How do you interpret passages the Bible?

[COPLAND_3]

sindexter,

I am getting the feeling that you are just trying to be argumentative and not trying to find answers or solutions, as if you are trying to pick a fight. I’m not even sure what your point is half the time. Forgive me if I’m misjudging, but that is what it seems like.

 

[billwjb]

(emphasis added) Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. You are forcing assumptions upon the text. You know, maybe that’s not what Roman governors did all the time. And maybe that’s never what they did at the three annual holiday seasons when 99% of the Jewish families in the whole world were in Jerusalem. Think “crowd control.” The crowd was big. The crowd wanted the bodies buried. Nobody wanted a riot. Ergo, it was in the best interest of everybody for the Roman governor to get the bodies off the crosses and get them buried.

My point is that sometimes the easy stuff is actually easy.

If the Roman governor was so intimidated by the crowd of jews, my guess is that he would choose a different day and time to crucify Jesus rather than be humiliated into taking down the bodies after only a few hours. A political embarrassment (taking the body down right away) because of being afraid of a riot – that would itself be a political embarrassment.(being afraid of a riot). Also, how much sense does it make that the mob of jews would demand Jesus be crucified, knowing how that practice worked, and then turn around and demand that the bodies be taken down and buried. It sounds like you believe that the governor was a wimp and that the mob was running things.

 

[scottm]

If the Roman governor was so intimidated by the crowd of jews, my guess is that he would choose a different day and time to crucify Jesus rather than be humiliated into taking down the bodies after only a few hours. A political embarrassment (taking the body down right away) because of being afraid of a riot – that would itself be a political embarrassment.(being afraid of a riot). Also, how much sense does it make that the mob of jews would demand Jesus be crucified, knowing how that practice worked, and then turn around and demand that the bodies be taken down and buried. It sounds like you believe that the governor was a wimp and that the mob was running things.

It sounds like you’re looking for any excuse to not accept the multiple unambiguous historical documents that we have.

No, wait – that is what you’re doing.

That’s bad scholarship.

 

[grannymh]

Is there an objective way for telling which parts are literal and which are not, without resorting to looking at the world around us?

Of course there is an objective way for telling which parts of the Bible are literal and which contain figurative language. Check out the Catholic Church.

What makes the Catholic Church unique is that it is commissioned by Jesus Christ to interpret, teach and preserve the Divine Revelation contained in Holy Scripture.

The best source for the Catholic Deposit of Faith is:

Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition, ISBN: 1-57455-109-4
Link: www.scborromeo.org/ccc.htm

Blessings,
granny

The quest for spiritual truth needs Catholicism.

 

[billwjb]

It sounds like you’re looking for any excuse to not accept the multiple unambiguous historical documents that we have.

No, wait – that is what you’re doing.

That’s bad scholarship.

My point is that we do not have multiple unambiguous historical documents. None. All of the written accounts are reflections of the apostles and disciples, recorded at least twenty years after the crucifixion, and I believe that the stories they tell had to have been influenced by the interpretation of prophetic material in the Hebrew scriptures. I can see that the stories have meaning, but I cannot see that they are historical documents.

 

[James224]

So that is a “No” on being able to tell us which parts are metaphorical and which arn’t then.

So we have to already know which bits are alegory and which bits aren’t before we acan know which bits are alogory and which bits arn’t? :huh:

You must remember that the Bible says that the devil will pretend divinity, so if we believe the bible, then the bible could ahve been written by the devil pretending to be God (hey, Iif I were the devil that would be the first thing I would think of doing

The answer is that we can interpret all of it literally. The Catechism of the Catholic Church says in P116, "The literal sense is the meaning conveyed by the words of Scripture and discovered by exegesis, following the rules of sound interpretation: “All other senses of Sacred Scripture are based on the literal.” So the “Literal” doesn’t mean what you think it means. It means you can read the text and exege it from the exact words of the text to draw the meaning out of it. For example, you can look up the exact words in Greek and discover a deeper meaning.

 

[OmniVan]

If the Bible cannot be take literal then what is the point of it? If you can’t take one story within it as literal, then why should you take the idea of a god literal? Like previously mentioned, other books such as Lord of the Rings also presents us with the same or similar ideological concepts as the bible. So what is the difference?

At the end of time you will realize the difference of the two books.

The other one is a fiction and the other is the truth.

 

[scottm]

My point is that we do not have multiple unambiguous historical documents. None. All of the written accounts are reflections of the apostles and disciples, recorded at least twenty years after the crucifixion, and I believe that the stories they tell had to have been influenced by the interpretation of prophetic material in the Hebrew scriptures. I can see that the stories have meaning, but I cannot see that they are historical documents.

That’s horrible scholarship. I’d be embarrassed if I had said that. Wow.

 

[NotWorthy]

At the end of time you will realize the difference of the two books.

The other one is a fiction and the other is the truth.

It’s funny that Lord of the Rings should be mentioned.

