Practical Hermeneutics: the Legal Text and Beyond

ABSTRACT

This article attempts to show the continuing practical relevance of hermeneutics through the example of legal interpretation. The article begins with the very concrete nature of legal hermeneutics that forms everyday legal practice – the interrelation of meaning and application – and expands at a more theoretical to show how legal hermeneutics, and hermeneutics more generally, offers what Ricoeur calls an interpretive “choice in favor of meaning.” The choice in favour of meaning underscores the restorative character of hermeneutics that legal hermeneutics can epitomize. The article concludes with some of the challenges facing contemporary legal hermeneutics.     

Critical hermeneutics and higher education: a perspective on texts,meaning and institutional culture

This paper is a discussion of critical hermeneutics as a research methodology employed in a conceptual analytic study of the concept ‘institutional culture’ within the context of higher education. The research was undertaken to develop an understanding of the concept and to explore its construction in university policy documents. The aim of this paper is to motivate the choice of critical hermeneutics as a research methodology for the mentioned study. I explore both aspects of critical hermeneutics, namely hermeneutics and critical theory. The interpretive nature of hermeneutics enabled me to expose the hidden meanings of institutional culture, while its context-specific nature was beneficial for pointing out the nature of institutional culture in the university setting. Critical theory, on the other hand, was appropriate because it is a theory that is self-conscious about historicity and the role of the social environment. In combination, the merits of these two aspects of critical hermeneutics facilitated the understanding of the university setting as a social reality. Employing critical hermeneutics as a research methodology furthermore assisted in analysing the construction of institutional culture within university policy documents, taking into account the important role of history in interpretation. In essence, critical hermeneutics facilitated my understanding of the difficult-to-explain concept ‘institutional culture’ in the higher education setting.     

Working with Korean-American Families: Multicultural Hermeneutics in Understanding and Dealing with Marital Domestic Violence

Multicultural hermeneutics is introduced as a method of understanding and dealing with marital domestic violence. The brief review of literature covers four categories of hermeneutic tradition: (1) philosophical hermeneutics, (2) psychological hermeneutics, (3) narrative hermeneutics, and (4) multicultural hermeneutics. This paper proposes that multiple perspectives or an interdisciplinary scheme of hermeneutics help to understand the central issues of marital domestic violence. Korean women are vulnerable to Hwabyung (an anger syndrome), in the patriarchal and oppressive family context. Korean-American families are experiencing a certain degree of acculturation stress in transition as well as intergenerational conflict between first and second generations due to explicit and implicit cultural differences in the United States. One Korean-American family case is presented to show how marital domestic violence can be evaluated and treated better from the perspective of multicultural hermeneutics. A number of recommendations are also suggested to change the social and political context in which marital domestic violence occurs.     

医学阐释学--医学哲学研究新视角

医学阐释学是哲学阐释学在医学领域的应用,是医学与哲学交叉的一个新领域.简述哲学阐释学的发展以及其主要观点,并集中讨论了医学阐释学研究的范畴,其中包括:人体的现象学、健康和病患的意义、医患关系、生命伦理学、医学的目的.指出医学阐释学对医学哲学、医学人文科学研究的影响.     

“误读”与新义——经学文本诠释刍议

中国的文本诠释学产生于战国时期。从文本诠释的内容、性质和体例看,大致可分为两类。一类是义理诠释学,一般称为"传"。另一类是语言诠释学,一般称为"训诂"或"诂训"。传的特点是"解说经义","并经文所未言者而引申之","多离经"。诂训的特点是"第就经文所言者而诠释之",追求文本原貌、原义。但是,在文本诠释的历史实践中,传往往离不开训诂,训诂也离不开传。"传"的内容在西方诠释学中又称作"误读"。我们借用"误读"的概念只是为了吸收西方文本诠释中的合理成分,并不是同意放弃追求文本原貌、原义的真理性原则。在中国文化史上,"误读"是创建新义理的一种方式,也是为汉语增加新质要素的一种方式。"误读"源于春秋战国间"断章取义"、"以意逆志"、"诗无达诂"的文本阅读诠释理论,是一种理论创新、语言创新的手段。"误读"在易学发展史上,尤其《易经》与《易传》的关系上有着重要的理论价值,有着突出的解释力。     

Through hermeneutics of suspicion to a rediscovery of faith

Ric?ur argued that the critique of religion developed by the three modern masters of a hermeneutics of suspicion – Marx, Nietzsche, and Freud – is liberating insofar as it makes possible a mature faith. In the first part of the article, I explore this issue in relation to Kierkegaard. In the second part of the article, I discuss how Kierkegaard uses a biblical critique of religion, particularly the figure of the prophet, in his final attack on the church in his pamphlet “What Christ Judges of Official Christianity”. Through my investigation of the role of a hermeneutics of suspicion in Kierkegaard’s rediscovery of faith, I aim to question Ric?ur’s dichotomy between an external, atheistic hermeneutics of suspicion versus an internal hermeneutics of faith.     

