Tradition history or criticism is a methodology of Biblical criticism that was developed by Hermann Gunkel. Tradition history seeks to analyze biblical literature in terms of the process by which biblical traditions passed from stage to stage into their final form, especially how they passed from oral tradition to written form. Tradition history/criticism is a sister discipline of form criticism--also associated with Gunkel, who used the results of source and form criticism to develop the history of tradition interpretation. Form criticism and tradition criticism thus overlap, though the former is more narrow in focus. Tradition history is connected with secular folklore studies, especially Axel Olrik's analysis of Scandinavian folklore and the "laws" which he established concerning the nature of such folklore. The stories in the Bible were then analyzed on the basis of these "laws".
Read more about Tradition History: Strengths and Weaknesses of Tradition History
Famous quotes containing the words tradition and/or history:
“Almost always tradition is nothing but a record and a machine-made imitation of the habits that our ancestors created. The average conservative is a slave to the most incidental and trivial part of his forefathers’ glory—to the archaic formula which happened to express their genius or the eighteenth-century contrivance by which for a time it was served.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)
“My good friends, this is the second time in our history that there has come back from Germany to Downing Street peace with honour. I believe it is peace for our time. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts. And now I recommend you to go home and sleep quietly in your beds.”
—Neville Chamberlain (1869–1940)