The Creeds and Biblical Interpretation

The lessons on this web site are written from an Anglican Perspective. Anglicans believe in the final and decisive authority of Scripture. This is expressed in Article 6 of the Anglican Articles of Religion which reads as follows,

Holy Scripture contains all things necessary for salvation. Consequently whatever is not read in Scripture nor can be proved from Scripture cannot be demanded from any person to believe it as an article of the faith. Nor is any such thing to be thought necessary or required for salvation. By holy Scripture is meant those canonical books of the Old and New Testaments whose authority has never been doubted within the church.

Anglicans are not alone in their beliefs about the authority of Scripture. Many Christian churches accept the authority of Scripture, but they do not always agree on how Scripture is to be interpreted, and as a result, Christians differ in their understanding of the Bible. This raises an important question: How should we interpret Scripture?

Our present circumstances are not unlike the circumstances of the early church as she began to preach the gospel to the Gentile world. In the Gentile world of the first few centuries of the Christian era, there were many different conceptions of spiritual matters, and as a result, when people first began to read Scripture, they interpreted it in many different ways. Many of these ways, however, were false interpretations of Scripture. How then, did the early church decide which of these many interpretative approaches were true and which were false? To address that question, let me begin with a passage of Scripture, Luke 24:25-27.

After Jesus was resurrected, he appeared to his disciples on the road to Emmaus. They were discussing what had happened to Jesus in Jerusalem. After hearing their report, Jesus said to them,

“O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself (Luke 24:25-27).

The early Christians knew how to interpret the Scriptures because Jesus taught them the right interpretation, and when false interpretations arose, the earliest Christians appealed to the interpretation they had received from Jesus himself.

One of the ways Scripture has always been falsely interpreted is to pick out certain verses and use them in isolation from the rest of Scripture. For example, the gnostics, an early group of false teachers in the second century, believed that the body was evil and that salvation did not include the body. They used I Corinthians 15:50 to prove their point. They also believed that the material world was inherently evil, and as a result, they claimed that the God described in Genesis chapters one and two, the God who created the material world, was not the true God. In their view, the true God was the Father of Jesus Christ, and this God was not the God of Genesis one and two. The false teaching of the gnostics was opposed by Irenaeus, a Christian who lived in the second century. Against the gnostics, he claimed that the right interpretation of Scripture had been given to the earliest apostles and handed down to their successors in the church. Irenaeus knew these successors and he knew their teaching. In fact, in his writings, he summarized their teaching and showed that it denied gnostic interpretations of the Bible.

Here is another example. Arius, an early fourth century false teacher, used John 14:28 to claim that Jesus was not God since this passage apparently stated that Jesus was less that God the Father. Athanasius, an early church theologian, argued against Arius, using many, many passages of Scripture to show that Jesus was indeed God.

Not only has the church needed to combat false teachers, it has, more generally, needed to teach the Christian faith to new believers. To help in this process, the church developed short summaries of the most important Christian ideas. These summaries were based on Scripture, and they summarized the teaching that had been given to the church from the apostles. These summaries were called "creeds," and there were several of them. Their primary purpose was to set forth the most important biblical ideas for preaching and teaching, especially teaching those who were about to be baptized. At the same time, however, the creeds were used to counter false interpretations of Scripture. One of them, commonly called The Nicene Creed, teaches that the world was made by the one God, the Father, and that this one God is the Father of Jesus Christ. In other words, this creed denied the gnostic interpretation of Scripture, and in particular, the gnostic understanding of I Corinthians 15:50. When Irenaeus opposed the false teaching of the gnostics, he appealed to an early creed, a forerunner of the Nicene Creed.(1)

The Nicene Creed also teaches that the Lord Jesus Christ is "light from light, true God from true God, begotten not made, of one substance with the Father," thereby denying the teaching of Arius that Jesus Christ was less than God. And, and in particular, the Nicene Creed denies Arius' understanding of John 14:28. In fact, it was Athanasius who insisted that the words, "light from light, true God from true God, begotten not made, of one substance with the Father," be placed in the Nicene Creed. In short, the early church developed the creeds to accurately summarize the teaching of Scripture as interpreted by the apostles. Once these creeds were developed, they were then used in teaching the faith to believers, and they were also used against false interpretations of Scripture.

