Proclaimer Blog
Finding types and hermeneutical bankruptcy
If you read the NT at all (duh!) you will know that one rich road for preachers is to trace typology when it comes to OT texts. But where do you find types? Reacting against the overblown typology of some of the earlier biblical interpreters many of us work to the rule that we should only see types where the NT does. That’s a safe rule and one for newbie preachers. You won’t go far wrong with that. But the question arises, are there other types which the NT does not identify? I find Ed Clowney really good on this. For what it’s worth his out-of-print “Preaching and Biblical Theology” has been a very formative book in my own preaching, and his “Preaching Christ in all the Scriptures” is also immensely useful – especially in the opening chapter (thereafter, it’s a series of sermons). This is the place, if you’re interested, where the famous preaching rectangle comes from that I use when I teach and is used by the Simeon guys (slightly amended). Here he is on typology:
“If the NT specifies something as a type, we may so interpret it. But that is a little like saying that you can find solutions to maths problems only by looking in the back of the book, since you haven’t a clue as to how to work the problems. To conclude that we can never see a type where the New Testament does not is to confess hermeneutical bankruptcy. We know that the New Testament writers did find types, but we confess that we cannot learn how they did it: there seem to be no discernible principles for us to follow.
“There is a principle, however. Geerhardus Vos enunicated it when he said that the door to typology lies at the far end of the house of symbolism. That is, if there is symbolism in the account, we can rightly infer typology. If there is no symbolism, there can be no typology. Symbolism is not occasional in the Old Testament, but structural. God’s acts point forward to his final salvation/judgment and his relations with his people look forward to the restoration and renewal of the New Covenant.”