Reading the Bible Interculturally: An Invitation to the Evangelical Covenant Church and Evangelical Christianity

How do Asian American, Latino/a American, and African American Christians Interpret the Bible?

When they apply and live out its message in their respective contexts, what can the wider church, especially European American Christians, learn from this lived theology? In this introduction, I seek to answer these questions as I address (1) what an intercultural interpretation of the Bible is, (2) how to practice it, and (3) why it matters for all Christians as we seek to proclaim God’s word faithfully in our complex, pluralistic world.

The Short History of a Pioneering Course

In spring 2009, a group of students of color petitioned the faculty of North Park Theological Seminary to modify the curriculum to reflect better the growing ethnic diversity of the Evangelical Covenant Church. From this request, a vision was born for a course on reading the Bible interculturally. With a group of eleven students, Bob Hubbard (now emeritus professor of Old Testament) and I launched a course titled “Ethnic American Biblical Interpretation” the following spring. The course integrated guest lectures from K.K. Yeo of Garrett Evangelical Theological Seminary and Bruce Fields of Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, who, as faculty of color, graciously shared their expertise. ¹These guest lecturers have also published in the area of ethnic biblical interpretation and theology. See, e.g., Yeo Khiok-khng, What Has Jerusalem Have to Do with Beijing? Biblical Interpretation from a Chinese Perspective (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity International Press, 1998) and Bruce Fields, Introducing Black Theology: Three Crucial Questions for the Evangelical Church (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2001).

Since that inaugural course, I have offered the course twice more, changed the course title to “Intercultural Readings of the Bible,” and most recently added class visits to the DuSable Museum of African American History, the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) Legacy Center of Chicago, and the National Museum of Mexican Art.

The following articles by Nilwona Nowlin and Erik Borggren are first fruits of this course, which continues to evolve and mature with each new group of students. It is my hope that the studies here will demonstrate what new questions can be asked from Scripture and what new and transforming insights can be gained when we read Scripture conscious of our own cultural location and with those whose ethnicity is different from our own.

What Is an Intercultural Reading of the Bible? A Preliminary Definition

As I present it in my course, reading the Bible interculturally (RBI) is the interpretation of the Old and New Testaments from the social location of ethnic Americans whose cultural roots lie in non-European traditions. The semester begins with learning the cultural histories of Asian Americans, Latino/a Americans, African Americans, and other ethnic groups living in the United States. Only after this do we delve into how these communities, who have been formed by these histories, interpret Scripture and seek to embody the gospel in their contexts. ²See especially the following ethnic histories: Ronald Takaki, Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans, rev. ed. (New York: Little, Brown and Company, 1998); Juan Gonzalez, Harvest of Empire: A History of Latinos in America, rev. ed. (New York: Penguin Books, 2011); Thomas C. Holt, Children of Fire: A History of African Americans (New York: Hill and Wang, 2010).

RBI as a method of biblical interpretation recognizes the distance that stands between the ancient contexts of Scripture and our contemporary contexts. For this reason we need to become students of history to determine what the text meant to its original, ancient audience (the process of exegesis), what it means today (the process of hermeneutics), and how its message ought to be applied and practiced in the life and ministry of the church (the process of theological reflection). ³James McClendon, Jr., Biography as Theology: How Life Stories Can Remake Today’s Theology, rev. ed. (Philadelphia: Trinity Press International, 1990), 22–23.

But to limit RBI to the processes of hermeneutics, theological reflection, and practice would be a misnomer. The cultural location of the reader does not simply shape their reception of Scripture’s meaning. Rather, this location can aid in accessing its meaning through the process of exegesis itself. While avoiding the dangers of “eisegesis” (reading meaning into the text), RBI can help illuminate the text’s meaning by drawing from the cultural, historical, social, and linguistic arsenal of the interpreter. Let me give a quick but poignant example.

