This thesis exploits recent research in the field of pragmatics and the emerging field of historical pragmatics to make the case for a relational hermeneutic that can facilitate an integrated approach with the concerns of theology as these arise within the grammar of the biblical texts. In the first part of the study the nature and status of language is shown to be central to the hermeneutic problematic. The interface of the philosophy of language with biblical and theological hermeneutics is investigated through critical discussion of Anthony Thiselton's appeal to speech act theory. It is argued that the trajectory in H. Paul Grice's philosophy of language is better able to elucidate the hermeneutic task. In particular, speech act theory struggles" account for the dialogical and conversational nature of discourse. In turn, this has serious consequences for Thiselton's attempt to integrate theology with his philosophical hermeneutics. It is argued that a theological account of language depends on priority being given to relational rather than institutional or even social considerations. In pali two a revised account of Brown and Levinson's theory of politeness is used as a basis for developing a relational hermeneutic. Consideration of Piene Bourdieu' s social anthropology and Erving Goffman's analysis of social interaction invite further revision in light of Pauline anthropology. This revised framework is better able to account for the logic of Paul's appeal to the cross and the participant role of the Spirit in I Cor. I: 18-2: 16. Specifically, description of the theological horizon in Paul's discourse is essential within the terms of a relational hermeneutic and no special pleadings need be made. Finally, the implications for pragmatics as well as for theological and biblical hermeneutics are noted.

Postmodernism in Biblical Studies is characterised by proliferation of methodological and ideological interpretive perspectives, emphasis upon the ethics of interpretation and awareness of the role of interpretive communities. Following Stephen E. Fowl, the underlying motives of interpreters can be understood when approaches are analysed in terms of interpretive interests. The work of David J. A. Clines, J. Cheryl Exum and Stephen D. Moore reveals a strong de-confessional motive and a desire to exclude confessional concerns from academic interpretation. This position is ideologically driven and, in terms of liberal academic values, self-contradictory. The difficulties posed for Christian interpretation by the postmodern context are evident in the narrative criticism of Mark Allan Powell and R. Alan Culpepper, where unresolved conflict of theological, methodological and political interests threatens the coherence of the approach. Recent work by Powell addresses postmodern concerns, but fails adequately to engage theoretical and theological issues. A postmodern understanding of the Bible as Christian scripture which affirms both the validity and legitimacy of multiple interpretive perspectives and a pneumatological understanding of the Bible as the Word of God can be framed using the work of Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Stephen E. Fowl, Roman Jakobson and Daniel Patte. Socio-pragmatic objections to the legitimacy and validity of Christian interpretation beyond the faith community can be resisted by asserting a dialogical relationship between the Bible, the church and the wider academic community, and by following Francis Watson’s argument that the church’s discourse is derived from that of the wider society in which it exists. Christian interpretation will seek to engage constructively with other interpretive approaches. A Christian ethics of interpretation characterised by openness, humility, repentance and forgiveness offers a positive contribution to the culture of postmodern academic interpretation. Jesus’ encounter with the Syrophoenician woman in Mark 7 offers a paradigm for such interpretive practice.

A fresh engagement with the formative work of Anthony C. Thiselton demonstrates that this work constitutes a source of insights of great value for a programmatic construction towards a unified hermeneutical theory. Such a construction provides powerful keys for unlocking six contemporary problems in hermeneutics. First, it brings organisation to a disorganised discipline by identifying three distinct spheres or strata of hermeneutical reflection. Second, it brings clarification to a complex discipline by identifying seven distinct hermeneutical 'conversations' centred on 'dialogue', 'history', 'epistemology', 'language', (Western) 'culture', the human 'self', and 'understanding' (including the hermeneutical task). Third, it tackles the problem of abstraction in hermeneutics by bridging the gap between hermeneutical theory and practice. Fourth, it addresses the problem of disunity in hermeneutical theory on three levels: philosophical subtext, the removal of perennial philosophical and theological 'dualisms' or 'dichotomies', and the relative ontological priorities of 'history' and 'language'. Fifth, it addresses inter-disciplinary polarisation in hermeneutics by clarifying the relationship between theological and philosophical hermeneutics. Sixth, it strikes at the heart of irresponsibility in interpretation by answering the question of what constitutes 'responsible interpretation'. However, despite these six potential advances and Thiselton's world-ranking stature, no thorough engagement with Thiselton's work yet exists in the literature. What little engagement there has been manifests serious misunderstandings and misrepresentations of Thiselton's thinking. Conversely, the criticisms emerging that can legitimately be made of Thiselton are relatively minor. His critical stance towards the Continental hermeneutical tradition necessitates a clearer highlighting of the grammatical changes implicit in his continued use of Continental terminology. Thiselton also needs to dialogue further with epistemological traditions, with philosophies and models of selfhood, with major 'postmodern' thinkers, with pastoral theology and with theological anthropology. Finally, a more sophisticated hermeneutic of fallen human relationships is required to provide a better understanding of historical conditioning

