B.H. Carroll’s Pastoral Theology
Southwestern Journal of Theology
Volume 58, No. 2 – Spring 2016
Managing Editor: W. Madison Grace II
By Richard B. Hays. Waco: Baylor University Press, 2014. xxii + 155 pages. Hardcover, $34.95.
Few sequels are as satisfying as their predecessors. However, Hays’s Reading Backwards: Figural Christology and the Fourfold Gospel Witness—a “Gospel-focused sequel” to Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul (1989)—does not disappoint. Perhaps, rather than a “sequel,” Hays’s slim volume (a permutation of his Hulsean Lectures delivered at Cambridge) may be better described as a tempting hors d’oeuvre to whet the appetite in anticipation of a future, more “meaty” monograph (ix). Upon first glance of the enigmatic title, Reading Backwards, the trials and tribulations of learning Biblical Hebrew came to mind. While this work is, indeed, interested with “Israel’s Scripture” (x), it is primarily focused on the Septuagint (not the Masoretic texts) as Hays notes: “the language of the Evangelists resonates most strongly with the language of the Old Greek versions of Israel’s Scripture” (xiv).
In chapter 1, Hays (Dean of Duke Divinity School and George Washington Ivey Professor of New Testament) contends: “the Gospels teach us how to read the OT, and—at the same time—the OT teaches us how to read the Gospels. . . . [W]e learn to read the OT by reading backwards from the Gospels, and—at the same time—we learn how to read the Gospels by reading forwards from the OT” (4, emphasis original). Hays suggests a “Gospel-shaped” hermeneutic that “necessarily entails reading backwards, reinterpreting Israel’s Scripture in light of the story of Jesus” (104, emphasis original). In chapter 2, Hays surveys Mark’s Gospel through the hermeneutical lens of the “singular mystery” (μυστήριον) referenced in Mark 4:11 (31). For Hays, Mark 4:11 reveals that this “mystery” is none other than Christ, himself. Hays then switches his focus to Matthew in chapter 3. Here Hays contends that the “Torah has been transfigured” through Matthew 28:20 in Matthew’s use of metalepsis (i.e., a poetic citation of a fragmentary phrase that implores New Testament readers to recover the original Old Testament subtext) via the repeated phraseology in Genesis 28:15, “Behold I am with you” (42, 50). According to Hays, Jesus is equated with the God of Israel at the end of Matthew’s Gospel because Jesus is seen as standing in the same role as YHWH in Jacob’s dream. Hays connects Luke 24:21 to a catena of Isaianic passages referring to YHWH as the “Redeemer of Israel” in chapter 4. Hence, through these metalepses, Luke depicts Jesus as “the One who redeems Israel” (74). In chapter 5, Hays depicts John as a “Baroque sign painter” employing “chiaroscuro” with words to illuminate Jesus as the “Temple transfigured” (78, 82). It is through John’s “figural hermeneutic” (2) of Jesus as “Temple” that John’s divine Christology reaches fulsome expression (91). Hayes concludes his book in chapter 6 with a helpful list of ten ways the Evangelists inform the reading of Scripture (104–09).
Several strengths mark this work. First, Hays synthesizes a vast amount of data into a concise, well-written argument in which nearly every sentence serves to support his thesis. Second, Hays’s commendation of the recovery of the Old Testament in ecclesiastical as well as scholarly circles is laudable (5). Identifying metalepses employed by the New Testament writers requires Christians to become steeped in Scripture. Lastly, Hays is unafraid to swim against the currents of the scholarly consensus. Hays rejects the two-source hypothesis of the so-called “Synoptic Problem,” as well as New Testament scholars’ pervasive usage of the terms “high” and “low” Christology. Hays dispenses with “Q” (xiv), and rejects any a priori philosophical categorization of Christology utilizing such “thermometric” nomenclature (107–08). Hays also rejects the consensus view that the Christology in Luke’s Gospel is “primitive” (see Hays’s caustic critique on page 60), and contends for the converse—that for Luke, Jesus is “Israel’s God” (74).
But this work is not without its faults. First, chapter 6 is Hays’s weakest chapter due to Hays’s somewhat troubling, superfluous statements regarding the “weaknesses” and “drawbacks” evinced within the Evangelists’ hermeneutics and portraits of Jesus (96–102). Such language implicitly suggests that God’s Word (which is the resulting fruit of the Evangelists’ supposed “defective” depictions of the Old Testament and Christ) has “weaknesses” and “drawbacks.” This does much to denigrate the unity as well as the trustworthiness of the Fourfold Gospel in the hearts and minds of the students, pastors, and laity reading this work. Second, it seems as if Hays overstates his case as some of his apparent “allusions” could possibly be “illusions.” Hays appears to do lexical searches for what he considers to be metalepses—the lexical ciphers or “hermeneutical keys” that unlock the meaning of the gospel narratives (42, 86). This could lead down some problematic paths in that (like chiasmus) one could find “allusions” at every turn if he or she looked hard enough!
In sum, Reading Backwards is a thought-provoking work that strikes some pleasant chords as well as a few sour notes (especially in chapter 6). Regardless, Hays’s thesis is compelling, well-argued, and deserves a hearing from any serious student of the canonical gospels. Hays is attuned to the Evangelists’ “hermeneutical hindsight” in their various readings of the Old Testament and portraiture of Jesus, and urges his readers to read the gospels backwards as well (85).
