Welcome to season six of Enter the Bible, a podcast where we share "Everything You Wanted to Know about the Bible...but were afraid to ask."
Mary Hinkle Shore is an ordained minister in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and a former professor of New Testament at Luther Seminary. Her work has appeared in The Christian Century, Journal for Preachers, Word & World, and on Working Preacher. She lives in Brevard, North Carolina, and continues to be a frequent speaker at church events.
Today, our theologians will answer the listener-submitted question, "What are the Top 5 Things to Know About the Bible to Interpret it Well?"
Do you have Bible questions you would like answered? Go to our website at https://enterthebible.org/about to get started.
Watch this episode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/T_ijKy8UN7M
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Hello and welcome to another episode of the Enter the Bible podcast, where you can get answers, or at least reflections on everything you wanted to know about the Bible but were afraid to ask. I'm Katie Langston.
And I'm Kathryn Schifferdecker, and today we have Mary Hinkle Shore, who is an old friend of mine. She was a longtime professor at Luther Seminary, New Testament professor, now serving as a chaplain resident at Charles George VA medical Center in Asheville, North Carolina, where she lives, and she very graciously agreed to come and answer some listener questions with us today. So welcome, Mary. Good to see you again. And thanks for being part of this.
Thank you, Kathryn , it's good to be with you both.
Yeah. Yes.
Welcome, welcome.
So the first question we want to address, in this episode, we'll have another one and another episode. But the first one is a question from a listener that we thought was really, uh, really a helpful question. And again, as always, if you have a question you'd like us to address, go to Enter the Bible. org, and send us a question. We read all the questions. We don't have time to answer them all, but we try to pick ones that, um, that we think will be particularly interesting to our listeners. So here's the question: What are the top five things to know about the Bible? To interpret it well. So, um, Mary.
Yes.
What do you think?
Yes. So I have five things that I've thought about, and, uh, we may if you don't like these five, I'll get five more.
Um, ladies and gentlemen, we got a bonus. We got a bonus five.
Bonus episode, that's right, that's right. Um, the first thing to say is you cannot break it. Um, that's the first, uh, people dumber than you have read this book. And, uh, so just be bold.
Oh, my God.
Uh, you can you can do this. And, um, and even if you mess it up. Right, it's, uh, other people have messed it up, right? This is, uh, we have, um, a long history of multiple interpretations and people talking back and forth. Uh, so you can't break the Bible. That's my first thought about it. I don't know if you want to react to that, or if you want me to just soldier on into other things.
No, no, I love that. I'd love to stop and and reflect on that for a minute. Um, I love it. I love how you said you can't. You can't break it. I do think sometimes there is like. Either a hesitancy to approach it because you actually don't. You don't know what you're getting into so, so much. Or also, I think there is a tendency to feel like you're not allowed to approach it with questions or concerns or problems. Like, I could see people on either side of that and that that sort of conjured the image to me of like holding it, you know, kind of gingerly and, and in a, in an afraid way.
Yeah. Imagine a new baby. Right. And and if you're not used to that, you, you really do wonder, like, how does this work? And and they're astonishingly resilient. They, they'll let you know if you know, their head is lower than they like it to be or whatever. Um, so yeah, you this is even the the Bible's even more resilient, I would imagine. Um hmm. So you can the other thing that this, that I say this for is when I started reading the Bible, you know, as a student of the Bible, I thought, oh, there's, I've got to get it right. Like, there's a, there's an answer and I need to be able to uncover it or, uh, isolate it or somehow, you know, get the right interpretation. And that was a lot of pressure to put on one self when, uh, truthfully, it's much more like a conversation than a than a, um, meaning to be uncovered by the experts.
Yeah. I love that metaphor of a conversation. I think we've talked about that, uh, in another episode of this podcast. But yeah, it's a conversation. I mean, Bible really is a library. Um, as much as it is one book. Right? And there's conversations between the different books, between the different voices in Scripture and an ongoing conversation with interpreters, you know, more than 2000 years of history. So, yeah, and obviously between Old Testament and New Testament as well. So, uh, so I I'll remember that phrase, though Mary, "people dumber than you have read this book."
And they've come up with dumber ideas too.
But you know.
Yeah, yeah. Just yeah, just look on the internet.
It's. Yeah, it just read the internet. Uh, but yeah, there's, um, there's lots of people who have read it. You're not going to break it. That's great I love that. What's what's what's your next point?