Cornelius Van Til is known for his work in the field of apologetics. His distinctive approach emphasized consistency between methodology and theology in order to defend the Christian faith. Though often neglected, his doctrine of God provided the foundation for his methodology. The nature of who God is informs how we know him and how we interpret his word. The three most prominent contours of his doctrine were: the Creator-creature distinction, incomprehensibility, and the ontological Trinity. The value of these particular emphases is that they are key touchpoints for diagnosing apologetic methods and affirming the Christian system of truth. The nature of his assessment of methodology at the worldview level along these contours has wide-ranging implications for other disciplines, including hermeneutics. The following study explores the relevance of Van Til’s doctrine of God for contemporary biblical hermeneutics in terms of consistency between method and theology proper as revealed in the Bible. Van Til’s doctrine of God is relevant for contemporary hermeneutics both, in how ‘hermeneutics’ has come to be defined and in terms of how its relationship to metaphysics has been understood. In the former, there has been movement toward a more explicitly holistic definition, one that provides a general theory of understanding involving worldview assumptions. In the latter, the relationship between hermeneutics and metaphysics has been unavoidable. It has also been unstable and inconsistent. Van Til speaks to each of these trends from a self-conscious, Christian worldview. His work focused on worldview considerations and presuppositions, including metaphysical and epistemological concerns. It is argued that Van Til’s contributions are not only relevant for evaluating hermeneutical methods, but also contribute to some concerns of recent developments in the field. Two such developments which have influenced evangelical hermeneutics are Speech Act Theory (SAT) and Theological Interpretation of Scripture (TIS). Van Til’s contributions strengthen the effort to give due consideration to the divine author in discussions of meaning and method, but also serve to help critically evaluate and round out both. Lastly, the relevance of his theology proper is seen regarding the contemporary hermeneutical issue of the NT use of the OT. This provides a brief case study concerning a prominent contemporary issue in evangelical hermeneutics. Van Til’s contribution asks deeper questions regarding method and meaning which further the discussion, and detects flaws in some attempts to make sense of how the NT uses the OT.

Text in Afrikaans / The hypothesis debated here is that a critical reading process leads to a responsible use of the Bible. The metaphor of birth and growth is used autobiographically in order to illustrate the mastering of a critical reading process. Fundamentalism as condition before the birth indicates a pre-critical reading and understanding of the Bible. The transition to a critical reading and understanding contains certain psychological effects for the reader. In some instances it may even be called a painful birth process. The growing process progresses slowly. Concepts like inspiration, canon, Scriptural authority, the Bible as Word of God are once more scrutinised in the light of a critical reading process. Aspects that need to be settled with any critical reading are surveyed and may be seen as proposed directives for the mastering of the process: the strangeness of the world of the Bible, the evolution of the Bible, the Bible as literature and the critical Bible reader and objectivity. A critical reading process has certain implications for the traditional understanding of certain Bible themes. This, for example, is illustrated in view of the relation between the two testaments, prophecy, human thinking about God in the Bible and the liberating energy of justification through faith. New insights also establish the necessity for contact with believers within and outside the Christian tradition. With regard to the New Testament and the Jesus movement, a critical reading also leads to new insights. Historical Jesus research is handled and settled in earnest in an attempt to reflect new insights in the Christian tradition. In conclusion, the role of the church is surveyed through a critical reading process. A few personal contentions and conceptions of faith are presented as a survey of the growing process up till the present time. The Divine image of a critical reader is argued in the light of the knowledge of science and the provisional nature of human knowledge about God. That the baby is not thrown out with the bath-water, implies that a critical reader's faith in God need not be sacrificed. On the contrary, it can lead to an enriching spiritual experience. / Religious Studies & Arabic / D. Litt. et Phil. (Bybelkunde)

