There was a time in our brotherhood when we elevated the book of Acts to a special status. Acts showed us how people became Christians in the first century. Acts revealed much about the structure and organization of the early church.
Paul’s writings were also of highest importance, partly because Paul figures so prominently in Acts. There was an awareness that Paul wrote to address issues in the church and teach basic doctrines essential to the faith. Out of these writings, Romans was valued for its teaching about salvation, while the pastorals found a special place because of their insights on church governance.
One tier down were the other epistles. They were seen as important, but not quite on the same level as what Paul wrote.
The gospels were relegated to the role of historical curiosity, speaking of times before the cross. Dispensationalism was strong, and the gospels didn’t belong to the current dispensation.
Last and least was the Old Testament. Not only seen as addressing things prior to the Christian age, the Old Testament was taught to have been “nailed to the cross”; anyone trying to teach Old Testament principles was considered to be trying to live under the old law instead of the law of Christ.
Times are changing. The Old Testament seems to be revered and despised at the same time. Old Testament teachings about justice have found a renewed place in Church of Christ canon, while stories of violence are considered to be the ignorant writings of underdeveloped peoples. Any woman mentioned in any positive light is held up as an example of why women should be given prominent roles today; any stories not exalting women are examples of the patriarchy that created the violent stories.
Where the gospels were once seen as somewhat irrelevant because they addressed a time that isn’t ours, the epistles have now slipped to that status. Much of the New Testament is seen as still being controlled by the underdeveloped patriarchy; or, to be more precise, many feel that the epistles couldn’t say all that they would have said because those advanced teachings wouldn’t have been received by the status quo. (Fortunately we’re more enlightened now)
And the gospels reign supreme. “I value Jesus over Paul.” Most would ignore the occasional nature of the gospels, except to say that there were things even Jesus couldn’t do because the people of that time wouldn’t accept them.
If my snark doesn’t show it, I don’t identify with the prior outlook nor the current one. I take the whole Bible as the Word of God, inspired by God, and useful for Christians. I believe we need to study genres and context and textual variants and a host of other things, but none of that removes the divine nature of the Bible, in my eyes.
There’s lots more to be said. I’ll pause for now, hoping to have some discussion.
We’ve been working through self-referential places in the Scriptures in my Sunday AM class, trying to get a sense of what the Bible says about its own origin.
Exodus 18 is a surprisingly important chapter, since it is the first place where God ever tells anybody, “Hey — you know what just happened? Write that down!”
We’ve talked about the covenant establishment ceremony in Exodus 20, and how it was 20+ years after Jeremiah started prophesying before God told him, “Hey — you know all that stuff I’ve been telling you for the past 20 years? Write that down.” And then the king tears it all up and he and Baruch have to put it all back together again.
Just like Genesis establishes Creation as a project initiated by God but intended after that to be worked out as a partnership between the divine and the human, the Scriptures are a project initiated by God but worked out in full partnership with humanity.
Interesting insights, Tim. I had not really put together a “timeline” of how our views of Scripture seem to be changing – and I think you are on to something here. May be self-evident here, but it seems that in times when certainty is needed and valued (during and after war times), the more doctrinal and legal texts are valued. In times such as we live today, where feelings and intuition is more highly valued, the more people are drawn to the esoteric, or intuitive, aspects of the text – where we get to insert our own meanings. Regardless of the time period, we all look onto the surface of the water and are surprised to see that the Bible is a remarkable reflection of our own culture, our needs, and our situation.
Excellent thoughts! I was identifying—perhaps too closely—with your snark!