by Nick Acker

Foreword by Paul R. Eddy

For too long, critical biblical studies have applied modern textual assumptions to ancient oral cultures. Exegeting Orality challenges many of these modern approaches, distilling decades of studies in oral traditions to redirect pastors and scholars toward a more accurate narrative of biblical origins, identity, and meaning. Many works in the area of orality, textuality, performance criticism, and media studies focus on critical issues. Exegeting Orality guides pastors and scholars through a brief introduction to these fields, emphasizing biblical inspiration, interpretation, and proclamation. This work honors the rich oral traditional foundations of the inspired canon, urging a transformative shift in how we interpret the Bible. The stories we believe define us. The Bible is not just a text to be studied but a record of voices from the past who performed our definitive stories. The Bible is a tradition to be reproclaimed and reenacted in the community of faith. Let us not recast these ancient voices into modern epistemological molds without letting them speak from within their own cultural realities. Their voices still call out to us through the abiding Holy Spirit who connects us all to the story of Jesus. May we live out that ancient story today together.

by Tom Steffen and William Bjoraker

Foreword by R. Daniel Shaw

Have Western exegetes turned an Eastern book into a Western one? Has our fondness for a fixed printed text capable of being analyzed with precision and exactitude blinded us to other hermeneutic possibilities? Does God require all people to be able to analyze grammar to interpret Scripture? Does God assume all people can interpret Scripture through oral means? The authors recognize the effects of centuries of literacy socialization that produced a blind spot in the Western Christian world–the neglect by most in the academies, agencies, and assemblies of the foundational and forceful role orality had on the biblical text and teaching. From the inspired spoken word of the prophets, including Jesus (pre-text), to the elite literate scribes who painstakingly hand-printed the sacred text, to post-text interpretation and teaching, the footprint of orality throughout the entire process is acutely visible to those having the oral-aural influenced eyes of the Mediterranean ancients. Could oral hermeneutics be the “mother of relational theology”?