Text in Afrikaans / The hypothesis debated here is that a critical reading process leads to a responsible use of the Bible. The metaphor of birth and growth is used autobiographically in order to illustrate the mastering of a critical reading process. Fundamentalism as condition before the birth indicates a pre-critical reading and understanding of the Bible. The transition to a critical reading and understanding contains certain psychological effects for the reader. In some instances it may even be called a painful birth process. The growing process progresses slowly. Concepts like inspiration, canon, Scriptural authority, the Bible as Word of God are once more scrutinised in the light of a critical reading process. Aspects that need to be settled with any critical reading are surveyed and may be seen as proposed directives for the mastering of the process: the strangeness of the world of the Bible, the evolution of the Bible, the Bible as literature and the critical Bible reader and objectivity. A critical reading process has certain implications for the traditional understanding of certain Bible themes. This, for example, is illustrated in view of the relation between the two testaments, prophecy, human thinking about God in the Bible and the liberating energy of justification through faith. New insights also establish the necessity for contact with believers within and outside the Christian tradition. With regard to the New Testament and the Jesus movement, a critical reading also leads to new insights. Historical Jesus research is handled and settled in earnest in an attempt to reflect new insights in the Christian tradition. In conclusion, the role of the church is surveyed through a critical reading process. A few personal contentions and conceptions of faith are presented as a survey of the growing process up till the present time. The Divine image of a critical reader is argued in the light of the knowledge of science and the provisional nature of human knowledge about God. That the baby is not thrown out with the bath-water, implies that a critical reader's faith in God need not be sacrificed. On the contrary, it can lead to an enriching spiritual experience. / Religious Studies and Arabic / D. Litt. et Phil. (Bybelkunde)

Psychotherapeutic practice often involves the telling and retelling of a client’s stories of life in collaborative, meaning-making dialogue with a counsellor. This study demonstrates and explores the dynamics of counsellor contribution to this narrative co-construction, particularly the ways in which the counsellor’s inner conversations, reflexivity and interpretive style may emerge in practice and have an influence on the client’s understanding, re-evaluation and cohering of his or her own story. The multi-voiced, multi-layered intersubjective space and time in which this kind of narrative collaboration takes place is a difficult area to access for study but one whose potential impact on the client should make it the focus of respectful, ethical monitoring and careful reflective practice. Using phenomenological theories of reader-response and dialogical play, my research sets up an analogy between the way a reader might reflexively interact with life story episodes in a written text and the ways a counsellor might listen to and interpret a client’s stories of life over the course of a counselling contract. My project uses a comprehensive and episode-rich story of a life, the iconic ‘womb to tomb’ story of Jacob in the book of Genesis. My own hearer/reader response to the story gives rise to the creation of a set of imaginary dialogues between two interlocutors, Jacob as an elderly client reviewing his life story and myself as counsellor, listening to his stories of life. This methodology is used as a means to access an in vivo lived experience, as it might unfold in practice, of my counsellor contribution to Jacob’s story and the interplay of voices and standpoints which characterise it. Attention is drawn to the inchoate, but deeply human, intersubjective aspects of narrative co-construction as a process and the value of this form of reflective practice to surface actual praxis experience for analysis. Insights surfaced by this reader-response methodology point to the significant extent to which the hermeneutical standpoints and dialogical voices of a counsellor are actively involved and implicated in narrative co-construction.

