James Barr: The Semantics of Biblical Language

James Barr wrote a critical review of the tendency of theology to adopt the stance that language reveals the underlying worldview of a culture.  Barr’s book, now a classic, is a serious attack on much of the etymological propensities of the Hebrew roots movement.  Therefore, it is important to address Barr’s critique.

The Semantics of Biblical Language by James Barr

A response to James Barr’s criticism of the proposed relation between language and worldview is absolutely necessary.  Barr objects to any theology that attempts to locate some inherent worldview in the vocabulary of a language.  He points to the linguistic evidence, claiming that far too often theologians who claim that a particular language incorporates a particular worldview ignore the full range of words and meanings.  He objects to the proposition that “language contains an implicit metaphysics.”  In particular, he objects to the idea that Hebrew thought, represented by Hebrew language, is a unique way of looking at the world, and that understanding the Hebrew worldview is a matter of tracing its vocabulary to “root” meanings that reveal unique aspects of the culture.  Barr points to the wider range of meanings associated with Hebrew words, demonstrating that there is no particular difficulty translating these words into appropriate equivalents in Greek or any other language.  In other words, Barr claims that the usual assertion that Hebrew and Greek are polar opposites in their worldview is false.  While there are certainly some differences in language structure and formulation, these are not incommensurable.  For Barr, translation is not only valid.  It is sufficient to communicate the meaning of the text.

Specifically, Barr argues that the contrasts between Greek thought and Hebrew thought are far less radical than claimed and there are sufficient overlaps to make this distinction less attractive or theologically useful.  He rejects the idea that Hebrew is “unique,” that the Hebrew “mind” can be deciphered from linguistic structures, that there is a necessary correspondence between grammar and thought-forms and that an understanding of the psychological elements of a culture can be determined from the culture’s language.

It is important to note what Barr does not claim.  Barr’s interest is in the linguistic evidence.  He repeatedly affirms that there might be significant differences in the worldviews of Hebrew and Greek (and many other cultures), but these differences cannot be traced to the linguistic stock vocabulary or grammar of the language.  What Barr repudiates is the idea that moving from linguistic constructions to claims about the thought world of the culture is valid.  Barr rejects the Whorf-Sapir hypothesis that language mirrors cultural reality.  He rejects the proposal that “linguistic structure reflects or corresponds to the thought structure”[1] of a culture.  He does not claim that different cultural realities do not exist.  He merely claims that the connection to language is not substantiated.

This leaves us with a philosophical rather than a linguistic problem.  It might be the case that Hebrew and Greek have very different views of the world, but this would have to be determined by philosophical investigation.  It is my belief that such an investigation has been accomplished.  The evidence is found in Judaism itself, for it is Jewish philosophers and theologians who argue that their view of reality stands opposed to the Western Greek view of reality.  On theological issues such as sovereignty, justice, law, social structure, teleology and history, Jewish thought is quite different than Greek thought.  On methodology, Jewish exegesis, historical priority and theological organization is also quite different.  There is a reason why Judaism does not concern itself with systematic theology.  Barr may be quite right about the over indulgence in etymologies and the selective choice of useful vocabulary, but this does not by itself eliminate the proposed cultural and philosophical differences between Hebrew and Greek.  It may be the Boman is wrong in his claim that the tense structure of Hebrew (e.g. the absence of the copula) means Hebrew is “dynamic” thought in opposition to Greek “static” thought, but this does not mean that the description of the world in Hebrew is the same as the description of the world in Greek.  There may be a good deal of overlap, but there are still significant differences in understanding how the world appears.

Barr’s principle objection seems to be the inadequacy of grammar and lexical stock alone as a means of determining cultural perspective.  Barr suggests that the real meanings associated with language occur at a minimum at the sentence level, and perhaps at much larger slices of written and spoken material.  Claims to discover worldviews within individual words, roots or words or historical development of words are too narrow to be sustained.  Cultural perspective, if unique at all, is not found as some sort of hidden essence within words or grammar.  Words, grammar and syntax have meaning in larger contexts.

But even if we grant Barr these criticisms (and he thoroughly defeats many claims of the Whorf-Sapir application to theological words), we have only dislodged an inadequate methodology.  We have not dismantled the idea that language does express reality from the perspective of the speaker.  Wittgenstein’s development of ordinary language philosophy and the concept of “forms of life” and “language games” make it abundantly clear that overlapping vocabulary does not mean synonymous meaning.  Soccer and football both have goals, a limited playing field, referees and scores, and they both are games with a ball, but they are certainly quite different.  Simply because Greek has a word for truth (alethia) that has significant overlaps with the Hebrew ‘emet does not entail that the two words communicate the same meaning, even if they are used in similar contexts within larger slices of the linguistic framework.  If this were true, cultural idioms would be non-existent.

What Barr’s criticism teaches us is this:  meaning is not found in the word by itself.  Linguistically, words do not have some hidden metaphysical reality.  Words are building blocks of bigger concepts.  In order to understand the full scope of the concepts  designated by words as linguistic markers, the entire semantic range of the word must be examined.  More often than not, the result of comparison of words between two different languages will look like overlapping Venn diagrams.  Barr adds an important caution to the tendency to make too much of the linguistic features of words within a language when compared to other languages.  But Barr does not deny that there can be significant changes in perspective about the larger meanings associated with cultural perspective.  Therefore, if we wish to garner insight into the cultural differences between Hebrew and Greek speakers, we will have to look at all the cultural aspects of the two civilizations, not just the linguistic ones.  Language can give us a clue, but it will not be definitive.  Furthermore, Barr’s suggestion points us in the direction of language in use in ordinary circumstances, not the expressions commonly found in philosophical and theological expositions.  What we discover confirms the general parameters of Wittgenstein.  There is a common “human form of life,” and we expect to find many ordinary patterns of similarity expressed in similar ways between cultures.  But there are sometimes striking differences and for those we need to examine the widest possible range of cultural perspectives.

Barr strikes down the rampant enthusiasm for etymological priority.  His admonition is a good one.  But when it comes to understanding the thought of an ancient culture, language, in its fuller sense, is indispensible.  Excess we must avoid.  Cultural perspective we dare not avoid.