We have, as you so rightly say, forgotten how to read. Not because we lack tools, but because we no longer kneel. The Fathers did not read as scholars but as lovers - wounded, ravished, purified by the flame that still flickers behind every word of Scripture.
The text is not dead ink but living flesh, and Christ is not merely found in its pages but embodied through them. We should not approach the Word as analysts, at least not as our default position, but as Emmaus pilgrims: bewildered, burned, and hoping that the Stranger who opens the text will stay with us through the night.
Thanks for this important call to return, not to a method but to the mystery. Not to mastery, but to surrender. The Bible is not a book we read but a place we meet Him.
I have often found myself reading the old testament, and wondering how on Earth it could be divinely inspired. If I’m being honest it seems like at best the effect of synergy, where the human contribution was very naive and confused so the revelation, at least interpreted literally, became distorted. In a sense I have to wonder if some of the old testament authors were in a state of disordered passions and the effect of the reader being without these is essentially to untangle the original divine intent. This is probably heretical, but otherwise how am I to relate to genocide as a secret story of destroying passions?? Why is the literal meaning such a thick and darkly mirror instead of itself simply being an obvious moral allegory or a history where God demands goodness through and through? So even if we take the Christ centered meaning, I still feel like the nature of the literal meaning cries out for explanation. What do you think?
I have an article I published dealing with this and to quote from it: But still, the question remains: do we have to accept the literal, historical meaning of the Old Testament?
To respond to this problem, let us turn to St. Gregory of Nyssa, who addresses this issue in Life of Moses when interpreting the meaning of God’s killing of the first-born children of the Egyptians during Passover. After offering a spiritual interpretation that the killing of the firstborn "laid down for us the principle that it is necessary to destroy utterly the first birth of evil" and that "it is impossible to flee the Egyptian life [evil] in any other way," St. Gregory emphasizes the incongruity of a purely historical interpretation with the nature of God:
It does not seem good to me to pass this interpretation by without further contemplation. How would a concept worthy of God be preserved in the description of what happened if one looked only to the history? The Egyptian acts unjustly, and in his place is punished his newborn child, who in his infancy cannot discern what is good and what is not... If such a one now pays the penalty of his father’s wickedness, where is justice? Where is piety? Where is holiness?
He then states outright:
Do not be surprised at all if… the death of the firstborn… did not happen to the Israelites and on that account reject the contemplation we have proposed concerning the destruction of evil as if it were a fabrication without any truth. For now in the difference of names, Israelite and Egyptian, we perceive the difference between Virtue and Evil.
Thus, Gregory of Nyssa, a great defender of Orthodoxy and Father of the Church, was not at all fazed by the idea that the meaning of this passage was not to be found in its historical occurrence, but rather in a proper spiritual interpretation of its typology.
As for my own perspective, it appears that from a historical point of view the Old Testament is a record of what amounts to an increasingly better understanding of God as becomes evident by the time of the prophets. It’s constantly reinterpreting events of their history or oral and written record in better ways, but thats why t Christ unveils and fulfills the scriptures. It is not, for me, understandable otherwise.
Yes progressive revelation! Which does imply decreasing levels of confusion of the authors over time. Yet to avoid the result of therefore dismissing the earlier passages we must assume they had real revelation as well. This then is grounds to interpret as St. Gregory of Nyssa does.
Does the historical-critical method help with the literal sense at all? Or perhaps the always pithy Pete Enns’ “God uses people to tell God’s story” - foibles and all. Even if the people who wrote these things down believed them to be true (historically, morally, etc) we can read them allegorically and with a sense that Jesus did not want a genocidal land-grab or babies’ heads dashed against stones.
I feel like there is some use to historical critical method, but all in all most of it is projection upon a text of a mode of reading it contrary to what I'd argue is scriptures purpose. It presupposes one meaning, not polyvalence, and as a causal reaction to some perceived or projected circumstance based on a constellation of evidence that is too limited and lacking in inspiration too help. More important is the scholarship that takes into consideration how Paul and the new testament writers for instance themselves read scripture (e.g. the Old Testament) like Margret Mitchell or John Behr.
If through the grace of God I am one day granted eternal life, I will be eager to see how many illiterate faithful have been welcomed into His kingdom. I suspect they'll be well-represented.
In chapter 3 of his 2nd Epistle to the Corinthians, St. Paul gives me pause to wonder:
"Do we begin again to commend ourselves? Or do we need (as some do) epistles of commendation to you, or from you? You are our epistle, written in our hearts, which is known and read by all men.
