By Dr. Scott Hahn

When it comes to working a puzzle, there are two kinds of people: One looks at the "big picture" on the box while they're working; the other enjoys figuring out how the pieces fit together and watching the picture slowly emerge. I'm definitely a big picture kind of person.

I tell you that as a way of answering one of the questions I hear most often: "What exactly is biblical theology? Why didn't you start The St. Paul Center for Bible Study?"

If you think of the Bible as a collection of "puzzle pieces" - all those individual books and chapters and verses, then biblical theology is the picture that shows you how those pieces are meant to fit together.

That's how we read the whole Bible and discover a unified vision of salvation history.

Biblical theology is based upon God's Fatherly plan ("divine economy"), the unity of the Old and the New Testaments ("typology"), and how this applies for us today in all seven sacraments, especially the Mass ("mystagogy").

But biblical theology is more than simply one of many possible methods for reading the Bible - it is the way the Church mandates that Scripture be studied.

The Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches puts it well: "It is necessary that Sacred Scripture be like the soul of all theology, and must influence all sacred disciplines; therefore, in addition to exegesis, an accurate methodology, the principal chapters of the economy of salvation, as well as the principal themes of biblical theology, are to be taught."

Thus, when the Vatican's Sacred Congregation for Catholic Education published guidelines, On the Theological Formation of Future Priests, this is what it concluded: "After the introductory questions have been handled, the teaching of Sacred Scripture must culminate in a biblical theology which gives a unified vision of the Christian mystery."

Unfortunately, many seminarians and priests express concern and regret that in their training there was barely enough time to get through the introductory questions and critical issues - so they never got the big picture, the unified vision of biblical theology. They also admit that this has greatly weakened their ability to preach and explain God's Word.

As a result, lay people haven't been given this unifed vision. No wonder Pope John Paul II, in his letter on Reconciliation and Penance, called for the development of "a biblical theology of the covenant."

That's what we're trying to do at the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology: to help Catholics read Sacred Scripture so they can see the "big picture" - not just the puzzle pieces.

April 2004