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rs > 4.1 ways of interpreting scripture > Flashcards

4.1 ways of interpreting scripture Flashcards

1
Q

According to Origen what are the 3 ways of interpreting scripture?

A
  • literal
  • moral
  • allegorical
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2
Q

What is meant by a literal interpretation of the Bible?

A
  • the words are literally true, the text is historical
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3
Q

What is a strength of using a literal interpretation?

A
  • this approach gives us an easy route to understanding its meaning and how we should think about its relevance to our lives today
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4
Q

What is a weakness of using a literal interpretation?

A
  • how do we tell what language is intended to be interpreted literally?
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5
Q

What is meant by using a moral interpretation?

A
  • lessons should be learned from the Bible about how to live your life
  • treats the Bible as a kind of practical document which is primarily examined in order to understand how we should live our lives
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6
Q

What is a strength of using a moral interpretation?

A
  • focuses on how the Bible can help is live in the here and now
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7
Q

What is a weakness of using a moral interpretation?

A
  • this focus can be too narrow
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8
Q

What is meant by an allegorical interpretation?

A
  • the stories should be read on a deeper symbolic level, they have a hidden meaning
  • the words are just a symbol for the reality
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9
Q

What is a strength of using an allegorical interpretation?

A
  • instances where it does appear as if the authors of the gospels write with the intention of creating symbolic meaning
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10
Q

How did Augustine interpret the parable of the Good Samaritan?

A
  • man going from Jerusalem to Jericho = man is Adam and Jerusalem is Heaven
  • attacked by robbers = the robbers are the devil persuading him to sin
  • leaving him half dead = away from God
  • Priest and Levite = OT ministry isn’t salvation
  • Samaritan looked after him = incarnation
  • took him to an inn = the church
  • innkeeper = apostle Paul
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11
Q

What is a weakness of using allegorical interpretation?

A
  • it isn’t always clear what hidden meanings a particular text might have
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12
Q

Where does the idea that the Bible is inspired by God come from?

A

1 Timothy 3:16 = “All scripture is inspired by God”
- the Bible is guided by God, it’s his words and therefore inerrant

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13
Q

What was the enlightenment?

A
  • also known as the Age of Reason
  • was a philosophical, intellectual and cultural movement of the 18th century, characterised by:
  • the idea that the progress of humanity could be advanced through rational thinking
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14
Q

Who is a key thinker associated with rationalism?

A

Descartes

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15
Q

What did Descartes argue about rationalism?

A
  • the power of reason should test all ideas
  • inspired philosophers to question religion and propose new answers to religious questions
  • things that Christians had accepted as part of the mystery of holy things were now dissected as the traditional explanations were found to be lacking
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16
Q

What key thinker is associated with deism?

A

Baruch Spinoza

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17
Q

What is deism?

A
  • introduced the idea of a non-interventionist God
  • Spinoza expressly denies personality and consciousness to God
  • rejection of revelation and miracles
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18
Q

Which key thinkers are associated with empiricism?

A

Isaac Newton and John Locke

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19
Q

What is empiricism?

A
  • all knowledge comes through observation of the natural world, experiment and science
  • these accounted for the working of the world without supernatural interference
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20
Q

What key thinker is associated with scepticism?

A

David Hume

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21
Q

What is scepticism?

A
  • questioning whether knowledge can be obtained at all, either rationally or empirically
  • people often lie and have good reasons to lie about miracles
22
Q

What options do Christians have post-enlightenment?

A
  1. liberal
  2. conservative
23
Q

What is the liberal approach?

A
  • the Bible needs to be interpreted using evidence and reason
  • non-propositional revelation = the Bible is inspired by God and requires us to interpret the text in an appropriate way
  • the Bible carries a moral message
24
Q

What is the conservative approach?

A
  • a fundamentalist/literal interpretation
  • propositional revelation = Bible is from God, he overshadowed the author/dictated the material word for word
  • rejects rationalism and science
25
Q

What is a problem with the liberal approach?

A
  • it abandons the search for theological meaning
  • we put our own focus/projections on it
26
Q

How does Barth respond to the liberal and conservative approaches?

A
  • he offers a middle-way: neo-orthodoxy
  • the Bible should be read as a story through which one can encounter God
27
Q

What does Barth say about revelation?

A
  • God reveals himself in Christ
  • Jesus NOT the Bible is the Word of God
  • the Bible is not revelation itself and to treat it like that is a form of idolatry
28
Q

What is Barth’s theology?

