Re: Meaning & historical information, etc.

Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Fri, 20 Dec 1996 18:50:18 -0600

At 4:20 PM -0600 12/20/96, A K M Adam wrote:
>Colleagues,
>
>The distinction between meaning and significance is not a novelty of which
>hermeneutics scholars
>need to be apprised. It is a problematic, but useful, way of simplifying a
>more complicated state of
>affairs. If we really want to transform b-greek into b-hermeneutics for a
>while, I'll rise to the bait
>that is being set for me; this is familiar terrain for me, and I relish a
>vigorous and demanding
>discussion of hermeneutics. But on this list, I honestly, really, just
>want to argue with my
>interlocutors about absolute clauses, tense and aspect, and so on.

I think probably we had best NOT transform b-greek into b-hermeneutics; I
guess we can't avoid getting into this from time to time, but I think that
we've gone far enough to make clear where the lines are drawn between
epistemological stances that are not readily reconciled with each other.
Maybe it's worth while clarifying the perspectives from which we approach
the text--if it's not fairly obvious. But we're getting beyond and outside
of the matters upon which we agree, and I think it probably would be
salutary to return to questions of grammar and syntax and leave
hermeneutics, insofar as possible, back in the area of hidden or unbroached
agendas.

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, MO, USA 63130
(314) 935-4018
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cwc@oui.com
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/