A New Testament With The Same Old Story (CH4PTII-III)

It is now widely known that the New Testament misuses the Old Testament. The literal account that Jesus was simply following a script laid out for him in prophecy and foreshadowing is just about incomprehensible to anyone interested in a coherent and unified account. What this means is that we can either conclude that the writers of the New Testament were incompetent, they simply did realize that they were reading the Old Testament wrong. They were corrupt, they were intentionally twisting scripture to suit their needs at the time. Or they already believed as they were writing that literalism was not the correct interpretation for understanding something that comes from God. They felt justified in symbolically reinterpreting the prophets to align with what they rightly believed "came from God". 

Here are a few examples that are pretty conclusive. Isaiah 7:14 says how a virgin will be with child. Christians love to cite this verse because it proves how Jesus' birth was prophetically foretold, but it is known that this claim cannot be made. Here's why.

In Hebrew there is a specific word for "virgin". The word is, bethoolaw, and it is translated to virgin almost

fifty times in the Old Testament. The word in Isaiah 7:14 is not bethoolaw. It is almah which could mean virgin, but is only translated that way exclusively for the Isaiah passage. In every other instance of the Bible the word is translated as maiden, or girl. So why does Isaiah say "virgin"? A few hundred years before the New Testament was written the Old Testament was translated from Hebrew to Greek. The Greek word "parthenos" was inserted into the Isaiah passage. This word means virgin, but it is more accurately translated as a girl who qualifies for marriage. Thus, this word was put into the Isaiah narrative because of the inherent tension that would be seen as God's presence existing with a girl who's innocence has been lost, or possibly violated.

The idea of Immaculate Conception was completely contrived when it comes to what the Old Testament says. Even if Jesus was born of a virgin, this passage in the Old Testament is not a prophetic prediction of it.

There's more. By just examining the portion of Matthew which refers to the birth of Jesus we can see more examples like the Isaiah 7:14 one. In Matthew 2:6 the author quotes Micah 5:2 to show how the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. But the Messiah in Micah is not the Messiah Matthew writes about. It is generally accepted that even in the Old Testament there are various "messiahs" depicted that are not necessarily mutually exclusive, but are nonetheless unique to themselves. Micah depicts an avenger for Israel who will lead a successful military campaign to rid the land of its enemies. Was Jesus this military leader? No. Then why did Matthew use this verse?

In Matthew 2:18 Herod kills all the boys in Bethlehem, and the author uses a verse from Jeremiah 31:15 to show the prophetic connection between the two events, but we know that this allusion could not be literally predictive. In Jeremiah 31:15 it laments how Rachel is weeping for her children. This verse is referring to the lost children of the exile, not to a massacre that would occur hundreds of years later. Why, then, did Matthew use this verse?

Just the same, in Matthew 2:15 Joseph takes Jesus and Mary to Egypt to live in peace while Herod hunts for them. Once Herod dies they are able to return, and then the author makes an allusion to Hosea 11:1 to show how Jesus' life correlates to Old Testament prophecy. But there is no prediction in Hosea 11:1 of a messiah coming from Egypt. Israel is called "God's son" in this passage. It is an allegory to Israel's apostasy and God's faithfulness. Knowing this, why did Matthew use this verse?

Fundamentalists have come up with an interesting idea. It is called double prophecy. Double prophecy is just like it sounds it is one prophetic utterance which can be applied to two different scenarios. This enables the sense of literalism in scripture (which conforms to my previous examples of using symbolism to maintain literalism). But this is no different then dispensations, harmonies, or Oral Torah. It is the same inevitable outcome of trying to apply a literal understanding to the Word of God; extra-biblical tools must be developed to buffer or mediate the interpretation of scripture. At no point does any prophet claim that his "predictions" will come to pass twice! Such an idea undermines prophecy, instead of bolstering it. Imagine a prophet who's predictions will come to pass an infinite number of times? If we can increase the power of prophecy by multiplying the number of times it can be applied to certain events then it would make sense that the ultimate or best prophecy would be one that applies to everything, at all times, and in all circumstances. Thus, the difference between the best prophecy and no prophecy is indistinguishable. When we go down the road of multiplying our difficulties instead of simplifying them.

Clearly, the author of Matthew was not transcribing dual prophecy in the Old Testament. But if he was not reciting what was literal, then what was he doing? Why was he doing it? I highly doubt that the author of Matthew believed that Jesus was simply following a script that was laid out for him in Old Testament prophecy. Considering that every prophecy was misinterpreted in Matthew to apply to Jesus we can either conclude that the author of Matthew was twisting scripture or that the early view of scripture was so different from literalism that it allowed for a certain elasticity to exist in how it was applied.

