by William Jackson
The ancient “school” in Antioch, though sometimes assessed with respect to Christology[1], is commonly identified by its unique contributions to biblical hermeneutics. Among others, the church fathers which may best represent Antioch are Diodore of Tarsus and his two pupils Theodore of Mopsuestia and John Chrysostom. The study of the school of Antioch has become more popular in the past half-century with a rising interest in the grammatical-historical method of biblical interpretation and a modern disdain for allegory within biblical hermeneutics, and consequently, more biblical scholars are claiming the ancient Antiochenes as their forefathers. As Donald Fairbairn correctly reveals, the result is a cycle in which the modern-day biblical scholar finds appreciation in reading the Antiochenes, and then inadvertently spreads the narrative of the School of Antioch as the protectors of the literal sense in constant opposition to the School of Alexandria, in which fanciful allegory permeated every commentary and pulpit.[2]
Various streams of scholarship have contributed to an oversimplified and caricatured representation of the school of Antioch suggesting an exegetical style that is woodenly historical and literalistic. The primary problem resulting from this teaching is the idea that the Antiochenes refused to interpret the Bible spiritually. On the contrary, like the rest of ancient Christendom, the exegetes from Antioch saw the Bible as uniquely inspired and continuously supernatural—therefore pregnant with spiritual meaning. The question then becomes, in what way did the Antiochenes believe the Scriptures contained spiritual meaning and how did they reach it?
Tool #1: Typology as the Safe Alternative to Allegory
Is typology the distinctly Antiochene way of spiritually reading the Scriptures? Mitchell Chase, in his book 40 Questions about Typology and Allegory, describes the schools of Alexandria and Antioch as existing on a spectrum with both parties promoting the literal and spiritual meanings of the text.[3] He, like others, seeks to tear down the false caricatures built to describe the Alexandrians and Antiochenes. Whereas the dichotomy of literal sense vs. spiritual sense suggests either party denied one or the other, Chase clarifies that each party valued both the literal and spiritual senses, albeit with nuance. According to Chase, in contrast to the Alexandrians, the Antiochenes operated with “interpretive restraint” by regulating their pursuit of the spiritual sense by use of typology. In particular, Chase sees Theodore as having understood the “most exalted sense of Scripture” as the sense delivered by typology. Likewise, Chase documents Chrysostom’s Christ-centered exegesis through his examination of the process of Old Testament type fulfillment with its concurrent New Testament antitype.
Alternatively, Frances Young is hesitant to suggest the Antiochenes be defined by typology when she insists, “The traditional categories of ‘literal’, ‘typological’ and ‘allegorical’ are quite simply inadequate as descriptive tools, let alone analytical tools.”[4] For Young, it seems, the problem with the present allegory-typology dichotomy is the supposed rootedness in historicity found in modern uses of the term “typology.”
Tool #2: Contemplating Theoria
In contrast to those who suggest typology is the key to clarifying the hermeneutical spectrum of the Antiochenes with respect to literal and spiritual meaning, there are some scholars who contend the recovery of the ancient term theoria provides the solution to rightly viewing the School of Antioch’s interpretive strategy.
Theoria, in its earliest Greek usage, is often translated as “contemplation.” Originally used to describe a literal journey in which one travels to another culture as a spectator, theoria was adopted by both Plato and Aristotle for the philosophical arena. By the 4th century for Christians in Antioch, theoria had become normative in biblical interpretation.While theoria was employed to describe the “journey” toward deeper meaning in Antioch, it could also mean “elevated understanding”—the product of the journey itself. As Chrysostom said, “There is great treasure stored up in the Scriptures, concealed beneath the surface ... so there is need of study so that we can learn the force hidden beneath the surface.”[5] For the Antiochenes, the key to grasping the higher sense of Scripture is found through diligent study of the obvious meaning.
Tool #3: Mimesis and the Portrait of Scripture
Unlike other scholars who focus on theoria as the key to unlocking the true Antiochenes, Frances Young points to another ancient term—mimesis.[6] Similar to modern terms such as “representation” or “mirror,”, mimesis in biblical exegesis refers to the way a text—an earthly representation—relays the spiritual reality existent beyond the senses. For the Antiochenes, the text itself served as a preview of the fuller picture not yet encapsulated but it would share distinct markers in such a way that the preview (the mimesis) and the fuller picture would be obvious to the Christian interpreter.
Against this understanding, the Alexandrian mimesis saw the text as containing “symbols” and “tokens” that point to the transcendent reality in a way that assumes the markers to be codewords in need of deciphering. Similarly, many of the ancient Christians pursued the biblical text as if it were a map to buried treasure—God’s scavenger hunt. The Antiochenes, on the other hand, were able to access the treasure by simply studying the biblical text as if it were a portrait of the treasure itself.
Tool #4: Divine Accommodation in Divine Revelation
Finally, I’ve found an additional category worthy of consideration—the Antiochene understanding of divine accommodation as it relates to the exchange between the human and divine authors.
The fact that God had chosen to reveal Himself within the confines of human language—whereas language is a construct of time and space—demonstrates his act of “divine accommodation” or “considerateness.” For the Antiochenes, according to Robert Hill, divine considerateness was a “loving gesture, with nothing patronizing about it” and the means by which God purposefully obscured his self-revelation in the Old Testament age only for the prior revelation to be clarified in the New Testament writings.[7] At times, the divine accommodation was believed to be manifested in the form of basic figures of speech drawn forth from the act of inspiration. In other words, the Antiochenes were faithful to look beyond the literal meaning of a sentence by acknowledging the author’s use of creative language and technique—supernaturally prompted by the Spirit.
As a practice, it seems the Antiochenes anticipated figures of speech when they approached the Scriptures, and by reading discerningly, they assumed they could understand the inspired meaning—when the human author says x by way of this particular articulation, he really means y. This speaks to how highly the Antiochenes valued the literal sense—it contained all the necessary information for the interpreter. In contrast, it is as if the Alexandrians saw the literal sense itself as some sort of divine figure of speech. When God reveals through Scripture, he is speaking in terms only he can fully know—only he knows how to cipher his own figures of speech when read plainly by humans. Therefore, the Alexandrian model becomes this: because the divine author said x, it is possible he meant y … or z … or q … or t, etc.
The Divine Accommodation approach seems most helpful to me because, in it, we can see that the key difference lays in how much the interpreter can concede to divine authorship over human authorship. In other words, it is not so much that the Alexandrians promoted multiple meanings for a given text. Instead, their concession that the Spirit was speaking of such transcendent realities suggested multiple potential meanings might exist. The Antiochenes, on the other hand, were not willing to “hand over” as much meaning to divine authorship in a way that would confuse the more obvious human authorship. At first glance, this poses several theological problems. Yet, more charitably, the Antiochenes did not believe God would inject meaning beyond the capabilities of a faithful, illumined, and curious interpreter.
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[1] See Donald Fairbairn, “Patristic Exegesis and Theology: The Cart and the Horse,” WTJ 69 (2007): 1–19.
[2] Fairbairn, “The Cart and the Horse,” 3–5.
[3] Mitchell L. Chase, 40 Questions about Typology and Allegory (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 2020), 211–12.
[4] Frances M. Young, Biblical Exegesis and the Formation of Christian Culture (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 1997), 2.
[5] John Chrysostom, Homily 45 (PG 54.414.1), in Hill, Reading the Old Testament in Antioch, 153.
[6] Young, Biblical Exegesis, 210.
[7] Robert Hill, Reading the Old Testament in Antioch, (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2010), 35–40.