Basics of Bible Interpretation

So far so good.

Prove it. Simply saying, "It ain't so" is not a valid debate point. Deal with my point about the Greek word idios, "one's own."

Okay, wait. So you don't think prophecy has anything to do with the reading of Scripture? You are divorcing prophecy from Scripture? That doesn't make a lick of sense. Furthermore, principles of proper interpretation are the same, whether the discourse is spoken or written.

And simply because Peter throws false prophets into the mix in the context does not make his point about true prophecy invalid.

Then you missed my point about communication.

Sort of.

 

Oh, come now. I've dealt with these questions in dialogue with you before. The least you could do is acknowledge that I have an answer for each of them, and actually a simple answer.

1. "Soon"--preterists have exactly the same problem with "soon." Whenever you put the 2nd coming of Christ, it wasn't "soon" if it was even one year, and you can't prove it was.
2. "At hand" is the Greek eggus, and it can mean spatially as well as temporally.
3. "Quickly" is an adverb describing speed of action, not lapsed time.
4. "Generation" can easily be translated "race."

 

So we clash swords again!

You are quite correct to ask that question brother and your answer to your own question is also correct. Obviously, it will be the same Jesus.

The same Jesus who went up in a visible and bodily form so shall He return as I see no scripture anywhere that states that He shed the body in which He was crucified, made alive by the Spirit, resurrected and glorified.

AOBTW if He did shed that body what scripture describes the disposition thereof, that body in which He fellowshipped, and ate a meal with the disciples.

Luke 24
41 And while they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, he said unto them, Have ye here any meat?
42 And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish, and of an honeycomb.
43 And he took it, and did eat before them.

Yours is the rebuttal from silence not mine as the angel did not say He would return "in a different form".

Revelation 1:7 Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen.

He left from the Mount of Olives, He shall return "in like manner".

Zechariah 14
3 Then shall the LORD go forth, and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle.
4 And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south.
5 And ye shall flee to the valley of the mountains; for the valley of the mountains shall reach unto Azal: yea, ye shall flee, like as ye fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah: and the LORD my God shall come, and all the saints with thee.

We all assign meaning to prophetic words of Scripture - literal or allegorical or otherwise and bring forth a point of view and I respect your point of view Tom.

 

'Full Futurist', 'Full Blown Futurist', I luv it.

 

No matter our point of view something cherished by others must be abandoned.

But that doesn't mean we must abandon each other.

 

At least that view would not be heresy, as Full blown pret is!

 

We must not confuse inspiration and illumination. The doctrine of inspiration teaches us that God gave us truth in humanly recognizable form--language. Since it is "God-breathed," it is very mistaken to take the form of language that we have received and not interpret according to normal linguistic meaning. The fact that the Hebrew of the OT and the Greek of the NT were the language of the man in the street emphasizes the truism that the Bible must be read with normal interpretation.

As for the difference between the "simple believer" and the unbelieving scholar, it is the unbelieving scholar that tends to ignore the literal meaning, because the normal meaning is spiritual. Note that "spiritual" does not mean "mystical." When I tell someone that Jesus loves them and died for them, that is a spiritual statement (of and pertaining to the spirit), not a mystical statement, but it is easily understood in a literal way. This is where illumination comes in. The unbelieving scholar is inimical to the truths of salvation, so he will reject the gentle pleading of the Holy Spirit, illuminating the plainly understood Scripture

Again, let's go back to the "simple believer." Imagine you are in Uganda. You read Acts 1:11 to a new believer who only has a minimal education. How would he understand it? Would he jump to an allegorical interpretation that says Jesus came "spiritually" in 70 AD? Absolutely not. He would interpret with the normal, literal meaning and rejoice that Jesus is going to come again physically someday. Allegorical interpretation is a learned hermeneutic, but literal interpretation is a natural hermeneutic.

Just a note on the figures of speech in the Bible. It is, of course, foolish for the Catholics to take the Lord's Supper literally, since it is so obviously a figure of speech. Having said that, who interprets the figures of speech more normally, the literal interpreter or the allegorical? Check the commentaries. Allegorical interpreters do not often try to explain the figures of speech in the Bible, yet dispensationalists and other literalists do. Just check the commentaries. Allegorical interpretation can't handle the figures of speech well because they are already taking so much in a non-literal fashion that the lines blur.

