Steps in Interpretation

Herman Hermeneut: Can we come up with a “how-to” list for interpreting the Bible?

Dottie Doctrinalist: That’s definitely useful, provided it is based solidly on the Bible.

Oliver Objectivist: We certainly need such a list, in order to be rigorously objective in our interpretation, and to eliminate subjective biases.

Peter Pietist: I’m not so sure. Won’t a method interfere with my personal communion with the Lord?

Laura Liturgist: I’m just as uneasy as Peter. Does “method” mean something purely academic? Or would it include participation in worship?

Missy Missiologist: I can see both advantages and disadvantages. We certainly need to take steps in order to make sure we are not blinded by the blind spots of the culture in which we were raised. But we need to be careful. Our focus on method can introduce a Western bias. The idea of having a technique or assembly-line process for producing the right meaning seems natural within an industrialized society, where we pursue technique.

The pattern of speaker, discourse, and hearer provides us with a framework for developing some specific principles in biblical interpretation.

First, on a broad scale, God speaks the entire canon of Scripture to the entire people of God through the entirety of history.¹

The study of the Bible involves all three aspects, God the speaker, the Bible as his speech, and the people to whom he speaks. In view of coinherence, we may focus on any of the times involved: the original time, when God first gives the word to people, the intermediate time during which it is passed on, and the time in which we as hearers now live.

As usually these foci are perspectivally related. Even at the earliest time, when God first spoke a particular message belonging to the canon, he designed that message in such a way that it could serve people of future generations as well as the immediate audience. When we focus on the earliest time, we find that it includes an intention extending to later times. The intention thus tacitly includes the later times. Conversely, suppose that we begin with God’s address to us now, in the present time. God intends now that we recognize that part of his plan involves a historical development. Hence, we find ourselves forced to reckon with how the message came about through an earlier process. Finally, when we focus on the intermediate times, and the process of transmission, we cannot ignore the purpose of what is being transmitted, a purpose that includes both an origin and a target, that is, the earlier and the later time. All three foci, properly understood, include tacit acknowledgment of the other foci.

We can see the importance of these perspectives by showing how they derive naturally from the very character of God.

God’s presence today

Consider first the perspective that focuses on the modern time and the modern hearer. God is present and active today, as he has promised (Matt. 28:18-20). His presence today is the basis for focusing on his communication to present-day hearers.

God is present as his word comes to us today. He speaks to us when we read the Bible. How is this so? The original manuscripts of the Bible are the word of God. Translations and copies may be imperfect. But they are the word of God insofar as they express the message of the original. The same applies to preaching, teaching, and other means of communicating the word of God. As ordinary Christians come to know the Bible, they communicate its contents to one another. Colossians 3:16 says, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.” Paul is here addressing the whole group of Christians at Colossae. “The word of Christ” is to dwell in you richly,” and you are to “teach and admonish one another” through the presence of this word. Modern preachers and modern Christians are not infallible. When they attempt to convey the word of God, they can mix it with merely human notions, or even with heresy. But fragments of it may remain even in the midst of serious deviations. And when the church is spiritually healthy, the word of God dwells in Christians with greater consistency. The word of Christ is present among Christians as they teach and admonish one another. As Hebrews indicates, God puts “the law in their hearts, and I will write them on their minds” (Heb. 10:16).

Our fallibility and failures contaminate the word. But the word does not cease to be present in the midst of the these contamination. The word of God cannot be muzzled or shut up (2 Tim. 2:9), particularly now that the Holy Spirit has been poured out on his church. In the modern transformations of the word of God, including modern translations, commentaries, counseling, we may genuinely hear and encounter God.² The Westminster Confession of Faith affirms this truth:

But, because these original tongues [Hebrew and Greek] are not known to all the people of God, who have right unto, and interest in the Scriptures, and are commanded, in the fear of God, to read and search them, therefore they are to be translated into the vulgar language of every nation unto which they come, that, the Word of God dwelling plentifully in all, they may worship Him in an acceptable manner; and, through patience and comfort of the Scriptures, may have hope. (1.8)

Classic Roman Catholicism fears this catholicity of the word, because it seems disorderly, unstructured, and productive of heresies. And indeed God in his love does startling things. The Word of God Incarnate suffered abuse and torture during the years of Jesus’ earthly life. In similar manner, false teachers try to subject the word of God written to abuse and torture to the end of the age.

