THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS

by KLAAS RUNIA

INTRODUCTION In this article I shall not deal with the whole doctrine of scripture as we find it in the works of the Reformers, but with their hermeneutics. Naturally, the two subjects are interrelated, but they are not identical. The doctrine of scripture deals with scripture as the Word of God, its inspiration, authority, sufficiency, infallibility, and/or inerrancy, etc. In short, it concentrates on the essence of scripture and its attributes. Hermeneutics deals with the interpretation of scripture. How is it being read and used in the theology of the Reformers? It is obvious that one cannot deal with the latter question without at the same time touching again and again upon the doctrine of scripture. Yet the emphasis is on the hermeneutical question, and the doctrine of scrip­ ture itself will be dealt with only in a secondary way. But what do we mean by "hermeneutics"? In recent years there has been a considerable shift as to the meaning of the term.1 In the past, hermeneutics was that part of theology that tried to formulate the rules of exegesis. Since the Second World War the term has obtained a new meaning. Now it no longer refers primarily to a set of exegetical rules, but rather to the whole process of interpretation itself, by which con­ temporary believers are brought into an understanding relation to the biblical message. It is interesting to note that this new concept of hermeneutics applies very much to the understanding of the Bible by the Reformers them­ selves. Although they most certainly were interested in the rules of exegesis, especially as applied by the medieval quadriga, their deepest concern went far beyond this. Their real concern was hermeneutical in a much wider sense of the term. They were looking for the door that would open the treasure house of scripture and indeed believed that

lSee Carl C. Braaten, History and Hermeneutics: New Directions in Theology Today, vol. 2 (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1956) pp. 130ff. and James M. Robinson and John B. Cobb, Jr., eds., The New Hermeneutic: New Frontiers in Theology, vol. 2 (New York: Harper and Row, 1964), pp. Iff.

121 122 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

they had found a new key. In this article I shall survey the new understanding of scripture that arose as a consequence of the rediscov­ ery of the gospel of justification by grace and by faith alone. This new understanding, however, did not suddenly fall from the sky. The Reformers were in many ways rooted in history and had connections with those who preceded them. Turning points in history always show both continuity and discontinuity. In the flow of history the discontinuity may stand out, but it can be truly understood only if it is seen in the underlying bedding of continuity. I want to point to three important aspects of continuity. (1) In the Middle Ages a great deal of important work in the field of biblical exposition was produced.2 Unfortunately much of this work was marred by the insistence on the fourfold interpretation of scrip­ ture. The so-called quadriga, which can be traced back to John Cassian, dominated both lecture rooms and scholarly publications.3 It was later summarized in the following lines: Litera gesta docet: quid credas allegoria. Moralis quid agis: quo tendas anagogia. (The letter teaches what has been done, the allegory what you are to believe, the moral what you must do, and the anagogy where you are heading.) Yet the awareness that the literal meaning is decisive was never com­ pletely obscured. In his Summa Theologica Thomas Aquinas stated that "all interpretations are based on one, that is the literal form, from which alone we can argue."4 Afterwards Nicholas of Lyra continued this trend and thus paved the way for Luther, as also appears from the jingle: Si Lyra non lyrasset Lutherus non sallasset. (If Lyra had not sung, Luther would not have danced.)5

2See Beryl Smalley, The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1941). 3See A. Kevington Wood, Captive to the Word—Martin Luther: Doctor of Sacred Theology (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1969), p. 79. 4Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, 1,1,10, ad 3. In this respect Thomas was a good pupil of Albert the Great. (See Smalley, Study, p. 299.) 5It should be noted that Luther in his first lectures as professor of biblical exposition still applied the customary fourfold interpretation of scripture. As a matter of fact, in this period he was very critical of Lyra. See W. Kooiman, Luther en de Bijbel (Baarn: Bosch and Keuning, n.d.), p. 28. Luther only gradually freed himself from the allegorical method and returned to the literal meaning of the text. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 123

(2) In the late Middle Ages a tension became visible between the authority of scripture and the authority of the magisterium of the church. While the general opinion was that the magisterium was the authoritative interpreter of scripture, there were also voices maintain­ ing that infallibility in the strictest sense must be ascribed only to the scriptures. One such voice was that of William of Ockham. Naturally, as a child of his time he expected every Christian to accept the doctrine of the church. Yet he also maintained that "what is not contained in the scriptures or cannot with necessity and obvious consistency be de­ duced from the contents of the same, no Christain needs to believe."6 He further maintained that in the (hypothetical) case of a contradiction between scripture and the magisterium the final authority and infalli­ bility belong to scripture.7 This view of scripture also paved the way for Luther,8 although we must not lose sight of the fact that for Ockham and the other nominalists this sola scriptura principle functioned en­ tirely within a judicial, church-political view of both scripture and church.9 (3) In the fourteenth century (in Italy) and in the fifteenth century (in Germany and the rest of Europe) the new humanism gave a fresh impetus to the study of scripture, especially through its emphasis on the study of the original biblical languages, Hebrew and Greek. Three names in particular come to the fore here: Laurentius Valla, Johannes Reuchlin, and Desiderius Erasmus.10 This movement too has been of inestimable value for the Reformation. Without it the work of Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, and the other Reformers would have been well nigh impossible. And yet the humanist movement does not "explain" the Reformation. The leading humanists, including Erasmus, still worked within the framework of the traditional hermeneutics of the Middle Ages. Theirs was a reform movement, not a reformation. What, then, was the new insight of the Reformers that turned the whole understanding of scripture upside down? What was the secret of the new hermeneutics of the Reformers? We can put it in a nutshell: the

6J. Michael Reu, Luther and the Scriptures (Columbus: Wartburg Press, 1944), p. 24. 7Hermann Sasse, "Luther and the Word of God," in Accents in Luther's Theology, ed. Heino O. Kadai (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1967), p. 59. 8Before coming to Wittenburg Luther had studied at Erfurt, where the influence of Ockham was very strong. 9See H. W. Rossouw, "Klarrheid en Interpretasie" [Clarity and Interpretation] (Doc­ toral dissertation, Free University, Amsterdam, 1963), pp. 155ff. 10See Peter Stuhlmacher, Vom Verstehen des Neuen Testaments: Eine Hermeneutik (Göt­ tingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1979), pp. 86ff. 124 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

Reformers did not recover the Bible as such, but the Bible as the bearer of the gospell Or to put it into the words of Jaroslav Pelikan: "The church did not need a Luther to tell it that the Bible was true. But it did need a Luther to tell it what the truth of the Bible is."11 The secret of the hermeneutics of Luther and the other Reformers was their rediscovery of the kerygmatic nature of scripture. The Bible is not the law book of the church, but it is the preaching text of the church. And this means that the door was opened to an altogether new understanding of scripture. The first one to discover this was the monk Martin Luther.

LUTHER Anyone who wants to understand Luther must see him first of all as biblical theologian. So he understood himself and so he wanted others to understand him.12 Paul Althaus starts his standard work on Luther's theology with the following statement: "All Luther's theological think­ ing presupposes the authority of Scripture. His theology is nothing more than an attempt to interpret Scripture. Its form is basically ex­ egesis."13 Luther never claimed to be a systematic theologian, even though he wrote many books dealing with aspects of systematic the­ ology. He always maintained that he was only a doctor of sacred scripture.14 It was also as a biblical theologian that he made his great discovery. As far as this discovery is concerned, we are usually referred to Luther's so-called "tower experience." As a matter of fact, he himself does this in the well-known description of this experience in the preface to the Latin edition of his works in 1545.15 According to some scholars, traces of this discovery are already to be found in his first exposition of the Psalms in the years 1513-1515.16 However this may be, it cannot be denied that the new insight into scripture came into sharp

