Introductory notes for readers of this thesis - Theses - Flinders ...

Personal reading of scripture as a discipline of spiritual formationRahner’s brief essay, ‘Reading the Bible’ 68 , demonstrates his view of the importance ofthe personal reading of scripture to the spiritual formation of the everyday believer. Inthis essay, Rahner discusses the many and varied nuances of personal experiences andpreferences in the way Christians read scripture, the nature of the relationship betweendivine and human authorship, the spiritual essence of Bible reading, and its ultimatepurpose.At the beginning of his essay, Rahner asserts that ‘Bible reading belongs necessarily tothe spiritual life’ 69 ; he defends this precept against a hypothetical challenge from someChristian mystics. According to Rahner, that Desert Fathers ‘in their radical renunciation’of the material world ‘actually gave up Holy Scripture’ does not imply that engagementwith scripture is an optional discipline for the everyday believer. Rahner argues that ‘theSpirit of God had so filled them; the whole of Scripture had become so interior to them,that they no longer had need of its words and letters’ 70 , and suggests that when seasonedChristians have lived and breathed spiritual lives dynamically formed through arelationship with scripture for decades, the word becomes a living and integral part oftheir interior being. Having become fully initiated in the spirituality of the HolyScriptures, seasoned Christians may become less dependent on rereading God’s word.Though this position may be considered controversial by those in Christian leadership—particularly within the Protestant tradition—who strongly advocate daily personal Biblereading, it clarifies that Rahner’s interior spirituality must pass through—rather thanbypass—an extended and engaged process of biblical formation.Rahner uses the exceptional nature of the Desert Fathers’ mystical experiences toadvocate that, for everyday Christians, extended regular Bible reading be the norm. Herecognised that Christians with differing intellectual capacities and personality traits willhave different ways of approaching their personal reading of scripture. Some will prefer amore methodical, exegetical approach. At the other end of the spectrum will be those68 K. Rahner, The practice of faith, 85-87.69 Ibid, 85.70 Ibid.145