The Torah, Interpretation and the Perverse Mind

Having studied Scripture and the history of the Christian church for many years, I have concluded that one of the most remarkable changes among Christians involves the Hebrew Scriptures (what Christians have long called the Old Testament). In the earliest centuries the Hebrew Scriptures, specifically through the medium of the Septuagint (a clunky and more literal translation into Greek), were the primary source for study and explanation of the meaning of the Gospel. They asserted that the Gospel explained the meaning of the Scriptures and the Scriptures bore witness to the Messiah, the Lord Jesus.

The study and use of the Old Testament, along with most of the New Testament documents, as Scripture, became normative at a very early date after the resurrection of the Lord. (I would argue that this was the case certainly by the end of the 1^st century or at the latest into the 2^nd century.) This perspective was important because they took the Lord’s words in Matthew 5:17-20 seriously. I do not think that the same could be said of us modern Christians today.

The Lord stated, when citing a cryptic text from Psalms in defense of his own assertion to be God’s Son (see John 10:34; Psalm 82:6), stated that “the scripture cannot be annulled” (John 10:35, NRSV). This is a core principle which is repeatedly affirmed in the Word of God. For example, in Deuteronomy, Moses warned,

“Now, oh Israel, listen to the statutes and the judgments which I am teaching you to perform, so that you may live and go in and take possession of the land which the LORD, the God of your fathers, is giving you. You shall not add to the word which I am commanding you, nor take away from it, that you may keep the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you.” (4:1-2, NASBU; see also 12:32)

I think it is remarkable that what Moses warned against is exactly what the Lord asserted that the Jewish teachers and religious leaders of his own day had done with the Torah. Texts from Scripture like this one (see also Proverbs 30:5-6; 1 Corinthians 4:6) state the same principle of the unity and authority of Scripture, which our Lord affirmed. We modern people feel rather free to selectively ignore whole sections of the Bible. And I am not merely speaking of the average Christian who intentionally only reads the parts of Scripture that are more familiar or supposedly easier to understand. No, I am referring to leaders—to the pastors and teachers who regularly teach people from the Bible.

The Church leaders up into the modern period, generally took this principle of the unified witness and authority of Scripture seriously. They may have interpreted Scripture in some ways that I would not agree with, or use methods of interpretation that I think are somewhat dubious (particularly allegorical) but nevertheless the whole of it was perceived as having a unified and authoritative main message. They believed that the words of Scriptures were the Word of God and therefore were to be revered, studied and action taken to do what they indicated was God’s will.

“For centuries, it was taken for granted that Scripture spoke with a single theological voice; where there were problems of harmonization, devices such as allegory were employed to get over the difficulty. More recently, theology has become increasingly dissociated from the Bible and has looked for its systematic principle within a philosophical framework. One need only compare Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion with Barth’s Church Dogmatics to realize how true this is. Barth, who claimed to be a biblical theologian, quotes or uses Scripture only very sparingly in his great work, whereas Calvin saw his systematics as intimately connected with his whole practice of biblical exegesis.” (Gerald Bray, Biblical Interpretation [IVP:1996], p.42)

Without this core conviction of a unifying set of principle doctrines which are set forth in Scripture how can anyone make sense all the material in the various books of the Bible? How can the Bible become a source for answering questions about doctrine and providing guidance for how to practice a truly “good life”? Further, the core affirmation that Scripture is “God-(out)breathed” and thus a mighty tool for teaching, reproving, correcting and training men and woman in righteousness (2 Timothy 3:16) makes little or no sense.

Either we modern Christians have departed from the tradition of the Christian church in regard to the authority and doctrines of Scripture or the Christian tradition has fundamentally misunderstood the purpose of the Bible. I am more fully convinced that the modern disregard for Scripture is symptomatic of a more basic unbelief in revelation. And that religious people who give lip service to the Bible are very much like the Pharisees and Temple leadership (Sadducees) in the Jesus’ time. They are lawless people who use the Bible as they please but do not believe its message nor do they intend to submit their lives to the God who is described in its pages.

The Jewish people called the Scriptures the “Torah”—that is, the instruction or teaching. The prophets persistently called them to listen to it and heed its message by obeying God’s commands and instructions. The prophets and the righteous men and women among the people (and occasionally among the leaders) did seek to understand the Torah and put into practice the commandments through the acquisition of wisdom. Others did not and God’s prophets warned them that God knew the perversity of their hearts and would not accept their sacrifices and religious acts.

I would contend that all errors and heresy are borne from choices to depart from the plain instruction of the Word of God. When we are confronted with the truth of the Word and we understand it properly we have one of two choices: Either we submit to it and conform our lives to that instruction or we seek to find ways to convince ourselves and others that it must mean something different—something more in line with what we already believe. This situation is different from genuine questions about the meaning of a specific passage(s) and the need to wrestle with how to best interpret Scripture.

Peter addressed a case in point by warning his readers against certain false teachers who live according to their own desires, ignoring truth revealed in Scripture even while they present themselves as Christian teachers (see 2 Peter 2). Acting from motives of greed they sought to “exploit” them “with deceptive words,” speaking “bombastic nonsense,” and they enticed people who had “just escaped from those who live in error. They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption; for people are slaves to whatever masters them.” (2 Peter 2:3, 18-19)

He refers to these men again, in an aside comment related to select affirmations in Paul’s letters (2 Peter 3:14-16). Namely, that Paul’s writing is sometimes “hard to understand” and that these men, being “ignorant and unstable [they] twist [or literally from Greek ‘torture’]” the meaning of Paul’s letters, “as they do the other scriptures. You therefore, beloved, since you are forewarned, beware that you are not carried away with the error of the lawless and lose your own stability.” (2 Peter 3:16-17, NRSV) They had intentionally manipulated the meaning of Scripture in order to give cover for, and give the appearance of legitimacy to, their own teaching and manner of life which they wanted others to adopt for themselves.

How could they do this? These men had perverse minds much like many modern people today—and many people who claim the name of Christ and identify as Christians. The true test for genuine faith in God revealed in Scripture is a sound mind and single-minded desire to know and please the Lord Jesus. God will not be mocked nor will he play games with us. He will show himself to a person according to that person’s character (see Psalms 18:25-27). If a person does not want to know the truth about the living God then he will judge him or her accordingly and they will perish in their own perversity of mind.

In a similar way, the person’s choices about how to perceive reality will color then how he or she interprets the word of God. No matter what the plain meaning of the biblical text(s) may be, this concern is not crucial to people who have already decided what is real for them. They will make the biblical text, as well as any other evidence gathered in other ways regarding God’s will for us, fit their own corrupt perspective of the world and themselves (Titus 1:15).

As the Scripture says again and again, God sees into the depths of the human heart and knocks to get access there so he can transform it with his power and love. To those who open to him he makes them pure and thus they can rightly perceive the beauty, truth and goodness in God and what he intends to make of his creation. People like this are by known by God and he will give them their due reward.