Why The Biblicist Interpretation Of Scripture Should Be Called "Textualism"

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The Biblicist interpretation of the Bible is often called the "literal interpretation" or the "historical-grammatical interpretation," meaning the same thing. It may also be named the "authorial intent hermeneutic."

Yet, I propose a succinct, one-word alternative that I think is better (not that I'm the first one to propose this name for the correct method of Bible interpretation). This alternative name is "textualism," meaning the method of interpretation that simply lets the text speak for, and thereby interpret, itself. To demonstrate why this term is the best, I will briefly and summarily show how the other, aforementioned descriptions of this hermeneutic are covered by the term "textualism." The Biblical text, in its entirety, self-evidently demonstrates what elements in it are literal and what elements are figurative. The historical background of the text is either clearly stated or clearly implied in the text itself, and I don't even need to show how the text self-evidently reveals its own grammar. In the same way, the intent of the author of a Biblical Book is either stated (John 20:30-31) or implied in the text (a big example of this being the arguments that Biblical Books, as wholes, make-like how the Book of Judges argues that, when there was no king in Israel, sinful self-rule reigned).

This is why, in my opinion, the literal, historical-grammatical, and authorial-intent hermeneutic should simply be called "textualism."