24 thoughts on “ESV Study Bible – Reading & Interpreting the Bible”
What in the world are you talking about?
How is our understanding of the Bible affected by a literal vs. allegorical interpretation of the bible? (If you would be able to go more in depth than the basic examples the reading provided for us.)
On page 12 they speak about the Bible as literature and the many types of art forms that are in it. My question is whether it is the authors (Moses, David, John, Etc.)showign their own personal form of artistic writing through the writing or is it The Author (God) writing in his own artistic forms through each of the writers of the bible? What about that?? Huh? Huh? Huh?
On page 15 it talks about part of communion as being prayer. It then says prayer is us speaking to God the Father, on the basis of Christ’s work, by the help of the Spirit. When I pray I usually don’t differentiate to whom I’m praying to other than God. I’ve never really thought of just praying to God the Father alone. So I was wondering if you agreed that God the Father is the one who we are addressing in our prayers or if we are able to pray to any in the Godhead?
The Medievalists developed a fourfold approach to interpreting the bible: the literal, showing what God did; the allegorical, showing what at surface level God hid; the moral, revealing what believers should do; and the mystical or anagogical, showing the heavenly life in which, for Christians, things will end.
Can you explain that in more depth, please?
When talking about the Bible being inspired, the article says, “All scripture is witness to God. given by divinely illuminated human writers, and all Scripture is God witnessing to himself in and through their words,” (Pg. 2567).
What does it mean when it says “… all scripture is God witnessing to himself…”? It’s confusing me.
The article also makes mention of several dozen authors in the Bible. How did these people know that they were supposed to write everything down and how did it all end up in the Bible we use today? What was the criteria for compiling all the books?
Also, pertaining to our discussion yesterday about skipping the genealogies: wouldn’t you agree that they would indeed be helpful, but only if one had time to research and discover who the people were? Thus, in our limited class/study time, wouldn’t it prove unhelpful and simply a really really dry read? Just wondering.
Ok I’m done.
When it walks about the bible being inspired, and a direct self revelation from god, how is it possible then, that the writers of the ot knew exactly which stories, down to exact details when they weren’t even alive when some has happened…sorry for the runon…basically my question is, “when it says inspired, does that mean god audibly told them what to write? How did the specific stories get into the bible? Were they passed down as oral tradition or what? And more or less, could you define “inspired” in a bit more depth?”
When the bible was written, did the authors know that what they were writing would bring so much debate? Did they know that it would take scholarly commentaries, Bible dictionary, and a encyclopedia to interpret? Why do we interpret the same scripture 3 or 4 different ways? How can we know which one is truly the right interpretation?
1)Throughout the “Interpreting the Bible: A Historical Overview” section, allegorical interpretation is consistantly dismissed as a misstep committed by the church teachers. Is this true that any figurative interpretation of the Bible leads to masking of Christ and His intentions? Are there any instances (e.g., specific genres or passages) in the Bible where God intended for us to interpret allegorically rather than literally?
2)In the same section, the word “historical” is usually attatched to “literal interpretation.” What does this mean in the sense of interpreting (e.g., with books in historical order, with the historical times in mind, etc.)?
Thank you very much, Paige V.
On page 8, it says “…all Scripture is witnessing to God himself in and through their words.” Do they mean it’s witnessing TO God? Does it mean that it is witnessing about God? Can you explain this a little better please?
on page 6 under the enlightenment heading it talks to about the enlightenment movement and how they rejected biblical doctrine. it also states that the enlightenment thinkers thought that the bible was an untrustworthy book created by churchmen to keep minds under the threat of punishment.
how did the elightenment thinkers come to this conclusion, and what led to thinking this?
When it comes to interpreting the Bible, what passages apply today versus those that were cultural for the times they lived in? For example 1 Corinthians chapter 11 says that a women should not pray or prophesy unless her head is covered, is that still true today?
1.On page 9 man’s anger is contrasted with God’s anger. What exactly does God’s anger look like since He is free from error and sin?
2. What did the Holy Spirit’s role look like in the O.T.?
3. Also, during the Enlightenment period what did churches look like? Were less people going? Other churches being formed?
Through the centuries, there have been many different methods to interpreting the Bible. Who decide what methods were correct and incorrect? How did they decide this and how did we get the method we have today? Is it a combination of different methods?
ok, so this may be a dumb question…but on page 20 of the hand out version it talks about Paul and Timothy and Paul told Timothy “read the Word; preach the Word!” my question is did timothy literally read it and preach it because the Holy Spirit lead him and teaching was one of his spiritual gifts or did he study and interpret the Word and like plan a sermon?
I also have a few questions from Genesis reading: (I hope I’m not being too nit picky)
1. Gen. 8:20 says that Noah sacrificed some clean animals and birds as a burnt offering…my question is since they like just came off the boat and there are only 2 of each animal wouldn’t taking one to sacrifice like eliminate that species?