But one of the purposes of Pentecost is that God would write his word on our hearts and we should all be prophets (Acts 2:17-18). Acts 2 opens the door to “prophetic” ministry on several levels. The apostles speak the word of God definitively and infallibly. Second, God commissions other ministers of the word, like Timothy, who are not infallible. Third, at another level people without ordination may spread the word (Acts 11:20?). As we have seen from Colossians 3:16 and Hebrews 10, all Christians should have the word dwelling richly in them. We are to honor and respect those whom God has appointed leaders and overseers (Heb. 13:7; 1 Thess. 5:12-13). But the people as a whole, not just the leaders, receive the Holy Spirit, and the people as a whole have the law written on their hearts (Heb. 10:16). We must respect the freedom with which Christ has set his people free, and not erect a paternalistic hierarchy attempting to monopolize other people’s access to the word of God.

The lesson here is relevant also for many anticharismatic Protestants. The charismatic movement, like all other sectors of the church, has its share of problems, aberrations, and doctrinal confusions. Critics may legitimately warn us about these problems. But they should not ignore the strengths resulting from the charismatic appreciation of the presence of the Holy Spirit and the priesthood of all believers.

God’s truthfulness

Consider next the perspective that focuses on the time of origin of biblical words. In this case, we consider God’s truthfulness and holiness. His word, not ours, is authoritative. This reality presses on us the importance of attending to what he said in its original circumstances. Not every word claiming his sanction actually has it (Jer. 28). He calls us to trust in him and not in man (Ps. 146:3). His word vindicates his holiness by testifying against the people (Deut. 31:26). In the Old Testament the worship of Molech, Baal, and Ashtoreth demonstrates the possibility of radically false religion. The corruption of the priesthood and the appearance of false prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord demonstrate the possibility of enormous confusion. In the New Testament the scribes, the Pharisees, and Christian heretics show the same danger. Even genuine Christians can succumb for a time to the temptations of false doctrine (1 Cor. 15; Gal. 1:6; 3:1; 5:10).

Hence, the holiness of God calls us to sift and reject human tradition by listening again to God. God is the standard, and his word is the standard by which we test the prophets (Deut. 13; 18; 1 John 4:1-3). But how do we identify God’s word? The word, we have said, dwells among Christians, but how do we drive deeper in discernment of what is and what is not this word? We need access to the word of God uncorrupted by sinful distortion. That is, we need that word deposited to testify against the people as well as (sometimes) on their behalf. In other words, we need the canon of Scripture. God so loved his people throughout the ages that he gave them clear instruction. He declared not only that Moses was his spokesman (Deut. 5:22-33), but that later spokesmen could be identified through the canon of Moses’s words (Deut. 18:17-22). This word cannot be broken and remains with perfect reliability to the end of time (John 10:35).

The canon of Scripture is now complete. It is the standard by which all modern communication is judged. But it is not only a standard. It expresses the inexhaustible fullness of what God communicates to us in redemption, for in it the Holy Spirit unfolds that full revelation of Jesus Christ, the one in whom “all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form” (Col. 2:9). As Hebrews says, “In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe” (Heb. 1:1-2).

