How sufficient is the Scripture?

[Ani_Ibi]

dennisknapp:

Ah, so its sola hermeneutica!

No, dennis. It’s Sola Historical-grammatical-literary hermeneutic. :crying:

 

[dennisknapp]

michaelp:

Cool . . . wait a minute, me thinks you are patronizing me. But I think that I can live with that, since it simply means sola Scritura (i.e. sola rightly interpreted Scripture).

Dennis, what is your favorite college football team?

Michael

Texas A&M, just kidding. I don’t have one, why?

Peace

 

[mayra_hart]

the doctrine of sola scriptura is NOT found in scripture. in fact, the BIBLE tells us that we need more than just the bible ALONE. the bible confirms that NOT EVERYTHING jesus said and did is recorded in SCRIPTURE.(john21:25) and that we must also hold fast to ORAL TRADITION, the preached word of god (1 cor 11:2;1pet1:25). in 2pet2:15–16, we are warned that sacred scripture can be very difficult to interpret, which strongly implies the need for an authoritative interpreter. finally,1 tim3:15 reassures us that the church is"THE PILLAR AND BULWARK OF THE TRUTH".

Gen. to Rev. - Scripture never says that Scripture is the sole infallible authority for God’s Word. Scripture also mandates the use of tradition. This fact alone disproves sola Scriptura.

Matt. 28:19; Mark 16:15 - those that preached the Gospel to all creation but did not write the Gospel were not less obedient to Jesus, or their teachings less important.

Matt. 28:20 - “observe ALL I have commanded,” but, as we see in John 20:30; 21:25, not ALL Jesus taught is in Scripture. So there must be things outside of Scripture that we must observe. This disproves “Bible alone” theology.

Mark 16:15 - Jesus commands the apostles to “preach,” not write, and only three apostles wrote. The others who did not write were not less faithful to Jesus, because Jesus gave them no directive to write. There is no evidence in the Bible or elsewhere that Jesus intended the Bible to be sole authority of the Christian faith.

Luke 1:1-4 - Luke acknowledges that the faithful have already received the teachings of Christ, and is writing his Gospel only so that they “realize the certainty of the teachings you have received.” Luke writes to verify the oral tradition they already received. John 20:30; 21:25 - Jesus did many other things not written in the Scriptures. These have been preserved through the oral apostolic tradition and they are equally a part of the Deposit of Faith.

 

[Ani_Ibi]

dennisknapp:

Texas A&M, just kidding. I don’t have one, why?

Would you like one?

 

[st_felicity]

michaelp:

This common practice of invoking the name of your God on something in order to make it valid was what God did not want the Israelites to do. They should never use God’s name to validate or “give power” to a statement.

Step 2:
Naturally and self-evidently coming from this is the timeless principle which says thus: God is very protective of His reputation. People should not use God’s in a statement to give it validity. This would be using His name in a worthless manner (in vain). Essentially, Don’t say that God has said something He did not say.

Step 3:
Today, we should not use God’s name to give any teaching absolute validity if we don’t know for certian that it is from Him. Do not say, "Thus sayeth the Lord, if you are not infallibly certian that the Lord said something.

I have had people come up to me and say, “The Lord told me this . . .” This is taking His name in vain, attempting to gain validity to a statement by invoking His holy name.

You see, it does have timeless truth and application, ONLY after you have gone through the first step. This is historical-grammatical-literary hermeneutics.

Michael

Ok…forget about only one question (I just can’t help myself)…:tsktsk:

But then by this hermaneutic (what a pain to type that out every time…) I could go around yelling G.D. this or Jesus H. that out of frustration and anger so long as I’m not trying to get God to give credence to my statement but to say, “I swear to God” would be breaking the comandment–this happens every day in courts across America–“so help me God!”. Furthmore, if one didn’t believe in God and said those things, that person wouldn’t be guilty of using His name in vain because if he didn’t believe there was a God who would lend His authority to his human statement–he’s not breaking the commandment.

From what you’ve said–to interpret beyond that would be taking the original comandment out of the original BiblicalHistoricalGrammaticalCultural (gasp) context and applying your own meaning to it. Your method is flawed.

