W
Wm777
Guest
Sometimes when I listen to a homily - it seems like Priests can get pretty creative in the way they relate scripture to contemporary matters… Let’s not get into specifics, or we could start arguing over them and go off topic… My question here is more general, and it needs to be kept at a general level…
When we get Priests who disagree with one another, who drum up strange conclusions, or who form odd relationships… it seems due to one of two things - either they misinterpreted the meaning of scriptures, or they misapplied the interpretation… or both - if you wanted to throw in a third…
So this is where I need a fact check - with respect to general principles…
Significance is basically the meaning or intention of a passage of scripture.
Relevance is how that snippet of scripture would connect, relate or otherwise pertain to scripture or some situation.
Yes?
As an “old” example, which we couldnt really argue about, let’s take the blood painted lintels at the Exodus…
The significance of the blood seems clear enough… it was a simple sign that designated a Jewish household…
The relevance is a little more confusing to me, but the sign was intended (and this is where the connection would occur) to be used to protectively identify them in the flight from Egypt…
The relevant part gets a little confusing, however, when one considers the audience… To the Israelites, it would have been a great sign because it protected them from getting killed… But - if you were Pharaoh, the relevance of the blood on the lintels would/should have been foreboding - because relative to Pharaoh, the blood on the lintels would have been an ill omen…
In this sense, relevance is relative (note those are two similar sounding, similarly meant - yet very different words - relevance and relative)… By “relevance being relative” I mean, if I have it right, it’s like relevance is a question of perspective…
That would actually make relevance harder to identify than significance, although significance could get potentially lost too, since the outcomes would be significantly different to both… Or in other words, we’d get run in a circle as to what was might really be significant to everyone in a situation…
But the Exodus in particular seems pretty solid… The blood identified the Israelites, and it was put there to help the Israelites safely escape from Egypt… The “significant (material) impact” that would have had on the Israelites, Pharaoh, etc… seems yet a third consideration, although I the significance seems like has been taken to a new level, when one considers the impact on different people in the scene…
Is this making sense? I ask because when you get to the point of debating interpretations, and the significance and relevance of them, the concept of moral relativism could come up, and then you have to really keep your facts straight…
When we get Priests who disagree with one another, who drum up strange conclusions, or who form odd relationships… it seems due to one of two things - either they misinterpreted the meaning of scriptures, or they misapplied the interpretation… or both - if you wanted to throw in a third…
So this is where I need a fact check - with respect to general principles…
Significance is basically the meaning or intention of a passage of scripture.
Relevance is how that snippet of scripture would connect, relate or otherwise pertain to scripture or some situation.
Yes?
As an “old” example, which we couldnt really argue about, let’s take the blood painted lintels at the Exodus…
The significance of the blood seems clear enough… it was a simple sign that designated a Jewish household…
The relevance is a little more confusing to me, but the sign was intended (and this is where the connection would occur) to be used to protectively identify them in the flight from Egypt…
The relevant part gets a little confusing, however, when one considers the audience… To the Israelites, it would have been a great sign because it protected them from getting killed… But - if you were Pharaoh, the relevance of the blood on the lintels would/should have been foreboding - because relative to Pharaoh, the blood on the lintels would have been an ill omen…
In this sense, relevance is relative (note those are two similar sounding, similarly meant - yet very different words - relevance and relative)… By “relevance being relative” I mean, if I have it right, it’s like relevance is a question of perspective…
That would actually make relevance harder to identify than significance, although significance could get potentially lost too, since the outcomes would be significantly different to both… Or in other words, we’d get run in a circle as to what was might really be significant to everyone in a situation…
But the Exodus in particular seems pretty solid… The blood identified the Israelites, and it was put there to help the Israelites safely escape from Egypt… The “significant (material) impact” that would have had on the Israelites, Pharaoh, etc… seems yet a third consideration, although I the significance seems like has been taken to a new level, when one considers the impact on different people in the scene…
Is this making sense? I ask because when you get to the point of debating interpretations, and the significance and relevance of them, the concept of moral relativism could come up, and then you have to really keep your facts straight…
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