How Are We to Read the Scriptures?
Literary criticism of the Bible seems to be an area best left to the specialists. Yet virtually anyone can learn certain principles that governed the writing of biblical passages, and this insight can lead to a much greater appreciation of the meaning of Scripture. It can help us to read the Scriptures in a new and fresh way that corresponds to the way they were in fact written.
Ancient Hebrews and other peoples of antiquity tended to write in poetic fashion, setting two lines together which we can term “A” and “B.” Thus Psalm 112:1,
(A) Blessed is the man who fears the Lord, /
(B) who greatly delights in His commandments. //
Note that the second line takes up the theme of the first line, “paralleling” it yet intensifying or fulfilling it by specifying just how one “fears the Lord”: by taking great delight in obeying His Law. There is a movement from A to B, such that B completes, intensifies, or fulfills A.
Much of the Bible and other literary works as well were written according to a more complicated form of this pattern, called “chiasmus,” or concentric parallelism. (The term “chiasmus” is derived from the Greek letter “chi,” written like a capital X, implying a crossing or reversal of terms, as in “The first shall be last / the last shall be first”) The author of an individual biblical passage or entire book develops his thought, as we would expect, from beginning to end. Yet he conveys meaning as well by creating a concentric movement from the extremities of the passage toward its center. The movement, again, is one of intensification, completion or fulfillment, beginning with the first and last lines, then progressing toward the middle.
Occasionally that middle may contain more than one element. An example is the pattern A:B:B’:A’, in which the major “point” or center of meaning is expressed by B:B’. For example, Matthew 11:27-28 (the indentation facilitates a reading of the lines that parallel one another),
A : All things have been delivered to me by my Father;
B : and no one knows the Son except the Father,
B’: and no one knows the Father except the Son,
A’: and all those to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him.
In A’, “all things” of A has been heightened and specified by “all those (people),” just as “delivered” has been heightened by “reveal.” The main focus, however, is B:B’, the reciprocal knowledge of Father and Son; and particular stress is upon B’, the fact that only the Son knows God the Father. This “Johannine thunderbolt” in the Synoptic tradition serves to make the point repeatedly made in the Fourth Gospel: we can know God only through His Son, Jesus Christ.
Another good example is 1 John 1:6-7, a text that expresses antithesis between those who falsely claim to be in communion with God and those who, by virtue of their moral conduct, are truly in communion both with God and with each other.
A : If we say we have fellowship with Him
B : and (yet) walk in the darkness,
C : we lie and do not do the truth.
B’: If we walk in the light as He is in the light,
A’: we have fellowship with one another. . . .
Here the last line (A’) parallels and completes the first line (A) by distinguishing the truth from the lie. The same relation exists between B’ and B. The primary message of the passage is expressed in C: those who claim they have fellowship with God, yet walk in the darkness (i.e., commit sin), are deceiving themselves: they “lie” and do not “do the truth.”
The meaning of this passage, then, is revealed by the spiraling movement that complements the linear reading from beginning to end. This spiral leads the reader from line A to line A’, then from B to B’, and culminates at the center, C. Like a tornado, a whirlpool, or a spiral galaxy, the passage draws the reader into a vortex that leads, with increasing intensity, from the extremities (the opening and concluding lines) of the passage toward the middle or central point. This way of reading is usually unconscious on the reader’s part. Yet the human brain seems to register the meaning of literary passages, and of much else in human experience such as classical musical works and landscape paintings, in two ways: from “beginning to end,” and also from the extremities toward the center. A Bach fugue, for example, will reach a crescendo, followed by development and intensification of the original themes. A landscape artist will often paint a dark foreground, complemented by a shaded background, while the middle of the work is flooded with light.
One of the most interesting literary examples of this form appears at the opening of the Gospel of Mark (1:1-15). In a few deft strokes the evangelist describes the mission of John the Baptizer and the fulfillment of that mission in Jesus’ own unique form of baptismal activity.
The passage can be set out as follows:
A (v. 1) : Beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
B (2f): John the Baptist comes to prepare the “way” (= the Gospel).
C (4): John appears in the wilderness.
D (5): The people confess their sins.
E (6): John clothed in camel’s hair (like the prophet Elijah).
F (7): One mightier than John is to come.
G (8a): “I have baptized you with water,
G’ (8b): but He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”
F’ (9): Jesus comes and is baptized.
E’ (10): Jesus is “clothed” in the Spirit (as the eschatological prophet).
D’ (11): The heavenly voice “confesses” the Son.
C’ (12f): Jesus is driven into the wilderness.
B’ (14) Jesus comes to preach the Gospel (= “the Way”; see Mk 10:52).
A’ (15) “Repent and believe in the Gospel!”
We can read this passage spirally, from the outside toward the middle (that is, from A then A’, to B then B’, to C then C’, etc.), finally arriving at the “point” or focus of meaning of the passage, expressed in G and G’: John’s baptism in water is merely preparation for the end-time baptism by Jesus. Jesus, and not John, is the true eschatological prophet, who will “baptize” His followers by bestowing on them the Holy Spirit.
Each line in the first half of this passage is paralleled by a complementary line in the second half. Those “prime” lines (marked by ‘) take up the same theme as the original line, yet they set it forward in a special way: they explain, amplify or otherwise “heighten” it, so that a centripetal movement draws the reader from the extremities toward the center, the focus of the author’s message.
I would invite you to read this passage over several times, especially in the Revised Standard Version of the Bible (except for those who can read the Greek original). Gradually you will find yourself reading it in two complementary ways: from beginning to end, as we read any text; but also according to this concentric flow. Although this may seem to be a wholly new way of approaching a biblical work, you will nevertheless be reading it according to the same chiastic principles the author used to compose it in the first place.