Threads from Henry's Web

Category: Bible Study Method

  • Reconciling the Gospel Genealogies

    There are generally two reactions I hear to this in Sunday School classes and church pews–it’s either fascination, as if the genealogies make or break the Bible or complete indifference, as in “who cares?”

    Both reactions miss the point.  Matthew and Luke are each making a point, and they are making it in a way that their early readers probably understood fairly well, though there is disagreement on the meaning in some quite early literature.

    There’s a great article on the genealogies and their meaning on the Christianity Today web site.  I think this presentation illustrates the importance of not reconciling texts before we understand what they’re trying to say as they are.  Many treatments of this issue simply list possible resolutions of the differences, which misses the message that each evangelist was trying to convey.

    Grant Osborne, the author, says:

    Examining each genealogy closely reveals the authors’ different purposes.

    Just so.  Go, read and enjoy!

  • Use of the Old Testament in the New Testament – Isaiah 7:14 and Hosea 11:1

    With a recent flurry of posts regarding the way in which the Old Testament is used in the New, at least peripherally, I wanted to call attention to one written from a different perspective.

    The post is Isaiah 7, Nativity, and the Theotokos, written by Mark Olson, who speaks from an Orthodox perspective.  He discusses quite accurately the difficulties involved with interpreting Isaiah 7 either from the Masoretic text or the LXX, the first based on language, and the second (or either) based on context.  Let me extract one paragraph from his post:

    But there is a problem for the modern western (protestant?) Christian who has decided the typological/allegorical hermeneutic is to be abandoned. For it seems if you do so, you need to abandon Isaiah 7 as a prophecy which points to Christ. Yet, noting that modern translators of texts such as the ESV, which primarily use the MT documents for their basis use the less proper translation term “virgin” over “unmarried/young girl” in this case. Why? Because they are Christian and the traditional Christian interpretation of this text is that it is in fact pointing to Christ and the Nativity. Yet that does violence to a consistent hermeneutical method.

    I think Mark is right.  If we stick with the historical-critical method, or even the historical-grammatical method, we really have no way to bridge the gap here.  We can say that Matthew prophetically reapplies the passage when he quotes it, and we can give special privileges to early Christian interpreters–they get to take things out of context while we don’t–or we can ask whether the historical meaning taken in context is always the controlling factor.

    As an aside, let me note that I don’t think the LXX is a translation of a different strand.  The TDNT article on parthenos implies that the word may have overlapped the word ;almah more than is normally thought and thus it is neither a mistranslation, nor a different strand, but simply a case in which the semantic range of the two terms overlapped at the time of translation, but less so at the time of quotation (Matthew).  In any case, I don’t think the translation issue will solve the problem completely, and this becomes even more difficult when one considers the syntax of Isaiah 7:14 which could quite easily be translated as “is pregnant” as well as “shall conceive.”

    But laying all that aside we’re stuck with the likelihood that those who first heard Isaiah speak the words of Isaiah 7:14 would have understood it differently from the way in which Matthew applies it in Matthew 1:18-23.

    I see this as an excellent case requiring typological interpretation, but also inviting us to do such typological interpretation within the bounds of church tradition, i.e. as part of a community.  One of the great problems I see with allegorical or typological interpretation is that it lacks controls.  My early inclination, during graduate school and for a time after, was to require the historical/contextual meaning as an anchor point for one’s typological understanding.  To a certain extent, I think that is still good plan, but it doesn’t really cover everything.

    First, the historical meaning doesn’t necessarily make much of a suggestion as to what typology might apply.  One is stuck with a sort of subjective guess as to how far one has deviated from the historical meaning.  Second, and as a result of the first, this idea really provides very little control.  The easy answer from a western protestant perspective, is to try to drop typological and allegorical interpretation entirely.  But if we do that we cut ourselves off from both much of the interpretation of the early church, and also most of the interpretation that scripture does of itself.  Thus any allegorical interpretation we may do will be rootless.

