Ethos Statement on Hermeneutics & Eschatology
Republished with permission (and unedited) from Central Baptist Theological Seminary. (The document posted at Central’s website in August of 2010.)
Hermeneutics and Eschatology
All faculty at Central Baptist Theological Seminary of Minneapolis affirm a hermeneutical system that interprets all Scripture with a consistently literal or normal method. We also affirm the paradigm of grammatical, contextual, theological, historical exegesis with a view to discerning authorial intent.
Dual Hermeneutics
We all hold that the same hermeneutical principles must govern the interpretation of both testaments. We reject any approach that asserts, for example, that Old Testament prophecies concerning the first advent, life, ministry, death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Christ should be interpreted differently from Old Testament prophecies concerning the second advent and the earthly rule and reign of Christ. There is no New Testament hermeneutic that supersedes an Old Testament hermeneutic.
Typology
We all believe that points of correspondence exist between the Old and New Testaments. Some of us limit this correspondence to correlation that is explicit in the text. Others assert a correlation that seems more textually implicit, understanding some points of correspondence to expand or enhance the earlier revelation on which they were based.
Multiple Fulfillments
In our commitment to literal interpretation, we encounter some New Testament passages whose connection to Old Testament antecedents is less obvious. Some passages might be taken to imply a fulfillment of items from Old Testament prophecies that cannot readily be found in the language of the prophecies themselves. Some of us understand those New Testament passages to be something other than actual fulfillments, e.g., analogies. Others of us understand that the New Testament author has, in fact, seen a genuine fulfillment, elements of which expand the meaning of the original prophecy.
Dual Authorship
We all believe that at least two participants were involved in the writing of any biblical autograph: a human agent and God. Some of us frame our understanding of this relationship by focusing on the “unitary” nature of this authorship: a confluence or concurrence in divine-human authorship in such a way that just as the human author’s wording was the very wording of God (no more or no less), even so the human author’s meaning is the very meaning of God (no more or no less). Others of us frame our understanding of this relationship more in view of the “binary” nature of this authorship: a cooperation of divine-human authorship in such a way that although the human author’s words were the very words of God (no more or no less), the meaning of the divine author might in some way be found fuller, heightened, or more expansive in later revelation. In both cases, we reject the notion that New Testament interpreters are adding meaning that is not somehow present in the Old Testament texts.
Inaugurated Eschatology
We all recognize that major eschatological prophecies and promises made to national Israel have not yet been fulfilled in the terms established within the prophecies. We further believe that the veracity of God demands the complete fulfillment of all of His promises made to Israel as a national, political entity. Such belief is grounded in the literal or normal interpretation of the covenants, promises, and prophecies that originated in God concerning Israel. Some of us affirm that some eschatological promises made to Israel in the Old Testament have been inaugurated in the present dispensation and yet await complete fulfillment in the future. All of us reject any application of the hermeneutic of inaugurated eschatology that would obliterate the distinction between Israel and the church and negate the literal, eschatological consummation of Old Testament promises and prophecies.
We all affirm belief in a future earthly reign of Christ in literal fulfillment of all biblical prophecies and promises regarding the eschatological kingdom. We also all affirm that the reign of Christ will be preceded by Daniel’s seventieth week, a time of tribulation, and that all Church saints are promised exemption from this tribulation through a rapture that will occur before its beginning. Furthermore, we reject any approach that replaces the gospel of personal salvation with the social benefits of the kingdom during the present age, or any approach that replaces personal evangelism with social activity.
- 11 views
So if I don’t interpret the Bible exactly like you do, I’m excising passages from Scripture? Who died and made you King?
Sorry to react this way but I was quite taken back when I came to that response.
I still plan to interact with your Hosea 11 bit, but let me calm down a bit first.
Striving for the unity of the faith, for the glory of God ~ Eph. 4:3, 13; Rom. 15:5-7 I blog at Fundamentally Reformed. Follow me on Twitter.
[G. N. Barkman]Well, I wanted to make a point. And my basic point is that based on your hermeneutics you don’t need Mal. 4:1-6 anymore in your Bible because you interpret Luke 1:16-17 as the complete filter through which that passage is now to be understood. Your theology would not be changed a whit if that passage were removed from your Bible.
Wow! Something must have touched a tender nerve. I doubt that we can profitably continue this further, as you appear to be so emotionally bound by your position that you are unable to discuss dispassionately.
But “emotionally bound to my position…” Hasn’t that sort of been your charge from the beginning. My hermeneutics are front-loaded so I have blinders to the NT quotes of the OT….I have “locked in my OT interpretation before factoring in the NT,… I am “setting my interpretations in stone before I get to the NT,”… I am assuming my hermeneutics are inspired” etc.
And all of this because…? Because I hold to a single meaning for each passage of Scripture independent of other passages, even those they quote?