Of course we still have much to learn from the Bible. And we can learn much from the world that God governs. God can teach us in ordinary or in extraordinary ways. But the heart of wisdom is in knowing Christ. Those who lust after “further revelations” make a great mistake, because they are deficient in love for the Person revealed in this one great completed redemption. And being deficient in love, and blinded by sin, they are in no condition to sift properly the modern voices that they examine.³

Modernism resists this apostolic exclusiveness and Christocentric definiteness of the word. Modernism trims down the word, adjusting it to what modern culture says is within the bounds of acceptability. Contemporary Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and Pentecostalism in their varying spheres exhibit a spectrum of attitudes. Some people within these circles would agree with me, but others would not. In some quarters we find theoretical or practical denial of the exclusiveness of biblical authority. Papal teaching or church tradition or the contemporary voice of the Spirit may function to supplement Scripture even though in theory it remains subordinate to Scripture. The uncertain trumpet hinders us from preparing for battle.

How do we find our way? In principle, we may learn from many sources. We may learn from modern scientific investigations, or from philosophical reflections. We may learn from human ecclesiastical tradition. We may learn from the saints of past ages, because they too received the Spirit. We may learn from our fellow Christians today, because they are being taught by the Spirit. All of these sources have some value. But all are fallible. So we must sift the modern ideas and the tradition and the spiritual voices by the divine standard.

Traditionalists observe that willfulness in private interpretation corrupts true doctrine. Of course they are right. But a willfulness in corporate interpretation will not serve any better in the long run.

Some of the differences arising out of church tradition do not easily go away. As examples, let us consider two such cases.

First, consider the rules on celibacy. Though there are some exceptional cases, the Roman Catholic Church as a rule requires its priests to be unmarried, and the Eastern Orthodox Church requires its bishops to be unmarried. These practices are firmly maintained in spite of biblical witness to the contrary. The Apostle Peter was married; Paul expects that elders will usually be married (1 Tim 3:2); Paul indicates that leaders have a right to be married (1 Cor 9:5); and he condemns the practice of forbidding marriage as a doctrine of demons (1 Tim 4:1-3)!

We must face the fact that church tradition at this point is attempting to be wiser than Scripture, and does not hesitate to go even to the point of virtually contradicting Scripture. Moreover, the traditional practices with regard to celibacy arose historically in a period when the church was influenced by antibiblical ascetic ideas (Col 2:20-23) deriving from neo-Platonism and various other philosophical and religious streams. It is mere blindness, in the form of underestimating the subtlety of human depravity, not to allow that such things could happen in an impure church, and not to allow that the Scripture may correct tradition, even a very well established tradition.

Second, consider the practice of venerating and invoking dead saints. Scripture includes no mention of such practices; they are later developments. Hence the church is again thinking herself wiser than Scripture in the advice that she gives to her members. Moreover, Scripture forbids contacting the dead (Deut 18:11) and indicates that the dead in Christ cannot directly help us who are left on earth (Phil 1:23-24). Such practices are a temptation at times when people do not fully appreciate the humanity of Christ (hence dead saints seem more accessible and more sympathetic than Christ himself) and when the living fellowship among Christians on earth grows weak (hence the biblical practice of asking living saints to pray with us and for us may seem not to be enough). It is understandable that over time the church could drift into such practices.

Now what do we do with such tradition? We should appreciate that church tradition is a valuable corrective to the biases and follies of our times and our narrow groups. But postapostolic tradition also needs the corrective of our listening afresh to the voice of the apostles! To admit that there may have been error on some one particular point of tradition seems to me to be in one sense a small matter. But many Roman Catholics and Orthodox Christians do not want to do it, because it affects one’s global attitude toward the whole of the tradition. The tradition and every aspect of it is instructive yet fallible, as are all modern teachers whom the Lord gives us (Eph 4:11). The Bible, by contrast, is infallible.

Charismatics observe that second-hand Christianity ruins spiritual life. But the willfulness of first-hand subjectivity, both individual and corporate, will not serve any better in the long run.