But if we allow for this elasticity to exist in our understanding of the Bible and how it was formed then we have no certainty that it was actually faithfully compiled. If the author of Matthew was not recording literal prophecies that applied to Jesus then the distinction between Matthew twisting scripture and Matthew reinterpreting scripture cannot be found in the text itself. Thus the problem of the Bible does not seem to be solved in the Bible, or in the formation of the Bible.

Literalism offers no key, or any help in solving its own problems. It only serves to multiply difficulties in order to preserve and maintain its existence. Such a phenomenon is expected to exist for any system seeking to gain power and control, which is not a negative or blameworthy attribute. All thriving organisms must survive through the acquisition of power and control. Thus, it is not unexpected for a religious system to want to promote and adhere to a literalism within its dogmatic ranks. So while literalism has an advantage on an organizational level, the problems with literalism cannot be avoided on a personal level. The intellectual merits of literalism are dismal, and it's service is to increase cognitive dissonance in its adherents rather then eliminate it.

The fact that ancient believers accommodated to their environment to protect their literalism indicates that their belief in literalism was simply taken for granted. They were not being literal for the sake of being literal. If they were they would not need to make accommodations. All such accommodations would be seen as a compromise. But they worked through their literalism as though it were something that could change at any moment.  If our religious faith was the result of the literal events described in our Bible then it would be impossible to hold to such a faith in good conscience. The Bible in its Jewish heritage, in its New Testament formation, and it its canonization stands opposed to literalism in all its stages. But yet the phenomenon persists.

III - Lonely Scriptura

Christianity has taken many forms. It is an ever changing system. How can such a dynamic system maintain itself under a uniform dogma. The Bible has endured through the ages as the normative standard for Christian belief. This much is true. So if we are unable to see Christian fundamentalism as essential to the Christian faith, then perhaps it is simply one of the adaptable forms to which Christianity has taken in its environment through the ages. This seems counter-intuitive since what would appear to be the most fundamental to Christianity would be the essence of fundamentalism, but try as we might and this conclusion cannot be backed.

Whether or not fundamentalism can tie its roots to the history and principles of the Christian faith is still to be seen. I think it has been well established how difficult that would be, but one thing is almost unanimously agreed upon by both fundamentalists and progressives and that is the pivotal significance of the Reformation.

Two things happened during the renaissance and Enlightenment that would forever change the face of Christianity and make it something that could never go back to the way it used to be. The first is the printing press and the second is the democratic system. The Reformation in many ways came to capitalize on both.

Only educated people used to be able to read the Bible, and among those only those in authority were permitted to do so. The Bible was a communal or tribal book. It existed for the betterment of the Christian faith, and that was it. It was not subject to criticism or debate. Its words were taught in a church, and its meaning derived from a uniform magesterium. A person could not hear a message in church feel uncomfortable about it and go do his own study in the Bible about it.

The Church, or to put more aptly, the authorities in the Church had no accountability, and this is not to say that this meant they were rotten or corrupt, but rather that no intellectual accountability existed for the Church as to what it was teaching or on how it was interpreting the Bible. The Church has always had some variety as to how interpreting the Bible played out. But there was always conformity to an established authority.

This all changed when one man began reading the Bible for what it actually said (supposedly). Whether or not we can ask the question if the Bible was ever meant to be read by individuals who had the right and desire to choose for themselves what the correct interpretation of Scripture was is pointless to consider. We cannot go back. What was once interpreted to be a liturgical book for a conclave of believers that submitted themselves to an established authority, was now and forever after going to be a book interpreted by individuals who would believe that no authority was established in itself.

If literalism is to be the correct interpretation of the Bible then it cannot be on the basis of why it was ever accepted in the past, before the Reformation. Literalism in a liturgical context served many ends that edified the church as a whole without any of them necessarily being the critical interpretation to edify an individuals intellect. The preservation of tradition, the communal narrative, or the solidarity of man were all reasons in a liturgical context to promote and represent literalism in a pre-critical society.

But as we have seen both literalism and symbolism can serve the needs of a corrupt power base. And this seems to have been the condition of things just before the Reformation. It cannot be considered a strength for the case of literalism that Martin Luther read the Bible and discovered the corruption of the Church. For Martin Luther was not a proponent of literalism when it came to Biblical interpretation. Luther picked and choose just as much as any other power system put in place of interpreting the Bible. He most certainly preferred the Pauline Epistles and in his own soteriology ignored many passages in the Gospels, like Jesus' teachings on works, and wanted to remove the book of James from the New Testament, all together.

