Zeal For Truth

When it comes to Hermeneutics, too many people believe they’ve got some kind of divine handling on interpreting the Bible. We’ll briefly outline two cases of hermeneutics in order to give evidence that interpreting the Bible is not as simple as some may believe.
Our two cases are the New Testament and the US Constitution. Why the Constitution and not something like Homer’s Odyssey? Simple. Homer’s Odyssey has little value in a person’s life. If something is misinterpreted in it, there are no repercussions or consequences. If we are to treat the NT as something important, then it is not logical to compare it to something unimportant. So now, on to the show!

Dates and Names
The US Constitution was adopted on 17 September 1787 and later ratified by conventions in each state. The autograph (original document) is located in the National Archives and on display still today. It is just over 220 years old. We have records of who attended the Constitutional Convention, as well as personal journals from many of these members concerning the Constitution and its creation. In addition, we have the signatures of all of the delegates.

To be generous, we’ll say that the New Testament was written by various authors between 40 and 120. Our first complete copy is Codex Sinaiticus, which is believed to have been written in the early fourth century with 330 being the earliest date.

Given these dates, there is a 210 year gap between the latest writing date of the NT and the earliest date of CodSin. We do possess fragments that date earlier. P52 is the earliest known fragment and contains just a few words from John 18. It dates to 150. We have no personal journals of the authors of the NT today. In fact, besides Paul, John, and Peter, no other author is named in the NT. This is expected when dealing with a document that is nearly 2000 years old. Compared to other ancient documents, this is at the high end of transmission fidelity.

The Rub
The US Constitution has always been highly debated. This is why we have a judicial system in which judges try to determine the intent of the Constitution. By 1810–25 years after the Constitution was signed–there were differing views on interpreting the Constitution, even by some of the original delegates! Even today, if one would question Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Clarence Thomas about the Constitution, one would find two very different approaches and answers.

The NT has also had a history of being highly debatable, but this has lessened in recent history. Today, all too many people believe that their interpretation of the NT is the only viable interpretation. They ignore (or are completely unaware of) the history of hermeneutics with regards to the NT. So, how is one to interpret the NT and the Bible? That remains to be determined, but asserting that one particular interpretation must be the correct one seems to be the one position that denigrates the NT and the history of Christianity.