Contents

Part I: Reasons to Explore the Hermeneutics of Doctrine

From Free-Floating ‘Problems” to Hermeneutical Questions from Life -- pg.3

Dispositional Accounts of Belief -- pg.19

3. Forms of Life, Embodiment, and Place -- pg.43

4. The Hermeneutics of Doctrine as a Hermeneutic of Temporal and Communal Narrative -- pg.62

5. Formation, Education, and Training in Hermeneutics and in Doctrine -- pg.81

6. Formation through a Hermeneutic of Alterity and Provocation -- pg.98

Part II: Replies to Possible Objections

7. Dialectic in Hermeneutics and Doctrine: Coherence and Polyphony -- pg.119

8. Can Doctrine as Science” Remain Hermeneutical and Promote Formation? -- pg.145

Part III: Major Themes in Christian Doctrine

9. Varied Llorizons of Understanding for the Hermeneutics of Being Human -- pg.177

10. Creation as a Horizon of Understanding for Interpreting the Human Condition -- pg.198

11. Being Human: Image of God, Relationality with Others, and Bodily and Temporal Life -- pg.223

12. The Hermeneutics of Misdirected Desire: The Nature of Human Sin -- pg.257

13. Toward a Hermeneutic of the Fall and Collective Sin -- pg.283

14. Hermeneutics and Linguistic Currencies of Theologies of the Cross -- pg.309

15. The Hermeneutics of the Work of Christ: Interpreting Biblical Material -- pg.337

16. Hermeneutical Factors in the History of the Doctrine
of the Atonement -- pg.355

17. Hermeneutical Approaches to Christology -- pg.376

18. The Holy Spirit: Scripture, History, Experience, and Hermeneutics -- pg.414

19. The Hermeneutics of the Doctrine of God as Trinity -- pg.451

20. The Church and Ministry in Hermeneutical Perspective -- pg.479

21. The Hermeneutics of Word and Sacraments: Baptism and the Lord’s Supper or the Eucharist -- pg.509

22. Eschatology: The Ultimate and Definitive Hermeneutical Horizon of Meaning -- pg.541

BIBLIOGRAPHY -- pg.582

INDEX OF NAMES -- pg.614

INDEX OF SUBJECTS -- pg.623

INDEX OF SCRIPTURE AND OTHER ANCIENT SOURCES -- pg.637

THE HERMENEUTICS OF DOCTRINE
Drawing on the resources of contemporary hermeneutical theory, Anthony Thiselton in this volume masterfully recovers the formative and transformative power of Christian doctrine.
The past thirty-five years have witnessed major steps forward in the use of hermeneutics in biblical studies, but never before has hermeneutics made a comparable impact on the formulation of doctrine and our engagement with it. Indeed, no other book explores the interface between hermeneutics and Christian doctrine in the same in-depth way that this one does.
Throughout the book Thiselton shows how perspectives that arise from hermeneutics shed fresh light n theological method, reshape horizons of understanding, and reveal the relevance of doctrine for formation and for life.
Arguably the leading authority world-wide on biblical and philosophical hermeneutics, Thiselton as written widely acclaimed works in the areas of biblical studies and philosophical theology. His probing interaction in The Hermeneutics of Doctrine with numerous other great thinkers —
Gadamer, Ricoeur, Lindbeck, Balthasar, Vanhoozer, Pannanberg, etc. — and his original perspectives will make this volume a valuable resource for scholars and advanced students.