Thursday, September 02, 2004

And some people are intelligent.

Such as this person, who is talking to a baptist in an internet forum... (and no, neither person is me)

"So what I don't understand is that when the Baptists read the Bible with their own set of presuppositions 1500 years after the events, and come up with an interpretation that is consistent with their own worldview, that is because "they are right". Yet on the other hand, when the first and second century Greek world read the Bible, their interpretation was wrong (where it differs from yours) because it was "corrupted by their world view"?

The NT was written in Greek, by Greek-speakers, for Greek-speakers, who belonged to a Greek worldview.

Far from being corrupted by such a worldview, good historical practice dictates
that a true interpretation can only be found in such a worldview. I mean, surely, no group is better positioned to interpret the NT within the context of the target audience than one who is actually a member of the target audience? Thus, when a modern tradition differs from them on points of doctrine (as the Baptist tradition does on several), it's not because the Greeks got it wrong, but because they got it right..."

Which is a rather succinct summary of why I think it is so important to study very seriously the early Greek Christian writings, and take far less seriously those outside the greceo-Christian worldview.