In another thread, LVKA offers the following argument for applying non-grammatical-historical interpretations to scripture, but not to other documents:
“The First Ecumenical Council does not need a typological or Christological interpretation: because it *IS* a Christological statement. And it doesn't need a spiritual or allegorical interpretation either: the Dogamtical statement that Jesus is God is intrinsically tied up with our Chr. spirituality: ‘If Christ is not God, then He cannot engod us either, since He does not then possess divinity by His proper nature, and we're pointlessly [not to mention heretically] baptised in the Name of a creature’ --> that's what St. Athanasius said in his defence of the faith against the Arians. ‘God became man so that man might become God’ -- there's no spiritually-superior statement to that. If not even the fact that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us isn't enough to boost us spiritually and make us more spiritual people, then nothing else will.”
Apparently, Nicaea and Athanasius are spiritual enough to be interpreted as we would interpret other historical sources. But the Bible isn’t spiritual enough. Does LVKA interpret grocery lists and newspaper articles allegorically? Or are they, too, more spiritual than the Bible? Or, if he’s going to claim that only religious documents have this standard applied to them, does he apply non-grammatical-historical interpretations to posts, articles, or books written by people whose theology he disagrees with? For example, does he interpret the posts of Roman Catholics and Calvinists allegorically? Or are even such theologically errant writings more spiritual than the Bible? Apparently, the Bible needs more spirituality added to it by means of non-grammatical-historical interpretations.
I wonder where people get the idea that Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox have too low a view of scripture. How could anybody get that impression?
Jason,
ReplyDeleteNo Christological statement (either from Scripture [the writings of the Apostles], or from Patristic literature [the writings of the Fathers]) can be made as reffering to something other than and/or superior to Christ Himself, "in Whom the Fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily" (Colossians 2:9). There is no (Gnostic) Pleroma ["plenitude" or "fulness"] that can out-trump that Plenitude or Fulness. Period.
(That was my point, and I'm sorry that You understood otherwise). :-(
Christ is the fulfilment of the Old Testament. He and no-one else.
John 5:39 Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.
Romans 15:4 For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope.
The same can be said about the New Testament Scriptures as well:
John 20:31 But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.
Christ Himself is not just our Teacher, but He -and He alone- is the very Exegesis, not only of the Bible, but of the Father Himself:
John 1:18 No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.
Where the KJV has "has declared", the Greek has "has exegeted". (source)
Christ (the Word) is the only proper lens through which and in which the Bible (the word) gains its proper, life-giving, edifying meaning: He alone and through Him alone is everything interpreted; He Himself is interepreted by no-one: (source)
Luke 24:27 And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.
The very last thing that the Scriptures need is even more spirituality than they already possess: the only problem is NOT to further obscure what's already hidden there either in shadow or in type or in pattern or in figure:
Hebrews 8:5 Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle: for, See, saith he, that thou make all things according to the pattern shewed to thee in the mount.
Exodus 25:40 And look that thou make them after their pattern, which was shewed thee in the mount.
Spirituality is "the fulness of Him that fills all in all" (Ephesians 1:23), and is nothing else but the godhuman life of the Godman Jesus Christ Himself.
To interpret Scripture by ANY OTHER means, or in ANY OTHER way that does NOT reflect Christ (through christological typology) or His Godlikeness (through spiritual allegory) means to distort the very meaning of Scripture itself. ANOTHER way of doing exegesis (other than the one shown by Christ Himself, and his Holy Apostles) is heretical at worse or poor at best (and I'm thinking here BOTH of the Talmudical literalism of the Jews that did not receive Christ ON ONE HAND ... and about the Gnostic delusional delirium ON THE OTHER).
[Don't get me wrong here: I'm not saying that Your method is somehow intrinsically wrong ... just that it befits more the clasroom [of history-classes or social-sciences-classes] than it does the Church's ambo or pulpit].
“John 1:18…Where the KJV has "has declared", the Greek has ‘has exegeted’. (source)”
ReplyDeleteYou’re committed a standard semantic fallacy by reading the specialized connotations of an English derivative back into the Greek.
“He alone and through Him alone is everything interpreted; He Himself is interepreted by no-one: (source).”
That’s pious nonsense. The NT writers constantly interpret the person and work of Christ.
“The very last thing that the Scriptures need is even more spirituality than they already possess: the only problem is NOT to further obscure what's already hidden there either in shadow or in type or in pattern or in figure: Hebrews 8:5.”
And what makes you think the author of Hebrews is interpreting the Pentateuch allegorically? God did reveal the blueprint to Moses. Coming from God, it came from heaven. A heavenly blueprint. Perfectly literal.
At a typological level, it foreshadows the NT antitype. But here we come up against the distinction between allegory and typology.
