04-2 Hermeneutics.pdf

LOGIA ForumSHORT STUDIES AND COMMENTARYArticles found in LOGIA Forum may be reprinted freely for study and dialoguein congregations and conferences with the understanding that appropriatebibliographical references are made. Initialed pieces are written bycontributing editors whose names are noted on our masthead. Brief articlesmay be submitted for consideration by sending them to LOGIA Forum,707 N. Eighth St., Vincennes, IN 47591–3111. When possible, please provideyour work on a 3.5-inch Windows/DOS compatible diskette. Because of thelarge number of unsolicited materials received, we regret that we cannotpublish them all or notify authors in advance of their publication. SinceLOGIA is “a free conference in print,” readers should understand that viewsexpressed here are the sole responsibility of the authors and do not necessarilyreflect the positions of the editors.THE WORD MADE FLESH“This should be the Christian’s only skill, to learn Christ aright,”Luther said (WA 45:511, 4). This was Ian D. Kingston Siggins’sobject in his work Martin Luther’s Doctrine of Christ, published in1970 by Yale University Press. Here we include the opening paragraph(broken into two for our format) from his initial chapter.St. John, Martin Luther says, is not a Platonist; he is an evangelist(WA 10I//1:227, 18). Luther is scornful of lofty interpretationsof the Johannine Prologue borrowed from Neoplatonicphilosophy: “St. Augustine says that this Word is an image of allcreation and like a bed chamber is full of such images, which arecalled ‘Ideas,’ according to which each creature was made, everyone after its image . . . But this seems unintelligible, obscure, andfarfetched to me, a forced interpretation of this passage; for Johnspeaks quite simply and straightforwardly, with no desire to leadus into such fine and subtle reflections” (WA 10/I/1:196, 6).To avoid such speculation is a thorough-going intentionwith Luther—to such an extent that he abandons the long-standingpractice of making “the Logos” the subject of christologicalstatements. Indeed, he rarely uses “the Word” as a christologicaltitle outside his expositions of the Prologue and Genesis 1. Needlessto say, the doctrine of the written and spoken Word of God ispivotal for Luther, but he does not systematically connect thisdoctrine with “Christ, the living Word of God” (WA 25:62, 36).There is a very great difference, he argues, between the Wordincarnate, that “inner, eternal Word” Who is God substantially,and the external Word, which is God effectively, not substantially71(WA Tr 4, 695:5177; cf. 25:257, 20). The theme “Christ the Word”is therefore infrequent, but where the biblical text does warrantit, Luther’s exposition is fresh, imaginative, and vivid.STRAW EPISTLE ORHERMENEUTICAL HAY?On the Thursday of Pentecost 16, 1994, those congregated in theChapel of Sts. Timothy and Titus at Concordia Seminary, St. Louis,heard this homily on James 1:17–27 preached by The Reverend Dr.Norman Nagel. The assigned text for chapel services has often followedthe previous Sunday’s pericopes as prescribed by the three-yearcycle of readings for the church year, one day focusing on the Psalm,another on the Old Testament lesson, another on the Epistle, and soon. This appears to be the case in the following sermon.It is no secret that Dr. Luther did have some difficulty withJames, and here we are for three Thursdays faced with James. Itwould be four were it not for the protection afforded us bySt. Michael and All Angels. We could recall that the three-year lectionarywas basically constructed in Rome. The traditional lectionaryhad James only twice. Yet one way or another we are stuckwith James. Dr. Luther did not throw it out; he could not in anycase tell the Lord what he may not do or say, even if that does notfit in with what we figure he ought to do or say. Like it or lump it,he does do and does say what he does do and does say, and there itis. Dr. Franzmann did not dodge the challenge, and he did notwaste time finding excuses for Dr. Luther or St. James. He studiedthe text. There it is. Let’s listen. “Quick to hear [Jas 1:19].” If someonesays “Don’t read verses 23 and 24,” they then are, of course, thevery ones we surely want to know all about. What’s this businesswith the mirror?As heirs to the Western tradition, we are tempted right off tomake some observations about mirrors and let that control whatthe text is saying. That is the way to all sorts of allegorizing nonsense,and that would be a departure from James so gloriouslyconcrete, so gloriously Sermon-on-the-Mount-ish. In the way hethinks and says things, in his Gedankenwelt, the use of such a pictureor simile is controlled by what that picture or simile is there toserve, to make clearer. When Dr. Luther saw that, we were well on