Early Anabaptist Biblical Hermeneutics

This course will address several questions: How did wider access to the Bible in both the original languages and new translations impact the Anabaptists? How did the Anabaptists’ understanding of the role of the congregation in interpreting the Bible differ from Catholic and Protestant approaches? How did the Anabaptists understand the relationship of the Old and New Testaments? What use did they make of the Apocrypha? How did the Anabaptists resolve the tensions between Letter and Spirit and literal versus figurative interpretations? How do modern approaches to the Bible interpretation (dispensationalist, modernist, neo-Calvinist, feminist, and Red-letter Christianity) agree or conflict with
early Anabaptist understandings?