Do you have family photos or does you son have action figures or your daughter have My Little Ponies? Those are graven images. Heck! Do you watch TV? That’s graven images flashing incessantly! (Ok–TV might actually BE the fast road to Hell… )

Will I be punished if my Great-grandfather was an idolater? It says so–wasn’t that how the Isrealites heard the message?

Do you keep holy the Sabbath–the 7th day–or Sunday–the first day? And if you do…have you ever mowed the lawn on Saturday? Shame-shame:tsktsk:

THAT plus what Mayra says…

 

[st_felicity]

Enough OT–Explain John 6 to me in your BiblicalHistoricalGrammaticalCultural Hermaneutics–Protestants say Jesus WASN’T speaking literally, but the disciples who turned away thought that he was–To interpret otherwise is imparting meaning that does not fit your criteria.

Don’t tell me the disciples misunderstood what He was saying–God would not let anyone lose their soul because of a “misunderstanding”–He is a merciful God.

And if the Church is right about that…

 

[st_felicity]

Ani Ibi:

Interpretation of the Bible has its uses. But it is not the be-all and end-all. And can actually be a trap. The devil, afterall, knows Scripture.

You are so right!

God Bless you Ani!

(Oh my!!!:bigyikes: I think I just broke that God’s name in vain commandment…:tsktsk: )

 

[Ani_Ibi]

st_felicity:

From what you’ve said–to interpret beyond that would be taking the original comandment out of the original BiblicalHistoricalGrammaticalCultural (gasp) context and applying your own meaning to it.

Whoa! You’ve been doing some homework. :clapping: michaelp’s name for this hermeneutic is this:

michaelp:

This is historical-grammatical-literary hermeneutics

You have added ‘cultural’ and deleted ‘literary.’ Any particular reason why have you done that?

There seems to be quite a bit of disagreement among proponents of any part of this hermeneutic about each part of this hermeneutic. Historical grammatical, for example, presupposes ‘natural, literal’ attributes to the language in question such that anybody can grasp the meaning intended by the author, even a non-Christian. I believe this is called dispensational theology.

Literary-cultural, on the other hand, presupposes (at first glance) exactly the opposite to that presupposed by historical grammatical. However, I am lost when it comes to how people apply the literarary cultural – or, more precisely, when people apply the literary cultural.

Covenant theology seems to start out with ‘natural, literal’ readings. Then it injects literary cultural in a way which seems arbitrary rather than systematic. For example, Israel in a natural literal reading means Israel, those people part of the community founded by God through Isaac. However, Covenant theology suddenly changes gears midstream and uses a literary cultural reading of Israel to mean ‘church.’ Prophetic writings are read sometimes by historical grammatical, sometimes by literary cultural.

So I can understand why someone would want to drop literary from the hermeneutic. Its inclusion raises embarrassing questions. So what remains is historical grammatical cultural. However, like the literary, the cultural can and does presuppose non-natural non-literal readings also. So, if one is dropping literary then why add cultural?

Oh! Wait. Are you sitting down? Here’s where it gets really rich: Historical grammatical includes figurative language which is then given a ‘normal’ reading. This seems odd to me. How is ‘normal’ reading distinguished from ‘literary’ (critical) reading? Specifically, either ‘normal’ reading is inadequate for figurative language or ‘normal’ reading is indistinguishable from ‘literary’ (critical) reading. To wit: if historical grammatical includes figurative language in its realm of concern, then why add literary cultural? Is literary cultural redundant? Or does its addition operate as a diversion to de-emphasize the inconsistency (and confusion) inherent in the historical grammatical approach?

In any case, all this is neither here nor there. michaelp: for purposes of the discussion it might help us if you were to synopsize dispensation/covenant theologies (or whatever these theologies are currently called or whatever these theologies have evolved into) and the hermeneutics which fall under each. I don’t care what you end up calling the theologies; I just want to grasp what exact hermeneutic are we discussing:

historical grammatical? (HG)
literary cultural? (LC)
historical grammatical literary? (HGL)
historical grammatical cultural? (HGC)

Bottom line: however this hermeneutic is qualified, it looks like reader-response (and not author-intent) interpretation to me. Why? because of the dependence on ‘natural, literal’ reading and because of the arbitrariness (lack of predictability) with which non-natural non-literal readings are applied. (Those just dropping in on this discussion: michaelp had previously promoted the use of author-intent interpretation.)