There are several “Catholic” symbols hidden in the book. The Elven bread which would satisfy someone for a long period of time, wasn’t a coincidence for a Daily Mass-attending author like J.R.R. Tolkien.

 

[billwjb]

That’s horrible scholarship. I’d be embarrassed if I had said that. Wow.

Obviously you and I disagree, and your conclusion seems to be that my scholarship is horrible and embarrassing. I have not represented myself as a scholar here. But, after years of struggle and doubt, I have come up with the scenario I describe, and I think it is a very plausible take on what probably actually happened.I admit that it threatens the traditional view, but it works for me, and it also clears up some of the inconsistancies in the various gospel accounts.

 

[bkayw]

*"I believe that the elements of the crucifixion story were evolved into it by the influence of prophetic old testament scriptures. My own non-scholarly belief is that Jesus hung on the cross for a long time, at least for many days, and most likely the elements and scavengers took their toll.

Jesus lived and died in a “mystical” society, where visions and appearances were not uncommon. Moreover, people in that society would accept an appearance in a dream as every bit as authentic as an appearance while awake. I believe that most if not all of the appearances were in dreams, which could very possibly have begun after three days or so. The appearances of a glorified Jesus rather than a ravaged rescuscitated corpse would be consistent as dream appearances. I am confident that if we knew where to look, and if time and the burial practices of the era did not erode them away, we might very well unearth the complete remains of Jesus the man some day. For me, the resurrection was not a physical event. "*

You even doubt then, the Gospels concerning doubting Thomas.

 

[scottm]

And he straight-up denied the Nicene Creed (physical resurrection of Jesus and his accent into heaven).

And he straight-up denied the opening verses of 1 John about being an eye-witness.

And he straight-up denied the opening verses of 1 Cor 15 where Paul lays out the sum total of his preaching.

Denial of the Nicene Creed by definition makes one not a Christian. And that makes one ineligible for communion. In both the Roman missal and the Byzantine divine liturgy the Creed is recited as a symbol of common faith before taking communion. A person can’t take communion if he doesn’t share the common faith.

 

[Wesley7]

How do you interpret passages the Bible?

You interpret the passages of the Bible in harmony the authoritative teaching(s) of the Holy Mother Church. . .

 

[JRKH]

If the Bible cannot be take literal then what is the point of it? If you can’t take one story within it as literal, then why should you take the idea of a god literal? Like previously mentioned, other books such as Lord of the Rings also presents us with the same or similar ideological concepts as the bible. So what is the difference?

The title of the thread doesn’t really seem to be what you are asking in the body here…

But I will try to answer the title question:
How do (I) interpret passages the Bible?

I start with Jesus Instruction that All of the Law and All of the Prophets stem from the Two Great commandments of Love. (Mt 22:36-40) This then becomes the overriding “key” to how to read the Bible.
Second is to recognize the various parts of the Bible, the Historical aspects, the “Prophetic” aspects etc.
Third is to recognize that the Bible is not a single volume “textbook” that can be equally applied in all of it’s aspects to today’s viewpoint. It is a series of books written over many centuries chronicalling the the relationship of God and man. This is, at least partly, where the “historical” aspects come in.

Taking all of this into account, interpreting the Bible becomes a matter of reading a passage, considering what it actually says. Looking at how it relates to “Love” and then, if moved by the spirit, what spiritual applications there might be for me on my journey.

Hope this helps

Peace
James

 

[JRKH]

You interpret the passages of the Bible in harmony the authoritative teaching(s) of the Holy Mother Church. . .

Well stated…

Peace
James

 

[rcjones]

And yet, some work so hard to “force” a literal interpretation For example, about the crucifixion, that mode of punishment was not merely about killing someone. It was about making a public point about what happens to people who do what Jesus did. To make that point, generally, a crucified body was left on public display for days or weeks. Why would the authorities put a body on public display, and then take it down after a couple of hours?
They wouldn’t. So that part of the story is difficult to take literally, at least for me.

Mt 24:22 And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened.

It certainly was not the norm, but had the days of Christ’s tribulation not been shortened, had he been beaten to death in prison, or simply delayed from the cross for a week, or left on the cross rather than placed in the tomb when he was… no flesh would have been saved.

A prophecy that merely predicts the predictable is no prophecy at all.

 

[JRKH]

And yet, some work so hard to “force” a literal interpretation For example, about the crucifixion, that mode of punishment was not merely about killing someone. It was about making a public point about what happens to people who do what Jesus did. To make that point, generally, a crucified body was left on public display for days or weeks. Why would the authorities put a body on public display, and then take it down after a couple of hours?
They wouldn’t. So that part of the story is difficult to take literally, at least for me.