uJaroslav Pelikan, Obedient Rebels (New York: Harper and Row, 1964), p. 21. 12Idem, Luther the Expositor (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1959), p. 46, Companion Volume in Martin Luther, Works, éd. Jaroslav Pelikan, et. al., 56 vols. (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1955-74), hereafter UN. 13Paul Althaus, The Theology of Martin Luther (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1966), p. 3. 14For a list of his commentaries and lectures, see Wood, Captive, pp. 77-78. 15Martin Luther, Werke (hereafter WA), Kritische Gesammtausgabe, 92 vols. (Weimar: Herman Böhlau, 1883-1982), 54:185; LW 34:336-37. 16See Gerhard Ebeling, 'The New Hermeneutics and the Early Luther/' Theology Today 21 (1964):34-36. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 125 focus in the "tower experience." Luther himself tells us that he had been captivated with an extraordi­ nary desire to understand Paul in the epistle to the Romans. One word in particular stood in his way, the word "righteousness" in 1:17: "In it the righteousness of God is revealed." He hated that word, because he had been taught to understand it as an indication of formal or active righteousness, that is, the righteousness with which God punishes the unrighteous sinner and is angry with him. Thus he raged with a fierce and troubled conscience. Yet he continued to beat on Paul at that place, ardently desiring to know what Paul wanted. At last, however, he began to heed the context of the words and then began to understand that the righteousness of God of which Paul speaks is the righteousness by which the righteous live by a gift of God, namely, by faith. The righteousness of God of which Paul speaks is the righteousness re­ vealed by the gospel, the passive righteousness with which the mer­ ciful God justifies by faith. Here I felt that I was altogether born again and had entered paradise itself through open gates. There a totally other face of the entire Scripture showed itself to me. Thereupon I ran through the Scrip­ tures from memory. I also found in other terms an analogy, as, the work of God, that is, what God does in us, the power of God, with which He makes us strong, the wisdom of God, with which He makes us wise, the strength of God, the salvation of God, the glory of God.17 It is striking that Luther himself says, "There a totally other face of the entire Scripture showed itself to me." Indeed, this exegetical discovery had an uncommon hermeneutical bearing.18 It led to a new under­ standing of scripture, in which new vistas were opened in all direc­ tions. In this article I can only summarize some of the main vistas. Not only did Luther himself reflect on this new understanding in numerous writings, but a complete library of books by scholars of various persua­ sions has grown around this understanding. In what follows I give my own view on some of the main aspects. (1) The rediscovery of the gospel of God's righteousness as a righ­ teousness that justifies the sinner by grace and faith alone means that the concept of the "Word of God" obtains a new meaning for Luther. As Althaus puts it: "The means by which God encounters us is the

l7WA 54:186. 18Gerhard Ebeling, Evangelische Evangelieauslegung (Munich: Evangelischer Verlag Α. Lemp, 1942), p. 275. 126 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL word. . . . This word is first and last the spoken word, that is, the living proclamation which takes place in any particular situation."19 The Word of God is primarily a verbum praedicatum et praedicandum, a word preached and to be preached. "Word" for Luther is always a verbum vivum, a living word, a word that carries the idea of Anrede (address, allocution), Zuspruch (address, exhortation).20 This is the direct consequence of the rediscovery of the gospel of justification. Of course, the scriptures also contain the law of God (I shall return to that in the next section), but the law is basically subservient to the gospel. The real message is the gospel of grace, and this message is meant to be proclaimed. Luther did not tire of emphasizing this kerygmatic nature of the gospel. In his Preface to the New Testament (of 1522) he said: "Gospel" (Euangelium) is a Greek word and means in Greek a good message, good tidings, good news, a good report, which one sings and tells with gladness. For example, when David overcame the great Goliath, there came among the Jewish people the good report and encouraging news that their terrible enemy had been struck down and that they had been rescued and given joy and peace; and they sang and danced and were glad for it. Thus this Gospel of God or New Testament is a good story and report, sounded forth into all the world by the apostles, telling of a true David who strove with sin, death, and the devil, and overcame them, and thereby rescued all those who were captive in sin, afflicted with death, and over­ powered by the devil. Without any merit of their own he made them righteous, gave them life, and saved them, so that they were given peace and brought back to God. For this they sing, and thank and praise God, and are glad forever, if only they believe firmly and remain steadfast in faith.21 In a sermon on Matthew 2:1-12 in the Church Postil of the same year he wrote: Christ Himself has not written His doctrine (as Moses wrote his), but has proclaimed it orally and commanded that it should be preached orally, but has given no command to write it down. . . . Therefore it is not in conformity with the New Testament to write books on Christian doctrine, but there should be good, learned, pious, and diligent preachers everywhere who would draw the living Word from the old Scriptures and bring it home to the people. This the

19Althaus, Theology, p. 72. 20See W. Kooiman, "Verbum vocale en focale visie," in M. A. Beek et. al., Spelregels (Amsterdam: Polak and Van Gennep, 1967), pp. 102-3. 21IW 35:358. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 127

apostles have done. For before they wrote, they first taught with the living voice and then converted the people. This was their proper apostolic work and New Testament preaching.22 Elsewhere he wrote: "The Gospel is really not a document but wishes to be a spoken word, which recites the content of Scripture just as Christ did not write but only spoke. He did not call his teaching Scripture but Gospel, that is, good news or proclamation. That is why it must not be described with the pen but with the mouth." "Do not attempt to see Christ with your eyes, but put your eyes in your ears." "The Gospel should not be written but shouted."23 This emphasis on the gospel as a message to be preached should not surprise us. For the real content of the gospel is the message of an alien righteousness which comes to us from outside us, which has to be announced to us, which is a personal summons to us, and which can be received only as a personal word. (2) For Luther, however, the word is not a matter of the gospel only. No one can understand his hermeneutics properly unless he sees that this hermeneutics is determined by the dialectical bipolarity of law and gospel. Again we cannot deal here with the whole intricate pattern of Luther's doctrine of law and gospel but can indicate a few basic lines only.24 According to Luther, the Word of God comes to us in two forms: as law and as gospel. Both are in scripture and both are to be preached, but they must never be confused. To distinguish them rightly is the art and mark of the true theologian. The law says: Do this. It is God's demand upon us. The gospel says: This I have done for you. It is God's gift to us. It is obvious that they are quite different, and yet they are related. The law itself is holy and good. In itself it is the expression of God's will. But when it is used as the way of salvation, it becomes devilish and is "a tyrant." As a way of salvation it has been abolished by Christ. Does this mean that the law has no further function according to Luther? On the contrary, it has two functions. It has a civil function, regulating our neighborly relationships. It also has a divine, spiritual function: it increases our transgressions and so prepares the way unto grace. Thus it can serve as "our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ." The

22WA 10. la, pp. 625-26; see also Sasse, "Luther," p. 95. 23WA 12:259; 37:207; cf. Ralph W. Doermann, "Luther's Principles of Biblical Interpreta­ tion/' in Fred W. Meuser and Stanley D. Schneider, eds., Interpreting Luther's Legacy (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1969), p. 19. 24See Philip S. Watson, Let God be God (Philadelphia: Muhlenberg Press, 1947), pp. 152ff. 128 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL gospel, too, has two offices. The first is to interpret the law and effect the second function of the law. This, however, is not the proper office of the gospel. Luther himself calls it the "strange work" (opus alienum) of the gospel. The proper office (opus proprium) of the gospel is to do what the law cannot do, namely, to give us grace, righteousness, life. Since this is the proper office of the gospel and since this office always has the primacy in his mind, Luther often speaks of the gospel as if it alone were the Word of God. But it would be a misunderstanding to take such expressions in an absolute sense. Law and gospel are the two forms of the one Word of God, and we can hear the Word of God truly only when we hear it as both law and gospel. Though the two have completely different functions, they are functions of the same Word. They always take place concurrently. And yet there is movement in a certain direction: faith moves from the law to the gospel and ultimately comes to rest in the gospel.25 (3) This view of law and gospel is also determinative for Luther's view of the relationship between the Old and the New Testament. At first glance it all seems to be very straightforward and almost too simple. According to Luther's preface to the New Testament, the Old Testament is a volume containing God's laws and commandments, and the New Testament is a volume containing God's promised gospel.26 But this is only his first approach—his first move, so to speak. On the pages following he qualifies the foregoing by adding that the Old Testament also contains promises of the gospel. It contains the com­ plete truth of law and gospel. Jesus Christ himself is already present in the Old Testament dispensation. Thus the Old Testament has a double dialectical relationship to the New: "first, as foreshadowing it by its promises of the coming Saviour, and secondly, as preparing the way for it by revealing through the commandments man's need for salva­ tion."27 Consequently the Testaments are inseparable. As Luther him­ self puts it: "There is no word in the New Testament which does not look back on the Old, where it has already been proclaimed in ad­ vance. . . . For the New Testament is nothing more than a revelation of the Old."28 In other words, there is a profound unity of all of scripture. (4) This unity has its foundation in the fact that Jesus Christ is the center of all scripture. In this connection Luther liked to use the figure

