Author: Rev. prof. Bogdan G. Bucur (St Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary, New York, USA)
Keywords: Christianity, Bible, hymnography, exegesis, theophanies, Christology
Abstract:
This article discusses the interpretation of Old Testament theophanies in Byzantine festal hymnography, and its place in patristic Scripture exegesis and theology. The author argues that “Christophanic exegesis”–that is, the straightforward identification of the “Lord God” in Hebrew Bible narratives with the “Lord” of Christian worship, Jesus Christ–is difficult to frame within the categories commonly used to describe patristic exegesis. A more recent suggestion, namely, appealing to the category “Rewritten Bible,” current among scholars of the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, is also rejected. Christophanic exegesis is an epiphanic and performative approach to the interpretation of Scripture by which the Hebrew Bible is appropriated as a coherent narrative leading from Genesis to Jesus, in which Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as well as Moses and the prophets are “men of Christ” (Justin Martyr), and in which the readers are invited to inscribe themselves. It provides the key for adequately approaching the Christology of the Fathers and the dogmatic definitions of the Ecumenical Councils, anchoring Christian Dogmatics in the living experience of Israel’s walk with the God of Abraham, of Isaac and Jacob, the Lawgiver and “God of our fathers.”
Pages: 190-214