    If I might illustrate from another text, Hosea 11:1 as quoted in Matthew 2:15, I think there is an even greater contextual problem here, based on purely historical-grammatical or critical exegesis.  Yet there is an excellent typological reason to connect the birth and mission of Jesus to the exodus.  In fact, I think it is important to see the shaping of the story of Jesus from the exodus and then the exile and restoration if one is truly to understand redemption.  I don’t think I’m terribly out of line with Christian tradition on that point, but what I want to underline here is that such a view involves a typological interpretation, not a contextual view of a text.

    It seems likely to me here that Matthew, rather than interpreting a specific text loosely or contrary to context, is using a piece of phraseology from the exodus to draw the broader body of the exodus/redemption story into our understanding of the story of Jesus.  To view it as a misappropriation of a phrase is a distinctly modern error, one of which I have been guilty in the past.  Rather, Matthew takes advantage of the fact that his readers will know the broader story, and uses the one phrase as a tie-in to connect the stories together.

  • John Cassian on Bible Reading

    John Cassian was a monk and ascetic writer from Gaul and lived in the late 4th and early 5th centuries AD [source].  I found this in Hebrews: Ancient Christian commentary on Scripture, New Testament X, though I went to the Order of Saint Benedict Lectio site for the translation I use here:

    YOU must then, if you want to get at the true knowledge of the Scriptures, endeavour first to secure steadfast humility of heart, to carry you on by the perfection of love not to the knowledge which puffeth up, but to that which enlightens. For it is an impossibility for an impure mind to gain the gift of spiritual knowledge. And therefore with every possible care avoid this, lest through your zeal for reading there arise in you not the light of knowledge nor the lasting glory which is promised through the light that comes from learning but only the instruments of your destruction from vain arrogance. Next you must by all means strive to get rid of all anxiety and worldly thoughts, and give yourself over assiduously or rather continuously, to sacred reading, until continual meditation fills your heart, and fashions you so to speak after its own likeness, making of it, in a way, an ark of the testimony,which has within it two tables of stone, i.e., the constant assurance of the two testaments;and a golden pot, i.e., a pure and undefiled memory which preserves by a constant tenacity the manna stored up in it, i.e., the enduring and heavenly sweetness of the spiritual sense and the bread of angels; moreover also the rod of Aaron, i.e., the saving standard of Jesus Christ our true High Priest, that ever buds with the freshness of immortal memory. … [emphasis mine]

    As always, I strongly recommend going to the referenced site and reading the larger passage in context.  I find the use of thetemple/tabernacle imagery here in connection with the spiritual life extremely interesting.

  • Biblical Studies Carnival XLVIII Posted

    … at Clayboy.

    On the topic of the size of this carnival, allow me to give an opinion.  I’m not in the current carnival.  I didn’t nominate any of my posts, and not surprisingly nobody else did either.  This is a good approach, I think.  Use only the nominations as those of us involved in the Christian Carnival do.  I didn’t nominate a post of my own thus there is none there, and all is right with the world.  At least in that one small way.

    It’s a good carnival, with lots of good material.  I would hope that if the carnival goes to a “nominations only” mode, many folks would submit their own best work for the month.

  • If You Don’t Know Greek and Hebrew

    … you don’t know Greek and Hebrew, and there are certain things you cannot do, like, well, reading Greek and Hebrew.  I don’t think this means you can’t read the Bible, or that your opinions don’t matter, but it’s a simple fact.

    When people pretend to know the Biblical languages, as they often do using tools such as Strong’s Concordance and associated tools coded to Strong’s numbers, they tend to introduce many more errors than they would if they stuck to English, or whatever language it is that they actually do read.

    If they don’t know the languages, that doesn’t mean they are stupid or even ignorant.  There are simply some things they can’t do.  No big deal, right?

    Well, Douglas Mangum wrote a perfectly reasonable post on the topic, deploring some tools such as I’ve described, which are advertised in a way that is at least questionable, and it appears that he has been called an elitist.

    The only reason I jumped in here is that I’m a strong advocate of lay Bible study.  I don’t believe my knowledge of Biblical languages gives me an exclusive on Biblical interpretation.  I believe that anyone can get involved, and anyone can have valid opinions.  But that doesn’t make everyone’s opinion valid.  Use of Biblical languages tools without the proper training is one of the best ways to get nearly everything wrong.

