Fred Craddock

Fred Brenning Craddock Jr. (April 30, 1928 – March 6, 2015) was Bandy Distinguished Professor of Preaching and New Testament Emeritus in the Candler School of Theology at Emory University. He was an ordained minister of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) from rural Tennessee. He was the director of the Craddock Center, a non-profit service group which operates in rural Appalachia.^[1]

Craddock has written a number of books, including The Pre-Existence of Christ (1968), As One Without Authority (1971, rev. 1974 and 1979), Overhearing the Gospel (1978), The Gospels (1981), commentaries on John (1982) and Philippians (1984), Preaching (1985), a commentary on Luke (1990) and a collection of sermon-related anecdotes (Craddock Stories. 2001). Craddock has also contributed articles to various journals.^[2]

There are at least three major features of Craddock's new homiletic that distinguish it from traditional homiletics. First, instead of using a traditional deductive approach, in which three points are named and illustrated, in his sermons, Craddock advocates an inductive style. Critiquing traditional homiletics—called the "old homiletic"—Craddock turned toward induction, in which the preacher re-creates for the listener the inductive process of study used to create the sermon itself. A second unique feature of Craddock's new homiletic is that a sermon should seek to create an experience for the listener, rather than attempting to gain the listeners' assent through sermons using deductive, linear logic. As a result of Craddock's inductive model, the role of the listeners fundamentally changes: no longer are listeners passive recipients of a conclusion already reached by the authoritative preacher, to which they must acquiesce. Rather, in Craddock's scheme, the listeners are active participants in the sermon by virtue of the sermon form itself, which enables the hearer to "finish" the sermon that is intentionally left open-ended. A key assumption of this model, as Craddock notes, is that listeners share a common universal experience, ensuring that the listener's mental processes will work in the same way as the preacher's, thus recreating the same type of experience. This assumption would be later challenged by, among others, John McClure. Third, Craddock emphasizes that the form or genre of the biblical passage to be preached should shape in some way the form taken by the sermon (a claim also made by Tom Long). While Craddock does not require that a sermon slavishly adhere to the biblical form—a psalm need not be preached entirely as a poetic sermon—he argues that various biblical forms seek to accomplish a variety of rhetorical aims; as such, the sermon should attempt to "do what the text does" in both the "what" (content) and the "how" (rhetorical strategies) of the text.

Craddock offers an inductive approach to preaching with an aim of active participation by the listener in the movement of the sermon as well as in the discerning of the message. His grounding principle is that good preaching is a socializing force that creates community.^[3]

クラドックはしばしば「庶民的」なスタイルで説教すると評され、^{[ 4 ]}説教にユーモアを取り入れることで知られています。^{[ 5 ]}ニューズウィーク誌は彼をアメリカで最も偉大な説教者の一人としてランク付けしました。^{[ 2 ]}クラドックの新しい説教術は、物語説教、現象学的説教、会話的説教など、新しい説教術に見られる特定の価値観を堅持しながら新しい説教形式を開発した、後世の説教者たちに影響を与えました。

講演者として非常に人気が高く、イェール大学のライマン・ビーチャー記念講演、クレアモント神学校のスコット記念講演、サウスイースタン・バプテスト神学校のアダムズ記念講演、ピッツバーグ神学校のシャフ記念講演、バートン大学（旧アトランティック・クリスチャン・カレッジ）のスプリンクル記念講演、ヴァンダービルト大学のコール記念講演、オースティン長老派神学校のウェスターヴェルト記念講演、サザン神学校のマリンズ記念講演、パシフィック神学校のアール記念講演を行った。また、クリスチャン・スカラーズ・カンファレンスでは基調講演者として招かれた。クラドックは、学部課程を修了し、聖書学と説教学の分野で教鞭を執ったジョンソン大学の2007年創立記念日講演者も務めた。

クラドックの後任としてエモリー大学の教員となったのはカール・R・ホラデイだった。^{[ 6 ]}

クラドックは1928年にフレッド・シニアとエセル・クラドックの間に生まれた。彼には3人の兄弟と1人の姉妹がいた。^{[ 7 ]}クラドックはジョンソン聖書大学を卒業後の1950年6月にネッティ・ダンガンと結婚した。^{[ 8 ]}彼らにはジョンとローラという2人の子供がいた。^{[ 9 ]}