BI607 Hermeneutics and Inductive Bible Study

1. BI607 Hermeneutics and Inductive Bible Study Christopher Cone, Th.D, Ph.D, Ph.D drcone.com calvary.edu

2. Module 1Intro and Bases for Hermeneutics

3. Some Introductory Concepts • How many meanings? • Who determines meaning? • Reader response • Authorial intent • Exegesis vs. Eisegesis • Hermeneutics – the discipline of interpreting texts, the rules for ascertaining meaning

4. Foundational Worldview Issues

5. Scripture through the lens of experience • Experience through the lens of Scripture

6. On What Basis to Choose? • Who determines meaning? • Reader response • Authorial intent • Presuppositions • External data needed? • External data not needed? • Internal modeling over external prescription • How does the text model deriving meaning?

7. Internal Modeling: Genesis • Records roughly 2,000 years • Alleges these are the first of human history (1:27, 5:1) • Alleges the first 33% of historical chronology, and 50% of Biblical history • OT = 4,000 years, NT to today = 2,000 years • Genesis provides a huge sample size for assessing an internal interpretive model

8. The Internal Model Test: Genesis • The Research Method: • Examination of every time God is recorded as speaking in Genesis, and the responses • The Research Question: • Do the recorded responses support one hermeneutic model over another?

9. Additional Considerations • Do God’s initial audiences take Him only literally or do they infer a deeper meaning than what would be normally signified by the words that were verbally expressed? • Responses categorized in 2 ways: • C1 responses provide evidence that the initial speech act was intended only for literal understanding. • C2 responses provide evidence that the initial speech act was intended for any understanding beyond the literal meaning of the words verbally expressed.

10. The Speech-Acts of God and Responses In Genesis • “God said” (36 verses), wayyomer el or wayyomerelohim • “the Lord said” (19 verses), wayyomeryahweh • “the Lord God said” (5 verses), wayyomeryahwehelohim • “He said (24 verses). • 84 total speech acts of God

11. Results Data from “The Genesis Account as Early Model for Scriptural Hermeneutics” (www.drcone.com)

12. Results • God Said – 36 verses, at least 27 C1’s, 0 C2’s • The Lord Said – 19 verses, at least 17 C1’s, 0 C2’s • The Lord God Said – 5 verses, at least 4 C1’s, 0 C2’s • He Said – 24 verses, at least 23 C1’s, 0 C2’s • Total – 84 verses, at least 71 C1’s, 0 C2’s

13. 71 C1’s / 0 C2’s • C1 responses provide evidence that the initial speech act was intended only for literal understanding. • C2 responses provide evidence that the initial speech act was intended for any understanding beyond the literal meaning of the words verbally expressed.

14. Implications • God intended for His words to be taken at face value, using a plain-sense interpretive approach • Method known as the literal grammatical historical hermeneutic (LGH) • Method recognizes that verbal expression has meaning rooted in and inseparable from the grammatical and historical context of the language used

15. Implications • Any departure from LGH requires explicit exegetical support for any change in method • Hermeneutic methodology for understanding Scripture is not arbitrary but is instead plainly modeled. • Later Scriptures should be understood in light of the hermeneutic precedent provided by Genesis.

16. A Case Study on the Importance of Hermeneutics Replacement Theology and Essentials

17. Every skill and every inquiry, and similarly every action and rational choice, is thought to aim at some good; and so the good has been aptly described as that at which everything aims. – Aristotle (Nicomachean Ethics)

18. What is an Essential??? • We can’t answer that question until we answer the question “Essential for what?” • Who has the right to determine the answer? • What is our basis for determining the answer? • Are there different levels of essential? • Primary essential: final and ultimate essential • Intermediary essential: something that contributes to the primary essential

19. What is an Essential??? • One website answers the question this way, • “The Bible itself reveals what is important and essential to the Christian faith. These essentials are the deity of Christ, salvation by God’s grace and salvation through Jesus Christ alone, the resurrection of Christ, the Gospel, monotheism and the Holy Trinity. These are the main “essentials” that we should understand and believe if we are followers of Jesus Christ.” (gotquestions.org/essentials–Christian–faith.html) • How does this site answer the question? • And on what basis?

