Yey for Hermeneutics! (Some Reflections on my Intellectual History)

A page from Sarajevo Haggadah.

A few years ago, when I was still taking classes at the Seminary, I registered for a course in Synoptic Gospels.  It was part of the requirement for the MA in Theology.  At that point in my academic career, and specifically in relation to theology, I was more intrigued by Systematic theology, as well as Christian spirituality. 

In any case, I registered for the course, and I was talking to my husband about it.  I proclaimed in a voice, which may have been slightly nerdy: “I get to write an exegetical paper in Synoptics!”  I was very excited.  My husband lovingly poked fun at me, quoting me on it, slightly exaggerating my nerdy voice, and pushing the imaginary glasses up his nose.  It’s one of those things, which has remained a constant joke in our household every time I get excited about some intellectual work, particularly textual analysis.

Here I am, working on my PhD in Comparative Literature, and God willing, if it all goes well, this will be my fifth degree.  I’m not going to go through the list of my degrees – see the bio to the right. 

I had wondered over the years whether I have made the right moves by getting all these degrees.  Have I steered in the wrong direction?  Why in the world have I been working on so many degrees?  Shouldn’t I have just quite after the first MA?  And all these disciplines – are they even interlinked? 

It does not help either that one has moments of absolute self-loathing.  Given this, you end up dismissing work which you have done.  “Oh, it was easy!  There’s nothing to it.  And now, it’s all useless!  What can someone possibly do with this in real life with all this accumulated knowledge?”  And on and on and on…

Lately, however, I have been taking a more loving approach to myself and my studies.  My husband has repeatedly told me that self-loathing will get you nowhere, particularly when you have so many intellectual and personal gifts.  He has been my supporter all these years.  But you also have to get to that point where you, yourself, begin to see who you are, what is emerging, what kind of person is being formed, and more than anything – that the person you are is really not a bad person!

Yesterday, I found myself at the Seminary library, working on my thesis, getting closer to finishing it.  I was looking for primary sources of Biblical commentaries and letters by Anselm and Bernard of Clairvaux.  There they were – Opera omnia (doesn’t that just sound so good and exciting?!), and I began sifting through them to find paragraphs in Latin, which corresponded to the English translations.  It certainly helped to know enough Latin!

It was like being part of some dig – unearthing history, which will always be part of us, no matter how much time passes.  Now, I know that probably for most people, these linguistic comparisons don’t mean much.  But being part of history in such a way, as I touched volumes and volumes of commentaries, I felt happiness.  Real happiness that I am engaging myself with these sources and trying to make sense of it and trying to make a small contribution to the interpretation of these wondrous texts.

I have always loved languages and learning new languages always came easy to me.  For my doctorate, I will be working on the Song of Songs, and soon, I will be learning Hebrew.  In plans also is to learn Arabic and expand my knowledge of Qur’anic exegesis.  At some point, I looked at copy of a medieval Jewish commentary on the Song of Songs.  The book itself also had a list of commentaries that were written over the ages.  I always knew that the Song is sacred but something more happened when I looked at the list.  I thought, I am in the presence of something far bigger than me – this Song of Songs is as elusive and ineffable as God himself, and the text cannot be violated (not that I ever intended that, but you get my point). 

Just when I thought that things are falling apart and that I have made huge mistakes in obtaining all these degrees, something happened, something clicked in your mind and heart and you know, without having an ability to explain it properly, that what you are doing is right.  Look at all these strands connecting, you think to yourself.  All of my academic career, I have been concerned with dialogism in texts, and by association, dialogism among peoples. 

For me, this is not just about quiet scholarly work, however important that is.  This is about a creation of a far more important dialogue – one, which acknowledges our differences and yet brings us closer to one another.  It is a creation of dialogue through language and through the metaphysics of text. 

And so, I realize that is not just about academic “career.”  This is about life itself.  It’s not about “usefulness” or “uselessness” of intellectual efforts.  The efforts have to be grounded in the reality of human relations, always!  Books are ways for us to discuss, agree, or disagree but most of all, to be on the path of an encounter. The reason hours I spent at the library brought me happiness was not because I was just trying to solve some textual mystery but that I am connecting and synthesizing texts that come from many different traditions – and let us not forget, traditions are not simply concepts.  They are visible in the human face.