The next one is, uh, you're not alone in this reading. And this gets to the idea of a conversation. Our colleague Kathryn, Fred Gaiser used to talk about, imagine a a cocktail party, and you go in and there are these conversation groups, and you join a conversation group for a while, and you don't talk right away because you kind of get, you know, you need to get your bearings, like, are they talking about basketball or are they talking about politics, or are they talking about, you know, the new tires on the pickup or whatever? And um, and so you get your bearings and you add something. And then you drift to another group and that's a different conversation. And the conversation you were in continues without you. But you're some you know. And so there's this sense of I mean, in religious terms, we would talk about a cloud of witnesses or, or a tradition, uh, history, you know, like how people have read this over the centuries. This shows up when we start to talk about the what we call the Old Testament, who which had a, of course, vibrant life, uh, being read and written and, and, uh, riffed on long before Jesus. And so Christians read texts in a way that's different from some of that history of tradition. But, um, hopefully it's in the it's in the same party. Right? It's in the same kind of, uh, conversation. So that's the first thing I mean by you're not alone. And then I also want to say you're not alone because, uh, as Christians, we confess that the spirit inspires, uh, the scriptures. And oftentimes people think that means the spirit inspired the writing of them. I, I think that, too. I also think the spirit inspires the reading of them so that inspiration isn't over with. And so, you know, we I don't know, I, I read. Part of what gives me the courage to read scripture is this sense that there's a net; I'm working with a net of of other people who've tried to figure this out, and of the spirit who is actually trying to draw us closer to the heart of God and will help us, uh, see what we need to see in Scripture to, to to make that move.
Yeah, that's beautiful too. Uh, you're not alone. I'm going to put in a plug for our website. Um, so we're, the Enter the Bible website, which this podcast is a part of, has entries, has quite a few essays on every biblical book. And we're we're coming to the end of a big revision project of those entries. And one thing that we've added to each book entry is a is a section we're calling Bible in the world, which is, uh, trying to at least, uh, give a taste of how this particular book has been interpreted through the centuries, how it's influenced Christian theology or art or literature or music. Um, and so, you know, if you're if you're curious to delve into that, um, and this is in no way comprehensive, there's, there's no way you can do the history of interpretation of any biblical book in just, you know, 10 to 20 entries. But, um, but it just gives, gives the reader, hopefully and the listener a taste of, um, of how, uh, for instance, um, the book of Isaiah, uh, was understood and was was spoken of as a fifth gospel, right, as speaking about Christ and about, you know, the the events around the time of Isaiah himself. So just I think that's a hopefully a helpful, uh, for those who are listening here, if you want to do some more exploration, but certainly, yeah, that conversation has gone on, uh, for, for centuries, for millennia, really. And so, uh, we can we can learn from those who have read before us, those who have interpreted before us, we may not agree with. We probably won't agree with everything they say, but it's certainly, um, certainly a rich thing to be, uh, part of that conversation. And I love I love that metaphor from Fred Gaiser. Uh, yeah. So who has who is a retired Old Testament professor from Luther and a wonderful scholar.
Yeah, I also I also think it helps sort of along those lines. You know, I think sometimes in our kind of individualistic society, there there are strains where it's like, I'm just going to kind of read the scripture on my own by myself and as if, um. As if it's not meant to be read in community together and to be interpreted in community together. Um, uh, as if it's, you know, kind of self interpreting, which there is an element where we let Scripture interpret Scripture, but also sometimes scripture's arguing with itself. Um, and if, if we're kind of by ourselves trying to make sense of it, we miss a lot of the depth and richness of the experience of exploring Scripture, um, together with other people. So that's why I think it's helpful to go to Bible studies, right? If you have one at your church or why in the Lutheran tradition and many traditions, you know, the preaching comes directly out of a particular text or passage of the of the Bible so that so that we're hearing the words and uh, and, um, exploring and interpreting it together, not just alone on our, on ourselves, you know, by ourselves. So, um.
Absolutely.
And, and obviously the, uh, you're mentioning of the Holy Spirit, right? If we mean anything by Scripture, surely we mean that, um, that that God is at work, right? Um, both, as you said, both in the in the composition of it, the editing of it, but also in the reading of it. Uh, and I think, I think the fact that there are different voices often, as you said, Katie, or at least sometimes arguing with each other, um, gives us permission to, to argue a bit, to um. In fact, rabbinic interpretation of Scripture is,
is mostly debate, right?
Right? If you're not arguing, you're not paying attention, right?
Yeah. Exactly. Right. You're debating back and forth about how to interpret a particular passage. Yeah. No. Beautiful. All right. So, uh, you can't break it. You're not alone. What's number three?
