Chapter 8 - Knowledge through Interpretation (1)

Summary

Like meaning, interpretation is a slippery notion. This chapter discusses three different accounts of interpretation. First, I discuss the allegoresis account, according to which some texts have a deeper meaning hidden below the text's surface meaning. I then explore what is required if an allegorical interpretation is to be justified, and I argue that two kinds of interpretative knowledge must be distinguished: (1) knowing through interpretation that what a text (or its author) says is p, and (2) knowing through interpretation that what the text (or its author) says, viz. p, is true. Second, the traditional account of interpretation is discussed, according to which interpretation consists in clearing up textual obscurities – this is called the difficulty account of interpretation. A number of possible obscurities are identified, and I show what is required to clear them up in a justified way. Finally, the modernist view of interpretation is discussed, according to which reading inevitably involves interpretation. The most natural development of this view is that all reading involves disambiguation, and that to disambiguate is to interpret. Here, too, I discuss what is required for justified disambiguations.