The TR, Exegesis, & Hermeneutics

Introduction

The most difficult bridge to gap with participants in this discussion is convincing them that this is more than just textual science. I have always emphasized this on my blog, that this is topic is deeply theological. In the tradition of my spiritual forefathers, all loci of study must not only be theological, but also practical. We do not needlessly debate the quantity of angels that can dance on the pin of a needle. One of the greatest errors of many Modern Critical Text advocates is to partition this part of the discussion into science and faith. Often, the discussion is made to seem like the textual scholars are doing hard science which is then handed over to Christians for interpretation and application. This is why many advocates of the modern text do not understand when those in the TR camp begin the debate with theological foundations rather than text critical ones. As a result of the “scientification” of the text in its creation, the same sterile techniques seem to have been transferred into the handling of the Word.

Mishandling of the Text Through Atomization

Perhaps it is the case that these things are not connected, but it is true that modern methods of textual scholarship have arrived hand in hand with modern exegesis and hermeneutics in the seminaries. This is why, in my opinion, modern reformed and reformed adjacent preaching is dry and difficult to understand. It is also often alienating to the layman. The method often taught at seminaries today is called the “historical grammatical” approach. An internet search will tell you this is a “Protestant” method of exegesis, though I would argue that there is nothing historically protestant about it. This method attempts to steer the exegete towards the true meaning of the text by focusing on grammar, syntax, and historical context. At face value, this sounds great, but in it’s application it often falls short. Such is the case with many well-meaning efforts to adapt scholarly methods for the church. I will say, it does do a wonderful job in steering pastors away from sports references or sermons filled to the brim with anecdotes and analogies.

First, I want to point out that this method has a historical critical trojan horse built into it at the outset. While the faithful minister would never think of doing this, a man pulled by the academy might consider “historical context” a license to inject critical perspectives into the text. Historical context, for example, might be a new perspective on Paul, or perhaps applying modern gender theory to the pericope adulterae as we see in Jennifer Knust and Elijah Hixson’s book “To Cast the First Stone.” Even if the exegete does not consider such extreme examples, the method itself opens the door to changing historical perspectives on the text. I will admit, this exegetical error is far more common in the less conservative corners of the Reformed world, but it is present in more benign applications.

What is far more common in conservative circles are exegetical errors produced in the grammatical portion of this method. While it is true that understanding the text properly requires accurate analysis of the grammar and syntax of a text, the way that this is applied is oftentimes harmful to the text. The primary error that many exegetes make is to handle the words of the text outside of the text itself. I remember vaguely in my early Christian years being amazed by a pastor who preached an entire sermon on the Greek word, “The.” I look back on that now, thinking how absurd that is. This of course is the most extreme possible example, but many such cases exist as it pertains to words like love, finished, and so on. This happens when the exegete doesn’t treat Greek and Hebrew like a real language, but a mystical one. I cannot count the number of times I’ve heard a pastor in a Reformed church say something along the lines of, “In English, this word means this, but in Greek, it means THIS THIS.” In almost every case of this happening, the pastor is merely taking a synonym of the Greek word, and emphatically presenting the word to the church as though they don’t understand how synonyms work. One egregious case of this is when John MacArthur famously translated the word, “run” to “glide” and gave the impression that somebody was gliding along the ground.

This kind of exegesis occurs when the exegete fails to understand what language is in the first place, not just Greek or Hebrew. The reality is, most adult Americans read at a 3rd or 4th grade level, so this kind of error is not unsurprising. What must be corrected is the idea that there is magic in the middle of translating one language to another. It is often said that two languages can never be perfectly translated from one to the other. This is true, if we are saying that every word must be translated to an equivalent word in the target language. I recently got into a heated debate with one of my friends who knows Japanese and English. He told me, “It is impossible to translate Japanese into English perfectly.” So I said, “I bet you’re wrong, give me an example.” He brought up a word that had a complex meaning, but he was able to perfectly articulate it into English for me such that I now understood what the word meant. After he described what the word meant, I responded, “See, it can be translated.” What he actually meant was that the word did not map to a single English word, but it definitely could be translated. This is why “word for word” translations use a flawed translation methodology because translation is not simply “word for word.”

