The Bible is both natural and supernatural,
temporal and eternal, human and divine.
The Bible is divine because it is the Word
of God. It is God's message for all human beings for all times. Through
the Bible, God speaks to all people of all ages in all cultures. The
message of the Bible is eternal. It transcends time and cultures. It is
relevant and speaks during the time of Moses, the time of Paul and to all
of us today.
The Bible is human because God chose to
speak through human beings who lived in a certain time and culture in
history with an specific language. It is temporal because some of its
elements such as the original language used in its original writing is
not being used today. So God's eternal Word and message is conditioned
and contained in a specific time in history with its own culture and
language, and is recorded by means of 'human style' of literature. It is
these two natures of God's Word that requires us to apply basic principles
of interpretation to understand God's message for us today.
The Bible should be interpreted like any
other literature. This does not mean that the Bible is just like any
other book. The Bible is unique in many ways and no other book is like
the Bible. But the Bible uniqueness and inspiration doesn't change its
literary form. The Holy Spirit will convict us of the truthfulness and
significance of His Word in our lives. But to understand the literary
style or genre, historical background, and the meaning of words should be
our task in studying the Bible. Our claim of the Holy Spirit's guidance
shouldn't be an excuse for laziness in studying.