25See Althaus, Theology, p. 265. 26LW 35:358. 27Watson, Let God, p. 151. 28WA 10. la, pp. 181-82. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 129

of the punctus mathematicus: Christ, the center of the circle, around which everything is placed in concentric circles.29 In one of his Table Talks Luther says: "Christus est punctus mathematicus Sacrae Scrip- turae."30 W. Kooiman claims that this centrality of Christ is the new element in Luther's doctrine of scripture, as compared with the Middle Ages. "To place the Bible in a central position had been done by the theologians of earlier centuries. To place Christ in the centre of the Bible, as totally as Luther did, was previously unheard of. With great monotony he ham­ mered consistently upon this single anvil."31 Indeed, he returned to it again and again. "In the whole of Scripture there is nothing but Christ, either in plain words or in involved words."32 "The whole of Scripture is about Christ alone everywhere, if we look to its inner meaning, al­ though superficially it may sound different."33 Christ is "the sun and truth in Scripture."34 "Christ is the scopus of the whole Scripture,"35 including the Old Testament. "[In the Scripture] you will find the swaddling clothes and the manger in which Christ lies, and to which the angel points the shepherds (Luke 2:12). Simple and lowly are these swaddling clothes, but dear is the treasure, Christ, who lies in them."36 Here we have Luther's basic hermeneutical principle: the whole Bible is a proclamation of God's grace in Jesus Christ. But was this really a new principle? Had not Erasmus, for instance, said the same before Luther? Did not Oecolampadius, the Reformer of Basle, acknowledge that he had learned from Erasmus that "nothing is to be sought in Scripture but Christ"?37 Indeed; yet there is a funda­ mental difference at this point between Erasmus and Luther. For Eras­ mus, Christ was the center of scripture; not, however, as the redeemer who today unites us with God, but rather as the great example of the past who instructs us in the virtues that please God. In other words, for Erasmus, Christ is the Christ of the law, not of the gospel. He reads the

29See Kooiman, Luther, p. 175; "Verbum," p. 119. 3°WA 47:66. 31Kooiman, Luther, p. 175. 32WA 11:223. 33WA 46:414. MWA 3:26. 3$WA 24:16. *>LW 35:236. 37See Otto Scheel, Luthers Stellung zur Heiligen Schrift (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1902), p. 10. 130 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

Bible as a law book, not as the Eu-angelion.38 For Luther, Christ is the center of scripture, because He is the Christus crucifixus, or, as Luther puts it in his exposition of the Psalms (1517): "Christ is God's grace, mercy, righteousness, truth, wisdom, power, comfort, and salvation, given us of God without any merit/'39 (5) Since this Christus crucifixus is the scopus of all scripture, it is not surprising to see that Luther accepts all scripture as the Word of God. We arrive here at a moot point. There is much difference of opinion among scholars concerning the question whether Luther identified scripture with the Word of God. From the nineteenth century onward many have rejected such an identification. Especially since the rise of the dialectical theology many efforts have been made to show that for Luther there is, at the most, an "indirect identity" between the Bible and the Word of God. Such is the view, for instance, of Emil Brunner,40 Paul Tillich,41 Friedrich Gogarten,42 Philip S. Watson,43 and John K. S. Reid.44 Others, particularly evangelicals, maintain that for Luther the Bible is the Word of God. Again I mention only a few names: James I. Packer,45 G. Bromiley,46 R. Finlayson,47 C. Van Til,48 and A. Skevington Wood.49 Why is there such a wide divergence among scholars? For one thing,

^See Scheel, Stellung, pp. 12,18, 46. 39WA 1:219; see also Kooiman, "Verbum," p. 94. ^E. Brunner, Dogmatics, vol. 1: The Christian Doctrine of God (London: Lutterworth Press, 1950), pp. 106ff. 41Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, 3 vols. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1951-63), 1:4-5,1:50-51. 42Friedrich Gogarten, Demythologizing and History (London: SCM Press, 1955), pp. 13ff. 43Watson, Let God, pp. 152,179 n. 30. ^John K. S. Reid, The Authority of Scripture (London: Methuen, 1957), pp. 56ff. His conclusion is: "For Luther Scripture is not the Word, but only the witness to the Word, and it is from Him whom it conveys that it derives the authority it enjoys" (p. 72). 45James I. Packer, "Contemporary Views of Revelation," in Revelation and the Bible, ed. Carl F. H. Henry (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1959), pp. 90ff; cf. James I. Packer, Fundamentalism and the Word of God (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1958), p. 174. ^G. Bromiley, "The Church Doctrine of Inspiration," in Henry, Revelation, p. 210. 47R. Finlayson, "Contemporary Ideas of Inspiration," in Henry, Revelation, p. 233. 48C. Van Til, Introduction to B. B. Warfield, The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1951), p. 58. 49Wood, Captive, pp. 139-40. According to Wood, Luther also believed in the inerrancy of the Bible (p. 144). THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 131

Luther scholars nearly always show a tendency to read their own theology into Luther.50 One of the reasons for this phenomenon is that Luther wrote so much and liked to express himself in such a paradox­ ical and hyperbolical way that it is usually not difficult to find one's own opinion reflected in some of Luther's statements. For another, there undoubtedly is a tension in Luther's doctrine of scripture (I shall return to this in the last section). But above all it is due to the complexity of his use of the term "Word of God." He uses it in many different ways. But however he may use it, it is always an active, dynamic concept and it always carries the connotation of God himself speaking. For Luther, "It was in the very nature of God to want to speak and to be able to speak and therefore by definition God was never speech-less. The Speech of God was as eternal as God Himself. The God of Christian faith was one who had a Voice, an eternal Speech."51 It is therefore not surprising to read in scripture that God creates by his Word. This is not "accidental," but follows from the fact that God is a speaking God. it also means that God's Word is "the essential and constitutive element in all His dealings with the world."52 Next, be­ cause God speaks to us in Jesus Christ, he too is the Word of God. Indeed, in him the Word that was eternally in God and by which the world was created became audible in a new way. In Jesus Christ the eternal and cosmic Word of God became flesh. Third, because in the Bible we have the witness of prophets and apostles concerning Jesus Christ, the Bible is also the Word of God. Finally, preaching, the living proclamation of the gospel of Jesus Christ, is also the Word of God. These various forms of the Word of God are inseparable. Pelikan rightly concludes: "Ultimately . . . there was only one 'Word of God,' which came in different forms."53 If we want to understand Luther's doctrine of scripture, we always have to keep this in mind. The concept "Word of God" is much broader than the Bible. Yet it implies that the Bible too may be called the Word of God. At the same time we can speak properly of the Bible as the Word of God only if we see it in conjunction with the other forms of the Word of God. When Luther calls the Bible the Word of God, this is never a simple, straightforward, static equation of a book with the Word of God. The Word of God can never be imprisoned in a book, not even in

50See Sasse, "Luther," pp. 49-50. 51Pelikan, Expositor, p. 50. 52Ibid., p. 51. 53Ibid., p. 70. 132 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

God's book.54 This particular book can be called the Word of God only because from start to finish it contains the gospel of Jesus Christ. Although Luther firmly accepted the inspiration of the Bible, it was not a formal concept of inspiration that made this book the Word of God. It is the Word of God for the single reason that Jesus Christ, the incarnate Word of God, is its content.55 As a matter of fact, Luther often sees an analogy between Christ and the Bible. Both forms of the Word of God are "incarnational" and in both cases this "incarnation" is a matter of condescension. "The Bible is God's Word written, presented in letters, as Christ is the eternal Word, presented in human nature, and just as it is with Christ in the world ... so it is with the written Word of God. It is a worm and no book, when compared with other books."56 And yet it is truly and fully the Word of God. It would not be difficult to quote many strong statements from Luther's writings on this score. It may suffice to quote just a few: "The Bible is the Holy Spirit's own peculiar book." "God is in every syllable." "One should tremble before a letter of the Bible more than for the whole world."57 Behind such statements is the deep conviction that this Bible is full of Christ. (6) Because of this deep conviction the Bible is for Luther a clear book. Again and again in his writings we encounter the idea of the claritas or perspicuitas of scripture. The medieval church had completely lost sight of this idea. Erasmus was a real medieval theologian when in his book On the Freedom of the Will he attacked Luther at this very point. Already in the Prefatory Observation he speaks about the "obscurity" of scripture, adding that some truths are not for common ears.58 In the Epilogue he returns to it and reiterates "that Holy Scripture is in very many places obscured by figures of speech . . . in some places it seems at first sight to be self-contradictory ... ; we are forced willy-nilly to forsake the literal sense of the words and seek their meaning modified by interpretation."59 In Erasmus this obscurity is related to the fact that scripture deals with divine mysteries that transcend all our concepts.

