Bible Study Is a Bit Like Meteorology, but....

Evening news weather forecasts have changed a lot over the years. In my youth, the weatherman told me whether it might rain and the high and low temperature. More recently, however, weather forecasters educate viewers on how they arrive at a given forecast. Many viewers find this highly interesting and pay close attention. My wife, nephew, and brother-in-law, as arm-chair meteorologists, have all learned enough that they first analyze the raw data and satellite radar before reading the actual forecast.

For me, I just want the forecast. When I ask Angie if it is supposed to rain, she’ll take a few minutes to analyze the data. She’ll say, “Well…there’s nothing on the radar, but oh…the forecast says we’ll have rain this afternoon.” And then she tries to figure out why the professional meteorologists forecast rain. In the process, I get a little impatient and tell her, “Just tell me the bottom line: what’s the forecast.”

As important as weather forecasting is, it is not nearly as important studying the Bible. Bible students should learn how to read the Bible for themselves, much like people learn how to forecast weather. While we might well depend entirely on expert meteorologists for the forecast, we should not rely entirely on the expert Bible teacher or preacher. We should all be personally committed to acquiring the skills for reading the Bible for all its worth.

While it is true that a person can get the gist of the Bible without any specialized knowledge at all, Bible students miss a lot if they never bother to acquire specialized Bible study skills. The more reading skills a person acquires, the more the person gets out of the Bible. Many a bad interpretation of a given text arises simply because the reader doesn’t know the cultural context, or the author’s rhetorical devices, or how to see interpretive clues in the words of the biblical text. Impoverished are those who rely solely on the pastor or teacher to interpret the Bible for them.

For this reason, your pastor deems it wise and appropriate to teach principles and skills of biblical interpretation. Some might prefer the pastor to skip those kinds of lessons, especially those lessons that require more critical thinking and patience. We are not, however, dealing with something inconsequential such as weather forecasting; we are dealing with God’s Word, and this calls for special effort in learning how to get the most out of our Bible reading.

Star Trek and the Perspicuity of Scripture

Star Trek and the Perspicuity of Scripture

Do you have to be a great scholar to understand the Bible?

We were serious Star Trekkers. We’d adjust the aerial antenna to catch whatever weak signal we could from Cincinnati, 90 miles away. Our black and white TV would give us just the faintest picture, in a blizzard of static and sound. Still, 20 years later, we were watching the same reruns.

In 1989, we moved to the North Cascades for grad school, taking only my books and a couple of cats. We heard rumors that a new Star Trek series had come to television. Having no tv ourselves, we soon discovered that if we scrolled the FM dial to the extreme left, we could catch audio of the new show Star Trek: The Next Generation. So, my wife and I would drive down to Lake Paddon where we had our best radio reception, and parked the car and listened to the show.

About three months later, my parents drove across the US to visit us. They brought our old 13” black and white tv. We extended the telescoping antenna and fitted it with the obligatory aluminum foil, and if we tapped the tuner just right, we could add a snowy image to the audio of the show. It was like Plato’s cave—we could see shadowy images of people acting while they spoke.

When we returned to visit relatives, we saw Star Trek: TNG for the first time on cable tv. We were surprised to see that Data the android had white skin. We were surprised to discover that Klingons looked much different in TNG than in the original series. And we were surprised at how the ship looked so real in comparison with the original.

As good as the picture was on cable, it was not until we saw the show in high definition that we discovered that Ferengi have a faint tattoo on their forehead.

Now, back to the question: do you have to be a great scholar to understand the Bible? Well, if you are capable of reading the Bible in your own language, you have the advantage over those who cannot read or who do not have the Bible translated in their own language. Still, having one’s own Bible was hardly possible prior to the 19^th century; for most of the Church’s history, access to the Bible had to be mediated by someone who read the Bible aloud to an audience. So, most 21^st century English speaking Christians have the advantage over most Christians of prior centuries. These realities, however, do not prove the notion that one must be a great scholar to understand the Bible any more than one must watch Star Trek: TNG in high definition in order to appreciate the show.

Even though for many months we only had access to the audio, we still understood what was happening in each episode. We still perceived the story line and the characters. Of course, acquiring the show’s video enhanced our appreciation, and we picked up on more and more of the nuances. Still, it was, all in all, the same show whether we only heard it on radio, or watched it through snowy static, or got the full effects in high definition. And thus it is with the Bible.

Let’s do the hard work of fine tuning the details.

Presuppositions for Biblical Interpretation and the Meaning of the Term Exegesis

Exegesis
Definition: A Bible study process to determine the author's intended meaning to his original audience.

1. The process includes doing word studies, context studies (phrase, sentence, paragraph, chapter, section, book, corpus, testament), historical and sociological studies, etc.
   
   "What the text meant to them back then."
2. Exegesis must precede application to our modern situation:

"Making what the text meant to them back then relevant to us today."