CHAPTER SIX: EPISCOPALIANS AND THE BIBLE

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1 CHAPTER SIX: EPISCOPALIANS AND THE BIBLE The approach Episcopalians take to the Bible is not unique. It is very similar to that used by Roman Catholics, Evangelical Lutherans, United Methodists, Presbyterians (USA), Congregationalists, and others. It is NOT the same as that taken by most Southern Baptists, Pentecostals, or others of the Fundamentalist side of the Church, however; and as those backgrounds contribute a large proportion of the adults who come to the Episcopal Church, it is important for us to explain just how Episcopalians typically view the Scriptures and how we put that into practice by applying scriptural principles to our individual and corporate life. It might be best to repeat the disclaimer that Episcopalians are not subject to a rule of dogma in this matter. You can and will find Episcopalians who take a variety of different positions on this as in almost everything else. In fact, just how to define such expressions as the Word of God, and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit continue to be matters of some controversy within our church, especially as we use scripture in the debate over various contemporary issues. There is a broad middle ground of agreement, however. THE WORD OF GOD At ordination, every deacon, priest, and bishop must declare that he or she does believe the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments to be the Word of God, and must sign a document to that effect. At the end of readings in the Sunday lectionary, the lector often ends with the line, The Word of the Lord, to which the people respond Thanks be to God! Sometimes our Christian brethren who claim to be Biblical literalists contrast themselves with us by designating themselves Bible-believing Christians, implying that we, therefore, are not, since we are not typically literalists. But Episcopalians do believe quite seriously that the Bible is the Word of God. That simple statement is not the end of the story, however, for we also believe some other things about the Bible as well. For example, we recognize that the various books of the Bible were actually written down by quite a number of human beings, many of whom were revising and compiling the earlier work of others, as well as conveying oral traditions passed down through generations. So the Bible has many human fingerprints on it, all those of men of their own times. Second, we believe that the Bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit. What does inspired mean? Surely, it does not mean dictated. We do not imagine the men who composed our scriptures becoming automatic writing instruments under the total control of the Spirit. Therefore, a very great deal depends upon how much of scripture one credits to the Holy Spirit, and how much to the imagination, memory, and experience of the human writers. Is it 80% divinely inspired? 40%? 20%? Does that scale perhaps slide somewhat, depending on the particular book and its purpose? For example, would we give the same credence to the Book of Esther, which never mentions the word God, or to the Song of Songs, which is a long lovepoem, as we give to one of the Gospels? Do the verses that agree with my opinion come from God and the others from mere mortals? Every Christian must decide where he or she can identify divine truth with some confidence.

2 Most Episcopalians would agree that the Bible is basically a love story the account of a deeply devoted, loving God and his relationship with his wayward creation, humanity, and in particular, his chosen people, Israel, through whom he has intended to reach out to all. The high point of the story is his sacrificial offering of himself, and his triumph over sin, death, and damnation all that ails the human race. But it is not an instruction book for life, or the user s manual for the human body, as some claim, though it certainly is the source of our ethical norms, and contains highly instructive models for living in loving relationship and community. Most of the examples, however, are largely negative ones, in itself a revealing circumstance! The Bible is the greatest collection of writings ever compiled (for it is many books, not one), and every reading produces new awareness and realizations. We will never learn all it has to teach or plumb its depths. Word is problematical, though. The introduction to John s Gospel identifies Jesus as the eternal Word, or Logos. Jesus, the second person of the Trinity, who walked the earth for some 30 or so years as incarnate man, is truly and perfectly the Word of God we believe in. The Bible may be called the Word of God only to the extent that it captures and portrays his image and likeness. As St. Paul puts it, now we look through a mirror dimly, then face to face. The Bible is the mirror image of Christ, an icon, if you will. It is not Christ, but it represents Christ to us. Indeed, without it, we would have difficulty knowing Christ though a couple of generations of Christians did, without the New Testament, anyway. It is important to remember, however, as we study the Holy Scriptures: Christ is perfect/the Bible is not. Christ is God/the Bible is not. We respect the scripture/we worship Christ. We call the Bible the Word of God, not the words of God. When we say that the Scripture of the Old and New Testaments contains all things necessary for salvation, we do not mean that it contains all true things, or even that all the things in it are necessarily factual, especially from a historical or scientific point of view. We just don t need any further information (like the Koran, or Book of Mormon) for salvation. SERIOUSLY, NOT LITERALLY Episcopalians great failing as Bible students is that we do not read and study our scriptures privately like we ought to, and like our fundamentalist brothers and sisters do. Consequently, we often lament that we don t know the Bible well (yet we tend not to do anything about that!) At the same time, few Christians read as much scripture in public worship as we do. While some may only hear the verse or two used as a text for the sermon, we read a passage from the Old Testament, a Psalm, a New Testament lesson (usually an Epistle), and a portion of a Gospel at almost every celebration of Eucharist. We also use a Lectionary for determining scripture readings. For the Daily Offices, the Bible is divided into two parts, for Year One and Year Two. One is for odd-numbered years, and Two is for even (they begin in Advent of the previous year, however.) Therefore, we read virtually the whole thing every two years, if we follow the offices every day. For Sundays, the main parts of the Bible are divided into three groups, A, B,