God’s control

Consider finally the perspective that focuses on the process of transmission from ancient to modern times. Here, we need to reflect on God’s control. God’s control over history is the basis on which we can understand the way in which the ancient word relates to the modern. We must reckon with God’s plan for the whole of history, and the working out of this plan, if we are rightly to assess how the coming of Christ has brought the Old Testament to fulfillment and also has made obsolescent some of the particular applications of Old Testament law. We must reckon with God’s plan and control as we wrestle also with the phenomena of text criticism: how do the later copies point to an earlier autograph, within a universe held in conformity with God’s providential rule?

Smaller acts of communication

We have considered the whole Bible as a single, great act of communication. But this one great act includes many smaller acts of communication. Each book of the Bible, and indeed each paragraph of each book, constitutes something distinct. As might be expected, the many acts of speaking cohere with the one overall act.

Each smaller act of communication has the same threefold structure that we have already seen. It has its origination in a speaker, transmission in a specific medium, and reception by a hearer. Let us take a specific example: the book of Micah.

First, Micah the prophet wrote the book of Micah to his contemporaries, most probably in the days of Hezekiah or shortly afterward (Mic. 1:1).⁴ The speaker (or writer) is Micah, the message is the book of Micah, and the hearers are Micah’s contemporaries in Judah. But we must note an extra complexity. God is the primary author, in addition to Micah’s second authorship.

Second, in modern times people copy, translate, preach, and study Micah. Many human writers and speakers endeavor to bring the message of Micah to bear on themselves and others. Through the Holy Spirit God gives teaching gifts, so that God speaks the message of the book of Micah today through noninspired spokesmen.

Third, between the original time and the modern time God provides means and media for transmitting the message: both the primary means of copying and various secondary means. God sustains his people so that they discern the importance of the message and endeavor to digest it, to apply it, and to preserve it. God providentially preserves other pieces of information about the ancient world and its societies, that we may have more confident and accurate understanding of them.

Let us picture communication as an arch. We can then represent the full process of biblical communication as a single big arch, together with smaller arches at both ends and smaller arches all along the span. The single big arch is from God and his spokesman Micah to the people of God of all ages. The author and originator stands in Micah’s time, the arch travels over all times, and the hearer and reader stands in our own time.

What do the smaller arches represent? A smaller arch at the beginning of the big arch represents Micah’s communication to his contemporaries. A smaller arch in our modern time represents the many-sided communication of modern interpreters of Micah. And in between are many arches representing many people through the centuries who interacted with the book of Micah.

The Bible itself describes in a general way such a process of transmission:

He decreed statutes for Jacob and established the law in Israel, which he commanded our forefathers to teach their children, so the next generation would know them, even the children yet to be born, and they in turn would tell their children. Then they would put their trust in God and would not forget his deeds but would keep his commands. (Ps. 78:5-6).

And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others. (2 Tim. 2:2).

Passages like these tacitly assume that corruption can enter in the course of transmission. Scripture explicitly warns us about corruption in Deuteronomy 31:27-29 and in Jesus’ criticism of the human traditions of the Pharisees (Matt. 15:1-20; 23). Thus the continual listening to the speaker and the original communication is important. But the application to one’s own circumstances is also important. In Psalm 78 the goal of the process of transmission is that they “would keep his commands” (Ps. 78:7).

Explicit hermeneutical procedure

The hermeneutical arch with its included subarches suggests the beginnings of formalized hermeneutical procedure. Understanding a text of the Bible includes three steps. The three steps deal successively with the three time periods of the arch, namely the origination of the message, the transmission of the message, and the reception of the message by us. We may lay out the steps as follows:

Step 1. Understand what God says to the Micah’s original audience, the people of Micah’s time. Find out about Micah the prophet, his words, and his audience.

Step 2. Understand how God preserves the book of Micah through a period of historical development up to the present. Include in this understanding not only textual transmission but additional words of God through later Scriptures and the historical and redemptive developments issuing in the work of Christ and the formation of the New Testament church.