2. Gen. 11:7&8…why does the tense of the Lord sometimes change? verse 7 says “let us” then verse 8 says “so the Lord”
3. Gen. 11:8 says “the Lord scattered then all over the earth” did people literally transport to places? Because if they all just walked somewhere there would never be any inhabitants in the Americas
4. Throughout Genesis and the Bible God just talks to someone…was that like Noah was doing the dishes and this loud voice talked to him? Like when you read you kind of read over it like duh the Lord is just chit chatting with this guy…but when you think about it that is crazy! To have the creator of the world speak to you…so I was just wondering how that really looked
sorry for this extremely long post of odd question ha
On page 9 it talks about how the Trinity is aparent in the New Testament but not the Old Testament. It also talks about how readers are able to read the Trinity back into the Old Testament. Was the Trinity aparent to the people of the Old Testament (the people that lived during this time) or was God the only part they recognized?
since all scripture is God breathed and should unify the church.yet all the different interpretations of the bible have cuased schisms in the church at various times in history.
Why has God not made all those who attempt to interpret the Bible come to the proper conclusion?
It seems like a lot of the information in this packet could be extremely useful to anyone who wants to glean as much as they can from the Bible. I’ve certainly never heard most of this outside of more rigorous bible classes at school. So my question is why do you think pastors chose to keep this from the average public? It seems like most choose to focus their sermons on solely us and how we need to change instead of showing us an aspect of God and how that alone has implications for us.
and the cultural stuff too. The text really shows an interesting side to the story of Abraham and the events occurring during the various kingships. My pastors have always chosen to skip most of the OT altogether and the rare occassions where they do go through a section the cultural events are skipped.
Sorry about all the posts, but one more. Why do you think the OT is neglected in church so often if it is focused so much on coming to know God more fully. It seems that there should be an equal amount of both the NT and the OT. What do you think the proper ratio would be?
on page 9 it talks about how the Bible’s God-language and that we must know that he is infinite and flawless so we must consider this when words like ‘father’ are used for Him. Even though i know that we’re supposed to look at him as the perfect father, why doesn’t he just have comparison that is more fitted for a perfect and flawless God? why even make the comparison to fathers who are far from perfect.
Could you start recording your classes so I can hear the answers to these questions?
I’m between computers at the moment, but I’ll see what I can do.
Ok so quick question on the Reserved Reading writing things…do I need to be all formal when I am writing or can I say things like this just slapped me in the face pertaining to something it says? Oh and this is just like responce right, like this stuck out to me and why and how it can change my outlook?
What in the world are you talking about?
How is our understanding of the Bible affected by a literal vs. allegorical interpretation of the bible? (If you would be able to go more in depth than the basic examples the reading provided for us.)
On page 12 they speak about the Bible as literature and the many types of art forms that are in it. My question is whether it is the authors (Moses, David, John, Etc.)showign their own personal form of artistic writing through the writing or is it The Author (God) writing in his own artistic forms through each of the writers of the bible? What about that?? Huh? Huh? Huh?
On page 15 it talks about part of communion as being prayer. It then says prayer is us speaking to God the Father, on the basis of Christ’s work, by the help of the Spirit. When I pray I usually don’t differentiate to whom I’m praying to other than God. I’ve never really thought of just praying to God the Father alone. So I was wondering if you agreed that God the Father is the one who we are addressing in our prayers or if we are able to pray to any in the Godhead?
The Medievalists developed a fourfold approach to interpreting the bible: the literal, showing what God did; the allegorical, showing what at surface level God hid; the moral, revealing what believers should do; and the mystical or anagogical, showing the heavenly life in which, for Christians, things will end.
Can you explain that in more depth, please?
When talking about the Bible being inspired, the article says, “All scripture is witness to God. given by divinely illuminated human writers, and all Scripture is God witnessing to himself in and through their words,” (Pg. 2567).
What does it mean when it says “… all scripture is God witnessing to himself…”? It’s confusing me.
The article also makes mention of several dozen authors in the Bible. How did these people know that they were supposed to write everything down and how did it all end up in the Bible we use today? What was the criteria for compiling all the books?
Also, pertaining to our discussion yesterday about skipping the genealogies: wouldn’t you agree that they would indeed be helpful, but only if one had time to research and discover who the people were? Thus, in our limited class/study time, wouldn’t it prove unhelpful and simply a really really dry read? Just wondering.
Ok I’m done.
When it walks about the bible being inspired, and a direct self revelation from god, how is it possible then, that the writers of the ot knew exactly which stories, down to exact details when they weren’t even alive when some has happened…sorry for the runon…basically my question is, “when it says inspired, does that mean god audibly told them what to write? How did the specific stories get into the bible? Were they passed down as oral tradition or what? And more or less, could you define “inspired” in a bit more depth?”
When the bible was written, did the authors know that what they were writing would bring so much debate? Did they know that it would take scholarly commentaries, Bible dictionary, and a encyclopedia to interpret? Why do we interpret the same scripture 3 or 4 different ways? How can we know which one is truly the right interpretation?