    Let each use what knowledge and skill he or she has, and depend on the proper experts where such skill is lacking.

  • Why You Should Read the Previous Post

    I had just finished posting the previous note, Talk about the Method, when I went back to my Google Reader and found this YouTube video, complete with a call to a five year commitment to God, via Polycarp:

    Now if people had any knowledge of method, or were at least practiced in thinking about method, that video would immediately seem just too stupid to watch.

    Besides the fact that it uses essentially random numbers to generate the results, I find it angers me to hear the gospel message connected to such things, especially that part about the five year commitment to God. I think that’s precisely why we don’t know the time when Jesus will return–so we make a lifetime commitment knowing it may be a long life that we have surrendered to God.

  • Talk about the Method

    When I teach Sunday School classes, as I often do, there is nothing more likely to lull people to sleep than a discussion of hermeneutics.  I get a great deal of attention talking about history.  People are very interested as I explore some different interpretations of a particular Biblical passage and where and when those interpretations have been used.  But when I get down to the details of how one discovers the meaning(s) of an ancient text such as the Bible, things tend to slow down.

    In my view, most Sunday School materials are shallow and repetitive.  I know that the Adult Bible Study series which is used in many United Methodist churches is often good for one pass, though it hardly gets me excited.  But I know people who have been going through cycles of that material over and over again for decades, and are no deeper into scripture now than they were when they started.

    One major problem, in my view, is that the material is always generic, which is not really the fault of those who produce it.  There’s an entire system that is being fed.  If you are going to produce Sunday School materials for a few million people, you can’t go into depth for those who have been studying it for years, while still covering the basics for beginners.  With the costs of publication and delivery, one could hardly provide an entire denomination with graded materials, not to mention the war that would erupt over who was more advanced.

    But there is a solution, I think, and it would have to start with church leadership determined to find and use teachers in the church.  There are materials available for Bible study, including a number of good study Bibles, such as the New Interpreter’s Study Bible, that serve as starting points for someone who is perhaps not a rank amateur, but still needs a hand up.  One can supplement such materials from an abundance that is available on the internet.  Of course, one needs to take the time to consider the quality and accuracy of such material as well.

    But for those of us who do have some sort of advanced training in Biblical studies, I think there is a very important role.  We need to talk about our method, about how we came to whatever results we are teaching.  What resources did we use?  What disciplines?  What theology informed our task and why?  How can an individual evaluate such work?

    Too often the expert, or even the quasi-expert, comes into a classroom and feeds the students his or her conclusions.  Often this can be quite entertaining, and may even appear quite educational to the listeners.  But if someone doesn’t tear the veil off the process and display some of the nuts and bolts (wow, mixed metaphor, eh?) then one feeds a church culture in which the proper way to study the Bible is to get an expert to talk to you about it.

    As we all know, or should, experts can disagree.  I always enjoy talking about the search for the historical Jesus, and the wide variety of views on it and responses to it.  I have found two things with every group of Christian lay people with whom I have discussed this.  First, they don’t know about the variety of views.  Very often they have read one popular book and concluded that was the scholarly consensus.  Second, they have never looked at the method used by that particular scholar or by others.  As a result, they are simply looking for the next person to tell them what the experts think about the historical Jesus.  And of course, the experts have many opinions.

    So I would suggest that while it may be less interesting, teaching how to study the Bible, and how to discuss Bible study methods and disciplines, is the most constructive contribution most of us can make.  Of course, many of us must respond to the audience.  If they want a lecture on history and archeology, you can’t give them a study of context, outlining, or form criticism.

    Or perhaps you could bring at least a little of that into the lecture, discussing how a passage has been misapplied to history, and what errors in the approach to the text  contributed to that misunderstanding.

    It takes some creativity, but it can be done.  I’ll have to work on doing the task while boring the audience a bit less!