Hermeneutics and Sport

Hermeneutics is the exploration of the process of textual interpretation. As such, it has long been recognised as an important component within the humanities and social sciences, whether one deals with actual texts or with other the products of meaningful human activity, including social actions and utterances. Here, we offer a brief overview of the contribution that hermeneutics might make to the philosophy of sport. If sports and sporting events are seen to be the results of meaningful human interactions, then they are meaningful phenomena that lend themselves to interpretation. It can thus be argued that a hermeneutics of sport is a valid and important discipline, worthy of consideration and development. We offer a review of the nature and history of hermeneutics in general, briefly exploring the place of key figures such as Schleiermacher, Heidegger, Gadamer and Riceour, as well as key concepts such as that of the hermeneutic circle. In addition, we suggest the importance of a hermeneutics of suspicion, grounded in the work of Marx, Freud and Nietzsche. In the second part of our introduction, we briefly comment on each of the papers that comprise the current volume, and that reflect the diversity of approaches that a hermeneutics of sport might embrace.     

Toward a General Theory of Understanding. Schutzian Theory as Proto-hermeneutics

This paper aims to explore the relations between Schutzian theory and hermeneutics. After presenting the connections between hermeneutic thought and Schutz’s work from a historical point of view, it will argue that despite its significant differences from hermeneutic theory, Schutzian theory can be utilized as a kind of proto-hermeneutics. By now, the heterogeneous movement of the interpretive social sciences has reached an established position, but with their growing reliance on the impulses coming from philosophical hermeneutics, the latent problem comes to the foreground: the former demand for an action-theoretical grounding has faded away. Currently, action theory itself is no more dominated by the work of interpretively minded authors, but by the theories of rational choice. This results in a false opposition between the explanatory models, which base their arguments on historical, cultural, and linguistic factors, and those, which focus on the plane of the decisions of individuals. Bypassing the objectivism present in both the rational choice approach and hermeneutics, Schutz’s pragmatic theory of the life-world, originating from both interpretive and pragmatic intellectual influences, may be useful to overcome this opposition, and can serve as a proto-hermeneutical point of departure: that is, as a theory which cannot alone take over the duty of hermeneutics, but which can complement hermeneutics on a fundamental level.     

‘Undecidability’ or ‘anticipatory resoluteness’ Caputo in conversation with Heidegger

In this article I will consider John D. Caputo’s hermeneutics of deconstruction or what he calls ‘radical hermeneutics’, with ‘undecidability’ as its major theme, in conversation with Martin Heidegger’s notion of ‘resolute existence’. Through an examination of the different positions of Caputo, Heidegger, and also Kierkegaard, Derrida and Meister Eckhart on the possibility of repetition, the hermeneutical circle and the mystical way of prayer and faith, I am arguing that deconstruction is not the end of hermeneutics, it is not the final destination of an interpretative task, and thus deconstructive hermeneutics has to concede a reconstructive process. Further, I am arguing that Caputo’s ‘radical hermeneutics’ is too reductionist to keep any meaning for the hermeneutic enterprise to aspire to. I am contending, rather, that it is resolute existence that theology aspires to as it is a move beyond ‘undecidability’.     

Horizons of hermeneutics: Intercultural hermeneutics in a globalizing world

Starting from the often-used metaphor of the “horizon of experience” this article discusses three different types of intercultural hermeneutics, which respectively conceive hermeneutic interpretation as a widening of horizons, a fusion of horizons, and a dissemination of horizons. It is argued that these subsequent stages in the history of hermeneutics have their origin in—but are not fully restricted to—respectively premodern, modern and postmodern stages of globalization. Taking some striking moments of the encounter between Western and Chinese language and philosophy as example, the particular merits and flaws of these three types of hermeneutics are being discussed. The claim defended is that although these different types of hermeneutics are mutually exclusive from a theoretical point of view, as interpreting beings in the current era we depend on each of these distinct hermeneutic practices and cannot avoid living them simultaneously.     

WHAT DOES HERMENEUTICS HAVE TO DO WITH BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION?

In common usage, ‘hermeneutics’ is a word often used interchangeably with ‘interpretation’. This has especially become so in biblical studies, but a review of how the word ‘hermeneutics’ came to prominence in biblical scholarship suggests that there is value in continuing to keep it as a concept distinguishable from interpretation. The omnipresence of the word in contemporary biblical studies obscures some of the specific roles that hermeneutics is well suited to perform. The potential benefits of hermeneutics in this more limited sense for biblical interpretation are discussed with respect to the two main hermeneutical theorists of the late twentieth century: Hans‐Georg Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur.     

