NT 993 Bibliography for Hermeneutical Foundations
Vern Sheridan Poythress, spring, 2025

*Altieri, Charles. Act and Quality: A Theory of Literary Meaning and Humanistic Understanding. Amherst: University of Massachusetts, 1981. This is the most comprehensive theory of meaning that I know of in English among those sympathetic to E. D. Hirsch. I believe that Altieri misses some of the point of Gadamer and company, but one can easily assimilate him to their point of view much more thoroughly by noting the flexible potential of the “form of life,” a Wittgensteinian concept which is the last thing back in Altieri’s approach. PN 81 .A453.
Arveson, Paul T. “Dialogic: A Systems Approach to Understanding,” JASA 30 (1978) 49-59. About types of logic.
Barbour, Ian G. Myths, Models and Paradigms: A Comparative Study in Science and Religion. New York: Harper & Row, 1974.
Berger, Peter L. A Rumor of Angels: Modern Society and the Rediscovery of the Supernatural. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1969.
________. The Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociological Theory of Religion. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1967. Chs. 1-3,6 are especially relevant.
*Berger, Peter L. and Thomas Luckmann. The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1967.
Bleicher, Josef. Contemporary Hermeneutics: Hermeneutics as Method, Philosophy, and Critique. London/Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980. A survey of Betti, Gadamer, Habermas, Apel, and Ricoeur. BD 241 .B58.
Bock, Darrell. “Evangelicals and the Use of the Old Testament in the New,” Bibliotheca Sacra 142 (1985) 209-223. A classification and survey of four major approaches on interpretation of NT use of the OT.
Borges, Jorge. Labyrinths. New York: New Directions, 1964. Pp. 3-18, 36-44 give stories difficult to treat by means of a narrow theory of closed propositional meaning.
Bourdieu, Pierre. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1977.
Braaten, Carl Edward. History and Hermeneutics. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1966. BT 28 .N47 v.2
Bultmann, Rudolf. Faith and Understanding. Ed. Robert W. Funk. New York: Harper & Row, 1969-.
Caird, George B. The Language and Imagery of the Bible. London: Duckworth, 1980. Influenced by James Barr. But tackles the theological implications of semantic theory. BS 537 .C33 1980.
Cook, Albert. Myth & Language. Bloomington: Indiana University, 1980. A wide-ranging but difficult-to-understand reflection. BL 304 .C66.
Culler, Jonathan. On Deconstruction: Theory and Criticism after Structuralism. Ithaca, NY: Cornell, 1982. This is not easy reading, but it is the most lucid that I know of on the question of deconstruction.
Ebeling, Gerhard. Introduction to a Theological Theory of Language. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1973. The new hermeneutic. Difficult reading.
Eco, Umberto. Interpretation and Over-Interpretation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992.
*Ellis, John M. The Theory of Literary Criticism: A Logical Analysis. Berkeley: University of California, 1974. A penetrating critique of “intentionalism” in literary interpretation, pp. 104-54, especially 124-33. PN 81 .E4 1977.
Ellul, Jacques. The Ethics of Freedom. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1976. Pp. 161-184. On freedom in hermeneutics.
*Fish, Stanley. Is There a Text in This Class? The Authority of Interpretive Communities. Cambridge: Harvard, 1980. Pp. vii, 1-17, 303-371. Nonautonomy of texts; no brute facts. PN 81 .F56.
Fish, Stanley. “Normal Circumstances, Literal Language, Direct Speech Acts, the Ordinary, the Everyday, the Obvious, What Goes without Saying, and Other Special Cases,” Critical Inquiry 4 no. 4 (1978) 625-44.
*Frame, John M. “Doctrine of the Christian Life.” Parts I and II. Mimeo. Philadelphia: WTS, 1979.
________. The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God. Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1987.
________. “Doctrine of the Word of God.” Mimeo. Philadelphia: WTS, 1978.
________. Perspectives on the Word of God: An Introduction to Christian Ethics. Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1990. A summary of use of perspectives in doctrine of the word of God and in ethics. BJ 1251 .F687 1990.
*Gadamer, Hans-Georg. Truth and Method. 2d ed. New York: Crossroad, 1989. BD 241 .G313 1989.
*Gaffin, Richard B. “Contemporary Hermeneutics and the Study of the New Testament,” WTJ 31 (1969) 129-144. Reprinted in Studying the New Testament Today, ed. John H. Skilton. Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1974.
Gellner, Ernest. Legitimation of Belief. Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1974. Chs. 1,8,9.
Gundry, Stanley. “Hermeneutics or Zeitgeist as the Determing Factor in the History of Eschatologies?” JETS 20 (1977) 45-55.
Habermas, Jürgen. Knowledge and Human Interests. 2d ed. London: Heinemann, 1978.
