Christian Higher Education in the Baptist Tradition
Southwestern Journal of Theology
Volume 62, No. 2 – Spring 2020
Editor: David S. Dockery
By David S. Dockery. Second Edition. Fort Worth, TX: Seminary Hill Press, 2020, 140pp., $15.99
The most important doctrine for American evangelicals in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries has been that of Scripture. Having taught the doctrine of revelation in the churches and in the academy (at the master’s and doctoral levels), I have long required an accessible introduction to the doctrine of Scripture. Sadly, nothing satisfactory has been available since the original and increasingly rare edition of this book was published in flimsy paper form in 1991. Happily, this significant introduction to the most important doctrine in contemporary evangelicalism has been republished in a more attractive and durable format in 2020 with a few changes to address recent scholarship.
David Dockery originally sought “to provide a careful overview of the important themes related to a doctrine of Scripture” in order to “help people in the churches better understand the nature of the Bible so we can better understand and obey its message” (pp. 1-2). Rooted among Southern Baptists, who regard themselves a “People of the Book,” Dockery agreed to reissue the text in light of recent changes to “plausibility structures” in Western culture and the ongoing need to “strengthen the convictions of God’s faithful people” (p. 6). Dockery fulfills his aim in a most satisfactory way.
The ecclesial and academic success of this book rests in large part on its digestible chapters, readable style, and comprehensible presentation. Nine chapters consider the Bible in relation to its source in divine revelation; its focus upon Jesus Christ; its divinely impressed attributes of self-witness, divine-human authorship, and inspiration; as well as its relationship to its human recipients as truthful and dependable, as text and canon, in its use and interpretation, and in its authority. Each chapter begins with a helpful glossary of important terms and concludes with referential endnotes. While indices are not included, a helpful up-to-date bibliography is.
Dockery is fully aware of various intra-evangelical debates regarding the Bible. However, as one ensconced within the Southwestern Seminary tradition of gentleman theologians, he expresses himself not through polemic but through careful evaluation, biblical balance, and positive reinforcement of the truth. For instance, the first chapter draws a holistic picture of the Bible that fits judiciously within the broader Christian tradition as well as his own community. He affirms the theological basis of Scripture as the Spirit-inspired Word of God (pp. 9-25). A second instance occurs in his touching upon the debate over whether biblical truth is primarily personal or propositional. Aware of the alternatives, Dockery serenely concludes biblical truth is both propositional and personal (pp. 16-17). A third instance, among others, occurs when he adopts a “Christological model” for Scripture. Using orthodox Christology, which states Jesus Christ is fully divine and fully human, as an analogy, Dockery argues Scripture comes entirely from God through its fully engaged human authors (pp. 35, 51-62).
While each chapter is filled with such evangelical wisdom, certain chapters providentially address critical issues that are challenging church and academy today. For instance, Dockery reminds his readers, “Jesus Christ is the central figure of the New Testament and the focus of the Christian faith” (p. 28). But Christ is not merely a New Testament figure, for he himself taught the apostles to engage in a new method of reading the Old Testament, “a Christological reading” (p. 29). Through our Lord’s Christological method, the church learned that Jesus himself is the hinge between the Old and the New. “Christ is not merely a model for our view of the Bible or its interpretation. He is the main theme and goal of our study of Scripture. The focus is on Jesus” (p. 36). This “Christocentric perspective” centers the Bible hermeneutically. Jesus Christ, in his “exalted lordship,” set “the pattern” in the early church, and we would do well to keep the worship of Christ and the preaching of his gospel in focus (p. 111).
An outworking of this theme occurs in the chapters on the canon and its interpretation. While evangelicalism has, since this book’s original publication, settled on formally identifying Scripture as the inspired and thus inerrant Word of God, it has not always successfully remembered Scripture’s hermeneutic unity is integrally bound with that claim. But because Dockery believes the Bible is inspired by God the Holy Spirit, he also believes the Bible must be read as a unity centered on God’s incarnate Word (pp. 20-21). The interpretive model proposed by Dockery comes from the Bible itself (pp. 112-15), builds on historic Christianity’s contributions (pp. 116-19), and engages with contemporary hermeneutics. Rather than surrendering to the singular sirens of modernist hubris, Dockery argues there is a sensus plenior in the text greater than “what was possibly intended or known by the author” (p. 119). Fully cognizant of the difficulties provided by the two cultural horizons of author and reader, he carefully crafts ten guidelines of interpretation, giving a salient example of how the Bible’s “fullest meaning is found in the Lord Jesus Christ” (p. 120-21).
Whether speaking of the Bible’s origin, transmission, or reception, Dockery never allows us to forget the entire Bible is the Word of God “breathed out by God” (cover). Scripture comes to us as a grace of divine revelation (p. 10) through the prophets of the Old Testament and the apostles of the New. Across the millennia, Scripture remains the Word of God because it was inspired by, preserved in the church by, and is illuminated to contemporary hearers by God the Holy Spirit. This dependable written Word of God authoritatively points our minds and hearts toward the Lord Jesus Christ, the incarnate Word of God. Evangelicals in general and Southern Baptists in particular should thank Seminary Hill Press for proposing and publishing a second and sorely needed edition of this now classic and still necessary theological introduction to the doctrine of Scripture.
