About ten months ago I published this article, and since it goes with my previous post about people who believe that Bible can be made to say what you want it to say, I thought it would be timely to post it again:
The following is adapted and condensed from an article, "Rules of Biblical Interpretation," by Melody Drake.
The reason
why there are so many different churches and beliefs among Christians
today is because many do not follow sound rules for Biblical
interpretation. The Bible itself tells us
how to study the Bible, either directly, or indirectly through
observation. If all Christians followed
these rules, we would not have so many different Christian
churches and beliefs.
1. With
a good concordance, search out everything the Bible says on the subject
before coming to a conclusion. “For precept must be upon precept,
precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and
there a little.” (Isaiah 28:10) One can pull out a Bible text to prove
just about anything, but when one first looks at all the Bible texts on a
certain subject, then a pattern of truth will emerge.
2. All
conclusions should be based upon the weight of evidence and must make
logical sense. God created us with minds to think and He appeals to our
intellect. “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord.”
(Isaiah 1:18)
3. Each passage of Scripture should be carefully
considered in its context. What does the Bible say before and after the
passage? First we must consider the immediate passage, then the chapter,
book, other books by the same author, and finally other writers of the
Bible.
4. A literal interpretation of the Bible should be given
unless the context clearly shows that the verses under consideration are
symbolic. When the interpretation is symbolic, the Bible will tell us
the meaning of the symbol either in that passage or elsewhere. The Bible
must always interpret itself.
5. One text of the Bible must not
undo another text. The Bible never conflicts with itself. Sometimes Bible texts, at first glance, can appear to contradict
with other texts, but upon a deeper study, the contradiction will
disappear. For instance, one can find Bible texts that appear to support
works in order to obtain salvation. Elsewhere, the Bible states that
faith obtains salvation. On the surface these texts appear to be
contradicting each other, but upon deeper study one finds that works and
faith are the flip sides of the same coin. Without one the other does
not exist. Sometimes the Bible will give us a harmonizing text and
sometimes it will not, leaving us to do the harmonizing. Here is a
harmonizing text. “Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have
works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my
faith by my works.” (James 2:18)
6. All words should be
accurately defined and understood. A good dictionary and concordance
will aid in this. Since, over time, language changes, sometimes we have
to search a word through a prophet’s writings to see how they define
that word so we can correctly understand what they are saying.
7.
We cannot conclude more or less than the evidence allows. “Ye shall not
add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought
from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I
command you.” (Deuteronomy 4:2) “If any man shall add unto these things,
God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book. And
if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy,
God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the
holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.”
(Revelation 22:18-19) These are serious words not to be taken lightly.
8. Consider the words of the text in the original languages. We do not
need to be scholars studying Greek and Hebrew in order to do this. Using
Strong’s Concordance one can easily find the original meaning of a
word. As in English, some words in Greek and Hebrew have multiple
meanings. Sometimes a contradiction may appear because the wrong
definition of the word was used. However, by carefully considering all
texts on a subject, one can determine the correct definition. For easy access to Strong's, use Blue Letter Bible with the Strong's numbers (click on Strong's box at the top of your KJV Bible text).
9. Each prophecy in the Bible has a beginning and ending
point in time, and the elements within this prophecy occur in
chronological order. This rule is not for conditional prophecy in the
Bible but only for prophecy which has definite time frames. Daniel
chapter 2 gives us a model. In this chapter the head of the image, which
represents Babylon, comes before the chest, which represents
Medo-Persia, which comes before the belly, which represents Greece, etc.
10. When God sets up a pattern, He never breaks this pattern. At
times the Bible clearly sets out the beginning of a pattern. By
following this pattern one can then determine the rest of the pattern
and discover wonderful truths. For example, here is a pattern: three,
six, nine. Once we see this pattern the next number is easy to
determine. Our Heavenly Father is a God of logic and order.
11.
Pray that the Holy Spirit will guide your mind before beginning to study
because without the Holy Spirit one cannot obtain truth. “But the
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are
foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are
spiritually discerned.” (1 Corinthians 2:14)
---
Other
writings need to come under the same scrutiny. Do they align with the
Bible? New truth doesn't erase old truth. New understandings build on
old understandings, and this is good, as long as the old understandings
are correct. When the original understandings are not scriptural, or off
just a little bit, the newer understandings go farther astray.
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