Abraham Kuruvilla - Judges: A Theological Commentary for Preachers

Theology, Goals, Prolegomena

Let those who love Him be like the rising of the sun in its strength.

Judges :b

T he goal of preaching is to bring to bear divine guidelines for life from the biblical text upon the situation of the congregation, to align the community of God to the will of God for the glory of God. This is the preachers burdenthe translation from the then of the ancient text to the now of modern listeners, with authority and relevance . This commentary is part of a larger endeavor to help the preacher make this move from text to praxis.

THEOLOGY

Elsewhere it was proposed that the critical component of the ancient text to be borne into the lives of the modern audience was the theology of the pericope, what the author is doing with what he is saying in the text.

All such discrete units of pericopal theology together compose a holistic understanding of God and his relationship to his people, with each individual quantum of pericopal theology forming the weekly ground of transformation of the lives of Gods people into Christlikeness. In a sense, this week-by-week and sermon-by-sermon alignment to the call of each pericope is an imitation of Christ. This is at the core of the theological hermeneutic followed in this commentary, a christiconic hermeneutic specifically geared for preaching. In other words, while pericopal theology describes what Christ looks like, sermon applications based on pericopal theology tell us how we can begin to look more like him in our own particular circumstances. Unfortunately, the importance of the pericope and its theologywhat the author is doing with what he is sayingand its employment in sermons for the edification of Gods people, have generally been neglected by Bible scholars. This work seeks to correct that misdirection.

GOALS

This commentary is part of a long-term endeavor to rectify the neglect of the pericope and its theology. Its goal is essentially this: to develop the theology of each pericope of Judges for preachers so that they may be able to proceed from this crucial intermediary to a sermon that provides valid application (i.e., application that is both authoritative and relevant). There is, thus, a twofold aspect to the homiletical transaction: the exposition of the theology of the pericope, and the delineation of how the latter may be applied in real life.

The first move, from text to (pericopal) theology, draws meaning from the biblical text with authority; the second, from theology to praxis, directs meaning to the situations of listeners with relevance. The advantage of employing pericopal theology as the intermediary between text and application is that its specificity for the chosen text makes possible a weekly movement from pericope to pericope, without the tedium of repetition of themes, but with a clear progression and development of distinct theological ideas as one preaches through a book. In sum, the theology of the pericope (a crystallization of which is labeled Theological Focus in this commentary) functions as the bridge between text and praxis, enabling the move from the then to the now for valid application. The resulting transformation of lives reflects a gradual and increasing alignment to the values of Gods kingdom and thus an increasing approximation of Christlikeness, as pericopes are sequentially preached. So, a pericope, as a quantum of the biblical text, is more than informing ; it is transforming . Sermon by sermon and pericope by pericope, Gods people are being conformed into the image of Christ by the power of Gods Spirit (Rom :, )a christiconic hermeneutic.

This commentary, as with the others in this series, adopts a synchronic approach that deals with the final form of the text as we have it, construing it as a meaningful, coherent, canonical unit of theological worth. I take it that a biblical author writes purposefully, creating a text with intention, each part of it contributing to the overall theological agenda of the book. Each of the narratives in Judges has a literary integrity apart from circumstances relating to the compositional process, the historical reality behind the story, or the interpretive agenda of the reader and that privileging the pericope and its literary features will reveal its thrust, the theology of the pericope. This, of course, is not to deny the relationship between the pericope and the larger narrative it is part of. As with pearls and the necklace they make uppearls are carefully chosen by color, grade, shape, and size to create the necklacepericopes, too, are diligently selected and linked to create the larger account. Pericopes, thus, are interpreted by the arc of the broader text they create and, in turn, the trajectory of the overall text is determined by the theological thrusts of the individual pericopes it comprises. It is a both... and... situation, a dual polarity true of any interpretive endeavor: the parts determine the whole and the whole determines the parts.