Asking good original meaning questions...

I shot this vidcast this morning as the first in a series for my Bible students to review the process of (original meaning) interpretation, how to answer an interpretive question about a biblical text.

In the vidcast, I present five guidelines for good original meaning questions. What is of course interesting is to notice how these guidelines stand in significant tension to reading the text as Christian Scripture. I don't see how we can reject either reading as orthodox Christians. There is no question that these are the guidelines that must be followed if we want to know what the text originally meant. By the same token, we are not limited in any way to their guidance when we then revisit these same texts with Christian eyes.

Good (original meaning) interpretive questions...

1. ... are based on disciplined observation of what the text says rather than on the “filler” we all inevitably bring with us to the text.

2. ... ask what the text meant, not what it means today. For the most part, the original meaning of the text was not addressed to us or our time but to the time of its original audiences.

3. ... make a distinction between biblical narratives and history

a. All history telling involves selection. There is no one to one relationship between any historical narrative and actual history.

b. Ancient history seems to have an artistic and theological element that can make it hard to harmonize biblical narratives.

c. Conflicting narratives should not be forced together. That does violence to both narratives in deference to the new one we create.

d. We miss out on the perspective of the text we are looking at when we are more oriented toward fitting it together with other texts or into our reconstructed historical narrative.

4. ... make a distinction between the perspective of a text and an absolute perspective. Not only were the biblical texts originally written to address particular times and places in particular languages. They did so starting with the paradigms of these audiences, often speaking to particular situations, usually with limited scope, in a “flow” of revelation.

5. ... does not read into one text of Scripture material from another text. Respect each text enough to let it speak for itself without forcing the categories of another text on it.

Good Types of Questions:
1. Questions of Definition
Who? What? Where? When?

2. Why Questions

3. How Questions

4. Significance for Original Meaning Questions