Crossing boundaries : the transformative potential of intercultural Bible reading in secular/post-secular contexts

Date
2021-11
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Department of Old and New Testament, Stellenbosch University
Abstract
Intercultural biblical hermeneutics is a fairly recent development in biblical scholarship in general. It emphasises that biblical interpretation almost always takes place in contexts where an array of cultural values and beliefs determine the outcome of the interpretative process. Although this branch of biblical hermeneutics emerged from the need to reflect theoretically on how Christians from different socio-cultural and socio-economic contexts engage the biblical texts, and one another on account of those texts, this approach may also be widened to include the interpretation of the Bible in non-Christian contexts (including the contexts of other religions and secular contexts) or even to engage in discourse on the interpretation of authoritative texts of different traditions (such as the Qur’an in Islam, in addition to the Tenakh of Judaism, and the Old and New Testament of Christianity). In research on intercultural biblical hermeneutics, it has been noticed that intercultural interpretation holds enormous transformative potential. My paper will examine how this could be of use in engagements between religious, secular and post-secular contexts.
Description
CITATON: Jonker, L. C. 2021. Crossing boundaries : the transformative potential of intercultural Bible reading in secular/post-secular contexts. Scriptura, 120(1):1-13, doi:10.7833/120-1-1982.
The original publication is available at https://scriptura.journals.ac.za
Keywords
Bible -- Hermeneutics, Bible -- Study and teaching, Religion and culture
Citation
Jonker, L. C. 2021. Crossing boundaries : the transformative potential of intercultural Bible reading in secular/post-secular contexts. Scriptura, 120(1):1-13, doi:10.7833/120-1-1982.