One week after I finished reading Manfred Brauch’s book “Abusing Scripture: the consequences of misreading the Bible” (2009, Intervasity Press), I challenge myself to write down what stays in my mind. The next two paragraphs are what I can retrieve from my memory without reopening his book.
Summary
It is a fact that virtually everyone selectively reads the bible to their own liking or preconceived notion, sometimes with trivial consequences, but oftentimes resulting in gross misunderstanding and distortion of the biblical intentions and grave damage to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Notable cases of abuse that Brauch addresses in various chapters include the social/cultural justice versus personal salvation mandate of the gospel, the cross versus prosperity gospel, the obedience versus civil disobedience to the governmental authority (e.g., just versus unjust war), the traditionally held but biblically untenable, hierarchical inequality in gender (male-female, especially husband/wife), ethnic (us vs. them) and social (master-servant) relations.
To avoid such abuses of the scripture, Brauch has a unique and what I would call realistic and still “high” view of the Bible. He readily acknowledges that Bible has alternative and even opposing teachings on many of the controversial issues, due to both the progressive, incarnational nature of revelation and the discrepancy between divine authorial intent and human understanding and practices during and after biblical times. The singularly most important word to bear in mind during exegesis is context, be it literary, theological or historical. One must examine a passage in its immediate and larger literary, historical and theological contexts and sort out the overarching, superintending biblical intent against the backdrop of imperfect human modeling and praxis during both biblical times and the two millennia of church age. To Brauch, such overarching and overriding principles must hang on the biblical theology of Cross with Christ at the very center of all divine intentions. Any teachings that do not reflect the Christ intention cannot have the all-time, universal and trans-cultural authority even if recorded in the Bible. Personally, I find Brauch’s handling of the scriptural interpretation properly balanced, well reasoned, and expertly articulated.
In the remaining pages, I will review in greater details by reopening his book and rereading many of the important paragraphs. Instead of summarizing linearly according to his chapter arrangement, I choose to cut across his discourse throughout the entire book and outline his counterarguments against gender inequality, arguably the single most discussed abuse of Scripture in the book. This way, one can clearly see how Brauch builds up his arguments for this specific and pervasive abuse. Someone said that the gender inequality is the last bastion of human inequality. Throughout the book reading, one cannot help but come away with a strong sense of Brauch’s championing gender equality based on an egalitarian as opposed to a hierarchical relation.
Intention and incarnation
Before he dives into the various aspects of abuses, Brauch identifies two pillars of intention and incarnation as the backbone of responsible, trustworthy interpretation of the Scripture. According to him,
“Much of the abuse of Scripture is the result of not taking the intention of Scripture—both the intention of God’s inspiring action and the intention of the particular authors of the biblical documents—with full seriousness. A second reason behind the abusive interpretation and application of Scripture is a disregard for, or a diminution of, its incarnational character. For when the historical, cultural and situational contexts of particular biblical texts are not given their proper due—or when their redemptive intention is not adequately considered—the trustworthy reading and understanding of the biblical word is seriously compromised”
Brauch issues poetically poignant critique to a bifurcated gospel due to abuse of the whole gospel. The modernist-liberals’ vision “offers a social gospel without a personal savior; a gospel of political peace without the Prince of Peace; a gospel of bread for the world without the Bread of Life; a gospel of harmony in human relationships without a life-giving and life-transforming relationship with the Holy One of God”. On the other spectrum, the evangelicals’ half gospel emphasizes what is neglected, and neglects what is emphasized, by the social gospel.
Be not selective but be balanced with passages.
Brauch traces the abuse of biblical teaching on gender issue to selective reading of the scripture. People who favor a hierarchical relation between men and women would frequently quote passages such as Gen.2, 1Tim 2, 1Cor.11, 14, Eph. 5, Col. 3, Titus 2, and 1Peter 3. Brauch points out an apparent contradiction between 1Cor.11 and 14, which the advocates of hierarchical school of gender relation seem to ignore. Furthermore, there are other passages that teach a divine intent for gender equality, chiefly in the creation intent (Gen.1:26-28) and redemption intent (Gal.3:27-28). How to reconcile the disparate teachings is the task at hand. Burying one’s head in the sand, turning a blind eye, or inclining a deaf ear to opposing teaching is not a viable option, for doing that would constitute scriptural abuse and damage to our reputation as biblical truth seekers. Worse, misunderstanding of this gender issue will continue to subject one sex (female) to unnecessary oppression and hurtful injustice of inequality.
To avoid the abuse of selectivity, Brauch gives the following cautions: (1) Never be satisfied with only part of a loaf of the “biblical bread”. (2) Seek to hear and understand the whole counsel of God in Scripture on particular issues. (3) When confronted with tensions between biblical affirmations or apparently contradictory voices in Scripture, employ “the forest versus the trees” principle. (4) Compare specific biblical texts—that support a particular point of view, doctrine or practice—with the “redemptive movement” within Scripture.
To void the abuse of biblical balance, Brauch suggests us to: (1) Acknowledge the reality of having to balance complementary or multiple biblical perspectives. (2) Refuse to dictate in advance what Scripture reveals about any particular aspect of God and God’s dealing with human life. (3) Approach complementary biblical materials with a “both/and” rather than an “either/or” mindset. (4) Heed the biblical call to practice humility. (5) Give heed to biblical precedence! (6) Never separate components of Scripture.
Correctly decode the meaning of words.
