Hermenuetical Methods of Complete Absurdity (CH2PT2)

I think the last chapter at least confirmed that the Bible is not an easy book to read. Thus, we ought to be skeptical of the literalist claim, simply from that, but admittedly it is not defeated. What I want to consider now are some of the absurdities that have come from literalism when it comes to interpreting the Bible. To make it clear, what I hinted at in the previous section is that the literalist is bound to manufacture extra-biblical narratives that are destined to compete with the Bible as itself in an authoritative capacity. I think this tendency can be seen historically and theologically. In the end, what progressive fundamentalism offers is truly no different then any other of the manifestations of fundamentalism in the past.

The first hermenuetical absurdity is dispensationalism. Fundamentalists who studied the Bible during the Enlightenment faced a new challenge. Their Bible was being studied by those who did not subscribe to the same beliefs a they did, and their findings were gaining prominent appeal. A cursory view of the Bible reveals clear discrepancies that seem troubling to take in. We see a God in the first five books of the Bible causing plagues and earthquakes to swallow people up. We see him acting so harshly toward Moses, and yet he has no problem letting David be King after he killed Uriah. Moses cannot enter the Promise Land for a minor offense, but David is given a mere slap on the hand from Nathan for a very major offense. That is just but a mere example, there are so many of these that it becomes almost impossible to reconcile them all in a literal fashion. In the Prophets sin is said to be accounted for individually, but in the Torah sin is accounted for in one's family. Thus, we carry with us the sin of our parents as opposed to simply carrying with us our own sin. How can this be reconciled? Plus, we have the biggest discrepancy of all time in the Old Testament to the New Testament. How can we account for the fact that the Old Testament is part of the Christian canon and hold that God inspired the authors with correct meaning, if in fact the authors of the Old Testament had it wrong the whole time. Even in the New Testament we see precursors to the dispensationalist mentality, by calling the Law and the Scriptures (Old Testament) as a foreshadow of what would come about in the New Testament. But this idea is not explicit enough or clear enough to form an entire hermenuetical system out of it.

Dispensationalism is its own independent system that is imposed on the Biblical narrative to give it coherency under a literal paradigm. Basically, the system of dispensations works according to the various covenants God makes with man. Each covenant changes how God interacts with man. Thus, under one dispensation God might seem more harsh and violent, whereas in another God is more kind and forgiving. Dispensationalism reduces covenant thinking into contractual obligations which is a very attractive mindset for the fundamentalist who is predominately a legalist. God expects man to act a certain way according to the covenant and his reactions are based on that covenant when man breaks it. It is a simple cause and effect. Thus, God has always been the same give and take deity. He has always worked according to his preset plan of covenant. God is an exacting and precise God who outlines his expectations and makes clear the consequences, and when there is a violation it is not God who is acting of his own accord. It is simply a result of the broken covenant.

Dispensationalism has pretty much fizzled out since the arrival of a more modern and progressive fundamentalism, and rightly so. Even among Evangelicals the idea of an exacting and obliged deity who Himself is controlled by the dictum of a contract was too much to bear theologically. Critical analysis of the Bible has revealed that the various "images" of God can be accounted for culturally, historically, and environmentally, and in their context are not as harsh or as exacting as may seem. In fact, many fundamentalists have discovered that these cultural conditions demonstrate that God has always been a God of love and justice for the poor and disenfranchised in the Biblical narrative. I recognize this as a good direction for fundamentalists to be going, but unfortunately. I do not think it is sufficient.

Even though dispensationalism has for the most part been abandoned what is common among most fundamentalists today is the absurdity of harmonizing. Harmonization began at the earliest stages of Christianity. Early Christians simply could not understand why four Gospels were held to as sacred when the information contained in them could not be reconciled into a unified story. Believe it or not, but people who existed thousands of years ago were just as smart as we are today. Our technical knowledge has grown indubitably, but our intelligence is roughly the same. The things that were an intellectual burden thousands of years ago are still intellectual burdens today. Tatian wrote the first Gospel harmony that is dated around 160 AD, and it pertains the same fundamental flaw that all literalists struggle with throughout the ages.

Let's consider the women's reaction to Jesus' resurrection in Mark compared to the women's reaction in every other Gospel. In Mark the women are terrified and go home in fear, never telling anyone (Mark 16:8). Now look at their reaction in Matthew, probably the next Gospel to be written after Mark, the women are still afraid, but an angel tells them not to be afraid, so, in spite, of their fear they hurry to tell the disciples (Mat. 28:8). In Luke the women aren't afraid. They are pious. When they see the angel they bow to him. Then they go and tell all the disciples (Luke 24:9). John completely re-writes the story. There is no angel, or announcer. There is no group of women, just Mary Magdalene. There is no telling of Jesus' resurrection from the women to the disciples. Mary sees that Jesus' tomb has been robbed (so she thinks) and tells Peter. Peter is the one who discovers that Jesus has been raised (John 20:2).