20. What is an Essential??? • Let’s do a quick case study to test whether the answer is Biblical: • “The Bible itself reveals what is important and essential to the Christian faith. These essentials are the deity of Christ, salvation by God’s grace and salvation through Jesus Christ alone…”(gotquestions.org/essentials–Christian–faith.html) • According to this statement, salvation is essential. • But essential for what?

21. Ephesians 1 on Essentials • Ephesians 1:5-6 • In love 5 He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, 6 to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. • Ephesians 1:12 • To the end that we who were the first to hope in Christ would be to the praise of His glory

22. Ephesians 1 on Essentials • Ephesians 1:14 • In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation – having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory.

23. Ephesians 1 on Essentials • Ephesians 1 identifies intermediary essentials: • 1:5-6 predestination, adoption, kindness of His will are intermediary essentials • 1:14 hearing, the gospel, belief, sealing with the Holy Spirit, and redemption are intermediary essentials • Ephesians 1 identifies a primary essential: • 1:6 to the praise of the glory of His grace • 1:12 to the praise of His glory • 1:14 to the praise of His glory

24. Ephesians 1 on Essentials • From Ephesians 1, we understand that salvation (and all associated with it) is an intermediary essential, contributing to the primary essential – that is his doxological purpose, or His purpose to glorify Himself • We do not have the right to measure essentials by what pertains to us (including salvation) – that would be arrogant and selfish

25. Where Does the “Replacement Theology” Issue Fit? • Replacement theology, or supersessionism, teaches that in some way the church takes national Israel’s place in God’s plan, by God fulfilling Israel’s promises in the church. • How important is this issue? Is it a minor theological controversy? Or is it vitally important to God?

26. What Did God Promise? • Abraham would be a great nation (Gen 12:2-3a, 15:18, 17:2-7). That covenant would be kept through Isaac (Gen 17:19,21), and through Jacob (Gen 27:27-29, 28:13-14) • The great nation would have three elements: • Land (Gen 15, Deut 30) • Government (2 Sam 7, 1 Kings 9) • People (Gen 12, Deut 30, Jer 31)

27. What Did God Promise? • “In you all the families of the earth will be blessed.” (Gen 12:3b, 28:14) • Those that did not have a covenant relationship with God would be blessed in or by those that did (Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, the nation of Israel) • Replacement theology tries to place all God’s people in a covenant relationship with Him, but that is not Biblically defensible

28. How Certain is God’s Promise? • Genesis 15:13 • “Know for certain…” Psalm 89:38-39 • “Once I have sworn by my holiness; I will not lie to David. His descendants shall endure forever and his throne as the sun before Me…” • Amos 4:2 • “The Lord God has sworn by His holiness…”

29. How Certain is God’s Promise? • Jeremiah 33:14-26 • “Thus says the Lord, ‘If you can break My covenant for the day and My covenant for th night, so that day and night will not be at their appointed time, then My covenant may also be broken with David…” (33:20-21a) • “Thus says the Lord, ‘If My covenant for day and night stand not, and the fixed patterns of heaven and earth I have not established, then I would reject the descendants of Jacob and David…” (33:25-26a

30. Why Did God Promise?

31. So What?

32. So What? • Conclusion: If God makes promises and keeps those promises for His glory, then any who would deny or adjust those promises are directly offending His glory. • So, replacement theology – essential or not?

33. Module 2Literal Grammatical- Historical Principles

34. Necessity or Possibility? The Logic of Literal Grammatical-Historical Hermeneutics

35. The Importance of Presuppositions • They are “first principles” from which we develop worldview • Conflicts between worldviews are usually directly tied to presuppositions • Everybody has them • Transparency about presuppositions helps us to think clearly

36. Bases of Presuppositions • Epistemology – the study of knowledge • Competing views: • Dualism – truth is hidden • Rationalism – reason determines truth • Empiricism – experience determines truth • Existentialism & Postmodernism – truth is indeterminable • Biblicism – God’s word is truth

