Interpreting the OT - Pre-Christ

[ncgolf]

There have been many threads on the Bible being “self interpretive” or “self explaining” which leads then to many differing views on what the Bible is telling us.

Let me ask then … how was the OT (the Torah) used in the time before Jesus? Was it explained to the people by the Jewish leaders or did all come together to understand? Was an ordinary Jew allowed to differ when his own thought process led him to a different understanding of the meaning of the Torah?

Was there a single authoritative view on God’s Word?

I really don’t know the answer but if there was an authoritative view pre-Christ why would an authoritative view not be seen as acceptable post-Christ?

 

[benedictgal]

There have been many threads on the Bible being “self interpretive” or “self explaining” which leads then to many differing views on what the Bible is telling us.

Let me ask then … how was the OT (the Torah) used in the time before Jesus? Was it explained to the people by the Jewish leaders or did all come together to understand? Was an ordinary Jew allowed to differ when his own thought process led him to a different understanding of the meaning of the Torah?

Was there a single authoritative view on God’s Word?

I really don’t know the answer but if there was an authoritative view pre-Christ why would an authoritative view not be seen as acceptable post-Christ?

From what I understand (I took two introductory courses, one OT and one NT), the priests and scribes were the prevailing authority. When the Babylonians destroyed the temple and took many of the children of Israel into exile, the Pharisees arose. They were the “separated” ones who felt the urgency of keeping the exiles pure. This meant applying precepts that were reserved only to the priests. At some point, the Pharisees then became the voice of some sort of authority.

Even after the second temple was built, the Pharisees still maintained some influence. The Sadducees, who came had their roots from Sadu, the priest of Solomon’s Temple, only believed in the Torah; the words of the prophets weren’t canon for them. This explians why they didn’t believe in the resurrection. The Pharisees, however, believed in the prophets and in the resurrection.

The Sanhedrin, which tried Jesus, was made up mostly of the Saddcuees. One interesting note about the Sadducees: they were rather wealthy, so, they went along with their Roman occupators so as to not rock the boat.

I hope this helps you some.

 

[ncgolf]

I hope this helps you some.

It does seem authority is part of the equation in understanding Scripture. It seems no one Jewish person interpreted Scripture on his own, rather it was top down.

My point being individual interpretation of Scripture does not have a historical basis. No Jew … even after the Resurrection or even in the Early Church would have thought of using his or her interpretation as a basis for belief. They were just not brought up that way … they respected and understood a hierarchy of sorts within the Church. I just am wondering where the Protestant view of self interpretation had its origin.

Thanks.

 

[benedictgal]

It does seem authority is part of the equation in understanding Scripture. It seems no one Jewish person interpreted Scripture on his own, rather it was top down.

My point being individual interpretation of Scripture does not have a historical basis. No Jew … even after the Resurrection or even in the Early Church would have thought of using his or her interpretation as a basis for belief. They were just not brought up that way … they respected and understood a hierarchy of sorts within the Church. I just am wondering where the Protestant view of self interpretation had its origin.

Thanks.

King Henry VIII, for one, managed to get that ball rolling himself when the Church refused to grant him an anullment for his marriage to Queen Catherine of Aragon. He felt that since he was king, his word was law and he didn’t need Papal authority to divorce Catherine and marry Ann Boyelin (spelling). Queen Anne, for her part, was already heavily influenced by Protestant thought and told Henry that he didn’t need the Pope to tell him what to do. He could interpret things his own way.

Martin Luther tried to excise the "catholic’ epistles out of the New Testament, including the verse from Matthew’s Gospel wherein Jesus granted Peter the authority to bind and loose. The Protestants then went back to the year 95, during the Council of Yamnia, when the Pharisees decided that the Greek Septuiagent should be removed from the Jewish canon because it was not written in Hebrew, and, based on the reasoning at Yamnia, decided that the Septuiagent wasn’t authentic and removed it from their version of scripture. And then you have all of these other Protestant ecclesial communities breaking off from the Anglicans and the Lutherans and interpreting scripture their own way.

In other words, the Protestants did not (and do not) regard the Magisterium as the chief teaching authority, nor do they regard Tradition, the other pillar of the Church as having any value. However, they fail to realize that scripture came out of the Church, not the other way around.

 

[ncgolf]

In other words, the Protestants did not (and do not) regard the Magisterium as the chief teaching authority, nor do they regard Tradition, the other pillar of the Church as having any value. However, they fail to realize that scripture came out of the Church, not the other way around.

It is interesting how this phenomenon came about … all of a sudden no single teaching authority exists. Even in Jesus’s time there is valid authority. Jesus denounces in Matthew 23 the behavior of the scribes and Pharisees but validates their teaching authority. There is legitimate authority and either the early Church never had it or it was corrputed or it was there and it was rejected.

So what do Protestants consider the chief teaching authority?

 

[benedictgal]

It is interesting how this phenomenon came about … all of a sudden no single teaching authority exists. Even in Jesus’s time there is valid authority. Jesus denounces in Matthew 23 the behavior of the scribes and Pharisees but validates their teaching authority. There is legitimate authority and either the early Church never had it or it was corrputed or it was there and it was rejected.

So what do Protestants consider the chief teaching authority?

Their chief teaching authority is soly scriptural, in other words, sola acriptuara.