Browsing by Author "Chisango, Andrew"

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    The Noah flood narrative within the context of cyclone Idai in Zimbabwe : an exegetical and hermeneutical study of Genesis 6:5 – 9:17
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2024-02 ) Chisango, Andrew; Jonker, Louis C.; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Theology. Dept. of Old and New Testament.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This research entails an investigation into the interpretation of the Genesis Flood story (Genesis 6-9) by Zimbabwean Christians in the Chipinge and Chimanimani areas. The special focus is on finding out the impact that the flooding during Cyclone Idai had on their understanding of the biblical flood narrative. A close look into most of Zimbabwean church leaders and ordinary readers’ appropriations of biblical narratives indicates that they tend to ignore historical-critical and social-scientific methods of biblical interpretation and prefer allegorical and/or literary self-projective reading methods. This kind of reading of the scriptures is applied to the Genesis flood story by most preachers and readers in the Chipinge and Chimanimani areas that had the most damage during Cyclone Idai in 2019. This has far-reaching implications both for how they make sense of the devastating event of the cyclone, as well as on how they may re ad the entire Bible in specific contexts. The research wants to study the methodological implications those Zimbabwean interpretations have for doing critical-scientific exegesis. There are several exegetical methodologies that are typically used in academic study to analyze the stories of the Old Testament and the Bible. These methods normally focus on the literary, historical, and theological dimensions of the biblical texts in order to reveal the intended meanings of a biblical passage, before the passage is interpreted in modern-day contexts. The question that stands central in this research is how, if at all, a combination of scientific methodological insights with lay readings of Genesis 6-9 can enrich our contemporary understandings, given the contextual experience of Zimbabweans during Cyclone Idai. The research therefore engages with the existing methodological tensions between Western and African readers of the Bible and asks how these could be integrated through communal and multidimensional approaches, for the benefit of both critical-scientific and lay readers’ understanding of the Bible within the context of the African continent.