A
  • theocentric not anthropocentric
29
Q

What is meant by dialectic theology?

A
  • God finds us, the Holy Spirit imparts our recognition of God via scripture
  • when God chooses to speak to the reader, the Bible becomes the Word of God
30
Q

How can John 5 be seen as an example of dialectic theology?

A
  • Jesus is the true power BUT the man wouldn’t have encountered him if he hadn’t gone to the pool
  • in the same way, the Bible is the place where Jesus is encountered BUT has no real power of its own
31
Q

Who was Rudolph Bultmann?

A
  • a German Lutherean theologian, who was very radical and controversial
32
Q

What did Bultmann propose instead of the liberal and conservative approaches?

A
  • he disagreed with liberal theology’s attempt to see the Bible as just moral guidance
  • he also opposed the fundamentalist approach of accepting myths as literal
  • we need to strip away the myths of the Bible to uncover the kerygma
33
Q

What is a myth?

A
  • a report of an event of supernatural forces at work but its true intention is to say something fundamental
34
Q

What did Bultmann argue about humanity’s understanding of myths?

A
  • humanity now has a scientific world-view and has lost the ability to understand myth
  • this gets in the way of understanding the kerygma
35
Q

What is meant by kerygma?

A

the fundamental truth

36
Q

What is the kerygma of Adam and Eve?

A
  • Adam’s sin is not living authentically, their sin was seeking false security, leaving the garden of Eden was them entering a life of sorrow and anxiety
  • they represent us
37
Q

What is a problem with demythologising the Bible?

A
  • if you demythologise too much you might loose the fundamental message of Christianity
    e.g. the resurrection
38
Q

How did Bultmann view the resurrection?

A
  • it is an existential reality in us
  • for Bultmann, belief in the resurrection of Christ’s physical body is completely unnecessary to Christian faith
39
Q

What did Alister McGrath identify?

A
  • four approaches to biblical interpretation:
    1. rational
    2. historical
    3. sociological
    4. literary
40
Q

What is the rational approach?

A
  • biblical criticism should be made to fit with our rational, scientific understanding of the world - this means discarding supernatural elements
  • this usually leads to liberal interpretations
  • influenced the deistic view
  • we are left with universal values
41
Q

What are strengths of the rational approach?

A
  • still important things that can be learned
  • religion and rationalism can coexist
  • promotes universal values
42
Q

What are weaknesses of the rational approach?

A
  • undermine theological truth of the Bible
  • ‘pick and mix’ approach
  • Bultmann = fails to understand the importance of Christianity
43
Q

What is meant by the historical approach?

A
  • tries to identify the original historical events behind the Bible through a variety of methods (form, source and redaction criticism)
  • key to this was the ‘Quest for the Historical Jesus’
44
Q

What is a strength of the historical approach?

A
  • helps the modern world to get closer to the Early Church and the original meaning of the text
45
Q

What are some weaknesses of the historical approach?

A
  • doesn’t take into account the divine nature of the text
  • reflects the scholars’ biases
  • epistemic issue = our distance from the life of Jesus and the relative paucity of historical sources about his life means we’ll never be able to truly know what he/his life was like
  • anachronism = natural imposition of modern ideas onto very different historical eras
46
Q

What is meant by the sociological approach?

A
  • looking at the structures, views and patterns of human activity at the time the Bible was written
  • theologians like Brown argued we have to understand the community that produced the revelation
  • Gager = interprets the Early Church as a millenarian cult that arose out of the widespread social and political situation in the Roman world
47
Q

What are some strengths of the sociological approach?

A
  • helps in understanding the meaning and significance of Jesus’ life/teachings
  • generates good explanations for why Christianity grew so quickly in certain communities
48
Q

What are some weaknesses of the sociological approach?

A
  • imposes modern assumptions on earlier believers
  • how do we know we’re not projecting a modern understanding of the human religious impulse onto figures in the past?
49
Q

What is meant by the literary approach?

A
  • looks at the literary methods used in each composition
  • this could mean the narrative structure, arc of development, or particular motifs
  • Culpepper = John uses motifs of light and darkness
50
Q

What are some strengths of the literary approach?

A
  • literary comparison of the Gospels helps in gaining an insight into the beliefs of the ECC
  • by focusing on the whole text, theological truths become evident
51
Q

What are some weaknesses of the literary approach?

A
  • subjective and open to creating meaning that was never intended
  • the Gospels are more than a story, they are intended to convey specific theological truths to an audience

rs (33 decks)

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