How to take a stand on difficult issues (part 3)

Have I studied the opinions of the church both past and present?

The Bible is a community book. It is a revelation that we share with one another. It is revelation that we share with the community of faith past, present, and future. Modernity has given us the philosophy that our own human reason is enough for discovering truth in scripture. Technology has made such a philosophy practical. And pietism has provided a spiritual justification for such individualistic approaches to the text.

The reality however is that scripture was never intended for mere private consumption. Do I believe in the virtue of individual study of the text? Yes. Certainly. But do I believe in the privatization of the text and studying the text in isolation? No. The Bible is and always has been the word that shapes our community as believers. Our New Testament was originally received through the ears as it was read publicly among the Church.

This has some important implications for us when it comes to navigating difficult theological/hermeneutical issues. Augustine (among many others) argued strongly for what is known as the “rule of faith.” This rule of faith (regula fidei) is closely associated with the T word – tradition. When we come across a text that is difficult to understand or an issue that is tough to figure out, Augustine advocated looking back on what has traditionally been taught in the tradition of the Church.

We modern evangelicals don’t much care for tradition. It’s a word that makes us feel constricted. (“What about freedom?”) It’s a word that we too often associate with “backwardness.” (“What about relevance?”) And to an extent, we are correct. Tradition has oftentimes been appallingly wrong. Those who preached indulgences in the late Middle Ages and those who preached segregation in more recent times come to mind. There have clearly been times where tradition has become more important than the clear teaching of scripture. But to shut the door on tradition altogether seems to me to be very unwise and extremely arrogant. It smacks of the type of generational prejudice that says, “We have got it all figured out. We would never make the types of embarrassing errors made by generations past. All of human history has been anxiously awaiting the wisdom and insight of our generation. You’re welcome!” (I’ve seen the same people turn into young curmudgeons as soon as they start to get passed by the next generation who obviously don’t know anything about anything.)

In light of this, I want to offer this suggestion. When taking a stand on any difficult issue, we should pause and ask, “How has this been handled by the Church historically?” This probably shouldn’t be our first question, but it definitely should be one of the questions we ask. There may be some insight to be gained from looking at 2,000 years of church history.

On a related note, I would also suggest that you should seek out expert opinions on issues from Christians in your own day (particularly Christians who might be outside of your immediate heritage). There are experts who have dedicated substantial time and effort to studying virtually any issue that we might have to deal with. Draw from their insight as they have struggled with the text.

The Bible is a community book. Interpretation does not begin and end with you. And further, let’s get rid of this pietistic error that essentially teaches that the Holy Spirit only (or principally) works on an individual level. The Holy Spirit is active in Christians everywhere and through all times. It could be that the Holy Spirit wants to teach us through the insights of others.

Part 1
Part 2

Chastened Epistemology

We need not think that hermeneutical despair ("anything goes") and hermeneutical arrogance (we have "the" interpretation) are the only alternatives.  We can acknowledge that we see and interpret "in a glass, darkly" or "in a mirror, dimly" and that we know "only in part" (1 Cor. 13:12), while ever seeking to understand and interpret better by combining the tools of scholarship with the virtues of humbly listening to the interpretations of others and above all to the Holy Spirit.

Westphal, Whose Community? Which Interpretation? (Loc. 174-178 Kindle Ed.)

Finishing the sentence began by exegesis with theology...

The church can and must, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, develop words, concepts, discourse of all sorts, out beyond the narrow confines of exegesis. That is what happened with Athanasius, holding out for the nonbliblical term homoousion to express, against Arius, the radically biblical view of the divinity of Jesus Christ. We cannot reduce the task of theology to that of biblical commentary.

N.T. Wright, Justification (Downers Grove: IVP, 2009), 81.

The Exaggerated Importance of Extra-Biblical Texts

It is remarkable how frequently there is the tacit assumption that we can be more confident about how we interpret secondary first-century sources than we are of how we interpret the New Testament writers themselves. But it seems to me that there is a prima facie case for thinking that our interpretations of extra-biblical literature are more tenuous than our interpretations of the New Testament. In general, this literature has been less studied than the Bible and does not come with a contextual awareness matching what most scholars bring to the Bible. Moreover, the Scripture comes with the added hope that there is conherency because of divine inspiration and that the Holy Spirit will illumine Scripture through humble efforts to know God's mind for the sake of the glory of Christ.

