Culture. Meaning. Application. History. The Bible’s original languages of Hebrew and Greek. On this episode of the With All Wisdom Podcast, Derek and Cliff will be talking about all these things and how they relate to biblical interpretation in the second part of a two-part series on hermeneutics.
Transcript
Derek: Culture. Meaning. Application. History. The Bible’s original languages of Hebrew and Greek. We’ll be talking about all of these things and how they relate to biblical interpretation in the second part of a two-part series on hermeneutics here on today’s With All Wisdom Podcast. Welcome to With All Wisdom, where we are applying biblical truth to everyday life. My name is Derek Brown. I’m pastor and elder at Creekside Bible Church in Cupertino, California, and academic dean at the Cornerstone Bible College and Seminary in Vallejo, California. And I am here today with Cliff McManis. He is pastor teacher at Creekside Bible Church in Cupertino, and also pastor of theology at the Cornerstone Bible College and Seminary in Vallejo. And today we’re going to talk again about the topic of hermeneutics, or the principles of biblical interpretation. But before we get back to this topic, I want to point you to WithAllWisdom.org, where you will find a large and growing collection of articles and audio resources that will help you grow in your walk with the Lord Jesus Christ. And now on to our topic, Cliff, I just want to hand it back to you and let you take it away and pick up where we left off last time.
Cliff: Yeah, if you were able to hear, the last program we had was on hermeneutics. We defined what that big fancy term meant, and it was regarding how you interpret the Bible, how you study the Bible, principles for studying and interpreting the Bible. And we were able to talk about what it means and why it’s important and its implications, how you approach the Bible. Every person, every Christian has a hermeneutic, whether they realize it or not. We all need to understand what the proper hermeneutic is, the way we approach the Bible. And the ultimate ideal is approaching the Bible the way Jesus and the apostles did, or the Old Testament authors, because they all approached the Bible and studied Scripture the same way. And so how we study the Bible is the science of hermeneutics. And if you were listening carefully last time, we had eight points that we wanted to share. Those were gleaned from our Statement of Faith at Creekside Bible Church. They’re very helpful, very practical. We only got through the first four, so our goal today is to wrap up five through eight.
And before we do, I just want to go through a definition of hermeneutics again. Hermeneutics, it is a good term. Sometimes theologians just make up words or philosophers because they think they’re smart. This one actually comes from the Bible, hermeneutics. And I just want to give you an example of that from the verb, hermeneutics comes from a verb, hermeneuo, hence hermeneutics, used three times in the New Testament. And hermeneuo as a verb is translated the same way in most English Bibles as translated. Just to give you one example, in John chapter 1, when Andrew first discovered Jesus at the beginning of his ministry, he went to go get his brother Peter, and he told Peter about Jesus. Said, could this one be the Messiah? And then Andrew took Peter to Jesus, and then Jesus looked at Peter and Jesus said, you shall be called Cephas. And then John writes in his Gospel there, which is translated Peter. And the Greek word here for translated is where we get the word hermeneutics. That’s literally what it says in the Greek. So that’s how it’s used three times in the New Testament. Hermeneutics means to translate something. In this case, it’s from one language to another. And the idea is to translate something that the reader might not be familiar with or understand and to put it into terms that they can understand and also to do it in a scientific and literal manner, in a consistent manner. And so that’s what hermeneutics is. Another good one is in Luke 24, 27. I’ll just read this passage because this is the same verb, hermeneuo, where we get the word hermeneutics, but then a preposition is added on the front of it, so it makes it a little more intensive or emphatic or specific. And it’s de-hermeneuo, this is used six times in the New Testament, consistently, pretty much the same way it’s translated in your English Bible with three different words, depending upon your English translation, as explain, interpret, or translate. And so in Luke 24, after Jesus rose again from the dead and He was on the road to Emmaus, He ran into those two disciples who didn’t realize they were talking to the resurrected Jesus, and they were asking Jesus, hey, haven’t you heard about Jesus of Nazareth? That He died and kind of disappeared, and then Jesus kind of rebuked them subtly, even though they were His disciples, oh foolish man and slow of heart to believe, that you don’t understand or believe what was written in the Old Testament. And then it says in Luke 24:27, then Jesus, beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, so basically He’s about to have a Bible study in the Old Testament with these disciples who are Jewish who should have known their Old Testament. And so He’s going to do a Bible study beginning with Moses, which probably means He began with the book of Genesis. And He’s going to go through the whole Old Testament showing them in the Old Testament about the Christ that He had to basically be crucified and then rise again from the dead. And so as He explained the truth of the Bible or taught it to them, the word that Luke uses is that Jesus did hermeneutics. And so verse 27 says, then beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, Jesus explained to them, and the word explained there is the word hermeneutics. Jesus explained to them the things concerning Himself in the Scriptures. So He explained, He interpreted, He gave them the meaning from Scripture in words that they can understand, and He was consistent and faithful in interpreting what Scripture meant. So that’s where we get the word hermeneutics. So it makes sense that we use that term and apply it today that hermeneutics are the rules of interpreting the Bible. We need to have a good understanding of what that is.
