In 2018, I was invited to discuss how I view Scripture at a panel held at the Episcopal Church of All Saints in Indianapolis. As an older person, looking back over a now-long life, I realize that my relationship with the Bible has most often been inadequate to the task of growing and living in Christ. I was not raised in a fundamentalist environment . . . in fact, it was a pretty progressive Disciples of Christ faith setting where we thought it was normal to have different views on Scripture and to discuss them around the dinner table. Literalism was never an option for me after the age of fourteen when I heard a preacher who recently graduated from the University of Chicago Divinity School announce that, yes, the story of Lot's wife turning to salt is in the Bible. The pastor then stated that he couldn't believe in a God like that. By graduation from high school, I had a complete set of The Interpreter's Bible Commentary. I could discuss literary theories of how Scriptures were composed, beginning with oral traditions, myth, historical context, and cultural influences. So what was I missing? I never developed further in my relationship with the Scriptures. They were primarily there for informational purposes, giving me--the reader--data on how to order my life and how the Jewish and Christian faiths had developed over centuries. Seminary studies compounded this approach at the Christian Theological Seminary in Indianapolis, the Iliff School of Theology in Denver, and New York's Union Theological Seminary. At all of these schools, especially at Union, I enrolled in Biblical courses, constantly sensing there was something I wasn't "getting" about the Bible despite my training, liberal progressive family and home parish, and my inclination to consume more Biblical information and data points constantly. I had no feeling of any kind for the Biblical materials I was reading. While reading the Bible I was locked into head trips of believing or not believing and consuming information. The heart and the Spirit were not involved in the reading. Looking back, I now believe that this approach was my way of avoiding a transforming encounter with God, a meeting that would cause me to be formed in the image of Christ as a result of profound Biblical reading and reflection. The late Robert Mulholland was a professor of the New Testament at Asbury Theological Seminary in Kentucky. He wrote in Shaped by the Word: The Power of Scripture in Spiritual Formation: "The worst form of the false self is when it becomes 'religious.' One of the chief characteristics of religious false self is its ability to manipulate the scripture consciously or, more often, unconsciously to avoid a transforming encounter with God. The religious false self wants relationship with God on its terms--not God's [ . . . ] the informational approach facilitates this manipulation of scripture. We are not looking for a transforming encounter with God. We are more often seeking some tidbits of information that will enhance our self-protective understanding of the Christian faith without challenging or confronting the way we live in the world."--p. 54. When I began to read and experience Scripture not informationally but formationally, I started letting it act on its terms to transform me. What did this mean? Essentially, it meant working with Scripture as prayer, much as in the ancient monastic practice of lectio divina. The idea is not to cover as much territory as possible but to read slowly and to ponder contemplative the meanings, moving from depth to depth. Here's an example: When reading the story of the pharaoh and Moses, Soon I start seeing myself as a little 21st-century pharaoh, wanting to control everything around me. That kind of Scripture reading is possible only when I relinquish my tendency to consume information about the Bible and allow the text to control and form me, the reader. In this respect, the dynamic is now different: Mulholland states, "Instead of the text an object we control and manipulate according to our own insight and purposes, the text becomes the subject of the reading relationship; we are the object that is shaped by the text. With respect to biblical reading we willingly stand before the text and await its address, ready for the world to exercise control over the 'word' we are"--p. 57. As we approach the text contemplatively, we allow the Word of God to pray us into being. We relinquish all control over it to allow this to happen. The Scripture calls forth new understandings of myself when I relinquish my control over it. So, have I given up on my Bible commentaries, word studies, and historical and literary information? By no means. I still use them for clarification and understanding. But I find a good balance between that informational approach to Scripture and a formational approach that frees Scripture to impact my development in the image of Christ. Finally, at age 75, I feel that when I read the Word of God, I am being shaped by it and not the other way around . I think I " get it" and have finally found my groove. --
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March 2023
AuthorDan Hoffman is an Indianapolis USA based spiritual director, supervisor of spiritual directors, and workshop/retreat leader. This occasional blog discusses things he is thinking about and wants to share. Comments are always welcome. |