Now its time for the fourth, and last (at least for now), installment regarding literal vs allegorical interpretations.
For much of the history of the Christian church, especially the Western church, there has been a leaning towards literal interpretations of the Bible, with the only allegorical interpretations that were really made were those that were foreshadowing Christ. However, it seems to be that allegorical interpretation were also made, in addition to literal ones. Simply look at the prophecies that Matthew proclaims Jesus to fulfill in Matthew 2 and the context of the Old Testament quotations to get a glimpse of the more open interpretation style. And earlier in the church we see early church fathers, such as Origen, who rely heavily upon allegorical interpretations. Finally, today we see a resurgence of allegorical/figurative interpretations today, in part probably due to people having difficulty accepting Genesis 1-11 as historical but yet wanting to maintain the Bible as true. And the current trend of the Christian culture is aiming towards more open-ended interpretation.
(Note: Now let me say at this point that I have included more in the few posts about literal vs. allegory than I intended to initially. It has included more of the objective, exegetical mindset vs. the subjective mindset. Since that was not the original intent of these series of posts, I will leave some dead ends for now and pick them back up in another post that will be aptly titled)
So. What is correct? To not say really much and at the risk of sounding like I am trying to be on the fence, both. To clarify further, allegory is more important to interpretation than many allow for, and literal is more important than the opposing side allows for either. And a literal interpretation does not exclude the possibility of an allegorical interpretation. For instance, in Romans 5, Paul discusses Adam and Adam as a type of Christ. Paul seems to clearly conceive Adam as a historic character, but then he interprets the character of Adam and what is recorded of him and creates an allegorical interpretation to present a teaching about Christ. In Paul's mind, both the literal and allegorical interpretations of the account of Adam are valid.
Now this does not provide an further evidence that allegory is more acceptable than has commonly been given, as many of the texts of the Old Testament were interpreted allegorically to present a teaching about Christ, along with metaphorical. But if we look at Paul in Galatians 4, he uses an allegorical interpretation in order to present a teaching about the Old Covenant and New Covenant. Also, in Matthew 2:17-18 the slaughter of the children of Bethlehem was said to be a fulfillment of a text that literally was talking about the captivity of Israel by Babylon.
What we see here is that both literal and allegorical interpretations were used for topics other than Jesus Himself specifically. Now one might say, "but all those events are about Christ." And rightly so, they are. But Christian doctrine can not be separated from the Savior.
Now let me add a caveat to this. Just because we can make an allegorical statement does not mean it is doctrinally true for the Church. It may speak truth to the individual in some instances (and this I will address in a future post about objective vs subjective interpretations). There are correct allegorical interpretations and our perception of them, or the lack thereof, does not affect the truthfulness of them. Likewise, there can be "false" allegorical interpretations, but our perception of them does not make them true for the Church as a whole. This is not different than literal interpretations though.
Also, I think the allegorical interpretations can not be accurately seen without spiritual maturity. The author of Hebrews is a fan of presenting allegorical interpretations of the Old Testament to present teachings of Christ, but then says in one instance (Hebrews 5:11-14) it would be hard because they lack maturity. Paul also speaks of this in 1 Corinthians 2:6-3:2. Not just any Christian should try to understand the Bible allegory. Their spiritual understanding is weak and wrong interpretations could very easily lead them astray.
So conclude this series of posts. I do apologize for the lack of quality with this final post. I did this topic more as a topic to get my feet wet with this, and it instead turned a bit more complicated than I initially expected for this. So I expect that my reasoning may be hard to grasp at times and it feels like that I didn't quite prove my point. I feel that way myself and will revisit this topic in the future, I am sure. However, I have been a bit more anxious to get onto other topics, and thus the abrupt conclusion to this.
Showing posts with label interpretation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label interpretation. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Monday, March 19, 2007
Biblical hermeneutics: Literal, allegorical, or both? (Part 3)
So to sum up the last post on this topic, I defined 3 different interpretation types of 2 different times of writing, story telling and declarative statements. To give a brief overview of them:
Story telling -
Literal and historical acceptance
Moral/lessons
Symbolism
Declarative statements -
Literal
Similar but modified meaning
Borrowed phrase but different meaning
This is by no means exhaustive, but it suits the purposes for this discussion. Nor are these precise categories. Also, keep in mind that a text can be taken in all the manners, and not just one. Acceptance of symbolism does not exclude the possibility of a historical interpretation, or vice versa. This is especially true knowing that God can work history and the method of storying telling out that all three can possibly be true (this is true for declarative statements).