So let me just review and recap what we covered last week. We walked through the first four. Before that, we actually pointed out in our statement of faith, before we got to the eight principles, was that we teach a grammatical historical method of interpreting Scripture. That pretty much just means we care about the grammar, the history, and the syntax of the Bible passages, just as we do any other normal literature. Then we introduced the first four principles. Number one was the Holy Spirit enables a person to understand Scripture. That’s His promise. Number two, the goal in Bible study is to determine the author’s original intent. When we read Paul, we want to know first and foremost what Paul meant when he wrote it 2,000 years ago. Number three, context determines meaning. Genre doesn’t determine meaning. That’s a competing view that’s leading people astray. Context determines meaning. The immediate context, the wider context. Number four, we talked about how the Bible does not contradict itself because the Bible is God’s words. It’s God’s thoughts. And God is perfect, and God does not contradict Himself. And the Bible really does represent what God has said and what He thinks. He will never contradict Himself. Therefore, Scripture cannot contradict itself. So let’s go on to these five. I’ll read it, and then I would ask you, Derek, if you can read the statement, or actually just put the statement in your own words in a practical way, and how we might be able to understand it better and apply it. Number five, the modern culture does not determine the meaning of a Bible passage.
Derek: Yeah, so this point goes back to something that we’ve already stated in the doctrinal statement, is that we are searching for the author’s original intent. That’s what we want to know. That’s the meaning we want to get at. And so, we’re not surveying the culture. We’re not following popular cultural trends and bringing those things to the Bible and making the Bible fit those popular trends and notions. But rather, we are going to the text wanting to know what the original intent was and drawing out from Scripture what it means.
Cliff: And so, the modern culture does not determine the meaning. This happens all the time today where we see people pressuring Bible teachers, or even Christians, to foist modern cultural norms and meanings into the Scripture. What would be a prominent example of that today?
Derek: The one I think I notice the most, and like you said, there are so many, and part of the pastor’s work is to constantly remain faithful to the Scriptures and not be pressed into the mold of the surrounding culture. And that’s a challenge. It requires courage. But the one I think of the most is the complementarian, egalitarian debate. As culture continually becomes more and more egalitarian, what I mean by that is wanting to remove the distinctions between men and women with regard to their roles both in society and in the home and in the church, and to create a kind of equality there that removes those roles. And we would argue for that Scripture presents a complementarianism where men and women are equal in their being, their ontology, their status before God. And yet, He has made us different. He has equipped us in different ways. He has designed us in different ways to have different roles. And it’s beautiful, and it’s good, and it’s wonderful. And yet, our culture seems to be going in more of an egalitarian direction and has been for some time, several decades, even centuries, you might say. And what has happened is that more and more evangelicals are reading the Scripture through an egalitarian lens and reading texts that are clear in this regard and making them say things that more reflect the culture than they do the actual biblical text.
