Between "Autobiography" And "Criticism"

Emerging under the background of postmodernism and cultural studies in the1980s, autobiographical biblical criticism is a correction to early reader response criticism. This burgeoning approach of biblical criticism is dramatically different from theological criticism and historical criticism in the exegetical tradition of the Bible. Its methodological characteristics are manifested as three following perspectives: contextualized perspective, perspective of the interplay between intersubjectivity and intertextuality and textual hermeneutic perspective.In terms of exterior critical approach, autobiographical biblical criticism belongs to cultural criticism. It emphasizes the important role of readers’contexts in scriptural hermeneutics. Therein, the communal context of the interpreter has a profound effect on his (or her) interpretive strategy. While presenting the communal context, autobiographical biblical criticism takes the presupposition shaped by this effect as the object of reflection, revealing a clear sense of identity. The construction of identity in autobiographical biblical criticism is a strategic act. Reflection of identical strategy and the implicit ethical issue of telling about the Other, becomes the focus of ideological criticism in this hermeneutic paradigm.In terms of interior critical dynamism, autobiographical biblical criticism adopts a perspective of interplay between intertextuality and intersubjectivity. In the understanding of autobiographical biblical criticism,"self is a fragmental one in the postmodernist sense. Self is not a stable and unified entity, but a compounded and changing subject-in-process. In autobiographical biblical criticism, dialectical transfer takes place between intersubjectivity and intertextuality, highlighting the communicative function of the hermeneutic action as a kind of discursive practice. The subversive power of reforming reality is implied under the intertextual carnival. Autobiographical biblical critic Jeffery Staley’s passionate reading of the Gospel of John in the perspective of intersubjectivity and intertexuality is an instance of this kind of subversive power.In terms of underlying reading experience, autobiographical biblical criticism adopts a perspective of textual hermeneutics, the dialectical relation between diatanciation and appropriation being its characteristic. As a fusion of "autobiography" and "criticism", two kinds of discursive modes, how can autobiographical biblical criticism be? Only when we make clear the hermeneutic dynamism of this kind of critical approach can we clarify this question. Philosopher Paul Ricouer interprets the dialectical relation between distanciation and appropriation, laying bare the possibility of ideological criticism implied in hermeneutics.The hermeneutic practice of Autobiographical biblical critic Ingrid R. Kitzberger is an instance of this hermeneutic dynamism.Autobiographical biblical criticism is a kind of hermeneutical practice under the background of contextual theology, being the manifestation of incarnation, which is the fundamental doctrine of Christianity. From the perspective of the disciplinary development of hermeneutic, the significance of autobiographical biblical criticism also lies in the integration of two kinds of discursive approaches--"autobiography" and "criticism".It is an attempt to compromise the dispute between humanistic hermeneutic,represented by Gadamer and based on tradition of romanticism, and critical hermeneutics, represented by Habermas and based on tradition of enlightenment.As a burgeoning critical approach, autobiographical biblical criticism is not mature enough to carry through profound and comprehensive theoretical conclusion and reflection from the inside. In particular critical practice, not all exegetics adopting this critical approach can deal with the relation between autobiography and criticism properly. Possible deviations of the three methodological characteristics discussed by this thesis are implied as well.