1)Throughout the “Interpreting the Bible: A Historical Overview” section, allegorical interpretation is consistantly dismissed as a misstep committed by the church teachers. Is this true that any figurative interpretation of the Bible leads to masking of Christ and His intentions? Are there any instances (e.g., specific genres or passages) in the Bible where God intended for us to interpret allegorically rather than literally?
2)In the same section, the word “historical” is usually attatched to “literal interpretation.” What does this mean in the sense of interpreting (e.g., with books in historical order, with the historical times in mind, etc.)?
Thank you very much, Paige V.
On page 8, it says “…all Scripture is witnessing to God himself in and through their words.” Do they mean it’s witnessing TO God? Does it mean that it is witnessing about God? Can you explain this a little better please?
on page 6 under the enlightenment heading it talks to about the enlightenment movement and how they rejected biblical doctrine. it also states that the enlightenment thinkers thought that the bible was an untrustworthy book created by churchmen to keep minds under the threat of punishment.
how did the elightenment thinkers come to this conclusion, and what led to thinking this?
When it comes to interpreting the Bible, what passages apply today versus those that were cultural for the times they lived in? For example 1 Corinthians chapter 11 says that a women should not pray or prophesy unless her head is covered, is that still true today?
1.On page 9 man’s anger is contrasted with God’s anger. What exactly does God’s anger look like since He is free from error and sin?
2. What did the Holy Spirit’s role look like in the O.T.?
3. Also, during the Enlightenment period what did churches look like? Were less people going? Other churches being formed?
Through the centuries, there have been many different methods to interpreting the Bible. Who decide what methods were correct and incorrect? How did they decide this and how did we get the method we have today? Is it a combination of different methods?
ok, so this may be a dumb question…but on page 20 of the hand out version it talks about Paul and Timothy and Paul told Timothy “read the Word; preach the Word!” my question is did timothy literally read it and preach it because the Holy Spirit lead him and teaching was one of his spiritual gifts or did he study and interpret the Word and like plan a sermon?
I also have a few questions from Genesis reading: (I hope I’m not being too nit picky)
1. Gen. 8:20 says that Noah sacrificed some clean animals and birds as a burnt offering…my question is since they like just came off the boat and there are only 2 of each animal wouldn’t taking one to sacrifice like eliminate that species?
2. Gen. 11:7&8…why does the tense of the Lord sometimes change? verse 7 says “let us” then verse 8 says “so the Lord”
3. Gen. 11:8 says “the Lord scattered then all over the earth” did people literally transport to places? Because if they all just walked somewhere there would never be any inhabitants in the Americas
4. Throughout Genesis and the Bible God just talks to someone…was that like Noah was doing the dishes and this loud voice talked to him? Like when you read you kind of read over it like duh the Lord is just chit chatting with this guy…but when you think about it that is crazy! To have the creator of the world speak to you…so I was just wondering how that really looked
sorry for this extremely long post of odd question ha
On page 9 it talks about how the Trinity is aparent in the New Testament but not the Old Testament. It also talks about how readers are able to read the Trinity back into the Old Testament. Was the Trinity aparent to the people of the Old Testament (the people that lived during this time) or was God the only part they recognized?
since all scripture is God breathed and should unify the church.yet all the different interpretations of the bible have cuased schisms in the church at various times in history.
Why has God not made all those who attempt to interpret the Bible come to the proper conclusion?
It seems like a lot of the information in this packet could be extremely useful to anyone who wants to glean as much as they can from the Bible. I’ve certainly never heard most of this outside of more rigorous bible classes at school. So my question is why do you think pastors chose to keep this from the average public? It seems like most choose to focus their sermons on solely us and how we need to change instead of showing us an aspect of God and how that alone has implications for us.
and the cultural stuff too. The text really shows an interesting side to the story of Abraham and the events occurring during the various kingships. My pastors have always chosen to skip most of the OT altogether and the rare occassions where they do go through a section the cultural events are skipped.
Sorry about all the posts, but one more. Why do you think the OT is neglected in church so often if it is focused so much on coming to know God more fully. It seems that there should be an equal amount of both the NT and the OT. What do you think the proper ratio would be?
on page 9 it talks about how the Bible’s God-language and that we must know that he is infinite and flawless so we must consider this when words like ‘father’ are used for Him. Even though i know that we’re supposed to look at him as the perfect father, why doesn’t he just have comparison that is more fitted for a perfect and flawless God? why even make the comparison to fathers who are far from perfect.
Could you start recording your classes so I can hear the answers to these questions?
I’m between computers at the moment, but I’ll see what I can do.
Ok so quick question on the Reserved Reading writing things…do I need to be all formal when I am writing or can I say things like this just slapped me in the face pertaining to something it says? Oh and this is just like responce right, like this stuck out to me and why and how it can change my outlook?