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The Nature of Biblical Criticism
Biblical criticism faces increasing hostility on two from biblical conservatives, who claim it is inherently positivistic and religiously skeptical, and from postmodernists, who see it as driven by the falsities of objectivity and neutrality. In this magisterial overview of the key factors and developments in biblical studies, John Barton demonstrates that these evaluations of biblical criticism fail to do justice to the work that has been done by critical scholars over many generations. Traditional biblical criticism has had as its central concern a semantic a desire to establish the "plain sense" of the biblical text, which in itself requires sensitivity to many literary aspects of texts. Therefore, he argues, biblical criticism already includes many of the methodological approaches now being recommended as alternatives to it and, further, the agenda of biblical studies is far less fragmented than often thought.
190 pages, Paperback
First published June 4, 2007
4 people are currently reading
71 people want to read
About the author
John Barton
187 books63 followersJohn Barton is Oriel & Laing Professor of the Interpretation of Holy Scripture, University of Oxford. His publications include The Theology of the Book of Amos (Cambridge University Press, 2012) and Oracles of God: Perceptions of Ancient Prophecy in Israel after the Exile (2007).
For the Canadian poet, see John Barton.
For the Canadian poet, see John Barton.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
December 3, 2018
Read for class.
June 23, 2013
John Barton makes a cool-headed case for biblical criticism as an essentially literary rather than historical discipline. What Barton calls criticism is nearly identical to what he regards as just good reading. Here a seasoned scholar's mature judgments are on display.
March 21, 2011
This book is so good...so profound...so penetrating. It is as if Barton knew everything I have been chewing on for five or six years, anticipated the questions, answers, problems, and solutions, gathered it all together, and lucidly arranged it all in a veritable tour de force. There is really nothing I can say about what Barton has done well in this book that will do anything but subtract from his genius. So instead, this review will focus on the two negative criticisms I have that prevent me from awarding the book a five-star rating. If my criticisms are harsh, it is only because I am so enamored of the job Barton has done and feel like the star player has momentarily let the team down.
- a particular choice of terminology or definition -
Barton unnecessarily obfuscates his discussion by using Positivitic terms like “objective,” “value-neutral,” “detached,” or “without distortion” in non-Positivistic ways (and also attributes his highly questionable definitions to the Positivists themselves).
For instance, when Barton says “objective,” he means something like “refusing to simply read one's own ideas into the text” or “having a sense of detachment from the text.” In other words, to be “objective” for Barton is to say “what I think and what the text says are probably a little different.” Talk about a ludicrous definition. As if scholars using the term “objective” meant to differentiate their work from those who had no concept of a distance between themselves and the text. Who exactly were those people? Even the Surrealists of the Post-Modern movement had an awareness of something real beyond the subjective self—the “Sur” real. Even the most conservative interpreters understand that the text has a meaning that exists outside themselves (which Barton admits outright on p. 172). Few are the extremists who have ever thought or said “there is no way of encountering the text other than one already totally colored by one's own presuppositions,” who seem to be Barton's talking partners (p. 49). If that is what is “not objective,” then Barton's definition would be perfectly reasonable. But in my estimation, it is a mammoth caricature of those who are “not objective” and those who saw themselves as being “objective” in opposition to them.
When Barton says “value-neutral” or “detached,” he doesn't mean “without bias or prejudice,” which would be its plain sense, Positivist definition. Rather, he means something like “allowing one's perspective to be questioned.” If someone is unwilling to question their perspective, they are not value-neutral or detached, but who are those who have been totally unwilling to question their perspective? The problem wasn't that nobody thought “maybe I should allow what I think the text means to be questioned.” The problem was that certain folk were okay with allowing what they thought the text should mean to come before attempting an understanding of the text (this is Barton's own argument here). Biblical critics were reacting to the later situation, not the former. So what's the point of the weird definitions? “Value-neutral” and “detached” are words that simply should no longer be used.
And when Barton says “without distortion,” he doesn't mean that we are not influencing the meaning of the text at all as one would expect, but something along the lines of “even though understanding is a self-involving exercise, one should seek to not completely distort the message that the text can convey.” Again, who are the ones that this definition is opposing? Biblical critics weren't responding to those who had no sense of the distortion they could cause to a text, but to those who were willing to let their religious belief dictate what the text could mean instead of trying to let the text dictate what they believed. Biblical critics sought to do otherwise because they had respect for the biblical scrolls as literary texts (instead of treating them as an “inspired jumble”). Barton's re-defining of terms causes unnecessary confusion. Positivistic phrases like this are better left abandoned.
- failure to incorporate the reader -
Barton recognizes that meaning is determined in part by the reader. This is one of the four “coordinates” of literary understanding that he draws on as illustrated by M.H. Abrams (p. 75). He indirectly depends on this dynamic, for instance, when he refers to intuition as the primary way of undertaking the biblical-critical exercise, by saying that “scientific” or “method” is not the appropriate way to describe it, or by saying that what is involved is understanding instead of processing. Unfortunately, however, he constantly neglects to include this coordinate anywhere in his arguments.