Being manifested, that you are the epistle of Christ, ministered by us, and written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in the fleshly tables of the heart. And such confidence we have, through Christ, towards God.
Who also hath made us fit ministers of the new testament, not in the letter, but in the spirit."
I especially agree with your point that "Scripture is not a static object to be dissected; it is a living voice" and have long thought that the distinction between purely academic study of scripture and what we might call a spiritually-oriented study of scripture is like the difference between an autopsy and a conversation: you can definitely learn things from an autopsy that you can't learn from a conversation, but the reverse is also true—and once someone is dead, only the autopsy remains an option. It's critical that we allow Scripture to speak *to* us, but as you so deftly point to in your piece, we are often more interested in speaking *about* it.
That said, as you concluded, I found myself wondering if we had a bit of a chicken or egg problem: you posit that we can't read scripture until we already know God (at least to some degree), but some what wonder how we can even begin to know God unless we can read and understand scripture. How would you respond? (I can imagine the liturgy and spiritual direction perhaps playing a crucial initial role, but I don't want to put words in your mouth.)
It’s like Phillip encountering the Ethiopian on the road who is reading Isaiah 53. Phillip asks the Ethiopian can you understand what you are reading and effectually the Ethiopian responds how can I unless someone explains it to me—so maybe in a sense that interpretation of scriptures, that sharing of the gospel is needed to initiate this reading, but even more than the interpretation is also the one interpretation g scripture for the Ethiopian being an icon of, an image of, an embodiment to the Ethiopian of Christ. This is a huge part of what opens the scriptures to others. Encountering one full of the Holy Spirit and mature at least in Christ witnessing as much at least with his mode of being as his act of preaching Christ crucified through the scriptures.
Now in zealousness for making other points or to emphasize certain things i did make a mistake you clearly identify—I seem to indicate that scripture isn’t part of how we come to know God even if in some ways ill equipped to read it. The New Testament itself was enough to convert Dostoevsky during years of hard labor. I think though ideally one hears the gospel preached and scriptures interpreted and encounters an icon or embodiment of Christ. There’s a sense in the Orthodox Church—because of the frequent examples of it in history—that one learns how to become a saint by meeting a saint. This principle doesn’t seem to have to be so extreme to create an effect, but Dr. Christopher Veniamin says that when he encountered St. Sophrony of Essex that he immediately was drawn to him realizing that “this is a true human being!” So I think it’s the constellation of having been shared the gospel, having the scriptures interpreted to you, and encountering one who begins to cut for you the figure of Christ even if if just to a degree becomes so essential in this constellation or matrix. So to be clear, I didn’t want to not encourage or say one cannot encounter Christ through scripture without reading scripture or being taught it or that at any time one can’t at least potentially encounter him, but rather emphasize I suppose that without the constellation of encountering icon or spiritual father, hearing preaching and interpretation, seeing the icon of Christ or his stamp on someone, then how do we begin to know. Of course with me and others there’s Dostoevsky and even saturated phenomena like a dream I had gifted to me by God which accomplishes much of this, but without the constellation of factors it seems easily much might be lacking and scripture can become even a tool used not for good in the wrong hands.
I think you make an excellent point here, and of course you exposed some of my own unreflective Protestant bias as well(!), since I posed my question as if people often encounter scripture without some other person giving it to them, recommending it, teaching about it, etc. But of course that's extremely rare; most people begin to read the Bible because someone recommends they do so, and gives them at least some hint of a reason as to why it's worth their time.
And of course this is a lesson that Protestants struggle to really admit: the Bible, as a canon, as a collection, was made by the church—not the other way around. We know this because we can point to the councils where the canon was formed, and we know of texts that were treated *as if* they were scriptural before that time, but which no longer are (e.g. 1 Enoch and Jubilees)—and this is so no matter what our theology of inspiration may be.
And I should have added that we know this since the NT is in part a history of the church itself—the church must predate scripture because scripture talks about the church in the past tense! So, as you say, it is the people of the ekklesia who ground our epistemic access to the Bible. This is as it should be, though as noted above, this has troubling implications for many Protestant doctrines.
We have, as you so rightly say, forgotten how to read. Not because we lack tools, but because we no longer kneel. The Fathers did not read as scholars but as lovers - wounded, ravished, purified by the flame that still flickers behind every word of Scripture.
The text is not dead ink but living flesh, and Christ is not merely found in its pages but embodied through them. We should not approach the Word as analysts, at least not as our default position, but as Emmaus pilgrims: bewildered, burned, and hoping that the Stranger who opens the text will stay with us through the night.
