I've heard more than one Christian say that, in order to understand
the Bible, we need to ask the author of the book----God----what he
meant. I find that sort of attitude to be arrogant, to tell you the
truth, and I really don't give a rip if Christians are cloaking it in
humility. As far as I'm concerned, it's false humility.
Here
scholars are, struggling with what the text means----they wrestle, they
debate, and they cope with ambiguity, sometimes coming up with answers,
and often concluding that we don't know 100 per cent what the text
means. And some Christians come along and dogmatically proclaim that
some subjective impression that they have about what the text means is
authoritative because it is from God. What so many religionists fail to
recognize is that they themselves are filtering the text through their
own subjective lens----that they are prioritizing some things in the
text over other things, and that they are reading the Bible in light of a
larger theology, as they subordinate to that larger theology (often
awkwardly) the texts that don't quite fit it.
So do I dismiss the
notion that the Holy Spirit can guide people as they read the Bible? I
have a hard time doing that, notwithstanding the things that I said
above. There have been times when I have seen Christians force the
Bible into their own theology and call that God's illumination of the
Scriptures. But there have been other times when Christians have found
something profound and applicable in the Bible, and their insight
appears to be faithful (or at least consistent with) what the text
appears to be saying.
Moreover, can God use an interpretation of
the Scripture that is technically not correct? As I've gone through
Leviticus for my daily quiet time, I have come across different
homiletical applications of the rituals in that book. I don't know if
these applications are faithful to the Book of Leviticus itself----the
Book doesn't even tell us a lot of the time what a ritual in question
means. Some may even question whether we should be looking for deep
meaning in the rituals, since perhaps there are times when a priestly
school simply copied rituals from other ancient Near Eastern nations, or
maybe the rituals were just there and became part of custom
and people later sought significance in them. But, in my opinion, if a
homiletical interpretation can encourage a person to love God and
neighbor----to admire God's righteousness, love, and mercy, and to show
kindness to others----then the interpretation is good, whether it's
faithful to the text or not.
At the same time, I think it's also
important to be honest about the times that the text appears to violate
our moral and religious sensibilities----when the text does not appear
to present God as particularly righteous, loving, and merciful, and when
it seems to endorse behavior that is not especially kind. Where to go
from there, however, I am not entirely sure. And, to be honest, I doubt
that those who think that they're sure have answers that are adequate.