HERMENEUTICS #3

The second principle of sound interpretation is the HISTORICAL-CULTURAL principle. One of the crucial steps in understanding what a text means is to have some grasp of the cultural, geographical, historical, social, and political setting in which the passage was written. If one understands this context, the passage often will practically interpret itself.

We have to understand the historical and cultural setting if we are to understand the viewpoint of the writer. For example, to understand Paul's letters to the Corinthians, we must first have a sense of the political, religious, and cultural issues that Paul was dealing with. What do we know about the city, and its times, and its people? What social pressures were involved? What was the culture really like? What was going on in the church?

To understand the historical-cultural setting, we can use Bible dictionaries, Bible handbooks, commentaries, history books, and books about Bible customs. There are many such books available, and many Bibles today include such material in introductions to books and among notations throughout the text. Just be careful not to rely on those books and notes that are written from an obviously biased perspective. There are many Bibles available today that contain notes and commentary from specific perspectives, and I have found that the notes are more designed to push that particular view than to really explain the plain meaning of the text.

The more general books and notes are the most valuable, as the facts in them are generally agreed upon among scholars. I have often had to correct the ideas that some of my church members have gotten from some of their annotated Bibles. For example, whatever position one takes on the issue of "self-esteem," one thing is certain -- the writers of the Bible were not aware of this modern psychological concept, and they did not write the scriptures with this concept in mind. But this has not kept some folks from publishing an entire Bible that twists scripture after scripture in an attempt to preach "self of steam" from the Bible. Understanding the historical-cultural setting will protect you from this kind of "reading-back-into-the-scriptures" all kinds of modern ideas that may or may not be valid.

#1 = Interpret LITERALLY.

#2 = Understand the HISTORICAL-CULTURAL background.