a significant, if disputed, place in the history of catenae, as his ‘epitomes’ provide the earliest chronologically secure point for the production, use, and transmission of collected excerpts. Outside of Procopius’ academy in Gaza, catenae proliferated in diverse centres in Syria-Palestine in the sixth to eighth centuries until the centre of production shifted to Constantinople in the aftermath of the Arab conquest. Catenae can be studied either as a genre of biblical commentary or as an exegetical technology that performed distinct functions within Byzantine schools, monasteries, and churches. This chapter focuses on the latter approach to identify practices and institutions that supported the use of these collections, calling attention to the role of catenae in reinforcing the limits of exegetical diversity in the Orthodox Church.

Paraphrase and Metaphrase

This chapter explores paraphrase as a common tool for early Christian exegesis. The first section discusses the definition of paraphrase, its parameters in Antiquity, and its broader use in classical literature and education. The second section looks in more detail at prose paraphrase of Scripture, including discussion of a striking instance of exegetical paraphrase in Greek by Gregory of Nyssa and one in Latin by the orator Gaius Marius Victorinus. The third section deals with verse paraphrase of Scripture, with reference to poets such as Juvencus and Nonnus of Panopolis, as well as the Late Antique hexameter paraphrase of the Psalms in Antiquity attributed to Apollinaris of Laodicea.