Was There an Apostolic Hermeneutic and Can We Imitate it?

The Heidelblog ^ | 25sep2007 | R. Scott Clark

[Lee N. Field]

Yes and yes. No, it's not in the Scofield Reference or Ryrie Study Bibles.

It seems that some of our dispensational friends have yet to read the memo. See this example sent to me a by a friend. This writer, whom I do not know, claims that folk such as we talk about the apostolic hermeneutic and claim to be able to replicate it but never say what it is.

One throws up one's hands in amazement and wonder.

[Lee N. Field]

It isn't that complicated. Pay close attention here: The Apostolic hermeneutic is to see Christ at the center of all of Scripture. We're not reading him into Scripture. We're refusing to read him out of it. There, I said it. That's what it is. Perhaps the reason our dispensational friends cannot see it is because they are blinded by their rationalism. They know a priori what the organizing principle of Scripture must be and it isn't God the Son, it's national Israel. "What my net can't catch must not be butterflies." Do they ever stop to think that the trouble could be their net? Does it ever trouble them that any system that leads to the conclusion that one day the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29, 36), who is presently ruling the nations (Acts 2:36; Rev 5:12-13) is going to sit on a throne in Jerusalem to watch sinful human priests slaughter lambs? Does it trouble them that, effectively, they agree with the Pharisees? I'm pretty sure I remember J. Dwight Pentecost saying that the Pharisees had the right hermeneutic but they came to the wrong conclusions. Really? Is that what Jesus said about them? "You guys are really close to getting it right if you would just tweak this one little detail?" I think not.

Just so no one thinks that I'm pulling hermeneutical rabbits out of exegetical hats:

Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.”

“Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!” And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them, saying, “To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!” (ESV)

For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our mAmen to God for his glory (2 Cor 1:20)

For Abraham saw my day and rejoiced (John 8:56)

. . .

There were exceptions, however. In the patristic period the Marcionites radically divided Scripture and set the "Old Testament" god against the NT "God." In the medieval church the Albigenses did something similar as did the 16th-century Anabaptists (all of whom denied justification sola gratia, sola fide). Those groups all also had trouble with the humanity of Jesus. What ties those two things together? A Platonizing dualism that sets the material against the physical. This same tendency produces a similar hermeneutic among many American dispensationalists as well. This dualistic tendency explains why dispensationalists refer to the apostolic hermeneutic as "spiritualizing." Yes, rather, but not in the way they think. "Spiritual" in Paul's vocabulary does not mean "immaterial" but "of the Holy Spirit." The same Spirit who inspired Moses also inspired Paul. There is a "Spiritual" interpretation of Holy Scripture that focuses on the God-Man who entered history and around whom all of God's self-revelation is organized.

...

(More good stuff from Scott Clark)

[LadyDoc]

Can I imitate the Apostolic Hermeneutic?
Heck, I can’t even pronounce it.
;-)

[vladimir998]

This is a good start:

http://www.rtforum.org/lt/index.html

[swmobuffalo]

Apparently this fellow has decided to cherry pick scripture regarding God’s promises to Israel and hasn’t a clue as to what is prophesied in the book of Revelation. It appears this is just another in a long line of criticism aimed at dispensationalists.

[LiteKeeper]

They know a priori what the organizing principle of Scripture must be and it isn't God the Son, it's national Israel.

Amazing lack of understanding of dispensational theology!!!

I would challenge the author to document this assertion.

[Alex Murphy]

Ooooh, now you did it! You struck the dispensationalists’ nest!

[Uncle Chip]

There were exceptions, however. In the patristic period the Marcionites radically divided Scripture and set the "Old Testament" god against the NT "God."

And your Preterism doesn't do this as well by allegorizing away the prophets of the "Old Testament"??? Wake up and embrace your father Marcion who wanted a Christianity devoid of the prophets and all things Jewish. Preterism is is his legacy.

[Iscool]

Apparently this fellow has decided to cherry pick scripture regarding God’s promises to Israel and hasn’t a clue as to what is prophesied in the book of Revelation. It appears this is just another in a long line of criticism aimed at dispensationalists.