Thanks for this important call to return, not to a method but to the mystery. Not to mastery, but to surrender. The Bible is not a book we read but a place we meet Him.
Number 1. people don’t know how to read.
That literally made me laugh. Touché. So true!
Nicholas, an outstanding essay. We live 30 miles from Dayton Tn. the site of the "Scopes 'monkey'
Trial," exactly 100 years ago! Believe me I know about "moral certainty, inerrancy, and repentance."
Can't wait for Sunday School!!!!!!!
Thanks for this lovely piece!
I have often found myself reading the old testament, and wondering how on Earth it could be divinely inspired. If I’m being honest it seems like at best the effect of synergy, where the human contribution was very naive and confused so the revelation, at least interpreted literally, became distorted. In a sense I have to wonder if some of the old testament authors were in a state of disordered passions and the effect of the reader being without these is essentially to untangle the original divine intent. This is probably heretical, but otherwise how am I to relate to genocide as a secret story of destroying passions?? Why is the literal meaning such a thick and darkly mirror instead of itself simply being an obvious moral allegory or a history where God demands goodness through and through? So even if we take the Christ centered meaning, I still feel like the nature of the literal meaning cries out for explanation. What do you think?
I have an article I published dealing with this and to quote from it: But still, the question remains: do we have to accept the literal, historical meaning of the Old Testament?
To respond to this problem, let us turn to St. Gregory of Nyssa, who addresses this issue in Life of Moses when interpreting the meaning of God’s killing of the first-born children of the Egyptians during Passover. After offering a spiritual interpretation that the killing of the firstborn "laid down for us the principle that it is necessary to destroy utterly the first birth of evil" and that "it is impossible to flee the Egyptian life [evil] in any other way," St. Gregory emphasizes the incongruity of a purely historical interpretation with the nature of God:
It does not seem good to me to pass this interpretation by without further contemplation. How would a concept worthy of God be preserved in the description of what happened if one looked only to the history? The Egyptian acts unjustly, and in his place is punished his newborn child, who in his infancy cannot discern what is good and what is not... If such a one now pays the penalty of his father’s wickedness, where is justice? Where is piety? Where is holiness?
He then states outright:
Do not be surprised at all if… the death of the firstborn… did not happen to the Israelites and on that account reject the contemplation we have proposed concerning the destruction of evil as if it were a fabrication without any truth. For now in the difference of names, Israelite and Egyptian, we perceive the difference between Virtue and Evil.
Thus, Gregory of Nyssa, a great defender of Orthodoxy and Father of the Church, was not at all fazed by the idea that the meaning of this passage was not to be found in its historical occurrence, but rather in a proper spiritual interpretation of its typology.
This is from: https://nasmith.substack.com/p/unveiling-scripture-a-journey-from?r=32csd0
As for my own perspective, it appears that from a historical point of view the Old Testament is a record of what amounts to an increasingly better understanding of God as becomes evident by the time of the prophets. It’s constantly reinterpreting events of their history or oral and written record in better ways, but thats why t Christ unveils and fulfills the scriptures. It is not, for me, understandable otherwise.
Yes progressive revelation! Which does imply decreasing levels of confusion of the authors over time. Yet to avoid the result of therefore dismissing the earlier passages we must assume they had real revelation as well. This then is grounds to interpret as St. Gregory of Nyssa does.
Does the historical-critical method help with the literal sense at all? Or perhaps the always pithy Pete Enns’ “God uses people to tell God’s story” - foibles and all. Even if the people who wrote these things down believed them to be true (historically, morally, etc) we can read them allegorically and with a sense that Jesus did not want a genocidal land-grab or babies’ heads dashed against stones.
I feel like there is some use to historical critical method, but all in all most of it is projection upon a text of a mode of reading it contrary to what I'd argue is scriptures purpose. It presupposes one meaning, not polyvalence, and as a causal reaction to some perceived or projected circumstance based on a constellation of evidence that is too limited and lacking in inspiration too help. More important is the scholarship that takes into consideration how Paul and the new testament writers for instance themselves read scripture (e.g. the Old Testament) like Margret Mitchell or John Behr.
Seems like another conversation partner to help discern the literal meaning. We can go up the ladder from there.
Thank you.
If through the grace of God I am one day granted eternal life, I will be eager to see how many illiterate faithful have been welcomed into His kingdom. I suspect they'll be well-represented.
In chapter 3 of his 2nd Epistle to the Corinthians, St. Paul gives me pause to wonder:
"Do we begin again to commend ourselves? Or do we need (as some do) epistles of commendation to you, or from you? You are our epistle, written in our hearts, which is known and read by all men.
