Reading Scripture with Others’ Eyes: toward an international hermeneutical community

The past two Sundays during our church’s annual mission festival, I have not preached but sat under the preaching of two guest preachers, one from East Africa and another from South Asia. I understand that some churches have let go of something like an annual missions conference, but I was reminded during this past week and a half of what a treasure it is for so many reasons. I want to highlight one of those reasons here.

Many years ago, I encountered the writings of the renowned cultural anthropologist and missiologist Paul Hiebert. In his book Anthropological Reflections on Missiological Issues, Hiebert suggest that it is both powerful and necessary to read and interpret Scripture not only on our own or with others from our own culture, but also with others from other cultures and backgrounds. Hiebert writes:

Just as believers in a local church must test their interpretations of Scriptures with their community of believers, so the churches in different cultural and historical contexts must test their theologies with the international community of churches and the church down through the ages. The priesthood of believers must be exercised within a hermeneutical community.

To use a weighty phrase from later in this same essay, Hiebert suggests we need an “international hermeneutical community” to help us gain perspective on how our reading and interpretation of Scripture might be skewed by our own cultural framework. Even if we believe that the ultimate authority of faith and practice is Holy Scripture, it is inevitable that our cultural situatedness shapes what we read and how we interpret and apply it. The international hermeneutical community—that healthy conversational interaction across cultures, languages, and backgrounds (perhaps even across time!)—offers helpful perspectives that contribute to correctives in how we read and interpret the Scripture. And this is at least one reason why I am thankful to sit under the preaching and teaching of brothers and sisters from other places, languages, ethnicities, and backgrounds.

Of course, this calls for more than merely having such people present in our lives. It calls us to deeper, relational engagement as we give these brothers and sisters appropriate respect and honest listening. It means we offer weight and value and authority to their voices in our lives. Neither do we romantically idealize their perspective as perfect. Rather, we choose to enter relationship and learn together. We are invited to move beyond mere presence and toward pilgrimage together, if I might borrow a suggestive phrase from a Congolese friend.

When I listened to my two friends proclaim God’s word in our church’s gathering, one from 1 Kings 19 and the other from Luke 18, I realize that their approach to reading, interpreting, and preaching the text is both similar to and different from the manner in which I might approach these texts. It is not the similarities that I readily notice but the differences. At first hearing, I may wonder if in these differences, they are approaching the text accurately, But as I linger in what they are saying, I begin to ask myself whether it might be my own approach to the text that is lacking. I explore this even as the preacher speaks, letting what they notice in the text and context, what words or concepts they emphasize, their approach to interpretation and their avenues of application lead me into new territory with the Word of God. The differences they bring out move me toward reconsidering the text which I may have already encountered many times, helping me to see and hear again with fresh eyes and ears and perspectives.

It is at least this that Paul Hiebert speaks of with his concept of the international hermeneutical community. We certainly must engage Scripture personally and in the community in which we regularly gather in relationship and worship of God. But to enter into relationship with those outside our culture also invites us to both recognize our incomplete understanding and move toward a more full understanding of Scripture. As Hiebert writes:

Consequently, churches in specific cultural settings need the check of the international community of churches to test where theologies are too strongly influenced by cultural assumptions.

This is always necessary in our lives, perhaps now as much as ever, and has been a consistently great gift to me in my own reading of Scripture and pastoral ministry. Let me encourage you to develop friendships that will help you learn and grow in this way. And if that is hard to come by where you live, to seek out resources that may help you read and learn from new cultural perspectives.

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Aside from personal relationships, here are just a few resources to aid with what I am writing about above:

Paul G. Hiebert. Anthropological Reflections on Missiological Issues. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1994.

Tokunboh Adeyemo, ed. Africa Bible Commentary. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2010.

Brad Vaughn. Reading Romans with Eastern Eyes: Honor and Shame in Paul’s Message and Mission. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2019.

Esau McCaulley, Amy L. B. Peeler, Osvaldo Padilla, and Janette H. Ok, eds. The New Testament in Color: A Multiethnic Bible Commentary. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2023.

Esau McCaulley. Reading While Black. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2020.

While I may not be able to speak to each book listed, there is a great list of Non-Western and BIPOC Commentaries here.

If you have your own recommended resources, please share them in the comments!