Ways to read and understand the bible. Your techniques?

[TopSilver]

What I have learned is one of the best ways is to take it literal. But how literal is the question. The word literal is hard for most christians to grasp when they are examining heaven and hell and basically trying to understand jesus teachings based on something that is eternal. It seems to boggle the mind quite a bit. You can't really take every last portion of it literally when your reading the stories as some of the teachings may trick your mind so to speak - What I mean is you may not understand based on a higher teaching level such as something that is more difficult to understand.

I think the best way to read the bible is to take everything literal - Even the smallest portions of words and sentences. That doesn't mean you shouldn't pay attention to the entire page for instance or the rest - What I believe in my opinion is if you put it together all at once and take even the smallest portion literal you could understand a lot.

For example. If you read a sentence and you take that literal, sometimes it might not make much since. Why don't you try taking the entire page and every sentence literal at the same time and combine the meaning as one.

I have come to understand this is a great way to read scripture.

Stack every portion that mentions family from the smallest and simplest to the more complex and bigger and when it gets towards the middle before the new testament, meet it halfway and simplify it again towards the end of revelation.

Basically like this:

Start of bible | Families small/simple <-> Families big/complex | Middle of bible | Families big/complex <-> Families small/simple | End of bible

As you stack the family, you basically read it literal. Then you use the family to interpret it. Now there may be a trick to this. If you use the fear of god to take it literal, but use the family stories/teachings to interpret you may have a winner. Your basically reading the bible literally like a solid born-again god fearing christian - But as everyone has to find a way to understand what their reading as well you also need a way to interpret it. So you basically use the family stories/teachings such as cain and abel and so forth to understand and interpret what you reading.

Anytime it talks about family you interpret, and anytime it's not talking about family you talk it as literal as possible. And if you do both you could understand a lot.

I have an illness that keeps me from seeing the correct words in the bible unfortunately. For me the bible has been changed and altered, however it's only what I see. This didn't develop until I was about 20 years old. I managed to read a fair bit before it happened. But I learned this a while back and I thought it might help someone.

What are your thoughts and does anyone have any techniques of their own?

 

[JRT]

After several decades of studying scripture I have come to the conclusion that very little in the Bible is to be taken literally.
But I take it seriously. To take it literally would mean that I believe that every word, as it is written, was spoken by God. I cannot do that. But I can and do take it seriously. To take the Bible seriously means to examine it in its time and for the culture in which it was written. I want to offer up a very handy distinction that can help in our understanding of the Bible. That distinction I would like to make is revealed in the two words: true and truth. True is if it actually happened. It is a fact of history. Truth is the moral. It is the actual essence of things. I do not believe that most of the biblical stories are true stories. But I sure do believe that they are truth stories. It doesn’t matter to me if the Red Sea parted or if Noah had an ark. I don’t care if Jonah was swallowed by a whale or if that’s not necessarily factually so. To me, the great meaning of these stories has nothing to do with whether they’re historically accurate or not. Whether Jonah slept or didn’t sleep for three nights in the proverbial halibut hotel does not take away from the moral of the story – that it is human nature to run away from the things that we don’t want to do. I don’t believe this historically happened. I don’t believe Jonah was swallowed by a great fish and brought to the bottom of the sea-world after not doing what he knew he had to do. This is a truth story. Not a true story. This is a story about humanity, about me, about the troubles we get into when we don’t do what we should do and about how it will bring us down to the very bottom of our existence. It’s a truth story, not a true story. And if we look at the miracles in the Bible as truth stories, what we learn from these stories will be liberative for us. In this important way the Bible can be a very liberating force in our lives. If we read the Bible in this way we will probably fight less with what we read in the Bible. Moreover, seeking the "truth" of the stories can allow us to have meaningful conversations with people who might read the stories to be true stories rather than truth ones. The truth aspect of the story offers a place of connection between myself and those who read the words literally.

 

[TopSilver]

Yes but to be honest the way I think it works is it's based on a paradox. Where so much works for and against itself that for example Cain and Abel were actually really the first 2 sons. And that was actually their name. I personally can see that their name would never of been Cain and Abel for the way it sounds but because everything works against itself to give us the end result I actually think that really was their name. Jonah actually probably was swallowed by a whale in real life but the time period in which it happened may have for some reason allowed this to be true. Things may have been different in that time period then they are today I believe.

Anyways thanks for the share. Just wanted to share some ideas I had behind understanding the bible. To be honest it can be taken literally and understood at the same time but no one takes it literally enough is what I was trying to say.

 

[NewCreation435]

Reading and studying the Bible are two different things. When I study it, I use a number of bible study tools including looking at the original language and commentaries. You have to consider the context the passage was written in. You wouldn't take most of the book of Revelations literally since it wasn't written in that format. You have to understand what type of literature your reading. For example Song of Solomon is mostly poetic.

 

[JRT]

Reading and studying the Bible are two different things. When I study it, I use a number of bible study tools including looking at the original language and commentaries. You have to consider the context the passage was written in. You wouldn't take most of the book of Revelations literally since it wasn't written in that format. You have to understand what type of literature your reading. For example Song of Solomon is mostly poetic.

And the Old Testament Books of Job, of Jonah and of Ruth are actually extended parables while Genesis and Exodus are mostly mythology. Forcing a literal understanding on such scripture is to lose the meaning that was intended in their writing.

 

[NewCreation435]

And the Old Testament Books of Job, of Jonah and of Ruth are actually extended parables while Genesis and Exodus are mostly mythology. Forcing a literal understanding on such scripture is to lose the meaning that was intended in their writing.

I would disagree strongly that Genesis and Exodus are mostly mythology

 

[Andrew]

If you want to know how the early Christians understood the bible, just take in what you read as literal especially the NT.
As far as the Genesis, the first book, compare it to Revelation, the last book.. just take it in and let the Spirit hear and interpret in your heart what it means to you.
The details in Genesis is condensed, imagine if every detail of creation was written down.. that would be impossible to finish reading in a life time lol