The Literal Sense of Scripture, Part 3

We continue our look at this chapter from MAKING SENSES OUT OF SCRIPTURE:

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The necessity for proper exegesis and the use of sound rules of interpretation becomes even clearer when we confront the fact that we are reading an ancient text from another culture written in a language foreign to the vast majority of us. The principal danger of Bible study is not that we will be mystified by the text, but that we will think we understand the text in the very act of radically misreading it. A woman I know once took great offense at the story of Tobit because her casual reading of it convinced her it was demonic. Why? Because the angel Raphael appears in the story under a false identity. Angels who lie are demons, she reasoned. So there you are.

This is, however, to badly misunderstand the kind of story Tobit is. The author does not mean (nor does his original audience understand him to mean) “Angels lie. So should you.” On the contrary, Tobit is a classic example of an “entertaining angels unaware” story (see Hebrews 13:2). We readers know who Raphael is all along. When Tobit cries out to God for help, God immediately answers him by sending Raphael. But, as is often the case, God’s deliverance is not understood at first. Raphael introduces himself as “Azariah” (which means “Yahweh helps”). By this device, the author is saying (with a nudge and a wink) “Psst! Audience! Get it?” And we, of course, do get it (particularly if we are listening to the story in the original Hebrew.) Indeed, by using the name “Yahweh helps”, Raphael is not so much using an alias as revealing the deepest truth about who God is and why he is here. It is that truth and not any detail about history or geography or the fun of lying that the author of Tobit aims to tell.

That said, it is necessary to add that while ancient writers of fiction may not be interested in such matters, it is nonetheless necessary for modern students of Scripture to pay attention (as much as the data permits) to the historical, geographical, ethnic, and linguistic circumstances behind the composition of a particular book. So, for instance, it is worth knowing that the gospel of Matthew was composed primarily for a Jewish audience. This would explain why Matthew makes far more frequent allusion to the Old Testament than the other gospels: he is at particular pains to show his Jewish audience that Jesus fulfils their Scripture. Matthew is aware of the connections between the Old and New Covenants and, like much of the New Testament, is trying to make these connections clear to his audience.

This explains why the Church urges us to pay attention to the “inner unity” of Scripture. That is, there is an interplay of ideas, concepts, historical references, and terminology between the various authors of Scripture that, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, creates a certain unity of outlook among authors separated by 1,600 years, several different languages, and various other circumstances. We should pay close attention when one inspired author cites another. We should also pay attention when an inspired author cites an uninspired author. Note, for example, that Luke is primarily writing for a cultured Greek-speaking Gentile audience that was also familiar with Judaism before becoming Christian, so he not only alludes to the Old Testament, he records Paul quoting pagan Greek poetry.

Likewise, in the Hebrew Scriptures, a knowledge of historical circumstances behind the composition of a given book is critical. If we do not know that the prophecies of Jeremiah concern the fate of the Jews in the years leading up to the Babylonian Captivity, we simply cannot understand what Jeremiah is about. It would be like reading a book about Abraham Lincoln’s presidency without knowing anything about the Civil War. In the same way, if we do not know the universal reputation of the Assyrians for their unbelievable brutality and cruelty, much of the impact of the book of Jonah (where God sends a prophet to save these monstrous creatures) is lost on us.

Another problem we can have with Scripture is our failure to understand when a text is using a figure of speech to make a point. Thus, if I tell a native speaker of Chinese “Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched” I am not giving advice on raising poultry, but I do have a literal meaning: “Don’t prematurely assume you know how things will turn out.” My Chinese friend, laboring to discern my literal meaning, might labor a long time if he didn’t happen to know about English slang and colloquialism. A classic example of this same problem is Jesus’ hyperbolic statement, “If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell” (Matthew 5:29-30). Jesus is using a dramatic image to convey the need for a pure heart in following God. The literal meaning of the text is “be pure” not “mutilate yourself.” Yet there have been, from time to time, Christians who have mistaken the metaphor for the literal sense it was intended to convey. And so, we periodically hear reports of overzealous Christians administering various forms of unpleasant self-surgery in what they imagine to be “obedience” to the supposed “literal” sense of this text.

This leads to another important distinction which needs to be made when discussing the literal sense of Scripture. In the verse quoted in the paragraph above, Jesus uses the image of hacking off our hands and gouging out our eyes to graphically describe what it is like to renounce cherished sins. It is therefore tempting for many modern readers to conclude from this that, since the verse is using a metaphor to express the literal sense, therefore Jesus must not be speaking literally when he mentions Hell either.

It is precisely here that we must pause and consider the second point made by the Second Vatican Council.

1. Read the Scripture within “the living tradition of the whole Church.”

That is, we must ask how a given text has been understood over the span of the Church’s history. In the case we happen to be discussing above, that would mean asking whether or not the Church has historically taken the doctrine of Hell literally as well as asking how the rest of Scripture treats the idea of Hell. When we do ask, we find that both Scripture and the subsequent Christian tradition does indeed take the possibility of damnation literally. And we find that the Church does so because our Lord does as well. True, he uses metaphorical language to describe Hell as the place where “their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched” [Mark 9:48]), but the metaphor points to a literal meaning: that is, to eternal damnation. In short, Jesus really does mean to say that it is possible to cut ourselves off from God for all eternity by freely chosen sin. What is metaphorical is not the doctrine of Hell itself but only the images used to describe it. And the images point to something more, not less, horrible than what they depict.

Conversely, when Jesus speaks of Heaven or eternal life or of our “reward” (Matthew 5;12), he really does mean Heaven. And this is verifiable by looking at the unity of Scripture and at the way in which the Church has always traditionally understood Scripture on this point. Heaven is not a metaphor for feeling good about ourselves or accruing the respect of our peers. It means, very literally, everlasting, ecstatic union with God for all eternity. The imagery Scripture uses to describe Heaven (white robes, gold, the new Jerusalem, etc.) is, of course, merely imagery. But, again, the images point to something more, not less, wonderful than what they depict.

All this reminds us again that we are to read Scripture as the written aspect of the total Tradition handed on to us “either by word of mouth or by letter” (2 Thessalonians 2:15). For, as we have seen in Chapter 5, the apostles handed down to the Church, not just a book, but an entirely new Way (Acts 24:14) of life, teaching, and worship. It was in that environment that the Old Testament was interpreted and the New Testament was written and read. Therefore, if we wish to “get” what Scripture is talking about, it is necessary that we too understand and live in that environment of the Body of Christ in unison with the successors of the apostles and Peter and learn to see the light of Scripture through the lens of the overall apostolic Tradition. When we do, this leads to the third instruction the Vatican Council has provided for us.

To be continued tomorrow.