The meaning and application of demythologization as a hermeneutical process seems to be an important issue to Good, in that he feels that the field of hermeneutics is regarded very much as a poorer cousin to both Greek linguistic skills and the study of ancient history when it comes to theories on New Testament interpretation throughout American Christian theology. Built on an existential foundation, the real value of demythologization for Good lies in its position as a balance between ‘literalist’ principles which demands that all records of supernatural occurrences be taken as absolute historic fact, and ‘liberalism’, where textual reductionism leads to the complete elimination of mythology as part of the quest for the ‘timeless’ truths contained within the text.
The act of demythologizing is deemed to be beyond question. Good’s understanding of the New Testament, as a piece of literature immersed with mythological motifs drawn from that era which are now obsolete, demands an exegetical method where the mythological understanding of that culture is understood in order to enable a full interpretation of the text. It is claimed that without demythologizing, this and subsequent generations will be unable to read the New Testament as a comprehensible document that demands an individual response.
To explain his understanding of demythologization, Good first defends the process on the basis of what is not involved. These rebuttals are based on outside criticisms of Bultmann’s work; demythologization is neither reductionalist, as charged by some evangelical groups, nor is it a simple adaptation of Heidegger’s existential humanist philosophy, as charged by some fellow German theologians. Having established what demythologization is not, Good avoids any specific definition, preferring to explain the basis behind the process, before demonstrating why Bultmann opts for an existential reading over both historic and mythological modes of understanding. This is based on his view of the current and future ramifications that a faith decision will make to an individual’s existence.
However, Bultmann’s understanding of what actually constitutes myth is of some concern to Good. For Bultmann, a mythological reading that is descriptive is of no value to faith. The mere description of an event that belongs to the historic, apparently does not ultimately lead to faith, because faith is not mythological, but existential. Faith’s power lies in how the myth is outworked in the believer.7 This has the strange appearance of a child’s definition of faith; ‘faith is believing in something that you know isn’t true!’ Suddenly, where Bultmann has been criticising liberals for their tendency to discard myth, the cross and resurrection leap out of the mythical realm and become purely existential concepts that enter the life of faith. What Good appears to miss here is that for Bultmann, any significant historical knowledge is always existential knowledge in its ability to lead to an engagement in that history.
This somewhat contentious point leads Good to question the way in which Bultmann broadly defines myth. Drawing on the work of Ronald Hepburn, Good asks if we can directly talk about God, or whether the limitations of language condemn us to ‘oblique’ talk about God. Good concludes that to understand myth purely as a linguistic tool almost excludes demythologizing as an interpretive device. However, I feel that Good does himself a huge dis-service by not expanding on his comment on the need for ‘remythologizing’. For instance, can restatements of myth properly function as a form of demythologization, allowing new forms of interpretation for hearers in different cultural paradigms?
Good raises further questions over the methodology behind the selection of existential categories necessary for the construction of a phenomenology. Is a faith discussion a prerequisite or an outflowing of a phenomenological search? Good’s eventual position has strong Otto overtones in terms of the necessity of experience; only through the existential experience of religious faith through grace, do we have the grounding necessary to explore those existential categories needed for the construction of an adequate phenomenology.
While Bultmann sought to emphasise the central message of the early church, he had little interest in the historical Jesus as a past phenomena. It is the present proclamation rather than the historic that gives faith its power. Good notes the emergence of a ‘neo-Bultmannism’ among Bultmann’s past pupils that gives a greater emphasis on the historic and argues that the New Testament writers, apart from their tendency to be influenced by post-resurrection faith, clearly held that the facts of the historical Jesus formed a major part of the church’s central message.
Good’s last issue concerns Bultmann’s emphasis on the individualistic nature of faith, and its relationship to the communal aspects of religious anthropology. Despite seeking personal clarification from Bultmann on the issue, where Bultmann concedes that personal history is grounded in encounters, Good’s strong belief in the nexus between soteriology and ecclesiology leaves him at odds with Bultmann. According to Good, for the church as a proclaiming organisation to exist, then it must have a history on which its proclamation is based, and that basis is the historic encounters between God and the church as a community. The contentious point appears to be Bultmann’s insistence on keeping within the broad framework of Heidegger’s highly individualistic ontology which virtually reduces faith to an individual response, as compared to Good’s need to view faith in terms of the overall redemptive history of the church.
Certainly the work of Rudolf Bultmann has had a profound effect on Biblical interpretation in the twentieth century within the western world. The importance of this article lies the the way in which Good has touched upon the various aspects of Bultmann’s theology that lie behind the demythologization process, such as the relationship between faith and the historical Jesus, mythology, hermeneutics, existential theology, ecclesiology and phenomenology. I personally found this article helpful in promoting some self-awareness of those sub-conscious methods that I bring to my reading of the New Testament, and to raise further questions in my mind on the precise nature of myth and it’s relationship to faith.