Measure development and the hermeneutic task

I examine the dynamics of measure development using two case studies: temperature, and health-related quality of life. I argue, following Bas van Fraassen and Leah McClimans that in each case these dynamics have a hermeneutic structure. Measure development is plagued by epistemic circularity, as is the task of interpreting a text, and similar strategies can be used in both measure development and hermeneutics to overcome that circularity. I show that Hans Georg Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics in particular are an effective lens through which to examine the development of the temperature standard as described by Hasok Chang. Despite similar grounding in hermeneutics, I note an important difference between measure development for temperature and for health-related quality of life. Namely, while the meaning of temperature can be standardized, the meaning of health-related quality of life cannot. This standardization of meaning for the temperature concept represents a limit to the analogy with hermeneutics. Finally, I argue that the indeterminacy we find in health-related quality of life measurement is a result not only of analogy with the hermeneutic task, but of full-fledged participation in it.

     

从我国现行法律看安乐死的实施

安乐死作为自然人在特殊情况下对自己生命自主选择的权利,涉及人的生命权益,有关生命权立法是安乐死问题的关键.安乐死的实施与我国现行法律对生命权的严格维护产生冲突,需要我国用法律的形式肯定安乐死,并对现行法律做出适当调整,为安乐死立法留下法律空间.     

Thingly hermeneutics/Technoconstructions

Within the Euro-American community of philosophers relating hermeneutics to science there is a considerable disagreement about where hermeneutics may be located. The older traditions hold that hermeneutics apply to and are limited to the social, cultural, and historical dimensions of science. But newer approaches claim that hermeneutics applies to the very praxis of science and to the constitution of scientific objects. This paper sides with the latter perspective and argues that a tendency to retain vestigial positivist interpretations of science keeps the older tradition from seeing hermeneutics as deeply embedded in science praxis. After arguing this point historically, I turn to a hermeneutic recuperation of science, first by drawing from the hermeneutic approach of Joseph Rouse, and then by the hermeneutic constructionism of Bruno Latour. I finally turn to what I term technoconstruction in science, particularly in imaging processes, to show concrete cases of the hermeneutic preparation of scientific objects. I conclude that contemporary science has exceeded its earlier modernist framework and now operates in a constructionist-hermeneutic framework.     

Repetition与激进解释学的理论取向

On the basis of current western philosophical readings,this article recommends two relevant subjects:one is the concept of radical hermeneutics,which represents a new descent of Hermeneutics; another is that of repetition,which is thought a basic concept of radical hermeneutics. Following the distinction between Platonic repetition and Nietzschean mode of repetition ,the article develops a theoretical clue from Kierkegaard and Heidegger to Deleuze and Derrida.     

Heideggerian hermeneutics and its application to sport

Whilst hermeneutics had been traditionally associated with the interpretation of texts, Martin Heidegger gave it a new meaning, associating it with the interpretation of the existence (the ‘being’) of Dasein. This paper will explain the Heideggerian understanding of hermeneutics, based on the early work of Heidegger (especially Being and Time and other related works from this period) which focuses on the analysis of the being of Dasein. His main contribution was a shift of focus from the interpretation of an unknown object (a text) to the interpretation of the human being (Dasein), which Heidegger sees as primary, since it is on the basis of Dasein’s understanding that other things and beings are interpreted. Firstly, the paper discusses hermeneutics in relation to human being (Dasein), with a brief introduction to the main characteristics of Dasein (including the ‘existentialia’), showing the place of hermeneutics within Dasein’s existence, together with Heidegger’s re-interpretation of the hermeneutic circle. Secondly, this understanding is applied to sport, focusing on the experience of athletes and on the possibilities for interpretations towards authentic existence, including its ethical aspect.     

语言学:医者的利器

在古代和中世纪,语言学是哲学的一部分,那时语言学还不是独立的科学.当今这两门学问都有了同样发展,对于医者的作用都很大[1].     

Hermeneutics and the Doctrine of Scripture: Why They Need Each Other

Current attempts to understand Scripture theologically typically appeal either to modern hermeneutics or to more traditional doctrines of Scripture – but not to both together. It is argued here that hermeneutics can help to identify and resolve certain problems bequeathed to posterity by the characteristic sixteenth‐century equation of Scripture with ‘Word of God’. The problems in question relate to the past and present modes of divine speech, the relation of text to community and the fundamental significance of the ‘Word of God’ concept itself.     

理解方法论视野中的读者与文本——加达默尔与方法论诠释学

Judging Gadamer’s theoretical stance is a complicated matter, and his ontological hermeneutics is usually regarded as a text-centered theory of understanding. Through an analysis of the phenomenological premises from which his theories take off, however, we can clearly see his reader-centric stance. On the basis of this stance some cease to seek for the original intention of the author or the original meaning of the text, which ineluctably leads to the ignorance of an understanding methodology. As far as people’s intentional understanding is concerned, however, the important as well as essential task is still that of striving for a certain kind of understanding that is relatively correct, with universally effective methodology as its necessary prerequisite. What is more, herein lies the significance of the epistemology of hermeneutics. This article aims to re-insert a sense of methodology after hermeneutics went through a period of ontological reflection, and hence clarify that it is of necessity that hermeneutics resumes its text-centric methodological stance. __________ Translated by Zhang Lin from Zhongguo shehui kexue 中国社会科学 (Social Sciences in China), 2008, (2): 42–53