Following the practice of the early Church, Anglicans have always recognized the importance of the creeds for teaching the faith and understanding Scripture.(2) This is because Anglicans affirm the authority of the creeds. In the words of Article 8 of the Articles of Religion, "The three creeds, the Nicene Creed, Athanasian Creed, and that known as the Apostles' Creed, ought to be wholeheartedly accepted and believed. This is because their contents may be proved by definite statements of Holy Scripture." Derived from Scripture, the creeds enable believers to rightly interpret Scripture. For this reason, in what follows, I will use the creeds, especially the Nicene Creed, to present some general principles that will guide the interpretation of Scripture for the lessons of this website.(3)

To begin, let me ask the reader to carefully read the Nicene Creed. Notice that it is composed of three paragraphs, and notice the opening words of each paragraph. These opening words are as follows" "We believe in one God, the Father, ..." "And in one Lord Jesus Christ, ..." "And in the Holy Spirit, ..." These words reflect the baptismal formula found in Matthew 28:19 which states, "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, ..." The development of the Creed began with the words used in baptism, and then allotted one paragraph to the work of each person of the Trinity, beginning with the Father, then the Son, and finally, a paragraph on the work of the Spirit. The Creed also states that "We believe in one God." In other words, the Creed states that God is one. Similarly, Matthew 28:19 does not say to baptize in the "names" of the Father, Son, and Spirit, but in the "name" of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is because God is one sole God, possessing one three-fold name, Father, Son, and Spirit. Therefore, as we interpret any passage of Scripture in which God speaks, acts, or appears, he does so in a single, three-fold manner as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. All three persons of the Trinity are involved in each of God's words, actions, and appearances. Indeed, Scripture as a whole is the work of one God who speaks in a three-fold manner. As a result of the foregoing, our first interpretative principle is this: In Scripture, when God speaks, acts, or appears, he does so as one God who speaks in a three-fold way as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This principle, along with the other principles of interpretation presented here, will become clearer as we interpret specific biblical passages.

The Creed begins with creation by the Father, centers on Jesus Christ who is "light from light, true God from true God, begotten not made, of one substance with the Father," and ends with the work of the Spirit and the "life of the world to come." These three events form a single narrative, the work of one God, staring with creation, then Jesus Christ, and finally, the end of the world. This reflects the biblical pattern which begins with creation, Genesis chapters one and two, has its central and decisive revelation in Jesus Christ of the gospels, and ends with the final age as described in the book of Revelation. Of course, there are many other events and words narrated in Scripture, but these three, creation, incarnation, and final age, are the three which anchor the rest. To help us see any particular passage in a wider context, a Biblical Timeline is given on this website.

As previously mentioned, one way to falsely interpret Scripture is to pick out a passage and read it in isolation from other passages. To rightly interpret a passage, however, one needs to interpret it in the context of the entire biblical narrative from creation to eschaton. The author of Scripture is one God who writes a single unified narrative. This claim was decisively affirmed against the Gnostics who sought to make differing gods the authors of Scripture. It was also affirmed against Marcion, a second century writer who denied the Old Testament as a revelation of God. The church has always, at least until the new developments of the 18th and 19th centuries, understood Scripture as a single narrative. In this context, one can measure the meaning of any single passage against the whole of Scripture, and the whole can be illumined by the meaning of a single passage. Therefore our second principle is as follows: In interpreting Scripture, any passage must be interpreted in light of the whole of the biblical narrative, beginning with creation, centered on Jesus Christ, and culminating with the life of the world to come.

As we study the Creed, we notice that Jesus Christ is described as "the only-begotten Son of God, begotten from the Father before all ages, light from light, true God from true God, begotten not made, of one substance with the Father, ..." This is very important. There are many philosophies, ideas, and beliefs about God. Only Jesus Christ, however, is "true God from true God." In other words, only Jesus Christ gives the true knowledge of God. Of course, there are many traces of God in the created world. For example, the order and expanse of the created world show that God is intelligent and powerful. But the Creed does not say that creation is "light from light, true God from true God." Or, one can learn things about God by attending a church, but the church is not the "only-begotten Son, begotten from the Father." Or, the Creed states that the Holy Spirit "spoke through the prophets," but none of the prophets of the Old Testament were "only begotten of the Father." This means that wherever one learns something of God, in creation, in dreams or visions, in the Old Testament, or in the Church, all these manifestations of God's will and nature must be measured by Jesus Christ for Christ alone is "the only-begotten Son of God, begotten from the Father before all ages, light from light, true God from true God." This means that he is the decisive revelation of God, the norm by which all other revelations of God's character are to be evaluated. This has immediate implications for how we interpret Scripture.

