Making Your Mark
Study and Interpretation Principles
Our intent in the Mark portion of the Rosetta Stone Project is to understand and apply the Gospel of Mark. Our pattern in leaders’ retreats will be to carefully observe the text, work to discover what the text means, and then apply that meaning to ourselves, our cell groups, our fellowship, and our larger community.
Understanding and applying scripture has a theological term: hermeneutics. In our times together we will focus on hands on observation, interpretation, and application. What we will be doing is actually practicing hermeneutics together. But it can be very helpful from time to time to take a step back and review hermeneutical principles to get a bigger picture of what we are attempting to do in understanding and living out Mark’s gospel.
To that end we’ve summarized some interpretive principles as described in Grasping God’s Word by Duvall and Hayes (references are to page numbers in this book). This book is a great resource and you might want to add this book to your library.
We’ll take a look at the following aspects of interpretation:
· God’s Word
· Interpretive Journey
· Genre
· Study Methodology
· Observation
· Interpretation
· Application.
God’s Word
“God has worked through human authors to convey his meaning through the conventions of language…As readers we do not create the meaning: rather, we seek to find the meaning that has already been placed into the text by the author (both divine and human)” (173-4).
The Bible is God’s word that he has graciously caused to be written down and given to all people to reveal his character and purposes in creation. God is the one who controls the meaning of scripture. But his word indwells human thinking and culture: God speaks his work through human living in specific historical and cultural settings, and in specific languages. Our task as biblical students is to seek to identify, understand, and apply God’s meaning in scripture.
Interpretive Journey
There are four steps in the interpretive journey: (22-25)
· Understand the authors’ intent (both God’s intent and that of the human author) and original hearers’ context and understanding of the text
· Describe the time/cultural distance between then and now
· Identify the timeless/trans-cultural theological concepts in text
· Consider how to understand and apply those theological concepts in our own context
Genre: Gospels
“Our method of reading the Gospels must respect the means God used to inspire them in the first place. The Gospel writers are saying something about Jesus in each episode and they are saying something by the way the link the smaller stories together to form the larger story” (239).
The gospels are not biographies as we would understand a biography that covers a chronological look at someone’s life and times. Rather the gospels are “Christological biographies” ( ) where Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John have intentionally crafted their ‘story’ to display the good news about Jesus Christ. This is why you will sometimes fine what look like discrepancies between one gospel and another. These are not really discrepancies; rather they clue us into that author’s specific intent and masterful writing under the direction of the Holy Spirit.
And the gospels are written as stories, as narratives, to reveal Jesus’ person, lifestyle, mission, and plans for those who follow him. The gospel writers crafted these stories to allow us to enter into the story and relate to the characters. It will be very fun, challenging, and revealing for us to enter into Mark’s story about Jesus, to see Jesus come to life from the pages of the written word, and to ask God to transform us and our community as we respond to Jesus as revealed in the Gospel of Mark.
Study Methodology
The process for understanding an entire book looks like this:
· Read the entire book several times
· Divide the book into sections, subsections, and individual stories
· Study each individual story using observation, interpretation, and application
· Relate each individual story to the other stories in that subsection
· Summarize the subsection
· Repeat the process for each subsection
· Relate each subsection to each other
· Connect each subsection back to the entire book
So we begin with an overview, examine each individual part, relate the parts to each other, and arrive at an understanding of the entire book.
Observation: What It Says
This story is a great introduction to the joys observation:
How To Read A Love Letter
This young man has just received his first love letter. He many read it three or four times, but he is just beginning. To read it as accurately as he would like would require several dictionaries and a good deal of close work with a few experts of etymology and philology.
However, he will do all right without them.
\He will ponder over the exact shade of meaning of every word, every comma. She has headed the letter “Dear John.” What, he asks himself, is the exact significance of those words? Did she refrain from saying “Dearest” because she was bashful? Would “My Dear” have sounded too formal?