 

[michaelp]

st_felicity:

Ok…forget about only one question (I just can’t help myself)…:tsktsk:

But then by this hermaneutic (what a pain to type that out every time…) I could go around yelling G.D. this or Jesus H. that out of frustration and anger so long as I’m not trying to get God to give credence to my statement but to say, “I swear to God” would be breaking the comandment–this happens every day in courts across America–“so help me God!”.

Not necessarily. Broadly speaking, we can say that the third commandment prohibits using God’s name in this manner as well, but it is by no means that primary violation of it. The primary violation would be to use God’s name to empower something you say. To say, God d****** is most specifically a request asking God to damn something. To say “Jesus Christ” in a worthless manner would not be wise since we should have our speech be pure and full of meaning (**Matthew 12:36 **36 I tell you that on the day of judgment, people will give an account for every worthless word they speak"). And Lev 19:12 tell us not to swear falsly in using God’s name. Paul swears to God in 2 Cor 1:23 (see also Heb 6:16 and compare with Jam 5:12).

Furthmore, if one didn’t believe in God and said those things, that person wouldn’t be guilty of using His name in vain because if he didn’t believe there was a God who would lend His authority to his human statement–he’s not breaking the commandment.

It may be a violation of the principle indeed. Each occurance must be compared to the principle itself, not our modern understanding of the words of the text.

From what you’ve said–to interpret beyond that would be taking the original comandment out of the original BiblicalHistoricalGrammaticalCultural (gasp) context and applying your own meaning to it. Your method is flawed.

How is it flawed to say that the principle is derived from the text and the principle applies to our contemporary audience only to the degree that it was actually derived from the text. This is called exegesis.

BTW: The short hand for this method of interpretation is grammatico-historical.
It involves:

1. Context: Immediate (what is the argument of the section) and broad (what is the argument of the book)
2. Cultural: What is the cultural situation and norms that contribute to the study.
3. Historical: What does the historical situation tell us about the passage.
4. Literary: What type of literature is it? This will determine the type of hermeneutic (i.e. you interpret a Proverb much differently than an Epistle)
5. Grammer: How does linguistics and syntax of the original contribute to our interpretation.

These all contribute to finding out what the author meant then so that we can better know how it applies today.

It looks more difficult than it is. You interpret this way everyday when you are reading the newspaper or a novel. Different rules apply. This is why it is better called a “Common Sense” hermeneutic.

Do you have family photos or does you son have action figures or your daughter have My Little Ponies? Those are graven images. Heck! Do you watch TV? That’s graven images flashing incessantly! (Ok–TV might actually BE the fast road to Hell… )

Not sure I understand. My daughter has Barbies (about 10000000)

Will I be punished if my Great-grandfather was an idolater? It says so–wasn’t that how the Isrealites heard the message?

The emphasis is on the concequenses of sin. When a person is a bad parent, the children are prone to follow in their footsteps. This is what God was saying. BUT, the emphasis is not on the consequences, but on the blessings. Where as God only visits the iniquity of the parents on the the third and forth generation, for those who love him, he blesses for a thousand generations. This is hyperbolic language of comparison designed to emphasis God’s mercy to those who follow him compared to the judgment (consequenses that are allowed) those upon those who don’t follow him.

Do you keep holy the Sabbath–the 7th day–or Sunday–the first day? And if you do…have you ever mowed the lawn on Saturday? Shame-shame:tsktsk:

No, because this fulfilled with the Christian since we have entered into our Sabbath rest and no one is to be our judge as to holy days. The principle of the necessity of rest and relaxation still applies. So I do take a day off each week.

Michael

 

[michaelp]

st_felicity:

Enough OT–Explain John 6 to me in your BiblicalHistoricalGrammaticalCultural Hermaneutics–Protestants say Jesus WASN’T speaking literally, but the disciples who turned away thought that he was–To interpret otherwise is imparting meaning that does not fit your criteria.

Don’t tell me the disciples misunderstood what He was saying–God would not let anyone lose their soul because of a “misunderstanding”–He is a merciful God.

