Reality and Illusion in New Testament Scholarship: A Primer in Critical Realist Hermeneutics

by Ben F. Meyer

Reality and Illusion in New Testament Scholarship is a basic introduction to the theory of interpretation and theory of history for New Testament readers, students, and scholars. It offers an entry into the thought of the late, great Bernard Lonergan on insight and judgment, subjectivity and objectivity, horizons and changes of horizon, alienation and ideology. It focuses on what it takes to measure up to the literature of the New Testament.

Genres: Theology

272 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Benjamin Franklin Meyer (1927–1995) was a theologian and scholar of religion. Born in November 1927 in Chicago, Illinois, he studied with the Jesuits, his studies taking him to California, Strasbourg, Göttingen, and Rome, where he received his doctorate from the Pontifical Gregorian University in 1965. He taught briefly at Alma College and at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley before joining the faculty at McMaster University in 1969, where he taught in the religious studies department until 1992. Meyer's areas of specialization included the historical Jesus, the early expansion of the Christian movement, and the hermeneutics of Bernard Lonergan. He authored several important monographs over his 30-year career. He died on 28 December 1995 in Les Verrières, Switzerland.

Reviews

[Zach Waldis · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm not sure who this book is aimed at and it fails to meaningfully address hermeneutics (be they general or Biblical) or New Testament scholarship. Strange because the Aims of Jesus is so good.