165 - Unleasing the Scripture: Freeing the Bible from Captivity to America

Unleasing the Scripture: Freeing the Bible from Captivity to America
By Stanley Hauerwas
Nashville, Abingdon 1993. 159 pp. $12.95.

To say that Stanley Hauerwas' new book is provocative and controversial is something of an understatement. In his opening paragraph, he challenges the assumption that Christians have a right to read the Bible, arguing that the central task of the church is to take the Bible out of the hands of individual North American Christians. The problem, says Hauerwas, is that both the historicalcritical and fundamentalist approaches to the Bible have severed the links between the community of faith and its Scripture. The Bible, he argues, can only be understood from "within the camp," by a disciplined body of believers who stand under its authority and who live out its story.

In the main part of the book, Hauerwas offers what he terms "sermonic exhibits" to illustrate the practical implications of his methodology. Among the gems found in this section is the one where Hauerwas turns Tillich's famous sermon on its ear with his own "You are Not Accepted." Similarly, sermon titles such as "The August Partiality of God's Love," "The Insufficiency of Scripture," and "Lust for Peace," only hint at his creative exposition of biblical passages, Like

166 - Unleasing the Scripture: Freeing the Bible from Captivity to America

Gary Larson of "Far Side" fame, Hauerwas approaches familiar texts from a different angle. His contrarian viewpoint is at once refreshing and disturbing.

However, Hauerwas places too much emphasis on the Bible as the norm of the community of faith and too little on its role as the church's critic. The Bible reads and judges the church every bit as much as a church reads the Bible. Nevertheless, like Jacob with the angel at Jabbok, preachers who wrestle with Stanley Hauerwas will come away from their encounter both changed and blessed.

M. Thomas Norwood, Jr.
Davidson College
Davidson, NC.