I’m not emotionally bound, but I don’t put a premium on dispassion, either.
As for the,
Hurling insults at godly and thoughtful exegetescomment, who are you talking about?
If you are saying I’m hurling insults at covenantalists, I’m sorry, but you still miss the mark. What I said was “covenantalist hermeneutics can’t deal with the details of a prophecy.” And I’m a-standing by it.
Regarding Hos. 11:1, you said the following:
They were writing Scripture. Nobody ever read “out of Egypt have I called my son” prior to the apostles and recognized it as a messianic prophecy. It took an apostle with the gift of prophecy to be led by the Holy Spirit to write that.John Sailhamer has pointed out that this is not entirely accurate. He brought out (in his latest book, The Meaning of the Pentateuch and probably earlier works) that Malachi is actually using earlier Scripture at this point.
He is alluding to the following texts:
How lovely are your tents, O Jacob,What’s interesting is that Numb. 23 views Israel in a corporate / plural sense, Numb. 24 views Israel in an individual / singular sense.
your encampments, O Israel!…
God brings him out of Egypt
and is for him like the horns of the wild ox;
he shall eat up the nations, his adversaries,
and shall break their bones in pieces
and pierce them through with his arrows.
He crouched, he lay down like a lion
and like a lioness; who will rouse him up?
Blessed are those who bless you,
and cursed are those who curse you.
(Numb. 24:5, 8-9)
He has not beheld misfortune in Jacob,
nor has he seen trouble in Israel.
The LORD their God is with them,
and the shout of a king is among them.
God brings them out of Egypt
and is for them like the horns of the wild ox.
For there is no enchantment against Jacob,
no divination against Israel;
now it shall be said of Jacob and Israel,
‘What has God wrought!’
Behold, a people! As a lioness it rises up
and as a lion it lifts itself;
it does not lie down until it has devoured the prey
and drunk the blood of the slain.”
(Numb. 23:21-24)
Both of these texts refer back to Gen. 49:
Judah, your brothers shall praise you;This is a messianic prophecy about the coming “Lion of Judah”. The author of the Pentateuch draws connections between this large poem in Gen. 49 and the two in Numbers. And God’s bringing Israel out of Egypt is seen in a coorporate sense but also a singular sense. Singular, Sailhamer argues, in the sense of the ideal messianic ruler to come from Israel.
your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies;
your father’s sons shall bow down before you.
Judah is a lion’s cub;
from the prey, my son, you have gone up.
He stooped down; he crouched as a lion
and as a lioness; who dares rouse him?
The scepter shall not depart from Judah,
nor the ruler’s staff) from between his feet,
until tribute comes to him;
and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples.
Binding his foal to the vine
and his donkey’s colt to the choice vine,
he has washed his garments in wine
and his vesture in the blood of grapes.
His eyes are darker than wine,
and his teeth whiter than milk.
Hosea then uses the individualist concept of Israel as God’s son, also hearkening to the “Son” language used in Psalm 2 and 2 Samuel 7. Hosea is intentionally bringing in the messianic idea here in 11:1 and elsewhere in Hosea (as Sailhamer brought out, and I don’t have my copy handy right now). Coorporately Israel had failed and was being judged, but there is still hope as Israel’s being called God’s son, hearkens to the Davidic and messianic prophecies about this ruler who would right the wrongs and bring lasting hope.
Matthew then presents Jesus as the ideal Israel who has his life threatened as a child (just like Moses and the babies with him of that day), is brought out of Egypt, endures temptation in the wilderness, and then gives Law from a mountain top (sermon on the Mount). He also chooses twelve disciples (like the twelve tribes). This is obviously just a picturesque way of looking at it. But the thought of connecting Israel with the Messiah as the ideal representative of Israel, is inherent in Hosea and other passages in the OT’s own understanding and interpretation of itself.
Striving for the unity of the faith, for the glory of God ~ Eph. 4:3, 13; Rom. 15:5-7 I blog at Fundamentally Reformed. Follow me on Twitter.
[Ted Bigelow] But “emotionally bound to my position…” Hasn’t that sort of been your charge from the beginning. My hermeneutics are front-loaded so I have blinders to the NT quotes of the OT….I have “locked in my OT interpretation before factoring in the NT,… I am “setting my interpretations in stone before I get to the NT,”… I am assuming my hermeneutics are inspired” etc.Ted,
And all of this because…? Because I hold to a single meaning for each passage of Scripture independent of other passages, even those they quote?
I’m not emotionally bound, but I don’t put a premium on dispassion, either.
You responded to GNB’s comments about this post first. It isn’t as if you were just minding your own business and some guy comes on ripping up your position. You took issue with his position.