Maybe she would have said “Dear So-and-so” to anybody! A worried frown will now appear on his face. But it disappears as soon as he really gets to thinking about the first sentence. She certainly wouldn’t have written that to anybody!
And so he works his way through the letter, one moment perched blissfully on a cloud, the next moment huddled miserably behind an eight ball. It has started a hundred questions in his mind. He could quote it by heart. In fact, he will – to himself – for weeks to come” (29).
Observations happen at three levels: sentences, paragraphs, and discourses.
When we look at sentences we look for: (39)
· Repetition of words
· Contrasts
· Comparisons
· Lists
· Cause and effect
· Figures of speech
· Conjunctions
· Verbs
· Pronouns
In paragraphs we look for: (57)
· Questions and answers
· Dialogue
· Means
· Purpose/result statements
· General to specific and specific to general
· Conditional clauses
· Actions/roles of God
· Actions/roles of people
· Emotional terms
· Tone of the passage
In discourses we look for: (77)
· Connections to other paragraphs and episodes
· Shifts in the story
· Interchange
· Chiasm
Observation is hard work. It is much easier to assume we know what a story says and move right to interpretation and application. But we must first know just what the passage says. The following story illustrates the challenges and blessings of entering into the difficult task of observation:
The Student, the Fish, and Agassiz
by the Student
It was more than fifteen years ago that I entered the laboratory of Professor Agassiz, and told him I had enrolled my name in the scientific school as a student of natural history. He asked me a few questions about my object in coming, my antecedents generally, the mode in which I afterwards proposed to use the knowledge I might acquire, and finally, whether I wished to study any special branch. To the latter I replied that while I wished to be well grounded in all departments of zoology, I purposed to devote myself specially to insects.
"When do you wish to begin?" he asked.
"Now," I replied.
This seemed to please him, and with an energetic "Very well," he reached from a shelf a huge jar of specimens in yellow alcohol.
"Take this fish," he said, "and look at it; we call it a Haemulon; by and by I will ask what you have seen."
With that he left me, but in a moment returned with explicit instructions as to the care of the object entrusted to me.
"No man is fit to be a naturalist," said he, "who does not know how to take care of specimens."
I was to keep the fish before me in a tin tray, and occasionally moisten the surface with alcohol from the jar, always taking care to replace the stopper tightly. Those were not the days of ground glass stoppers, and elegantly shaped exhibition jars; all the old students will recall the huge, neckless glass bottles with their leaky, wax-besmeared corks, half-eaten by insects and begrimed with cellar dust. Entomology was a cleaner science than ichthyology, but the example of the professor who had unhesitatingly plunged to the bottom of the jar to produce the fish was infectious; and though this alcohol had "a very ancient and fish-like smell," I really dared not show any aversion within these sacred precincts, and treated the alcohol as though it were pure water. Still I was conscious of a passing feeling of disappointment, for gazing at a fish did not commend itself to an ardent entomologist. My friends at home, too, were annoyed, when they discovered that no amount of eau de cologne would drown the perfume which haunted me like a shadow.
In ten minutes I had seen all that could be seen in that fish, and started in search of the professor, who had, however, left the museum; and when I returned, after lingering over some of the odd animals stored in the upper apartment, my specimen was dry all over. I dashed the fluid over the fish as if to resuscitate it from a fainting-fit, and looked with anxiety for a return of a normal, sloppy appearance. This little excitement over, nothing was to be done but return to a steadfast gaze at my mute companion. Half an hour passed, an hour, another hour; the fish began to look loathsome. I turned it over and around; looked it in the face - ghastly; from behind, beneath, above, sideways, at a three-quarters view - just as ghastly. I was in despair; at an early hour, I concluded that lunch was necessary; so with infinite relief, the fish was carefully replaced in the jar, and for an hour I was free.
