THE HEURISTIC VALUE OF A PSYCHOANALYTIC MODEL IN THE INTERPRETATION OF PAULINE THEOLOGY |
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| Authors: | Robin Scroggs |
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| Affiliation: | Robin Scroggs is professor of New Testament, Chicago Theological Seminary, 5757 University Avenue, Chicago, Illinois 60637. He says: This paper of necessity is only a sketch of the thesis which I am struggling to bring to adequate expression in a full-length book manuscript. I am painfully aware that both from the psychoanalytic and the exegetical disciplines my thesis in this sketch remains relatively unprotected from important objections which might be raised by sympathetic readers, let alone by skeptics and opponents. My basic interpretation of Paul, while classical, is certainly not the only one, and many eyebrows will be raised by my stubborn use of Norman O. Brown as an interpreter of Freud. Here I can say only that in my judgment these thinkers concur in important ways in their interpretation of social and religious realities. In other ways, of course, they are miles apart. As a New Testament scholar, 1 intend ultimately to present a coherent and, if possible, persuasive view of Paul's thinking. I hope that readers will take the title of my paper seriously;if I use this particular interpretation of psychoanalytic theory, it is only because it has come to have for me a profound heuristic value in reaching a deeper understanding of Paul. The interested reader will find some issues touched on here explored in slightly greater depth in my little book, Paul for a New Day;(Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1977). |
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