Interpreting the Old Testament

得窥天境,须看透红尘万丈;人神相通,只凭借灵犀一缕。信靠耶稣,此外路路是绝望;坚定不移,万里迢迢聚天堂。
打印 被阅读次数

3. Interpreting the Old Testament

Reading has never been as simple as it seems, especially when it comes to the Bible. The process of reading is always governed by a theory, conscious or unconscious, of how a text should be interpreted. When we approach a text we typically have a preliminary idea of its type, as in a bookstore where volumes are arranged in fiction, biography, travel, self-help, and other categories.
    Categorizing the Bible is doubly difficult. Since it is a collection of books, it is like a bookstore that has a variety of types of books. But even when we think we know which type a particular biblical book is, we may not have it right. A book that appears to be history may be in fact be historicized fiction or myth, or a poetic text may tell us something important about history.
    Consequently we need to develop a perceptual awareness of the literary, historical, and thematic qualities of all the texts we examine. We will apply a number of reading perspectives to the biblical text:
   
  • a literary perspective, looking for style, repetition, and cross-text allusion;
       
  • a linguistic perspective, to explain the meaning of names and terms;
       
  • a perspective from comparative literatures, using parallel ancient Middle Eastern documents;
       
  • an archaeological perspective, using artifacts that illuminate cultural and textual features;
       
  • an historical perspective, placing biblical events within their broader setting, and gleaning the history of Israel from the texts.
  • 登录后才可评论.