The Drama of Theological Disputation (Vanhoozer enters the Blogosphere)

NT scholar Andreas Köstenberger has recently reviewed Kevin Vanhoozer's latest effort, The Drama of Doctrine, on his blog.

To this analytical scrubbing, Vanhoozer has "systematically" responded in a helpfully succinct manner.

As Kostenberger, a "declared Vanhoozer fan" notes, Drama "is not for the faint-hearted" as "it is a hermeneutical tour de force." Though he commends Vanhoozer for the way he "continues to wield his prolific pen and [challenge] Christian theologians to contextualize their approach to biblical interpretation in the postmodern context in which we increasingly find ourselves," Kostenberger nevertheless raises various significant issues in Vanhoozer's work.

I think that Vanhoozer gives adequate answers to most of Kostenberger's primary concerns, and helpfully nuances specific parts of his own argument along the way. He ends by asserting,

I think we both want to affirm the Bible’s multi-perspectival truth. Ironically, the key difference between us may lie not in our estimate concerning the genre not of Scripture but of systematic theology. But this, I have to confess, is something I am still very much working through…

This cordial (and informal) dialogue between a NT scholar and a Systematic Theologian is at once helpful and encouraging. It's also good to read Vanhoozer at the "blog" level, where I can understand 67 % of his words (rather than the normal 34 % rate I experience when reading his published tomes).