Recently, Dr. Wu Dongri, a theological researcher, shared his thoughts on the interpretation of the Bible and its significance in intercultural contexts during a lecture titled "Interpreting the Bible with Eastern Thought and Its Hermeneutical Significance."
In his call to urge Chinese people to interpret the Bible with an Eastern way of thinking, Dr. Wu continued by bringing up the Liang Shuming-proposed cultural trichotomy, which contrasts Western, Chinese, and Indian cultures. Liang suggested that the Western path, representing life as it is, has led to scientific and democratic achievements. However, the Western emphasis on changing the natural environment to meet desires has reached its limit, shifting focus to human problems. Chinese culture, with its fundamental spirit of seeking harmony and compromise, offers a way out for world culture through its middle-of-the-road approach that adapts to changing circumstances. Indian culture, which places a strong emphasis on going backward and renouncing the material world in favor of spiritual life, will come after the revival of Chinese culture.
Dr. Wu emphasized that Liang’s cultural theory represents three different attitudes towards life in China, the West, and India, and there is no inherent superiority or inferiority among them. However, the historical choice of different cultures is a matter of timeliness.
“We often underestimate Chinese culture, but each culture has its own unique characteristics. Different types of culture dominate at different times, allowing sustainable development in human life,” he added.
The foundation of Western culture is maritime-city life (production-trade-commodities), and its representative ways of thinking in ancient times were geometry and mathematics. In modern times, it was physics, and in the postmodern era, biology has become the most representative, emphasizing rationality, thinking, and invariance, with nature as its foundation. The foundation of East Asian culture is agricultural life (village community-crops-land), focusing on society, personal cultivation, morality, the middle-of-the-road approach, and realism. Hebrew culture is based on nomadic life (pastoral community, animals, grassland streams, etc.), with God as its foundation (defining everything through its relationship with God), emphasizing a life of faith, community, verbal thinking, and laws.
He then mentioned that Eastern Biblical interpretation, similar to the Chinese translation of the Bible, is an "event" of the deep encounter between God's words and Chinese culture. It is a new way of expressing the gospel and a beautiful witness to the Holy Spirit's breakthrough work once again.
"The Bible is often groundbreaking, while humans are limited by their cognition, customs, and traditions. The Holy Spirit opens us up to new understandings," he said.
“What I want to challenge here is the use of Eastern thinking to interpret the Bible as a way to declare our departure from the Western mindset as the only approach to Biblical interpretation. The attitude of viewing Eastern or Chinese culture as inferior cannot contribute to theological construction.”
When asked about the relationship between Chinese culture and idolatry, the professor responded: "Many churches in Korea have a strong Confucian influence, but they do not openly acknowledge it. Confucian culture has subconsciously influenced us, and if we do not reflect on it, it will control us. Therefore, we should bring the topic forth to discuss the issue." "I believe we can discuss whether there is idolatry in any culture. However, when we truly discover the spirit of the Christian faith, these things can be negated," he added.
"I emphasized Chinese culture earlier because it is often marginalized or excluded in theological fields, with the assumption that Western culture is absolute. However, while Western culture has its strengths, it also has significant limitations. Therefore, what we should learn from the West is the ability to reflect and transform our culture, moving forward towards cultural innovation.”
- Translated by Charlie Li
日前，神学研究者吴东日博士在一场题为《用东方思维解释圣经及其诠释学意义》讲座中分享了他对不同文化之间的思考。
他首先提到了中国学者梁漱溟对比西方文化、中国文化、印度文化的文化三路向说。梁认为，以西方文化为代表的第一路向是生活本来的路向，这条路走到今天，成就了西方的科学与民主。但以意欲向前要求为其根本精神的西方文化，改造自然环境以求满足的路已经走到了尽头，人类开始转入对人的问题的时代，中国文化以意欲调和折衷为其根本精神，要求改变自己随遇而安的中庸之道正是世界文化的出路所在。中国文化复兴之后，将继之以印度文化复兴——以意欲翻身向后要求为其根本精神，遇到问题就想根本取消，放弃物质世界而转向精神生活。
吴东日博士说道，梁的文化学说，代表人类三种不同人生态度的中西印的问题，并没有好坏之别，但对不同文化的历史选择，却有一个是否合乎时宜的问题。
”我们平常贬低中国文化，但每个文化其实各有各的特色，不同时期不同类型文化占主导性，这样人类生活才有可持续发展，” 他补充道。
西方文化的基础是海洋—城邦生活（制作—交易—商品），古代最具代表性的思维方式是几何学、数学，近代是物理学，后现代是生物学最具代表性的，注重理性、思考、不变性，以自热为本。东亚文化的基础是农耕生活（村落共同体—农作物—土地），以社会为本，注重于个人修养、崇尚道德、中庸之道和现实主义。而希伯来文化的基础是游牧生活（牧民共同体—动物—草地—溪水等），以神为本（以与神的关系来界定所有的东西），注重信仰的生活、共同体式、动词思维和律法。