On my return, I learned that Professor Agassiz had been at the museum, but had gone and would not return for several hours. My fellow students were too busy to be disturbed by continued conversation. Slowly I drew forth that hideous fish, and with a feeling of desperation again looked at it. I might not use a magnifying glass; instruments of all kinds were interdicted. My two hands, my two eyes, and the fish; it seemed a most limited field. I pushed my fingers down its throat to see how sharp its teeth were. I began to count the scales in the different rows until I was convinced that that was nonsense. At last a happy thought struck me - I would draw the fish; and now with surprise I began to discover new features in the creature. Just then the professor returned.
"That is right," said he, "a pencil is one of the best eyes. I am glad to notice, too, that you keep your specimen wet and your bottle corked."
With these encouraging words he added -
"Well, what is it like?"
He listened attentively to my brief rehearsal of the structure of parts whose names were still unknown to me; the fringed gill-arches and movable operculum; the pores of the head, fleshly lips, and lidless eyes; the lateral line, the spinous fin, and forked tail; the compressed and arched body. When I had finished, he waited as if expecting more, and then, with an air of disappointment:
"You have not looked very carefully; why," he continued, more earnestly, "you haven't seen one of the most conspicuous features of the animal, which is as plainly before your eyes as the fish itself. Look again; look again!" And he left me to my misery.
I was piqued; I was mortified. Still more of that wretched fish? But now I set myself to the task with a will, and discovered one new thing after another, until I saw how just the professor's criticism had been. The afternoon passed quickly, and when, towards its close, the professor inquired,
"Do you see it yet?"
"No," I replied. "I am certain I do not, but I see how little I saw before."
"That is next best," said he earnestly, "but I won't hear you now; put away your fish and go home; perhaps you will be ready with a better answer in the morning. I will examine you before you look at the fish."
This was disconcerting; not only must I think of my fish all night, studying, without the object before me, what this unknown but most visible feature might be, but also, without reviewing my new discoveries, I must give an exact account of them the next day. I had a bad memory; so I walked home by Charles River in a distracted state, with my two perplexities.
The cordial greeting from the professor the next morning was reassuring; here was a man who seemed to be quite as anxious as I that I should see for myself what he saw.
"Do you perhaps mean," I asked, "that the fish has symmetrical sides with paired organs?"
His thoroughly pleased, "Of course, of course!" repaid the wakeful hours of the previous night. After he had discoursed most happily and enthusiastically - as he always did - upon the importance of this point, I ventured to ask what I should do next.
"Oh, look at your fish!" he said, and left me again to my own devices. In a little more than an hour he returned and heard my new catalogue.
"That is good, that is good!" he repeated, "but that is not all; go on." And so for three long days, he placed that fish before my eyes, forbidding me to look at anything else, or to use any artificial aid. "Look, look, look," was his repeated injunction.
This was the best entomological lesson I ever had - a lesson whose influence was extended to the details of every subsequent study; a legacy the professor has left to me, as he left it to many others, of inestimable value, which we could not buy, with which we cannot part.
A year afterwards, some of us were amusing ourselves with chalking outlandish beasts upon the blackboard. We drew prancing star-fishes; frogs in mortal combat; hydro-headed worms; stately craw-fishes, standing on their tails, bearing aloft umbrellas; and grotesque fishes, with gaping mouths and staring eyes. The professor came in shortly after, and was as much amused as any at our experiments. He looked at the fishes.
"Haemulons every one of them," he said; "Mr. ____________ drew them."
True; and to this day, if I attempt a fish, I can draw nothing but Haemulons.
The fourth day a second fish of the same group was placed beside the first, and I was bidden to point out the resemblances and differences between the two; another and another followed, until the entire family lay before me, and a whole legion of jars covered the table and surrounding shelves; the odor had become a pleasant perfume; and even now, the sight of an old six-inch worm-eaten cork brings fragrant memories!
The whole group of Haemulons was thus brought into review; and whether engaged upon the dissection of the internal organs, preparation and examination of the bony framework, or the description of the various parts, Agassiz's training in the method of observing facts in their orderly arrangement, was ever accompanied by the urgent exhortation not to be content with them.