Hatch, Nathan O., and Noll, Mark A. Eds. The Bible in America: Essays in Cultural History. New York: Oxford, 1982. Concrete examples of interaction of culture and biblical hermeneutics. BS 540 .B4453.
Hirsch, Eric Donald, Jr. The Aims of Interpretation. Chicago: Chicago University, 1976.
*________. Validity in Interpretation. New Haven: Yale, 1967.
Howard, Roy J. Three Faces of Hermeneutics: An Introduction to Current Theories of Understanding. Berkeley: University of California, 1982. This is a reasonable introduction with a chapter each on “analytic hermeneutics” (Goerg H. von Wright and Peter Winch), “psychosocial hermeneutics” (Jürgen Habermas), “ontological hermeneutics” (H. G. Gadamer). BD 241 .H73 1982.
*Hoy, David Couzens. The Critical Circle: Literature, History, and Philosophical Hermeneutics. Berkeley: University of California, 1978. A lucid critique of E. D. Hirsch and exposition of Gadamer. BD 241 .H74.
Iser, Wolfgang. The Act of Reading: A Theory of Aesthetic Response. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins, 1978. Pp. 3-50. On the completion of meaning by the reader. PN83.I813.
Johnson, Cedric B. The Psychology of Biblical Interpretation. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1983. More elementary than what we need, but competent on its own level, and therefore usable. BS 476 .J63 1983.
Johnson, Dennis E. "The Function of Romans 7:13-25 in Paul's Argument for the Law's Impotence and the Spirit's Power, and its Bearing on the Identity of the Schizophrenic 'I.'" In Resurrection and Eschatology: Theology in Service of the Church: Essays in Honor of Richard B. Gaffin, Jr. Ed. Lane G. Tipton and Jeffrey C. Waddington. Phillipsburg, NJ: P & R, 2008. 3-59.
Johnston, Eddie. “Biblical Interpretation and the Church,” Baptist Reformation Review 9 no. 1 (1980) 21-31. Hermeneutics takes into account love for the body of Christ. This paper is the fruit of a student’s work in the NT 993 course, and is a sample of the type of paper that one might do.
Jordan, James B. Ed. The Failure of the American Baptist Culture. Christianity and Civilization 1 (spring, 1982) 1-299. Presuppositions of baptists and paedobaptists.
Juhl, P. D. Interpretation: An Essay in the Philosophy of Literary Criticism. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University, 1980. An extension of E. D. Hirsch’s theory: meaning is (rather than “ought to be”) authorial intention. PN 81 .J83.
Kaiser, Walter C., Jr. Toward an Exegetical Theology: Biblical Exegesis for Preaching and Teaching. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1981. BS 476 .K35
________. The Uses of the Old Testament in the New. Chicago: Moody, 1985.
Kline, Meredith G. Images of the Spirit. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. An example of an interpretation raising many questions about interpretation theory.
Kraft, Charles H. Christianity in Culture: A Study in Dynamic Biblical Theologizing in Cross-Cultural Perspective. Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis, 1979.
Longman, Tremper, III. Literary Approaches to Biblical Interpretation. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1987. Introduction to and evaluation of literary approaches.
*Lundin, Roger, Anthony C. Thiselton, and Clarence Walhout. The Responsibility of Hermeneutics. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1985. A sane and nuanced attempt toward a balanced approach to hermeneutics. It refuses to leave out the context of human beings, life, and action.
Madison, G. B. The Hermeneutics of Postmodernity: Figures and Themes. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1988. BD 241 .M25 1988.
Marsden, George M. “J. Gresham Machen, History, and Truth,” Westminster Theological Journal 42 (1979-80) 157-175. On Machen’s lack of perspectives.
McCormick, Thomas Wilson. “Interdisciplinary Contributions to the Theory of Reading,” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Texas at Arlington, 1985. Chap. 2 and onwards contains much analysis of phenomenological theories of reading (Wolfgang Iser, Hans-Georg Gadamer, and especially Paul Ricoeur). Also, some discussion of Habermas and Freire. McCormick attempts to develop a Van Tilian point of view, though right-wing Van Tilians will be uneasy about his considerable sympathy to a phenomenological approach.
McKim, Donald K. Ed. A Guide to Contemporary Hermeneutics: Major Trends in Biblical Interpretation. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986. Reprints of key articles concerning hermeneutical frameworks. BS 500 .G85 1986.
Milbank, John. Theology and Social Theory: Beyond Secular Reason. Oxford: Blackwell, 1990. BR 115 .S57 M54 1993.
Miranda, Jose Porfirio. Marx and the Bible: A Critique of the Philosophy of Oppression. Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1974. Especially Chs. 2-3. BS 511.2 .M5713.
