Comments on: Hermeneutic of Love & Psychotherapy: Unlikely Friends http://www.ntwrightproject.com/2008/10/03/hermeneutic-of-love-psychotherapy-unlikely-friends/ A Collaborative Study on the Work of Tom Wright Sun, 05 Feb 2012 09:35:04 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.2 By: peregrinatio » Kapstadt und eine christliche Postmoderne http://www.ntwrightproject.com/2008/10/03/hermeneutic-of-love-psychotherapy-unlikely-friends/#comment-58715 peregrinatio » Kapstadt und eine christliche Postmoderne Thu, 02 Jun 2011 12:28:47 +0000 http://www.ntwrightproject.com/?p=72#comment-58715 [...] Licht unter den Scheffel zu stellen. Insofern wäre Capetown 2010 mit seiner Tendenz zu einer Hermeneutik der Liebe und deren Praxis vielleicht tatsächlich ein Schritt in eine christliche Postmoderne. Kapstadt [...] [...] Licht unter den Scheffel zu stellen. Insofern wäre Capetown 2010 mit seiner Tendenz zu einer Hermeneutik der Liebe und deren Praxis vielleicht tatsächlich ein Schritt in eine christliche Postmoderne. Kapstadt [...]

]]> By: Andrew http://www.ntwrightproject.com/2008/10/03/hermeneutic-of-love-psychotherapy-unlikely-friends/#comment-7 Andrew Sat, 04 Oct 2008 20:37:17 +0000 http://www.ntwrightproject.com/?p=72#comment-7 Great post! I think you draw a key distinction between a hermeneutic of love and one of suspicion. It is important to be critical of our methods of reading, and yet at the same time attentive to the claims and stories composed in Scripture. But what does attentiveness require? the answer, in part, I would argue, is vulnerability. In a hermeneutic of love, I think that vulnerability is extremely important. One must be open to having Scripture transform, and sometimes shatter, our previous understandings of ourselves, our world, how interact with one another and so on. This vulnerability is often missing when we engage Scripture and other individuals' understanding of it. More often, what we are doing is not listening, but rather reshuffling opinions that we already hold about the text, how it should function in the lives of Christians, etc. The perennial - and perhaps even a central - task of interpreting the text in love is to maintain a posture of vulnerability when studying Scripture. I don't however, want to throw out a hermeneutic of suspicion. Here, we have to draw a delicate distinction between approaching Scripture with trust and particular interpretations of Scripture with an element of suspicion. When I hear interpretations of Scripture that pretend to be universal, I get suspicious. And yet it is this suspicion that compels me to listen more closely, always being open to the possibility of having prematurely - and wrongly judged - this or that reader of Scripture . Great post! I think you draw a key distinction between a hermeneutic of love and one of suspicion. It is important to be critical of our methods of reading, and yet at the same time attentive to the claims and stories composed in Scripture. But what does attentiveness require? the answer, in part, I would argue, is vulnerability. In a hermeneutic of love, I think that vulnerability is extremely important. One must be open to having Scripture transform, and sometimes shatter, our previous understandings of ourselves, our world, how interact with one another and so on. This vulnerability is often missing when we engage Scripture and other individuals’ understanding of it. More often, what we are doing is not listening, but rather reshuffling opinions that we already hold about the text, how it should function in the lives of Christians, etc. The perennial - and perhaps even a central - task of interpreting the text in love is to maintain a posture of vulnerability when studying Scripture.

I don’t however, want to throw out a hermeneutic of suspicion. Here, we have to draw a delicate distinction between approaching Scripture with trust and particular interpretations of Scripture with an element of suspicion. When I hear interpretations of Scripture that pretend to be universal, I get suspicious. And yet it is this suspicion that compels me to listen more closely, always being open to the possibility of having prematurely - and wrongly judged - this or that reader of Scripture .

]]> By: laura http://www.ntwrightproject.com/2008/10/03/hermeneutic-of-love-psychotherapy-unlikely-friends/#comment-6 laura Sat, 04 Oct 2008 17:01:27 +0000 http://www.ntwrightproject.com/?p=72#comment-6 I love what you have drawn out here. I very much enjoy listening to others, especially my friends and family, and I have become practiced at giving them my full attention, though it definitely can be work to not allow distractions to disrupt my focus. But rarely do I approach Scripture (or any book I'm reading- Wright included!) with the same intensity of listening focus. I don't know what it is about the written medium which makes this so much more difficult, perhaps because we have no one on the other side of the table from us holding us physically accountable for how well we've been listening! I love what you have drawn out here. I very much enjoy listening to others, especially my friends and family, and I have become practiced at giving them my full attention, though it definitely can be work to not allow distractions to disrupt my focus. But rarely do I approach Scripture (or any book I’m reading- Wright included!) with the same intensity of listening focus. I don’t know what it is about the written medium which makes this so much more difficult, perhaps because we have no one on the other side of the table from us holding us physically accountable for how well we’ve been listening!

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