Journal: Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society
Volume: JETS 49:4 (Dec 2006)
Article: Enslaved To Slavery: An Application Of A Sociological Method To The Complaint Motif
Author: Timothy M. Pierce

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JETS 49:4 (December 2006) p. 673

Enslaved To Slavery:
An Application Of A Sociological Method To The Complaint Motif

Timothy M. Pierce*

I. Introduction

The question of which interpretative methods are appropriate for use by evangelicals and which are not has long been a debate of some substance within scholarly societies. Whether the discussion involves approaches usually identified as higher criticism or simply the use of allegory (however denned), the evangelical, perhaps more than most, struggles to maintain a sense of balance between supernaturalism and humanism.1 Unlike the radical critic, the evangelical cannot simply relegate the Bible to being merely an ancient text that is subject to our perusal and scientific examination of its content. On the other hand, neither can we allow the text to belong solely to the realm of the mystic who claims that understanding is only available to the “initiated”—a path chosen by cults, sects, and to some degree groups that deny the priesthood of believers. Despite the difficulty, if we accept the biblical precepts that Scripture is both inspired by God and a communication to man, this is the road we must walk.

The narrow path between recognizing that the Scriptures are God’s word and acknowledging that reason and observation play a role in how a person understands his word is one that has been debated for centuries. Each community of faith, whether it is as small as a local church or as broad as a category such as evangelicals has a lens through which the process of hermeneutics is viewed. Indeed, this issue in particular is what separates one group from another. Because of the breadth of areas that grow out of the topic of biblical interpretation and its dependency on both worldview and reason, evaluation and testing of various methodologies are issues that must continually be revisited if a group is going to maintain both its relevance and its identity. Sometimes this process of evaluation takes place in a formal setting, but more often than not a method is accepted or rejected solely on the basis of one’s comfort level with it.

* Timothy M. Pierce is assistant professor of Old Testament at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, P.O. Box 22176, Fort Worth, TX 76122–9176.

JETS 49:4 (December 2006) p. 674

1. Evangelicals and sociological methodologies. One of the methods that has not received any formal censure but that has nonetheless been understood to be taboo is the sociological method of interpretation. Excepting the broadest definitions of the method that look at the society of Israel from a historical, almost forensic, viewpoint, this technique has had few proponents in the evangelical world.

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