RIGHTLY DIVIDING THE WORD (cont'd)
the Bible says in other
passages. One of those two interpretations is wrong and we must find
out which one is correct. If there are several passages that say one
thing and one passage seems to say the opposite, then the single passage
needs to be looked at more closely. Several clear statements in the
Word of God must be taken for what they say and any passage that seems
to contradict those statements is misunderstood.
Next, the interpretation must always agree with its context. It is
easier to understand what a passage is saying if we consider carefully
what the context of the passage is. It is incorrect to remove a passage
from its context. Never draw a meaning from a passage that would be
improper for the context that it’s in. Failing to consider the
context of a passage is a sure way to misinterpret the Scriptures.
We must not only consider the immediate context but also the context
of the whole Word of God.
We must also, always interpret according to the normal historical-grammatical
meaning. This means we must understand what a word or phrase meant
at the time it was written, where it was written, and in the language
it was written. The historical portion of this can be broken down
into several parts. These parts are time, culture, and geography.
For instance “to plow ahead” will mean something entirely
different today than it meant 200 years ago. In the past it would
have meant to continue plowing the ground with an animal and a plow.
Today we understand it to mean to forge ahead with what we are doing.
Also, the culture that was in place at the time that something is
written bears on what is meant. To compute in a far eastern ancient
culture could mean to do math on an abacus. In the USA to compute
can mean many different things depending on the context of the conversation.
It could refer to the use of a computer, the use of a calculator,
or the use of a variety of scientific instruments. So the culture
at the time and place of writing is important to understand the exact
thought represented by what we are reading. In addition to time and
culture, we mentioned geography. In our earlier example of plowing,
the geography 200 years ago would tell us if the plowing was with
a horse or with water buffalo or some other animal. The tool used
would also be different. So the historical setting is very important
to a proper understanding of what is being said.
The grammatical part of the normal historical-grammatical meaning
also has several parts. The more obvious is the grammatical construction.
It is not the grammatical construction of our translation that is
the greatest concern, but rather it is the grammatical construction
of the original language that the passage was written in. The language
could have been Greek, Hebrew, or Aramaic depending on which passage
it is. The New Testament was written mainly in Koine Greek or the
Greek of the common man with a very small number of verses being written
in classical Greek, the more formal and scholarly language of the
day. The Old Testament was mainly written in Hebrew with a few passages
in Aramaic. A study of these languages can be very useful in gaining
a better understanding of the Word of God. If this is not possible
there are several very useful helps for English speaking students
of the Word.
The grammatical includes many different types of literature. The Bible
contains history, prophecy, poetry, parables, figures of speech, letters,
and even phenomenal language. A poetical passage must be interpreted
differently than a historical passage. Parables need to be understood
as being stories for the purpose of both preventing the unregenerate
heart from understanding and providing a picture for amplification
of a truth or as an aid to understanding to those that are saved.
Never, never should a doctrine be built out of a parable. It is there
to pictorially represent a truth and should be interpreted based on
clear statements either found in context or elsewhere. We need to
build doctrine from passages that are plain statements of Scripture.
Historical passages are also not a good place to build doctrine. Their
purpose is to record events. Just as our experience is not a way to
determine truth, neither is the experience of others as recorded in
a historical passage. Phenomenal language is another concern. If someone
says “the sun has risen” it doesn’t mean that it
literally rose, but rather that the observer’s point of view
is that it has moved to a higher position in the sky.