54Wood, Captive, p. 90. 55Here we find the decisive difference between the view of the Reformers and that of later Fundamentalists (cf. Sasse, "Luther," pp. 82-83). 5*WA 48:31. 57See Doermann, "Principles," p. 20; see also Reid, Authority, p. 62. 58Erasmus, On the Free Will, in Ernst Gordon Rupp and Philip S. Watson, tr., Luther and Erasmus: Free Will and Salvation, Library of Christian Classics, vol. 17 (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1959), pp. 38ff. 59Ibid., p. 97. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 133

Scripture, therefore, can be read only in the light of the magisterial pronouncements of the church. H. Sasse rightly comments: "As the sola gratia must be limited by the cooperation of man, so the sola scriptura must be limited by the teaching authority of the church."60 Luther vehemently objects to this view. He does not deny that there are difficult, obscure passages in scripture (how could he? cf. 2 Pet. 3:16!), but he finds the cause of this obscurity not in scripture itself or in its message of the Christus crucifixus but in our linguistic and gram­ matical ignorance. Emphatically he adds: These texts in no way hinder a knowledge of the subject matter of Scripture. For what still sublimer thing can remain hidden in the Scriptures, now that the seals have been broken, the stone rolled from the door of the sepulcher (Matt. 27:66; 28:2), and the supreme mystery brought to light, namely, that Christ the Son of God has been made man, that God is three and one, that Christ has suffered for us and is to reign eternally? Are not these things known and sung even in the highways and byways?61 Here we see again what for Luther is the heart of the scriptures: it is Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son of God, who died for our sins and is our eternal king. For this reason he closes the statement just quoted with the famous words, "Tolle Christum e scripturis, quid amplius in illis invenies?" (Take Christ out of the scriptures, and what will you find left in them?). For Luther the clarity or perspecuity of scripture is not just a rhe­ torical criterion, a "merely water-clear perspicuity,"62 but it is a re­ ligious category. This becomes quite evident when Luther distinguishes a twofold clarity. He writes against Erasmus: "There are two kinds of clarity in Scripture, just as there are also two kinds of obscurity: one external and pertaining to the ministry of the Word, the other located in the understanding of the heart."63 On the one hand there is the objective clarity of scripture. Whenever and wherever its message is preached, this message, as P. Althaus, puts it, "illuminates everything with a bright light and leaves nothing in the dark and open

^Sasse, "Luther," p. 66. 61Martin Luther, 'On the Bondage of the Will," in Luther and Erasmus: Free Will and Salvation, p. 110. 62R. Hermann, Von der Klarheit der heiligen Schrift: Untersuchungen und Erörterungen über Luthers Lehrte von der Schrift in "De Servo Arbitrio" (Berlin: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 1958), p. 37: "blosse wasserklare Helligkeit"; see also p. 49. 63Luther, "Bondage," p. 112; cf. pp. 158ff. 134 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

to misunderstanding."64 indeed, scripture as proclaimed in the gospel is clarissima and apertissima. "It ought above all to be settled and estab­ lished among Christians that the Holy Scriptures are a spiritual light far brighter than the sun itself, especially in things that are necessary to salvation."65 Scripture is "crystal-clear."66 On the other hand, this objective clarity comes to full fruition only when it is accompanied by internal or subjective clarity, by which the individual Christian is convinced of the truth of the gospel by the enlightening of the Holy Spirit. "For the Spirit is required for the understanding of Scripture, both as a whole and in any part of it."67 (8) From this clarity of scripture it is only one more step to Luther's basic rule of all biblical exegesis: "Scriptum sui ipsius interpres" (Scrip­ ture is its own interpreter). "Scripture is its own light. It is a great thing when Scripture interprets itself."68 This is not just a formal, technical rule, according to which obscure and doubtful passages of scripture must be interpreted by a clear and certain passage. (Of course that also is a sound idea, and not a new one: we encounter it already in Origen, Jerome, and Augustine.69) For Luther the meaning of this rule goes much deeper. It is connected with the clarity that scripture possesses in itself. This appears from his opposition at this point to both Catholics and the so-called Enthusiasts. According to both parties, something in addition to scripture is needed in order to validate its interpretation. According to Rome, it is the gift of the Spirit bestowed on the mag­ isterium of the church. According to Enthusiasts, it is the Spirit given personally to individual believers. Naturally Luther does not deny that we need the illumination of the Spirit for the interpretation of scripture as a separate addendum. But for him the Spirit comes in and through scripture itself. In a famous passage from the Smalkald Articles, aimed against the Enthusiasts, he states as his firm conviction that God gives no one his Spirit or grace except through or with the external Word which comes before. Thus we shall be protected from the Enthusiasts, that is, from the spiritualists who boast that they possess the Spirit without and before the Word and who therefore

^Althaus, Theology, p. 78. 65Luther, "Bondage," p. 159. 66Ibid., p. 162. 67Ibid., p. 112. ™WA 10. 3, p. 238. 69Cf. A. Skevington Wood, Luther's Principles of Biblical Interpretation (London: Tyndale Press, 1960), p. 21. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 135

judge, interpret, and twist the Scriptures or spoken Word according to their pleasure.70 Immediately in the next section Luther turns against the papacy, which also is "nothing but enthusiasm," for the pope claims that whatever he decides and commands is spirit and law, even when it is above and contrary to the scripture of the spoken Word. According to Luther, however, the Spirit can never be claimed apart from scripture itself. Coming in and through the scriptures, the Spirit himself inter­ prets scripture. In fact, as Althaus correctly notes, Luther uses the expressions "self-interpretation of scripture" and "interpretation of scripture through the Holy Spirit" synonymously.71 This is not at all surprising. Being the author of scripture, the Spirit is also its inter­ preter, and this interpretation can therefore be nothing else than scrip­ ture's self-interpretation. (9) Against this background it is also understandable that Luther had no remaining use for the traditional allegorical interpretation.72 Al­ though it cannot be denied that at times he still used allegory (mainly as a homiletical device in order to obtain a more striking application of a text73), his basic opinion is what he states, e.g., at the beginning of his lectures on the Psalms (1519): "Our first concern will be for the gram­ matical meaning, for this is the truly theological meaning."74 In his controversy with Erasmus he says: Let us rather take the view that neither an inference nor a trope75 is admissible in any passage of Scripture, unless it is forced upon us by the evident nature of the context and the absurdity of the literal sense as conflicting with one or another of the articles of faith. Instead, we must everywhere stick to the simple, pure, and natural sense of the words that accords with the rules of grammar and the normal use of language as God has created it in man.76 This does not mean that Luther opts for a superficial literalism. As a

70Smalcald Articles 3. 8. 3, in The Book of Concord, ed. T. G. Tappert (Philadelphia: Muhlenberg Press, 1959), p. 312. ^Althaus, Theology, p. 76. 72See Ebeling, Evangelische; H. Bornkamm, Luther und das Alte Testament (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1948); Pelikan, Expositor. 73Gerhard Ebeling, Luther: An Introduction to His Thought (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970), p. 108. ™WA 5:27. 75"Tropus" is a figure of speech or figurative meaning. It was a technical term in scholastic exegesis. 76Luther, Bondage, p. 221. 136 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

true biblical scholar he is willing and eager to make use of all the philosophical, historical, grammatical, and contemporary aids offered by the humanists. He also benefits greatly from the insights of the fathers. His definite choice for the literal meaning has therefore nothing to do with obscurantism; it is rather the fruit of his conviction that the literal meaning is the spiritual meaning of scripture because of its content. The spiritual meaning is not an "extra," as in the fourfold medieval exegesis, but the deep meaning of the text becomes visible in the grammatical sense. How else can it be? The author of the Word of scripture is no one else than the Holy Spirit, and, as H. Bornkamm says, "God can speak through the Spirit in no other way than through the Word."77 Or, to say it in Luther's own words: "Scriptum, hoc est Spiritus in Scriptum."78 (10) This leads us to the relationship between Word and Spirit in Luther's theology. We have already touched on it, but it requires more attention. Again and again Luther refers to it, not only (as we have seen in section 6) because both Rome and the Enthusiasts gravely erred in this matter, but also and especially because here we meet with the real secret of all biblical interpretation. There is an intimate relationship between the external Word that comes to us in the proclamation of the gospel and the internal Word that God speaks to our hearts. Paul Althaus summarizes it in two sentences: (a) The Spirit does not speak without the Word; (b) The Spirit speaks through and in the Word. Both sentences need elaboration.79 (a) For Luther the external Word always comes first. God does not give his Spirit directly, i.e., without means, but rather through means. The primary medium for Luther is the verbum praedicatum, in which the message of the gospel comes to us as by a viva vox. It is the Spirit who brings this message via this medium to us. (b) But this is not the whole truth. This message has to enter into our hearts. This too is the work of the Holy Spirit. He himself makes the external Word into an internal Word. The promise of the gospel be­ comes the Word of the living God to us only when the Spirit says to us: this is God's Word for you\ Sometimes Luther calls this "the testimony of the Holy Spirit." In opposition to the view of the Church of Rome he says: "We should not believe the Gospel because the church has ap­ proved it, but in fact because we feel that it is the Word of God. . . . Ev-

