How to read the Bible
I had a very interesting and increasingly complex conversation about the Bible with Chris Guin in the comments of one of his blog posts back in October. What began as a discussion about the proper way for Christians to treat nonbelievers soon became more about how the Bible ought to be read and interpreted. Go check out those old comments if you are interested; I am going to respond here to Chris’s newest post about contradictions in the Bible.
Before I delve into what Chris wrote, let me reiterate/clarify my stance. I often bring up particular parts of the Bible in discussions with Christians when we’re talking about their framework of beliefs. I make the assumption—a reasonable one, I think—that the Bible is an important part of that framework. I think it’s important to have a coherent belief system, so I might cite some part of the Bible if, for example, I think a Christian is claiming or defending something that isn’t supported by the Bible.
That’s not to say that I think that Biblical teachings are, as it were, the “gospel truth.” I acknowledge that the Bible makes many clear and relatively unambiguous statements that contradict each other, so all those statements cannot possibly be true. I acknowledge that church doctrine often differs from particular passages of scripture—in fact, that entire distinct denominations have arisen because of different choices in sorting out apparent contradictions. In a theological debate setting, my goal in pointing out a Biblical passage isn’t really to convince someone of a particular version of theology, but rather to point out that it’s seemingly impossible to form a coherent theology from a text so fraught with contradictions and ambiguities. Either you are picking the parts of the Bible you like and ignoring the parts you don’t, or you are making up context and explanation where it doesn’t exist in order to argue away contradictions. In both cases, your beliefs are coming from within yourself rather than from Christian teachings, and the text that is supposedly the foundation for your religion can’t actually hold any weight on its own.
Chris, I was very impressed by your willingness in that earlier post to grapple with “the harder teachings” of “the complex, real, dissonant Jesus.” I don’t think you fall into the first category, cherry-picking which parts of the Bible to care about. I do think that in your current post, you are offering two ways of taking the latter route.
First, you write:
Some “contradictions” require a reevaluation of how one verse or the other is interpreted (or even translated – human language is not infallible, and it’s sometimes worth checking into things). Or how BOTH are interpreted. If there seems to be a contradiction, perhaps one or more of the Scriptures don’t mean what you think they mean.
Your second suggestion is that some seeming contradictions “require a larger contextual understanding” in order to be resolved. These sound like plausible ways to go about understanding a text, and in some cases may be reasonable responses. This is certainly how I would go about reading a physics textbook. I might find in my textbook two statements that I think can be used to work out a problem, but which recommend very different methods. I could study them both in more depth, and perhaps realize that one is a generalized principle and one is a simplification of that principle in a special case, so the two can be reconciled and thought of as the same concept. Or, I could study the surrounding context of those statements, and come to understand that they answer related questions in two entirely different situations—perhaps one applies to metals, and the other is about insulators. This is fine on face.
However, if the Bible plainly says “X but not Y” in one verse, and “Y but not X” in another verse, we are in a very different type of situation. No amount of reinterpretation, no amount of additional context can change the fact that there are very clear statements in the Bible on both sides of the “saved by faith alone” vs. “saved by good works” debate. In fact, the Bible includes specific statements about many different ways to get yourself saved, including statements that it is all predestined and not actually up to you at all. (I don’t think these lists I’ve linked to are perfect, but I think they’re more than sufficient to illustrate what I mean.) You yourself bring up the issue of the old and new covenants—no additional “context” could possibly smooth over the fact that in Leviticus 23 alone God tells Moses “it shall be a statute for ever throughout your generations” four times, yet the New Testament is full of statements that Christians “are not under the law” and that Jesus is the mediator of a “new covenant” which is “superior to the old one” and “made the first one obsolete.”
You point out that “nowhere does God say that the Bible is comprised of the infallible and perfect words of angels, as some other holy texts claim to be.” This could hypothetically get us around some of the stickier contradictions. Maybe one of the statements is just wrong, a mistake. I would ask, though: is it possible to tell what parts are wrong? You shrug off inaccurate troop headcounts or precise timelines, and I agree, these details probably do not matter as far as theology is concerned. But what about the stuff that does matter? For example, how do you know that “the harder teachings” you are attempting to face head-on even came from Jesus himself? Or, one could ask instead, how do you know that the nicer ones did?
