Add blog post on contextualizing Scripture.

blog/posts/0164-contextualizing-scripture.cfg

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+filename = 2025-02-13-contextualizing-scripture.html
+title = Contextualizing Scripture
+description = Explaining why I like to have lots of footnotes in my Bibles.
+created = 2025-02-13
+updated = 2025-02-13

blog/posts/0164-contextualizing-scripture.html

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+<p>
+Generally when reading the Holy Scriptures I like to read from a Bible that
+contains a lot of footnotes. In one of them (a large edition of the Jerusalem
+Bible in Spanish) four fifths of the first page of Genesis is actually filled
+with footnotes. For some I've met this is a hindrance for the reading of
+Scripture - a distraction - and to each their own, I guess. But for me it is a
+great aid for the reason that I want context.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+While reading Scripture we often come across passages, both in the New and
+especially in the Old Testament, which are quite incomprehensible to our modern
+minds. This is because we lack a lot of the knowledge of the culture, customs,
+and language of the time. For me this makes the reading of said passages to be
+greatly difficult and even misleading, since at a loss for the proper context we
+may come to an erroneous conclusion (something which the devil truly desires as
+we attempts to use Scripture to confuse for his own purposes). Thus it can also
+be perilous to our spiritual life to read the Bible without proper guidance. To
+borrow a silly example given by Trent Horn, imagine two thousand years from now
+someone were to look at media from our era and find the term “lady-killer,” and
+assume we're speaking of someone like Ted Bundy, because they lack the cultural
+and linguistic context to know that it is a colloquial term used to refer to men
+who are unusually attractive to women. This demonstrates, therefore the
+importance of contextualizing texts.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+This being said, it's important to know the difference between contextualization
+in order to know the meaning underlying the text (which in the case of Scripture
+is inerrant) versus contextualization so as to arbitrarily dismiss parts of
+Scripture as merely products of their time. This sort of practice is very common
+among the more liberal Christians (and sometimes even not so liberal) who will
+look at certain passages, particularly of St. Paul's epistles, and claim that we
+can completely disregard them because it was “merely a product of his time,” in
+what ultimately amounts to suggesting that we strike through an entire passage
+of Scripture. Yet, this is not to say that the passage ought to always be
+interpreted in its most superficial meaning, but to understand that there is an
+underlying meaning to the passage that must be sought. A clear example of this
+can be seen in the case of St. Paul's teaching on women's head coverings (1 Cor.
+11:2-16). Surely today even the Church does not require, as it did, that women
+wear veils in churches, yet this does not mean that this passage may simply be
+ignored, because although we are no longer bound by the disciplinary ruling that
+St. Paul prescribes, the teaching underlying it about the place of man &amp;
+woman respective to one another in the order of creation. A similar point can be
+made for all the disciplinary laws found in the Old Testament: we do not simply
+get rid of the Old Testament as something no longer applicable, but we maintain
+it as part of our Bibles as something which has perpetual significance in spite
+of its most superficial meanings having been fulfilled already in Jesus Christ
+and no longer binding on the participants of the New Covenant.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+I am not saying that reading with footnotes is necessarily the superior way of
+reading Scripture. After all, I do not think that the Church Fathers had
+footnotes while reading the Scriptures either. In fact, much of Scripture,
+particularly in the Catholic tradition, is meant to be read in a liturgical
+context where one has the guidance of a priest, is prepared spiritually by the
+context of the Mass, and is primed for the reading by the flow of the liturgical
+seasons. However, especially when reading the Scriptures privately I think it's
+worth the effort to have some clarifying contextualization that helps us to
+understand the meaning behind the words of the text. We must remember that
+Scripture, like any sign, is a visible symbol of an invisible (and spiritual)
+reality.
+</p>