Example: Translating ḥesed

One article that always proves illuminating for students in the RBI course is a chapter by Uriah Kim on the difficulties of translating the Hebrew word ḥesed, often rendered inadequately in English as “loving kindness.” Used some 246 times in the Old Testament, over half of which occur in the Psalms (as in Psalm 107:1), ḥesed is a difficult term to translate. A single English gloss such as “mercy,” “loving kindness,” “steadfast love,” “favor,” or even “grace” does not convey the concept adequately.

The problem, as Kim points out, is that ḥesed has a semantic component of faithfulness or loyalty, in addition to mercy and kindness. God has mercy and kindness toward Israel, but he also demonstrates his faithfulness to his people when he rescues them from their enemies (e.g., Exodus 34:6–7; Numbers 14:18–19; Psalm 17:7; 51:1; 86:13; 117:2; 119:41). In terms of human relationships, ḥesed describes affection between friends but also loyalty and mutual responsibility between them, as with David and Jonathan (1 Samuel 20:14–15). There simply is not an English word that can encapsulate both the affection-mercy and faithfulness-loyalty dimensions of ḥesed. ⁴Uriah Y. Kim, Identity and Loyalty in the David Story: A Postcolonial Reading (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2008); David A. Baer and Robert P. Gorden, “hsd,” in NIDOTTE 2, ed. Willem A. Van Gemeren (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1997), 211–18; H.J. Zobel, “ḥesed,” in TDOT 5, ed. G. Botterweck and H. Ringgren, trans. David Green (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986), 54–64.

Kim provocatively suggests that the Korean term jeong fills this semantic gap in the English lexicon. Jeong denotes a kind of “stickiness” between persons due to shared experience that remaps relationships, loyalty, and responsibility across existing social boundaries. In the context of God’s dealings with Israel, to speak about YHWH’s jeong is a helpful way to explain how Israel experienced the Lord’s faithfulness-mercy as they witnessed God’s mighty acts of salvation on their behalf time and time again. The “stickiness” between God and Israel has a distinctly soteriological context in history, and even the jeong between David and Jonathan is based on a commitment to YHWH’s promises (1 Samuel 20:14–15; 2 Samuel 22:51; 2 Chronicles 6:42).

The ability of another language to fill in semantic gaps left by English translations is just one of many ways RBI can help seminary students, pastors, lay leaders, and congregations become better interpreters of Scripture. I will let the articles in this issue demonstrate additional ways RBI aids the exegetical task, and even still, the articles do not exhaust all possibilities.

How Do We Practice Reading the Bible Interculturally? A Working Method

Latino biblical scholar Fernando Segovia holds that no one can automatically engage in a minority criticism of the Bible. A Latino/a American, for example, does not automatically interpret the Bible from a Latino/a American cultural location. He or she must intentionally read for the causes and concerns of Latino/a Americans. What is more, Segovia argues that it is not possible for a non-Latino/a to employ a Latino/a hermeneutic, even if that interpreter became deeply invested in the culture, politics, and social causes of Latino/a Americans and endeavored to interpret the Bible with these interests in mind. ⁵Fernando Segovia, “Toward Latino/a American Biblical Criticism: Latin(o/a)ness as Problematic,” in They Were All Together in One Place? Toward Minority Biblical Criticism, ed. Randall Bailey, et al., SBL Semeia Studies 57 (Atlanta: SBL Press, 2009), 201–223.

Segovia insists that someone not shaped by the particularities of an ethnic history cannot possibly develop the insider’s perspective, the cultural instincts, or the emotional and aesthetic tastes inherent to those raised within that ethnic community. The person may study another culture with encyclopedic scope but will still never feel or think, love or hate, or have the same gut-reactions to life’s variegated tragedies as those who have occupied that space since birth. Segovia’s caution should humble all of us: the desire to read Scripture interculturally demands hard work and perseverance in pursuing intercultural competence.

For this reason, I incorporate an experiential component into the course through required field trips. One can gain knowledge of the history of Japanese internment from Takaki’s Strangers from a Different Shore, but it is another matter to visit the JASC Legacy Center of Chicago and hear firsthand the story of a woman who survived the internment camps as a child. ⁶For more information on the JASC, see their website and especially their Legacy Center Archives and Library: http://www.jasc-chicago.org/legacy-center-archive-library.