Yeah. This gets a, um. So I wrote down the word genre, but I want to say this a little differently. Um, you said it's a library. The Bible is a library. I think I would say to people, remember, that the library that the, uh, Bible is like an old person's attic. I mean, you can find everything up there. Uh, it's, you know, it's poetry. It's a warning. It's a blessing, it's narrative. It's, uh, short story. If you think about something like Jonah, it's, um, all all and. And so what form am I looking at? Uh, um, another colleague of ours, Mike Rogness, um, was talking one day about the, uh, I think inerrancy or something. He felt the need to talk to seminarians about this, and, uh, he said, you know. Yeah. Okay, fine. There aren't any mistakes, but. But still, do you think you're an actual sheep and God is leading you by actual still waters and, you know, like, that's a metaphor, right? It's a so once you go there with the 23rd Psalm, then that, you know, you, you recognize, oh, the the thing I'm reading helps me read it. And I guess that's what I mean by the third thing. So what are you reading? And how does that, uh, that form, that genre? Uh, how does it help you in the interpretation?
I think that's that's lovely. Um, and, and I feel like some people don't some people go their whole lives without knowing this, and I don't know how that happens. Uh, that's probably an indictment of the way that that we, um, teach people maybe or assume that they know things that maybe they don't. But I remember I was teaching in a congregation an intro to the Bible, um, little kind of adult ed class. And I brought this up. I said, there's different, you know, you use the word genre, Mary. I said, there's different genres in in the text. And so if we want to take the text seriously, we probably want to know, like what we're actually looking at and what the text is trying to do, because a lot of, um, uh, a lot of interpretations that are maybe not helpful or don't stand up to scrutiny or whatever come because there's an error in the in, in what you're expecting the text to be or do that it's not trying in and of itself to be or do, right? The book of Genesis is not trying to be a science textbook. So if you read the Book of Genesis as if it were, you're going to run into difficulties. For example .
I had a conversation this week with someone who asked me, you know, uh, there's all this stuff in the Bible about the mercy of God, and then, you know, and the love of God. And then there's these, you know, like. God seems really angry texts and, um, and I'm a, uh, I know the Gospel of Matthew as well as I know anything. And there are all sorts of warnings in Matthew and there's, you know, going to be weeping and gnashing of teeth and all the things. And, um, he said, how can you hold those together? And, uh, what popped into my head was, imagine that your child is running into traffic, right? You've got a four year old and you are and and you are running after the child, screaming at the child and jerking the child's arm in a way that you would never do when you were reading a bedtime story. Like that's those are two really different contexts. And I think so much of what and I, uh, I don't I'm shy about, uh, sweeping generalizations about this book. Um, but a lot of what seems like God being really angry is, uh, in the context of, you know, you're like gonna walk into traffic. This is such a bad idea. Uh, and, uh, I'm warning you, you know? Yeah. So just that kind of example of your. Yeah, it doesn't all mean in the same way. It doesn't. Just like our words don't all mean in the same way.
Yeah. I love that, uh, um, metaphor of, uh, of the the old person's attic. I haven't heard that before. I think that's great. I also, I like the metaphor of a newspaper, too. So there are different sections of a newspaper. I don't know what you guys do. And maybe, you know, maybe this is too old fashioned. Like, maybe most people don't read the newspaper.
No one does this anymore, Kathryn .
We get the Sunday paper from the Saint Paul Pioneer Press. And the first thing I read is the comics. I don't know what that says about me, but, you know, and then I'll look at the Sunday life, and then I'll look at the front page, whatever. But you don't you don't read the comic strips in the same way that you read the front page, or in the same way that you read the op ed section or whatever. So knowing what it is, I think that point is so important. Knowing what it what you're reading, uh, guides your reading of it. So you referred to The Book of Jonah as a short story. I think that's I think that's exactly right. It's not a historical I, I would argue, I think most scholars would, that it's not a historical tale. It's kind of along the lines of a parable about, uh, you know, how we how we treat our enemies or how God feels about our enemies. But in any case, uh, that's that's a great. Um, that's a great point. So I should be writing this down. We're not alone. You can't break it and genre or know what you're reading. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.
You're looking at. Yeah.