The fact that Eve was created as a “helper” (ezer) suitable for Adam (Gen.2:18) is by no means suggestive of her, or future women’s, second class status, just as the prolific use of the same Hebrew word about God being the helper of his people in the Old Testament never means an inferior or subservient status of God. The word “adam” was also misunderstood to mean only man. The singular and plural forms of “adam” have been recognized now in many translations to mean man or mankind in general, not just Adam the first specific man, in Gen.1:26-27. Essentially, both men and women are co-bearers of God’s image. The poetic rendering of wife as the bone of bones and flesh of fleshes to her husband (Gen. 2 and Eph.5) connotes an intimate, “biunitarian” (a term I coined not long ago) relation that jointly beams the glory of the triunitarian God. A third word, “issabon” (pain, toil, sorrow) was often incorrectly translated in Gen.3:16-17 to mean greater culpability for woman than man, even though it signifies troubles of related kinds in life-giving (for woman) and life-sustaining (for man). A fourth word, “kephale” (head) was badly misunderstood, with modern meanings read back into the biblical text. A historical word study in Greek lexicon and Septuagint reveals that “source” or “origin”, rather than authority over (which is often translated in Greek as archon, megas, hegeomai instead), best describes the word kephale. Only six out of 180 Hebrew word “ros” is rendered as kephale in Septuagint, and even there, literal rather than metaphorical meaning is emphasized. The context of 1Cor.11 also affirms the meaning of source or origin, rather than authority, for kephale in describing the God-Christ-man-woman relations. Similarly, in Eph.4:12-16,
To avoid the abuse of words, Brauch has the following advice: (1) Remember that the biblical revelation was given within the confines of human language. (2) Recognize that “hearing” the biblical revelation includes the possibility of understanding and misunderstanding. (3) Be attentive to the range of meanings particular words have in the original and translated languages. (4) We must take seriously the contexts in which words are created and used. (5) Linguistic tools and resources are critically important to avoid the abuse of words.
Apply literary-theological contextual analysis.
Brauch believes that Genesis
Brauch offers some important guidelines to avoid the abuse of literary and theological contexts. (1) Ask “what is its context”. (2) Analyze, first, the immediate literary and then the larger context (from verse, to paragraph, to chapter, to book). (3) Resist the temptation to bring preconceived notions to what a text should mean. (4) Ask “What would the implied audience of this text, when it heard or read the text within the author’s context, have heard?” (5) Interpret any text from the perspective of the larger literary and/or theological argument of which it is a part.
Understand historical situation and cultural reality.
Basically, discern what is historically and culturally relative and what is universally abiding and authoritative. This is not only inevitable, legitimate, but crucial and necessary. Brauch candidly acknowledges that we Christians all implicitly and explicitly ignore some of the biblical instructions or injunction while emphasizing others. This, in fact, has biblical precedents. Examples of such apparent disharmony due to historical/cultural relativity include the blessed faith versus suffering faith, mandate for versus rebuke against sacrificial offerings, “clean” versus “unclean”, Sabbath observance, retributive justice versus mercy and forgiveness. Brauch believes that Christ is the litmus test to the discernment between what is historically and culturally relative and what is universally abiding and authoritative. This is so because Christ fulfills all the Scriptures about him and he is the consummation of all Laws. In Brauch’s words, “in the written Word of God, whatever blossoms in the light of the cross has abiding authority for Christians faith and life and mission; and whatever withers in the light of the cross is culturally and historically relative”. When applied to man-woman relationship, “the exercise of power over and control of the other withers, but the subordination of each to the other in self-giving love blossoms”.
Another criterion or “hermeneutical filter” that is helpful for our discernment of relativity versus absolute authority lies in Jesus’ words and acts. It boils downs to: what would Jesus say and what would Jesus do? According to the gospel record, Jesus modeled a radically different relation with men and women, often treating women with respect and dignity usually accorded to men then.
A third criterion is prophetic anticipation and apostolic implementation during redemptive movement from God’s vision (articulated by contrary prophetic voices) to the embodiment of that vision in the Word, to the (often imperfect) implementation of that vision in the life and mission of the community of Jesus’ disciples. Brauch explains,
“In seeking to discern those elements in Scripture prior to Jesus that are historically-culturally relative, the continuity between the prophetic voices that challenged the faith tradition and the lived and spoken words of the Word is very significant. For while contrary prophetic voices give a tentative hermeneutical filter and place question marks over the legitimacy of certain elements in the tradition, the confirmation of those contrary prophetic voices by the person, words and acts of Jesus remove the question marks and replace them with exclamation marks.”
Thus, all texts that stand between the declarative, creational vision and the incarnational embodiment of that vision, and that reflect a reality falling short of the vision, do not have abiding authority. Likewise, the partial or limited implementation of the vision in apostolic teaching and ecclesiastical practice does not have normative authority. For example, the old conviction of the over-under status of the master-slave and man-woman relationship in a fallen condition is no longer valid (Gal.3:28), a new creation in Christ (2Cor.5:17) now emerges to reflect the original intent of creation: all human beings are created in the image of God. The Lord Jesus made himself a servant, challenging all to imitate him (John
Brauch summarizes eight points in avoiding the abuse of historical situation and cultural reality: (1) Scripture is communicated in particular, changing historical and cultural contexts. (2) Scripture can transcend a historical, cultural context, be limited to that context and/or be misunderstood in many contexts. (3) We must distinguish between what is relative and what transcends all contexts. (4) All Christians, from the first century to the present, have been and are engaged in this discernment process. (5) These pitfalls can be avoided if we ground our discernment in biblical precedent. (6) Precedents found in Scripture: (i) Christ is the center; (ii) Jesus’ words and acts are normative and paradigmatic; (iii) There should be concurrence between prophetic anticipation and apostolic implementation. (7) We must judge the vision in Scripture as having normative authority rather than its limited implementation. (8) The cross of Christ is the ultimate hermeneutical key.