Step 3. Understand what God says to us now. Find out about yourself, the church of Christ, the gifts of the Spirit, and the role of teachers and preachers in order to assess the ways in which the church as a whole is digesting the message from Micah. Assess your culture in the light of the Bible. Respond to what God is saying; apply the message to yourself, your circumstances, and your neighbors.

As we already observed, if Step 3 is not controlled by Step 1, the church loses its moorings. She begins to distort the message of Micah or even replace it with another message of her own devising. On the other hand, if Step 3 is omitted, we are not obeying God, and our profession of being the church is hypocritical (Rev. 3:1; James 1:22; Matt. 7:24-27). Moreover, if we do not love God, as exhibited in Step 3, our perceptions becomes clouded with sin and we cease to make good progress with Step 1.

We must also remember that the steps that we have distinguished are not, in practice, isolated from one another. We continually return to the source (step 1) in order to critique our present applications (step 3), and we continually return to application (step 3) in order to purify our competence to understand the source (step 1). Each of these cycles of coming and going is directed by our understanding of God’s plan for the entire course of history, and this plan is revealed in the canon as a whole (step 2). In all this work we are not simply on our own. God directs us through sending the Spirit to guide us.

In fact, the expressive, informational, and productive aspects are coinherent. That is, author focus, discourse focus, and reader focus coinhere. Hence, we cannot do any one of the three steps without tacitly involving the others. For example, when we explore the meaning of the past (step 1), we are the ones doing the exploration. We must reckon with ourselves as persons who live in the present (step 3). Moreover, our study of the past is already an attempt to reform our cognitive processes, and thus it is a form of application in the present. Godly interpretation is always interpretation in the presence of God, and hence involves present fellowship with God even when we are consciously focusing on the past.

Conversely, any application of the message of the Bible to the present involves receiving the message as a message coming from God, who has plans for all of history. Thus we cannot dispense with an overall understanding of history. Action in the present presupposes knowledge of the past. In the next chapter we shall consider this coinherence in greater depth.

Further subdivisions

Scholarly, technical study of the Bible often focuses on only a small part of the whole. This small part may belong to any one of the three steps above. For this purpose, we might proceed to subdivide the three steps almost indefinitely.

For example, under step 1 we can introduce several substeps. First, with expressive focus, we analyze the author. Who is Micah, what is his background, and what are his characteristics? Next, with informational focus, we analyze the text. What are the words? In what order do they occur? What do they say? Next, with productive focus, we analyze the hearers and their situation. What is going on in Micah’s time, where is Micah located, and what people surround him? What does the text set out to achieve? Finally, we analyze the total communication. What does God do with these words through Micah to the people of Micah’s day?

We may analyze modern interpretation of the Bible in a similar way. Who is the human speaker? What are the words and what do they say? What is the situation (the facts)?⁵ What does God do with these words to the hearers through the speaker? Suppose that you yourself are striving to speak on God’s behalf, whether in a sermon, a commentary, or a private exhortation. Before speaking or writing, or while doing so, you endeavor to understand the people to whom you are speaking, the message of Micah, and yourself as a person with capabilities, weaknesses, and sins. You speak to an audience. You try to fashion your words so that they as persons receive a normative guidance in intelligible form relevant to them and their situation.

God’s work in the whole process

As we have already said, the broad context of God’s communication in history exhibits three aspects, the expressive, the informational, and the productive aspects. The canon as a whole is the message, representing the informational aspect. The whole of history worked out under God’s control represents the productive aspect. And God’s prophets, apostles, and other spokesmen are the mediating persons, representing the expressive aspect.

In a deeper sense, however, Christ himself is the archetype for all three aspects. First, consider the informational aspect. Christ is the focus of the content of the Scriptures. In him “are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col. 2:3). The Scripture as the utterance of God’s wisdom expresses only what is already contained in him.