Um, uh, the fourth thing I have is, uh, start with things like: Who? What? Where, when? Uh. Why? I mean, just of, uh, this is just, again, to demystify that, I must read the Bible in a completely pious way or religious way. I mean, you can certainly pray, uh, parts of the Bible. Uh, but when you are reading, you can. I love a study Bible for this reason. Uh, a Bible that has some notes in the sort of about three quarters of the way down the page, there'll be some notes that tell you. Well, this is also a story in another part of the Bible. You can compare those two, or this happened in a particular century or something like that. And so you get a little bit of, um, just like I'm trying to orient myself to this very different world. Uh, so when you don't know what else to do, does are there characters? Can you see a beginning, a middle, and an end to this little piece of scripture that you're reading? Um, if there are characters: who has names, who doesn't have names, what does that seem like? Uh, it might mean to you, uh, do you know any other stories that are kind of like this? How is this one different from those, uh, those sorts of they they. I think when I've taught the Bible in the parish, people, uh, often want to know, like, what is the, you know, the eye of the needle. Is it really a gate in the temple? You know, and I'm like, I don't, I don't care. Uh, and no, the answer is no. And, um, but but just, you know, like, uh, we don't need to. We're not archaeologists here as much as we're just. We're just kind of looking around and noticing what we notice. And it seems like a camel going through any little spaces is pretty tough. And a needle. Eye of a needle. Maybe. Maybe we're looking at hyperbole. Uh, yeah. Yeah. Um, so, uh, so just some. It's okay to start with simple questions. Uh, and you'll find some interesting things.
Yeah, that's really helpful. The, uh. Yeah. The who, what, where, why kind of. I don't know the English major approach or the or the reporter's, but I don't know what that is about.
Well, sort of like, you know.
Like, yeah, noticing details.
I used to talk about things like, um, you know, paying attention to characters, paying attention to time. What what kind of time markers do you see? How many days or weeks or, uh, hours has does this talk about, um, you know, who are the characters, who's the friends? Who's the who's the enemy? Where's the conflict? These are things that your English professor and, uh, freshman English or English teacher will will direct you to. And I think they're pretty good questions for Scripture as well.
I just want to note for those, uh, listeners who who might not like the idea of characters, we're not saying that these are untrue stories,
That they aren't people, right? No. They are. Yeah, that's true too. Yeah. Peter is actually like a person. And but in a story, he functions like a character. That's a really helpful, uh, I guess, corrective, I to to, um. Yeah. To the, my way of speaking.
But no, I think I think your larger point is a really good one. And, uh, yes, we we believe we believe that Peter was a real person, that that.
And that Isaiah was a prophet.
Yeah. But yeah. To, uh, to I sometimes tell my students that, I often tell my students especially, you know, first year, first semester students: reading the Bible as a cross-cultural experience. Right? Right. I mean, you're back in first century Palestine or you're back in, um, you know, um, eighth century BCE, right? Uh, Palestine. Usually, often in Palestine. Right. Um, and, and the the economy is agrarian based and it's subsistence farming or, you know, smallholder farming and, uh, there's no, there's no cars, let alone internet. Right? I mean, there's there's just a lot of things that, uh, is very different from our culture and from our time, uh, uh, both in place and in time. Um, and yet there are some common human experiences, right? The, the the grieving of, uh, a mother over her son's death. Right. Or the or the, uh, the fear of the disciples in the locked room or, um, the the anger of Jonah right at being told to that that God's going to have mercy on the enemy. Right. So, so there's both commonalities and differences, but asking questions like you're suggesting, Mary, I think are helpful in. And using a study Bible, as you said, are helpful in bridging those gaps of the differences and also recognizing the commonalities. Yeah. Yes. Number five.
I got one last thing.
Yeah. Number five.
Five is, uh, look for God in the scripture. Um, this is going out to our beloved colleague Terry Fretheim of blessed memory. Um, what is God doing? You know. Uh, I would say to students when I was teaching, preaching, please give God some verbs. Uh, because God is active in these stories and seeks to be known and, uh, and so how's that happening? And sometimes it happens through means. Sometimes, as in, uh, someone else does some talking and says, thus saith the Lord, or, um, or other, uh, events. Um, but but that's the that's the fifth thing is, uh, what is this piece that you're reading? Whatever it is. What what does God have to do with it?
I love that. That reminds me, uh, of Catherine. Do you remember when, um, Ellen Davis came to Luther Seminary and she, uh, gave a lecture, and then she came to our script wit class, and I remember her saying something like. And you'll you'll have to correct me. You probably know what she what she said. Uh, you probably heard her say it before, but I remember her saying something about, um, when you're reading with a hermeneutic of generosity which which means to to look it, look at the text generously look at the text from the standpoint of kind of like, think where might you find God in it? And, and she said, some of those texts you have to like look a little bit harder for , you know, to read them generously. But she said something about like, try to imagine, when you're reading, try to imagine, especially when you're reading, like the really difficult, challenging texts. Mary, like you were kind of talking about earlier. It's like, try to imagine the circumstance in which this would come as as good news or would sound like a word from God. What what would what sort of extreme, you know, circumstance would produce something like that such that it that this text that is hard for us. That sounds so weird or so scary or whatever.
