Thoughts on Interpretive Paradigms: Part I

I had originally posted this on my blog for philosophy class (http://philosophicaljourney.blogspot.com). But I decided I was getting off track for a class so thought I would republish/continue the series here.

A local group of Christians with which I am a little familiar provides us with an excellent test case for my claim that the paradigms and dictionaries we bring to the text are even more determinative for the meaning we see in the Bible than the text of the Bible itself.

With what little knowledge I have, I would characterize the group in terms of three key beliefs which differ from most mainstream churches (if I am wrong on details, this entry is more about how we read the Bible than about the group per se):

1. A belief that speaking in tongues is the evidence of having the Holy Spirit (in distinction from the gift of tongues, which I suppose would be those who continue to speak in tongues regularly after conversion). Those who do not speak in tongues are not truly saved.

2. A belief that a person should only be baptized in Jesus' name. Baptism in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is inappropriate because of the manner of baptism in Acts. Those who have been baptized in the name of the Trinity must be rebaptized. Further, a person cannot be saved unless s/he is baptized (although children who have not reached the age of accountability will go to heaven).

3. A disbelief in the Trinity. God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are in fact three phases or modes of the same person. God is one person, not three.

Now, how does this theology work in terms of how the Bible is appropriated. I will give a description in terms of my claims about how we read the Bible.

This is a wonderful example of a pre-modern interpretation of the Bible. The overriding presumption is that the words of the Bible form a single message. Therefore, words from one book of the Bible are interpreted on the basis of controlling interpretations from other words from other books. This approach, typical of so many Christian groups, usually reflects a lack of awareness of how to read the books of the Bible in context. This approach is particularly typical of the "Left Behind" approach to prophecy, which mixes words from various contexts all over the Bible into a coherent paradigm.

The original meaning of an individual book is of course what the words of that book meant when the book was produced. A contextual reading of 1 Thessalonians thus asks what situation Paul was in when he wrote it, what the words likely meant in Paul's mind, and what the words likely meant in the minds of the Thessalonians.

This is of course how the words "want" to be read. Perhaps it is valid to read them in terms of God's message for us, perhaps in fact that is what it means to consider them Scripture (I am now alluding to a post-modern way of using Scripture). But this is not how the words themselves "want" to be read--it is not what Jesus, Paul, or the other authors understood their words to mean. When 2 Thessalonians 2 says, "Didn't I tell you these things when I was with you," it clearly wants us to take the I as the apostle Paul and the you as the Thessalonians. Paul did not tell anyone alive the things to which these words refer.

In my second post, I will explore ways in which the group in question infuses the words of the Bible with the definitions of their "tradition" and how they "glue" words from one context to words from other contexts. All of these operations take place outside the text and the resultant meanings are distinct from the original meanings of the text. From a post-modern perspective, however, these observations in themselves do not necessarily mean the group is wrong. They can modify their paradigm by claiming to have the correct spiritual interpretation of the text. At the moment, however, these processes take place on a pre-modern plane. That is, the group does not realize they are not reading the words with the meanings Jesus, Paul, or the other New Testament authors understood the words to have.