A couple of weeks ago I pointed out the importance of literal or normal interpretation. Today I would like to spend a little bit of time to explain why it is important to be consistent in one’s hermeneutics and why normal interpretation is the way to go.

There are basically two ways to interpret Scripture: Literally or allegorically. Literal interpretation is also called normal interpretation because of the negative connotation of “literal.” It simply means you interpret what it says literally. If it says Jesus will come back riding on a horse, he will come back riding on a horse and not a helicopter. If it says Jesus rose from the dead after three days, he was dead and then came back alive after three days. It’s really simple. Literal interpretation does leave room for figures of speech, odd grammatical constructions, approximations, writing styles and types, etc.
For example, in John 15:1, Jesus says He is the true vine. Jesus obviously wasn’t a vine, but this figure of speech emphasizes the meaning of the passage: Jesus as the center and us as the little satellites or branches which are dependent on the vine.
Similarly, approximation are not wrong. If I asked how far it is to Oklahoma City, I’d get all kinds of answers. 20 miles, 15 miles, 18 miles, 15 minutes (hold on, minutes don’t even measure distance!); these are all valid answers. The same is true for Scripture.
We also need to recognize the type of literature we are dealing with. Psalms is poetry, Kings and Chronicles are history-prose, Revelation is prophecy. All these factors play a role in interpreting Scripture normally.

Today, Scripture is mostly interpreted literally except for prophecy. We take everything literally until we hit Revelation and we change to allegorical interpretation because of the prophetic language. The problem is how to decide when to make that shift. I’ve heard that we should interpret the text depending on which interpretation will give us the true meaning of the passage. This method is obviously self-defeating. We are after the true meaning of the passage through interpretation, so we can’t base our interpretation on the true meaning.

The most convincing argument for consistent literal interpretation even for prophecy is the Bible itself. If we look at prophecies that have already been fulfilled, it has generally happened literally. Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey (Matthew 21:5), just as was prophesied in Zechariah 9:9. He was born of a virgin (Matthew 1:23), just as Isaiah (Isaiah 7:14) prophesied. There are many other passages like it.

So in order to be consistent in one’s hermeneutics I believe one has to interpret Scripture normally, and it seems that the Bible supports that idea.

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