And if the Church is right about that…

You know that this would get us off track don’t you. Do you really want to go here. Are you REALLY open minded to listen to what I would say, or are you preset to disagree with my conclusions?

 

[michaelp]

Ani Ibi:

Whoa! You’ve been doing some homework. :clapping: michaelp’s name for this hermeneutic is this:

You have added 'cultural’

and deleted ‘literary.’ Any particular reason why have you done that?
Read above for an explaination of the name. I use the longer descriptive names sometimes to emphasis the importants of all the elements. But most commonly it is known as Grammatico-Historical hermeneutics.

There seems to be quite a bit of disagreement among proponents of any part of this hermeneutic about each part of this hermeneutic. Historical grammatical, for example, presupposes ‘natural, literal’ attributes to the language in question such that anybody can grasp the meaning intended by the author, even a non-Christian. I believe this is called dispensational theology.

No. Dispensational theology has to do primarily with the separation of Israel and the Church. They say that they are taking the Bible more literally sometimes, but this does not mean that they are the only ones who practice this hermeneutic. In fact, all Evangelicals use the Grammatico-Historical hermeneutic. As does today’s Orthodox Jewish community in interpreting the Hebrew Scriptures.

Literary-cultural, on the other hand, presupposes (at first glance) exactly the opposite to that presupposed by historical grammatical. However, I am lost when it comes to how people apply the literarary cultural – or, more precisely, when

people apply the literary cultural.
Literary-cultural hermeneutic is inseprable from historical grammatical.

Here is the full name:
Literary-cultural-grammatico-historical hermenteutic.

The short name is Grammatico-historical.

Here is the most important work that has been done by an Evangelical concerning a defense of this method against the modern reader-response. It is a VERY heavy read, but is the most scholarly work out there right now.

amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0310211565/104-0775294-7024728

Cont. . . .

 

[michaelp]

Covenant theology seems to start out with ‘natural, literal’ readings. Then it injects literary cultural in a way which seems arbitrary rather than systematic. For example, Israel in a natural literal reading means Israel, those people part of the community founded by God through Isaac. However, Covenant theology suddenly changes gears midstream and uses a literary cultural reading of Israel to mean ‘church.’ Prophetic writings are read sometimes by historical grammatical, sometimes by literary cultural.

You seem to be working off a rather archaic understanding of the agreements and disagreements among Dispensationalist and Covenant theologians. The differences in interpretative method are slight and produced varying conclusions only on non-essential issues such as end-times and the relationship between Israel and the Church. But, contemporary theologians on both sides (Covenant and Dispensationist) have come to see that they are much closer than their older polemics have suggested. See this book for more info:

amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0801022436/qid=1109186963/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-0775294-7024728

So I can understand why someone would want to drop literary from the hermeneutic. Its inclusion raises embarrassing questions. So what remains is historical grammatical cultural. However, like the literary, the cultural can and does presuppose non-natural non-literal readings also. So, if one is dropping literary then why add cultural?

OH, I see, you are mistaking “literary” for “literal.” Literary means that you look to the type of literature that the book was written in to understand how to interpret it.

Does this clear some things up???

Oh! Wait. Are you sitting down? Here’s where it gets really rich: Historical grammatical includes figurative language which is then given a ‘normal’ reading. This seems odd to me. How is ‘normal’ reading distinguished from ‘literary’ (critical) reading? Specifically, either ‘normal’ reading is inadequate for figurative language or ‘normal’ reading is indistinguishable from ‘literary’ (critical) reading. To wit: if historical grammatical includes figurative language in its realm of concern, then why add literary cultural? Is literary cultural redundant? Or does its addition operate as a diversion to de-emphasize the inconsistency (and confusion) inherent in the historical grammatical approach?

Read above.

