The Authority of the Community (of All the Saints): Toward a Postmodern Baptist Hermeneutic of Tradition

Abstract

As the traditional Baptist aversion to tradition has its roots in the modern milieu in which Baptists flourished, the reconstruction of Baptist life after the collapse of modernity may require the formulation of a new hermeneutic of tradition that is both postmodern and distinctively Baptist. After reevaluating the Baptist tendency to reject tradition as a source of authority, I survey several non-Baptist theologians and theological movements that have made constructive use of tradition and consider the contributions they may make to a postmodern Baptist hermeneutic of tradition. Finally, the article proposes a hermeneutic of tradition that (1) has its locus in the universal Church, the larger community under the Lordship of Christ to which local churches and denominations belong; (2) focuses on the narrative that is shared by the churches and rehearsed in their worship; and (3) requires constructive dissent for the health of the tradition.