The Evangelical Reformed Church is celebrating its sixtieth anniversary. This study investigates this church's unique view of Scripture and places it within the broader context of a Reformed approach. To this end, a literary study is conducted, whereby the Evangelical Reformed conviction is compared to that of Calvin and Barth, as put forward in their Institutions and Church Dogmatics, respectively. This procedure allows for a collation of the Evangelical Reformed stance and the Reformed view. Since the belief regarding Scripture has an effect on many aspects of the traditional reformed dogma, several bibliological facets are singled out, namely, revelation, authority, inspiration, and the inception of the canon. By way of illustration, these details are considered with specific reference to the Reformed doctrine of Predestination. The goal of this exercise is to evaluate the application of the bibliological dogma in the formulation of theology. / Systematic Theology & Theological Ethics / M.Th

Text in Afrikaans / Een van die grootste probleme waarmee die prediker in 'n industriele konteks te doen het, is om die evangelie op 'n sinvolle wyse aan die hoarders oor te dra. Die radikale verandering in die samelewing deur die moderniseringsproses, het die homiletiek gedwing om teoreties her te besin. Hierdie moderne homiletiese teorie soos deur H.J.C. Pieterse, T.G. Long en G.D.J. Dingemans verteenwoordig het die volgende belangrike teoretiese aanpassings gemaak: Eerstens, in plaas van die tradisionele beweging van die teks na die hoarders, is die homiletiese proses omgekeer. Die beweging is nou vanaf die hoarder na die teks deur middel van die prediker en weer terug van die teks na die hoorder. Tweedens, hierdie benadering het noodwendig hermeneutiese implikasies gehad. Daarom het die homiletiek die bree aanpak van die moderne kritiese hermeneutiek in diens geneem. Derdens moes 'n nuwe kommunikasieteorie ondersoek word naamlik, die dialogiese kommunikasieteorie van H.J.C. Pieterse en C.J.A. Vos. / One of the greatest problems, with which a preacher in an industrial context have to deal with, is to convey the gospel in a sensible manner to the listeners. The radical change in society caused by the modernisation process, forced homiletics to review its theoretical base. Modern homiletics as represented by H.J.C. Pieterse, T.G. Long and G.D.J. Dingemans, has made the following theoretic adjustments: Firstly, in stead of the traditional movement of the text to the listeners, the homiletical process is revearsed. The movement is from the listener to the text by means of the preacher and back from the text to the listener. Secondly, this approach inevitably has hermeneutic implications. Therefore homiletics has employed the broad approach of modern critical hermeneutics. Thirdly, a new communication theory has to be developed namely, the dialogical communication theory of H.J.C. Pieterse and C.J.A. Vos. The most important theoretical foundation for preaching in an industrial context is the approach of taking the listeners as starting point without neglecting the text. In practice, it brings about that the following topics ask for particular attention: For the understanding and formulating of the message of the Scriptures, the modern critical hermeneutics and the use of metaphors is of the greatest importance. The new understanding of rhetorics which is about conveying the message, must be taken into consideration. The formulating of the message in the language of the listeners has a theoretical influence on the formulating and use of the theological concepts during preaching. The dialogical communication theory is also of great importance, and has dialogue before, during and after the preaching in mind. For it to be fulfilled, preaching work groups is an important component to improve dialogical communication in the congregation. / Practical Theology / D.Th. (Practical theology)

The Evangelical Reformed Church is celebrating its sixtieth anniversary. This study investigates this church's unique view of Scripture and places it within the broader context of a Reformed approach. To this end, a literary study is conducted, whereby the Evangelical Reformed conviction is compared to that of Calvin and Barth, as put forward in their Institutions and Church Dogmatics, respectively. This procedure allows for a collation of the Evangelical Reformed stance and the Reformed view. Since the belief regarding Scripture has an effect on many aspects of the traditional reformed dogma, several bibliological facets are singled out, namely, revelation, authority, inspiration, and the inception of the canon. By way of illustration, these details are considered with specific reference to the Reformed doctrine of Predestination. The goal of this exercise is to evaluate the application of the bibliological dogma in the formulation of theology. / Philosophy, Practical and Systematic Theology / M.Th