Being manifested, that you are the epistle of Christ, ministered by us, and written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in the fleshly tables of the heart. And such confidence we have, through Christ, towards God.
Who also hath made us fit ministers of the new testament, not in the letter, but in the spirit."
I especially agree with your point that "Scripture is not a static object to be dissected; it is a living voice" and have long thought that the distinction between purely academic study of scripture and what we might call a spiritually-oriented study of scripture is like the difference between an autopsy and a conversation: you can definitely learn things from an autopsy that you can't learn from a conversation, but the reverse is also true—and once someone is dead, only the autopsy remains an option. It's critical that we allow Scripture to speak *to* us, but as you so deftly point to in your piece, we are often more interested in speaking *about* it.
That said, as you concluded, I found myself wondering if we had a bit of a chicken or egg problem: you posit that we can't read scripture until we already know God (at least to some degree), but some what wonder how we can even begin to know God unless we can read and understand scripture. How would you respond? (I can imagine the liturgy and spiritual direction perhaps playing a crucial initial role, but I don't want to put words in your mouth.)
It’s like Phillip encountering the Ethiopian on the road who is reading Isaiah 53. Phillip asks the Ethiopian can you understand what you are reading and effectually the Ethiopian responds how can I unless someone explains it to me—so maybe in a sense that interpretation of scriptures, that sharing of the gospel is needed to initiate this reading, but even more than the interpretation is also the one interpretation g scripture for the Ethiopian being an icon of, an image of, an embodiment to the Ethiopian of Christ. This is a huge part of what opens the scriptures to others. Encountering one full of the Holy Spirit and mature at least in Christ witnessing as much at least with his mode of being as his act of preaching Christ crucified through the scriptures.
Now in zealousness for making other points or to emphasize certain things i did make a mistake you clearly identify—I seem to indicate that scripture isn’t part of how we come to know God even if in some ways ill equipped to read it. The New Testament itself was enough to convert Dostoevsky during years of hard labor. I think though ideally one hears the gospel preached and scriptures interpreted and encounters an icon or embodiment of Christ. There’s a sense in the Orthodox Church—because of the frequent examples of it in history—that one learns how to become a saint by meeting a saint. This principle doesn’t seem to have to be so extreme to create an effect, but Dr. Christopher Veniamin says that when he encountered St. Sophrony of Essex that he immediately was drawn to him realizing that “this is a true human being!” So I think it’s the constellation of having been shared the gospel, having the scriptures interpreted to you, and encountering one who begins to cut for you the figure of Christ even if if just to a degree becomes so essential in this constellation or matrix. So to be clear, I didn’t want to not encourage or say one cannot encounter Christ through scripture without reading scripture or being taught it or that at any time one can’t at least potentially encounter him, but rather emphasize I suppose that without the constellation of encountering icon or spiritual father, hearing preaching and interpretation, seeing the icon of Christ or his stamp on someone, then how do we begin to know. Of course with me and others there’s Dostoevsky and even saturated phenomena like a dream I had gifted to me by God which accomplishes much of this, but without the constellation of factors it seems easily much might be lacking and scripture can become even a tool used not for good in the wrong hands.
I think you make an excellent point here, and of course you exposed some of my own unreflective Protestant bias as well(!), since I posed my question as if people often encounter scripture without some other person giving it to them, recommending it, teaching about it, etc. But of course that's extremely rare; most people begin to read the Bible because someone recommends they do so, and gives them at least some hint of a reason as to why it's worth their time.
And of course this is a lesson that Protestants struggle to really admit: the Bible, as a canon, as a collection, was made by the church—not the other way around. We know this because we can point to the councils where the canon was formed, and we know of texts that were treated *as if* they were scriptural before that time, but which no longer are (e.g. 1 Enoch and Jubilees)—and this is so no matter what our theology of inspiration may be.
I have hope though as more Protestants seem at least to begin to be getting this more. It’s hard though.
And I should have added that we know this since the NT is in part a history of the church itself—the church must predate scripture because scripture talks about the church in the past tense! So, as you say, it is the people of the ekklesia who ground our epistemic access to the Bible. This is as it should be, though as noted above, this has troubling implications for many Protestant doctrines.
In many ways, Genesis is the end of the Bible rather than the beginning. It promises how things will be when we rightly order our lives to Jesus.
Another wonderful essay with valuable spiritual insights. Thanks for writing and sharing it.
I enjoyed the article. I love the allusions to the Quadriga of scripture, without direct mentioning it.