Literary Criticism and Biblical HermeneuticsJesus and the Language of the Kingdom: Symbol and Metaphor in New Testament Interpretation. Norman Perrin

Abstract

Norman Perrin has just published and the Language of the Kingdom, a completely rewritten and expanded version of certain articles from the early seventies (p. 16) as his continuing interest in the historical came more and more under the literary influence of Amos Wilder and the philosophical influence of Paul Ricoeur. book contains four chapters: a short introduction (pp. 1-14), a long chapter on The Interpretation of of God in the Message of Jesus (pp. 15-88), a still longer one on The Modern Interpretation of the of Jesus (pp. 89-193), and a final brief synthesis, The of God and the of Jesus: Some Conclusions (pp. 194-205). There is also an excellent annotated bibliography of major works under four rubrics: Kingdom of God, Parables of Jesus, Metaphor and Symbol, and Hermeneutics. introductory first chapter is more important than its length might indicate because Perrin outlines here how the historical problem of has become for him a hermeneutical one and what such a transition means for