Now, lets see if we can find these principles being used in the Bible. Basically, we would get our vindication from using quotes in such a manner by the way that the New Testament authors interpreted the Old Testament.
I believe that there are times for literal interpretations is obvious, though to the degree one should take the Bible literally is disagreed upon. But for now, I will assume that a literal interpretation is vindicated and will not endeavor to show how it is used in the New Testament (though if necessary I will provide evidence).
What about interpreting stories for a moral or lesson? One should look no further than Hebrews 11, which describes the faith of many people in the Old Testament. There the author talks about the situations they were in and how faith was pivotal in what they did, even though the Old Testament texts scantly talk about the results of their faith.
As for symbolic, Paul often times uses stories of the Old Testament as symbolic of Jesus Christ. A big one is the character of Adam. This is more of foreshadowing, but it is still taking a text presented in a story format taken in a symbolic matter.
As for modified meaning of a declarative text in Luke 13:27. There Jesus quotes from Psalms 6:8. In that Psalm, David tells people to depart from him because he was suffered but had prayed to God and was going to receive an answer. Whereas Jesus uses it, with the same basic meaning, but slightly altered to refer to being cast away at the judgment.
Finally, adopting the language but having a totally different meaning was demonstrated previously by Paul in Romans 10:6-8.
Again, this is not exhaustive and there are many other techniques of quoting the Old Testament in the Bible. My purpose is to demonstrate that there are some figurative ways the Old Testament was used.
In the next post, I will look into what is the proper manner in which to use the different interpretation techniques and what that usage means.
Story telling -
Literal and historical acceptance
Moral/lessons
Symbolism
Declarative statements -
Literal
Similar but modified meaning
Borrowed phrase but different meaning
This is by no means exhaustive, but it suits the purposes for this discussion. Nor are these precise categories. Also, keep in mind that a text can be taken in all the manners, and not just one. Acceptance of symbolism does not exclude the possibility of a historical interpretation, or vice versa. This is especially true knowing that God can work history and the method of storying telling out that all three can possibly be true (this is true for declarative statements).
Now, lets see if we can find these principles being used in the Bible. Basically, we would get our vindication from using quotes in such a manner by the way that the New Testament authors interpreted the Old Testament.
I believe that there are times for literal interpretations is obvious, though to the degree one should take the Bible literally is disagreed upon. But for now, I will assume that a literal interpretation is vindicated and will not endeavor to show how it is used in the New Testament (though if necessary I will provide evidence).
What about interpreting stories for a moral or lesson? One should look no further than Hebrews 11, which describes the faith of many people in the Old Testament. There the author talks about the situations they were in and how faith was pivotal in what they did, even though the Old Testament texts scantly talk about the results of their faith.
As for symbolic, Paul often times uses stories of the Old Testament as symbolic of Jesus Christ. A big one is the character of Adam. This is more of foreshadowing, but it is still taking a text presented in a story format taken in a symbolic matter.
As for modified meaning of a declarative text in Luke 13:27. There Jesus quotes from Psalms 6:8. In that Psalm, David tells people to depart from him because he was suffered but had prayed to God and was going to receive an answer. Whereas Jesus uses it, with the same basic meaning, but slightly altered to refer to being cast away at the judgment.
Finally, adopting the language but having a totally different meaning was demonstrated previously by Paul in Romans 10:6-8.
Again, this is not exhaustive and there are many other techniques of quoting the Old Testament in the Bible. My purpose is to demonstrate that there are some figurative ways the Old Testament was used.
In the next post, I will look into what is the proper manner in which to use the different interpretation techniques and what that usage means.
Saturday, March 17, 2007
Biblical hermeneutics: Literal, allegorical, or both? (Part 2)
When we communicate, we communicate in many ways and forms. Even in written or spoken language, there can be multiple ways to communicate a certain point or idea. However, the natural way people communicate is in a literal manner. When I say "I am hungry" it is pretty likely I am trying to speak fact that I want to eat something. This is the most natural and basic form of communication we humans have. However, it is not the only way.
