In the second part of her article, French catechist and theologian, Waltraud Linnig, offers us two more doors into reading and teaching the Bible and the keys for unlocking them.
To recapitulate, by opening the first door, we started to read the Bible as the Word of God. We discover the human authors have written different genres of biblical books!, we read the human words written in their own manner of thinking, of speaking, of conception of the world and influenced by their culture, one that differs greatly from our own. We become aware that we are reading translated texts. This is true for the original texts were written in Hebrew, Aramaic or Greek.
Did you ever read an ancient text in old-English, texts from the 14th century for example? It will not have been an easy task and the Hebrew texts of the OT are much more ancient as they were written between 1000 BC and 27 BC which is 2000 or 3000 years ago. We may read the Bible and interpret the words as if the author lived within our culture and age! We are perhaps not aware that the words do not always have the same meaning in the biblical language as in our language.
Immediately this raises another question: If there are true human authors who wrote the biblical texts, how can we affirm that the Bible is really the Word of God? For example, in Deuteronomy 14:7 we learn that the rabbit is a ruminant! This of course is not true! So, if there are such errors, how can I say that the Bible is really the Word of God? A key is needed to open that door!
This article is from The Sower and may be copied for catechetical purposes only. It may not be reprinted in another published work without the permission of Maryvale Institute. Contact sower@maryvale.ac.uk