Content area
Full Text
INTRODUCTION
One of the difficulties that we encounter in studying the early history of Biblical interpretation is that many Patristic commentaries and homilies have not survived the ravages of time. Only in rare instances do we have the opportunity to examine more than one Patristic interpretation of an entire book of the Bible. However, we are rather well off when it comes to the twelve Minor Prophets. In the course of my research into Patristic exegesis I was pleased to discover that no less than three complete Patristic commentaries are extant, namely those by Theodore of Mopsuestia, Theodoret of Cyrrhus, and Cyril of Alexandria. Clearly this affords us an opportunity to compare and contrast the differing exegetical methods characteristic of the Alexandrian and Antiochene schools. I am not going to suggest that we jettison the distinction between these two approaches. Nonetheless, I do believe that it needs to be re-evaluated from time to time in the light of particular Biblical texts.
METHODOLOGY
In his article on the different presuppositions and methods of these two schools Jacques Guillet observes that they both concur in seeing the history of the Hebrew people as a preparation for the Incarnation. The austerity of the Antiochene exegetes does not prevent them from finding types of the Savior in the Old Testament. Someone like Theodoret is quite willing to acknowledge that Joshua prefigures Christ and the twelve stones of Gilgal the Apostles. Even Theodore, hostile though he is to the luxuriant allegorizing of the Alexandrians, affirms that the Law contains the shadow of all the realities of the Gospel. For the Antiochenes, as Isidore of Pelusium expresses it, "if it is not always a question of Christ, it is still sometimes a question of Him." But the Alexandrians consider it necessary to find the presence of the Lord on every page. Guillet sums up the differences between the two schools as follows: "Antioch retains the prophetic aspect of the typology of the Old Testament, while Alexandria retains its symbolic aspect and spiritual content."'
Before going any further, let me emphasize the limitations of the present study. Granted that there are divergences between the Antiochene and Alexandrian methods of exegesis, how do we set about exploring these divergences? There is a...