Do you remember as a child when your parents or someone else would tell you a story? Many times the story was told to entertain the child. Often times though, there was a moral behind the story. The story itself was presented as if it actually happened, even though it may or may not convey an actual event. A big purpose of the story though, whether it is real or not, was to give a specific message. For instance, the story of George Washington and the cherry tree. Regardless if it is true or not (and it probably is not) it teaches the moral that we should not lie. This is a perfectly acceptable way to communicate, even if it was not a real story. Stories sometimes helps to convey a message better than a direct plain statement, like "You should not lie." This is because we are emotional people, and stories evoke more emotions than a regular straight-forward statement. In this type of interpretation of a story though, whether it is true or not is not the issue. Rather, it is the meaning of the story.
However, those types of stories with a moral behind it are a different type of allegory than that of stories like Narnia. In stories such as George Washington and the cherry tree, there is a specific message behind it. The meaning is up forward and often times presents itself in a a specific action and it is a simple message. Other allegorical stories, on the other hand, are more expansive in their meaning. They also convey allegorical meanings differently. For instance in the Chronicles of Narnia, the lion Aslan symbolically represents Jesus Christ, whereas the White Witch may be said to symbolically represent Satan. In these type of stories, the allegory is represented through symbolic means that the reader must connect. They are more hidden and are rarely seen. Also, many, if not most, of the characters, events, etc. that are contained in such stories have a deeper symbolic meaning.
However, it must be said that the stories that have a deeper meaning still require a certain level of literal understanding, because we communicate literal ideas through language and then the hearer makes connections between the literal meaning and deeper meaning. But, how literal the story is taken varies, because the story may be taken in a literal manner, but it is not taken in a very literal way, as if to say the story is historical. But a literal meaning must be understood before any deeper meaning can be gleaned.
Communications though takes many other forms other than just story telling. The bulk of the Old Testament is a collection of stories, but there are many declarative statements that are talking about the present reality. For instance, the letters of Paul have very little story telling in them. Instead, they are more descriptive of an idea. That type of writing in most any context would be taken literally with very few attempts to search for allegorical meanings.
However, this does not stop us from using certain parts of such texts in alternative ways. For instance, we may hear a speaker talking about being a entrepreneur and he makes the statement "Never give up." Taken in the context of his speech, it is talking about always make every effort to make your business succeed. He is not necessarily talking about enduring in other situations. However, a listener might take that quote and apply it to other facets of their life. This does not betray the meaning of the quote, but it is used in a different way than the author intended it. We expand the meaning of a statement to include something that it did not originally mean.
We can go even further in such borrowing of words. We can sometimes strip something that is said of its original meaning and give it an entirely new meaning. We may possible modify it a little bit or leave it in is original form. I struggle as of the moment to give a non-Biblical example of such, so I will present a Biblical example. In Romans 10:6-8, Paul makes a loose quotation from Deuteronomy 30:12-14. Deuteronomy 30:12-14 talks about the fact that the people had the commandments of God and it was with them right there. Paul borrow and modifies the language in order to present a teaching not about commandments but about Jesus Christ and how He came to the earth from heaven and rose from the dead. The original usage and the modified usage are distinctly different. This type of usage is sometimes used in order to make remembering a specific teaching easier to remember by relating it to something we have heard.
It should be said that when we borrow statements and alter their meaning and little bit or a lot, we can not claim the original intent of the statement by the original author is in fact agreeing with what we are claiming. Nevertheless, these methods of borrowing the language of others is acceptable in certain instances.
Now I know that I have not given an exhaustive overview of how we interpret written and spoken language. Nor is it very technical. However, I hoped this gives you a basic idea of how we interpret statements in ways that can be acceptable in certain instances. In the next post, I will apply what we have here to Biblical interpretation.