Consider next the productive aspect. The supreme effect or application of the word of God lies in the earthly life of Christ. Christ is the supreme Fact of history. His incarnation, life, death, and resurrection provide the hinge on which all of history turns. They are also the factual center of Scripture, around which, in God’s providence, all the other events are organized and find their fulfillment (see Luke 24:44-49).

Finally, consider the expressive aspect. Christ is the personal mediator of all God’s words. All the prophets are images of Christ, who is the one final and greatest prophet (Acts 3:22-24). All the apostles act on Christ’s authority and with the impetus of his Spirit. As the second Person of the Trinity Christ is author of all of the Scriptures. As savior he has acted in redemption in order that we could hear the word of God and not die (Deut. 5:22-33). Christ is thus the archetypal prophet.

Thus interpretation of the Bible is Christocentric in several ways. We must interpret Micah in conformity with God’s purposes for the book. And his purposes center in the accomplishments of Jesus Christ incarnate.

Step 2 of our hermeneutical procedure can be subdivided in a way that acknowledges these various contexts. Understand the context of persons doing the transmission, namely the people of God in various ages (expressive). Understand transmission of the message of Micah (informational). Understand the situations through which the transmission goes (productive).

Each of these aspects are structured by God so that they are not mere featureless deserts across which the transmission glides, but God-ordained historical developments focused in Christ. Let us consider the expressive, informational, and productive aspects.

First, consider the expressive aspect. Focus on what happened to the people who transmitted the Scriptures. Through Christ God maintained communion with his people through the ages. At Pentecost God transformed them into the Spirit-filled body of Christ, in which the message of the Old Testament lives. We need to understand what happens to God’s people at the coming of Christ, and how all Scriptural interpretation is now mediated by the presence of his Spirit transforming us into the image of Christ (2 Cor. 3:12-18).

Second, consider the informational message. Focus on the message that people transmitted. In Old Testament times, God commissions spokesmen in Christ’s image to give further words interpreting the earlier words and further unfolding God’s mind. Christ himself climaxes the message. He is himself the eternal Word (John 1:1) and speaks the words of life (John 6:63, 68). After his resurrection, the apostles proclaim the gospel, whose content centers on Christ.

Third, consider the productive aspect, connected with the facts of history. Focus on God’s acts in history. God accomplishes redemption and fulfills his promises through the death and resurrection of Christ. All of the events of the Old Testament anticipate Christ’s work, and all of the New Testament reflects on it and shows its implications for present and future facts. God’s purpose is “to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ” (Eph. 1:10).

Hence, interpreting Micah involves seeing how God uses its words in further interpretation, reflection, and expansion in later canonical books (informational). It involves seeing how the words of Micah are fulfilled in later history (productive). It involves seeing how people are affected by its message (personal involvement).⁶ It involves above all seeing how Micah is fulfilled in Christ. Christ is the final word, the fulfillment of the truths and norms expounded by the book of Micah. Christ is the final fact to which Micah’s factual promises and predictions looked forward. Christ is the final mediatorial person, the prophet to whom Micah the prophet was analogous.

The sort of focus that we have on step 1, step 2, or step 3 influences to a great extent what kind of questions we ask and what kind of answers we seek.

In step 1, we focus on the origination of the message. We want primarily to understand what a particular book like Micah says, or what a particular passage of Micah says. But we may still ask the question in a manner that prepares for us to move forward toward application. How does God’s word to them back then fit into the larger picture? Answering this question leads primarily to exegesis, commentaries, and expository sermons.

Second, let us focus on the transmission of the message as in step 2. We want primarily to understand, not what a particular book or a particular passage says, but how God builds up the total message of the gospel and the total message of Christ to us in the course of time. Even if we consider a smaller passage, we ask, “How does this passage from Micah fit into a growing corpus of canonical communication, destined to be completed with the coming of Christ and the writing of the New Testament?” Answering this question leads primarily to biblical theology and reflection on the historical unfolding of redemption.

