BBI Part Six

For those of you not among my Facebook followers, I will start by reposting a quotation in a book chapter that got me thinking about Part Six. "The antisupernaturalist rationalism that sprang from the deism of the Enlightenment and the pantheism of the Romantic movement had combined with evolutionary euphoria to produce among the professionals a kind of theology that effectively denied the faith of the Bible and the creeds on basics like the Trinity, the incarnation, the atonement, . . ." J.I.Packer, "Theology & Bible Reading" in The Act of Bible Reading, Paternoster Press, 1996, 72. Packer's conclusion is worth including: "There can be much spiritual understanding where there is little or no technical theological education. Anyone who reads and rereads the Bible carefully and prayerfully, asking to be taught by God the Holy Spirit about knowing God through our Lord Jesus Christ, will do well; our faithful God will see to that. These pages of mine are simply making the marginal comment that some knowledge of and commitment to theology may well help such a Bible student do even better." (87). 

Following Part Five: Share, Part Six is a bit more difficult, Continue Learning.

I feel that my educational experience permits the following statement, "Biblical Interpretation is not Mathematics." In mathematics a series of numbers used in a formula will always provide the same answer when kept according to mathematical theorems, i.e. 6 + 2 = 2 + 6.  There is a constancy and a stability in mathematical studies that permits postulating conclusions, theorems, and corollaries. Biblical Interpretation, despite the influence of "antisupernaturalist rationalism" and/or "evolutionary euphoria" and the efforts of a multitude of scholars working in the modern period is not constant.  The assessment of a "living canon" presupposes that each encounter with the biblical text produces a new, if not clearly distinct, event.  Since humans are most familiar with interacting with other, living, humans an analogy might be in order despite its inherent limitations.  Two individuals, friends in college, sharing experiences and retreats and teaching, do not see each other for five years.  They encounter one another, now married, one with kids, the other with none.  This second encounter with a living human will be new, if not clearly distinct, in the way that they relate although there will be some familiarity.  Why the newness?  Because each has a different frame of reference for the encounter!

Likewise, each repetitive encounter with a text will bring new, and distinct, events.  Take for instance a short reading, Paul's letter to Philemon.  Read it once.  Read it twice, Read it twenty times.  What will happen through each reading? Each reading will have a decreasing return on familiarity and perceived newness. After the 20th reading, take a moment to read a brief introductory article on the letter in a good Bible Dictionary.  Now read Philemon for a twenty-first time.  What just happened?  Something has made the 21st reading distinct from the 20th reading.  Even though after 20 readings the reader is familiar enough with the text that the changes of a 21st reading are minimal, there is an actual increase in perceived newness.  What causes the change?  It is the new perspective brought to the text by an outside experience.

Similarly, read Psalm 51.  Read it again and again.  If you are unfortunate enough to have a really, really, I mean REALLY, BIG life failure (Preferably not one that results in prison or divorce court), read Psalm 51 another time.  What has happened? The living text has come powerfully alive!

So, BBI Part Six: Continue Learning is crucial to biblical interpretation.  The Bible is not a mathematics table that one can memorize and then "spew, heave, retch" (you get the picture) when called upon from a static database that never changes.  Instead, the Bible is a living document that grabs one by the throat and raises up to one's toes until the uncommitted victim succumbs to its authority or is cast aside unwilling to engage the potentiality of the Bible's power (envision Darth Vader, Episode 4, with the crewman of Princess Leia's starship).

Continue learning and bringing your newfound knowledge back to the task of biblical interpretation.