# Question on Berkhof's principles of biblical interpretation



## chuckd (Jan 9, 2014)

pg. 57-60 he argues that there is one sense in Scripture (I guess literal?). Maybe I'm misunderstanding what the literal sense is, but what to do with all the similes, metaphors, hyperboles, allegories, etc. in the Bible. Aren't these all figurative speech?


----------



## chuckd (Jan 9, 2014)

He does mention that and, again, I think I'm misunderstanding "literal sense." I take it as the words are being used as they are defined as opposed to figurative where they are being used in a meaning other than usual (or exaggerated). Such as,

"They have Moses and the prophets."

The literal sense would mean they possess Moses and the prophets themselves whereas figurative would mean they possess their writings.



> In all such cases, the mystical sense is *based on the literal*, and constitutes the proper sense of the Word of God.



The book is available here:
http://media.sabda.org/alkitab-2/PDF Books/00050 Berkhof Principles of Biblical Interpretation..pdf


----------



## Eoghan (Jan 9, 2014)

Excellent book which is currently at work. He does go on to explain in other sections the use of metaphors, poetic language etc..

Will post tomorrow with page references when (if I remember) retrieve the book.


----------



## Andrew P.C. (Jan 9, 2014)

Chuck, 

I would like to point out the difference between taking scripture literalistically (this is what dispensationalists do) and literally. In other words, one who does the former would look at a passage where it speaks about God having nostrils and concluding that He has a physical body(this is an extreme case but I hope my point comes across). Whereas the latter reads scripture according to literary style, context, etc. This is why you have dispensationalists that think Gog and Magog is Russia and Syria (or Iran, or someother country in that region depending on who you talk to). This is also where we get the Left Behind series.


----------



## Contra_Mundum (Jan 9, 2014)

William Ames (Puritan author of _The Marrow of Theology_) said: "There is only one meaning for every place in Scripture. Otherwise the meaning of Scripture would not only be unclear and uncertain, but there would be no meaning at all--for anything which does not mean one thing surely means nothing."

If the intent of the author is to use a figure of speech, then as interpreters subservient to the power of another to command and control--to shape--our thinking (rather than the sovereignty of the hearer) we are obligated to understand the figure _*as figure*._


----------



## chuckd (Jan 9, 2014)

So "literal" means that it has but one meaning - the author's? But this can be written in figures of speech? I guess the confusion I was having was I always thought literal and figurative were a dichotomy.

What then is a non-literal sense? (if not figurative)


----------



## Contra_Mundum (Jan 9, 2014)

Any meaning that is _foisted_ upon the text is unsubmissive. One of the church's early failures (explainable though, from pious motives) was its recourse to "allegorical" interpretation. This form of "interpretation" is not submissive to the meaning inherent (or honestly derivable) from the text. Instead, it makes the interpreter--who is something of a guru, able to see into the "secrets" of the text invisible to mere mortals--sovereign.

For example, unfettered allegory might take a straightforward narrative out of the OT, and read into it some kind of "parabolic" meaning based on ostensible NT revelation. David means something, Bathsheba means something, Nathan means something, the dying child means something--all four of which are interrelated in some esoteric way. But this is a recipe for interpretive anarchy. There are no objective controls on this sort of "interpretation." The perceived piety of the interpreter becomes the locus of faith.

"Newspaper-exegesis" is another form of the same subjective disease, although (oddly) the people who tout this line are frequently self-described "literalists."


----------



## Jack K (Jan 9, 2014)

Berkhof's intent in those pages is to address people who might say, "Well, you understand the Scripture to mean one thing but I understand it to mean something else, and both are equally valid. I may understand it however I like." No, he says, there is a single right way to understand what a passage is saying. That's the "single sense" he has in mind.

He's NOT saying there's a single genre. The right way to understand the passage may be symbolically if the writer writes in a genre that uses symbolism. He's also NOT saying that the single right way to understand it can't lead to many valid points to be made, or have several applications, or have both a literal and symbolic/typical meaning, or have multiple fulfilments.

Reactions: Informative 1


----------