This type of realization is obvious to anybody who has actually learned a second language, especially if the language uses conjugations and declensions to change the word into different forms, like Greek. Much of these types of errors occur because seminary students do not study Greek as a language. Seminary students learn just enough vocabulary to use language tools, but could not go to Greece and order a meal. Daniel Street proved this when he tested seminary Greek professors on 10 basic vocabulary words, and they all failed. Seminaries are not teaching Greek as a language, and it is damaging the pulpit. The reality is, the Bible is not written in “ancient Greek,” it is written in a form of Greek that is about as far from modern Greek as King James English is from us today. You can take a Greek New Testament, open it up in Greece, read it out loud, and every single elementary school child will be able to understand what it is saying. They may think you sound funny, but they will understand you.

The point in saying all of that is to say this, the grammatical portion of modern exegetical methods sounds great, but it falls apart if the exegete does not understand Greek as a language, or even language learning in general. I will say this, if the exegete cannot go to Greece and have a conversation with the people there, he is not learned enough to utilize the Greek of the New Testament without falling into unfortunate errors. Believe it or not, you must know a language to engage with that language in literary form. Let me provide an analogy to drive my point home. Imagine you take a Spanish speaker, teach him English for 1-2 years, and then tell him to do advanced literary analysis of Shakespeare in English. That is what our Seminaries do for Greek language studies.

The end result of this method is that pastors, who have less understanding of Greek than a 2nd grader in Greece, are doing grammatical and syntactical analysis in a language they barely understand, and coming away with meanings that are often nonsensical or exactly the same as the English. This is why when pastors appeal to the original languages in a sermon, they often mysticise the text, as if the true meaning cannot be discovered in the English translation. Even more common, is for a pastor to simply say the Greek word (often incorrectly or in a pronunciation that nobody in history would recognize), and then say the definition in English, which their translation has already done for them! They do this because they don’t understand how translation from any language works, and they also do not really know the language they are trying to translate. The effect of hyper focusing on grammar and syntax is that it forces men into language analysis in a language that cannot be learned in 4 semesters. It would be ridiculous to ask such things from somebody learning English as a second language, so why do we impose this upon those pursuing the pulpit?

Unless the exegete actually knows Greek and Hebrew, he should be analyzing the grammar and syntax of the translation he has before him in the language he can understand. I will say, in every single case I have ever heard of a pastor doing Greek or Hebrew analysis from the pulpit, the same meaning could have easily been derived by simply analyzing the text in English and using an English dictionary. Now, I do think it is incredibly important for pastors to learn Greek and Hebrew, but that effort takes more than what your seminary has to offer. What is unfortunate about all of this, is that men who do not know Greek are taught to use Greek in their sermons. The effect is that the average layperson now believes that their translation is inadequate to understand the Word of God. Every Greek word is made to seem as though it has 50 meanings, and only the pastor truly knows what it means. It is, ironically, a modern practice of having secret knowledge, and a chief example of private interpretation. There is a correct way to use the Greek in sermon preparation, but that involves actually knowing the language.

The modern method of exegesis teaches pastors to look at a text in a language they do not know, pull words out of the sentence, look at those words individually, and place them back into the text pregnant with meaning. They then take this meaning and present to the congregation in a sermon, and the people of God are impressed that their pastor used a Greek lexicon or dictionary or language tool. More importantly, the layperson believes that in order to understand the Bible, they must wait for the man of God to tell them what it says, or go back to the Greek themselves.

What does this have to do with the TR?

One of the reasons that people take the TR position is that they see it as a logical consequence of returning to the old paths. While many people turn back to Rome, or perhaps the Eastern Orthodox church, those that wish to stay “reformed” see the TR view as a historical artifact of the Reformation. In many ways, this view is a rejection of modernity that extends beyond the textual debate. Perhaps it is as simple as people being tired with the chronological snobbery of the scholar class. In any case, there is value in doing things the way our spiritual fathers in the faith did them. In my opinion, instead of the historical grammatical approach, the seminaries should be teaching Perkins and Puritan preaching. Instead of teaching diagrams of Greek syntax, seminaries should be teaching students how to exegete the text in their mother tongue. Instead of focusing on two years of Greek vocab and grammar, seminaries should teach students conversational Greek with the eventual goal of mastery.

In any case, I am an advocate for returning to the old paths. We, as Reformed people, have treasures upon treasures in our spiritual heritage. There is no need to reinvent the wheel every decade.