A Word From the Author: How Can This Commentary Help You?

Biblical
interpretation is a rational and spiritual process that attempts to understand
an ancient inspired writer in such a way that the message from God may be
understood and applied in our day.

The spiritual process is crucial but
difficult to define. It does involve a yieldedness and openness to God. There
must be a hunger (1) for Him, (2) to know Him, and (3) to serve Him. This
process involves prayer, confession and the willingness for lifestyle change.
The Spirit is crucial in the interpretive process, but why sincere, godly
Christians understand the Bible differently is a mystery.

The rational
process is easier to describe. We must be consistent and fair to the text and
not be influenced by our personal or denominational biases. We are all
historically conditioned. None of us are objective, neutral interpreters. This
commentary offers a careful rational process containing three interpretive
principles structured to help us overcome our biases.

First Principle

The first principle is to note the historical setting in which a biblical book
was written and the particular historical occasion for its authorship. The
original author had a purpose, a message to communicate. The text cannot mean
something to us that it never meant to the original, ancient, inspired author.
His intent—not our historical, emotional, cultural, personal or denominational
need—is the key. Application is an integral partner to interpretation, but
proper interpretation must always precede application. It must be reiterated
that every biblical text has one and only one meaning. This meaning is what the
original biblical author intended through the Spirit’s leadership to communicate
to his day. This one meaning may have many possible applications to different
cultures and situations. These applications must be linked to the central truth
of the original author. For this reason, this study guide commentary is designed
to provide an introduction to each book of the Bible.

Second Principle

The second principle is to identify the literary units. Every biblical book is a
unified document. Interpreters have no right to isolate one aspect of truth by
excluding others. Therefore, we must strive to understand the purpose of the
whole biblical book before we interpret the individual literary units. The
individual parts—chapters, paragraphs, or verses—cannot mean what the whole unit
does not mean. Interpretation must move from a deductive approach of the whole
to an inductive approach to the parts. Therefore, this study guide commentary is
designed to help the student analyze the structure of each literary unit by
paragraphs. Paragraph and chapter divisions are not inspired, but they do aid us
in identifying thought units.

Interpreting at a paragraph level—not
sentence, clause, phrase or word level—is the key in following the biblical
author’s intended meaning. Paragraphs are based on a unified topic, often called
the theme or topical sentence. Every word, phrase, clause, and sentence in the
paragraph relates somehow to this unified theme. They limit it, expand it,
explain it, and/or question it. A real key to proper interpretation is to follow
the original author’s thought on a paragraph-by-paragraph basis through the
individual literary units that make up the biblical book. This study guide
commentary is designed to help the student do that by comparing modern English
translations. These translations have been selected because they employ
different translation theories:

1. The United Bible Society’s Greek text is
the revised fourth edition (UBS4). This text was paragraphed by modern textual
scholars.

2. The New King James Version (NKJV) is a word-for-word literal
translation based on the Greek manuscript tradition known as the Textus
Receptus. Its paragraph divisions are longer than the other translations. These
longer units help the student to see the unified topics.

3. The New Revised
Standard Version (NRSV) is a modified word-for-word translation. It forms a mid
point between the following two modern versions. Its paragraph divisions are
quite helpful in identifying subjects.

4. The Today’s English Version (TEV)
is a dynamic equivalent translation published by the United Bible Society. It
attempts to translate the Bible in such a way that a modern English reader or
speaker can understand the meaning of the Greek text. Often, especially in the
Gospels, it divides paragraphs by speaker rather than by subject, in the same
way as the NIV. For the interpreter’s purposes, this is not helpful. It is
interesting to note that both the UBS4 and TEV are published by the same entity,
yet their paragraphing differs.

5. The Jerusalem Bible (JB) is a dynamic
equivalent translation based on a French Catholic translation. It is very
helpful in comparing the paragraphing from a European perspective.

6. The
printed text is the 1995 Updated New American Standard Bible (NASB), which is a
word for word translation. The verse by verse comments follow this paragraphing.

Third Principle

The third principle is to read the Bible in different
translations in order to grasp the widest possible range of meaning (semantic
field) that biblical words or phrases may have. Often a Greek phrase or word can
be understood in several ways. These different translations bring out these
options and help to identify and explain the Greek manuscript variations. These
do not affect doctrine, but they do help us to try to get back to the original
text penned by an inspired ancient writer.

This commentary offers a quick way
for the student to check his interpretations. It is not meant to be definitive,
but rather informative and thought-provoking. Often, other possible
interpretations help us not be so parochial, dogmatic, and denominational.
Interpreters need to have a larger range of interpretive options to recognize
how ambiguous the ancient text can be. It is shocking how little agreement there
is among Christians who claim the Bible as their source of truth.

These
principles have helped me to overcome much of my historical conditioning by
forcing me to struggle with the ancient text. My hope is that it will be a
blessing to you as well.

Bob Utley
June 27, 1996