As a medievalist, the bulk of Bynum’s work is based upon a critical engagement with late medieval religious texts. To provide a foundation for her research, she must utilize aspects of the text-critical method. For Bynum, the exercise of translating, dating, and ascribing texts is the starting point from which all other modes of inquiry can begin.[1] In describing the various essays in her collection, she both critiques the classic text-critical methodology and gives us a sense of her own specific hybrid. In contrast to those scholars who believe that by applying the text-critical method they can achieve a near-complete knowledge of the historical moment, Bynum argues that the historian’s task is one that “precludes wholeness.”[2] She argues that despite our best efforts we will never know what the author was trying to say: we can only read the text in context. The task then is to embrace the fragments we do uncover and to highlight recurrent themes present in the texts so that we might gain some small insight into the historical situation.
Beyond forcing us to acknowledge the “partiality” of our findings, Bynum fleshes out her critique of the text-critical method by arguing that we must also recognize our own lack of objectivity. In Holy Feast, Holy Fast she notes that recent scholarship on medieval religion understands the renunciation of sex and money as the basic motif of medieval spirituality. This, she argues, is more indicative of the preoccupations of twentieth century thinkers than of those in the middle ages.[3] Food, she continues, was a far more pressing issue for the people of that time. She proffers the renunciation of food as an important alternative motif. What we can derive from Bynum’s assessment is that we must abandon this false sense of objectivity: we exist in a specific historical moment influenced by certain ideas and trends and so what we find in these texts is what is of significant interest to us. To a certain extent, we find what we are looking for.
To combat this academic ‘tunnel vision’, Bynum suggests a remedy: history in the comic mode. Comedy, she argues, incorporates many stories, reaches a conclusion only by chance, and “undergirds our sense of human limitation, even our cynicism about our motives and self-awareness.”[4] The comic stance allows the historian to be self-conscious, admit to the partiality of their findings and even to their errors. This way the book is left open. Historians are able to return to a text each time discovering new themes and enriching our understanding.
Bynum’s suggested methodological approach insinuates that the text-critical method alone is an inadequate methodology. In “Methodological Considerations,” Huntington also brings to light some of the limitations of the text-critical method. He argues that we think we have gained a full understanding of a certain point in time when we “place ourselves in the historical situation and seek to reconstruct the historical horizon.”[5] However, he continues, the act of locating a moment within its historical context creates a division: it becomes the object of our study, an “other.” This gesture of “alienation,” he argues, prohibits us from the possibility of extracting a truth from the historical situation that is meaningful to us.[6] The result is that our understanding is somewhat lacking. We are preventing ourselves from attaining some important insight that may be relevant to our current experience.
Like Bynum, Huntington also suggests an alternative methodological approach: the modern Buddhist mentality. Huntington argues that to really grasp Madhyamika philosophy and thereby possibly extract a truth applicable to ourselves it helps to read these texts through the lens of the ‘modern Buddhist mentality’. Huntington cites J.W. de Jong who argues that the historical method alone does not provide enough of a context to fully illuminate texts of a spiritual nature. The ‘historical dimension’ within the South Asian context, he continues, plays a lesser role than it does in the West. Furthermore, he argues that by attempting to interpret and understand Madhyamika philosophy as a body of answers to ontological and epistemological questions we have missed the point of the philosophy itself. [7] Concepts such as ‘emptiness’ cannot be understood through these methods alone: the very language and goals of the text-critical method prevents a full grasping of Madhyamika philosophy. For Huntington the “Buddhist mentality” as a critical lens through which to approach these texts allows the academic to understand the heart of the philosophy, making it an indispensable addition to the text-critical method.
Having been taught the text-critical method from very early on in my undergraduate career, I appreciate it for the benefits it offers. Yet like Bynum and Huntington I am also looking for something more, some additional tool or perspective that can help me gain fresh insight into the texts that I am translating. I value beyond a doubt the skills that I have acquired learning the text-critical method and I recognize that it would be impossible for me to conduct my research without them, but I see this method as a starting point, a foundation from which to build on. Which methodological approach comes next, I have yet to decide. One thing has been made clear though, as both Bynum and Huntington have addressed, is that it is vitally important as I begin work that I remain conscious of my complicity in the flow of history.
[1] Bynum, “In Praise of…,” p. 15.
