The Old Testament and Christian Spirituality - International Voices in ...

130 The Old Testament and Christian Spirituality
There is no simple correlation between faith in the Bible and
modern faith, nor even a one-to-one match between some of the
diversity of spiritualities we encounter in the Bible and some of the
diversity of spiritualities we encounter among believers. The
complexity and historical situatedness of all these expressions of
faith preclude the drawing of simplistic connections. It is for
precisely these reasons that the ways in which post-biblical (i.e,
after the time of the Bible, including our time) spiritualities employ
the Bible forms a legitimate and important study field within
Biblical Spirituality, most probably drawing heavily also on social
sciences such as Sociology, Anthropology, and Communication
Studies. Christian faith lived is the Bible interpreted. How this
interpretation is effected affects Biblical Spirituality.
9. The Last(ing) Word
“[S]pirituality is not a method of literary analysis but of
appropriation,” 55 that is, a “response to the Word of God.” 56
However, this�rb'D' includes not only the oral word, but also actions
and occurrences through which God “speaks.” In the preceding
pages, four attempts at describing this process have been
discussed. This has led me to identify four aspects as the tentative
outlines of a possible working model for the discipline of Biblical
Spirituality:
• The Bible itself is a focal point of spirituality;
• The relationship of history and faith;
• The spiritualities we find reflected in the Bible; and
• The way in which latter-day spiritualities draw on the
Bible.
55 Sheriffs, The Friendship of the Lord, 4.
56 Craghan, Love and Thunder, 1.