on July 5 - Mens Bible Study

<> Sea change of the fast paced, morning commuter traffic on the streets leading to the church parking lot, on the one hand, and passing through the open door leading to the assembled small group of men gathered around the table with coffee and treats, ready to hear God’s Word and to connect this to each of our understandings of the meanings. How rare a feeling to know that each week at this place and time the 2,000 year old message can be heard and known. And even though in the quiet and supporting space of that weekly get-together we talk about the modern-day meanings to us and sometimes also the (unstated) implications of those meanings, still it is hard to hold on to those ideas after leaving the circle and disbanding to our separate paths outside.

<> Accounting for the best human efforts to follow the example of Jesus in the world: as far as anyone can tell, what was the Golden Age among Jews; that is, if ever there was a time when a sizeable proportion of believers actually hungered after God’s Will and carried out the 10 commandments, and so on, then what differences in human society followed from this? After the coming of Rabbi Jesus and the core of His message circulated widely, is there a time or place when a sizeable proportion of followers actually succeeded in holding Him in the front of their minds, or preoccupied themselves with the idea of “What Would Jesus Do”? As a result of attaining some degree of Heaven On Earth, what differences in human society followed from this? On the other hand, if this question only makes sense at the level of individual relationship to God, rather than at the society-wide scale, then what real-life examples (especially of our time) are there to examine and see what difference in the person’s deeds, words, viewpoint and attitude follows from this? In short, making the supreme effort to actually fulfill God’s Word, what difference does it (empirically) make? Or is this the wrong question to be asking?

<> Does Faith displace Fear (mutually exclusive); does Good displace Evil? Or can there be instead a sliding scale of overlap (like the Yin-Yang image) whereby the mixture tips at a given moment from a preponderance of the one or the other?

<> Peter calls, “Lord, if it is you, call me to come to you on the water.” The group took a few things from this episode and choice of words: (1) that any expression of Faith should be connected to Jesus/God/Holy Ghost (not a solitary, solo experience of one’s own volition), (2) that it is prudent to seek evidence that God is the one leading one’s heart (not another motive or source) by requesting Him to call us.

<> Translation theory: from time to time the group wants to know the source word or phrase of the Greek. Early translations were formal or literal, but the opposite approach seeks “dynamic equivalence” and permits idiomatic and conversational rhythms of spoken (educated, college or at least 9th grade level, American) English. An example of this is Eugene Peterson’s translation, The Message. And yet the facts of translation remain, translating across scores of decades; across ethnic differences and material conditions of living; across language structures and senses (ethnopoetics and grammar boundaries; connotation and denotation shifts). The upshot is that Original Language (such as the Q’uran, frozen in 7th century written-style Arabic) becomes harder and harder for moderns to grasp beyond the surface level. And the Bible’s approach of allowing vulgates into all human languages, even those lacking a writing system, means that deeper, older, stranger meanings are dropped, out of focus or streamlined to fit the particular language style and flow. Either way the result is the same: a gap grows between each new generation and the fixed source texts. Readers impose surplus meaning by projecting modern experiences onto the original words, or the words of today simplify and flatten out the rich flavor and depth of the original, turning parts of the text from Technicolor to sepia; turning parts from three-dimensions to cardboard cut-outs. Expert editorial processing gives smooth reading to modern ears, but mischaracterizes some of the source. What is the remedy –short of bundling a hodge-podge of original texts into a folder, learning to read each century and genre on its own terms, and calling the resulting packet The Bible? Surely the smart people of past generations and the software wielding scholars of today have come to conclusions about how big or small this fact of translation is to knowing the Bible and seeking the meaning of God’s actions and declarations as recorded in the miscellany of writings we now call The Bible. [I wonder when that term came into common usage? New Oxford English Dictionary gives no date found in written materials, but shows the roots of the word itself: Middle English from Old French from Greek from semitic.]