On Patristic Interpretation

The Tenth Sunday after Trinity

LET thy merciful ears, O Lord, be open to the prayers of thy humble servants; and that they may obtain their petitions make them to ask such things as shall please thee; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Perhaps the most enduring legacy of the Fathers of the Church is their grounding of the fundamental tools of Christian exegesis. Exegesis comes from Greek and means to draw out the meaning of a passage, therefore the means by which the deeper meanings of a particular passage are explained.

In ancient times, the interpretation of Scripture was heavily influenced by the philosophy of the day, which saw the literal or historical sense of a passage as the lowest possible sense of meaning. There was a two-fold reason behind this. First, physical things (and thus literal descriptions of history) were viewed as being far more base or corrupt than spiritual things. The second and related reason for this was the Greek influence. Greek mythology is replete with stories that even the Greeks found somewhat embarrassing. They had developed extremely sophisticated philosophies and overall learning, yet had these narratives of gods acting capriciously, ridiculously and governed by base passions.

In order to explain that, the Greeks interpreted their mythology to explain a deeper spiritual meaning through analogy. This practice was used and expanded upon by the Fathers, who sought to discern the deeper meanings of scripture. For example, in his homilies on Genesis, St John Chrysostom explains the story of Noah’s drunkenness from Gen 9. 18-26 by pointing out that while the moral sense was not to shame our fellow Christians for their sins and faults, but rather to privately exhort them to repent and return to righteousness, in the way that Shem and Japheth cloaked Noah without looking at him, in contrast with Ham.

Over time, there came to be an understanding that every passage had at least three or four possible levels of interpretation. The literal interpretation described the historical sense of the passage and the events it was depicting. The allegorical sense gave the deeper spiritual meaning, that informed us of the nature of God. The Tropological or moral sense described the way in which the passage provides us with instruction on how we, as Christians, are to live our lives. Finally, the Anagogical sense speaks in particular to what our life in the Kingdom of Heaven will look like when we are reunited with Christ. Ss. John Cassian, Augustine of Hippo and Pope Gregory the Great were all Fathers who supported this four-fold interpretation.

To discover these different levels of meanings, the Fathers employed a number of different exegetical techniques. There are no uniformly accepted names for different techniques and different Fathers and Biblical scholars have called the same techniques by different names or used the same word to refer to different techniques. The terms used here may therefore not always line up with the way they are used by other authors.

There were a number of general techniques used that could be applied to most any level of Scripture. These techniques might be used to better understand the literal meaning, the allegorical interpretation, the moral interpretation or anagogical interpretation, and sometimes more than one sense of scripture might be discussed using the same exegetical technique.

The technique of redaction criticism was used to explore the context in which a passage occurs, be it the historical context in which the passage was written or the literary context in which the passage appears within a particular chapter or verse. Analysis of the skopos of a passage was used by many of the fathers in their exegetical homilies. Skopos is Greek for the goal or aim, and the analysis could either be widely or narrowly drawn, focused on the goal of a passage within a verse or chapter, or the skopos of the entire book might be examined to provide that context for the particular passage being examined. These forms of contextual interpretation were among the most widely used and important for setting the tone of interpretation whether it be the literal and historical meaning of the passage or the moral or spiritual sense.

Another of the types of analysis that was applied at multiple levels was a literary analysis. Diction would be examined. Grammar, the use of hyperbole or metaphors would be reviewed. Rhetoric and other elements of style would be used to explore an allegorical interpretation or reinforce the understanding of the context for the literal meaning. Similar to this was the technique of akoloutheia which explored the sequence of arguments in a passage, along with the structure of those arguments, to uncover its meaning.

Another technique used was to use more clearly understandable passages to interpret more obscure or dense passages. Dependent upon the idea that the Holy Scriptures are an inspired, unified and consistent whole, this technique would be used to show how passages can and must be interpreted in the context of all of Scripture together. Similar to this technique was the use of word association in which the Father would look for the use of a particular word in other parts of Scripture and build a link between the passages. In this sense, the Father is not doing a word study where the use of a word is explored in multiple contexts, but rather the specific word is used to build a linked meaning between the two passages in which it is used.