The bottom line: I think there are significant internal contradictions that are impossible to wriggle out of, and I see no reason to suppose that either (or if more than 2, any) face of a given contradiction is actually true. I’ve seen no reason to suppose the Bible is a reliable source of information, and therefore no grounds to believe that the teachings in the Bible are true.
I suppose I had better stop for now; this is long enough. I look forward to hearing what you think, Chris—and other readers who may want to jump in! I hope I’ve managed to keep up the civility and that I’ve explained myself clearly.
Coming soon: my responses to some of Chris’s other remarks, about epistemology, logic, and science.
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16 Responses to “How to read the Bible”
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There was a Jewish scholar I think from about 2000 years ago who said something along the lines of how one should be careful about reading Scripture, because it would be arrogant of man to think that the whole of God could be understood completely by scriptural revelation alone. It might have been Akiba that said this – I DO know that Akiba established a way of studying the Torah that was so “out there” that – according to one Talmudic passage – Moses came into his school and did not know what they were studying. (They were studying, of course, the texts that Moses himself had written down.)
As a Catholic we are taught that the Bible is mostly meant to be symbolic and most priests today will admit it is full of contradictions, especially in the Old Testament and the more ‘abstract’ books of the New Testament. In my opinion, if you are a person of the Christian faith and you want to use the Bible as a guide, all you really need to focus on is the Gospels and Letters. The Gospel will tell you the basic story of Christ’s life and Letters are a very good guide to how the early Church was formed and the advice for faith communities is still relevant.
Emily K: The concept makes sense to me, that “it would be arrogant of man to think that the whole of God could be understood completely by scriptural revelation alone.” Two questions. One, the scriptures should still convey an accurate picture of part of God, right? Two, is there any other way to gain understanding about the rest of, or at least more of, God?
Mike: If “the Bible is mostly meant to be symbolic and most priests today will admit it is full of contradictions,” what gives you the confidence to say that the Gospels and Letters ought to be taken literally and have a sufficiently low amount of contradictory passages? And why keep the OT and those “abstract” books in the Bible, a holy and revered text, if they’re so unreliable? …I suppose the fallibility of the Bible is, for Catholics, made up for in part by the infallibility of the Pope. If the Bible says A and B and the Pope says B is right, it must be B.
Well if we’re going to talk about the accuracy of written word, I can tell you from experience that huge chunks of world history are built on shakier sources. Drill deep on anything older than 100 years ago and you will quickly find more contradictions and assumptions than you can imagine.
When it comes to the Bible, I don’t look at it as the Word of God. I mostly view it as an attempt to impart advice (Letters) and an attempt to relay the events of Jesus’ life (Gospels). As for officials Church positions, we all know the Bible was construcgted from a larger pool of books and many were thrown out in an arbitrary fashion. That doesn’t mean the Bible is completely flawed. Even Herodotus was right as often as he was wrong (see gold digging ants) .
Right… and that’s why historians are constantly engaged in research investigating those old accounts. Tossing out ideas which don’t seem to hold water. Re-evaluating our understanding of the past and trying to get closer to the truth. They don’t just shrug and keep on memorizing texts known to be riddled with errors. I didn’t say that religion is the only context in which written words are often inaccurate or contradictory! My point is that, in the face of questionable accuracy, people should be investigating as in the case of history, rather than unquestioningly accepting as in the case of religion.
If you acknowledge that the Bible has lots of mistakes in it, why do you accept the advice in the Letters and the teachings and parables in the Gospels? (And how do you handle two contradictory pieces of advice, or two contradictory teachings of Jesus?) My point isn’t that there are no true or valuable statements anywhere in the Bible. My point is that if you are able to distinguish them from the “wrong” parts, you must be relying on a value/belief system external to and separate from Christianity.
