Russell R. Reno on Reading Genesis Theologically

Russell R. Reno, ‘Reading the Bible with the Church’, Calvin Theological Journal 43, 1 (2008), 35-47.

One of a number of essays devoted to Genesis in this issue of Calvin Theological Journal, this one explores some issues related to theological interpretation of Scripture, on which Reno has published elsewhere.

Reno is slated to write the commentary on Genesis in the ‘Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible’ series (published by SCM in the UK) for which he is also the general editor. The inaugural volume was Jaroslav Pelikan, Acts (Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2005), though a number of others have appeared since.

Reno writes that the series is written with ‘the conviction that dogma clarifies rather than obscures’ (‘Series Preface’, in Pelikan, Acts, 13). The aim of the series is to use the Nicene tradition as the ‘proper basis for the interpretation of the Bible as Christian Scripture’, on the understanding that ‘doctrine provides structure and cogency to scriptural interpretation’ (‘Series Preface’, 14, 16.). Hence the series has turned to theologians rather than biblical scholars, ‘chosen because of their knowledge of and expertise in using the Christian doctrinal tradition’ (‘Series Preface’, 14).

These same concerns are explored in this essay on Genesis focusing particularly on the contentious issues of the ‘beginning’ in 1:1 and of ‘creation out of nothing’ in 1:2.

Reno notes that exegetes fear that theological loyalties ‘have for too long overdetermined our reading of Scripture’ (37), and that ‘many modern readers recoil at the notion that doctrine should be relevant to any critically responsible approach to the Bible’ (42).

But he wonders whether biblical exegesis may be ‘blind to the wealth of reasons in favor of traditional readings’ (37), asks whether doctrine is ‘really so alien to a close analysis of the biblical text’ (35), and says that ‘we ignore our dogmatic, ecclesiastical, liturgical, and spiritual traditions at our peril’ (47).

He is not advocating an approach which ignores or distorts the text, but recognises that ‘doctrines such as creatio ex nihilo became authoritative precisely because communities of readers found them to be very helpful guides to a coherent, overall reading of Scripture’ (42).

‘A theological reader is theo-logical precisely because he or she wants to read Scripture in such a way as to sustain a coherent view of God’s plan and purpose’ (39).

‘[D]octrinal governance of scriptural interpretation is not a simpleminded submission to a biblically extrinsic authority. Traditional doctrines involve complex, multilayered exegetical judgments that operate across the biblical text as a whole’ (46).