Throughout Scripture God speaks, acts, and appears, but all these revelations of God's words, deeds, and appearances must be understood in relationship to Jesus Christ. For this reason, Colossians 2:17 will say in reference to Old Testament legislation about festivals, food, and drink, that these were a "shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ." Or, Hebrews 8:5 states that the Mosaic priesthood is a copy and shadow of Christ's priesthood. Again, Hebrews 10:1 states that the Old Testament law was "a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities," for in Christ and only in Christ is that true form given. In Luke 24:27, states that “beginning with Moses and call the Prophets, he [Jesus] interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.” In John 5:39-40, Jesus tells the Jews, “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.” Paul, writing to the Corinthians and referring to the wanderings of Israel in the desert, declared that they “all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.” (First Corinthians 10:3-4). Or, the Nicene Creed will state that Jesus' resurrection was "according to the Scriptures," that is, Jesus fulfilled the Old Testament Scriptures. In other words, when considering any scriptural passage, its deepest meaning is given in relationship to Christ. He is the center, the key, to understanding the whole of Scripture, and further, the knowledge of Jesus Christ is found in Scripture, in the four gospels that witness directly to him.

Historically, the relating of the Old Testament revelation to the New Testament revelation given in Christ was worked out through a theory of types. Since Jesus was and is the fulfillment of the Law and the prophets, the events and words of the earlier revelation were types fulfilled in Christ. For example, the forty years Israel spent in the desert were fulfilled by Christ when he was in the desert and tempted by the devil. Or, the passing through the Red Sea and the escape from Pharaoh’s armies was a type of baptism where believers are liberated from sin and death. Or, the tree of life in the Garden of Eden was a type of the cross where God conquers death. Typological exegesis has its basis in God’s consistent character, in his unfolding revelation in Scripture culminating in Christ. At times in her history, the church has also used allegory to interpret Scripture, but of the two, allegorical or typological, the typological is closer to the Creed and the tradition of the early church fathers. J.N.D. Kelly sums up the matter in these words,

Of these two methods of exegesis the characteristically Christian one was typology, which had its roots firmly planted in the Biblical view of history. In its struggle with the Marcionites the Church found it an invaluable weapon for countering their attempt to separate the two Testaments.

Typological exegesis worked along very different lines. Essentially it was a technique for bringing out the correspondence between the two Testaments, and it took as its guiding principle the idea that the events and personages of the old were "types" of, i.e. prefigured and anticipated the events and personages of the New. The typologist took history seriously; it was the scene of the progressive unfolding of God's consistent redemptive purpose. Hence he assumed that, from the creation to the judgment, the same unwavering plan could be discerned in the sacred story, the earlier stages being shadows or, to vary the metaphor, rough preliminary sketches of the later. Christ and His Church were the climax; and since in all his dealings with mankind God was leading up to the Christian revelation, it was reasonable to discover pointers to it in the great experiences of his chosen people.(4)

Therefore, our third principle is as follows: When interpreting Scripture, any passage must be understood in reference to Jesus Christ as revealed in the gospels. In this regard, Old Testament persons or events are figures or types fulfilled in Christ.

This third principle can be considered theologically. The Creed states that Jesus Christ is “the only-begotten Son of God, begotten from the Father before all ages, light from light, true God from true God, ….” It denies the possibility that there are two or more beings begotten of the Father, or two or more lights from light, or a plurality of gods begotten of the Father. As God is internally, so he is externally in his acts. There are no acts, words, and appearances of God that derive from a second word or light in God. All God’s acts are related to Jesus Christ. For example, in creation, God acts by Jesus Christ since, according to the Creed, Jesus Christ is the one “through Whom all things came into existence, …” Or, the sending of the Spirit is not from the Father apart from the Son, but from the “Father and the Son.” For this reason, all God’s acts, words, and appearances set forth in Scripture are related to Jesus Christ who is the decisive revelation of God. In other words, the whole of Scripture must be interpreted christologically.