[2] Bynum, “In Praise of…,” p. 14.
[3] Bynum, “Holy Feast,” p. 1.
[4] Bynum, “In Praise of…,” p. 24.
[5] Huntington, p. 13.
[6] Ibid. Bynum disagrees with the idea of looking back to historical texts to find answers to modern day questions. Why?
[7] Huntington, p. 15.
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3 comments:
Hi Amy,
Your footnote, which states “Bynum disagrees with the idea of looking back to historical texts to find answers to modern day questions. Why?”, is an excellent question/challenge to Bynum, since it seems to reveal a severe limitation in her method and methodology, despite her attempt to stay open. Although admitting that there is no ‘complete’ meaning to be had when reading a text or studying an object, that the most we can hope for are fragments of an inaccessible whole given our own contextual prejudices, she still fails to concentrates on the ‘need’ which gives rise to these contextual prejudices. She concentrates almost entirely on the essence of the text, however imperfect she believes our access to it may be.
If we can’t explore these rich texts of the past, plough them for the many riches that they have to offer us for our existence, what use are they to us except as dead artefacts? Are we then just caretakers of these dusty fragments of the past? I like Huntington’s adoption of Rorty’s hermeneutic approach, the “strong textualist” approach, where the reader “asks neither the author nor the text about their intentions, but simply beats the text into a shape which will serve his own purpose”(8).
Though in the end what takes place lies somewhere amidst the two methods, Bynum’s and Huntington’s, since any reading of a text makes manifest realities about both the text/author/subject of study and the reader. The question then becomes ‘are we open and cognisant enough to see the interpenetrations of these various dimensions as they play their game before us?’
babak
Amy,
I sympathize with your concluding paragraph about being exposed to the text-critical method during your undergraduate degree. I too was deeply immersed in that methodological approach. I find that it can be very difficult to move from one approach to another when studying religious texts. Thus, I find that in my case (and perhaps in yours too) that when I am studying a religious text, I often get caught up in textual-criticism and have a hard time “stepping out of the box” per se. However, when I do find my way to another methodological approach in studying religious texts, the fruits can be rather plentiful. This said though, I am still making my way out from textual-criticism. What I mean by this is that, in particular, textual-criticism is, in a sense, is always my home base. If I am studying something and an alternative approach becomes overwhelming, I always default by stepping back into the box (of textual criticism).
Hence, even upon reading your blog, I can’t help but wonder what it might be like if I had a different starting point. I mean, of course, I use various different approaches to studying religion, but my biases always keep me rooted in at a general starting point. Thus, what if I were to start from somewhere else when studying a given text? Might an alternate starting point be more fruitful than that of textual-criticism? I’m not pretending to say that I suspect that there will be a stronger starting point than our common textual-critical method; rather, I can’t help but wonder if there could be a stronger starting point? Personally, I don’t feel I can recommend a particular point though, as I, myself, am still trying to figure this out, so this is just a thought.
Andrew
Hi Amy,
I cant fully appreciate the text-critical method as much as Id like to, as I wrote most of my undergrad papers from a more phenomenological perspective. I really agree with Huntington that the act of locating a moment within its historical context creates a division, in which it becomes an object or "other" and this hinders the reader from extracting a meaningful truth, which you mentioned. I feel that so much of the meaning of a tradition or text can be understood by allowing it to influence and colour your understanding, an interpenetration as Babak said. Regardless of how much we can understand something from without (and thus looking inwards), something must be said for the experience of being within (and thus looking outward from this inner position). If we simply say that we can never achieve a clear and complete picture of a tradition, text, etc. and that all we have are incomplete fragments then we should ask ourselves: have we attempted to understand a phenomenon from an insider’s perspective? As Huntington mentions, so many concepts of Candrakirti's writing and thoughts would "...appear as nothing other than intellectual curiosities entirely uprooted from the Buddhist way of life which alone is capable of imparting to them their most profound significance." (p.9) Its interesting to note that in Arabic, the word that is used for study/studying comes from the root d-r-s. However, this root actually doesn’t meant to study but means to efface. I think that this notion of emptying oneself in order to appreciate and study something, especially religious traditions, could be a very effective means to gaining a deeper understanding of the significance and meaning of these phenomenon.
- Adam
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