TSIYON NEWS

 

From Eliyahu

“The Bible is like a bull fiddle, you can play almost any tune you want on it.” - Tommy Douglas

Not surprisingly, the man who said this was a politician, and politicians have the reputation of being able to spin almost any statement to their own advantage. Having said that, we have to ask; is there any truth to this quote? To determine if there is any truth to this quote we must first be sure we know what it means. For fun, I asked an AI on Google what the quote means. The AI said:

"This analogy means that the Bible, like a violin, is a versatile text that can be interpreted in many different ways depending on the individual reading it, allowing people to "play" different "tunes" (meanings) based on their own understanding and perspective...

There is more the AI said (which I'll get back to in a minute) but would you agree with me that this, so far, is a pretty good interpretation of what Tommy Douglas meant when he said the Bible is like a fiddle? That people can interpret the Bible differently, depending upon the person reading it? That seems to be the core point being made by Tommy Douglas, don't you think?

 

And yet, the quote by Tommy Douglass feels to me like an attack on the Bible. As if Douglass is saying there is something wrong with the Bible that allows different people to twist different meanings out of it. Of course, I don't see that as being the fault of the Bible. While I have further thoughts on that, I never expected the AI to see that, much less object to it. Here is the rest of what the AI said:

"...however, it is important to remember that responsible interpretation should still be grounded in the text's original context and intent."

I was impressed! I couldn't have done better myself! I really wasn't expecting the AI to, in essence, defend the Bible, and yet, it did (and completely without prompting).

"Responsible interpretation should still be grounded in the text's original context and intent." Exactly!

 

Reading that, it felt like the AI was showing that different people interpreting the Bible differently is the responsibility of the individual Bible interpreters - not the fault of the Bible. "Responsible interpretation" involves some work on the part of the interpreter. "The text's original context and intent" must determine the real meaning of the text. If the person seeking to interpret a Bible text has insufficient knowledge of  "the text's original context and intent" then they are bound to misinterpret the Bible text in question.

 

It is not uncommon for unbelievers to ignore a 'text's original context and intent' and out of sheer Bible ignorance, to assume the Bible is saying something entirely different than what the original context and intent would indicate. Since they don't believe, and often don't want to believe, they don't invest the time it takes to fully grasp the original context and intent of a given passage.

 

For example, Bible detractors often use the Four Gospels as 'evidence' of 'mistakes' because they give 'different' stories from one another. However, it is not unusual at all for different witnesses, even in court, to tell the truth, yet for their accounts of an incident to vary in some details from one another.

 

One witness may talk about one suspect while another witness might mention two. Does this mean one of these witnesses is lying? Not really, since the witness who talks about one suspect simply isn't talking about the other man. Any policeman can tell you this is one reason multiple witnesses are interviewed, because every witness sees things others did not. By putting the testimony of all witnesses together the bigger picture becomes known. That you find this happening sometimes in the Four Gospels only means you are getting real eye-witness accounts - not a made up story in which collusion occurs where each witness says exactly the same words. That would be the mainstream news - not reality.  

While that helps to explain why unbelievers misinterpret the Bible, what about believers? While most Christians claim to believe in the Bible, there is still a great deal of disagreement among them when it comes to interpretation. After all, there are thousands of distinct denominations in the world, indicating differences among them. Even in the same church or group people often disagree on the message of the Bible. Why is this?

 

If we get too specific about this I will have to write a book instead of sharing this newsletter. However, getting back to the fundamentals 'responsible interpretation should be grounded in the text's original context and intent.' Often, this doesn't happen. Why?

 

Paradigm - a paradigm is a standard, perspective, or set of ideas. A paradigm is a way of looking at something. Its a composite picture in your head of how you see reality. Its like the operating system (OS) of your computer. If a particular 'program' i.e. a set of ideas do not mesh with your paradigm, than your OS will have trouble processing that, or may not see it at all. This happens in religion all the time.

 

Here is an example:

"Behold, the days come, says YHWH, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah..."  (Jeremiah 31:31-33)

This verse specifically states that the New Covenant is with "the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah." Yet, many Christian commentators cannot accept that clear statement as written. They invariably find some circuitous route by which they tell us that the New Covenant is made with a Gentile organization known as "the Church." Why? Their church paradigm insists the New Covenant is made with 'The Church' so they replace "the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah" with 'The Church' in their head, ignoring the original context and intent of the text.

 

Their church paradigm can never be based upon "the text's original context and intent" of this passage. That approach would fail them, because the original context of the passage is all about YHWH resolving the conflict between He and His nation, Israel, regarding the Sinai Covenant. There is not a word in view in the text, or the entire book of Jeremiah for that matter, to suggest the New Covenant would be made with some new Gentile group instead of with Israel.

 

Why can't they see that in the clear meaning of Jeremiah 31? Again, their paradigm is blocking it out. Church, Bible School, Seminary, the entire Christian mesh that was built in their head, prevents them from seeing the full role of Israel in Jeremiah 31, and therefore, in the rest of the Scriptures. I'm not saying this to denigrate believing Christians. What I'm really pointing out is that Bible readers, including Christians, often have a smaller paradigm of what the Bible teaches than the larger, but actual paradigm of the Bible itself. If we would grasp the fullness of Bible truth, we cannot ignore the original context and intent of the Bible text. It involves mental and spiritual work, and moral courage, to dig deeply in Scripture to understand what it is really saying. Of course the Holy Spirit helps us with that, but the Holy Spirit leads us, it doesn't do the work for us. Dig deeper and you will be blessed!

 

A good example of people making the paradigm shift can be found in our live stream this evening. Abigail will be hosting a panel discussion entitled He Will Raise Us Up! Watch this and consider some details of Scripture that will definitely help to expand your paradigm! We begin tonight at Tsiyon.Net at 8 PM, Central. Join us and invite your friends on any of our streaming platforms. I know you will enjoy this!

 

Eliyahu
Tsiyon.Org

Click on the graphic to see the video.