Further, the Old Testament words, appearances, and acts of God are revelation. They have revelatory substance. Against Marcion, Old Testament events are not simply ephemeral events without substantive significance. The Old Testament revelations may be partial, pointing to and fulfilled in Christ, but they are necessary for understanding and receiving God’s good will. Without that contribution, the revelation in Jesus Christ often degenerates into a piety devoid of social and economic significance. In the light of Christ, the Old Testament is maintained and affirmed. The great Anglican theologian, Richard Hooker (1554-1600) summarized the ancient tradition of relating the two testaments with these words,

We find that in ancient times there was publicly read first the Scripture, as namely, something out of the books of the Prophets of God which were of old; something out of the Apostles' writings; and lastly out of the holy Evangelists, some things which touched the person of our Lord Jesus Christ himself. The cause of their reading first the Old Testament, then the New, and always somewhat out of both, is most likely to have been that which Justin Martyr and St. Augustin observe in comparing the two Testaments. “The Apostles,” says the one, “have taught us as themselves did learn, first the precepts of the Law, and then the gospels. For what else is the Law but the Gospel foreshowed? What other the Gospel, than the Law fulfilled?” Similarly, the other said, “What the Old Testament has, the very same the New contains; but that which lies there as under a shadow is here brought forth into the open sun. Things there prefigured are here performed.” Again, “In the Old Testament there is a close comprehension of the New, in the New an open discovery of the Old.”(5)

The Creed states that Jesus Christ was "incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became man, and was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried, and rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures and ascended to heaven." The word "incarnate" means to take flesh, to become a specific human being who was born at a definite time in history. Jesus had a real mother, he died on a certain day under the authority of a man named Pontius Pilate, and he rose again three days later. These are all specific places and events. Consistent with this perspective, the gospel accounts reveal Jesus as a man who spoke, acted, and lived as a Jew in Palestine at the time of the Roman occupation. He did not act or speak as a person from another time or place, but only in that place and at that time. He was not, for example, a man of the twenty-first century, or any other century except his own, although his words and deeds speak to all centuries. Similarly, when God speaks, acts, and appears throughout the whole of Scripture, his revelation is according to specific times, places, customs, languages, beliefs, and historical circumstances. He does this so the people of that time and place will understand him. In order for us to understand what God is saying and doing as set forth in any particular passage, it is important to know the historical and social circumstances surrounding that passage. For example, to understand what is being said in the book of Amos, one must know something of the conditions at the time of Amos, as well as the meanings of the words that Amos used. Or, to understand Genesis one and two, the narratives of God's creation of the world, we must know something of the historical circumstances that gave rise to these creation narratives.

Another way to think of this is in terms of genre. One aspect of God speaking in terms of specific historical, linguistic, and cultural circumstances, is that God makes use of the various literary genre common to the people who set forth his message. The word "genre" in reference to a passage of Scripture refers to its type of literature. The Bible was written by people who wrote according to the various literary forms of their day, and Scripture has many genres of literature. For example, the literary genre of the Book of Proverbs is proverbs. They are not, for example, history and therefore, we do not read them as history. According to Luke 1:2, the genre of the gospel of Luke is eyewitness testimony. The letter of Paul to the Corinthians is an epistle, the creation narratives of Genesis one and two are saga, where "saga" is understood as a series of divine acts that create the world and not a scientific account.(6) Therefore, we may phrase our fourth principle in this way: The original meaning of any passage of Scripture depends upon the meanings of its words in the context of its historical circumstances, and further, when reading Scripture, genre needs to be taken into account. The meaning of a scriptural passage for today is rooted in the original meaning.

