Reading the Bible in the Elizabethan Era (1558–1603): Exegetical Analysis of Matthew 4.1-11 and Its Interpretation in William Perkins’s Treatise
Palavras-chave:
William Perkins, Biblical Hermeneutics, The Gospel of Matthew, Jesus’s Temptation, PuritanismResumo
This paper investigates the role of William Perkins (1558–1602), preeminent Puritan theologian and Cambridge lecturer, as an interpreter of Scripture in the Elizabethan era. Seeking to address a recent scholarly gap, the study analyzes Perkins’s hermeneutical practice in his treatise The Combat Between Christ and the Devil Displayed, a series of sermons on the temptation of Jesus in Matthew 4:1–11. The investigation follows a three-stage methodology: first, it contextualizes Perkins’s life and his conviction in the inerrancy and sufficiency of Scripture; second, it provides a historical, literary, and grammatical exegesis of Matthew 4:1–11; and finally, it evaluates Perkins’s interpretative process in his treatise. The analysis reveals Perkins to be a sensitive reader who prioritized the “natural” or literal sense of the text through literary structure and grammatical analysis, while also considering the broader canonical context. Nevertheless, he occasionally extrapolated semantic meanings to fit the text into categories from Systematic Theology.
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Publicado: 2026-04-13