Do you remember as a child when your parents or someone else would tell you a story? Many times the story was told to entertain the child. Often times though, there was a moral behind the story. The story itself was presented as if it actually happened, even though it may or may not convey an actual event. A big purpose of the story though, whether it is real or not, was to give a specific message. For instance, the story of George Washington and the cherry tree. Regardless if it is true or not (and it probably is not) it teaches the moral that we should not lie. This is a perfectly acceptable way to communicate, even if it was not a real story. Stories sometimes helps to convey a message better than a direct plain statement, like "You should not lie." This is because we are emotional people, and stories evoke more emotions than a regular straight-forward statement. In this type of interpretation of a story though, whether it is true or not is not the issue. Rather, it is the meaning of the story.
However, those types of stories with a moral behind it are a different type of allegory than that of stories like Narnia. In stories such as George Washington and the cherry tree, there is a specific message behind it. The meaning is up forward and often times presents itself in a a specific action and it is a simple message. Other allegorical stories, on the other hand, are more expansive in their meaning. They also convey allegorical meanings differently. For instance in the Chronicles of Narnia, the lion Aslan symbolically represents Jesus Christ, whereas the White Witch may be said to symbolically represent Satan. In these type of stories, the allegory is represented through symbolic means that the reader must connect. They are more hidden and are rarely seen. Also, many, if not most, of the characters, events, etc. that are contained in such stories have a deeper symbolic meaning.
However, it must be said that the stories that have a deeper meaning still require a certain level of literal understanding, because we communicate literal ideas through language and then the hearer makes connections between the literal meaning and deeper meaning. But, how literal the story is taken varies, because the story may be taken in a literal manner, but it is not taken in a very literal way, as if to say the story is historical. But a literal meaning must be understood before any deeper meaning can be gleaned.
Communications though takes many other forms other than just story telling. The bulk of the Old Testament is a collection of stories, but there are many declarative statements that are talking about the present reality. For instance, the letters of Paul have very little story telling in them. Instead, they are more descriptive of an idea. That type of writing in most any context would be taken literally with very few attempts to search for allegorical meanings.
However, this does not stop us from using certain parts of such texts in alternative ways. For instance, we may hear a speaker talking about being a entrepreneur and he makes the statement "Never give up." Taken in the context of his speech, it is talking about always make every effort to make your business succeed. He is not necessarily talking about enduring in other situations. However, a listener might take that quote and apply it to other facets of their life. This does not betray the meaning of the quote, but it is used in a different way than the author intended it. We expand the meaning of a statement to include something that it did not originally mean.
We can go even further in such borrowing of words. We can sometimes strip something that is said of its original meaning and give it an entirely new meaning. We may possible modify it a little bit or leave it in is original form. I struggle as of the moment to give a non-Biblical example of such, so I will present a Biblical example. In Romans 10:6-8, Paul makes a loose quotation from Deuteronomy 30:12-14. Deuteronomy 30:12-14 talks about the fact that the people had the commandments of God and it was with them right there. Paul borrow and modifies the language in order to present a teaching not about commandments but about Jesus Christ and how He came to the earth from heaven and rose from the dead. The original usage and the modified usage are distinctly different. This type of usage is sometimes used in order to make remembering a specific teaching easier to remember by relating it to something we have heard.
It should be said that when we borrow statements and alter their meaning and little bit or a lot, we can not claim the original intent of the statement by the original author is in fact agreeing with what we are claiming. Nevertheless, these methods of borrowing the language of others is acceptable in certain instances.
Now I know that I have not given an exhaustive overview of how we interpret written and spoken language. Nor is it very technical. However, I hoped this gives you a basic idea of how we interpret statements in ways that can be acceptable in certain instances. In the next post, I will apply what we have here to Biblical interpretation.
Friday, March 16, 2007
Biblical hermeneutics: Literal, allegorical, or both? (Part 1)
How many have read stories such as Narnia or the Lord of the Rings trilogy and find deeper messages about the Christian faith in them? These books, along with a host of others, present a story in a literal way (albeit, not generally historical) but have a deeper meaning to them, shown through key actions and themes throughout the story. This type of teaching is often referred to as allegory. However, allegory is not a concept that has been reserved for books that present themselves as fiction. Allegory has also been used to draw teachings out of the Bible.
A big area of contention in some groups is how should we interpret the Bible. This has been an issue even in the early church. For instance, the Antiochian and Alexandrian schools of thought for Biblical interpretation differed, with the former emphasizing a more literal approach to Scriptural understanding whereas the Alexandrian school had a more figurative approach to Scripture (though neither side was exclusively one or the other).