BTW, do you interpret Heb 8:5 literally or allegorically? If allegorically, then Christ is not the fulfillment of the OT—either here or elsewhere.
“To interpret Scripture by ANY OTHER means, or in ANY OTHER way that does NOT reflect Christ (through christological typology) or His Godlikeness (through spiritual allegory).”
The allegorical method doesn’t single out a Christocentric interpretation of the OT. Using the allegorical method, you could just as well have an Antichristocentric interpretation of the OT. The allegorical method doesn’t point in any particular direction.
“Luke 24:27…John 1:18…John 5:39…John 20:31…Romans 15:4…Ephesians 1:23…Colossians 2:9.”
Do you construe your prooftexts literally or allegorically?
“His Godlikeness (through spiritual allegory).”
You keep assuming, without benefit of argument, that grammatico-historical exegesis doesn’t yield an ethical meaning or practical application. What makes you think a literal statement can’t be practical or ethical?
If you apply the grammatico-historical method to an ethical genre (like Proverbs), it will yield an ethical sense.
LVKA said:
ReplyDelete“That was my point, and I'm sorry that You understood otherwise”
Then your point was poorly communicated and irrelevant, thus leaving the arguments you were responding to untouched.
You write:
“Christ is the fulfilment of the Old Testament. He and no-one else….The same can be said about the New Testament Scriptures as well”
You then go on to cite John 20:31, which has reference to the gospel of John, not the entire New Testament. And John 20:31 doesn’t just convey information about Christ. For example, it also discusses the means of attaining something (faith) and the object attained (eternal life).
I don’t deny that Christ is central to scripture, that He’s “the fulfillment of the Old Testament” in some sense, for example. But what does any of this have to do with applying non-grammatical-historical interpretations to scripture?
Christ can be central to scripture without being directly referred to by every word of scripture. We don’t need to come up with an allegory to see a reference to Christ in Paul’s shipwreck in the book of Acts or in every reference to the Holy Spirit, for example. Christ is relevant to Paul’s shipwreck (everything in life is relevant to Christ in some manner), but that fact doesn’t require a non-grammatical-historical method of interpretation. Similarly, the centrality of God the Father doesn’t require us to apply allegorical interpretations to some passages of scripture in order to find direct references to the Father everywhere.
Even if we were to assume that every word of scripture is a direct reference to Christ, sometimes requiring something like an allegory to discover it, why should we think that we have to find those references? If we don’t know how a passage relates to Christ, why can’t we acknowledge our ignorance without speculating about how Christ might be referred to by means of an allegory? Since your non-grammatical-historical interpretations are unverifiable, why not just acknowledge your ignorance and move on? It’s not as if Jesus, the apostles, or any other relevant authority has commanded us to speculate about unverifiable secondary meanings of Biblical passages. If we’re not commanded to do it, and there’s no means of determining whether we’re correct in our interpretations when we do it, then why do it at all?
You write:
“Christ Himself is not just our Teacher, but He -and He alone- is the very Exegesis, not only of the Bible, but of the Father Himself”
You then go on to cite John 1:18, which doesn’t refer to Jesus as “the exegesis of the Bible” in the manner you’re suggesting.
You write:
“Christ (the Word) is the only proper lens through which and in which the Bible (the word) gains its proper, life-giving, edifying meaning: He alone and through Him alone is everything interpreted; He Himself is interepreted by no-one”
That’s your interpretation of Him.
You make a lot of assertions that are true if they’re understood in a particular sense, but would be untrue if understood in another sense. You’re being too vague. I suspect that the reason why you’re relying on such vague language is that you can’t defend your position on more specific grounds.
Regarding whether every part of scripture has to be seen as a direct reference to Christ, see my comments above.
You write:
“The very last thing that the Scriptures need is even more spirituality than they already possess: the only problem is NOT to further obscure what's already hidden there either in shadow or in type or in pattern or in figure”
In other words, you’re saying that scripture is sufficiently spiritual if we use non-grammatical-historical methods of interpretation. That would be like my saying that your posts are sufficient to prove that you’re left-handed, as long as I’m allowed to read into your posts an allegorical reference to left-handedness. Nothing in your posts suggests left-handedness if the posts are read as we would normally read a post. But I can find a reference to left-handedness if I’m allowed to interpret your posts allegorically. If we interpret the Bible as we would any other historical document, you don’t consider it sufficiently spiritual. And since you and others have given us no reason to interpret the Bible differently than we would interpret other documents, it follows that you consider the Bible as it actually exists spiritually insufficient.
You write:
“Spirituality is ‘the fulness of Him that fills all in all’ (Ephesians 1:23), and is nothing else but the godhuman life of the Godman Jesus Christ Himself.”
That’s another assertion without a supporting argument.