This is a good point, I think, to stop and say some good things about CENI, the idea of looking in the Bible for commands, examples and necessary inferences. I’ve tried to emphasize throughout that my problem is with the use of CENI as a hermeneutic. I object to the idea that says “Just look for commands, examples and inferences, and you’ll know what God wants.” That doesn’t work.

A few other things that I disagree with:

• The idea that the Bible “authorizes” certain things to be done in worship. The concept of authorization is foreign to the New Testament. (So yes, I reject the regulative principle)
• The idea that the New Testament was written to be a constitution. Reading the Bible as legal code fails to recognize the text for what it is: an ancient sacred text. It’s not a science book. It’s not a history book. It’s not legal code. It’s not even a love letter, which was a popular concept not long ago. It is a collection of the writings of God’s people. They are occasional writings. They have a teaching purpose, even the books that seem to be mere narrative or poetry. They are not law code.
• The idea that we are to restore the first century church. (Which one? The Jerusalem church that was “zealous for the Law”? The Corinthian church with its divisions? The Ephesian church that was plagued by false teachers? The Thessalonian church that had lazy members?) We are to attempt to be the church that God wants us to be. We should be a biblical church, seeking to live out the norms of the Bible in a twenty-first century world. The goal of the early church was to be like Jesus. We should imitate that goal. We don’t try to be like the first-century church. We try to be like Jesus.

That being said, I like the idea of looking to the early Christians to learn about how to please God. I believe that we, as Luke says of the Jerusalem Christians, should devote ourselves to the teachings of the apostles. We should examine the commands given in the New Testament, analyze them and learn from them. Some are obviously temporal in nature; others seem to have a longer reach.

We should look to the example of the early church and learn from that example. I should say “examples,” I guess, for there are multiple examples. There are things we should imitate about the early church. There are things we should avoid. And inferences are part of how we come to understand these stories.

Unless we’re going to deem the New Testament record irrelevant, we will look at the commands and examples of the Bible and consider the inferences we make from them. In that respect, CENI is great. Long live CENI. But as a hermeneutic, it’s a failure. It’s a way of putting ourselves in the seat of Law Giver, when that seat is already occupied. It’s way of taking our opinions and making them laws, of codifying our traditions.

Obviously there’s a lot more to say on this subject. We’ll continue the discussion. I just want to make sure that I give commands, examples and inferences the respect they deserve.

For me, 1 Corinthians 16 is the poster child for the “CENI doesn’t work as a hermeneutic” campaign. The first part of that chapter has been very popular among those who rely on commands, examples and necessary inferences for their biblical interpretation. The first paragraph of that chapter reads:

“Now concerning the collection for the saints: as I directed the churches of Galatia, so you also are to do. On the first day of every week, each of you is to put something aside and store it up, as he may prosper, so that there will be no collecting when I come. And when I arrive, I will send those whom you accredit by letter to carry your gift to Jerusalem. If it seems advisable that I should go also, they will accompany me.” (1 Corinthians 16:1–4)

We have a command: put something aside and store it up (on the first day of the week).
We have an inference: for this to be a collection, one would assume that the church would be gathered. Therefore, we can infer that the church gathered on the first day of the week.
Many find another inference: the collection is “for the saints.” Therefore, the collection is for the church and its needs.

That’s all well and good, unless we’re interested in what this passage is saying. This is rather obviously a special collection, one that we read of numerous times in the New Testament: a collection for the poor saints in Jerusalem. This was not the gathering of funds for the Corinthian church to use locally. This particular collection seems to have been of limited duration, since Paul says that he doesn’t want collections to have to be done when he is there. This mode of gathering money is something that Paul had taught in Galatia and now in Macedonia; it’s not something that he has taught everywhere he has gone. It’s not standard practice in the church. And if we’re going to follow these teachings to the letter, we’re going to have to hold our funds until Paul comes and they can be sent on to Jerusalem!

So how did we come to use it for our regular Sunday offering? In the first place, since we can’t start at zero, we started where we already were. We took a practice that was already in place (collections on Sunday) and looked for biblical support. That sounds good, but isn’t it healthier to start with the Bible and work out, rather than the other way around? Rather than saying, “How can I justify this?,” we would need to ask, “If I had never heard of this practice, would I come upon it merely by reading Scripture?”

But starting where we were, we then applied the subjective hermeneutic of CENI to make the passage say what we needed it to say, rather than the original message to speak.

Can CENI be applied objectively as a hermeneutic? It’s hard for me to see that. There are too many decisions that need to be made that go beyond the scope of CENI. Could CENI be included as part of an objective hermeneutic? Yeah, maybe. But on it’s own, it’s merely a too for making scripture say what the interpreter desires.