For instance, Barton says biblical criticism “is precisely an attempt to avoid trying to master the text, but instead to allow it its own space, to make its own points in its own way, and to receive it without the distortion that is produced if we try to control it and twist it to our own ends” (p. 58, note 63). But he forgets to mention that we do control and twist the text by every act of understanding we undertake. If three people go into a room, come out, and someone asks them what they saw, they will each say they saw something different, or they will describe the same thing(s) differently. That isn't because there is nothing in the room to see and not because they are wrong about what they saw, but because all three interpretations are formed and constrained by those who make them. Barton knows this. But he doesn't seem willing to make that dimension clear.
He says on the same page “biblical criticism contains in essence three central features: (a) attention to semantics, . . . (b) awareness of genre, and (c) bracketing out questions of truth,” but leaves out (d) imposition of our own perception. Barton knows that our perception is part of the equation, which is why he calls so strongly for a struggle with and against it. So why is (d) missing? Why is he leaving out the fourth coordinate in literary competence?
Again, Barton says “what constitutes it as critical is that it asks about the sense the text makes if it is read without a constraining framework of expectations” (p. 108). But Barton knows that there is no such thing as interpretation without a framework of expectation. His own argument throughout the book is that biblical criticism developed because of a specific framework of expectation: biblical texts are literature and thus should be understood as literature. So why isn't his argument more nuanced? Why isn't he saying what either a Positivist or Romanticist would not?
Barton says “our aim as critics is not to translate the text . . . into our own terms, but to get inside it and understand it from within” (p. 113). And yet, it is only by the terms of the one who goes into the text that the text can be understood. All understanding is colored by our particular perceptions. This doesn't mean we can't say something true about the text, and it doesn't mean there is unlimited meaning, but it does acknowledge that the reader influences understanding. Barton could have said as much, but didn't.
Barton comes close to bringing this aspect into the conversation is when he notes “in postmodernist thinking, . . .it is believed that the very perception of meaning is entirely determined by where one is standing” (p. 162, note 43). But then he doesn't engage that line of thinking. Surely he doesn't believe one can step from where one isn't already standing. Surely he must realize the obvious link between his two-fold argument (A. most biblical scholars are people of faith and B. if anything, scholarship has been slanted in favor of faith perspectives) with the quote above. What people think influences how they think! One cannot think in a manner foreign to our own selves.
Only two sentences in the entire book gave me what I was hoping for. And so I end with that stunning revelation: “How can we be sure that our own concerns and preoccupations are not contaminating our reading of past texts? We cannot, but we can try” (p. 181).
- a particular choice of terminology or definition -
Barton unnecessarily obfuscates his discussion by using Positivitic terms like “objective,” “value-neutral,” “detached,” or “without distortion” in non-Positivistic ways (and also attributes his highly questionable definitions to the Positivists themselves).
For instance, when Barton says “objective,” he means something like “refusing to simply read one's own ideas into the text” or “having a sense of detachment from the text.” In other words, to be “objective” for Barton is to say “what I think and what the text says are probably a little different.” Talk about a ludicrous definition. As if scholars using the term “objective” meant to differentiate their work from those who had no concept of a distance between themselves and the text. Who exactly were those people? Even the Surrealists of the Post-Modern movement had an awareness of something real beyond the subjective self—the “Sur” real. Even the most conservative interpreters understand that the text has a meaning that exists outside themselves (which Barton admits outright on p. 172). Few are the extremists who have ever thought or said “there is no way of encountering the text other than one already totally colored by one's own presuppositions,” who seem to be Barton's talking partners (p. 49). If that is what is “not objective,” then Barton's definition would be perfectly reasonable. But in my estimation, it is a mammoth caricature of those who are “not objective” and those who saw themselves as being “objective” in opposition to them.
When Barton says “value-neutral” or “detached,” he doesn't mean “without bias or prejudice,” which would be its plain sense, Positivist definition. Rather, he means something like “allowing one's perspective to be questioned.” If someone is unwilling to question their perspective, they are not value-neutral or detached, but who are those who have been totally unwilling to question their perspective? The problem wasn't that nobody thought “maybe I should allow what I think the text means to be questioned.” The problem was that certain folk were okay with allowing what they thought the text should mean to come before attempting an understanding of the text (this is Barton's own argument here). Biblical critics were reacting to the later situation, not the former. So what's the point of the weird definitions? “Value-neutral” and “detached” are words that simply should no longer be used.
