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Why So Many Different Interpretations?
Why So Many Different Interpretations?
Sewell Hall
Last month, we discussed a question raised by a friend who was concerned that “good hearted Christians, in a spirit of honesty and truth, reason together from the same New Testament, but draw different conclusions.” This question is one of common concern.
On the subject of interpretation, G.H. Schodde writes: “A person has interpreted the thoughts of another when he has in his own mind a correct reproduction or photograph of the thought as it was conceived in the mind of the original writer or speaker. It is accordingly a purely reproductive process, involving no originality of thought on the part of the interpreter. If the latter adds anything of his own, it is eisegesis and not exegesis. The moment the Bible student has in his own mind what was in the mind of the author or authors of the Biblical books when these were written, he has interpreted the thought of scripture (I.S.B.E.)
If God is the author of the scriptures, then all true interpreters will come to the same conclusion. It is not in the mind of God that a child of God both can and cannot so sin as to be lost. God does not say in one place that baptism is essential to salvation and in another that it is not. We would have no confidence in a man who taught opposite things under varying circumstances. How can we believe in a God who so contradicts Himself? This notion that valid interpretations of scripture can produce conflicting doctrines is one of the reasons that many have ceased to believe that the Bible is the word of God.
If we maintain that the Bible is God’s inspired word, we must insist that the problem is not with the New Testament but with the interpreters. This does not necessarily question the honesty of the interpreters, but it does take into account that honest individuals can be honestly mistaken.
Reasons for Differences
Jesus and the Sadducees both accepted the Old Testament as the word of God, yet they disagreed on the subject of resurrection. Jesus said to them “You are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God” (Matthew 22:29). Though religious leaders, they were ignorant of the scriptures (in verses 31 and 32 Jesus cited a passage they had never considered) and they underestimated the power of God. Many supposed religious scholars today know only certain scriptures that seem to teach what they already believe, but have not considered the context of those passages, nor taken note of other passages that would clarify and reveal the full truth. Many, too, are ignorant of the power of God. This explains the many different interpretations of Genesis 1 as well as the ridiculous attempts to rationalize all the miracles of the Bible.
The apostle John and many brethren disagreed about whether or not Jesus promised that John would never die (John 21:22–23). John explains: “Yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but, ‘If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you?’ ” Why did some think Jesus had promised that John would not die? Obviously, they were sensationalists. Love of sensationalism explains many so-called interpretations of prophecy. Great crowds will come to hear “What the Bible Says About Russia” or “The Meaning of 666,” in spite of the fact that such sensational “interpretations” have been proved wrong by subsequent history again and again.
According to Matthew 4:5–7, Jesus and Satan reached different conclusions from Psalm 91:11, 12. Satan “interpreted” it to mean that Jesus could jump from the pinnacle of the temple and not be harmed. Why did Satan interpret this passage in this way? He had something he wanted to prove. Jesus, on the other hand, used scripture to identify God’s will, not His own (John 6:38). Today, there are people who do not love truth. “And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness” (2 Thessalonians 2:9–12). That strong delusion may well be in scriptures which they can easily “twist to their own destruction” (2 Peter 3:16).
Most disagreements in religion, however, do not result from differences of interpretation of any given scripture, but rather from different attitudes toward the exclusive authority of scripture. There is no scripture that people “interpret differently” to produce the different names that men wear in religion, or the different church organizations which they adopt or the multitude of activities in which modern churches engage. In most instances no effort would be made to justify them by the scriptures. And this is where many of the differences exist. These differences are not over what the scriptures teach, but over things that have been added by human authority. When men begin adding and add different things, those differences should not be blamed on different interpretations of the Bible.
The primary requirement for correct interpretation is an obsessive desire to know and do God’s will. Jesus said, “Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled” (Matthew 5:6).
Sewell Hall, “Hallmarks: Why so Many Different Interpretations?” Christianity Magazine (Jacksonville, FL: Christianity Magazine, 1997), 5.
