Abstract
The book is based on lectures, given in 2018, at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, Kentucky. The question shaping the lectures is - How is it that churches in ‘the west’, whose leaders generally approach the New Testament through the eyes of critical scholarship, are in decline; while many churches elsewhere, (e.g. in parts of Africa), where the critical approach does not appear so dominant, are experiencing significant growth? Yarbrough asserts that the reason for this lies in their differing attitudes to the New Testament. Alongside this, lies the question (which he calls ‘the elephant in the room’), as to how students from a ‘conservative’ background should regard the critical approach, particularly when they encounter it in post-graduate work.
He calls the critical approach to the New Testament, the ‘elite approach’. He argues against it, (though Robert Morgan does win a favourable comment regarding his writing on Baur!) Against this he presents the ‘populist approach’–one that is ‘unshackled by too-stringent scholarly conventions and methods’ and one that can be entertained by people who range from ‘illiterate to highly trained.’
After presenting this ‘clash of visions’, he asks whether there might be any rapprochement. He sees some hope coming through renewal in the work of traditional evangelical biblical scholars, who can challenge elite attitudes, while being read sympathetically by those in the populist arena.
He also hopes for a closer engagement between evangelical scholars and Roman Catholic scholars. He claims that both share a belief in ‘inerrancy’, on which such a meeting together could be based. His assertion at this point could have benefitted from a closer examination of the more nuanced approaches found in the documents of Vatican II, and of the 1993 report of the Pontifical Biblical Commission.
Thus a message being conveyed to the students in these lectures is that conservative biblical scholarship could hold a key to enabling a meeting between three major groupings within contemporary Christianity—the current guild of ‘elite’ scholars, populist teachers in growing churches, and Roman Catholic teaching. This could appear as an exciting programme for those listening in the seminary.
Yarbrough writes within a Christian context. It would have been interesting to see how he viewed those who sought to handle similar issues within the context of Judaism. For example James Kugel can see virtue in a critical attitude to the text of the Hebrew Bible, but can also see virtue in those traditional interpretations that continue to shape his Jewish faith. For him two approaches are held in tension, both being ‘affirmed’. Here we can see a both/and approach, while Yarbrough’s language of ‘clash’ is much more either/or. The ‘elite’ position is simply in error. Also Yarbrough’s focus on New Testament scholarship means that he does not explicitly consider other possible reasons for differences in church growth.