Cliff: Yeah, that’s good. You used the word egalitarian a few times, and you also used the word equality in explaining that. I think it’s a good definition because I was just talking to a pretty well-informed Christian this past week, and he referred to egalitarian, so he didn’t know how to pronounce it. And he admitted he didn’t know how to pronounce it, and he wasn’t quite sure what it meant. But egalitarian does basically means equality. And the idea is those who say they’re egalitarian is that men and women are equal, which sounds good. That’s why it fools a lot of people. But they overstate the case because what they’re saying is that men and women are equal in all ways, and they’re not. We’re different. And God created us with those differences. And one of the ways we’re different by God’s design is in terms of our function. Just like you’re saying here, 2000 years ago, Paul made it clear in 1 Timothy that women should not function in the role of pastor. That hasn’t changed. And yet today, if you say that in the culture in which we live, that women shouldn’t be pastors, then you’re seen as a misogynist. You hate women. You don’t believe in the equality of the sexes and so on. But the fact of the matter is the modern culture does not determine the meaning of the Bible because the meaning of the Bible never changes. It always stays constant. Truth doesn’t change. Number six, the text will have one meaning, although it may have many applications. So one interpretation, many applications. Explain that.
Derek: Yeah. Again, this goes back to seeking the authorial intent, and it’s another basic element of communication between people is when you say something, you mean something by what you say, and I want to know what that meaning is. You don’t mean multiple different things or even contradictory things. You mean one thing. And yet because scripture is God’s, so that’s what scripture has. It has that one meaning and we’re seeking to understand it, that authorial intent. And yet because it is God’s word, it can be applied across various cultures and times and places and people. And that’s the beauty of God’s word is that you have, and in fact that one interpretation is what guarantees those many applications. You don’t have to have multiple different texts for every single different person in the world. You have one text, one meaning, and it can be applied across all people at all times. So it’s quite an important piece of the hermeneutic structure.
Cliff: It’s a beautiful balance because in that one sentence, you’ve got the unity with diversity at the same time. Unity in that one meaning, yet many applications, very important. I’ve seen this a lot where this is violated many times, even by many well-intentioned Christians that say they’re having a personal Bible study and everybody goes around, they read a verse and then they go around and say, tell us what this, what does this mean to you? That’s a very subjective, relative way to interpret the Bible, very dangerous, and they are violating this principle. It really doesn’t matter what I think it means or what I want it to mean. What is going back to that original author’s intent, that one meaning that Paul intended doesn’t change. We can’t deviate from that, but there are many applications without that truth. For example, I think of the meaning of Ephesians 5 where Paul gave the command, husbands, love your wife. That meaning never changes. And there are a thousand ways, applications. So one meaning, but many applications. Husbands can love their wives in many different ways. And that’s the beauty of God’s living word.
Derek: Yeah, and some of those applications may fit for some people in some cultures at some times, and they may not. And so that’s the beauty of the flexibility there. That’s why you have to be able to go back to that original meaning and to be able to have the flexibility in the application and not to claim that certain applications are what the Scripture actually teaches. But when you go back to that original meaning, husband, love your wives, and in various places at various times, it may look a certain way that may look different elsewhere in different settings, but you are always able to go back to that original meaning.
Cliff: Yeah, absolutely. Good stuff. Number seven, the Bible relates true history. This is a biggie.
Derek: So yeah, this one is going directly after the notion that Scripture contains mainly or predominantly mythological elements that are bereft of historical reality. And so we are saying that starting in Genesis, through the history of the patriarchs, through the history of Israel, through the dynasty, through the life of Christ, through the early church, through the work of Christ and the various aspects of the Gospel, these are all historical place and time events that really happened. And we reject the idea that Bible has mythological components. And this is just a direct response to what has become popular, historical, critical scholarship. And we want to answer that by saying Scripture is true, it is historically accurate, and when it speaks of historical realities, it is speaking truly. And we can rely upon those statements.