As mentioned, the use of allegory (allegoria) was one of the most popular forms of Scriptural exegesis because it provided a deeper and spiritual meaning. The problem with allegory, however, is that there was no need to justify or link the allegorical interpretation with the original passage. This left allegory wide open to eisegesis, the process of reading in an interpretation to a passage which was not intended. Origen was a champion of this method, and as he would become the head of the School of Alexandria, it would become associated with the allegorical method. In contrast to this, the School of Antioch would promote the use of theoria, a method of allegorical interpretation in which the allegory was more closely linked to the literal meaning of the passage being interpreted.

A number of different subsets of allegorical interpretation existed, that provided for allegorical interpretations hinging on particular points. A prominent form of this was typology (typos) which  would create an analogy showing how a particular Old Testament person or event had prefigured Christ in some way. In number symbolism, numbers mentioned in the Bible are used to provide a mystical or allegorical meaning. Similarly, the Fathers might use philogoy or the etymology of a word as the starting point and basis for an allegorical interpretation of a passage. This was especially used for the names of people and places, perhaps most notably in Origen’s analysis of the place names in the Book of Numbers.

An example of this can be found in St John Chrysostom’s homilies on Genesis 22. In the story of Abraham and the sacrifice of Isaac, Chrysostom explores the history behind what actually happened, and then to provide one level of spiritual interpretation he uses typology, describing how in this passage Abraham is a type of God the Father, while his only son Isaac is a type, prefiguring, Christ. Abraham is willing to sacrifice his only son, and Isaac realises that he is to be sacrificed, and goes willingly.

These types of interpretive techniques helped to open the Scriptures to people around the world, as well as forming the basis of continued exegetical interpretation to this day.

On the Fathers

The Ninth Sunday after Trinity

GRANT to us, Lord, we beseech thee, the spirit to think and do always such things as be rightful; that we, who cannot do any thing that is good without thee, may by thee be enabled to live according to thy will; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Last week discussed the Saints. Among the Saints are a particular group of Christians known as the Fathers of the Church. Father has many uses among Christianity. Most prominently, Christ identified God as the father. In Holy Scripture, however, it was also associated with teachers. St Paul says of himself, “though you have countless guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers. For I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel,” (I Cor 4. 15).

There are other examples in Holy Scripture of the use of the term father, including a seemingly contradictory message often cited by those who oppose the title of Father for priests, St Matthew 23. 9, where Christ says, “call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven.” Given that from the earliest periods of Christianity, the term father remained associated with teachers, the question becomes what did Christ mean there? It does not seem his intention was to have Christians cease from referring to their biological fathers as father, but rather Christ made the statement in the context of chastising the hypocritical Pharisees of his day who afforded themselves grandiose titles. This contrasts with St Paul’s writings where he identifies his authority. He became a Father and teacher through Christ’s gospel. He is not claiming authority, but was given it by God.

The question of authority is essential in understanding the role of Church Fathers. Throughout the early years of Christianity, many challenges to doctrine arose. The Canon of Scripture had not yet been fixed. While the books of what would become the Old Testament were generally understood and fixed because they were simply the Jewish Scriptures, the books of what would become the New Testament were not fully set. Each book was prepared separately and there was not yet a collection of all of the books bound together. Different books which do not form a part of the canon were promoted. Some of these books were entirely orthodox in their Christianity, while others were not. In some cases, challenges to doctrine came even during the apostolic age and were later recorded in the Scriptures when the books of the Bible were actually writen. The Judaisers are an example of this. While accepting, or seeming to accept, some of the truths of Christian teaching, they sought to maintain adherence to the Jewish Law in contradiction of core principles of Christian teaching that Christ had fulfilled the Law and brought freedom from the Law.