John Piper, The Future of Justification (Wheaton: Crossway, 2007), 34-35.

The Goal of Study

Read whatever chapter of Scripture you will, and be ever so delighted with it--yet it will leave you as poor, as empty and unchaged as it found you unless it has turned you wholly and solely to the Spirit of God, and brought you into full union with and dependence upon him.

William Law, The Power of the Spirit (Fort Washington, PA: Christian Literature Crusade, 1971), 19 quoted in Cymbala, Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire, 140.

Community Hermeneutics

Reading within community occurs as we approach the text conscious that we are participants in the one faith community that spans the ages. This consciousness involves recognizing the theological heritage within which we stand as contemporary readers of the text. Because we come to the text as participants in a trajectory of faith--because we come as those who seek to understand the whole of scripture as the instrumentality of the Spirit's speaking to us--we do well to keep in view what the church through the ages has considered this biblical "whole" to be.

Stanley Grenz and John Franke, Beyond Foundationalism (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001), 91.

Illumination and Subjectivity

A theology of Word and Spirit need not lapse into subjectivism, however. What leads to subjectivism is the articulation of such as theology in the context of a basically individualistic understanding of the event of revelation. In other words, the problem of subjectivism arises only when we mistakenly place the individual ahead of the community...We, in turn, acknowledge individually that the Bible is scripture because we participate in this listening and confessing people. And it is this corporate confession of the Bible as scripture taht forms the context for our hearing the Spirit voice in its pages as well. Our participation in the Spirit-illumined congregation facilitates our personal experience of the Spirit's illuminating work.

Stanley Grenz and John Franke, Beyond Foundationalism (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001), 68

Allegorical/Spiritualistic Summary

Meaning: Beyond the text
Authority: Spirit
Question: Is there a deeper, spiritual meaning that needs to be uncovered?

Restoration Movement Hermeneutics

Cummins’ four guiding principles from The Declaration and Address (Sept. 7, 1809)
1. Every person has the right of private judgment (i.e., the right and responsibility to interpret Scripture apart from human authority)
2. The Scriptures will be the sole authority; no human creeds or inventions.
3. The sectarian spirit is evil; bitter jarrings and janglings of party spirit, clashing human opinions should be at rest; restore unity and peace.
4. The Bible alone for our rule; the Holy Spirit for our teacher of truth; and Christ alone as our salvation.

D. Duane Cummins, The Disciples (Chalice, 2009), 45.

Homosexual Hermeneutics

The crux of the matter, it seems to me, is simply that the Bible has no sexual ethic. There is no biblical sex ethic. Instead, it exhibits a variety of sexual mores, some of which changed over the thousand year span of biblical history. Mores are unreflective customs accepted by a given community. Many of the practices that the Bible prohibits, we allow, and many that it allows, we prohibit. The Bible knows only a love ethic, which is constantly being brought to bear on whatever sexual mores are dominant in any given country, or culture, or period…Our moral task, then, is to apply Jesus’ love ethic to whatever sexual mores are prevalent in a given culture. This doesn’t mean everything goes. It means that everything is to be critiqued by Jesus’ love commandment…Approached from the point of view of the Spirit rather than the letter, the question ceases to be “What does Scripture command?” and becomes “What is the Word that the Spirit speaks to the churches now, in the light of Scripture, tradition, theology, and, yes, psychology, genetics, anthropology, and biology?” We can’t continue to build ethics on the basis of bad science.

Walter Wink, “Homosexuality and the Bible,” www.soulforce.org/article/homosexuality-bible-walter-wink, 9-10.

Holy Spirit and Hermeneutics

The task of the Spirit in biblical interpretation is thus to enable us to recognize the true character and purpose of the Bible and then to interpret the text in the light of this fact. The Author Himself comes to our side and helps us to understand what He has written. He gives us the eyes of faith and the mind of Christ so that we receive the message that God intends for us…As we open our minds to the Lord in prayer, so He will illumine them by the Spirit to understand the Word. Obviously this does not take away the need for our wrestling with the text, using all the tools of scholarship at our disposal. Nor does it mean that the Spirit-filled student will necessarily get higher marks in a biblical examination than one who scorns the Spirit’s help. But it does mean that God will speak to us the message that He wants us to receive, and that He will use us to convey this message to other people.

