Is Hermeneutics REALLY important?

Why is hermeneutics important?

I get asked this question on a fairly regular basis – almost as often as “What IS hermeneutics?” The fact that any Christian would ask either of these questions is pretty disturbing. Hermeneutics is often called “The art & science of Biblical interpretation” – but you can just as easily say it is “finding out what the Bible really says – using common sense and basic logic” …but that doesn’t sound very impressive!

First off, a couple of sad but true points. Most Christians today:

· Are lazy. They don’t want to find out what the Bible says – they want someone to TELL THEM what it says.

· Defend their laziness by saying “I just let the Spirit lead/teach/guide (etc) me”

· Almost completely lay aside the concept of “context” with regards to the Bible, and treat the Bible as a collection of verses, or “wise sayings” – though they would never admit to that directly!

As a result of these points, most Christians today are Biblically ignorant. They have a few “life verses” they have smashed together, and have very weak and shallow theology. They know next to nothing about doctrine – often chanting “doctrine divides” – even though the Bible is FILLED with doctrine. Most Christians have no idea what the Bible says – and they don’t seem to care. So the church is filling up with bad teachers and even worse teaching. This explains why people like Benny Hinn and Joe Osteen haven’t been dismissed as frauds and charlatans who would fit better as cartoons on a Denny’s kids menu than on TV preaching ANYTHING!

If we would take some time to make sure we are “getting it” – and use some common sense, we could avoid some serious errors. I thought I would use an example that most people are familiar with, and show you how some simple and basic hermeneutics can make a BIG difference. But this example is not from the Bible. It’s from something we are hearing more and more about these days… a phrase I am sure we are all familiar with: “Separation of Church and State!”

I am sure you have heard that statement. Regardless of your position on it, for our purposes here, that doesn’t matter. What do you know ABOUT the statement? Well, a fair number of people have heard that phrase attributed to Thomas Jefferson. Some have even heard that it’s from The Constitution. It’s taught in our schools – it is routinely talked about on the news, the “who’s who” in Hollywood shout it out on an increasingly regular basis. It’s chanted in near reverent tones in Washington – it has become sort of a “Prime Directive” in America… but what are the facts? Did our forefathers really intend this phrase do govern our lives? Let’s use some hermeneutics and see what we can find out.

Did Thomas Jefferson say it? Yes! Well, actually he wrote it… but where? I mentioned that some people have heard that the phrase was in the constitution, but is it? No! This is the first problem – most Americans have not read the Constitution (and most Christians have not read the Bible). So since most Americans are ignorant of what’s in the Constitution, it’s easy for this error to continue on. You need to be familiar with the source you are citing. The phrase “Separation of Church and State” never appears in the constitution.

But Jefferson DID write it – now another principle of hermeneutics is needed: Be familiar, at least to SOME degree, with the historical context surrounding the source you are citing or dealing with. The phrase appears in a letter Thomas Jefferson wrote to a group called “The Danbury Baptists Association.”

But WHY did he write it? Yep, another hermeneutics principle – know the “situational context” …or the “why” of the source you are dealing with. This part may be a little long – but I will try my best to keep it short. Before the USA won its freedom from England, we were PART of England (duh). In England at the time, if you were not a part of the “Church of England” you had very limited rights. You couldn’t go to most universities, you couldn’t hold a government office, and you had to have a license to preach the Bible – a license that could be revoked at any time. And also of EXTREME significance, it was not unheard of for the government to remove pastors from Non Church of England churches (these churches were called “Non-Conformist” churches). The government in England exercised DIRECT control over all the churches in England – even sometimes getting involved in what was allowed to be preached! After the revolution in America, MOST of the people who were involved in writing our foundational documents, and setting up the government in general were Presbyterian (or a similar denomination). Well, the Baptists saw this as a potential problem – fearing a repeat of the situation in England that they had just (hopefully) gotten rid of. You have heard that one of the issues regarding the revolution was “freedom of religion” – well, THIS is what that was about! One group of Baptists, calling themselves the “Danbury Baptists Association” decided to write to Thomas Jefferson and express their concern. He RESPONDED to their concerns with a letter that contains the now famous phrase! All that is (heavily condensed of course) the “why” behind Jefferson’s letter.

But what exactly did the letter say in regards to this phrase? You guessed it, another hermeneutics principle! We need to know the grammatical context of the source we are dealing with. This is what Jefferson wrote: “Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State” – You see, Jefferson was assuring the D.B.A. that the founding fathers had taken steps to ensure that the government could not interfere with the practice of religion – in anyway. That there was a “wall” protecting the church FROM the state! Wow! Context makes all the difference in the world. Far from keeping the church out of politics, the founding fathers wanted to make sure the government kept out of churches! The “wall” was intended to be a “one way” form of protection. This is absolutely backwards from the way this phrase is being used today…. Because most people only hear this phrase yanked out of context, mentioned with the authority of Thomas Jefferson, and then we end up with bad policies and silly laws. Much like many bad teachers mentioning a verse, yanked out of context, presenting it with the authority of the Bible, and then we end up with bad doctrine and silly teaching… and HUGE heresies (“The Shack” anyone?)

If you’ve made it this far, it should be obvious that the overriding principle of hermeneutics is “Context, context, context!” Context can take many forms, in our example we used, historical, situational, grammatical and general context. You can boil all these down to this: context means what’s around the source you are dealing with. Context is key, it should never ever EVER be ignored. If you are interested, one of the most important things you may ever read can be found here: Never read a Bible verse!

Thanks for readin!

Rob