From my outside perspective, things were going along okay, with GN Barkman being very careful and correcting himself and interacting humbly and then POW out of nowhere you come in and insinuate that he’s chopping verses out of the Bible. You then chide him for not getting what you and others had said. That’s a tad bit passionate and arrogant. And in my opinion it isn’t fitting with the kind of intramural, brotherly discussion that we have going on here.
Striving for the unity of the faith, for the glory of God ~ Eph. 4:3, 13; Rom. 15:5-7 I blog at Fundamentally Reformed. Follow me on Twitter.
To step away from NT-OT questions, think of the parables. Jesus a few times gives us a model of how to interpret parables. Now it is in vogue today to say that parables make one main point. They have a shock and awe affect and aim for one punchline. Now how do you conclude that this is the case? Scientific Research! Rationalistic research into 1st century techniques.
Now what does Jesus do, though? He says that parables are designed to keep people from hearing. He says that only those with spiritual ears will hear them. And then in a few cases he gives us a model for how to interpret them. Guess what? They have more than one main point.
Now we could say, well this isn’t a model. We can only interpret those few parables that Jesus interprets for us explicitly, using His model. Everything else, we are left to the hermeneutical methods which we think will keep us objective and scientific. Those methods which are rationalistic and downplay the role of Spirit-illumination.
But Jesus explicitly says, the following:
And he said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables? (Mark 4:13Isn’t he then giving us a model?
The hermeneutical methods employed to keep things literal and plain and natural, result in a model where anyone, spiritual or unspiritual, saved or unsaved, can still scientifically discover the one true meaning. Yet 1 Cor. 2:14 tells us that isn’t the case. Something spiritual is going on in the Text. We need to realize that we have been affected by the rationalistic spirit.
I contend that Just as we are given a model in how to interpret the parables, we are given a model for how to interpret the OT.
Any method of interpretation is subject to human error. And interpretations are inherently human, it is the area where faulty man interacts with perfect Scripture. This is why the apostle’s view of the OT is so helpful to us.
We weren’t given a hermeneutics book authored by God. But as we see the OT Scripture use the OT Scripture and the NT Scripture interact with the OT Scripture, this is all meant for our learning and growth in understanding. To say otherwise and to say it dogmatically is to stand things upside down. Where is the 100% certainty you have in making that declaration? I at least have the Scriptural use of the OT by NT authors to stand on. And the history of the Church and how it has interpreted Scripture prior to the era of the enlightenment favors my view too.
Striving for the unity of the faith, for the glory of God ~ Eph. 4:3, 13; Rom. 15:5-7 I blog at Fundamentally Reformed. Follow me on Twitter.
[Bob Hayton] John Sailhamer has pointed out that this is not entirely accurate. He brought out (in his latest book, The Meaning of the Pentateuch and probably earlier works) that Malachi is actually using earlier Scripture at this point….Very cool. I would like to get my hands on that. I think what Sailhammer is trying to do is noble.
By way of anecdote…. A friend of mine was trying to get his PhD in hermeneutics from Westminster East, and he and the professor, who is no longer teaching there (you may know who) came to logger heads on this text - Mat. 2:15 and Hos. 11:1. It boiled down to whether Matthew was inspired, or merely using ancient hermeneutic techniques of Jewish scribes available to anyone. Well, the kerfuffle held up my friend’s PhD for years. He eventually got it, and now teaches at a seminary in CA.
Quick question - does Sailhammer claim certainty, or is he more cautious - i.e., “Malachi may have been alluding to Numbers and Genesis? He doesn’t mention this connection in his fine book, The Pentateuch as Narrative, but that is a 1992 print.
BTW, Sailhammer’s approach is a new tack, at least to me. The old tack was to find Hosea reaching back to “Israel is My son, My firstborn” (Exo. 4:22). See the singular/corporate emphasis there too.
This Exodus text was likewise used to provide a rationale for how Matthew saw in the “son” of Hosea 11:1 not only Israel, but a further reference to Jesus Christ. However, as I pointed out earlier in the thread, if we go that way, what do we say about Hos. 11:2? If 11:1 contained a double reference to both Israel and the Christ, wasn’t 11:2 at least slightly confusing to every OT reader? In fact, let me go a step further. Wouldn’t it completely throw him off the trail when he reads of a perfect Israelite son in 11:1, but who, in 11:2, is sacrificing to the Baals? I know I would have been thrown off had I even considered 11:1 as Messianic.
Matthew then presents Jesus as the ideal Israel who has his life threatened as a child (just like Moses and the babies with him of that day), is brought out of Egypt, endures temptation in the wilderness, and then gives Law from a mountain top (sermon on the Mount). He also chooses twelve disciples (like the twelve tribes). This is obviously just a picturesque way of looking at it. But the thought of connecting Israel with the Messiah as the ideal representative of Israel, is inherent in Hosea and other passages in the OT’s own understanding and interpretation of itself.Thanks, I so agree with that interpretation of Mat. 2:15 (see my post #34), but not so in Hos. 11:1. But I love what Sailhammer’s trying to do - ground Hosea 11:1 in antecedent revelation. Call me stubborn. And for the connection of the 12 apostles and the 12 tribes - totally - Mat. 19:28.
