How Catholics Should Read the Bible
"Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ" (St. Jerome).
Lectio Divina
Slow, thoughtful, prayerful, imaginative reading of the Bible.
Enter the Scriptures
Ignatian meditation: Place yourself in the scene.
Think with the Church
Stay within the bounds of dogma
The Creeds of the Church tell us how to interpret the Scriptures.
- Original Sin (requires monogenism).
- Authenticity of the Old Covenant (Abraham--Moses--David--prophets).
- Immaculate Conception of Mary in her mother's womb through the ordinary act of marriage (celebrated on December 8).
- Virginal Conception of Jesus in Mary's womb by the power of the Holy Spirit (celebrated on March 25).
- Perpetual Virginity of Mary.
- Divinity of Jesus: Trinity and Incarnation.
- Death and resurrection of Jesus.
- The foundation of the sacraments:
- Eucharist
- Marriage
- Reconciliation
- The infallibility of the Church.
- Jesus will come in glory to judge the living and the dead.
Interpret the Old Testament in the light of the New
De-literalization of the Old Testament
Typological Interpretation
Re-definition of terms
To be a Christian is to take the death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus into glory as THE key to understanding what God was accomplishing in the Old Covenant. On the basis of what Jesus did, everything that came before Him looks entirely different from the way it did to those who did not know about His saving action. The words are the same but the meanings are dramatically different.
| Term | Old Covenant | New Covenant |
|---|---|---|
| Christ | A human being anointed with oil. | God, the Son, Incarnate as true man, anointed with the Holy Spirit. |
| King | Human being with a harem and children. | God, the Son, Incarnate as true man. |
| Kingdom | Geographic territory; external to us. | Spiritual relationship. |
| Enemy | Human beings. | Sin and death. |
| Victory | Achieved by wounding and killing human beings. | Achieved by accepting death on the Cross. |
| Temple | Built of rock in one location in one Holy Land. | Built of "living stones" and accessible everywhere. |
| Sacrifice | Killing and burning animals. | Joining Jesus in renewing His self-offering to the Father. |
| Sin | "Missing the mark." Remedied by animal sacrifice. | "Alienation from God." Cannot be remedied by the actions of sinners. |
Primacy of Tradition
Both the Scriptures of the Old Covenant (a.k.a. the Old Testament) and the Scriptures of the New Covenant (a.k.a. the New Testament) developed over the course of time out of a living tradition.
In neither case did the development of written expressions of the faith of the People of God annihilate the existence of the faith community. The Scriptures came out of a pre-existing community, were recognized as inspired by that community, and were interpreted and used used by that community to sustain the community.
Development of the Old Covenant
God did not give Abraham, our father in faith Rom 4:16-17), the books of the Old Testament and command him to read, interpret, and obey the Scriptures. He gave Abraham a covenant, a committed personal relationship.
The children of Abraham inherited God's covenant blessings and promises in unwritten form for many generations. We don't know exactly when the first Scriptures of the Old Covenant were written. It seems likely to me that the assembling of the Old Testament library began with Moses during the Exodus, which would be four or five hundred years after Abraham's covenant with God. The Psalms probably began to develop around that same time with hymns of petition, praise, and thanksgiving related to the Exodus and conquest of the land God had promised to Abraham centuries before.
Once the Kingdom of Israel was established under David (circa 1010-970 BC) and the Temple was built under Solomon (circa 970-930 BC), there were ample human, financial, and technical resources available to compose, edit, and copy the scrolls that we Christians now call "the Old Testament" (TNK or LXX to the Jews).
Development of the New Covenant
When Jesus ascended into Heaven, He left a Body, not a "book."
The Church--and her Scriptures--developed from the hearts and minds of the Body of Christ as they handed on to the next generation what had been handed on to them (1 Cor 15:3-4).
Tradition came first and never died out, even though some aspects of it were faithfully expressed in the Scriptures that emerged from the life of the Body. Putting some aspects of the faith into writing never killed the Body of Christ. At no time in history has it been necessary to re-create the living Body of Christ from the disembodied Word of God. Paul speaks of preachers carrying the Word of Christ to the world, not a "book."
