To Peter.

Your reply misses the point. Here it is again.

"Expand on this thought, and talk about the correct interpretation on biblical texts. Make sure you actually reference the texts you are interpreting as well."

What you've given definitely expands on your belief to disregard the bible. And that is not the point I am trying to address or argue against. (Because I will not argue for such a point). But you also rationalize your view of disregarding the bible by saying that the church and it's theology is the only one that can interpret the bible.

In this article you said a statement that modern epistemology is being forced on the bible. So I've asked you about what is the correct interpretation of any section of the bible. Without that, all that you are saying is an open disregard for the bible. Not just that theology in the church supersedes the written words of the bible, but also the bible is not even worth consulting.

Here it is again. Provide a correct interpretation of any verse or section of the bible so that you may present a theological view from that interpretation. With out the theological interpretation you have nothing from the bible except arguments for why to not read it.

Or if you have no interpretation and theology of the bible, here is an alternate but direct question for you. Do you disregard the bible completely, or do you not? I'm not talking about it's history, or it's teachings, but of any content that is held in it at all.

Not_Now.Soon
I really do not like your tone. I spent a lot of time in good faith in trying to answer your questions but your are clearly out of your depth, or more likely, so wedded to a deficient method of reading the bible that you refuse to listen to my answers.

How dare you accuse me of neglecting the bible. I have spend years in the pulpit and each sermon was very carefully based on the readings for the week.

Sells,

<<My argument is that biblical texts demand to be read theologically not as if they described actual events. Certainly, there were often events behind the texts, but the texts were written primarily to talk about God. I repeat, they are more about preaching than modern history.>>

Whose theology? Yours or mine?

So there are <<events behind the texts>>. You gave no examples of what you mean.

This is your personal invention about biblical texts: <<the texts were written primarily to talk about God. I repeat, they are more about preaching than modern history.>>

That was not so when Cain killed Abel (Gen 4:8). That's a literal fact, isn't it? Or do you think there is a deeper meaning behind it. If so, who decides the deeper meaning?

What about the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20? Are they actual commands to be kept by the people of Israel or are they theological commands that have no factual meaning?

According to Acts 16:25-28, Paul and Silas were imprisoned in Philippi,

About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. 26 Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everyone’s chains came loose. 27 The jailer woke up, and when he saw the prison doors open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself because he thought the prisoners had escaped. 28 But Paul shouted, “Don’t harm yourself! We are all here!”

Is this talking about literal persons, Paul, Silas, other prisoners and the jailer? Was it an actual prison or one that talks about God? Was there a really violent earthquake that shook the prison foundations, the doors flew open, the chains came loose and the prisoners could have escaped? Paul shouted to the jailer not to harm himself. Was that really true or a theological invention?

Were there real events or are you trying to gloss over the literal to give your allegorical or symbolical spin?

Sells,

<<If they are taken as historical all our energy is spent on justifying this view. We wonder about the site of the garden and the identity of the rivers and later get interested in digging up the ark of Noah.

If they are taken as theological legends, then we may concentrate on what is being expressed. These texts are particularly rewarding for theological exegesis and have provided the ground of all Christian theology.>>

I think you miss something fundamental with your modernism/postmodernism, Peter. When we examine Scripture, we deal with the word of truth (2 Tim 2:15). I couldn't possibly follow your view of discarding the historical in Scripture and promoting the view that the Bible contains theological legends.

Nowhere in Scripture do I find what you promote.

What's your kind of 'theological exegesis' look like - just like the modernism you promote that eliminates history from the Bible and refused to take the text at face value and interpret literally.

All theology comes from an exegesis of the biblical text that contains history, poetry, narrative, parables, figures of speech (in literal interpretation), etc.

The Bible says this is to be our approach to Scripture: 'Work hard so you can present yourself to God and receive his approval. Be a good worker, one who does not need to be ashamed and WHO CORRECTLY EXPLAINS THE WORD OF TRUTH'. Truth relates to that which conforms with reality.

Your theological impositions do not conform with the truth of historical, cultural, exegetical interpretation. What you promote is that which destroys the biblical text and does not 'correctly explain the word of truth' - and empties modernist churches.

If you don't believe me, check the liberal dioceses of the Anglican and Uniting churches in Australia. Thriving Anglican churches are found in the largest diocese - evangelical Sydney Anglicans.

Sells,

<<the early Church was doing theology long before a word of the bible had been written.>>

You were not there 2,000 years ago, so how do you know that?

<<This means that the bible was derivative of the theological ideas of the early Church rather than being a source of factual information from which theology was derived.>>

Sadly, this is fake theology. Not a word is mentioned by you of oral tradition, eyewitness testimony and other writings that were used as ‘notes’ for writing Scripture. Luke’s Gospel tells what the writer did:

“Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eye witnesses and servants of the word. With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught” (Luke 1:1-4).

Contrary to your view, the Bible is not derivative of theological ideas but Luke’s Gospel was drawn from many sources so that the people who read it “may know the certainty of the things you have been taught”.

<<This means that we have to read the bible through the lens of theology”.

Fake theology again, as Luke demonstrates.

<< The mistake of the Reformation was to give the bible to the isolated and often theologically uneducated individual to make of it what they will >>

You really dumb down the uneducated theologically. You would have treated the Apostles Peter and John as dummies because they were “uneducated and untrained men” (Acts 4:13).

How could a theologically uneducated fisherman, John, write such a theologically profound Gospel? God’s standards are not ours, Peter.

Early church father, Irenaeus, confirmed John wrote the Gospel that bears his name (Against Heresies, 1.8.5). Irenaeus was discipled by Polycarp who was a disciple of the Apostle John.

NNS,

<<Here it is again. Provide a correct interpretation of any verse or section of the bible so that you may present a theological view from that interpretation. With out the theological interpretation you have nothing from the bible except arguments for why to not read it.>>

Don't hold your breath waiting for an example of Sells' theological interpretation, using a specific Scripture. He's a whiz at making general statements that come out of his modernist-postmodernist mind.

Getting specifics will be like pulling a tooth out of a gum and the tooth won't budge.