Thanks.
Thanks for interacting, and I appreciate the level of your agreement. Obviously we won’t see eye to eye on this exactly, but hopefully we can build on the interpretations of others and do our best according to our conscience to follow what we believe is being taught in Scripture.
I’ll try to look up the relevant passage in Sailhamer’s work on this if I have time tonight, or else later this weekend. I believe it fits with so many other things he’s explaining about the Pentateuch and it follows with a stylistic way in which previous revelation is cited and alluded to in other Jewish writings and Scriptures. He probably maintains some tenuousness though (and certainly we all should always allow for that).
I am sure he brings up Ex. 4 too, now that you mention it.
If you get your hands on it, you’ll have to be prepared to grip it! It’s 615 pages long or so. But I loved every minute spent in the book (I hadn’t been all that exposed to Sailhamer before, so afterward I went out and got his commentary on the Pentateuch too).
Striving for the unity of the faith, for the glory of God ~ Eph. 4:3, 13; Rom. 15:5-7 I blog at Fundamentally Reformed. Follow me on Twitter.
Looking back on one of my posts I see where I came down too strong and took the conversation away from a love. I’m thinking of #43.
I don’t think anything badly about you and would hate to know I hurt you, so please forgive me for the stridency in my words.
Thanks.
I planned to opt out of this thread, as your diatribe in post #43 indicated that you were not open to civil discussion. However, perhaps I will try one more time.
To say that my understanding of Malachi 4, based upon the inspired statements of the angel in Luke 1:16,17 means that I have cut Malachi 4 out of the Bible (or might as well do so)strikes me as sheer bombast.
Just because I don’t think Malachi 4 says what you believe it says doesn’t mean I wish to cut it out of the Bible. On the contrary, I greatly value the insight it gives me into how NT writers interpreted OT prophecies. Without it, I would be short one very valuable example of this important insight. Furthermore, there are several elements in Malachi 4 which are not mentioned in Luke 1, which give valuable, inspired revelation. I value those statements as much as you do. When I couple Malachi 4 with other OT prophecies quoated by inspired NT writers, I begin to see a line of OT interpretation that escaped me until I studied them in the light of the NT.
Your charge about my cutting Malachi 4 out of the Bible sounds somewhat similar to the kinds of statements KJV-only proponents make to those who do not accept their position. It smacks of emotional diatribe rather than thoughtful reasoning and cordial response. I trust this is not characteristic of the manner you normally use in discussions with brethren who sincerely and thoughtfully hold positions different from your own. I will be happy to believe it is an anomaly, unless you indicate otherwise.
Cordially,
Greg
G. N. Barkman
Blessings in Christ,
Bob
Striving for the unity of the faith, for the glory of God ~ Eph. 4:3, 13; Rom. 15:5-7 I blog at Fundamentally Reformed. Follow me on Twitter.
I wrote my last post, # 55, before your # 54 appeared, even though you wrote yours first. Sorry if it you thought I was simply ignoring you.
Thanks for the apology. I am happy to accept. I’ve done similar and worse enough times to know my own need for forgiveness. It’s easy to get overwrought in the heat of debate.
I hope you sleep well tonight, and have a great day tomorrow.
Warm regards,
Greg
G. N. Barkman
Sorry if you misunderstood — I was actually defending you, even if it didn’t come out that way. My use of “algebra” instead of logic was an attempt, no matter how lame, to respond to Greg’s use of the word, and show why it didn’t work exactly the way he was trying to use it.
I thought about getting into logic, and necessary and sufficient conditions, but I realized that would just sound overwrought and pedantic, not to mention way off the topic of hermeneutics, so I just tried to explain briefly. Obviously, I was still a bit too brief. Since I teach critical thinking to my kids as part of homeschool, I probably get way too interested in discussions about logic.
Dave Barnhart
I knew that your algebra explanation was in support of Aaron, and not in support of my position. I thought it was very clear, and reflects perfectly my understanding of algebra, limited and rusty as it is after all these years, and is also correct as a matter of logic. Your conclusion, in my opnion, is absolutely correct.
It seems to me that this does help to support my understanding of the Malachi 4/Luke 1 relationship. If, according to logic Luke 1 means that John may be Elijah, even though it is not enough evidence to certify this conclusively. Then Jesus teaches his disciples that John is Elijah (Matthews 17:10-13), adding another piece of evidence, it becomes much harder to ignore the accumulated evidence. Luke 1,says John may be Elijah. Matthew 17, says John is Elijah. I don’t know how to add that to the algebra without appending a second formula, but it sure seems convincing to me.
G. N. Barkman
Discussion