In any case, all this is neither here nor there. michaelp: for purposes of the discussion it might help us if you were to synopsize dispensation/covenant theologies (or whatever these theologies are currently called or whatever these theologies have evolved into) and the hermeneutics which fall under each. I don’t care what you end up calling the theologies; I just want to grasp what exact hermeneutic are we discussing:

historical grammatical? (HG)
literary cultural? (LC)
historical grammatical literary? (HGL)
historical grammatical cultural? (HGC)

I hope that this has been cleared up.
**
Bottom line: however this hermeneutic is qualified, it looks like reader-response (and not author-intent) interpretation to me. Why? because of the dependence on ‘natural, literal’ reading and because of the arbitrariness (lack of predictability) with which non-natural non-literal readings are applied. (Those just dropping in on this discussion: michaelp had previously promoted the use of author-intent interpretation.)
You have toltally lost me here.Authorial intent hermeneutic is the presupposition behind the grammatico-historical interpretation. How else to you understand the text if you start by disregarding what the author said (as you seem to be proposing by your denial of authorial intent hermeneutics)? Your proposed method is, by definition, reader-response.

Michael**

 

[st_felicity]

michaelp:

How is it flawed to say that the principle is derived from the text and the principle applies to our contemporary audience only to the degree that it was actually derived from the text. This is called exegesis.

Exegesis is simply explanation or analysis–not specifically your way of explaining it. We went round and round about this…Your exegesis is flawed in that it claims to use emperical information only, but clearly, there are points when you depart from that and move into “personal” interpretation that is specifically forbidden in the NT. 2 Pet.

Case in point…

My statement…

Felicity:

Will I be punished if my Great-grandfather was an idolater? It says so–wasn’t that how the Isrealites heard the message?

Your response…

Michael:

The emphasis is on the concequenses of sin. When a person is a bad parent, the children are prone to follow in their footsteps. This is what God was saying.

Where in the world is the Grammatical or Historical or Cultural or Whatever evidence for this interpretation??? There IS NONE. God said He was a jealous God who inflicts punishment for a father’s wickedness–He said NOTHING about bad parenting!

(I do agree that the emphasis, however, is on His blessings–Still, where does it say that the blessings will be from good parenting? NOT THERE EITHER)

Michael

 

[st_felicity]

michaelp:

You know that this would get us off track don’t you. Do you really want to go here. Are you REALLY open minded to listen to what I would say, or are you preset to disagree with my conclusions?

I am interested in listening to what you say. I cannot agree to being “open minded” because that usually implies that either I agree or I am being close-minded–but I will listen…Do you think I have been close minded thus far?

GO HERE to explain it to me please…

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?p=478584#post478584

 

[st_felicity]

Ani Ibi:

Whoa! You’ve been doing some homework. :clapping:

smileys.smileycentral.com/cat/5/5_3_1.gif I’m trainable…!

Ani:

You have added ‘cultural’ and deleted ‘literary.’ Any particular reason why have you done that?

My mistake…( maybe I should study more ) I got it from this…

michaelp:

Without getting into the lexical and grammatical issues, lets try to understand it from a historical perspective. In the culture which the Israelites lived

Honestly, my head is spinning a bit…:whacky:

 

[Ani_Ibi]

st_felicity:

My mistake…( maybe I should study more ) I got it from this

michaelp:

Without getting into the lexical and grammatical issues, lets try to understand it from a historical perspective. In the culture which the Israelites lived

No, obviously not your mistake. My mistake. I missed it. Good catch.

st_felicity:

Honestly, my head is spinning a bit…:whacky:

You’re lucky you still have a head. I have to go to work in a bit and I can’t remember where I dragged mine last night. :bigyikes: Do you think they’ll mind if I show up without? Maybe if I wear a very big hat.

 

[Philthy]

michaelp:

This may look more true than it is in actuality. Why? Because, broadly speaking, Protestant denominations use two different hermeneutics. 1) The “uniformed” lay person. He or she uses a “spirit-led” biblical docetic interpretation. In other words, this hermeneutic simply thinks the Bible is a magic book that you open up and God speaks to you wherever you are at. 2) Historical-grammatical-literary hermeneutic. This means essentially, the text means only what the author intended it to mean in is original language and cultural situation. Much more to it, but that should do. This is the most common Evangelical hermeneutic. It is what would be taught at the most promenient evangelical seminaries Dallas Theological Seminary, Trinity, Gorden-Conwell, Denver Seminary, SWBT, etc. Now, when you find people using this hermeneutic, you find an increadible amout of agreement on most theological issues. As a matter of fact, being around both groups, Evangelicals who follow this hermeneutic, and Catholics on this site, I find at least as much agreement (dare I say more?) as those of you on this site.