77H. Bornkamm, Das Wort Gottes bei Luther (Munich: Chr. Kaiser Verlag, 1933), p. 17. 78WA 2:512; see also WA 3:256: "Spiritus enim latet in litera" (the Spirit is hidden in the letter). 79Althaus, Theology, p. 36. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 137 eryone may be certain of the Gospel when he has the testimony of the Holy Spirit in his own person that this is the Gospel."80 What Luther says here has nothing to do with subjectivism or spiritualism. Personal certainty is, in fact, possible only because the Spirit is the Spirit of the Word, just as much as the Word is the Word of the Spirit. (11) There is one more aspect of Luther's hermeneutics that requires our serious attention, namely, his critique of certain parts of the canon. It is a well-known fact that Luther occasionally made rather strong critical remarks on certain Bible books.81 The letter of James especially came in for some rough handling. In the so-called September Testa­ ment (the concluding section of the Preface to the New Testament, which appeared only in the first edition of 1522) he called James's letter "an epistle of straw, for it has nothing of the nature of the gospel about it."82 But other books of the New Testament were also criticized.83 Undoubtedly this critique, as is apparent from the September Testa­ ment, is related to Luther's understanding of the gospel: John's Gospel and St. Paul's epistles, especially that to the Romans, and St. Peter's first epistle are the true kernel and marrow of all the books. They ought properly to be the foremost books, and it would be advisable for every Christian to read them first and most, and by daily reading to make them as much his own as his daily bread. For in them you do not find many works and miracles of Christ de­ scribed, but you do find depicted in masterly fashion how faith in Christ overcomes sin, death, and hell, and gives life, righteousness, and salvation. This is the real nature of the Gospel, as you have heard.84 At the end of the Testament he mentions these books again, and then the famous statement about James's letter follows: "Therefore St. James' epistle is really an epistle of straw, compared to these others, for it has nothing of the nature of the Gospel about it." Note the words "compared to these others." Luther does not reject James. In fact, the

*°WA 30. 2 pp. 687-88; see also Althaus, Theology, p. 38. 81See Scheel, Stellung; J. C. S. Locher, De leer van Luther over Gods Woord (Amsterdam: Schef fer, 1903); Paul Althaus, "Gehorsam und Freiheit in Luthers Stellung zur Bible," in Theologische Aufsatze (Gütersloh: C. Bertelsmann, 1929), pp. 140-52; H. Bornkamm, Wort; Reu, Luther; Bornkamm, Alte Testament; R. Bring, Luthers Anschauung der Bibel, Luthertum, Heft 3 (Berlin: Lutherisches Verlagshaus, 1951); Pelikan, Expositor, pp. 86ff.; W. Maurer, "Luthers Verständnis des N.T. Kanons," in Die Verbindlichkeit des Kanons, Fuldaer Hefte (Berlin: Lutherisches Verlagshaus, 1960). 82LW 35:362. 83See Wood, Captive, pp. 155-56; Kooiman, Luther, pp. 189ff. **LW 35:361, 362. 138 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

Preface to the epistles of St. James and St. Jude begins as follows: "Though this epistle of St. James was rejected by the ancients, I praise it and consider it a good book, because it sets up no doctrines of men but vigorously promulgates the law of God."85 In other words, Luther's problem is only that James preaches the law rather than the gospel. This critique of certain parts of the canon has been interpreted in many different ways. For instance, Luther has often been considered one of the fathers of historical criticism, but this is rightly rejected by Paul Althaus.86 Is Luther's critique then a matter of pure subjectivism, as has often been asserted by Roman Catholic theologians? This is no more likely: Luther himself time and again stresses the "letter" of scripture. Can his criticism perhaps be explained by setting the young man Luther against his older, mellower self? Kooimans shows that this too is a false solution, for even in the writings of the older Luther we find the same critique.87 Can it be, then, that the Christocentric ap­ proach to scripture represents the new Reformational insight, while the massive doctrine of inspiration with its emphasis on the "letter" is a remnant of medieval Scholasticism? This thesis of Adolf Harnack, set forth in his History of Dogma, is no solution either. It must be admitted that the problem is very complicated indeed. I am afraid that evangelicals at times are too much inclined to minimize it.88 This critique is not just a marginal phenomenon but is related to the very heart of Luther's doctrine of scripture, namely his Christo­ centric understanding of it. Here I can make only a few comments. (a) Luther's critique of the canon is purely theological.89 He does not criticize certain parts of scripture in the name of reason or of the new scientific world view (as propounded by Copernicus), but rather in the name of the gospel. When he cannot recognize the gospel of the Christus crucifixus and, therefore, of the justification of the sinner sola gratia and sola fide, he becomes critical of the book concerned. This comes very clearly to the fore in his Preface to the epistle of James, where he sets out his own "canon": All the genuine sacred books agree in this, that all of them preach and inculcate (treiben) Christ. And that is the true test by which to

S5LW 35:395. 86Althaus, Theology, p, 82. 87Kooiman, Luther, pp. 189, n. 2; 193ff. 88See e.g., Wood, Captive, pp. 154ff. 89At times he also makes critical remarks of a more historical nature (cf. Kooiman, Luther, pp. 191-92), but these are of a different kind and do not fall within the scope of his theological critique of the canon. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 139

judge all books, when we see whether or not they inculcate Christ. For all the Scriptures show us Christ, Romans 3(:21); and St. Paul will know nothing but Christ, 1 Corinthians 2(:2). Whatever does not teach Christ is not (yet) apostolic, even though St. Peter or St. Paul does the teaching. Again, whatever preaches Christ would be apos­ tolic, even if Judas, Annas, Pilate, and Herod were doing it.90 To regard Luther's critique as a first step on the road to historical criticism, however, is not only anachronistic but also contrary to fact. A. Skevington Wood rightly remarks: "Luther's attitude to the New Testament canon was not so much a foreshadowing of the future as a recreation of the past."91 The church fathers already distinguished between recognized writings (homologoumena) and disputed writings (antilegomena). From his new understanding of the gospel Luther opened up again the question of the canon, and it is interesting to note that several of the books questioned by him (such as James, Jude, 2 Peter) did indeed belong to the antilegomena of the church fathers! In his discussion of this matter Hermann Sasse states as the Lutheran view till the present that there always remains an element of uncertainty con­ cerning the borders of the canon.92 This was certainly true of Luther's own position. A Bible book that does not have the Christus crucifixus for its content is not canonical in the strictest sense, even if it is in the Bible and read in the church. But there is also another side to the coin. Using this same criterion of was Christum treibt (what inculcates Christ), Luther accepted many Bible books as fully canonical and treated them accordingly. He may have had his doubts about the canonicity of certain books, but he had no doubts whatever about the authority of the books which he did accept as canonical.93 (c) Luther knew his own view of certain books was not final or definitive; surely he did not regard it as binding on anyone else. In the Preface to the epistles of St. James and St. Jude he frankly states: "Therefore I cannot include him among the chief books, though I would not thereby prevent anyone from including or extolling him as he pleases, for there are otherwise many good sayings in him."94 Moreover, Luther was always aware of the fact that scripture contains depths which may be hidden to us: "From his own experience he could

90LW 35:396. 91Wood, Captive, p. 157. 92Sasse, "Luther/7 p. 87. 93See Carl F. H. Henry, The Protestant Dilemma (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1949), p. 251. 9*LW 35:397. 140 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL testify that often a Christian found one or another book of the canon difficult or useless to him at a particular time, only to discover later on that it was just what he needed in a time of trouble or temptation."95 Luther also knew only too well that the Word of God must become God's Word for us personally. This is the miracle of God's own divine freedom. We on our side should always expect the miracle. We may never cease to wait for it and should therefore constantly search the scriptures. Luther himself read through the whole Bible twice a year! One can safely say that he summed up his own attitude in the words which, shortly after his death, were found on his desk. They are the last words from his pen and constitute his spiritual testament. No one can understand the Bucolica of Vergil, unless he has been a shepherd for five years. No one can understand Vergil's Geórgica, unless he has been working the land for five years. No one is able really to understand Cicero in his epistles, unless he has been active in the politics of a great state for 25 years. And nobody should think he has sufficiently grasped the Holy Scriptures, unless he has gov­ erned the churches for a hundred years with prophets like Elijah and Elisha, with John the Baptist, with Christ and the apostles.96 How moving! Luther's last theological statement was a word on biblical hermeneutics! The statement closes with the very personal confession "We are beggars. This is true."