Photo by Amy Aldworth

The weakest link in the CENI hermeneutical chain is that of inferences. This is usually described as “necessary inferences.” In Thomas Campbell’s Declaration and Address, the sixth proposition states:

That although inferences and deductions from Scripture premises, when fairly inferred, may be truly called the doctrine of God’s holy word, yet are they not formally binding upon the consciences of Christians farther than they perceive the connection, and evidently see that they are so; for their faith must not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power and veracity of God. Therefore, no such deductions can be made terms of communion, but do properly belong to the after and progressive edification of the Church. Hence, it is evident that no such deductions or inferential truths ought to have any place in the Church’s confession.

On the one hand, Campbell says that properly-made inferences can be called “the doctrine of God’s holy word,” he insists that they must not be made a test of fellowship. Why? Because they are what he calls “wisdom of men.”

Even the most ardent supporters of CENI as a hermeneutic squirm a bit as they describe the proper use of inferences. Which ones are necessary? How far are we willing to go with those inferences?

Many advocate the use of “common sense” in the making of inferences (as well as other aspects of CENI). To the modernist mind, this works. Logic. Common sense. That’s how you arrive at answers.

It’s strange to me that many of the same people are uncomfortable with any inclusion of the Holy Spirit in the process. We can pray for understanding, but that means that God gives us the common sense we need, they would argue.

To my eye, this is where the CENI hermeneutic’s mask of objectivity gets ripped away. More than necessary inferences, we tend to make desired inferences. If the inference supports the point we want to make, then it’s “necessary.” If not, it’s “going too far.”

Am I being too harsh? Should we give inferences an equal place at the table? Under what guidelines? How do we know what’s a “necessary inference” and what’s a “desired inference”?

Photo by Amy Aldworth

We’re taking some time these days to look at what is sometimes touted as a method for interpreting the Bible. It’s often called CENI, which refers to commands, examples and necessary inference. What some would advocate is a fairly simple hermeneutic: we look for direct commands, approved examples and make necessary inferences from those. Having done so, we have now ascertained the Lord’s will on any given matter. (Usually this method is coupled with the regulative principle, the idea that anything not expressly sanctioned in the New Testament should be considered as disallowed)

My argument is that CENI is insufficient as a hermeneutic. It is subjectivity masquerading as objectivity. Looking at commands, examples and making inferences is not enough to allow us to establish doctrine. I’ve already looked a bit at commands. Now I want to turn our attention to examples.

The question necessarily becomes: Which examples are approved? Who decides which examples are approved?

Let’s take the book of Acts. We start off with a gathering in an upper room. Did you know that some argue that Christians can only hold their assemblies in upper rooms? I’ve seen churches who built an auditorium on the upper floor, refusing to meet on the ground floor. They note that Jesus established the Lord’s Supper in an upper room, we have the example here and the example in Acts 20 (specified in verse 8). No ground floor meetings are ever specified.

At the gathering, a need is seen to choose a new apostle. This is done democratically, of course, since the Bible advocates democracy consistently throughout its pages. (Sorry… sarcasm slipped in again) Two men are nominated, though we aren’t told how. We are told how the final decision is made. Lots are cast, a very common procedure from Old Testament times. Is that example approved? Should we cast lots to choose leaders?

And so it goes through the book of Acts. The only New Testament model we have for funding the work of the local church is revealed to us in chapters 4 and 5: selling personal property to outsiders. I’ve heard churches criticized for having garage sales to raise money; seems like that’s not all that far from the approved example. Or are those examples not approved? It seems a bit hard to tell.

In the book of Acts, fasting accompanies the choosing of leaders, on several different occasions. Chapter 13 models a group fast, either among the leaders of the church of Antioch or within the whole congregation. I know of congregations that have never had a group fast in their entire history.

Leaders chosen are then recognized by the laying on of hands. Again, many churches shy away from this practice. Somehow that example doesn’t get everyone’s stamp of approval. (I was at a church that was installing deacons, and one of the elders announced, “We’re going to substitute the right hand of fellowship for the laying on of hands.” Really? Now we can do substitutions? What other things can be used in lieu of others?)

Other examples can be looked at, but hopefully you see the point. We have no red letters in our Bibles to distinguish the approved examples from the unapproved ones. What we need is a concise rule as to how to know when an example is approved and when it’s not. It needs to be fairly concise, or we lose the simplicity touted by those who favor CENI, you know, the “you just look for commands and examples and follow them” argument.

If you were going to state the rule for determining when an example is considered to be approved, what would you say?

Photo by Amy Aldworth