Marshall in Roy Zuck, Rightly Divided (Grand Rapids: Kregel, 1996), 73.

John Calvin

The testimony of the Spirit is more excellent than all reason. For as God alone is a fit witness of himself in his Word, so also the Word will not find acceptance in men’s hearts before it is sealed by the inward testimony of the Spirit. The same Spirit, therefore, who has spoken through the mouths of the prophets must penetrate into our hearts to persuade us that they faithfully proclaimed what had been divinely commanded.

Institutes, 1.7.4

Even if it wins reverence for itself by its own majesty, it seriously affects us only when it is sealed upon our hearts through the Spirit. Therefore, illumined by his power, we believe neither by our own nor by anyone else’s judgment that Scripture is from God; but above human judgment we affirm with utter certainty…that it has flowed to us from the very mouth of God by the ministry of men.

Institutes, 1.7.5

in McCartney, Let the Reader Understand (Bridge Point, 1994), 98.

Martin Luther

The Holy Spirit is no skeptic, and the things he has written in our hearts are not doubts or opinion, but assertions—surer and more certain than sense and in life itself.

From Bondage of the Will In McCartney, Let the Reader Understand (Bridge Point, 1994), 94.

Martin Luther

If God does not open and explain Holy Writ, no one can understand it; it will remain a closed book, enveloped in darkness.

In McCartney, Let the Reader Understand (Bridge Point, 1994), 94.

John Wycliffe

For him the Bible was an all-sufficient guide without contradictions; mirroring the truth of God, it gave access to metaphysical reality. Wycliffe not only insisted on the primacy of Scripture; he also refused to separate theology from the Bible and laid a foudnation for reform by calling for church doctrine and practice to line up with Scripture. Using Augustine's principles, Wycliffe believed that the law of love should guide interpretation, that faith precedes understanding, and that the essential message of Scripture is plain to those who submit humbly to illumination by the Holy Spirit. Although colored by allegory, his preaching and his theological works were always built upon the brammatical-historical sense of Scripture, and he said all allegory should have a Christological focus. Wycliffe stood for the priesthood of the believer: individuals could work out their own salvation with the help of the gospel and without the church being the essential mediator of grace. Since this called for a Bible in the common language, he began translating the Vulgate into English. This work was completed after his death, probably by Nicholas of Hereford and John Purvey.

James T. Spivey Jr. in Bruce Corley et al, Biblical Hermeneutics, 2nd ed (Nashville: Broadman and Holman, 2002), 109.

Pentecostal Hermeneutics

If the church had a more dynamic sense of God’s inspiration in the twentieth century, it would be more effective in its witness and outreach. It is well and good to protect the distinctiveness of the Bible, but to think only in terms of its inspiration as absolutely different in kind from inspiration in our time is too high a price to pay. Christians today need to have the same sense of being God-motivated and God-sent as did the biblical writers and interpreters. In a genuine sense, the difficulty of interpreting God’s record of revelation to this complex age requires as much of God’s inbreathing and wisdom as did the process of interpretation in the biblical periods.

Dewey Beegle, Scripture, Tradition, and Infallibility (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1973), 309.

Pentecostal Hermeneutics

Pentecostals, in spite of some of their excesses, are frequently praised for recapturing for the church her joyful radiance, missionary enthusiasm, and life in the Spirit. But they are at the same time noted for bad hermeneutics…First, their attitude toward Scripture regularly has included a general disregard for scientific exegesis and carefully thought-out hermeneutics. In fact, hermeneutics has simply not been a Pentecostal thing. Scripture is the Word of God and is to be obeyed. In place of scientific hermeneutics there developed a kind of pragmatic hermeneutics—obey what should be taken literally; spiritualize, allegorize, or devotionalize the rest…Secondly, it is probably fair—and important—to note that in general the Pentecostals’ experience has preceded their hermeneutics. In a sense, the Pentecostal tends to exegete his experience.

Gordon Fee, “Hermeneutics and Historical Precedent—A Major Problem in Pentecostal Hermeneutics” in Russell P. Spittler, ed., Perspectives on the New Pentecostalism (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1976), 119-122.