Monday, August 27, 2012

Thoughts on Commentaries

Finally feeling the doors of time are opening to do some more reading - actually to catch up on reading is more like it - I've once again got a stack of books beside my night stand that's too tall and more than I can read before I need to return them to the library!

A few of the books in the stack are commentaries, two on Matthew's gospel and one on Luke-Acts. Commentaries have always been a love of mine for 20 years. I've referred to them, I've studied with them, I've read them. However, this love isn't without frustration; a frustration of two paradigms.

It is common - too common - that many authors write commentaries that are either too technical or too superficial. They are not always to be blamed since the vast majority of them are contracted to contribute to a series, managed by a publishing house. On the other hand, a balance between the technical and the practical is truly difficult to achieve.

In the intro to his Matthew commentary, theologian Stanley Hauerwas (Duke University) has some interesting thoughts on commentating (I am summarizing here), which I think can bridge this often artificial gap:

1. Don't write about the author, as if the book is fixed to a point and time; write with the author as if the book is written to us.
2. Retell the story as Matthew tells it.
3. Write so as to create a hunger in your audience to re-read Matthew.
4. The commentary is not a substitute for the Gospel. Hauerwas organized his commentary according to the chapter divisions of Matthew in the hopes that people would read Matthew first and then turn to his commentary for reflection/interaction.
5. An approach that the Matthew (and the bible, really) is a narrative (essentially) and not a poem to find meaning in every stanza.
6. Avoidance of sectarian and high-brow language.
7. No over-preoccupation with one, singular, over-arching meaning.
8. "Assertions are reports on judgements that require further inquiry." Think about it!
9. Respect for Matthew's compositional austerity and reticence displayed in his "gospeling".
10. No over-preoccupation with what we really don't know!

A long list, I realize - and I'm not usually one for "lists" - but good food for thought. If we never write a commentary, no worry - our lives should be commentaries!

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