I’m not sure that advice and parable are subject to being flawed simply because the context is inaccurate. ‘Turn the other cheek’ is good advice whether it came from a real or fictitious Jesus.
When I say ‘inaccurate’ I am saying that maybe Jesus was married and it wasn’t recorded. Maybe the events surrounding the Resurrection were embelished. But as people of faith we believe the core message is accurate; that God sent his son to die for us and that he left the world with the gift of his teachings and founded the one true Church.
Z, the way a Jew such as myself can gain understanding of the “rest” of God (and keep in mind that Jews classically view God as un-ending, and therefor incalculable) is through study and prayer. This is what the Oral Torah attempts to do – and it explains why even 2000 years ago it was so massive that a great effort was made to organize it into digestible segments that made systematic study easier.
I believe Christians label a similar sort of endeavor, “being moved by the Holy Spirit.” That is, an ordinary person can personally be moved by a unique “experience of God.”
Mike: You wrote, ‘Turn the other cheek’ is good advice whether it came from a real or fictitious Jesus. I have no doubt that there are many good tidbits in the Bible! There are also many morally repugnant tidbits. What I am saying is that we are able to formulate those ideas without relying on the Bible, and can read the Bible and say “this is good advice” or “this is not good advice.” So why revere the Bible, why cherish it as holy? You are not “believing in the Bible,” you are believing in your own personal wisdom (which is fine) and then finding Bible verses to match (which is unnecessary).
Emily K: Well, okay. “Study” is study of scripture, though, or of other people’s writings after having studied scripture. Correct? “Prayer,” or “being moved by the Holy Spirit,” or whatever one calls it, is something I can’t really say anything substantive about because it’s such a personal, subjective experience. I can conceive of a system in which one is supposed to pore over contradiction-riddled texts, study them, argue about their interpretation with others, and then sit down to meditate quietly on those texts, whereupon a heavenly voice would reveal the correct answer. All I can say is, that sounds kind of silly to me, that maybe people are confusing their gut instincts and their consciences for the voice of God “moving” them, and that if the resolution for all these contradictions is to be worked out through prayer anyway, there’s no point in reading the super-confusing scripture in the first place.
[...] is part 2 in my response to Chris Guin. Here, I’m going to begin by setting aside some of the direct ties to religious beliefs, and [...]
Z – I have to ask, what is the purpose of the post? Is it to point out that anyone who uses the Bible as a guidepost is a dunderhead? If that is the case, isn’t that a bit disingenious since you sort of believe than anyone who believes in God in general is a dunderhead? I mean, I could say that I don’t believe in chemistry. Aren’t I then probably not the best person to judge whether a textbook is a good or bad resource for chemists?
I’m not quite sure what the point of the post is, either. All I did was point out what Jews did in the context of their own religious tradition, to gain understand of what is classically considered to be a Holy revelation from the Almighty unto the Israelites. Nothing I said made any personal judgment on anybody else, Z included. Whether or not one considers it “silly” is beside the point, and it wasn’t what I was addressing. Some may consider it “silly” to meditate, or “silly” to explore tenants of Eastern medicine. I don’t need anyone to justify my religious beliefs for me. Neither do I need to wait for science to justify something for me, either, should it not yet be able to. I’m not really an advocate of the “God of the Gaps” – But neither do I think humans know nearly everything we could, and I suspect on many levels we never will know everything possible. I just don’t believe we have the ability to sense everything that affects existence. I will say this; it seems terribly insecure to write a post about religion only to attempt to justify superiority over it. Where others might see an inherent hierarchy present where intelligence or commonsense is concerned, I simply do not.
I don’t really bother to separate the two, since i believe that the force of the Almighty works through humans; rather than as simply a static “Sky Faerie” looking down on us from above the clouds.
