
Stephen D. Campbell | Aquila Initiative (Bonn, Germany)
In an oral tradition about biblical theologian Brevard Childs, it is said that a student once asked, “Professor Childs, how can I become a better Bible interpreter?” “If you want to become a better reader of the Bible,” Childs replied, “you must become a deeper person.” To a large degree, it no longer matters whether this event happened the way it was described to me. What it communicates is true enough: becoming a deep person—a theologically rich person, for example—helps with the interpretive task in ways that can hardly be overestimated. In practice, the truth of Childs’s comment is likely to be underappreciated more often than not. What is clear, however, is that one of the chief aims of the theological educator is the growth of individuals into deeper people.
[Read more…]