Third, let us focus on the reception of the message, as in step 3. We want primarily to understand, not what a particular book or a particular passage says, but God’s total communication for our total benefit. Even if we consider a smaller passage, we ask, “How does this passage fit into the total teaching of the Bible on topics or issues with which I am struggling?” What does the Bible teach about sin? about Christ? about marriage? about use of the tongue? about Christian growth? about the Second Coming? Answering these questions leads to systematic theology and books of Christian devotion and practice.

In practice, the interpretation of a particular passage of the Bible is never finished. Responsible obedience to God involves loving him with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind. Such love desires to understand and obey all of God’s instruction. If we are to understand with thoroughness and depth, we must engage in relating all the passages of the Bible to all the steps and substeps enumerated above. We can never in one lifetime complete everything ourselves, but many others aid us. The church labors corporately to grow “until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ” (Eph. 4:13).

We can at this point summarize our results by listing in a single list the various steps and aspects that we have enumerated.

Step 1. Original time and context.

a. Understand the person who is God’s spokesman (for example, Micah the prophet) (personal).

b. Understand the text itself (normative).

c. Understand the situation of the times and the situation of audience (situational).

d. Understand the total import of God’s speaking to the people through his spokesman.

Step 2. Transmission and its context.

a. Understand the persons who engage in transmission: official tradition bearers, and more broadly the people belonging to God.

b. Understand the transmission of the text and its message (normative). Both text criticism and the history of interpretation are involved.

c. Understand the situation of transmission. Understand narrowly the concerns of scribes and broadly God’s plan for history.

d. Understand the total import of God’s speaking to the whole church through the Scripture.

(1) Understand with different foci.

(a) Understand later use of the passage (exegetical focus).

(b) Understand how the passage fits into growing revelation (biblical theology).

(c) Understand how the passage fits into an entire body of teaching on various topics and issues (systematic theology and practical life).

(2) Understanding Christocentrically.

(a) How does Christ fulfill the word of the passage, by climaxing its truths, and embodying its wisdom, righteousness, and holiness?

(b) How does Christ fulfill the facts of the passage, by fulfilling its promises and predictions and bringing to climax the historical struggle with which the passage interfaces?

(c) How does Christ fulfill the personal aspect of communication (the prophet as mediator)?

Step 3. Modern context.

a. Understand what God is saying now through the text and its larger biblical theological and systematic theological context.

b. Understand your situation, as controlled by God.

c. Understand your gifts and capabilities and those of other speakers or hearers with whom you are communicating.

d. Understand the total import of God’s call to you as speaker and/or hearer.

Within each of the three major steps, subdivision d contains the more synthetic overview of the entire process. Particularly in subdivision d, we are analyzing God’s action and God’s speech. Hence knowing God the author is in fact part of the task implied in each step.

These steps in interpretation are similar to what can be found in many textbooks of hermeneutics and in many summaries of interpretive procedure. But there is a significant difference in our analysis. The three steps and their subdivisions originate in the triad of author, discourse, and reader, or the closely related triad of expressive, informational, and productive perspectives. These perspectives in turn are based on the Trinitarian character of God. The three perspectives are coinherent; they are mutually involved in one another and presuppose one another. As a result, the steps are inevitably coinherent and mutually involved in one another. Not only do the steps influence one another (as many people might admit), but they interpenetrate one another. They are not neatly separable, either in time, in subject matter, or in conception. Each step, rightly understood, encompasses the others.

Nevertheless, we can distinguish the steps. We have three distinct steps, and they belong in a certain distinct order. The order derives from an analysis that spreads out God’s speech in time. God speaks through Micah in the time of Hezekiah (correlating with step 1), the message is transmitted through intermediate times (step 2), and the message is received in our own time (step 3).

Let us call these three steps, taken together, the transmission perspective on interpretation. Is this the only way of analyzing interpretation?