as promised... more on hermeneutics (woo-hoo!!)

I mentioned in a previous post about hermeneutics (hermeneutics means interpretation, in this case it's the interpretation of a text) that there can be two correct interpretations of Scripture. A good example of this is OT prophecies that are also prophecies of Jesus. One could reference Is. 7:14 in this case. Originally the child, Immanuel, was prophesied to help Ahaz, but its fullest meaning was that the child, Immanuel, would be Jesus Christ. So, scholars often comment upon how the NT takes the OT out of context, and that the NT "appropriates" the OT for its own purpose. I would suggest that if we believe that the human authors of Scripture were inspired by the Holy Spirit, i.e. God, then the human authors might be writing the biblical text for their contemporary situation. However, the Holy Spirit sees all of time - or if you believe in the "open" view of God then God knows all the probabilities of possible outcomes, which makes God the great oddsmaker - so the Holy Spirit can see all of time and use a text to speak to a contemporary situation, which the author is involved in, and a situation 1000 years later after the text was written. Moreover, we need to remember that there are two authors of Scripture, the first and most important author is GOD, the second and less significant author is the human author. Now how do we prevent people from interpreting Scripture in any manner that they desire? I'm glad you asked :) First and most important rule is, Scripture interprets Scripture. If a person derives an interpretation of Scripture from a passage in Revelation and this interpretation is inconsistent with a passage of Scripture in Psalms, then that person's interpretation is incorrect. Secondly, (these priciples are from St. Augustines De Doctrina Christina also referred to as On Christian Teaching or On Christian Doctrine) one cannot interpret Scripture contrary to the love of God or love of humans for God's sake. In other words, if a person interprets the Bible in such a way that one believes this passage of Scripture teaches us to hate other humans, then that interpretation is incorrect. So all interpretations must agree with the idea that we ought to love God, and love humans for God's sake. Third and last (but this will be the subject of another post because this will also be confusing) we cannot interpret a passage of the Bible in which the interpretation would be contrary to any of the creeds. Now I realize that there are many creeds out there and people will object to my position and label it "papist" but I am going to stick to my guns. I only hold to the four creeds in which the universal catholic (not "Roman Catholic") church agreed to. As soon as the Latin/Greek (or east/west) church split occurred, all further creeds became null. Why's this? Because true biblical interpretation occurs within the community of believers. We no longer have a true community of believers that are united among the universal church, so that any creeds (which I really believe are hermeneutical guides) that are produced by the churches are not as significant as the creeds which were produced when the church was united.

I will probably need to explain more about my position on the creeds later, because right now, all of my readers are thinking that i am a papist. Well I will discuss more on my creedal position, later...