Rev. David Holwick ZA After Acts: Early Church series #9
First Baptist Church
Ledgewood, New Jersey
August 8, 2004
1 Corinthians 10:1-11
ORIGEN - HOW NOT TO READ YOUR BIBLE
I. Elephants in the Bible. 2 Peter 3:15-16
A. Troubled Iowa farmer.
One of my college professors, Dr. Walter Elwell, shared with
us a book that had been mailed to him.
It had been sent by a farmer in Iowa, who had published the
book himself.
The title was, "I Have Found an Elephant in the Bible."
Actually, he had found many elephants in the Bible.
Practically every verse revealed an elephant.
Bear in mind that traditional scholars say elephants are never
mentioned in the Bible.
But to this farmer, you could not understand the Bible unless
you grasped that it was all about elephants.
B. Bible interpretation is critical.
1) The Bible is a hard book.
a) If you feel this way, you are not the first.
b) It has ALWAYS been considered hard to understand.
1> Note Peter's appraisal of Paul's writings:
2 Peter 3:15-16 -
Bear in mind that our Lord's patience means salvation, just
as our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom
that God gave him.
He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them
of these matters.
His letters contain some things that are HARD TO UNDERSTAND,
which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the
other Scriptures, to their own destruction.
2) The Bible is an important book.
a) It claims to be more than a book.
1> Jesus and others say it is the Word of God.
2> What the Bible says, God says.
b) Jesus says the Bible points to him. John 5:39
"You diligently study the Scriptures because you think
that by them you possess eternal life.
These are the Scriptures that testify about me."
3) We must learn how to make proper sense of the Bible.
a) People take different approaches to it.
b) Since salvation is at stake, we must be diligent.
c) Decisions of the early church influence us even today.
II. History of Origen.
A. His background.
1) Origin was born in a Christian family around A.D. 185 in
Egypt.
2) He lived 69 years, but only because his mother was smart.
During a severe persecution he wanted to be a martyr.
She realized this, and hid his clothes.
3) At a young age he became a teacher of a Christian academy.
a) Origen was one of the most brilliant minds the church
has produced.
b) He wrote commentaries on almost every book of the Bible.
c) He dictated his thoughts to as many as 9 secretaries
at the same time.
d) He was the first Christian scholar to produce a
systematic theology.
4) At end of his life he got his wish - he was martyred for
his faith.
B. His contribution to Bible interpretation.
1) The Bible and the body.
a) Origen felt that both had three parts: body, soul and
spirit.
2) Three levels of meaning in the Bible:
a) Literal meaning. (Body)
1> Straightforward historical meaning.
2> Very basic surface understanding, for simple-minded
people.
3> Often for Origen, the straightforward meaning was
not true.
A> He rejected what did not agree with his
understanding of prophecy.
B> He rejected what did not make sense to him.
1: Often this was due to a poor translation.
2: (Exodus midwives and "houses" - families)
C> He misunderstood figures of speech. [1]
b) Moral meaning. (Soul)
1> Deeper. What leads to perfection in Christ.
2> (In practice, he combined #2 and #3)
c) Spiritual meaning. (Spirit)
1> Deepest. Mysteries of the Spirit that reveal Jesus.
2> Sometimes it results in an allegory, but is almost
always a "spiritualized" interpretation.
C. Everything pointed to Jesus.
1) Both Testaments were Christian to him.
Origen did almost anything to find something in a word or
a phrase in the Old Testament that would speak to
Christians of his day.
Sometimes he was reminded: water reminded him of baptism,
wood of the cross, bread of the Eucharist.
Sometimes he saw types: Joseph was a type of Christ, the
bride of the Song a type of the church.
Sometimes he saw moral lessons.
2) The Bible sometimes uses a similar approach.
a) In 1 Corinthians 10, Paul sees Jesus in the Exodus.
1> Crossing the Red Sea is like a baptism.
2> Manna and the water from the rock were like
communion.
3> He even says Christ "was" the rock.
b) The practice of typology.
1> Types are parallels more than identification.
A> They function as analogies.
B> Paul is not arguing the pre-incarnate Christ
was a chunk of sandstone; he is saying the
rock served a purpose for them that Jesus
serves for us.
2> Paul emphasizes these past events as examples. v6,11
A> We can apply their principles to our own day,
just as he did.
III. Dangers of spiritualization.
A. Origen's approach can be very subjective.
1) An interpreter can make the text mean anything he wishes.
a) This was useful when debating heretics.
b) Unfortunately, the method produced even more heresy.
1> Origen found "secret meanings" in a text, much
like the Gnostics did.
2) The literal, historical meaning becomes meaningless.
a) The Bible, on the other hand, treats the literal
meaning as most important.
b) Some of the arguments of Jesus based on the Old
Testament revolve around a single word.
3) The Bible points to Jesus, but not every verse does.
a) Origen operates much like the Iowa farmer, finding
things in the Bible which God did not intend.
b) He was only limited by his fertile imagination.
B. We can be captive to our culture.
1) Origen rejected some verses because they did not agree
with his society's view on issues.
2) New Hermeneutic - your gender/social class determines what
the Bible means. #2349
3) Better: society should be critiqued by Bible.
IV. How to interpret the Bible.
A. Put some effort into it. 2 Timothy 2:15
B. Meaning - how would the original hearers understand it?
1) Historical and cultural background is important.
2) Consider the context of passage.
3) Identify the genre of the passage you are reading.
4) Consider the grammar and structure within the passage.
C. Significance - what principles apply to us today?
1) Progressive revelation: some principles are limited
to ancient times.
a) Example: dietary laws. Jesus released us from them.
2) Other principles will always be valid.
a) Ten Commandments.
b) Note Paul's main point in 1 Cor. 10 - rebellion has
a cost. Always has, always will.
D. Application - what are we going to do with it?
1) Conform to Bible, don't conform the Bible to the culture.
2) Jesus: those who hear God's Word and put it into practice
are the real family of Jesus.
3) James: don't just be hearers, but doers of the Word. 1:22
"Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive
yourselves. Do what it says."
V. The easy stuff is the hardest.
A. Comment by another college professor of mine:
"It's not the verses that I don't understand that are hard,
but the ones I DO understand."
(perhaps quoting Mark Twain, #14825)
B. We usually know what God expects of us.
1) Will we do it?
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SOURCES FOR ILLUSTRATIONS USED IN THIS SERMON:
[1] "Origen of Alexandria," by Robert I. Bradshaw,
http://www.earlychurch.org.uk/origen.html
# 2349 "The Authority of the Bible, Interpretation, and Submission of
the Self," by Scott Hafemann, American Baptist Evangelicals:
Journal, September 1995, page 3.
#14825 "Mark Twain On Understanding The Bible," Fredericksburg Bible
Illustrator Supplements, 2/1997.101
Other articles which were used for this sermon:
"Seven Keys To Understanding Scripture," by Tremper Longman III,
Discipleship Journal #89, September/October 1995.
"The First Battle for the Bible," by Joseph T. Lienhard, S.J.,
professor of theology at Fordham University, New York; Christian
History magazine, Fall 2004.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ch/2003/004/1.12.html
"Origen: Friend Or Foe?" by John R. Franke, Christian History magazine,
Fall 2003. http://www.christianitytoday.com/ch/2003/004/2.18.html
These and 25,000 others are part of a database that can be downloaded,
absolutely free, at http://www.holwick.com/illust.html
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