3 and C. This doesn t cover the entirety of the Scripture, but most of it. Note that our clergy do not choose the texts they preach on. We have to deal with all of the scripture. Remember also that scripture is central for us, one of the three legs we stand on (and most would say, the primary leg of those three). Therefore, study and explication of scripture is probably the most important thing we do together. EXEGESIS DOES NOT HAVE TO MEAN EXIT, JESUS! Rule number one for Episcopalians when we use the Bible as authority is, NO PROOF-TEXTING! It is awfully tempting when we find a verse, or part of one, we like, to lay that text down like a trump card against every adversary. Unfortunately, that tactic is not quite honest. We have said we consider the scriptures to be the Word of God. That means ALL the scriptures, not just any one verse. Also, if we are to use someone s writing, we must use it fairly, not contrary to the purpose for which it was written. That means we must do some pretty hard work. First, we must research all that the Bible says on a particular point. While there are certainly vast areas of agreement from book to book, there are some discrepancies also. For example, we must not shout, Anyone who is not for us is against us at each other without remembering that Jesus also is quoted as saying, Anyone who is not against us is for us. Second, we must look at the context of each verse in the whole book in which it appears. What comes before and after? Often, it will be something quite contradictory, especially in St. Paul s writing, but in the Gospels sometimes, as well. As in so many things, context is everything. Next, we might consider what the author s original purpose seems to be. Of course, we may not know for sure. But from the text itself, and from other writings, we can come to some strong suggestions. One part of that purpose might be found in examination of the setting of the work itself. It was written originally for a particular group of people, at a particular time, and in a particular place. Who were those people? What was going on for them? Why would this work need to be written to them? What were their cultural norms and expectations, and how would this work either affirm or challenge those? Another helpful tack is to look at the form of literature the passage is from. An Epistle is different from a Psalm or a Gospel or an Apocalypse. Understanding the characteristics of these genres is important to fully understanding the writing. Finally, language study is imperative. If we read scripture only in English, as the great majority of us do, we must recognize that our knowledge must always be severely handicapped. We have some very fine translations to choose from, and using several will help to reduce some of the distortions. Translators are superb scholars, and they work painstakingly to produce the most accurate rendition of a text that they can.

4 Nevertheless, very few sentences can be morphed from any one language to any other without altering meaning. English has a quarter of a million words. Greek and Hebrew have a fraction of that. We have many choices for each of their words, but the nuances of meaning still do not always coincide. Sometimes, phrases just don t translate at all. Few of us are going to read the Old Testament straight from Hebrew or the New Testament straight from Greek. We do have access to commentaries, however, and we can learn about what the problem words and phrases are, and what the options are. Knowing these things can have a big impact on how we read a passage. The purpose of all of this is called exegesis, which simply means reading out of the original. We are trying to find in the scripture what the Spirit has placed there, with the human failings, including our own, as much as possible, pulled away. We are only looking for what is there, however challenging and surprising that may be. Our study may take us some distance from where we originally thought it would lead, however. The opposite of exegesis is a dreadful thing, but we are all guilty of it sometimes. It is called eisegesis, and it means reading into the original. We do this when we know what God thinks about something (because we think so ourselves!), and we look for Bible passages to support, more or less, that view. Christians have performed astonishing acts of Biblical contortion when we stoop to eisegesis. Back in the Reformation, Martin Luther believed that the individual Christian, reading his Bible on his own, is as competent to comprehend the Holy Scriptures as the Pope himself. That is why he translated the Bible into German, and following his example, others have done so into English and hundreds of other languages. Something has gone wrong, however. We do not all understand the scriptures in the same ways. The end result of Luther s little experiment is schism and disharmony among the Christian movement, and the creation of hundreds of different denominations, many of which don t even consider any of the others to be Christian at all! Luther s confidence was based on his belief in the Holy Spirit, and his faith that the Spirit is as active in the reading of the Bible as s/he was in the writing of it. No doubt he was correct about the Spirit. Luther also generally had a pretty negative view of human nature he thought that we are a pretty sorry and sinful lot. He surely was right about that! What God joins together, we have an incredible knack for putting asunder. That means that, finally, there are two more ingredients that are essential to any Episcopalian s study of the Bible. Number one is humility. We will never get it all right. We will also never outgrow the need to keep trying. Perhaps this is because it is not so much the destination (ultimate knowledge) that matters to us in this earthly pilgrimage as it is the journey itself (walking in faith). Oddly, we do not learn or grow from our triumphs, but from our disasters. When we read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest the Holy Scripture, we will make blunders. Yet those are the very areas in which God will be calling us to grow. The second ingredient, but equal to the first, is prayerfulness. Actually, this is the condition under which Luther had confidence in individual Christians to read and

5 understand the Bible, that it is to be done while praying. Maybe that accounts for so much misreading and disagreeing we so often read without praying. Just don t leave Bible reading to the professionals. This is one thing that IS to be attempted at home by amateurs. Better yet, join a Bible study group, or form one. As in all things Christian, the work of the community is better than the solo act.