CALVIN I have given so much time and attention to Luther because he was the pioneer of the new interpretation of scripture. But he was not the only one to practice it; others followed. It would not be difficult to mention many names here, such as Melanchthon, Zwingli, Bucer, Oecolam- padius, Farei, etc. In order to stay within the limits of this article, however, I shall restrict myself to the hermeneutics of John Calvin, the Reformer of Geneva. More than anyone else, he influenced the de­ velopment of the Reformation movement. Calvin was, needless to say, a great systematic theologian. His In­ stitutes of the Christian Religion is the most important systematic work of the Reformation period. Nowhere else are the new insights formulated and summarized in such a clear and systematic way. Yet Calvin was first of all a preacher and biblical theologian. In his last will he identi­ fied himself as "I, John Calvin, Minister of the Word of God in the

95Pelikan, Expositor, p. 87. 96Sasse, "Luther/' p. 88. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 141

Church of Geneva,"97 and just before his death he said to his fellow pastors in Geneva: "Concerning my doctrine, I have taught faithfully . . . and God has given me the grace to write. I have done this as faithfully as possible and have not corrupted a single passage of Scripture or knowingly twisted it."98 As a matter of fact, in the Preface to the Institutes of 1559 (the same is true of earlier editions) he stated as the avowed purpose of his work: It has been my purpose in this labour to prepare and instruct candidates in sacred theology for the reading of the divine Word, in order that they may be able both to have easy access to it and to advance in it without stumbling. For I believe I have so embraced the sum of religion in all its parts, and have arranged it in such an order, that if anyone rightly grasps it, it will not be difficult for him to determine what he ought especially to seek in Scripture, and to what end he ought to relate its contents."99 Likewise, he said in the Preface to the French edition of 1560 that this book "can be a key to open a way for all children of God into a good and right understanding of Holy Scripture."100 Furthermore, it should be noted that after the second edition of the Institutes Calvin produced an endless flow of commentaries. With one or two exceptions he wrote commentaries on all the books of the New Testament and also on a great number of books of the Old Testament.101 With regard to Calvin's hermeneutics I shall again summarize my findings in a number of points. (1) First, a few remarks on his relation to Luther. Peter Stuhlmacher approvingly quotes H. Ruckert, who calls Calvin Luther's "greatest disciple," not only because he absorbed and incorporated Luther's legacy most independently and most thoroughly, but also because he, better and more deeply than anyone else, understood the thrust of Luther's new insights.102 Stuhlmacher himself sees Luther as the cre-

97John Calvin, Opera Quae Supersunt Omnia, 59 vols, (hereafter CO), in Corpus Refor- matorum, ed. Guilielmus Baum, Eduardus Cunitz, and Eduardus Reuss, vols. 29-87 (Brunswick: C. A. Schwetsche et Filium, 1863-1900), 20:299. 98CO 9:893. "John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Library of Christian Classics, vols 20, 21, ed. John T. McNeill, tr. Ford Lewis Battles, 2 vols. (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1960), vol. 1, p. 4. 100Ibid., vol. 1, p. 7. 101See John H. Leith, Introduction to the Reformed Tradition (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1977), pp. 98-99. 102Stuhlmacher, Verstehen, p. 98. 142 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

ative theologian who, in his originality and biblical engagement, was the pioneer of the Reformation, while Calvin, as the more systematic thinker, amplified the new exegetical insights and put them into prac­ tice in his commentaries. I believe this comparison is true to fact. There is a deep, underlying unity between Calvin's theology and that of Luther. For both the center of faith is exactly one thing: the justification of the sinner by grace and by faith alone. In the Institutes Calvin calls this doctrine "the main hinge on which religion turns."103 For him, as well as for Luther, Jesus Christ is the very center and scopus of scrip­ ture. For him, too, scripture is characterized by its own inner clarity104 and, therefore, is its own interpreter. Yet there are also some important differences in emphasis. (a) In Calvin we find a much stronger emphasis on scripture in its canonical form as the Word of God. No doubt, he too was well aware of the fact that the aim of scripture is the proclamation of the gospel. In fact, his whole purpose in writing both the Institutes and the Commen­ taries was to promote the pure preaching of the gospel.105 Yet in doing this, he concentrated on scripture itself because for him, more so than for Luther, faith rests upon Scripture as the instrument of the Spirit. (b) As a consequence of this, Calvin had a somewhat different approach to the Old Testament. Luther's view of the Old Testament was basically determined by the dialectic of law and gospel. To be sure, Luther did not deny that the Old Testament contains the gospel. Yet for him the New Testament was the real book of the gospel. Compared with it, the Old Testament has a more provisional nature. Calvin, however, emphasizes the essential unity of the two Testaments. Cer­ tainly he does not deny the difference. Yet for him there is no difference in "substance" but only in "administration" or "mode of dispensa­ tion."106 (It is interesting that the Institutes' chapter on the similarity of the two Testaments precedes that on the differences between them.)107 Calvin does not deny that there is something provisional in the law, but for him it is a historical rather than an essential provisionality. The law, so to speak, gives only a shadowy outline of what the full picture will be. "Under the Law was shadowed forth only in rude and imperfect

103Calvin, Institutes 3. 11. 1. 104See H. W. Rossouw, Klarheid, pp. 162-63,239-40; R. S. Wallace, Calvin's Doctrine of the Word and Sacrament (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1953), p. 106. 105See Wallace, Doctrine, pp. 82ff. 106Calvin, Institutes 2. 10. 2. 107Ibid., 2. 10, 11. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 143 lines what is under the Gospel set forth in living colours and graph­ ically distinct." Nevertheless, the things the believers of the old dispen­ sation saw are the same which are now set before our eyes. "To both the same Christ is exhibited, the same righteousness, sanctification, and salvation; and the difference is only in the manner of painting."108 For Calvin the law is always the covenantal law. For this reason it is salutary. If it now kills the sinner, this is not due to its essence but to the way people (mis)use the law. Still, this misuse does not alter the fact that "the Law was given, not to restrain the folk of the old covenant under itself, but to foster hope of salvation in Christ until his com­ ing."109 (c) As a consequence of this stress on the essential unity of the history of salvation, Calvin was still more consistent than Luther in his rejection of all allegoresis and in his stress on the need for historical- grammatical exegesis. True, he was not averse to the Christological- typological interpretation of the Old Testament (as a matter of fact, this is consistent with his salvation-history approach), but he always re­ mained cautious in its application. His general concern was le sens naturel, the natural meaning of the passage, for only in it do we find the meaning of the Spirit.110 (2) What was Calvin's view of scripture? Again we need not discuss his whole doctrine of scripture. What we are looking for are the hermeneutical implications. There can be no doubt that Calvin re­ garded the Bible as the Word of God. Here God himself speaks to us. The doctrina which we find in scripture is not from men but from God. In his Institutes he writes: In order that true religion may shine upon us, we ought to hold that it must take its beginning from heavenly doctrine and that no one can get even the slightest taste of right and sound doctrine unless he be a pupil of Scripture. Hence, there also emerges the beginning of true understanding when we reverently embrace what it pleases God there to witness of himself.111

108Calvin, Comm. on Heb. 10:1; cf. Institutes 2. 10. 2: "They had and knew Christ as Mediator, through whom they were joined to God and were to share in his promises"; see also Wallace, Doctrine, pp. 8-9, 27ff., 40ff. 109Heading of institutes 2. 7.; cf. Wilhelm Niesei, The Theology of Calvin (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1956), pp. 92ff. noCf. Kenneth S. Kantzer, "Calvin and the Holy Scriptures/' in Inspiration and Inter­ pretation, ed. John F. Walvoord (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1957), p. 153. mCalvin, Institutes 1. 6. 2. 144 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

We read the same time and again in his Commentaries: "Christ cannot be properly known in any other way than from the Scriptures."112 "Christ is rejected when we do not embrace the pure doctrine of the Gos­ pel."113 Scripture, therefore, is the sole authority in the life of the church, not only with regard to its proclamation, but also with regard to all the other aspects of its life. This authority is not finally dependent on the interpretation of scripture by the church; to the contrary, the church in all its interpretation is bound to the clear message of scrip­ ture, for it is here that the Spirit speaks to us. Just as Luther, Calvin fights here on two fronts: against Rome and against the Enthusiasts or Spiritualists. In his reply to Cardinal Sadoleto's letter to the Genevans he states: We are assailed by two sects which seem to differ most widely from each other. For what similitude is there in appearance between the Pope and the Anabaptists? And yet, that you may see that Satan never transforms himself so cunningly as not in some measure to betray himself, the principal weapon with which they both assail us is the same. For when they boast extravagantly of the Spirit, the tendency certainly is to sink and bury the Word of God, that they may make room for their own falsehoods.114 A little further on the same page he succinctly states his own view in these words: "The Spirit goes before the Church, to enlighten her in understanding the Word, while the Word itself is like the Lydian stone by which she tests all doctrines." (3) But how must we read scripture? For Calvin too there is only one answer: we must read it Christologically and Christocentrically. In his Preface to the Genevan translation of the Bible he explicitly deals with the purpose of Bible study. Negatively, it is not for the satisfaction of our foolish curiosity. Positively, it is for our edification. If you ask in what this whole edification consists, which we are to receive thereby, in a word, it is a question of learning to place our trust in God and to walk in fear of him, and since Jesus Christ is the end of the law and the prophets and the essence of the Gospel [it is a question] of aspiring to no other aim but to know Him, since we realize that we cannot deviate from that path in the slightest without going astray.115