Hoo, wow, okay. I thought my first paragraph made it clear, but I guess not. The point of this post was a continuation of a conversation I was having with Chris Guin, a Christian, in the comments section of his blog. We were going back and forth about how one should read the Bible, how to understand the teachings therein, whether it was possible to live by them, etc. Our comments became longer and longer, and we were putting a lot of thought and effort into explaining where we each were coming from, so we decided it would be valuable to do a back-and-forth conversation in blog post form instead. This post is a reply to what Chris wrote, something he was expecting.
Uh, also, I write about my atheism here from time to time, and this is an articulation of some of the reasons for my atheism. This may be surprising to you, but some people actually cite the Bible as evidence for why they believe in God (and then cite God as the reason the Bible must be true), so here is my explanation of why I don’t buy that evidence.
Well, I was explaining how Jews read the Bible. Since that’s the title of the post, “How to read the Bible.” Which you then dismissed as “silly.”
Atheists have no use for scripture, and I, as a religious person, do not have any use in “converting” (or trying to convert) Atheists; nor do I have use for head-butting dialog with Atheists to justify my own faith. Maybe the opposite is true for you, judging by the nature of the responses you’ve made in this post. Why care about reading the Bible if you have no use for it? It would be different, IMHO, if it were two religious people arguing about their shared text. But Atheists have no use for the Bible and therefor shouldn’t give a damn about how others read it.
And since Atheists are quick to complain about how conservative Christians constantly try to tell them how to go about religion, I would think Atheists would not try to dictate the proper way for a religious person should live religiously.
After all, the Rule of Reciprocity is not bound by any one faith; nor is it unique to religious thought; and it probably did not necessarily originate with religion alone.
Your lack-of-religion vs. my religion amounts to apples vs. shoes. At least when I discuss Atheism, I don’t pass judgment on it. Nor do I feel superior for believing in the Almighty. Like I said: apples and shoes.
Additionally, I really don’t see a point in continuing this dialog, since it seems people will inevitably be talking over one another’s heads. So.. have fun, kids.
I’m really sorry, Emily K. It seems I’ve really misunderstood you. I thought that your comments were aimed at refuting a point I had made in the post above, I didn’t realize you were just telling me something about Judaism that was related to the post. I responded to you in that sort of debate mode, and came across extra-aggressive which was not at all what I would have wanted. I would generally only have such an in-depth religious debate with people who wanted to have it — which is why I’ve never done a back-and-forth blogging thing with anyone except for Chris. We talked (well, wrote) about it beforehand and both agreed that the discussion would be interesting and enjoyable, as well as something that would be of interest to readers of both of our blogs.
I don’t think it should be taboo to say that ideas are wrong, illogical, or silly. I believe in the value of the marketplace of ideas; I think we are all looking for truth and if we talk about it, we are more likely to find some truth eventually. It was never my intention to say — and it is certainly not my belief! — that certain people are bad people for thinking particular ideas are true. Again, I’m very sorry for having come across that way to you. (And, it seems, to Mike. Mike, I’m not calling anyone a dunderhead.) I hope you (both) can forgive me.
No apologies necessary…
Back to the premise though, there are a lot of different ways to read the Bible and quite honestly it’s usch a big, complicated book that I don’t think any one strategy would work.
As I said, for me I prefer to concentrate on Letters because they contain a lot of good information on the formation of the early Church and there isn’t much contradictory information in there. I also think it’s important to use ancillary materials to supplement the Bible. For example, the Rule of St.Benedict is a good resource for also understanding the early Church. It also helps to have a general understanding of history during that period.
While the Bible is of course an important touchstone for Christians, it’s also just one piece of the puzzle, IMO. As a Catholic we have our own internal documents and traditions that have been passed down since Peter. They aren’t necessarily contained in the Bible, but they are still important tools for our faith.
Z, if I understand your core criticism it’s that clearly the Bible is a flawed document filled with contradictions, etc so how can it be an effective tool for Christians? My answer is that I think it’s about the connection between modern Christians and those who were there in the early days…using the Bible as a bridge between the two. We know the bridge may be flawed (see Herodotus) but we still find the exercise to be worthy.