- How can they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe in him of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone to preach? And how can people preach unless they are sent? As it is written, "How beautiful are the feet of those who bring (the) good news!" But not everyone has heeded the good news; for Isaiah says, "Lord, who has believed what was heard from us?" Thus faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes through the word of Christ. But I ask, did they not hear? Certainly they did; for "Their voice has gone forth to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world." (Rom 10:14-18)
Divino Afflante Spiritu
Divino Afflante Spiritu (On Promoting Biblical Studies)--Pope Pius XII, 1943.
Vatican II
- "Dei Verbum: Dogmatic Constitution on Revelation" (1965).
- 7. ... But in order to keep the Gospel forever whole and alive within the Church, the Apostles left bishops as their successors, "handing over" to them "the authority to teach in their own place."[1] This sacred tradition, therefore, and Sacred Scripture of both the Old and New Testaments are like a mirror in which the pilgrim Church on earth looks at God, from whom she has received everything, until she is brought finally to see Him as He is, face to face (see 1 John 3:2).
- 8. And so the apostolic preaching, which is expressed in a special way in the inspired books, was to be preserved by an unending succession of preachers until the end of time. Therefore the Apostles, handing on what they themselves had received, warn the faithful to hold fast to the traditions which they have learned either by word of mouth or by letter (see 2 Thess. 2:15), and to fight in defense of the faith handed on once and for all (see Jude 1:3)[2] Now what was handed on by the Apostles includes everything which contributes toward the holiness of life and increase in faith of the peoples of God; and so the Church, in her teaching, life and worship, perpetuates and hands on to all generations all that she herself is, all that she believes.
- Notes on Dei Verbum
Catechism of the Catholic Church
- "The Transmission of Divine Revelation" (§74-100).
- "Sacred Scripture" (§101-141).
Verbum Domini
Verbum Domini--2010 Apostolic Exhortation by Bendedict XVI.
"Here we can point to a fundamental criterion of biblical hermeneutics: the primary setting for scriptural interpretation is the life of the Church. This is not to uphold the ecclesial context as an extrinsic rule to which exegetes must submit, but rather is something demanded by the very nature of the Scriptures and the way they gradually came into being" (§27).
"It is the faith of the Church that recognizes in the Bible the word of God; as Saint Augustine memorably put it: "I would not believe the Gospel, had not the authority of the Catholic Church led me to do so" (§27; Contra epistulam Manichaei quam vocant fundamenti, V, 6: PL 42, 176).
Studying the Scriptures
One of the categories on this wiki is "Scripture Studies." These are notes I have made for myself to get ready for or else to follow up on questions asked on the show.
- The Canon (official list of books) of the Bible
- A criticism of Martin Luther's theory of Sola scriptura.
- "Bible" in the Bible
- Transliteration
Some favorite verses
- "In times past, God spoke in partial and various ways to our ancestors through the prophets; in these last days, he spoke to us through a son, whom he made heir of all things and through whom he created the universe, who is the refulgence of his glory, the very imprint of his being, and who sustains all things by his mighty word. When he had accomplished purification from sins, he took his seat at the right hand of the Majesty on high, as far superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs" (Heb 1:1-4).
- "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be. What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it" (Jn 1:1-4).
Some favorite characters
| Person(s) | Status |
|---|---|
| Adam and Eve | Biologically and theologically necessary. The Church teaches that all human beings are descended from an original pair who also plunged all of us into Original Sin (monogenism). |
| Nephilim | Biologically and theologically impossible. Angels have no power to impregnate human beings. |
| Noah | Legendary. We are not obliged to believe the details of the Noah story at the literal level. The meaning of the story is that sin cannot be eradicated by killing sinners; sin survived the flood. |
| Jonah and the Big Fish | Theological fiction. The whole point of the book is given in the last verse; it is not about miraculous fish but about how we should think about our enemies. |
| Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob | Essentially historical and not inherently implausible; theologically significant. Our faith comes from Abraham's covenant with God. |
| Moses | Historical. There is hyperbole in the account of the Exodus, but Moses left an indelible mark on the people of Israel. The best archeological evidence of the reality of Moses is the nature of Torah. |