Who was it that became was "incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became man, …? Orthodox theology has always stated that it was God the Word, the second person of the Trinity. God became incarnate in Jesus Christ, and therefore, he was not only human, but divine, “the only-begotten Son of God, begotten from the Father before all ages, light from light, true God from true God, begotten not made, of one substance with the Father, …” Born of the Virgin Mary he was human, incarnate of God, he was God. The Creed of Chalcedon states that the divine and human natures came “together to form one person and subsistence, not as parted or separated into two persons, but one and the same Son and Only-begotten God the Word, Lord Jesus Christ; …” Therefore, when reading Scripture, centered on Jesus Christ, we not only encounter the human nature of Jesus Christ, but in union with that nature, we meet God the Son who assumed the human nature of the man Jesus by incarnation. To put it another way, as we receive the biblical witness to Jesus Christ, and study the whole of Scripture with Christ at the center, this narrative of words, deeds, and events, reveals the person of God to us. This needs to be emphasized. Human beings, by the work of the Holy Spirit, can meet God, hear him speak and see his face, as he reveals himself as the words of Scripture. Some have said that God reveals himself in or through the words of Scripture. This is inadequate, giving the impression that meaning is hidden within Scripture, or communicated through Scripture like water through a tube. The Word actually takes form as the biblical words, so that it is best to say that that God speaks as the words of Scripture. The biblical words themselves are God’s speech. How this can be is described in the essay Barth on Anselm.(7) In light of the foregoing we state our fifth principle in this way: The biblical narrative reveals God; its narrated words and deeds are God speaking to us.

The Creed sets forth a linear temporal sequence. It begins with creation by God the Father, centers in Jesus Christ, and ends with the "life of the world to come." We are located at a specific time, after the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ and before "the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come." This is the time of the church. As seen in Acts 2, the church was established by Jesus Christ through the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and as one can see, the church is described in the paragraph on the Holy Spirit.

The paragraph on the Spirit states that the Holy Spirit "proceeds from the Father and the Son." There are two matters here. First, as just discussed, the Son is the revelation of God. Then, this revelation is conveyed to the church by the Holy Spirit who reveals God the Father as known in the Son so that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. The Spirit does not reveal something other than the Son. He reveals the Son who is the revelation of the Father. In reference to the Spirit, Jesus states in John 16:14-15, "He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you." As a result, all the things narrated in the second paragraph of the Creed are made living realities in the lives of believers by the Spirit. Therefore, when reading a passage of Scripture, its deepest meaning is seen in relationship to Jesus, and then by the Spirit, it becomes a saving power in the life of the church. The meaning of a passage is not simply to understand its human and historical content with the mind. Much more than this is required. The meaning of a passage is not complete until the Spirit takes what is set forth in the passage and makes it real as a word or deed of God in the present. For example, Mark 3:1-6 describes how Jesus healed a man with a withered hand. According to the previous principle, that event took place at a specific time and place and it revealed God. Even as we read the passage, the past event and God revealed in that event can become real to us. Its full meaning for today, however, is not given unless the risen Jesus heals the sick and suffering today. For this reason, the meaning of a passage comes to completion as God does today by the Spirit what the passage narrated in its original context. Further, God healing today is itself the foretaste of the final healing when God will bring the life of the world to come. In the end, for believers, God will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away (Revelation 21:4). From this perspective, the Spirit takes the words, deeds, and appearances of God narrated in Scripture and repeats them in life today as a foretaste of God's final victory.

The word “repeats” indicates that the Spirit’s present work of revealing the Son does not go beyond the biblical witness to Christ. As previously mentioned, the Son is “God from God, light from light,” the complete revelation until Christ comes again. For that reason, the Old Testaments events and words were types which were then fulfilled in Christ who was and is the decisive and complete revelation. Although the Old Testament revelation was progressive, culminating in Christ, it cannot be said that revelation progresses beyond the biblical testimony to Christ. He is the light of the world, both before and after his coming. Although the work of the Spirit leads us deeper into an understanding of Christ as revealed in Scripture, the Spirit cannot lead us beyond or away from Jesus as known in the biblical witness. Therefore, what happened in Jesus is a not a type which was to be completed later, as were Old Testament events, but rather, they are the decisive revelation set forth by the Spirit in life today.