Today, there are some groups that are very prone to literal interpretation with literal regard for allegory. Take for instance many conservative Christians and most Bible scholars. Their approach to Scripture is rooted in a historical-grammatical approach to the Scriptures. In other words, they try to understand the texts of the Bible by understand the times in which it was written and through the grammar of the language in which the text was written. The assumption that is made about the Bible is that each text has only one intended meaning and no other. However, this principle is not applied strictly at all points, as many recognize that much of the commandments within the Law of Moses, such as the sacrificial system, are shadows of Jesus Christ and His sacrifice.
On the other hand, there are many groups that approach much of Scripture allegorically, even some scholars. For instance, many take Genesis 1-11 to be narratives presented in order to convey deeper meanings. Some take the stance that one can not know the literal historical value of the text, and others say it is not possible. So they glean teachings from the text by looking for themes and key parts of the text that could be interpreted as commentary on an aspect of life or theology. However, even in their attempts to take deeper meanings from the text, they have to use some literal interpretation techniques in order to be able to take some allegorical teachings. Furthermore, there is a greater tendency with those who approach the Bible with a more allegorical approach to see a plurality of meanings within the text. This is the theme within the emerging church today that emphasizes narratives and the teachings that can be taken from them. With post-modernism (though this is not a well defined term) and relativism more prevalent today, it is an increasingly more popular way of approaching the Bible.
Who is right? What is the proper approach to understanding the Bible? The Bible itself does not specifically say "you shall interpret the Bible literally" (or the opposite). Nor does it prescribe directions as to when to use what type of Bible interpretation method. Therefore, in order to try to obtain an answer, we must look at how we as humans typically understand the written language. In the next post, I will attempt to look deeper into how we are understand written language and work from there.
Terms to define:
hermeneutics - the development and study of theories of the interpretation and understanding of texts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermeneutics)
allegory - a figurative mode of representation conveying a meaning other than the literal (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory)
A big area of contention in some groups is how should we interpret the Bible. This has been an issue even in the early church. For instance, the Antiochian and Alexandrian schools of thought for Biblical interpretation differed, with the former emphasizing a more literal approach to Scriptural understanding whereas the Alexandrian school had a more figurative approach to Scripture (though neither side was exclusively one or the other).
Today, there are some groups that are very prone to literal interpretation with literal regard for allegory. Take for instance many conservative Christians and most Bible scholars. Their approach to Scripture is rooted in a historical-grammatical approach to the Scriptures. In other words, they try to understand the texts of the Bible by understand the times in which it was written and through the grammar of the language in which the text was written. The assumption that is made about the Bible is that each text has only one intended meaning and no other. However, this principle is not applied strictly at all points, as many recognize that much of the commandments within the Law of Moses, such as the sacrificial system, are shadows of Jesus Christ and His sacrifice.
On the other hand, there are many groups that approach much of Scripture allegorically, even some scholars. For instance, many take Genesis 1-11 to be narratives presented in order to convey deeper meanings. Some take the stance that one can not know the literal historical value of the text, and others say it is not possible. So they glean teachings from the text by looking for themes and key parts of the text that could be interpreted as commentary on an aspect of life or theology. However, even in their attempts to take deeper meanings from the text, they have to use some literal interpretation techniques in order to be able to take some allegorical teachings. Furthermore, there is a greater tendency with those who approach the Bible with a more allegorical approach to see a plurality of meanings within the text. This is the theme within the emerging church today that emphasizes narratives and the teachings that can be taken from them. With post-modernism (though this is not a well defined term) and relativism more prevalent today, it is an increasingly more popular way of approaching the Bible.
Who is right? What is the proper approach to understanding the Bible? The Bible itself does not specifically say "you shall interpret the Bible literally" (or the opposite). Nor does it prescribe directions as to when to use what type of Bible interpretation method. Therefore, in order to try to obtain an answer, we must look at how we as humans typically understand the written language. In the next post, I will attempt to look deeper into how we are understand written language and work from there.
Terms to define:
hermeneutics - the development and study of theories of the interpretation and understanding of texts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermeneutics)
allegory - a figurative mode of representation conveying a meaning other than the literal (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory)
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