 

The non saved person can do a decent job of translating the original language texts into English, but they really do not understand what it means!
I base that upon someone like a Thayer, who made a very good NT lexicon of his time, was well regarded, and yet believe that he was a Unitarian, so denied jesus was God, but still stated what the scriptures said in Greek about him.

 

My caveat would be that illumination helps us spiritually, but not necessarily mentally. A believer in the pew, as well as an academic, is still obliged to do the tough study to get the facts of history and grammar straight--thus, "grammatical-historical."

Point well made. As unbeliever Mark Twain supposedly said, "It ain't those parts of the Bible that I can't understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand."

That's why on the mission fields of the world as well as in the homeland, we need to train our church leaders in the grammar and history, especially.

Point well taken. I have often heard sermons by fundamental Baptist preachers that were really allegorical, though the preacher may not even have understood that. To stay true to the Word of God requires Spirit-led thought and meditation.

 

I've heard types being defined as an Old Testament picture of a New Testament truth. Without that tie to the NT, typology can (and has) run wild.
Another somewhat simplistic rule that I like for interpretation is, "When the plain sense of scripture makes common sense, seek no other sense."

 

One of the hardest things we have to do when coming toi the bible and understanding it is to not force our own sytem of theology unto it, as we need to have it be the source of authority, and not our theological system

 

First, I am typing on a Peruvian computer, my laptop having been stolen, and cannot find several of the punctuations. Hopefully my work-around is understandable.

Then do I not merit the same courtesy.? You post as if I had never answered the points you raised.

No, we do not have the the same problem. Not at all. That is what began to draw me to Preterism after decades of being a futurist myself. I just could not find satisfying answers to those troublesome verses. The passages that speak of the soon-coming Parousia were all, or almost all, written in the 60s – just a few short years before that event. That is why John spoke of it being the last hour.

Are you seriously going to argue that "soon" cannot be a few years --- and yet CAN be twenty centuries?

From your other post

No, I am not going to go down this rabbit-trail. Save the assignment for your students. There are certainly times when Greek is helpful, but many times it leads to the problem of not seeing the forest for the trees. Context is all-important here – what has Peter been writing about and will return to in the very next verse?

The true messengers of Gods Word contrasted to false prophets and teachers. – 2 Pet. 1.16 through 2 Pet. 2.1. Peter had earlier brought up this topic in 1 Pet. 1.10 through 12.1.

It is not about our interpretation of the Word of God. Certainly it has nothing to say about the issue of literalism vs. metaphorical interpretation.

I have no idea where you come up with these accusations. And your follow up is meaningless. Maybe you could be clearer on this. I get the feeling you are reading for ammunition, not understanding.

He did not throw it into the mix. He was continuing the topic he had already developed. And your second part – once again – is a head scratcher.

 

Don't have time for your whole post--it's VBS week here. But I'll mention a couple of crucial things.

Okay, so actually debating about the passage you have questioned is a rabbit trail. I guess I'm just supposed to accept your non-debated view. Nah, I think I'll claim victory instead. You have no answer for the Greek word idios.

I'm laughing. I'll ask you the same thing I asked Deacon then. It's not about interpretation even though the word is right there in the verse? Then what word would God and Peter have used other than "interpretation" to make it about interpretation?

 

Good grief. I guess I have to shout. Bad manners but you seem to require it. It is not about OUR interpretation. Yes, the word is in there. Never said it wasn't.

I suspect that your knee-jerk
reaction is negative toward what I write. I will let AT Robertson make the same point. Maybe you will agree with the two of us now.

From Robertson's Word Pictures:
"Peter is not here warning against personal interpretation of prophecy as the Roman Catholics say, but against the folly of upstart prophets with no impulse from God."

And, no, I am not going to bother with idios. It is not pertinent to the point I am raising.

Funny. To a surgeon every problem patient seems to call for surgery. To you, theological problems must always be solved by recourse to the Greek. Not so. Certainly not in this case.

 

In England the "humerus" (the upper arm bone) is called the "funny bone." Quite different from its homophone "humorous."

I'm not a full Preterist, but I as a partial Preterist, understand the many Scriptures that support Preterism in their plain sense.

Jesus literally said he would come before "this generation" passed. "This generation" is used repeatedly by the LORD Jesus in his condemnation of those who rejected him. In context, "race" is not valid. We often refer to "seeing" as meaning understanding, rather than seeing with our eyes. When the prophesied judgment destroyed the city, the rebels would see & understand the dreadful meaning of Jesus' prophecy.

 

No, not what he originally said. If he had he would have agreed with me earlier on this point.