112Idem, Comm. on John 5:39. 113Idem, Comm. on John 12:48; see Wallace, Doctrine, pp. 96ff. 114John C. Olin, ed., John Calvin and Jacopo Sadoleto: A Reformation Debate (New York: Harper and Row, 1966), p. 61. 115Niesel, Theology, p. 27. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 145

We find the same in his comment on John 5:39: "First, then, we ought to believe that Christ cannot be properly known in any other way than from the Scriptures; and if it be so, it follows that we ought to read the Scriptures with the express design of finding Christ in them."116 This statement (we should remember here that John 5:39 refers to the Old Testament scriptures) also explains Calvin's high regard for the Old Testament.117 Yet for Calvin, just as for Luther, the revelation under the new covenant is superior to that under the old. R. S. Wallace sum­ marizes Calvin's view of this superiority by making six comparisons. The revelation under the new covenant is (1) richer and fuller, (2) more vivid and distinct, (3) more satisfying, (4) more familiar, (5) more immediately substantial, (6) simpler.118 In this revelation we not only have the shadow of things to come but hear of the Son of God who became incarnate. Here the "rude lineaments," the "outlines" are re­ placed by the "living colors." However even the believers of the new covenant must be content to live by faith alone. They cannot yet live by sight. They too can receive the promises only from the Word of God and the accompanying Spirit. (4) This leads to the relationship between Word and Spirit in Calvin. Calvin, no less than Luther, always emphasized the necessity of the Spirit in relation to the Word. He worked it out in his famous doctrine of the inner testimony of the Spirit. In fact, this testimony plays a role on various planes, (a) It is the final and definitive proof that scripture is from God himself. In the Institutes he describes it thus: For as God alone is a fit witness of himself in his Word, so also the Word will not find acceptance in men's hearts before it is sealed by the inward testimony of the Spirit. The same Spirit, therefore, who has spoken through the mouths of the prophets must penetrate into our hearts to persuade us that they faithfully proclaimed what had been divinely commanded."119 (b) The same testimony also gives the final certainty that the message of scripture is a message for us personally. "The letter, therefore, is dead. . . . But if through the Spirit it is really branded upon hearts, if it shows forth Christ, it is the word of life 'converting souls . . . giving wisdom to little ones,' etc."120 (c) The same testimony also "seals" the gospel upon our heart. The testimony of the Spirit is "a testimony we

116Calvin, Comm. on John 5:39. 117Cf. Niesel, Theology, pp. 106, 108. 118Cf. Wallace, Doctrine, pp. 32-39. 119Calvin, Institutes 1.7. 4. 1201^ 193 146 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL feel engraved like a seal upon our hearts, with the result that it seals the cleansing and sacrifice of Christ."121 All this does not mean that Calvin distinguishes two different testi­ monies, the one from scripture and the other from the Spirit. It is one and the same testimony that comes through scripture and the Spirit. He himself formulates it beautifully: By a kind of mutual bond the Lord has joined together the certainty of his Word and of his Spirit so that the perfect religion of the Word may abide in our minds when the Spirit, who causes us to con­ template God's face, shines; and that we in turn may embrace the Spirit with no fear of being deceived when we recognize him in his own image, namely, in the Word.122 Perhaps one could put it thus: in this conjunction of Word and Spirit the truth of God's revelation in its pro nobis structure is now fulfilled as his truth in nobis.123 It is also obvious that Calvin, although he formu­ lates it somewhat differently, is here in full agreement with Luther. One could say that Calvin conceptualized what really concerned Luther in his De servo arbitrio over against Erasmus.124 (5) Several authors have criticized Calvin for his unreserved accep­ tance of the whole canon. E. C. Blackman, for instance, is of the opinion that Calvin, rather than Luther, can be claimed as the fore­ father of modern literalist interpretation: "For Calvin the Bible itself, rather than Christ in it, is the final authority. Thus Calvin is the progenitor of Biblical literalism."125 Now it cannot be denied that Calvin did accentuate scripture in its totality as the Word of God. The reason was his firm conviction that there is an underlying unity in all of scripture. Everywhere it proclaims the same doctrina: God's grace in Jesus Christ. For this very reason he felt no need to subject certain parts of scripture to a theological critique a la Luther. In all his commentaries he proceeds from the given unity. It may be true that at times this leads him to a somewhat forced harmo­ nization. But this is quite different from a forced literalism, as Black-

121Ibid. 3. 1. 1. See also ibid. 3. 1. 3: "Until our minds become intent upon the Spirit, Christ, so to speak, lies idle because we coldly contemplate him as outside ourselves— indeed, far from us." 122Ibid. 1. 9. 3. 123See Rossouw, Klarheid, p. 236. 124See Stuhlmacher, Verstehen, p. 99. 125E. C. Blackman, Biblical interpretation (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1957), p. 125. See also p. 117. It is striking that Blackman in dealing with the view of the Reformers usually quotes only secondary sources! THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 147 man asserts. The latter would be possible only if Calvin had advocated a theory of mechanical inspiration, but such a theory is in fact entirely foreign to his whole way of thinking. One can see this by considering Calvin's use of the idea of "accom­ modation" in his doctrines of both revelation and scripture. Again and again he emphasizes that God's self-revelation to us always involves accommodation on God's side. This is true not only of his self-revela­ tion in the Old Testament dispensation,126 but even of his self-revela­ tion in Jesus Christ. True, in Jesus God himself comes to us, but he manifests himself in thefleshl The whole idea of incarnation itself means accommodatio Dei, as Calvin says, appealing to Irenaeus: "The Father, himself infinite, becomes finite in the son, for he has accommodated himself to our little measure lest our minds be overwhelmed by the immensity of his glory."127 One who holds such a view of revelation can be accused neither of a mechanical view of inspiration nor, accordingly, of literalism. Such a person is too deeply aware of the fact that "finitum non capax infiniti" (the finite cannot possibly contain the infinite). His hermeneutics, accordingly, will be characterized by a humble and obedient submis­ sion to the Word of him who condescended so deeply that he entered into our human forms of thought and our human words—in fact into our human existence under the veil of flesh. Exactly at this point Calvin and Luther are again in the deepest harmony. For Luther, Jesus Christ in his humanity is the place to which God summons us. He alone is the mercy seat of the New Testament. Only in him is God now present with men. If we seek God outside of Christ, we will not find him, even if we look for him in heaven.128 According to Calvin, God has disclosed himself in his grace and mercy only in Jesus Christ, and we must therefore hold fast solely to this one and not attempt to seek God outside of him.129 And because for both of them scripture speaks of Christ, scripture for both of them is the Word of God for us.

CONCLUSION I shall now make a few comments on the significance of the Reform­ ers' hermeneutical insights for our own understanding of scripture. 126Wallace, Doctrine, pp. 2ff. 127Calvin, Institutes 2. 6. 4.; see also Klaas Runia, Karl Barth's Doctrine of Holy Scripture (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1962), pp. 69-70. 128See Althaus, Theology, p. 22. 129See Niesel, Theology, p. 119. 148 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

(1) It is evident that we live in a quite different historical situation. After the Reformation some important developments took place, which, whether we like it or not, to a great extent determine our own way of understanding scripture. We are all post-Enlightenment peo­ ple. We are all aware of the fact that the eighteenth century saw the start of historical-critical research of scripture and that the historical-critical school is still the leading school in biblical interpretation. Admittedly, it has lately been joined by such new schools as structuralist exegesis, materialist exegesis, and feminist exegesis, but even these new schools do not deny the value of the various critical methods, such as literary criticism, form criticism, tradition criticism, and redaction criticism. (2) According to most theologians, the post-Reformation rise of historical criticism means that we cannot possibly read the Bible as the Reformers did. This does not mean that all their hermeneutical insights have utterly lost their value. As a matter of fact, even some of the most critical scholars, such as Gerhard Ebeling,130 maintain that the her­ meneutics of the Reformers contain many valuable insights which we' ignore only to our own detriment. And yet Ebeling and others also believe that we can no longer share the Reformers' basic approach to scripture. In an article on "The Crisis of the Scripture Principle,"131 Wolfhart Pannenberg points out that Luther's insistence on the literal sense of scripture and the corresponding doctrine of the clarity of scripture proceeded on the assumption "that the most important or 'essential' content (die Sache) of Scripture arises clearly and univocally from its words when they are expounded in accordance with sound ex­ egesis."132 According to Pannenberg, such an approach to scripture now belongs to the past. Modern theologians cannot possibly accept this any longer. There are two important differences between Luther and us.133 (a) For Luther the literal sense of the scriptures was still identical with their historical content, (b) Luther could still identify his own doctrine with the content of the biblical writings. Both assumptions are impossible for the modern theologian, since he is aware of a twofold gap: (a) there

