The following is an excerpt from the introduction to my new edited volume, Christian Theologies of Scripture. To read the entire introduction, click here…and to check out the table of contents and list of contributors, click here.

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“Most of us hear the word ‘scripture’ without stumbling over it. Using it, we give the impression, even to ourselves . . . that we know what scripture is. On reflection, it turns out that it is hardly the case.”—Wilfred Cantwell Smith, What is Scripture?

What is scripture? W. C. Smith challenges us to pause and ponder this question. All religious traditions that ground themselves in texts must grapple with certain questions. In worship services and public and private readings, Christians often turn to scripture for guidance: to the stories of Abraham or Moses, to the Psalms, to the prophecies of Isaiah, to the life of Jesus, to the letters of Paul, to the vision of John. Therefore, Christians must confront their own set of questions. Indeed, to ask such a question—“What is scripture?”—is to become mired in a muddy pool of questions: What is the nature of scripture? Is it divine? Human? Both? Is scripture authoritative? If so, how is it authoritative? For whom? What is the scope of its authority? Is scripture inspired by God? What about scriptural interpretation—is that inspired? Does God illuminate humans to understand scripture? Is there an appropriate method of interpreting the words of scripture? Who can interpret the scriptures? What is the purpose of scripture? How is scripture used? How ought scripture to be used? How do scripture and tradition relate? Does scripture interpret tradition or does the tradition interpret scripture? Or both? What does it mean for a Christian to call the Bible “the word of God”? And if Jesus is also called the word of God, how does Jesus as the word of God relate to the Bible as the word of God?

To ask these questions about scripture is to set forth on a dark and winding path—there seems no end to the list of questions over which we suddenly stumble. But we are not the first to ask these questions about scripture, nor the first to stumble over them; in fact, two thousand years of Christian tradition provide us a series of guideposts to mark our way and a series of lampposts to guide our steps. This book traces what the theological giants have said about scripture when they themselves stumbled over what scripture is and stumbled over each other. The goal of the volume is to map the terrain of the Christian tradition on scripture and let the contours speak for themselves. This is not a work of dogmatic or systematic theology that posits a specific doctrine of scripture that must be rigidly followed. Nor is this a work of religious history that records the transmission of bible texts or the development of the canon, or enters into debates about how the Bible was formed, compiled, and preserved. This book is an investigation into the history of Christian thought that looks at major figures in the tradition and describes their unique contributions to the lingering and overarching question: What is scripture?