HERMENEUTICS #7
#1 = Interpret LITERALLY.
#2 = Understand the HISTORICAL-CULTURAL background.
#3 = Analyze the GRAMMATICAL structure.
#4 = Use SYNTHESIS .
#5 = APPLICATION comes last!
As valuable as these five principles are -- they are useless without the illuminating ministry of the Holy Spirit:
1 COR. 2:12-16: "We have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom, but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words. The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual man makes judgments about all things, but he himself is not subject to any man's judgment: 'For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him?' . But we have the mind of Christ."
In this passage Paul describes the Holy Spirit's ministry of ILLUMINATION. This is NOT revelation; that was given only to the chosen apostles and prophets that formed the foundation of the church. But illumination is a ministry to every true believer. It is not new scripture, nor is it a mystical power to perfectly understand everything in the written word. But it is a ministry of the Spirit that helps the diligent seeker of truth as he searches the scripture.
Anyone can hear the facts, study other people's teaching, and gain something of an intellectual understanding about the meaning of Scripture. But apart from the Holy Spirit, the Bible will utterly fail to penetrate and transform the human heart. With the Spirit of God comes illumination -- true understanding of what has been written. Every believer has the Holy Spirit, the One who inspired the writers of Scripture, and without His illuminating ministry to us, the truth of Scripture could not penetrate our hearts and minds.
The Holy Spirit indwells us, and helps us understand the written word. However -- this is NOT to say that the illuminating ministry of the Holy Spirit REPLACES diligent study of the word. Rather -- they work together. As we carefully and thoroughly explore the Scripture, the Holy Spirit uses whatever tools we acquire, whatever godly wisdom we expose ourselves to, as the means to illumine our hearts. Appealing to Scripture apart from complete dependence on the Holy Spirit is presumption; but, to expect the Holy Spirit to teach us APART from diligent study of the Scripture is fanaticism -- it is dangerous -- and it is not biblical.
#1 = Interpret LITERALLY.
#2 = Understand the HISTORICAL-CULTURAL background.
#3 = Analyze the GRAMMATICAL structure.
#4 = Use SYNTHESIS .
#5 = APPLICATION come last!
#6 = At every step, rely on the ILLUMINATION of the Holy Spirit.