130See his essay, "The Spirit of the Critical Historical Method for Church and Theology in Protestantism," in Gerhard Ebeling, Word and Faith (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1963), pp. 17-61, especially p. 51. 131 \y Pannenberg, Basic Questions in Theology (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970), pp. 1-14. 132Ibid., p. 5. 133Ibid., pp. 6ff.; see also pp. 96ff. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 149 is a gap between the (New Testament) documents and the actual history to which they witness; (b) there is a gap between the docu­ ments and our own situation. This twofold gap means that we cannot simply go to the texts in order to find the "essential content" (die Sache) there. Pannenberg puts it thus: "For our historical consciousness the 'essential content' of Scripture which Luther had in mind, viz., the person and history of Jesus, is no longer to be found in the texts themselves, but must be discovered behind them."134 (3) It is evident that, by comparison with the Reformation under­ standing, this is quite a novel approach indeed, and that it leads to a quite different understanding of the message of scripture. But is this approach justified? And is it a necessary consequence of the historical critical method as such? I believe that the answer to both questions must be negative. I believe, however, that the problem does not lie in the methods them­ selves, i.e., in various critical techniques (which can be used by evan­ gelicals too), but rather in the presupposition which underlies the modern theologian's use of critical method. The fact is that this presup­ position runs counter to the whole tenor of scripture itself. Contrary to modern theology, scripture itself everywhere presupposes that we have to do with an interpretation of an actual history of salvation. We do not meet with nuda facta, bare facts, but always with interpreted facts. The interpretation belongs to the fact, just as much as the fact is the presupposition of the interpretation. In scripture, fact and interpreta­ tion are inseparable. The interpretation is not something added after­ wards as a kind of "extra." Nor is it something that can take the place of a fact that never happened the way it is "described" in the interpreta­ tion. The fact itself becomes transparent as to its actual meaning (i.e., as to its revelatory and saving dimension) only in the interpretation. Likewise, the interpretation is a message of revelation and salvation only when it interprets a real fact. In other words, fact and interpreta­ tion together are die Sache. (4) It may be true, of course, that the Reformers were pre-critical theologians and that for this reason they were not so much aware of the historical development that lies behind many Bible books. Yet the Reformers' essential understanding of scripture was in conformity with scripture's own self-understanding.135 The Reformers were right in their belief that the message of the gospel is to be found in the texts and nowhere else. God did not leave the interpretation of the history of

134Ibid., p. 7 (emphasis added). 135See Klaas Runia, Prediking en Historisch-Kritisch Onderzoek (Kampen: Kok, 1972). 150 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL salvation, which is an actual and factual history, to the arbitrary judg­ ment of some clever historians, but he sent his prophets to Israel and gave his apostles to the New Testament church. In other words, God himself provided the interpreters of his own acts in history. Sometimes the interpretation was given even before the act took place (as in Exod. 3), so that God's people would know that they had to do with an act of God. In many other cases the interpretation followed the event, as we find it, for instance, in the books of Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles and in the New Testament gospels and the epistles. But whether before or after the event, the prophets and the apostles did nothing else than unfold that which was implied in the facts themselves.136 The inter­ pretation is always the secret that is present in the fact and that becomes visible in the unfolding. When, for instance, in the gospels and the epistles the apostles interpret Jesus Christ, both as to his person and as to his work, they do not put their own subjective interpretation upon his person and work, but derive it from his person and work. The Reformers were therefore entirely right when they looked for the gospel in the very words of the texts. (5) It should be observed that only with such an approach can we continue to share the Reformers' belief in the clarity or perspicuity of scripture. Modern biblical scholarship has lost sight of this idea. Since in the opinion of most scholars the real truth lies behind the texts, the Bible again becomes an obscure book, the understanding of which becomes dependent upon the "high priests" of modern scholarship. This means that the lay reader is again relegated to a position of dependence on the expert. In fact, some scholars do not hesitate to say so. Some years ago Prof. L. G. Geering of New Zealand openly stated: If the Bible is to continue to be the rule of the church's faith and practice, and the basis of continuing reformation, the study of it must necessarily be the task of the specialist. The Bible is a book from the ancient world and must be studied in the light of modern scholarship and all that it can tell us about the world that bequeathed us the Bible. The Holy Spirit is no more likely to reveal all its truth to the lay reader, however sincere, than He is to reveal the cure to the lay medical practitioner.137

136See Th.C. Vriezen, Hoofdlijnen der Theologie van het Oude Testament (Wageningen: Veenman, 1954), pp. 147ff; see also idem, "Geloof, Openbaring en Gescheidenis," in Kerk en Theologie 16 (1965):215. 137L. G. Geering in an article in The Outlook, Sept. 25,1965; see also Alan Richardson on the critical study of the Bible in the 18th and 19th centuries, in 'The Rise of Modern Biblical Scholarship," ch. 8 of The Cambridge History of the Bible (Cambridge: University Press, 1963), 3.301; see also my booklet, Where Stands the Bible Today? (n.p., n.d.), pp. 12ff. THE HERMENEUTICS OF THE REFORMERS 151

This is the inescapable consequence if one can no longer say with Luther (and Calvin) that scripture is its own interpreter: "in itself most certain, most easy, most open, its own interpreter, testing, judging, and illuminating everything."138 (6) All this can be said of scripture only because it is full of the gospel of Jesus Christ—in fact, full of Christ himself. This is the key to the hermeneutics of the Reformers. Ralph W. Doermann says: "It cannot be denied that Luther used whatever methods were necessary to find Christ behind every bush and beneath every stone. But he did this because he had first heard the living voice addressing him. Regardless of method Luther continually pointed beyond himself to the Living Word who speaks when and where he will through the Scriptures."139 No one can ever understand scripture unless he sees that everything in it is related to Jesus Christ, who is the scopus of scripture. Nor can anyone understand scripture unless he is personally related to Jesus Christ. The Reformers were "modern" in the best sense of the word in their realization that true interpretation presupposes and requires existential involvement. Theirs was an existential interpretation through and through. However, they never made the modern mistake of making our human existence determinative for what is of value in scripture. "Not we [with our existential understanding] comprehend the biblical word . . . but in the biblical word Christ apprehends us and creates faith or unbelief, life or death."140 Only when we discover this truth does the Bible become an open book for us. Then it no longer is the Word of God in an abstract or conventional sense, but it becomes God's Word pro me. On the one hand, this is a painful experience, for our own existence is exposed in all its sinfulness and alienation. On the other hand (and simultaneously!), it is a most joyful experience, for our sinful and alienated existence is healed by the grace of Christ. Because this is the secret of the Bible, we will never be "ready" with it, but it will prove to be full of surprises, again and again. Indeed Luther was right when in his last written words he wrote that we need at least centum anni (a hundred years) to grasp the holy scriptures sufficiently. (7) Finally, if we want to come to a truly biblical hermeneutics, we must realize with the Reformers that the Word of God cannot be understood without the illumination of the Spirit of God. Luther and Calvin never tired of emphasizing this. Let me give just one quotation

138W4 7:97, "per sese certissima, facillima, apertissima, sui ipsius interpres, omnium omnia probans, iudicans et illuminans." 139See Doermann, //Principles/, p. 25. 140Kurt Fror, Biblische Hermeneutik (Munich, Chr. Kaiser Verlag, 1964), p. 24. 152 CALVIN THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

from each of them. Luther writes concerning the preaching of the Word (the same is true of the existential understanding of the written Word): "It is easy enough for someone to preach the Word to me, but only God can put it into my heart, or nothing at all will come of it. If God remains silent, the final effect is as though nothing had happened."141 Calvin says the same in a sermon on 1 Timothy 3:8-10: When we come to hear the sermon or to take up the Bible, we must not have the foolish arrogance of thinking that we shall easily understand everything we hear or read. But we must come with reverence, we must wait entirely upon God, knowing that we need to be taught by his Holy Spirit, and that without Him we cannot understand anything that is shown to us in his Word.142 This is still as true today as it was in the days of the Reformers. We can never dispose of scripture. Even when, with the Reformers, we believe in the clarity of scripture and affirm that scripture is its own interpreter, we nevertheless depend on him who alone can open the door to the treasure house. The final key to the hermeneutics of the Reformers is the confession "Spiritus Sanctus est Verus Interpres Scripturae" (the Holy Spirit is the true interpreter of scripture). Therefore the beginning and end of all biblical hermeneutics is the humble prayer "Veni Creator Spiritus" (Come, Creator Spirit).

141WA 10.3:260. ™2CO 53:300. ^s

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