Thus, the Reformation was consistent with the age before it that a theological principle was required to guide biblical interpretation. It was not a movement to put literalism back in its rightful place, it was a revival of what the correct theological orientation was for a Christians life. It was a revitalization of Biblical thought and study, and it was an empowering vision that gave the individual Christian the ability to hear from God through his private reading of scripture. The last thing it was, was proof that literalism is the correct and authentic interpretation of the Bible.

In many ways the Reformation led to the near debasement of all religious and spiritual interpretations of the Bible through the establishment of liberal Protestantism. Sola Scriptura had a monumental impact on the Christian world, and it was not entirely considered what the fallout of this belief might bring about. Using the Bible as the only normative authority for Christian belief and practice is in many ways a good thing, but it is not without its side effects. In extremists circles sola scriptura has the effect of creating isolated and narrow minded communities. In academic circles sola scriptura removes the authority of the Bible from the Church and breeds an ideological distortion of the religious life. This is exactly what happened during the Enlightenment in Europe.

When Protestantism took root in Europe the academy took after the study of the Bible apart from any church authority, like Luther himself had done, and the layman became more easily drawn to literal extremism. This divide grew and became too disparate to reconcile. When this happened a clear tension occurred between the Church and the College. In 1860 a monumental work was written called "Essays and Reviews" which encapsulated the modern Biblical critique. In this work such things as miracles were rejected and revelation was seen in an evolutionary perspective. The work itself was very intriguing, but as you can imagine it flew in the face of what had become the common understanding of what Christianity represented. Over time this tension spread to America, and in the beginning of the twentieth century a series of some 90 essays were written in response to the spread of liberal Protestantism and higher criticism in Biblical interpretation. These volumes of essays were called, "The Fundamentals", and it is ground zero for fundamentalism as we know it today.

In these essays such ideas like evolution and socialism were deemed sinful and wrong. But what is most important to understand that despite it's claim in its namesake there was nothing "fundamental" about fundamentalism. The spirituality which has now taken root in American culture was nothing but a byproduct of religious development in the West. Their ideas and systems are just as contrived and invented as their liberal counter-parts. Thus, fundamentalism without liberal Protestantism is senseless. It is a reactionary belief system that only exists to ensure that another more "dangerous" system isn't allowed to exist.

This is one of the most important things to understand about Christian fundamentalism. Read very carefully these next few lines. Christian fundamentalism needs an opponent in order to exist. It did not arise in itself to exist in the landscape of faith. Spiritual men did not receive a revelation that fundamentalism is the right orientation of faith. In no religion did this ever happen. Fundamentalism only arose to protect or preserve that sense of faith that some in power felt was threatened. Without the threat, fundamentalism is not needed.

Consider what this might mean. Whether or not fundamentalism arose out of a genuine threat to the faith the reality is that as a collective organism fundamentalism now relies on the existence of threats in order to maintain its own survival. Whether or not the conditions which brought about fundamentalism were worthy of such a reaction the fact of its existence cannot be denied. If one's survival is only guaranteed through threats then such an organism will ensure that threats exist, even if they must be manufactured or contrived.

The problem with the "Solas" is that their arrangement sets ones up for ultimate disappointment, and for the existence of the liberal and conservative extremes on either side. Of the five solas four of them exist in the abstract. Sola fide, sole gratia, sola Christus, and sola Deo gloria are all abstract ideas that have no real concrete reality in the here and now. A person can affirm all these "solas" with ease, but sola scriptura is something we can measure, investigate, and even replace should another come along. The first four are theological propositions, but the fifth is a hermenuetical one. Sola scriptura is categorically different then the other solas, but it is treated as though it were not. In this sense the Bible is truly alone. But what happens in "sola scriptura" is rather the opposite of what is supposed to happen for an inspired text. Inspiration should move us to accept the authority that God gives His Church and it should move us to develop the needed theological ideas which underpin it, sola scripture taken concretely bypasses this altogether.

The Bible is an invitation to relate to God. It's exclusivity is not a tenet of faith, but rather a demonstration of its own inspired message. A Christian does not rely only the Bible because he must, by obligation of tradition, but because he could possibly think of no other book to relate to God with. When we reify the inspiration of the Bible, through sola scriptura, we turn God's invitation into a Law, and what was once a mode of relationship becomes a cause for estrangement. The Bible ends up all alone.