"Facts are stupid things," he would say, "until brought into connection with some general law."
At the end of eight months, it was almost with reluctance that I left these friends and turned to insects; but what I gained by this outside experience has been of greater value than years of later investigation in my favorite groups. (From Appendix American Poems, Houghton, Osgood & Co., 1880)
May Mark become our Haemulon!
Interpretation: What It Means
“Does the Bible have different levels of meaning? We do not believe it does. There is one level of meaning: - the one tied to the historical-cultural and literary contexts” (193).
With interpretation we work to understand what the text means. Collecting facts is extremely important; but facts are just meaningless lists until we connect them to greater meaning. In interpretation we need to consider what we bring to the text, the historical and cultural context of the story, and the literary context of the story.
What we bring: pre-understanding and presupposition.
Duval and Hayes have two stories to illustrate pre-understanding and presupposition.
The first story is about US missionaries attending an Ethiopian Christmas pageant (85-7). In the Ethiopian pageant Mary and Joseph are accompanied on their journey to Bethlehem by a group of aunts and cousins who join Joseph and Mary in the sheep pen where the aunts act as midwives for Jesus’ birth. This is dramatically different than our US pageants where Joseph and Mary travel alone. Why ae these two interpretations of the Christmas story so different? Because in both cultures we tend to fill in the gaps in the story with our own pre-understanding of how things are done. Which of our two cultures – Ethiopian and US – do you think are actually closer to biblical times?
Duval and Hayes’ second story challenges US citizens to consider the American Revolution in light of Romans 13:1-7 where Paul directs Roman believers to be subject to Roman authority.
“With this in mind, would it have been wrong for you to participate in the Boston Tea Party of 1773? In protest of a new tax on tea, American ‘patriots’ dumped tons of someone else’s’’ tea into the Boston Harbor. Was that a Christian thing to do?...You see, the morality of the American rebellion against Britain is never questioned as we grow up. It is always presented as wonderful and glorious – the epitome of patriotism (which must be good). It is tightly intertwined in our hearts with the flag, baseball, Mom, an apple pie. This it has become sacred. We place the ‘rightness of it over any critique or challenge to it that may come from the Bible. Any interpretation of Romans 13 that can possibly be legitimate must comply with respect for the Revolution. Thus we place our culture over the Bible, and we become closed-minded to any understanding of the Bible that conflicts with the status quo of our culture” (91).
In interpretation we must understand our own pre-understanding and cultural presuppositions!
Historical and cultural context
The historical and cultural context looks at the interaction between the biblical writer, the biblical audience, and any of the cultural or historical elements that come to bear on the story being studied.
Resources for looking at historical and cultural context include:
· Bible Handbooks
· Old and New Testament Surveys
· Bible Atlas
· Bible dictionaries and encyclopedias
· Many resources are available on the web
· Bible software is a great way to get many of these resources at your fingertips
Literary context[1]
Literary context includes both the genre of the text, mentioned above, as well as the direct textual context. The following diagram illustrates the principles of textual interpretation:
(118)
This diagram illustrates that an individual passage should first be interpreted in the immediate contest of passages before and following the story, then in the context of the larger section of the book, then in the rest of the entire book, and finally in the context of the entire Bible.
Application
“When it comes to biblical interpretation, the Spirit appears to work little in the cognitive dimension, more in the area of discerning truth, and most in the area of application” (199).
Application completes the interpretive journey: after extensive observation and careful interpretation, we are ready to ask the Spirit to direct us to action.
Reference Citation
Duvall, Scott and Hayes, Daniel
2001 Grasping God’s Word: A Hands-On Approach to Reading, Interpreting, and Applying the Bible. Grand Rapids: Zondervan.
[1] For more discussion on this concept see Let the Authors Speak For Themselves in Rosetta Stone Project Resources.
