The Spirit Speaks: Pneumatological Innovation in the Scriptural Exegesis of Justin and Tertullian

This paper considers the role of the Spirit within early Christian writers’ use of prosopological exegesis, an interpretive method which seeks to identify various persons (prosopa) as the “true” speakers or addressees of a Scriptural text in which they are otherwise not in view. While scholars are i...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Hughes, Kyle R. (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Brill 2015
In: Vigiliae Christianae
Year: 2015, Volume: 69, Issue: 5, Pages: 463-483
IxTheo Classification:HA Bible
KAB Church history 30-500; early Christianity
NBC Doctrine of God
NBG Pneumatology; Holy Spirit
Further subjects:B Justin Martyr Tertullian Holy Spirit prosopological exegesis trinitarianism
Online Access: Volltext (Verlag)
Description
Summary:This paper considers the role of the Spirit within early Christian writers’ use of prosopological exegesis, an interpretive method which seeks to identify various persons (prosopa) as the “true” speakers or addressees of a Scriptural text in which they are otherwise not in view. While scholars are increasingly recognizing that, for some early Christian writers, the Spirit could himself be a speaking agent, there remains no systematic analysis of the texts in which the Spirit speaks from his own prosopon. After making just such an analysis, focusing on key texts in the writings of Tertullian and Justin Martyr, this paper concludes that the need for divine testimony concerning both the Father and the Son was the central motivating factor for assigning ot quotations to the prosopon of the Spirit. In particular, this paper argues that this emphasis on the Spirit’s role as one who testifies is a direct outgrowth of the portrayal of the Spirit in the Johannine corpus and arose in the context of conflict with Judaism concerning the cessation of the Spirit. By making this connection, we have a new means by which to glimpse the theological dynamics at work in the pre-Nicene period that would contribute to the development of a distinctively Trinitarian, and not merely binitarian, view of God.
ISSN:1570-0720
Contains:In: Vigiliae Christianae
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1163/15700720-12341231