Volume 3, Issue 1

This article studies the role of theological preunderstanding in interpreting the text of Scripture in the middle of the fourth century CE. It investigates Hilary of Poitier’s use of Scripture in Trinitarian controversies, his hermeneutical approach in his De Trinitate , and his theological exegesis of John 1:1–2. It is contended that Hilary’s pro-Nicene theology determined his particular reading of the opening verses of the Gospel of John. The article demonstrates how this exactly worked. Encountering the exegesis of Arius/‘Arians’/Latin Homoeans, Hilary attempted to show that the Son was eternally born from the Father and therefore, one could not speak about the temporal or even pre-temporal beginning of the Son’s existence. The Son already “was” “in the beginning.”

Of all biblical topoi within the repertoire of Western culture, the Gog and Magog narratives have a presence in literary reception history that far outweighs their slender beginnings. They tend also to be an alien element in the metanarratives in which they occur. Even in their earliest biblical manifestation, the ‘Go’ narratives seem to have been grafted onto an existing text. Almost always, their use implies the recovery of the archaic as a means of replenishing or revitalizing present culture. At the same time they persistently signal the phenomenon of the unassimilable in human experience. The topos of Gog of the land of Magog in Ezekiel 38–39 modulates into the twin apocalyptic figures of Gog and Magog of Revelation 20:8–9. Later they become part of the conceptualization of the cultural Other, the uncivilized hordes which must be kept at bay. In European literature they assume a plastic form as representations of what is excluded from culture. In British literature (with which we will be chiefly concerned) they occupy an ambiguous position as figures of the defeated paganism which Christianity has replaced and yet as symbols of a hopeful or whimsical alterity which resists the language, the hegemonic discourse, of the status quo.

This article examines how a prophetic religious tradition can exploit the gaps of indeterminacy within a biblical text, in order to develop new readings in response to changing circumstances. Using Brennan Breed’s ideas about biblical texts as “objectiles,” which are prone to change throughout their life, this article traces the interpretation of Genesis 49:10 in the history of a modern prophetic movement. The article proceeds to examine how members of the so-called Southcottian visitation – a British prophetic movement started in the early nineteenth century by the self-proclaimed prophet Joanna Southcott – have used this text to shape their identity and beliefs. By examining how Southcottian prophets of different generations have handled this text – ranging from Southcott herself to a female-led organisation called the Panacea Society established in the early twentieth century – we can see how prophetic readers have used their authority to guide interpretation of the text, and have shaped how it ought to be read within their respective communities. The article shows how Southcottian readers generate a range of different readings of Genesis 49:10, exploring a series of alternative identities and genders for “Shiloh,” and developing new reading strategies for ascertaining the meaning of the term. The article concludes by reflecting on how the text is affected by the Southcottians’ treatment, and how prophetic readers can exert their authority to even change the text itself. Examining how such idiosyncratic readers receive – and change – biblical texts is an important area for investigation by reception-historians keen to understand what texts can do when handled by their diverse readers. Looking at the reception of biblical texts within heterodox religious traditions also raises methodological challenges: it underscores how readings within a religious tradition are processual, develop over time, and can be generated through private, archival correspondence as well as in published media.

The present paper presupposes (developed under the scope of Semiotics and Cultural Studies) that texts in culture are endowed not only with their capacity to produce images but mainly to create new messages. As texts are transmitted to receivers in different times, places and repertoires, they undergo processes of recodification and become new texts by inserting dynamism in cultural processes. Furthermore, it must be taken into account that texts do not exist isolated, without relation with other texts. On the contrary, the possible combinations among them are potentially the most unexpected. Those references allow us to think about the creative role of the reception of biblical elements in the articulation of identities and narratives in history. And a special challenge is imposed: considering the Bible’s popular reception. It is necessary to take into consideration specific scenarios and, simultaneously, the dynamic scenarios of the same reception. It is important to overcome prejudice regarding the sources that lead us to that reception. At the Belo Monte of Antonio Conselheiro, stage of one of the most significant social and religious experiences, and, at the end, one of the bloodiest experiences of Brazilian history, the Bible’s new readings link many of its themes to references coming from other mythological worlds of African origin and (mainly) of indigenous matrix. The myth of the flight into Egypt and the conquest of the Promised Land were linked to others connected with abundance and freedom. The biblical concept of the Antichrist played a significant role in the sertanejo’s understanding about the social and the political environment: Belo Monte was the place where salvation could be perceived and the body could be fed and healed. And the perspective of the imminent end of the world became more intense when military operations, through a brutal war, acted in order to destroy the holy village: biblical references supported ideas that encouraged resistance movement and prepared the “death in the Lord,” martyrdom, under Judgment Day expectation.

After the Six-Day War, members of the American Schools of Oriental Research experienced conflict over how and whether to maintain the organization’s policy on political neutrality. This article argues that ASOR members who supported Israel framed their views as theological, lauding the war for achieving a mystical unification of Jerusalem, while members who opposed the war’s outcome responded that appeals to theology and neutrality were being deployed to justify one ethnic group’s domination over another. I present two main examples, George Ernest Wright and Paul Lapp, and connect their scholarly views on objectivity versus relativism to their political views on the conflict. Wright, a biblical theologian, argued the Old Testament was an objective record of a religion revealed by God to the Israelites and defended the slaughter of Canaanites in terms that echoed justifications for Palestinian displacement. Conversely Lapp, who read the Old Testament as a polemical text, overtly connected his perspectivalism to his pro-Palestinian politics. In 1968 Wright clashed with ASOR residents, including Lapp, who protested Israeli plans to reroute a parade through recently captured areas of East Jerusalem. A reading of the correspondence record created after the protest analyzes the political implications of these differing scholarly positions.

This article examines the charismatic New Zealand politician Winston Peters’ sparse use of the Bible as a case study in the propagation of the “Cultural” and “Liberal” Bibles across the relatively irreligious landscape of New Zealand’s political landscape. It considers why politicians continue to employ biblical rhetoric despite increasing indifference towards Christianity and the Bible, by situating such moves within the context of global capitalism. It also identifies some peculiarities of the political use of the Bible unique to the New Zealand situation and explores how these have aided the construction of distinctive political identities. “Jesus said to him, ‘No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the Kingdom of God’.” – Luke 9:62 “The Old Testament was my textbook.” – Winston Peters