________. Being and the Messiah: The Message of St. John. Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1977.
Mohanty, Satya P. Literary Theory and the Claims of History: Postmodernism, Objectivity, Multicultural Politics. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997. PN 94 .M65 1997.
Olson, Bruce. For This Cross I’ll Kill You. Carol Stream, Ill.: Creation House, 1973. Chs. 16-19 illustrate cross-cultural evangelism.
Oss, Douglas A. “Canon as Context: The Function of Sensus Plenior in Evangelical Hermeneutics,” Grace Theological Journal 9:1 (1988): 105-127. Interaction with Kaiser, Waltke, and Poythress on the relation of exegesis of individual passages to the context of the canon. This article was earlier a paper for NT 993.
Packer, James I. “Infallible Scripture and the Role of Hermeneutics,” in Scripture and Truth. Ed. D. A. Carson and John D. Woodbridge. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1992. Pp. 325-356. A highly useful critical survey of contemporary hermeneutics, positioning evangelical hermeneutics over against deviants. The major remaining question is, how do we know what is rational and in what respects rationality is a good thing? BS 480 .S346 1992.
Percy, Walker. The Message in the Bottle: How Queer Man Is, How Queer Language Is, and What One Has to Do with the Other. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1975. A Catholic novelist trying to communicate about man and language to the late twentieth century. Especially valuable is “The Loss of the Creature,” pp. 46-63, on the evaporation of nonobjectivistic meaning. PS 3566 .E6912 M4.
Perkins, John. A Quiet Revolution: The Christian Response to Human Need, A Strategy for Today. Waco, Taxas: Word, 1976. Hermeneutics as corporate interaction in the church. Pp. 127, 201-224. Chs. 20-22.
Poythress, Vern S. [Items below are available at frame-poythress.org]
________. “Analysing a Biblical Text: Some Important Linguistic Distinctions,” Scottish Journal of Theology 32 (1979) 113-137.
________. “Analysing a Biblical Text: What Are We After?” Scottish Journal of Theology 32 (1979) 319-331.
________. Book Review: “Anthony Thiselton: The Two Horizons … ,” Westminster Theological Journal 43 (1980-81) 178-180.
________. “Christ the Only Savior of Interpretation,” WTJ 50 (1988) 305-321.
________. “Divine Meaning of Scripture,” WTJ 48 (1986) 241-279.
________. “A Framework for Discourse Analysis: The Components of a Discourse, from a Tagmemic Viewpoint,” Semiotica 38-3/4 (1982) 277-298.
________. God-Centered Biblical Interpretation. Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1999.
________. “God’s Lordship in Interpretation,” WTJ 50 (1988) 27-64.
________. “Hierarchy in Discourse Analysis: A Revision of Tagmemics,” Semiotica 40-1/2 (1982) 107-137.
________. In the Beginning Was the Word: Language--A God-Centered Approach. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2009.
________. "Introducing the Law of Christ (Lex Christi): A Fruitful Framework for Theology and Life," https://frame-poythress.org/introducing-the-law-of-christ-lex-christi-a-fruitful-framework-for-theology-and-life/.
________. “Is Exegesis Possible? I. A Relational Perspective on Meaning,” unpublished ms.
________. “Is Exegesis Possible? II. A Dynamic Perspective on Meaning,” unpublished ms.
________. Philosophy, Science and the Sovereignty of God. Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1976.
________. "The Presence of God Qualifying Our Notions of Grammatical-Historical Interpretation," to appear in JETS.
________. Reading the Word of God in the Presence of God: A Handbook for Biblical Interpretation. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2016.
________. Redeeming Philosophy: A God-Centered Approach to the Big Questions. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2014.
________. Redeeming Sociology: A God-Centered Approach. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2011.
Rescher, Nicholas. Methodological Pragmatism: A Systems-Theoretic Approach to the Theory of Knowledge. New York: New York University, 1977. Stimulating material on the spiral process of validation of methods and theses. B 832 .R472
________. Scepticism: A Critical Reappraisal. Totowa, NJ: Rowman and Littlefield, 1980
Ricoeur, Paul. The Conflict of Interpretations. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University, 1974.
Ricoeur, Paul. Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences. Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1981.
Ricoeur, Paul. Interpretation Theory. Fort Worth: Texas Christian University, 1976.
Ricoeur, Paul. The Rule of Metaphor. Toronto: University of Toronto, 1977.
Robinson, Richard. Definition. Oxford: Oxford University, 1954. Clears up some of the fallacies and infelicities in definition-making, and raises questions about what it is to look for an “essence.” See especially pp. 149-192.