38. What are Biblical Presuppositions?4 Pillars • Pillar 1: The existence of the Biblical God • Pillar 2: God’s authoritative self-revelation to man • Pillar 3: Natural-man’s incapacity to comprehend God’s revelation • Pillar 4: A consistent hermeneutic

39. Is Literal Grammatical-Historical a Logical Necessity? • God revealed Himself using language • The principle of single meaning • Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek • Did God communicate with the expectation He would be understood? • The example of God’s earliest listeners • The NT use of the OT

40. Is Literal Grammatical-Historical a Logical Necessity? • If we adopt Biblical presuppositions, we cannot reasonably reject Biblical methodology • Literal grammatical-historical is not just an option, it prerequisite to properly understanding God’s word

41. 3 Related Stages of Logic for LGH • Stage 1: Epistemological basis for preferring Literal Grammatical-Historical (LGH) • Stage 2 : Applying LGH to the exegetical process • Stage 3 : Ground rules for praxis, exposition

42. First-Stage Textual Logic of LGH • P1 Genesis contains almost 100 speech acts of God • P2 In the roughly 70 instances in which we see the response, the response shows His speech act was understood with LGH • P3 Genesis spans the first 2500 years of recorded history • P4 The hermeneutic model used for the first 2500 years holds unless there is an announced change • P5 There is no announced change • P6 NT use of the OT reflects continuity in hermeneutic method • P7 The Biblical hermeneutic model is LGH • C Therefore, LGH must be employed

43. First-Stage Linguistic Logic of LGH: • P1 There exists a God who created • P2 Language and humanity originated from God • P3 God communicated w/ humanity using language • P4 God’s use of language confirms language as suitable vehicle for revelation • P5 Earliest recipients understood meaning based on normative use • P6 Earliest interpretive model was based on face value, and recognized grammar and historical context • P7 LGH best represents this approach • C If we are to understand the intended meaning in the same way, LGH must be employed

44. First-Stage Worldview Logic of LGH:

45. Second-Stage Logic of LGH: Exegesis • Step 1 Verify Text and Translation • Step 2 Understand Background, Context • Step 3 Identify Structure • Step 4 Identify Grammatical, Syntactical Keys • Step 5 Identify Lexical Keys • Step 6 Identify Biblical Context • Step 7 Identify Theological Context

46. Experience through the lens of Scripture

47. God’s Revelation Claims to be… • Exclusively Authoritative – Jn 17:17 • Exclusively Sufficient – 2 Tim 3:16-17 • The Source of Absolute Certainty – 2 Pet 1:19-21

48. Biblical Evidences for Objectivity

49. Textual: 1 Corinthians 13:8-10 • 8 Love never fails; but if there are prophecies, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away. • 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part; • 10 but when the complete comes, the partial will be done away. • 8 Ἡἀγάπηοὐδέποτε πίπτει. εἴτεδὲπροφητεῖαι, καταργηθήσονται· εἴτεγλῶσσαι, παύσονται· εἴτεγνῶσις, καταργηθήσεται. • 9 ἐκ μέρους γὰργινώσκομενκαὶἐκ μέρους προφητεύομεν· • 10 ὅτανδὲἔλθῃτὸ τέλειον, τὸἐκ μέρους καταργηθήσεται.

50. Chronological: Ephesians 2:20/4:11-12 • 2:20 having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone, • 4:11 And He gave some apostles, and some prophets, and some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, • 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; • 20ἐποικοδομηθέντεςἐπὶτῷθεμελίῳτῶνἀποστόλωνκαὶπροφητῶν, ὄντοςἀκρογωνιαίουαὐτοῦΧριστοῦἸησοῦ, • 11 καὶαὐτὸςἔδωκεντοὺςμὲνἀποστόλους, τοὺςδὲπροφήτας, τοὺςδὲεὐαγγελιστάς, τοὺςδὲ ποιμένας καὶ διδασκάλους, • 12 πρὸςτὸνκαταρτισμὸντῶνἁγίωνεἰςἔργον διακονίας, εἰςοἰκοδομὴντοῦ σώματος τοῦΧριστοῦ,