Harmonization is the hermeneutical method to construct a story line where all these events could happen. Since, John seems the best place to start it is conceivable to think that Mary went to the tomb before all the other women and first thought the tomb was robbed. She went to tell Peter, never realizing he was raised. Since Peter discovered the resurrection he was never able to confirm it with Mary. So Mary went to the other women to tell them the bad news, but they were already on their way, and she figured that they should all see for themselves. Besides, maybe Peter went into the tomb and found that nothing had happened at all. After all, all she saw was that the stone had been removed. So she goes with the rest of the women and lo and behold an angel is there to tell them that Jesus has been raised from the dead. This angel appeared like a man, which angels can do, but we all know that it was really an angel. Mary's first impression is changed, and she learns that Jesus had actually risen from the dead! But now she is wondering about Peter. What happened to him? Did he realize the same thing as they are now realizing, and "got taken care of" by the Romans? All the sudden this good news seemed frightening. Mary realized that Peter may have in fact gone to tell someone about Jesus resurrection and been killed for it. So the women did the reasonable thing. They fled and hid. They soon realized as Peter did when the cock crowed that their fear was causing them to betray their Lord. Once they regrouped they realized that they ought to check on the disciples to make sure that they were okay. Peter had been trying to do the same with the women. He figured he go tell Mary the good news since she was the one who told him to check the tomb, but when he got to her house she wasn't there. He went to the other women's houses just to be sure, but in the hustle he was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. By the time the women got to the disciples Peter was right behind them. He figured he should just tell someone! At first the disciples doubted what the women were saying. Since technically Peter came late into this conversation there is debate about whether or not all the disciples doubted. But one thing is for sure Peter went from there to show everyone the truth. He was so excited he ran, but one of the younger disciples outran him. And then from here this one story was neatly divided into four separate accounts that may seem conflicting, but in the end is harmonized.

Do you see the problem with harmonization? The Bible is not the Bible, but is a piecemeal to an actual Bible that we have to construct. Once this harmonization is achieved the meaning of the parts which construct the whole become irreversibly changed. When we read Mark, we do not read it for what Mark is saying or telling us about Jesus. We read it thinking that Mark is not telling us the whole story. We read Mark in a position of superiority over Mark. Mark no longer has authority for us. We have authority over Mark. The harmony becomes the authority, but in reality once this happens its no longer the Bible we care about, but the Bible that the Bible constructs for us. In this way the literalists to the atheists job by making the Bible obsolete for Christians today.

Harmonization is a natural response to the problem of literalism, but it has a fatal outcome. And one that was responded to even in the early stages of Christianity. Origen, who is considered as a theologian who solved the early problem biblical interpretation, taught that the grammatical interpretation of the Bible is inerrant, but that the meanings of the words were spiritual. Thus, the inconsistencies did not need resolving, because every person, thing, and event required a spiritual interpretation. Egypt was a symbol for worldly success and trusting in the strength of the world. Babylon was a symbol for the world as an enemy of God and faith, they were the pagan world. If two Gospel events were inconsistent it is only because each has a different spiritual meaning, and in this sense, there is no inconsistency at all.

And the final absurdity of the methods of literalism is what progressive fundamentalists are referring to as the intent of the author. Modern fundamentalists are becoming literary experts and this is a good thing, but more often then not it is simple confirmation bias. Academia is being used as staging ground to hide a much more profane agenda. The problem with this new development in fundamentalism is that when we look to literary categories as providing authoritative insight into scripture we are still inserting extra biblical narratives into our articles of faith. And here is why.

Science has many facets. But it is centered around the entire principle of experimentation and verifiable results. Progressive fundamentalists are influenced by science, just as everyone is today in our modern world, but the progressive fundamentalists are motivated to provide religious answers using scientific methods. One of the ways science is able to examine or inquire to un-observable phenomena is to create models. Cosmology is largely a model based area of science. There are very few experiments that can be done to prove what "kind" of universe exists. Given that we only have one universe we really only have competing models that correlate to the data we have collected. So models are constructs which are created in order to explain phenomena.

For instance, we know that when Paul wrote his letters he used common Roman letter writing forms. Understanding these forms can give us insights into Paul's writing and even possible meanings in the structure of his letters. But these understandings rely on a consistency between Paul's letters and Roman letter writing forms. This information does not come from Paul, nor does it come from the Bible. Nor is there a necessary claim for faith to hold that interpretations of inspired texts must correlate to literary criticisms. This claim only needs support when we seek to interpret such texts literally.

If we follow the reasoning of the author's intent as being the basis of correct meaning in the inspired texts then all believers would have to become scholars of history in order to faithfully read their scriptures, and while this has academic merit, it lacks spiritual integrity. The reality is that most believers will not accept the responsibility to independently research the historical underpinnings of what the author intended with their writing, and will instead rely on the research done by those who agree with the conclusions that they have already formed. Thus, Biblical interpretation will become a popularity contest. And a grab for power. Those with the most degrees, the highest positions in academia, and the most prolific list of published works will become the authorities on what God wants for His People. And while this may seem appealing it is a mere facade of true spirituality. No one should be responsible for mediating between us as individuals and God. Every Christian has access to the Bible, and is entitled to interpret it for themselves. This does not collapse the Bible to relativism, a responsible interpretation is still called for.

Is it responsible to say that God desires us to learn the correct interpretation of Scripture through what the author intended to write? While there are many insights to gain from the study of literary forms and criticisms a position of faith should only be concerned with what God has to say through the sacred text and there is no indication that knowledge of the authors intent leads to this.