Yeah.
What might be the circumstance in which can you use your imagination to think about what might be the circumstance in which that would actually sound like something from God, and and try to imagine yourself in those in that situation that that was part of how she I'm probably butchering what she said, but that's what I took away from it, that it was like, that's part of how she reads generously. Is it even in especially in those texts that are a challenging or confusing or, or, you know, whatever or.
Or terrorizing, you know, or. Yeah, or distancing
I guess, the scary ones, right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
No. Yeah. No, I think I think you're remembering well Katie and and. Yes, um, Terry would say that Terry Fretheim was there another colleague now, as you said, dearly departed. But, uh, yeah. And I love what you said Mary. Give God some verbs, right. If a if a sermon is only, you know, you should do this, you should do that whatever. Or is, um, all about how whatever, how you should feel, how you should change your attitude. That's not that's not true to the text. Right? Because if anything, the texts, every biblical text is about what God is up to, uh, in the lives of Israel and then in the lives of the church, uh, um, and, and so looking for what God is up to in the text and sometimes as, as you said Katie, as Ellen, said, Ellen Davis, it's harder to see in some text than others, but I'm remembering, and this may or may not be a good example, but I'm remembering, um. A student that I had many years ago now, who had experienced some violence and sexual violence in her life before that. And she said, you know, in those in that time, as I was healing from this, reading about the story of Dinah in Genesis 34 and Tamarah in, uh, 2 Samuel, um, who were who were women who were, um, assaulted. Um, it helped me realize that even this experience can be brought into the life of faith. Like even this experience can be talked about if it's talked about in Scripture. And it I'll say very clearly that those events are not condoned in Scripture. They are in fact condemned. Right. But just the fact that those kinds of stories remain in Scripture, that it's not kind of, Scripture does not look at the world with rose colored classes. Right? Um, but just knowing that, um, really hard events are talked about gave her at least permission to, um, to, you know, to think about it, to talk about it in the context of of faith. Um, that, again, may not be a good example, but I think what you said earlier too Mary about, you know, often when God is angry, it's because the people are about to do a really dangerous or stupid or unjust thing or have already done that. And so God is angry about that. Um, so, you know, sometimes God sounds pretty peeved in the prophets. Often God sounds pretty peeved in the prophets. But it's when, you know, when one child of God has hurt another one or is oppressing another. So those uh, yeah, asking what is God up to in this story is is uh or where is God in the text is a really great question.
There are lots of other things, you know, and I suppose if you had five different people give you five lists, they'd be, you know, almost different, almost all different. Uh, I don't know, maybe some things would be overlapping, but, uh, yeah, it's one of the other things one might say is if you if you're stuck somewhere like I used to try to start in Genesis 1, and I would get stuck in the, in the genealogies at about Genesis, I don't know, ten or something. And I couldn't get any farther. It's like now I would say to somebody, okay, if you're stuck, go somewhere else. It's a big book. Uh, that's another, that's at no additional charge. A sixth thing.
But the bonus, the bonus.
The bonus right there.
No. That's good. You don't have to read it front to back, though. Certainly lots of people do that. If you get stuck, skip over the really the part that you're stuck on and go on or go to the New Testament or whatever, go back and forth because again, it's a conversation and the voices go back and forth. Five is obviously an arbitrary number. As you said, Mary, we could, uh, we could come up with a lot more. But I think the ones that you've listed are really, really helpful. Will you list them again? Uh, just.
Yes. Absolutely. Yes. First, you can't break it. And you're not alone in the reading. Form matters. Genre matters, for how you how you understand the text. Start with questions. You might start with, on any other kind of literature that you were reading. Like, what's going on and what changes from the beginning to the end and where's the conflict and who are the people? And then, um, look for God.
That was beautiful. Thank you so, so much, Mary. Really appreciate that. And thank you, our wonderful listeners and viewers on YouTube for joining us for this episode of the Enter the Bible podcast. Remember, you can go to Enter the Bible. org and get lots more resources and insights. Um, courses, videos, commentaries on various passages, timelines, histories, pictures, blog posts, anything you could need at Enter the Bible. Org and uh, if you're listening to this, uh, please go and, uh, review this podcast on Apple Podcasts. It really does help. Five stars are extra special and amazing. We appreciate that. Uh, and if you're joining us on YouTube, please like and subscribe to our channel. Until next time.