Consider.
Pilate did not WANT to Crucify Jesus.
Pilate even told the high priests that he could find no guilt in Him.
Yet he was forced to allow it due, not to Jesus’ guilt, but to the “mob mentality” of the Jews.
Therefore, when Joseph asked for the body shortly after the death, Pilate, saw no reason to refuse the request. In fact he, being a practical man, may well have felt the quicker the body was out of sight the quicker the mob would disperse and forget the whole matter. Mobs are often like that.
So, with just a little thought, this part of the story is not difficult to believe at all…

Peace
James

 

[sinnerdexter]

God the Almighty, Omniscient, and Perfect might deliberately put some design flaws into his creation, but only where good reasons dictated this choice. When it came to communicating his message in a divinely inspired book, he must have realized that if the book’s style, composition, logic, and power to convince were not reflective of its divine authorship, it would fail to communicate, since many would quite reasonably doubt the godly authority of the stories and theories it imparted. Instead, its character looks like just what it is: the composition of many different human authors from varying Hebrew and Greek traditions who were mutually inconsistent, not always very logical, and more than occasionally poor writers.

That there is nothing in the Bible which stands out as inconsistent with all the cultural, religious, and philosophical forces surrounding its composition also raises suspicions about its divine origin. If the forces of intellectual history of the era were already inclining towards generating that message on their own, then why would God have had to step in and inspire people to write it? On the other hand, if God inspired its composition, shouldn’t at least something in it look startlingly inconsistent with the ordinary ideas already floating around at that time and place? It would be a stunning coincidence if the Infinite Mind of the Cosmos (as it appears in the New Testament) just happened to think like someone influenced by Egyptian relgion, Greek philosophy, and Hebrew traditions current in the Eastern corner of the Mediterranean during the first few centuries A.D.! And yet that is exactly how it looks, since somehow his writing seems uneducated by any of the developments in human thought from the Enlightenment, Existentialism, Relativism, Historical Materialism, Epistemological Idealism, Hermeutics, Phenomenology, or any other advance since the time period when he communicated his message. This would make perfect sense if humans rather than God wrote down that message, but would seem quite peculiar if an Infinite, Eternal Mind, which would obviously already have anticipated all future human thought, wrote it.

Also, if the Christian message has indeed ‘evolved’ since its first transmission as part of the natural selection process of better over worse ideas throughout the ensuing history of Western culture, then what is the right message we should now believe in? The 17th century Puritans executed cats for killing mice on Sunday because they manifested their evil nature by ‘working on the Sabbath’; other Christians took seriously the Biblical injunction that ‘thou shalt not suffer a witch to live’; and still others think that the Christian teaching forbids saluting the flag, having blood transfusions, or respecting monogamy. The first Christian communities were even communist in their social organization.

With all these stages and branches of evolution from the initial message, who knows what to believe? Even more disturbing, the Omniscient Mind of Jehovah must have known in advance that a message communicated by whispering an ‘inspiration’ into the minds of people acting under certain narrow cultural influences in one time and place was bound to become corrupted and unclear over time by various historical forces, so why was he so profoundly silly as to entrust his message to that medium of transmission? Why did he make the spread of his message subject to the contingent forces of history by delivering it in the Roman Province of Judea ca. 30 A.D., which guaranteed that the people in places like Tibet and Madagascar would only first hear of it centuries later and thus suffer the undeserved prejudice that many more of them would be denied a chance of salvation?

All these problems arise from the same issue: It is simply inconsistent with the nature of an infinite god that he would manifest himself in some special way at a special time and in a special place, in one particular language with all its conceptual limitations, and through the medium of inspired authors mired in one rather backward way of thinking.

 

[billwjb]

And he straight-up denied the Nicene Creed (physical resurrection of Jesus and his accent into heaven).

And he straight-up denied the opening verses of 1 John about being an eye-witness.

And he straight-up denied the opening verses of 1 Cor 15 where Paul lays out the sum total of his preaching.

Denial of the Nicene Creed by definition makes one not a Christian. And that makes one ineligible for communion. In both the Roman missal and the Byzantine divine liturgy the Creed is recited as a symbol of common faith before taking communion. A person can’t take communion if he doesn’t share the common faith.

It is nice to see that the spirit of Fr. Torquemada is alive and well!

 

[billwjb]

Consider.
Pilate did not WANT to Crucify Jesus.
Pilate even told the high priests that he could find no guilt in Him.
Yet he was forced to allow it due, not to Jesus’ guilt, but to the “mob mentality” of the Jews.
Therefore, when Joseph asked for the body shortly after the death, Pilate, saw no reason to refuse the request. In fact he, being a practical man, may well have felt the quicker the body was out of sight the quicker the mob would disperse and forget the whole matter. Mobs are often like that.
So, with just a little thought, this part of the story is not difficult to believe at all…

With all due respect, another odd part of the story is that we really don’t learn exactly why Jesus is crucified. If the scripture is to be taken literally, the jewish mob was calling the shots, and Pilate was too weak to stand up for his own impression, so he had Jesus scourged and crucified just to avoid the wrath of the jewish crowds. Somehow the story does not seem consistent with what one might expect from a Roman governor.
But even if the jews were calling the shots, they would want Jesus to hang for weeks as an example to his followers, at least.