Ain't that the truth...

[Iscool]

Does it ever trouble them that any system that leads to the conclusion that one day the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29, 36), who is presently ruling the nations (Acts 2:36; Rev 5:12-13) is going to sit on a throne in Jerusalem to watch sinful human priests slaughter lambs?Rev 5:10

If Jesus was ruling the Nations, He would be sitting on the Throne in Jerusalem right now...

So what wrong with killing lambs...They don't make good pets...And they taste fairly good...

[dangus]

The apostle’s hermeneutic: Learn at the foot of their teacher. Modern Protestant hermeneutics seems obsessed with text-proofing, with every generation trying to discern how the previous generation screwed it up. The truth is that the sinfulness of church members has zero to do with some lack of hermeneutical technology.

There was never a Catholic attempt to keep bibles from the laity; the legend derives from Catholic rejection of the King James bible’s heretical interlinear notes. But prior to Guttenberg’s invention, personal interpretation of scripture was simply impossible. Because monks labored away their lifetimes to make the bible as readily available as possible, and because so many men dedicated their lives to the dissemination of the gospel, any layman could seek out a cleric for discussion of the bible, but independent study simply wasn’t practical... unless one was willing to devote their lives to such study, because that was the value of one copy of the bible: a lifetime’s work.

The breviary, ferquently cited by Protestants as evidence that even priests were denied access to the bible, was an attempt to give each priest or brother their own access to meditate on the bible in private. It contained every unique verse in the New Testament, as well as every psalm and the full context Old-Testament passage refered to in the New Testament. These passages were arranged into the various Hours of prayer.

From the founding of the Church in the first century, the Church has arranged scripture passages into a liturgical context; From the 1st century, prayer gatherings have consisted of an act of contrition, bible readings, a homily, and a eucharistic meal. THAT is the hermeneutic of the apostles.

[dangus]

>> Does it ever trouble them that any system that leads to the conclusion that one day the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29, 36), who is presently ruling the nations (Acts 2:36; Rev 5:12-13) is going to sit on a throne in Jerusalem to watch sinful human priests slaughter lambs? <<

No; while animals are still tasty, animal sacrifices are done for. The lamb who is slaughtered is Christ Jesus, who died once for our sins, and whose sacrifice permeates through time, so it is re-presented at Mass, that it may be present in every tabernacle, in every Church throughout the world.

[swmobuffalo]

“There was never a Catholic attempt to keep bibles from the laity”

Is that why they chained them to the pulpit or whatever it is the Catholics call it?

[joebuck]

"There was never a Catholic attempt to keep bibles from the laity"

Tell that to all the Saints who were burned at the stake for translating the Vulgate into the common languages of the people.

[dangus]

>> Tell that to all the Saints who were burned at the stake for translating the Vulgate into the common languages of the people. <<

Uproarious nonsense. Anyone who could read in the middle ages could read Latin. The paucity of English usage is evidenced to this day by the lack of spelling standardization. The Venerable Bede published his New Testament nearly 1,000 years before James. Even the standard English Catholic bible (until Vatican II), the Douay-Rheims was published (1604, 1610) before the King James (1611).

Part of the legend of Catholic opposition to laymen’s bibles comes from England, where, having murdered or surpressed the Catholic priesthood, King James published his own English version, chock full of mistranslations, which just happened to further his own heresies. For instance, “molten idols” was re-translated into “graven images,” so that the king could justifiy seizing and destroying the artwork which had been used to educate illiterates about their own cultural history.

The King James Bible included many interlinear notes with so many anti-Catholic diatribes, that the Catholic Church forbade Catholics to use it.

Meanwhile, they were the Catholics who were tirelessly working to publish the bible, in exile, for fear of their lives.

The charge of bible censorship is especially uproarious, since to this day, Protestants read from redacted bibles.

[dangus]

>> The paucity of English usage is evidenced to this day by the lack of spelling standardization. <<

By which I mean the lack of spelling standardization at the time of King Henry VIII and James.