Being born Asian American does not mean that I can automatically read from and for Asian American communities. Segovia reminds me that I need to be born again culturally and apply myself to an intense study of my own cultural history. Only then can I adequately interpret Scripture in a way that directly addresses the unique spiritual and communal challenges faced by Asian American churches.

That said, I remain optimistic that anyone can practice an intercultural reading of the Bible, even from within a cultural location that is not their own. Benny Liew objects to the “it-takes-one-to-know-one” assumption and offers an Asian American biblical hermeneutic that can be practiced by all. Liew defines RBI as an interdisciplinary enterprise that hinges upon both ethnic/cultural studies and biblical scholarship. ⁷Tat-Siong Benny Liew, What Is Asian American Biblical Hermeneutics? Reading the New Testament (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2008).

So long as one is willing to mine the literature, history, politics, and culture of a particular ethnic group, that person may seek to apply the biblical text to this specific cultural location, regardless of their own ethnicity or cultural location. Asian American studies, Latino/a American studies, and African American studies are well-defined academic disciplines, and the biblical interpreter who practices RBI needs to engage these disciplines critically. A good starting point for the novice is Ronald Takaki’s Strangers from a Different Shore, Juan Gonzalez’s Harvest of Empire, and Thomas Holt’s Children of Fire. ⁸See note above for full citations.

Concerning the second discipline, biblical studies, Liew makes a case for practicing a post-colonial hermeneutic. While I find post-colonial interpretation helpful for its analysis of power relations within systems and its goal to empower disenfranchised minority communities, I have accepted Liew’s invitation to pursue alternatives, opting instead for historical criticism. Despite its limitations, I believe the historical-critical method provides the best interpretative framework for allowing the biblical text to speak to us as “other” in its own historically contingent voice rather than overriding its voice with our own. ⁹Kevin Vanhoozer, Is There a Meaning in This Text? The Bible, the Reader, and the Morality of Literary Knowledge (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998); Kevin Vanhoozer, “Introduction: What Is Theological Interpretation of the Bible?” in the Dictionary for Theological Interpretation of the Bible, ed. K. Vanhoozer, et al. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005).

Finally, practicing RBI includes a critical engagement with the secondary literature of scholars who have interpreted Scripture in Asian American, Latino/a American, African American, and other ethnic American contexts. Minority biblical criticism is a burgeoning field in the academy, and there are many emerging scholars whose work in contextual interpretation and theology provides a sounding board for further dialogue and critical reflection. ¹⁰See collections such as Mary Foskett and Jeffrey Kah-Jin Kuan, eds., Ways of Being, Ways of Reading: Asian American Biblical Interpretation (St. Louis: Chalice, 2006); Francisco Lozada, Jr., and Fernando Segovia, eds., Latino/a Biblical Hermeneutics (SBL Semeia Studies 68, Atlanta: SBL Press, 2014); Cain Hope Felder, ed., Stony the Road We Trod (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991); Brian Blount, ed., True to Our Native Land (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007).

Why Is Reading the Bible Interculturally Important? A Sincere Invitation

One of the biggest ironies of biblical interpretation is the suspicion that RBI would encourage the interpreter to read something “foreign” into the text and as a consequence distort the text’s meaning. But the opposite is actually true. RBI, rather than encouraging “eisegesis,” functions as a mirror to help expose the reader’s own presuppositions so that he or she can interpret Scripture more faithfully. This is especially true for the dominant white majority in North America, who often is oblivious to the “whiteness” of its own readings of the Bible. Because most European Americans cannot even define what whiteness or white culture is, they often mistake their own enculturated readings of the Bible for orthodoxy and are sometimes too quick to label ethnic American readings as “unorthodox.” Diverse social locations give rise to diverse, and at times more faithful, interpretations of Scripture. ¹¹A helpful collection on race and ideology: George Yancey, ed., Christology and Whiteness: What Would Jesus Do? (New York: Routledge, 2012); see Karen Teel, “What Jesus Wouldn’t Do: A White Theologian Engages Whiteness.”