And when Barton says “without distortion,” he doesn't mean that we are not influencing the meaning of the text at all as one would expect, but something along the lines of “even though understanding is a self-involving exercise, one should seek to not completely distort the message that the text can convey.” Again, who are the ones that this definition is opposing? Biblical critics weren't responding to those who had no sense of the distortion they could cause to a text, but to those who were willing to let their religious belief dictate what the text could mean instead of trying to let the text dictate what they believed. Biblical critics sought to do otherwise because they had respect for the biblical scrolls as literary texts (instead of treating them as an “inspired jumble”). Barton's re-defining of terms causes unnecessary confusion. Positivistic phrases like this are better left abandoned.
- failure to incorporate the reader -
Barton recognizes that meaning is determined in part by the reader. This is one of the four “coordinates” of literary understanding that he draws on as illustrated by M.H. Abrams (p. 75). He indirectly depends on this dynamic, for instance, when he refers to intuition as the primary way of undertaking the biblical-critical exercise, by saying that “scientific” or “method” is not the appropriate way to describe it, or by saying that what is involved is understanding instead of processing. Unfortunately, however, he constantly neglects to include this coordinate anywhere in his arguments.
For instance, Barton says biblical criticism “is precisely an attempt to avoid trying to master the text, but instead to allow it its own space, to make its own points in its own way, and to receive it without the distortion that is produced if we try to control it and twist it to our own ends” (p. 58, note 63). But he forgets to mention that we do control and twist the text by every act of understanding we undertake. If three people go into a room, come out, and someone asks them what they saw, they will each say they saw something different, or they will describe the same thing(s) differently. That isn't because there is nothing in the room to see and not because they are wrong about what they saw, but because all three interpretations are formed and constrained by those who make them. Barton knows this. But he doesn't seem willing to make that dimension clear.
He says on the same page “biblical criticism contains in essence three central features: (a) attention to semantics, . . . (b) awareness of genre, and (c) bracketing out questions of truth,” but leaves out (d) imposition of our own perception. Barton knows that our perception is part of the equation, which is why he calls so strongly for a struggle with and against it. So why is (d) missing? Why is he leaving out the fourth coordinate in literary competence?
Again, Barton says “what constitutes it as critical is that it asks about the sense the text makes if it is read without a constraining framework of expectations” (p. 108). But Barton knows that there is no such thing as interpretation without a framework of expectation. His own argument throughout the book is that biblical criticism developed because of a specific framework of expectation: biblical texts are literature and thus should be understood as literature. So why isn't his argument more nuanced? Why isn't he saying what either a Positivist or Romanticist would not?
Barton says “our aim as critics is not to translate the text . . . into our own terms, but to get inside it and understand it from within” (p. 113). And yet, it is only by the terms of the one who goes into the text that the text can be understood. All understanding is colored by our particular perceptions. This doesn't mean we can't say something true about the text, and it doesn't mean there is unlimited meaning, but it does acknowledge that the reader influences understanding. Barton could have said as much, but didn't.
Barton comes close to bringing this aspect into the conversation is when he notes “in postmodernist thinking, . . .it is believed that the very perception of meaning is entirely determined by where one is standing” (p. 162, note 43). But then he doesn't engage that line of thinking. Surely he doesn't believe one can step from where one isn't already standing. Surely he must realize the obvious link between his two-fold argument (A. most biblical scholars are people of faith and B. if anything, scholarship has been slanted in favor of faith perspectives) with the quote above. What people think influences how they think! One cannot think in a manner foreign to our own selves.
Only two sentences in the entire book gave me what I was hoping for. And so I end with that stunning revelation: “How can we be sure that our own concerns and preoccupations are not contaminating our reading of past texts? We cannot, but we can try” (p. 181).
November 24, 2025
Had to read this for class. My professor, when assigning the book, warned us gleefully that we’d “either love or hate it, with no in-between.” I think I can proudly say I both loved and hated it 😂
The first half was infuriating to read and the second half wasn’t that bad. I was shaking his hand throughout the whole thing because everything he was arguing for was either something I a) was aware of/had already come to the conclusion of on my own and b) made sense once I figured out what he was saying. Ironically, with his central argument being about reading the Bible and trying to understand its meaning “in a plain sense”, I had to do the same with his roundabout way of arguing 😂😅
The first half was infuriating to read and the second half wasn’t that bad. I was shaking his hand throughout the whole thing because everything he was arguing for was either something I a) was aware of/had already come to the conclusion of on my own and b) made sense once I figured out what he was saying. Ironically, with his central argument being about reading the Bible and trying to understand its meaning “in a plain sense”, I had to do the same with his roundabout way of arguing 😂😅
December 20, 2021
In this book, Barton seeks to define and defend biblical criticism, an oft-misunderstood and oft-maligned approach to the Bible. He lays out 10 theses, all of which I find to be convincingly argued. This book has shaped how I read the Bible more than any other I have read.
December 5, 2017
He’s just wrong.
He writes well. Insightful. Misguided.
He writes well. Insightful. Misguided.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews