Finding God in Scripture

Table of Contents

Preface

Abbreviations

Introduction

Chapter 1: A Historical Survey of Biblical Interpretation

Chapter 2: Getting Back on Track

Chapter 3: Establishing the Text

Chapter 4: How Did We Get Here?

Chapter 5: Part 1 (The Artistry of the Text Itself: Biblical Narrative)

Chapter 6: Part 2 (The Artistry of the Text Itself: Epistles)

Chapter 7: The Subject of Literary Genre

Chapter 8: The Question of Historical Context

Chapter 9: Jesus in Scripture

Chapter 10: The Spirit and Meaning

Conclusion

Bibliography

Finding God in Scripture

John A. Bertone

Finding God in Scripture

Copyright © 2016 John A. Bertone. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

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Preface

My wife takes an interest in my research and publications. Even though she is not formally trained in any of the subcategories that fall under the rubric of theology, she demonstrates more theological acumen than some of the theologues with whom I am associated. I have a friend who appears to take some pride in the fact that after one of his family members read his master’s thesis, that family member couldn’t understand it. My wife asked very practical questions, Can people understand what you are saying? How does this benefit them today? Then she gave me some wise advice, You should write a book that everybody could understand and one that would prove useful to them. Wives everywhere will be happy to know I am finally following my wife’s advice: I am writing this book for a general readership—for you, whether you are formally trained in theology and biblical studies or not. This book could also be used for first-year undergraduate courses in hermeneutics or theological interpretation of the Bible. The underlying premise of this book is that the disciplines of theology and biblical studies should be accessible to all. It is the privilege of all to understand the message of the Bible with respect to God’s character, the plans God has for the world, and how you too may have a part in this plan.

A wise professor once told me that any theological proposition that is impractical and detached from the experience of life is really no theology at all. My goal in this book is to suggest a course of inquiry for you that will make your study of the Bible and the theological propositions it conveys more enriching, then offer you some advice on how the message of the Bible can transform you personally. In my opinion, this is the ultimate goal of theology. The Bible communicates information about God, but more than this, that information becomes meaningful to readers, transforming our thoughts and will. This is not simply a book about how to interpret the Bible. It is also a book about how to appropriate its meaning for today. These are the reasons I have entitled this book Finding God in Scripture.

Special thanks go to family and friends who have read several of the chapters and offered helpful suggestions for improvement: my wife Beth Bertone, Patty Cianfagna, Bob Foley, Michael DelDuca, and Mary Flynn. Special thanks also go to the editors of Wipf and Stock. Thank you for accepting this manuscript for publication.

There is a story about a rabbi who always told his people that if they studied the Torah, it would put Scripture on their hearts. Someone asked, "Why on our hearts, and not in them? The rabbi answered, Only God can put Scripture inside. But reading sacred text can put it on your heart, and then when it breaks, the holy words will fall inside."¹ Whether through the difficult experiences of life or in your search for worth or meaning, my prayer is that the words that are on your heart when you read the Bible, God will now "put inside."

1. Lamott, Plan B,

74

.

Abbreviations

AB Anchor Bible

BDAG A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and other Early Christian Literature

NICNT New International Commentary on the New Testament

WBC Word Biblical Commentary

Introduction

Finding God in Scripture

Sometimes children say the funniest things. One day I happened to be in the living room of our home when I overheard a conversation between my three children and four neighborhood children who had came over to play. My wife had decided to put on her baker’s hat and make chocolate cookies for them. As they sat at our dining room table enjoying a fresh glass of milk with their cookies, a conversation about God began. I listened intently from the next room. The children were unaware of my presence. They shared their experiences of saying their prayers at bedtime, reading the Bible, and accepting God’s existence and his involvement in their personal lives. Suddenly, one young girl piped up to ask, What are you guys? One of the children said, I am Pentecostal. Another spoke up with I am Roman Catholic. Some of the others responded, We are Christian and Missionary Alliance. Then one young girl looked at her younger brother, nodded, and said with simplicity and sincerity, I think we’re Irish.

These children were comfortable speaking about God and their various experiences with him in their daily lives, even those who had no particular church affiliation. The other details about church or traditions were not a priority, as the rather humorous response by the young girl indicated. This made me think that perhaps as adults we sometimes lose sight of the main reason why the Bible was composed in the first place. Have we lost the simplicity of thinking God still speaks to us today through the Bible? What is the real intention of the Bible? Is it only to ask the historical questions of an ancient culture represented in biblical literature, or does the Bible offer more than this? There is a living God who wants to make himself known through the pages of the Bible, drawing us into his story and his plan.

My aim in this book is to suggest a method of studying the Bible with special attention to its description of God and how we can respond to its message today. I propose that this book will provide the necessary steps to interpret biblical texts in order to help us answer questions like What does this text teach us about God and his plans in the world? How are we to respond to biblical truths and history? In this study, I will suggest various ways of studying the Bible that give priority to uncovering its propositions about God so that those truths can transform and inspire us. Our use of the appropriate interpretive tools will allow us to better understand the Bible as God’s living word for today.

The Trend Towards Minimizing God in the Bible

No one would deny that the Bible makes claims about God—that is, it is a book about theology. The word theology comes from two Greek words: theos, meaning God, and logos, meaning word. At its very essence, the discipline of theology is considered a word about God. This includes an understanding of the nature of God, his plan for creation, and his desire to have a relationship with the humans he has created. Even though the Bible is undeniably theological in nature, there has been a concerted effort by some scholars to free it from its so-called theological captivity. It is thought that God-statements in the Bible can be too closely associated with a particular Christian confessional tradition (e.g., Roman Catholicism or Protestantism) or even more specifically, a set of church dogma. Consequently, some scholars today use methods of analysis that minimize or even disregard the Bible’s theological propositions.

One example of this type of analysis is researching the Bible from an exclusively historical perspective. The inference is that scholars can examine the Bible from a neutral historical perspective without considering its statements about God and the challenges they present for contemporary society. In some circles, biblical interpreters are increasingly viewing their roles as biblical historians—not theologians—and attempting to establish a demarcation between their work and the discipline of theology, their confessional traditions, and the church. Even if the Bible contains information, for example, about the nature of humanity, the meaning of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, and the future coming kingdom of God, these passages are interpreted historically as the worldview of an ancient civilization and are not brought to bear in the twenty-first century. It is thought that the theological information communicated in the Bible is neither relevant nor necessary in modern attempts to discover what the ancient document meant. Biblical historians endeavor to restore the meaning to its original context and read the text on its own terms—as a product of a particular time and place, culture, and society. In addition, biblical perspectives about God and people are considered to be a part of a historically developing religion. For example, the Bible reveals how the ancient Israelites and later Jesus and his followers tended to think about God, the world, and themselves. These are considered to be glimpses of ideas from individuals attempting to cope in an ancient civilization—ideas that were never meant to be adopted by people living in modern society.

There is no doubt that the books of the Bible have historical particularity and are to be examined using all the historical tools of inquiry. But is the Bible more than just words compiled by historical people? Even if we were to examine the Bible from an exclusively historical perspective, we would soon realize that it does not comply with our modern definition of history. The various books of the Bible share one common characteristic throughout: history is always interpreted theologically. Historical facts are never communicated just to teach us something about the history of ancient Israel or the early Christian movement. They are always used to convey something more. The events described in ancient Israel and the early Christian movement highlight the unfolding providential plan of God and draw the reader into this plan. Removing the Bible’s perspective of God compromises the nature of its understanding of history and undermines its message and intention.

The Bible is the story of God’s involvement with humanity, including individuals today. This is the reason why so many still believe the Bible is God’s Word speaking to all humankind, with eternal relevance in every age and in every culture. Our society is a part of this plan. If we approach the Bible with a view to performing an exclusively historical interpretation, then its message loses its contemporary relevance and becomes nothing more than a lifeless ancient document—a surviving relic memorializing the worldview of an ancient civilization.

Another method of analysis that minimizes the theological propositions in the Bible is one that attempts to modernize its message. Even though it is acknowledged that the Bible makes propositions about God, these propositions are often minimally valued under this interpretation. Instead, they are understood as the viewpoints of ancient civilizations that need to be translated for our contemporary society. This approach seeks to make the Bible’s message more digestible or politically correct today by making it less offensive. This is not simply the task of modernizing ancient biblical cultural practices; rather, it is a reinterpretation of the Bible’s propositions about God to the extent that they no longer posses the authoritative potential to challenge and transform today. For example, there are many who do not take seriously the Apostle Paul’s claim that humans are sinful and God provided Christ as a sacrifice in order to pay for humanity’s sins (Rom 3:23–25). Those with the mindset to make this less offensive think it is inappropriate today to conceive of God in this fashion: How could God, who is both loving and forgiving, allow his Son to endure such a brutal death in order to pay for our sins? This tendency is more than a rejection of various propositions about God in the Bible. It is an example of an underlying ideology whose motivation is to make the Bible’s understanding about God more digestible in the twenty-first century. But in the end, this trend toward modernizing the Bible compromises its most important propositions about God.

Surprisingly, even some sincere parishioners who think of the Bible as God’s Word employ a method of analysis that may misrepresent the Bible’s understanding of God. Because it is God’s Word, they understand the Bible only as a repository of propositions to be believed and imperatives to be obeyed, no questions asked: The Bible says it; therefore, believe it and do it. This method of interpretation does not consider the historical context in which the Bible’s propositions about God are stated, resulting in all kinds of error and misunderstanding. The Bible’s propositions are situated within the particular circumstances and events of biblical history. It was genuine history, which was understood in a theological manner. This means that in order for us to understand how God’s Word speaks to us today, we must first determine what it meant in its original context. For example, are there cultural and historical issues we need to probe before we can understand some of Paul’s statements? Consider the following: Every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head (1 Cor 11:5). Does this mean that Paul was recommending females of all ages worship with a head covering in church? Those who treat the Bible simply as a repository of imperatives to be obeyed without regard to their historical particularity would have to respond in the affirmative. However, we know that loose, flowing hair was the sign of a prostitute in the ancient city of Corinth in the first century. In this verse, Paul was addressing the cultural situation in Corinth. This was not an injunction advocating that females of all ages must wear veils in churches.

On one occasion after worship service, someone asked me, Do you think the identity of the beast in the book of Revelation is the future antichrist, like true Bible-believing Christians do, or is it a reference to a past historical Roman leader, like non-believing liberals tend to believe? Have you ever been put in a situation where you know there is no right answer? On the one hand, if I tried to position the book of Revelation in its historical context, I would be labeled a non-believing liberal. On the other hand, if I wanted to confess my Christian faith and express my trust in the Bible as God’s Word for today, I had to ignore all matters of biblical history. My response was to give an intentionally ambiguous nod acknowledging the question while expressing a non-committal position, then I made a tactful exit.

This brief conversation indicated this individual’s disregard for the historical context of the book of Revelation. Whether he realized it or not, his interpretation implied this book was composed exclusively for him living in a twenty-first century North American context. Even though he had a sincere desire to understand how the message of the Bible was God’s Word, he had lost sight of the fact that the book of Revelation was written many years ago in order to address the situation of persecuted followers of Christ in the first century.¹ His understanding of the message of the book of Revelation was pre-determined. He understood the message of Revelation solely as a repository of propositions about what God was doing today, without considering its original historical context.

Sometimes the propositions about God in the Bible are minimized under the auspices of the neutrality of the discipline of religion. But as we shall see, the disciplines of religion and theology are innately complementary. One cannot explore the nature of religion without addressing the notion of a superior being and how this being relates to humans. As I stated above, theology refers to the study of the nature of God and God’s relationship to both the universe and the people he has created. The concept of religion is strikingly similar to this definition. The Oxford English Dictionary defines religion as a recognition on the part of man [a person] of some higher unseen power as having control of his [or her] destiny, and as being entitled to obedience, reverence, and worship.² Among some people today, it is quite common to mistakenly define religion as adherence to a set of fundamental beliefs, rituals, and practices associated with the organized church. This negative understanding is usually the result of a person’s unfavorable experiences with his or her own church and with theology as well. However, the most basic meaning of religion has a positive connotation.

Religion is the study of how an individual’s personal convictions about God impacts and shapes one’s behavior towards God and one’s purpose in the world. The Oxford English Dictionary definition highlights the idea of convictions associated with a superior being (a recognition . . . of some higher unseen power). But more than this, religion seeks to understand how this superior being takes a personal interest in the individual’s life (control of his destiny). Consequently, the individual responds, in turn, through obedience, reverence, and worship. A tangible expression of this obedience encompasses submission to the plans this higher power may have for the whole world. Obedience and reverence can be misconstrued as a mechanical sense of duty, but when they are combined with worship, the relationship described is a personal one. Worship includes prayer, singing, and other practices intended to promote experiences of communion with God. To summarize, the starting point for a basic understanding of religion is to first inquire about one’s personal convictions about God, then determine how these beliefs impact one’s behavior towards God and one’s participation in God’s plans in the world. Even though God is not specifically mentioned in the above definition of religion, the higher unseen power can be equated with the Judeo-Christian conception of God. Thus, we can say theology is complementary to the Oxford English Dictionary’s definition of religion. One cannot truly comprehend the Judeo-Christian notion of religion without becoming aware of its theological foundation.

Many institutions of higher learning are deliberately moving towards an anthropological concentration in their religious studies departments. The focus of such an education does not take as its starting point an individual’s belief in God, as our definition of religion above suggests. Rather, the aim is to examine human nature to discover what provides meaning in life and, if necessary, determine why it requires a conception of a higher power. This restructuring means that theology becomes incidental to the more central anthropological investigation. For example, a professor may define the subject of religion in the following manner: The study of religion is the study of people, and the gods are interesting to us only insofar as they shed light on the people who conceptualize them . . . Religious study attempts to advance knowledge by advancing our understanding about why and how humans are religious . . . It does not reveal a god to us.³ This understanding of religion treats inquiries about belief in God or the gods as a negligible part of its discipline. Biblical scholars working in departments of religion at a number of universities take this approach. This understanding can be more accurately classified under the discipline of anthropology,⁴ diverging significantly from the more basic understanding of religion as we described above.

The God Who Wants to be Found in the Bible

Throughout the books of the Bible there is one common theme: the nature of God’s character is described in a personal and relatable manner to make God known to humans. The first words we read in Genesis are, "In the beginning God was the creator of heaven and earth" (Gen 1:1). The word used for God is Elohim, signifying that God is not some abstract philosophical concept but is someone who wants to communicate and make himself known tangibly through his creative acts—i.e., as the architect of heaven and earth.⁵ The idea of God wanting to be known is attested throughout the Bible. For example, the psalmist writes, The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge (Ps 19:1–2). In Romans 1:19–20, Paul adds, For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made.

The very nature of the Bible is theological, that is, it is primarily a word(s) about God and God’s intention to make himself known. Can we really study the Bible, even from a purely cultural or anthropological perspective, by extracting its theology, as if the theological propositions are inconsequential? The Bible’s anthropological and theological statements are inextricable, like the weft and weave of a tightly woven cloth. For example, we cannot understand the anthropological statement, There is no one who is righteous (Rom 3:10) without first comprehending the theological phrase, righteousness of God (Rom 3:21). For this biblical writer, God is inherently perfect, even in his relational obligations towards humans. This is why God’s character is described as righteous. In comparison, humans are inherently flawed, being controlled by the power of sin and no matter how hard they try to please God, they fail. The description of humans in this context can only truly be understood when we probe its theological complement.

There are many who believe there is life-transforming information about God in the Bible and this should never be said to be part of a passé and evolving religion, antiquated and superseded by contemporary ideas. The Bible conveys the power of the gospel anew to different times and circumstances. We admit there is a vast cultural difference between our time and the era of the Bible and those who hold the Bible as the Word of God must face a serious question: How can the authority of Scripture be posited in the face of its historically dated and culturally specific features? Below I will provide various guidelines that will help us answer this question.

There are timeless truths about the nature of God and his plans for the world that impinge upon our lives here in the present. One fact is sure. God is the central character in the biblical story who strives to make himself known to human beings, in the past as well as the present. Hebrews 1:1–2 reads, "In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, and in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe. These verses accentuate the continuity of God’s communication between the ancient Israelites and Jesus’ followers. This information is significant for us since we today are part of this continuum. I describe this as a continuum because twenty-first- century Christians are considered to be in the last days as well. The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews understood the last days" as the time between Jesus’ birth (Heb 1:5) and his Second Coming (Heb 9:28). This means that God continues to speak to us through the teachings and events associated with his Son, which are preserved in our New Testament. Even though this author did not know about the formation of the New Testament, he was in fact demonstrating the continuity of God’s communication from Old to New Testament, or put in other words, from the former covenant to the new covenant. The purpose of the Bible is to explain the association between God’s voice as it was heard in the past through the Old Testament (the former covenant) and the relationship this has with God’s voice as it is heard in the present through the New Testament (the new covenant).

The writings that preserved God’s communication through the ancient prophets of Israel were highly valued because these were considered part of the unfolding redemptive plan of God, anticipating the time of God’s Son in the new covenant era. This helps us clarify what our understanding of the Bible should be today. Our Bible should be read as a continuous whole, as God’s communication about his Son. The central aim of the Bible is to help us comprehend and acknowledge God’s plan through his Son, Jesus—a plan that also includes individuals in the twenty-first century.

Finding God in Scripture

As the title suggests, the main theme in this book is to find God in the Bible—that is, to determine the information it conveys about God. I will suggest a course of inquiry that will help us draw out the message the biblical authors conveyed by reconstructing the historical situation, culture, and society of the biblical world, then probing its literary conventions. I am hoping through this study that we can come to a better appreciation of the resources available to us in order to uncover the Bible’s propositions about God. But even more than this, my hope