‘Contextual Bible Study’ as a Form of Liberation Biblical Interpretation

Abstract

Abstract The political context of South Africa in the 1980s generated distinct forms of liberation theology, including Black Theology and Contextual Theology. These two South African liberation theologies, in conversation with other liberation theologies, gave birth in the post-State of Emergency (1985) period to a particular form of liberation praxis, what has come to be called ‘Contextual Bible Study’. Forged in South Africa by the conceptual contours of both South African Black Theology and South African Contextual Theology, this approach took its initial conceptual shape from the community-based work of the Centro de Estudos Bíblicos in Brazil, but was regularly reconstituted by actual anti-apartheid collaborative praxis, which provided particular sites in which these different liberation ideo-theological trajectories intersected. This chapter traces the early conceptual contours of Contextual Bible Study as liberation biblical interpretation praxis, with a particular focus on method, tracking the regular rhythmical cycle of action-reflection and its conceptual contributions.