Therefore, it is not exactly like you say, since all people who interpret the Bible don’t use the same hermeneutic. Just like all people who interpret the Bible through a Magisterium (JW, Mormans, Roman Catholics, etc) don’t use the same Magisterium.

Do you see the connection now?

If not, I don’t know what to say. Expecially since I don’t know how we got thos this point to begin with!!

Nope, it is all your hermeneutic.

Michael,

It is not “all in the hermeneutic”. Hermeneutics may explain the difference between “lay people” and “intellectuals” in interpreting scripture, but it certainly doesn’t explain why there are differences between educated Protestants. Why, if it is simply hermeneutics and not a formal insufficiency of Scripture, do we still have several major divisions within the Protestant community? Again, the transdenominational banner of “Evangelical” does not eliminate the reason why there are still Lutherans, Baptists, Methodists…etc. Sorry, still insufficient. And even if I were to agree with your assessment you have to realize that an authority is now needed to recognize that someone is “hemeneutically correct” in their interpretations and not simply a “lay person”. Starting to sound very familiar to me. At the very least, one could argue that Scripture interpretation requires a level of education over and above what the “lay person” has - again insufficient.
You’re starting to sound like the early Church in attempting to protect the Truth by restricting Scripture to the enlightened only.

Now as to your contention that infant baptism is “not a problem” for Evangelicals, I have to disagree - and half of Evangelicals would agree with me. What you mean is that you recognize the situation (biblical lack of clarity) and have decided that this means it must not be an essential. Sorry, but that doesn’t make the cut. Unless you’re going to abandon original sin you still have an issue unresolved - and it is an essential. You just have nowhere to turn.
A final point I’ll make on Biblical sufficiency is that given that it is obvious that certain doctrine have developed over time and continue to develop (contraception is one) the best answer one can give to “Is the bible sufficient?” is “perhaps eventually”. If doctrine develop and there is no authority to claim truth then how do we ever know when our doctrine has fully run its course? I will anticipate your response by saying that I’m not interested in whether you’re CONCERNED about it, or whether you FEEL THE NEED to be certain, but simply when and how do we know a doctrine is fixed?

Phil

 

[Lady_of_Shalott]

I’m not a Catholic, so I can’t respond with the Catholic answer to your question…but here’s the truth.
The Scriptures are the absolute authority on everything…you don’t need any other source of truth. While interpretation and translation has varied because we’re ‘looking through a glass dimly’, we do not need a ‘superspiritual’ authority like a pope or priest to tell us what’s right and wrong. Such figures should only be seen as fellow interpreters of the same Scriptures; their interpretation should be regarded just as highly as any other believer’s.
Faith is about God, not about a pope, a king, or any human being. His Word, not anyone else’s, is the final authority on everything. If you can’t back it up with Scripture, it’s not true…don’t make an idol out of your religion or Church and miss the true Reason for faith and worship.

 

[Ani_Ibi]

Lady of Shalott:

don’t make an idol out of your religion or Church and miss the true Reason for faith and worship.

This is really insulting.

 

[Catholic29]

Ani Ibi:

This is really insulting.

I second that.

Alot of these Bible alone Christians only come here to tell us they are right and we are wrong, never considering if anyone else may have a valid point not in keeping with their own. They will tell us if it is not straight from here :bible1: it is NOT from God (Sola Scriptura). Of course the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox belief (Scripture plus Tradition) is contrary to this, much to their dismay. But as a true believer in it, I will hold to it no matter what threats or promises of hellfire and brimstone I receive.

The adherents of Sola Scriptura depend on either their own, or their pastor’s, or favorite evangelist’s interpretation of the Gospel. Of course they will always claim that all essential teachings from scripture are so plain that a donkey couldn’t miss them. But have they read the Bible from cover to cover and actually comprehend the whole thing, and correctly? And what about the poor blind man or woman who could not actually read the scriptures to interpret them anyway?(Remember Braille was not invented until 1829)

Sorry if I offended anyone by this dissenting opinion.