Top Ten Things

The next time our group gathers face to face (Tuesday, March 24^th, 6:30 – 8 PM in Room 1 at First Church of Lombard) the focus of the presentation will be, essentially, on a different set of “lenses” through which we look at and relate to scripture. Some of us around the table have been working at this with uneven success for a long, long time.

5 or 6 years ago I led a 5 week bible study I called The Top 10 Things You Should Know About Reading, Understanding, and Finding Meaning in the Bible, making it very apparent that I do not have an alternate career path as a headline writer. The idea for the study was that we would shamelessly steal David Letterman’s signature bit, and over the 5 weeks we would “countdown” a “Top Ten List” of thing those of us who want to take the bible seriously without taking it literally could keep in mind to help us with that endeavor. Remember, this is all my stuff, titrated down from who knows how many teachers and books and lectures and papers and random ideas. That means, it is where I have “settled” on this stuff at this stage in my “journey,” and that the more I think about it as time goes along, the more likely the possibility that I will continue to change my mind a little here and there. Here, summarized and with only a little commentary is that list.

10. Even the newest material in the Bible is very, very, very old.

The “newest” material in the Bible (the very late pieces of the New Testament) are 1,875 years old (give or take a decade, and the oldest is more than 3,000 years old. And when you think of the utter lack of communication technology one thousand eight hundred and seventy-five years ago (doesn’t it seem longer when you “spell out” the numbers?), particularly when compared to the present, it isn’t all that tough to imagine that the material there as being “normative” without necessarily being “historical.”

9. You can’t make an apple taste like a T-Bone, and won’t “get” the Bible when you try to make it be something it’s not.

There are all sorts of things we say the Bible is out of respect or deference to it that become quite challenging when and if we look at them closely. We get into trouble when we try to make an apple taste like a T-Bone, when we try to make the Bible be something it’s not. Five pairs of “is/is not” things about the Bible, at least as I am continuing to learn it

The Bible is a collection of 66 books written by different authors, mostly about their experiences of or their ancestors’ memories of “the Holy” (God). The Bible is not a single book written from only one perspective that tells only one point of view about God.

The Bible is a source that describes how ancient people thought about the important things in their lives. The Bible is not a “science book” with objective, dependent on reliable data descriptions of unfathomable phenomena.

The Bible is a collection of writings, letters, stories, songs, and memories that span more than 2,000 years. The Bible is not a “history book” that describes in chronological order the historical details about the events it describes.

The Bible is a source that reveals how faithful people in antiquity responded to what they perceived to be God’s will for their lives in their day and time. The Bibl is not a “law and rule book” designed to instruct people how to act and think in every possible imaginable circumstance.

The Bible is what faithful people have come to call “God’s Word” because it is among our most important and revealing tools helping us understand how God relates to us, and vice-versa, The Bible is not the only possible way God can communicate God’s will to faithful people, nor the only source of God’s comfort, guidance, and strength.

8. Everything in the Bible came from someone, somewhere – nothing in the Bible simply “appeared” in a vacuum.

There is not one thing in the Bible that wasn’t created, remembered, written, and then treasured in one context or another. That context is everything. The greater our understanding of the context of any given piece, the deeper our understanding of what is being communicated

7. Always ask this question: “Why is this (story/song/memory/et.al.) in the Bible?

The material in the Bible is certainly not the only remaining literature from that 2,300 year period during which the Bible was compiled and then canonized. So it’s important to ask not only why any given text is remembered and treasured enough to “make the cut” for the Bible, but also to ask who was doing the remembering and treasuring and arguing for its inclusion.

6. Songs are songs, stories are stories, memories are memories, visions are visions; things make much more sense when we know what they are.

Material in the Bible always makes more sense when we let it speak for itself, and not try to turn it into something it’s not (I know this sounds a lot like number 9 above, but this is more about individual texts than about the Bible as a whole). Example one: biblical prophets were not so much “fortune tellers” as they were people of discernment. Their poetry is not so much “predictive” as it is “indicative,” meaning that rarely if ever are the visions Nostradamus-like prognostications, and that their “timbre” is more like a riff on “logical consequences” (“Thus says the Lord: if you keep up this nonsense, things will not end well for you” rather than “Thus says the Lord: on the 3^rd of April 2010, your favorite baseball team will begin an undefeated season.”) . Example two: the Apocalypse of John (the Book of Revelation) is not at all a prediction of end times, but rather a dramatic and symbolic portrayal of the evil and corruption of empire gone mad, the paralysis of faithful people, and the ever-present love of God. Example three: Jesus’ parable of the last judgment in Matthew 25: 31-46 (sheep and goats, right and left hand, paradise and punishment, caring for the least of these). It is a parable, a story to make a point not so much about how the Son of Man in all his glory will be given barnyard duty, but the kind of attention, intention, and response expected of those who claim to be followers. Things are much clearer when we accept them for what they are.

5. Repetition = importance

When the Bible says something again and again and again, and then says it again, it is probably a pretty big deal.

4. The Bible was originally written in either Hebrew (Old Testament) or Greek (New Testament), and every translation in every other language has its own “agenda.”

There are over 500 different English translations or paraphrases of the Bible. Were I a better linguist and student of antiquity, even the translation I came up with be colored by my theological, philosophical, sociological and ideological biases. That’s why the “best” translations are done by teams of learned scholars who are in relatively constant dialogue during the translating process. I most consistently use the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible because I respect the scholarship of its teams of translators. Still, even with my limited knowledge of the original languages, I find words and phrases that I would have most certainly translated differently. If you want an interesting discussion of biblical translations, visit Rev. Ken Collins’ website at http://www.kencollins.com/.

3. A “critical” approach to Bible reading doesn’t mean you’re “picking the Bible apart;” it means you’re being thoughtful and reflective and open to new learning about something you think you have always known.

“Critical” as in “developing a critique,” as in “reading for understanding,” or as in “reading to learn something new about the piece or about yourself or both. Not “critical” as in “you never fold the towels the way I want you to fold the towels.”

2. Not everything written, said, or taught about the Bible, even if it sells well, actually “gets it.”

Bookstores, libraries, universities are loaded with all sorts of things written about the Bible. And some of the most literate, well-written stuff misses all the important stuff. If it doesn’t take great notice of context, if it declares that every English word you read is inerrant, if it doesn’t invite you into further conversation with and exploration of the text, then the piece, no matter how attractive, well-written, or famously endorsed on the back cover, simply doesn’t get it.

1. What’s “holy” about the “Holy Bible” is not the book itself, but the God it reveals and remembers and teaches.

Enough said.