IF PEOPLE WERE PREPOSITIONS

Nerdish as it seems, I am enthralled with grammar. Many feel grammar is boring, useless, and, at best, a necessary “evil.” I think it’s spiritual. God chose to have His revelation communicated via written words, and written words involve grammar. I am particularly interested in prepositions—you know, that part of speech that shows relationships between nouns. My interest in prepositions is probably attributable to the role they play in the exegesis and interpreting of the Bible. Prepositions in Greek carry fuller and more nuanced meaning than in English. Teaching prepositions in an English class, I would use the illustration of a tree and a squirrel. A preposition was anywhere the squirrel would go in relation to the tree. Up the tree. On the tree. Around the tree. Under the tree. In Greek, the aspect of movement is more pronounced in the use of prepositions, yet I would use a much more mundane visual to illustrate them: I would draw a large circle to represent the stationary noun and then draw tangential lines, arrows, dots, dashes to represent a preposition’s relationship to the circle and label each with the corresponding preposition’s name. For example, above the circle I would draw a length of horizontal line and label it “huper,” Greek for above. Below the circle, I would draw a parallel line and label it “hupo,” Greek for below. Now, I’m sure, this has all been very tediously boring, but this week, my musing of this illustration of prepositions suddenly enlightened me to what is wrong with the increasingly popular modern approach to Bible interpretation. Think of the large circle as the Word of God. Think of parallel lines, the one above and the other below the circle, as people interpreting the Bible. Some approach the Bible from above. Some from below. There was a time when any honest student of the Bible attempted to interpret and apply Scripture from the below position. What does that mean? It means the interpreter saw the Bible as the absolute, authoritative, infallible, inspired Word of God. This student, as he grappled with understanding what the Bible said, saw that he must subject his own opinions, ideas, preferences, prejudice, etc., to the objective meaning of the text. The text was right, and he was wrong. The Word judged him, not he the Word. Contrarily, today, the progressive who approaches the Bible sees himself as above the Word. He can do this because he does not see Scripture as the absolute, authoritative, infallible, and inspired Word of God. He does not see Scripture as having objective meaning, unchanging and true for all, but as a text to critique, deconstruct, and then reconstruct to conform to his already-held beliefs. These above -the-Word interpreters see the Bible, not as the revelation of God, but as a collection of stories narrating past people’s spiritual journeys, quests, questionings, searches. These stories can be helpful in one’s own quest for truth. Thus, one reads the Bible and picks and chooses the parts he feels would be helpful to him in his own quest for truth and spirituality. The parts he deems suitable, he incorporates into the tapestry of his own self-concocted beliefs. In other words, he sits in judgment of what the Word means, what of the Word is true, and what of the Word he considers applicable or not applicable (useful or not useful to him). More dangerously, he is free to take the Word and reinvent what it actually means. He can redefine words and give them the meaning that would fit his contemporary culture. Interpreting the Bible from above is to treat it as text that is to be subjectively understood and applied. Interpreting the Bible from below is to treat it as text that has an objective meaning that is not to be tampered with but obeyed. For example, “Christians” who support same-sex marriage famously practice above-the-Word interpretation: They redefine words, reject parts of the Bible as being antiquated, impugn the character of the OT God, etc., and then say, “The way I read the Bible, the way I see it, there is nothing wrong with homosexuality or same-sex marriage.” They do not see it as wrong because of the way they read the Bible. They read it from above. They pompously subjected the Bible to their own convoluted designs by imposing their ideology upon it. Through this lens of their own thinking, the Bible is twisted to fit the template they force upon it. To interpret the Bible from below is to seek the literal, objective, intended meaning of the text understood in its literary, cultural, and historical context. Having as closely as possible ascertained that objective meaning, one then conforms his thinking, life, attitude, etc. to the application of a text’s meaning. He is below, under, the Word. He subjects his life to the Word and refuses to subject the Word to his own way of thinking. So, with the circle being the Bible, are you the preposition above or below it? Is your approach to understanding Scripture huper or hupo?

IF PEOPLE WERE PREPOSITIONS

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