Daniel Streett posted the following based on a discussion on B-Greek in which I was involved:
Exegesis vs. Reading? Or, How to Dismantle an Atomistic Bomb
In my own experience, I had come to seminary with a Masters in Classics (ancient Greek and Latin literature). Classics majors at the undergraduate level simply improve their skills at Greek and Latin, but with some attention to the broader meaning of the text, in other words, the literary value of the text. Graduate work is largely training in literary criticism focusing on the original language texts (and this would be the same for someone studying French or Russian or Spanish literature at that level). I learned to look for thematic connections and particularly to understand the individual pieces in the light of the whole and how the individual pieces contribute to understanding the whole (sort of the forest for the trees and how one tree or set of trees help make up the forest). For example, I wrote a paper for my Homer seminar course in which I examined “threshold imagery” in the Odyssey, and one conclusion was that from the consistent use of the imagery throughout the Odyssey one could posit a single author/redactor of the text. That’s a simple (and debatable!) example but it does illustrate the kind of thing done in the field.
Now, I expected more of the same when I went to seminary (and I went to a very academic seminary), but instead was introduced to the wonderful world of exegesis. It was like learning a new language in itself, the sort of thing that Daniel is talking about in his blog post. Now, to their credit I had professors who realized that this kind of focused exegesis (to use a slightly more neutral term than atomistic) was far from the whole story, and really made efforts to communicate that the student needed to see the local passage contextually and co-textually. They were working to help cure the problem that Daniel so well articulates, but that involved doing and discussing exegesis as it is normally used in NT studies. This experience confirms to me the peculiar and insular nature of biblical exegesis as a discipline. I agree wholeheartedly that the cure is to have true mastery of the original language…