Cliff: And unfortunately, this the liberal theology that basically said that pretty much all the Old Testament was mythology is crept into the evangelical church today, as you know, and it’s everywhere. So it is not uncommon for someone to say they’re an evangelical Christian and to say that Adam and Eve weren’t even real people. We’ve heard that one. It’s been around for a while. And now evangelicals at so-called evangelical colleges and seminaries are saying this and teaching this that Adam and Eve weren’t real and they weren’t historical. They’re even saying things like Cain and Abel were not real people, Lot was not a real person, Noah and the Ark was not a historical event or story. Lot’s wife is not historical. The Exodus did not happen the way the Bible says. The Jericho walls that fell down, that wasn’t historical. So you’ll find that just about everywhere. The ironic thing is, or the interesting thing is, is that if you read the Gospels, Jesus mentioned every one of those. He talked about Adam by name and Jesus thought Adam was a real person. In Matthew 19 and Mark 10, Jesus referred to Cain. He talked about Lot’s wife who turned to a pillow over a stone. Jesus did. The greatest Bible teacher there ever was. The omniscient God man. He referred to Noah as a real man and the flood as a historical event. He referred to Moses in the Exodus. So Jesus knows better than all these liberal theologians. So we can count on the Bible as true history. I know that in the, I think it was in the 1900s when the liberals were rising in their prominence in terms of their theology, they would make accusations and say, oh, here, gotcha. The Bible isn’t true and we’ve proved it because it says there were Hittites and everybody knows there’s no such thing as a Hittite. Well, years went by and they found out that Hittites were a real civilization. So history and archaeology exposed the liberals for what they are, that they were not accurate. We don’t depend on archaeology to prove the Bible, but that’s just a good example. So we can count on our Bible as true history. Moving along to number eight. Ideally, key word, one should study the original languages, Hebrew and Greek, to get the clearest meaning of scripture. You went to seminary, I went to seminary, and we had to study, well, if your seminary is worth its salt, they’ll make you study Greek and Hebrew. And for good reason. Why don’t you comment on that one?
Derek: Yeah, an important word here is ideally because most people will probably only be able to read the Bible in their native language, English in our case, right? But another basic element of communication, you will gain more clarity if you go back to those original languages. And English translations that stick closely to those original translations are reliable. And so people today, Christians today, should have full confidence that when they hold those translations in their lap, their ESVs, their New American standards, their NIVs, that they have a reliable translation of scripture because those texts are trying to remain as close as possible to the original intent and meaning of the original text. But having said that, you will naturally gain more clarity when you go to the original languages.
Cliff: Absolutely. More clarity, actually more accuracy and precision. That’s why we need to, hopefully your pastor is trained in Greek and Hebrew so that he can go back to those original languages and give you the precision that you need. Because even though the English translations are good for the most part, the main ones, every one of them has a mistake somewhere in terms of translation. So when I’m preaching through a Bible verse by verse, if there’s a better translation than what is rendered in that English version, I will let my people know and I’ll tell them. When I’m preaching through Genesis 4:21 in the King James Version, it says that Jubal in 3000 BC or whatever invented the organ. That’s what it says. No, I don’t think so, Jubal. The organ wasn’t invented for another 3000 years, so I’ll let my people know. This word here in Hebrew doesn’t mean organ. It literally means an instrument that you blow into like a reed. And then you have to correct that or fix that. So that’s the importance of getting that education to give precision so we get back as close as we possibly can to what God actually said in each case. And we need that precision.
Derek: Absolutely. Well, I think that’s an excellent place to end. And just to sum up, we can rely upon God’s word. He has provided us clarity. He has given us a clear word. And by His grace, He’s also given us resources. Especially today, we look at all that we have today to understand God’s word. He’s given us all that we need to understand it, to interpret it rightly. And like you’ve already said, interpretation really is everything. If we want to know God, know who He is, know about salvation, know how to be saved, how to know God, then we want to have precision. We want to know accurately what He has said. And so we need to have correct hermeneutical principles. And so that’s why this is so vital. So I appreciate you, Cliff, taking us through this and helping us better understand the principles of biblical interpretation.
Cliff: Amen. Thanks, Derek.
Derek: Well, we want to thank you for joining us on With All Wisdom. And again, I want to point you over to WithAllWisdom.org where you will find a large and growing collection of resources to help you in your walk with the Lord Jesus. And we will see you again next time.
