Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

FAITH AND THE HISTORICAL JESUS §6.4
tation. Here too the above survey has produced some enduring insights on which
it is still important to build.
a. Historical Text as Historical Text
If the Renaissance and Reformation recognition of the distance and difference of
the past continues to provide a fundamental perspective for historical inquiry, so
too their reappropriation of the fact that the original texts of the NT were not first
composed in the lingua franca of western Europe (Latin) likewise continues to
provide a fundamental hermeneutical principle. In other words, the necessity and
character of translation become a basic factor in any contemporary use of these
texts to speak about Jesus. Modern readings of the NT in North America in particular
sometimes seem to forget that the NT texts were not first written in English.
In reality, to anyone who lacks knowledge of Greek, the texts are little
more than indecipherable squiggles on the page. In order that they may be read in
the first place, these squiggles must be identified as Greek, and as ancient Greek.
And in order that they may be conveyors of any meaning these ancient Greek
words need to be read within the context of the language usage of the time. 50 Historical
philology is still essential and unavoidable. 51 It inevitably follows that the
Greek text (even in its modern, eclectic form) is normative in regard to any and
every translation; unless the Greek text is recognized as determining and limiting
the range and diversity of translation, then the translation loses its claim to legitimacy
as a translation.
Transpose this into the language of the current hermeneutical debate and
the consequences begin to become clearer. The point can be put simply: there are
such things as bad, or even (dare one say it?) wrong translations. 52 Presumably
50. Here again I acknowledge my debt to Collingwood, Idea of History 244.
51. Schleiermacher summed up the gains of previous discussion by defining the two
canons for 'grammatical interpretation': 'First canon. A more precise determination of any
point in a given text must be decided on the basis of the use of language common to the author
and his original public'; 'Second canon. The meaning of each word of a passage must be determined
by the context in which it serves' {Hermeneutics: The Handwritten Manuscripts by
F. D. E. Schleiermacher, ed. H. Kimmerle [ET Missoula: Scholars, 1977]) excerpted by
Mueller-Vollmer, Hermeneutics Reader 86, 90. Similarly Bultmann: 'every text speaks in the
language of its time and of its historical setting. This the exegete must know; therefore, he must
know the historical conditions of the language of the period out of which the text he is to interpret
has arisen' ('Exegesis without Presuppositions' 344).
52. An interesting feature of the libel action brought by David Irving (n. 8 above) was
the number of points at which the case hung on allegations of Irving's mistranslation of German
documents. In his Judgment, Mr Justice Gray found the allegations to be well founded
(most explicitly §13.31).
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