  • John Hobbins on Exegesis

    John Hobbins has produced an excellent post on exegesis, The unacceptable limits of traditional exegesis, in which he calls us to keep the various senses of the text together, or perhaps in tension.

    At some time I would like to extend this discussion to the use of the various disciplines we normally bundle under the label “historical-critical method.”  It seems to me that aficionados of one discipline tend to ignore the others.  The meanings of the text are a continuum that extends from the prehistory of the text to its present reading.  At some point I’ll have to say more about that.

  • Literal and Figurative in Genesis 3

    I have been reminded several times recently in private conversations of just how inadequate the literal to figurative continuum is in discussing how we understand scripture.

    Bruce Alderman has written an interesting article on the number of things we take as figurative in Genesis 3, and then asks:

    Why is it that so many Christians who have no problem reading Genesis 3 metaphorically, can’t do the same with Genesis 1 and 2?

    While I agree with Bruce on the need to read these chapters largely figuratively, it is important to note another factor.  One can read something both historically and figuratively.  I have mentioned here before teaching one of the first classes I taught in a United Methodist church, and it was on Genesis 1-11.  To my right sat a theistic evolutionist; to my left a young earth creationist.  When we discussed Genesis 3, both were able to agree on the figurative meanings (though I could do some arguing!), but one saw historical events behind the figures, while the other did not.

    But even here you have to ask what historical events might be referred to as a figure.  Let’s consider the parable of the trees (Judges 9:8-15).  Here we have definite reference to historical events, but in a general and figurative way.  In Genesis 3, I don’t regard there as being much history behind the figures, but it is quite possible to read it figuratively with a one-on-one correspondence between the characters and something real.  For example, many readers would take the snake as a symbol pointing to Satan who then acts in tempting a historical Eve who speaks to a historical Adam.  There would be an interplay between historical and figurative elements.

    But at the other end of the spectrum there are historical events that are narrated for figurative reasons.  The Exodus is certainly treated as a literal event in scripture, yet it is related with meanings well beyond any historical events.  For something will less controversy, take the destruction of Jerusalem and the exile to Babylon.  Here we have broad consensus that the events are historical, yet they are not narrated to answer the question:  What happened in the early 6th century BCE?  Rather, they are narrated to point to spiritual things, first in the life of Israel, then more distantly in New Testament reading.

    It seems to me that both “we don’t take it literally”, and “we do take it literally” are very inadequate statements.

  • Mosaic Bible (NLT) and Lectionary Preaching

    I decided to check on what Holy Bible: Mosaic NLT might have for my lectionary reading this week.

    First I checked the material for the 18th Sunday in Pentecost.  Their readings do not coincide with the Revised Common Lectionary at all this week, though they do follow the church year.

    The RCL readings (with United Methodist readings) are:  Job 1:1, 2:1-10, Psalm 25 or 26, Heb. 1:1-4, 2:4-12, Mark 10:2-16.  The Mosaic Bible readings are Job 32:1-37:24, Psalm 112, 1 Corinthians 1:18-31, and John 9:1-34.

    Oddly enough, there is a thematic match in terms of suffering, hardship, and justice, though the take on it might be different depending on which scriptures you use  The additional reading from Isaiah 52:13-53:12 is also contructive though it takes the theme in a slightly different direction.  Readings from Alexander McLaren on Christ as the lamb of God and by Ed Cyzewski on “Unfair Justice” would make good reading before one tries to preach on Job.

    Looking at the texts the other way, by going to the scriptures and finding readings, I find that Psalm 25 is used for Advent 1, and there are some useful readings there as well as some additional themes.  The epistle, Hebrews 1:1-4 is used for Christmas (actually Hebrews 1:1-12, but who’s counting?) and continues the theme of waiting introduced in Advent.  (Waiting and justice might make an excellent combined theme for a homily, don’t you think?)  The gospel reading from the RCL does not occur in the meditations of the Mosaic Bible.

    I believe that I will consult this Bible regularly in my lectionary reading.  The weekly lectionary passages form the core of my personal devotions, even though I do not preach regularly.  I especially enjoy finding connections between the texts and finding themes on which to meditate from those.