Justo González points out that a majority of European American Christians in the North Atlantic world understand Moses primarily as a lawgiver. Alternatively, Latino/a American and African American traditions are more likely to view Moses as savior and liberator. These differing presuppositions can lead to divergent Christologies and readings of Scripture. The point is that all communities bring invisible presuppositions to the text; encountering one another’s readings exposes our blind spots and enriches the wider church.

My hope is that you will join me and the contributors of this issue on an ongoing journey of embodying the gospel for all nations, tribes, peoples, and languages, for the glory of God and for his mission in our divided and broken world.

This article originally published with the Covenant Quarterly on April 24, 2015.

Endnotes

• 1
  These guest lecturers have also published in the area of ethnic biblical interpretation and theology. See, e.g., Yeo Khiok-khng, What Has Jerusalem Have to Do with Beijing? Biblical Interpretation from a Chinese Perspective (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity International Press, 1998) and Bruce Fields, Introducing Black Theology: Three Crucial Questions for the Evangelical Church (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2001).
• 2
  See especially the following ethnic histories: Ronald Takaki, Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans, rev. ed. (New York: Little, Brown and Company, 1998); Juan Gonzalez, Harvest of Empire: A History of Latinos in America, rev. ed. (New York: Penguin Books, 2011); Thomas C. Holt, Children of Fire: A History of African Americans (New York: Hill and Wang, 2010).
• 3
  James McClendon, Jr., Biography as Theology: How Life Stories Can Remake Today’s Theology, rev. ed. (Philadelphia: Trinity Press International, 1990), 22–23.
• 4
  Uriah Y. Kim, Identity and Loyalty in the David Story: A Postcolonial Reading (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2008); David A. Baer and Robert P. Gorden, “hsd,” in NIDOTTE 2, ed. Willem A. Van Gemeren (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1997), 211–18; H.J. Zobel, “ḥesed,” in TDOT 5, ed. G. Botterweck and H. Ringgren, trans. David Green (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986), 54–64.
• 5
  Fernando Segovia, “Toward Latino/a American Biblical Criticism: Latin(o/a)ness as Problematic,” in They Were All Together in One Place? Toward Minority Biblical Criticism, ed. Randall Bailey, et al., SBL Semeia Studies 57 (Atlanta: SBL Press, 2009), 201–223.
• 6
  For more information on the JASC, see their website and especially their Legacy Center Archives and Library: http://www.jasc-chicago.org/legacy-center-archive-library.
• 7
  Tat-Siong Benny Liew, What Is Asian American Biblical Hermeneutics? Reading the New Testament (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2008).
• 8
  See note above for full citations.
• 9
  Kevin Vanhoozer, Is There a Meaning in This Text? The Bible, the Reader, and the Morality of Literary Knowledge (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998); Kevin Vanhoozer, “Introduction: What Is Theological Interpretation of the Bible?” in the Dictionary for Theological Interpretation of the Bible, ed. K. Vanhoozer, et al. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005).
• 10
  See collections such as Mary Foskett and Jeffrey Kah-Jin Kuan, eds., Ways of Being, Ways of Reading: Asian American Biblical Interpretation (St. Louis: Chalice, 2006); Francisco Lozada, Jr., and Fernando Segovia, eds., Latino/a Biblical Hermeneutics (SBL Semeia Studies 68, Atlanta: SBL Press, 2014); Cain Hope Felder, ed., Stony the Road We Trod (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991); Brian Blount, ed., True to Our Native Land (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007).
• 11
  A helpful collection on race and ideology: George Yancey, ed., Christology and Whiteness: What Would Jesus Do? (New York: Routledge, 2012); see Karen Teel, “What Jesus Wouldn’t Do: A White Theologian Engages Whiteness.”