接着，他提到，东方式解经，如同圣经的中文翻译，都是上帝的话语和中国文化之间深度相遇的“事件”，是福音获得新的表达方式，是圣灵再一次的突破性工作的美好见证。
“圣经往往是突破性的，因为人的局限，人总是局限于自己的认知、习俗、传统中，圣灵开启打开我们让我们进入全新的认识中。”
“我想在这里挑战的是，用东方思维来解经是我们宣告‘走出’把西方思维视为唯一的解经思路的想法。视东方文化或中国文化为低劣的态度，不可能在神学建构上有所作为的看法。”
当问及如何处理中国文化和偶像崇拜的关系，“韩国很多教会内部儒家文化很重，但是他们不提儒家。但儒家文化已经潜移默化到我们里面了，你不拿出来反思的话反而是它支配你，所以我们应该亮出来、讨论这个问题”，这位教授回答，“我认为都可以拿出来讨论有没有偶像崇拜，但是，我们真的发现基督信仰精神的时候，这个东西是可以被否定的。”
"刚才强调中国文化是因为在神学领域过于把中国文化边缘化，或者驱逐，认为西方的东西就是绝对的，但是西方文化有它的强项，但是也有很大的局限，所以，我们从西方要学习的是反思能力，使得文化蜕变，往前走，这是文化创新的能力。”
一神学研究者谈：用东方思维解释圣经及其诠释学的意义 （下）
Recently, Dr. Wu Dongri, a theological researcher, shared his thoughts on the interpretation of the Bible and its significance in intercultural contexts during a lecture titled "Interpreting the Bible with Eastern Thought and Its Hermeneutical Significance."
In his call to urge Chinese people to interpret the Bible with an Eastern way of thinking, Dr. Wu continued by bringing up the Liang Shuming-proposed cultural trichotomy, which contrasts Western, Chinese, and Indian cultures. Liang suggested that the Western path, representing life as it is, has led to scientific and democratic achievements. However, the Western emphasis on changing the natural environment to meet desires has reached its limit, shifting focus to human problems. Chinese culture, with its fundamental spirit of seeking harmony and compromise, offers a way out for world culture through its middle-of-the-road approach that adapts to changing circumstances. Indian culture, which places a strong emphasis on going backward and renouncing the material world in favor of spiritual life, will come after the revival of Chinese culture.
Dr. Wu emphasized that Liang’s cultural theory represents three different attitudes towards life in China, the West, and India, and there is no inherent superiority or inferiority among them. However, the historical choice of different cultures is a matter of timeliness.
“We often underestimate Chinese culture, but each culture has its own unique characteristics. Different types of culture dominate at different times, allowing sustainable development in human life,” he added.
The foundation of Western culture is maritime-city life (production-trade-commodities), and its representative ways of thinking in ancient times were geometry and mathematics. In modern times, it was physics, and in the postmodern era, biology has become the most representative, emphasizing rationality, thinking, and invariance, with nature as its foundation. The foundation of East Asian culture is agricultural life (village community-crops-land), focusing on society, personal cultivation, morality, the middle-of-the-road approach, and realism. Hebrew culture is based on nomadic life (pastoral community, animals, grassland streams, etc.), with God as its foundation (defining everything through its relationship with God), emphasizing a life of faith, community, verbal thinking, and laws.
He then mentioned that Eastern Biblical interpretation, similar to the Chinese translation of the Bible, is an "event" of the deep encounter between God's words and Chinese culture. It is a new way of expressing the gospel and a beautiful witness to the Holy Spirit's breakthrough work once again.
"The Bible is often groundbreaking, while humans are limited by their cognition, customs, and traditions. The Holy Spirit opens us up to new understandings," he said.
“What I want to challenge here is the use of Eastern thinking to interpret the Bible as a way to declare our departure from the Western mindset as the only approach to Biblical interpretation. The attitude of viewing Eastern or Chinese culture as inferior cannot contribute to theological construction.”
When asked about the relationship between Chinese culture and idolatry, the professor responded: "Many churches in Korea have a strong Confucian influence, but they do not openly acknowledge it. Confucian culture has subconsciously influenced us, and if we do not reflect on it, it will control us. Therefore, we should bring the topic forth to discuss the issue." "I believe we can discuss whether there is idolatry in any culture. However, when we truly discover the spirit of the Christian faith, these things can be negated," he added.
"I emphasized Chinese culture earlier because it is often marginalized or excluded in theological fields, with the assumption that Western culture is absolute. However, while Western culture has its strengths, it also has significant limitations. Therefore, what we should learn from the West is the ability to reflect and transform our culture, moving forward towards cultural innovation.”
- Translated by Charlie Li
Theological Researcher Talks Interpreting the Bible With Eastern Thought