After the Apostolic Age, new heresies and challenges crept up. Gnosticism, Marcionism, Arianism and others plagued the early church as much, if not more, than the physical persecution which was occasionally brought about by the Romans. In the mid-2nd century. Marcion of Sinope taught that the Hebrew Scriptures were to be rejected, as he could not reconcile Christ’s teachings on the Kingdom of Heaven and God the Father with the depictions of God in the Jewish Scriptures. His views on Christ himself were also heretical in that he did not view Christ as both fully god and fully man. His teachings were denounced by the Church Father Tertullian. In the same way, in the late 3rd and early 4th century, the bishop Arius proclaimed the inferiority of the Son to the Father, sparking a great controversy within the Christian world. Many different prominent Christians wrote against his views. St Athanasius the Great, St John Chrysostom, St Augustine of Hippo, St Ambrose of Milan; all writing in the 4th and 5th centuries against Arianism and its heresy.

These great saints and teachers did not claim the title Church Father for themselves, but rather the Fathers of the Church we later so-named because their combined teachings formed, and today still form, the foundation of Christian understanding and interpretation of the faith.

Much like how St Paul often uses his epistles to address particular controversies that had arisen in the churches he was writing to, the Fathers would write letters to colleagues or other churches, as many of the Fathers served as bishops. As bishops, one of their primary duties was teaching through Sunday preaching, and many of their writings, rather than being purely theological treatises or even letters, are recordings of homilies they delivered. These homilies may expound on the Scriptures, address issues of the day and explain what our Christian response ought to be. In many ways, the writings of these homilies are no different than the transcripts of homilies you can today find online from current weekly homilies.

The real difference stems from the fact that the Fathers were pioneers. Often the first to reveal particular understandings of Scripture, or make the connection between various Christian doctrines and their practical applications to the daily lives of their congregations. In essence, they went from nothing to forming the theological framework and basis by which we continue today to understand the orthodox interpretation and application of Holy Scripture and Christian doctrine.

When orthodox Christians wanted to understand some matter of Christian theology, they would turn to the writings of the Fathers. When a Christian theologian expounded some new interpretation of Christianity, it would be tested against the writings of the Fathers to determine whether or not it was acceptable.

While many of the Fathers were quite prominent during their day, particularly St John Chrysostom in the East and St Ambrose of Milan in the West, they were not viewed as Fathers in their own day. Just as their canonization as saints took place after their deaths, their status as Fathers of the Church was similarly solidified later. Just as Saints are not sinless in their lives, though the Fathers are viewed as extremely learned, wise and discerning theologians, they do not always agree. Tertullian and Origen are viewed as Church Fathers, but neither were canonized due to certain heresies they promoted. Despite that, Origen in particular was extremely influential and widely read due to the number of books he published in his day. St Augustine of Hippo changed his own views several times over the course of his life, later writing certain treaties to explain where his views had changed from earlier works and why.

In Anglicanism, the Fathers play a traditionally important role in the understanding of theology. In as much as the English Reformation sought to remove superstitious medieval additions to the faith, the Fathers were the standard of authority by which the Reformation sought to return to a traditional and orthodox understanding of Christianity. They provided a standard by which the faith could be measured during that turbulent time, as they do today.

When Anglicans do theology, we test against Scripture, reason embodied in the writings of the Fathers, and tradition, embodied in the Anglican formularies. If you want to test a theological statement, you first test it against Scripture and see if it contradicts the plain meaning of Scripture. Then, you test it against human reason embodied in the writings of the Fathers. Then you test it against the injunctions of the 39 Articles and Book of Common Prayer.

The Fathers were not infallible, nor were they apostolically inspired as the writers of the Bible were, but they certainly were inspired by God in their writings. Their thoughts and understanding continue to prove and inspiration to theologians today, and make their writing an invaluable tool and resource for all Christians.