Interpreting Scriptures in Judaism, Christianity and Islam
Overlapping Inquiries

This comparative study examines how scriptures - the Bible and the Qur'an - were interpreted in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam throughout history.

Mordechai Z. Cohen (Edited by), Adele Berlin (Edited by)

9781107065680, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 6 June 2016

402 pages, 16 b/w illus.
23.1 x 16 x 3.3 cm, 0.68 kg

'This volume brings together an excellent collection of essays that will prove useful for scholars in many fields including hermeneutics, medieval religious thought, the history of biblical interpretation, and the history of the three Abrahamic religions. The two outstanding qualities of the volume are the various chapters on Islamic interpretive tradition and the four chapters comprising part 2s on the sensus literalis. In the case of this first strength, the chapters dealing with issues within the Islamic interpretive tradition go a long way in both introducing this important vein of scriptural interpretation to the interested reader and showing in a compelling manner the various points of contact between Islamic interpreters and those from Judaism and Christianity. In the second instance, part 2 of this volume represents one of the best treatments of the sensus literalis available to an academic readership. For these reasons, this volume deserves much attention.' Stephen D. Campbell, Journal of Hebrew Scriptures

This comparative study traces Jewish, Christian, and Muslim scriptural interpretation from antiquity to modernity, with special emphasis on the pivotal medieval period. It focuses on three areas: responses in the different faith traditions to tensions created by the need to transplant scriptures into new cultural and linguistic contexts; changing conceptions of the literal sense and its importance vis-à-vis non-literal senses, such as the figurative, spiritual, and midrashic; and ways in which classical rhetoric and poetics informed - or were resisted in - interpretation. Concentrating on points of intersection, the authors bring to light previously hidden aspects of methods and approaches in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. This volume opens new avenues for interdisciplinary analysis and will benefit scholars and students of biblical studies, religious studies, medieval studies, Islamic studies, Jewish studies, comparative religions, and theory of interpretation.

Introduction: intersecting encounters with scriptures in three faiths Mordechai Z. Cohen
Part I. Scriptural Texts in Changing Contexts: 1. The emergence of biblical interpretation in antiquity James Kugel
2. Disclosing the mystery: hermeneutics of typology in Syriac exegesis Sidney Griffith
3. 'We have made it an Arabic Qur'an': the permissibility of translating scripture in Islam in contrast with Judaism and Christianity Meir Bar-Asher
4. The unmoved mover begins to move: literary and artistic renderings of the Christian Bible Piero Boitani
5. Deconstructing the dual Torah: a Jewish response to the Muslim model of scripture Meira Polliack
Part II. Conceptions of the Literal Sense: 6. The literal sense of Christian scripture: redefinition and revolution Jon Whitman
7. Figuring the letter: making sense of 'sensus litteralis' in late-medieval Christian exegesis Alastair Minnis
8. Conceptions of the literal sense (??hir, ?aq?qa) in Muslim interpretive thought Robert Gleave
9. Emergence of the rule of peshat in Jewish Bible exegesis Mordechai Z. Cohen
Part III. Rhetoric and the Poetics of Reading: 10. Reading Virgil, reading David: poetry and commentary in the medieval school of Rheims A. B. Kraebel
11. On the figurative (maj?z) in Muslim interpretation and legal hermeneutics Wolfhart Heinrichs
12. Words of eloquence: rhetoric and poetics in Jewish peshat exegesis in its Muslim and Christian contexts Mordechai Z. Cohen
13. Classical rhetoric and scriptural interpretation in the Latin West Rita Copeland
14. Robert Lowth's biblical poetics and Romantic theory Stephen Prickett
15. From scripture to literature: modern ways of reading the Bible Adele Berlin.

Subject Areas: Judaism [HRJ], Islam [HRH], Biblical studies & exegesis [HRCG], New Testaments [HRCF2], Old Testaments [HRCF1]