As it was with the Son, so it is with the Spirit. When God spoke as his Son, he spoke in the idiom of the people who heard him, according to their language, traditions, habits, and culture. Similarly, when the Spirit enlivens the words of Scripture and recreates them as God’s actions today, these contemporary words, deeds, and actions of God are normally rendered in the language of the people. The biblical revelation judges, redeems and transforms cultural forms, but it does not deny cultural forms per se. Jesus and the disciples spoke Aramaic, but the New Testament was written in Greek for a Greek-speaking world. In the same way, the Spirit repeats the biblical revelation in ways that account of the habits, needs, and hopes of people today. Or, it can be said that biblical interpretation is not a wooden repetition of past words, but a Spirit-enlivened rendering of those words and deeds in ways that bring salvation to every cultural context.

Furthermore, the Creed describes God as powerful because he can do miracles such as create the entire cosmos, or enable a virgin to give birth to his Son by the Spirit, or raise Jesus from the dead, or raise all people from the dead at the end of time. The Creed also describes God as loving because he sent his Son, the only-begotten Son of the Father to bring us salvation by dying for us under Pontius Pilate. Therefore, as we consider the work of the Holy Spirit who makes real the work of Jesus in believers, it is understood that God will act with loving, miraculous, creative power to redeem human life. This needs to be emphasized because there are some who do not believe that Jesus ever did miracles, or that the risen Jesus does today the miracles that Scripture narrates he did in his lifetime. When the Creed says that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, it does not say that the Spirit divides the work of Christ into portions, as if the Spirit effects some of Christ's miraculous acts in the beginning but not now. No, the Spirit witnesses to the whole of Christ's words and deeds, and without all his words and deeds as present creative acts of love, we do not have Jesus Christ, nor the Father revealed by Jesus, nor do we fully know God. We may now state the sixth principle as follows: By his mighty power the Spirit takes the creative, powerful words, deeds, and appearances of God narrated in Scripture and repeats them in life today as a foretaste of God's final victory. From this perspective, Scripture, understood as God's action with corresponding human responses, are a promise of what God can do today. The meaning of a passage for today is God’s act and our response.

What is the purpose of Scripture? As seen in principle three, the fundamental purpose of Scripture is to witness to Jesus Christ who is the center of Scripture. What then was Jesus' purpose? Why did he come among us to live and die for us? According to the Creed, he did these things "because of us men and because of our salvation." Scripture was written to reveal God to us, and specifically, it was written for our salvation. That is why Scripture was written, and that is why it is so important. There is much information in Scripture -- geographical, historical facts, social customs, economic practices, and more. Among Christians today, there is debate as to whether Scripture is perfectly accurate in all its facts, or accurate in all the facts pertaining to salvation. I will not, at least not at this moment, enter into that debate in detail except to say that Scripture is fully sufficient to reveal a saving God to us, and further, that we need to read each passage and the whole with the aim of entering into a relationship with God, a relationship that saves us from our sins and gives us eternal life with God.

The Creed does not say that Jesus came down from heaven “because of me and my salvation,” but rather, “because of us men and because of our salvation …” Salvation is corporate. Being saved means belonging to the people of God. When Jesus began his ministry, he called twelve disciples, forming a new Israel. Therefore, when interpreting Scripture our primary goal is to see how a particular Scripture relates to the forming of the church, and in that context, how Scripture applies to the life of the individual.

The Creed speaks of certain persons, Jesus Christ, Mary, Pontius Pilate, and the prophets, and it mentions the church as the community created by the message of salvation. Among those who heard the saving words of God, some responded in faith and obedience, others did not. Jesus was obedient to the will of God. Mary responded to the revelation of the angel with the words, "Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word" (Luke 1:38). Pontius Pilate gave way to the cries of the crowd, and even though he knew Jesus was innocent, he washed his hands of the matter and had him crucified. In short, the Bible shows the many ways we human beings have responded to God's word to us, both in faithfulness and in disbelief. When, therefore, we read the words of God in Scripture, when we receive that revelation, we are called to respond in faith and obedience.

We may state the seventh principle in these words: The purpose of Scripture is to bring us into a saving relationship with the one true God, and Scripture is to be read with that as the primary goal. As members of the body of Christ, we enter into that saving relationship by faith and obedience.

You will notice that the Creed begins with the words, "We believe." The Creed describes what Christians believe and our belief is something we hold together. We receive God's revelation together, we understand it together, and we put it practice as the body of Christ. Therefore, it is good to listen to what others said on the interpretation of Scripture or any other Christian topic. It is not wise to think that we alone can understand the Scriptures. We need the help of the larger church as well as the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. We can state our eighth and final principal in these words: Understanding Scripture is the work of the entire church, and for that reason, it is important to study what others have thought about a particular passage.

