Discussion Hermeneutics

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School

Regent University *

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Course

303

Subject

Religion

Date

Apr 3, 2024

Type

docx

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Uploaded by ziggzagg1000

What Hermeneutics Taught Me This author must admit that before taking this course, she felt confident that she could read and understand the Bible better than some. However, after reading about the history surrounding the Bible with The Drama of Scripture: Finding Our Place In The Biblical Story. This author discovered she knew about 80% of the Bible's content. Then, once the course moved forward into reading Hermeneutics, this author discovered that she required a lesson on how to read the Bible, which Hermeneutics offers. This author learned the importance of structure and speech used by the biblical writers. However, the three significant lessons this author learned were the value of interpretation, the importance of recognizing ancient literary techniques, and the importance of symbolism used by the writer. However, Being taught briefly by the author's name has helped this author improve her bible reading skills tremendously. This author never looked at the Bible as a living, breathing document. Her mother taught her it was God's word and the law she should live. However, during this course, this author discovered that the Bible is a form of communication. As Thomas Keiser states, when speaking of the Bible as God's word, we are referring to the Bible's character and that the Bible is, in fact, communication (Keiser, 2021, Ch. 3, p.3). Thinking about the Bible from this standpoint has enabled this author to read it as if she were listening to a narrator. The other stumbling block this author faces with reading the Bible is that it communicates spoken history, not written history. Keiser states that the author shares ideas using language (Keiser, 2021, Ch 3, p. 4). After reading, this author attempted to recognize the use of language within and feels her understanding of Bible content will continue to improve. Secondly, this author should have realized the significance of ancient literary techniques. This author was reading the Bible as if it were written during her lifetime, leading to a misinterpretation of its meaning. This author can barely keep up with the acronyms of today, so she was oblivious to the literary styles of the authors of the Bible. During Biblical times, it was challenging for the authors of the Bible to write. Keiser listed some of the following as reasons for the difficulty: the materials used to write on (stone, clay, reeds, and animal skins), biblical authors also encountered great expense, and often transposing these stories took an extensive amount of time and depending on the materials used the writing did not last long (Keiser, 2021, CH 6, p. 4). The authors of the Bible did not have pictures to help their readers grasp what they were attempting to say. Biblical authors used the structure of their words to relay their messages. Keiser stated in his book that ancient authors used the way they arranged the material and used a framework to organize their text (Keiser, 2021, CH 6, p. 5). Using the tools given in Hermeneutics chapters 5 and 6 continues to open the stories of the Bible in a new light for this author. Finally, in her readings in general, this author has always paid attention to symbolism. Nevertheless, within the Bible, she found that most of it was going over her realm of understanding. Because this author was very uneducated on how to read the Bible, she missed most of the intended purposes of the symbolism used. Keiser mentions that symbols were not always accepted, interpretation of word usage was very literal, and that during that time, these feelings about the Bible were justified (Keiser, 2021, Ch 10, p. 2). Keiser uses the creation as an example to reestablish the importance of symbolism in the Bible. Keiser states that the current world symbolizes a larger reality beyond us (Keiser, 2021, Ch 10, p.3). Keiser also referenced names and numbers used in the Near East, which are currently used in today's reality (Keiser, 2021, Ch 10, p. 4). This author now reads the Bible with a different understanding, creating a positive outcome.

The two books assigned during this course have been very insightful to this author's spiritual growth and understanding. She has learned how to correlate actual history to the history spoken about within the Bible, specifically the Old Testament. This author has also learned to be more observant, recognize techniques within the writings, and recognize that a symbol presents meaning and importance to a story. This author intends to start rereading the Bible during her winter break using the tools she has learned in this course.

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