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I'ht' Moral Authority of Scripture
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currently seems so problematic. Indeed, many of (he articles written on the
relation ol scripture and ethics focus on ways scripture should not be used for
ethical matters. Yet if my proposal is correct, that very way of putting the
issue i.e., how should scripture be used ethically—is already a distortion,
l or to put it that way assumes that we must first clarify the meaning of the
text in the sense that we understand its historical or sociological
background—and only then can we ask its moral significance. David Kelsey
has reminded us, however, that claims about the authority of scripture are in
themselves moral claims about the function of scripture for the common life of
the church. The scripture’s authority for that life consists in its being used so
that it helps to nurture and reform the community’s self-identity as well as the
personal character of its members.3
To reinstate the moral and political context required for the interpreta
tion of scripture, moreover, demands that we challenge what Kelsey has
characterized as the ‘‘standard picture ’’ of the relation between scripture and
theology. The “ standard picture,” supported by a variety of theological
agendas, assumes that if scripture is to be meaningful it must be translated into
a more general theological medium.4 Such “ translation” is often deemed
necessary because of the texts’ obscurity, cultural limits, and variety, but also
because there seems to be no community in which the scripture functions
authoritatively. As a result we forget that the narratives of scripture were not
meant to describe our world—and thus in need of translation to adequately
describe the “modem world”—but to change the world, including the one in
which we now live. In the classic words of Erich Auerbach, scripture is not
meant
merely to make us forget our own reality for a few hours, it seeks to
overcome our reality: we are to fit our own life into its world, feel
ourselves to be elements in its structure of universal history. . . . Every
thing else that happens in the world can only be conceived as an element
in this sequence; into it everything that is known about the
world. . . must be fitted as an ingredient of the divine plan.5
I would only add that scripture creates more than a world; it shapes a
community which is the bearer of that world. Without that community, claims
about the moral authority of scripture—or rather the very idea of scripture
itself—make no sense. Furthermore, I shall argue that claims about the au
thority of scripture make sense only in that the world and the community it
creates are in fact true to the character of God. In order to develop this
proposal, the concepts of “moral authority” and “ scripture” must be
analyzed to show how each gains its intelligibility only in relation to a particu
lar kind of community. Before doing so, however, it should prove useful to
examine how many current problems associated with the moral use of scrip-