The foregoing has implications for how we approach Scripture. To understand a particular passage of Scripture, we need to know some of the historical context of a passage, the meaning of its words, the passage's relationship to the whole of Scripture, as well as what others have thought about a passage. Doing this is hard work, the work of a lifetime, but the rewards cannot be measured. Furthermore, according to principles five and six, the final meaning of a passage is God speaking to us, acting in our lives, and enabling us to respond in faith and obedience as members of his body. Therefore, our attitude toward Scripture needs to be one of prayer and humility, beseeching God to make the saving events of Scripture living facts in our community. It is not enough to simply understand the historical content of a passage with our minds. We need a living, loving God who acts. We need the risen Lord Jesus, we need the power of the Spirit, and to receive these things we need to prostrate ourselves before his cross, asking him with thanksgiving to make his living Scriptures a saving power in our lives today.

More could be said about the study of Scripture, as well as the importance of the creeds for understanding Scripture. The eight principles given here will, however, lay a good foundation. As you read the website, you will see these principles at work as we study the Scriptures. Let me invite the reader to approach our lessons on Scripture with an open mind. I do not understand all things, but I offer these to you as my best effort to be faithful to what God commanded me to do nearly forty years ago, that is, build up the ancient foundations of the Church. Please pray about what you learn here, test these things against Scripture and the writings of other Christians, and as you go forward, God will use all these things to bring you to an ever deeper knowledge of him through his mighty written Word, the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments.

Principles of Biblical Interpretation

1. In Scripture, when God speaks, acts, or appears, he does so as one God who speaks in a three-fold way as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

2. All passages must be interpreted in light of the whole of the biblical narrative, beginning with creation, centered on Jesus Christ, and culminating with the life of the world to come.

3. When interpreting Scripture, any passage must be understood in reference to Jesus Christ as revealed in the gospels. In this regard, Old Testament persons or events are figures or types fulfilled in Christ.

4. The original meaning of any passage of Scripture depends upon the meanings of its words in the context of its historical circumstances, and further, when reading Scripture, genre needs to be taken into account. The meaning of a scriptural passage for today is rooted in the original meaning.

5. The biblical narrative reveals God; its narrated words and deeds are God speaking to us.

6. By his mighty power the Spirit takes the creative, powerful words, deeds, and appearances of God narrated in Scripture and repeats them in life today as a foretaste of God's final victory. From this perspective, Scripture understood as God's action with corresponding human responses, are a promise of God’s saving action in the present and future. The meaning of a passage for today is God’s act and our response.

7. The purpose of Scripture is to bring us into a saving relationship with the one true God, and Scripture is to be read with that as the primary goal. As members of the body of Christ, we enter into that saving relationship by faith and obedience.

8. Understanding Scripture is the work of the entire church, and for that reason, it is important to study what others have thought about a particular passage.

Endnotes

1. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, III,4,2.
2. See, for example, Frederick Houk Borsch, (ed.) The Bible's Authority in Today's Church. Valley Forge: Trinity press International, 1993, p. 56. Booty, John and Sykes, Stephen, eds. The Study of Anglicanism, London: SPCK/Fortress Press, 1988, p. 91.
3. For an excellent book on early Christian Creeds, written by an Anglican, see J.N.D. Kelly, Early Christian Creeds. Third Edition. New York: David McKay Company, Inc., 1972. An excellent book on the importance of creeds for early biblical interpretation is that of Francis M. Young, Biblical Exegesis and the Formation of Christian Culture, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
4. Kelly, J.N.D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1978), pp. 171-2.
5. Richard Hooker, Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, (Ellicott City: Via Media, 1994), V.xx.6. I have modernized Hooker’s English slightly.
6. This term is taken from Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, Vol. III:1, The Doctrine of Creation (Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark, 1958), pp. 76-92.
7. In this connection, the outstanding article by Dr. Mary Ford, "A Brief Reconsideration of the Term ‘Pre-critical’” shows how the Church Fathers understood the human capacity to know God when enabled by grace.