*Rorty, Richard. Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University, 1979. Arguing for the demise of the philosophical metaphor which views the mind as an optical-like image of the world, and true knowledge as undistorted mirroring. Pp. 315-389 are of great importance, in that they expound the aims of the later Heidegger, the later Wittgenstein, and Gadamer as essentially exponents of the cultural value of openness to restructuring one’s ultimate conceptual system. If Rorty is correct, he has written the clearest and most attractive exposition of the continental hermeneutic tradition to date. B 53 .R68 1980.
Rose, Margaret A. The Post-Modern and the Post-Industrial. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. B 831.2. .R67 1991.
Sarup, Madan. An Introductory Guide to Post-Structuralism and Postmodernism. 2d ed. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1993. B 831.2 .S27 1993.
Scholes, Robert. Semiotics and Interpretation. New Haven: Yale University, 1982. Chap. 1 has a useful classification of current approaches to literary criticism. PN 98 .S46 S3.
Silva, Moises. Has the Church Misread the Bible? The History of Interpretation in the Light of Current Issues. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1987. A stimulating study of the history of interpretation concentrating on major perennial tensions.
Sless, David. In Search of Semiotics. Totowa, NJ: Barnes & Noble, 1986. A critique of mainstream semiotics on the basis of the indispensability of the observer. P 99 .S55 1986.
Swartley, Willard M. Slavery, Sabbath, War, and Women: Case Issues in Biblical Interpretation. Scottdale, PA/Kitchener, Ontario: Herald Press, 1983. Examining hermeneutical influences on some crucial issues. Swartley appears to favor a neo-orthodox view of inspiration, but the examples are still useful to work through.
Tayler, Charles. “Theories of Meaning,” Mand and World 13 (1980) 281-302.
Thiselton, Anthony. Interpreting God and the Postmodern Self: On Meaning, Manipulation, and Promise. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995. BT 102 .T52 1995.
Thiselton, Anthony. Hermeneutics: An Introduction. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009.
*Thiselton, Anthony. New Horizons in Hermeneutics. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1992. Survey of the main contemporary approaches to hermeneutics, and their implications for biblical interpretation. BD 241 .T46 1992.
________. The Two Horizons. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980.
Turner, Geoffrey. “Pre-understanding and New Testament Interpretation,” Scottish Journal of Theology 28 (1975) 227-242.
Van Til, Cornelius. Christian Theistic Ethics. Volume III of the series, In Defense of Biblical Christianity. Philadelphia: den Dulk Christian Foundation, 1971.
________. An Introduction to Systematic Theology. Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1974.
________. “My Credo,” Jerusalem and Athens. Ed. E. R. Geehan. Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1971. Pp. 3-21. Reprinted in The Reformed Pastor and the Defense of Christianity & My Credo. Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1971.
________. The New Hermeneutic. Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1974.
________. Why I Believe in God. Philadelphia: The Committee on Christian Education of the OPC. N.d.
Vanhoozer, Kevin J. The Drama of Doctrine: A Canonical-Linguistic Approach to Christian Theology. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2005. BR 118 .V36 2005.
Vanhoozer, Kevin J. First Theology: God, Scripture, & Hermeneutics. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2002. BT 55 .V36 2002.
Vanhoozer, Kevin J. Is There a Meaning in This Text? The Bible, the Reader, and the Morality of Literary Knowledge. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998. BS 476 .V34 1998.
*Vanhoozer, Kevin J. “A Lamp in the Labyrinth: The Hermeneutics of ‘Aesthetic’ Theology,” Trinity Journal 8 NS (1987) 25-56.
Vanhoozer, Kevin J. Remythologizing Theology: Divine Action, Passion, and Authorship. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010. BT 40 .V363 2010.
Vollenhoven, Dirk Hendrik Theodoor. “Hoofdlijnen der logica,” Philosophia Reformata 13 (1948) 59-118.
Watkin, Christopher. Biblical Critical Theory: How the Bible's Unfolding Story Makes Sense of Modern Life and Culture. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2022.
Weinsheimer, Joel C. Gadamer’s Hermeneutics: A Reading of Truth and Method. New Haven/London: Yale University Press, 1985. A successful attempt to make intelligible to English readers Gadamer’s Truth and Method. Weinsheimer interprets Gadamer’s book section by section. B 3248 .G33 W3438 1985.
Wittgenstein, Ludwig. On Certainty. New York: Harper, 1969.
________. Philosophische Untersuchungen (with English translation). New York: Macmillan, 1968.
________. Preliminary Studies for the “Philosophical Investigations,” Generally Known as the Blue and Brown Books. New York: Harper, 1958.
Wood, Charles M. The Formation of Christian Understanding: An Essay in Theological Hermeneutics. Philadelphia: Westminstess, 1981. A readable and sensitive Barthian approach to hermeneutical questions and the canon of Scripture.