Principle 9
HERMENEUTICS
PRINCIPLE 9
Check Out the Historical and Cultural Background
Let’s revisit the “well diagram” we studied in the introduction to the course. The well is dug into the earth, and the water in the well is surrounded by the ground. In the same way, the Bible was written by authors who were surrounded by the historical and cultural context in which they lived - and those cultures were very different than ours! Every culture has myths and errors, so God protected His pure Word from being contaminated by the errors of the surrounding history and culture in which it was written. Just as the stone walls of the well protect the pure water from being muddied by the surrounding dirt and mud, so God protected His Word from errors and myths with the “walls” of inspiration, canonization, and criticism.
However, aspects of the various cultures are frequently mentioned in the biblical texts (as in the accounts of patriarchs, the history of Israel and the parables of Jesus). The more we know about the history and culture in which the Bible was written, the more we’ll understand what the human author was saying. And the more we understand what the inspired human author was saying, the more we’ll understand what God is communicating to us.
Many resources are available to help us gain insight into the historical and cultural background of Scripture. You can practice this principle by reading books or studying books or reading online sources. Study Bibles, Bible dictionaries, Bible encyclopedias and handbooks, and commentaries describe the background.
Let’s look at several examples where this principle comes into play. It can be divided into three categories:
Background helps us understand the situation
Background helps us interpret correctly
Background helps us make better applications. Be sure to look up the Scriptures as you study!
Background Helps Us Understand the Situation
In the following examples, knowledge of the historical and cultural background is not critical for correct doctrine, but an awareness of the background will certainly help us to better understand each passage.
John 5:8
“Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.” (NKJV)
This is a rather obvious example to illustrate the concept. John 5 is the account of the healing of the paralyzed man at the pool of Bethesda. After he was healed the Lord told him to pick up his bed and walk. Even if you don’t know much historical background, it’s obvious that this bed was not a bed frame with a modern mattress. It was a simple mat (as some other translations portray) that could easily be rolled up and carried.
John 13:21-26
“After he had said this, Jesus was troubled in spirit and testified, “Very truly I tell you, one of you is going to betray me.” His disciples stared at one another, at a loss to know which of them he meant. One of them, the disciple whom Jesus loved, was reclining next to him. Simon Peter motioned to this disciple and said, “Ask him which one he means.” Leaning back against Jesus, he asked him, “Lord, who is it?” Jesus answered, “It is the one to whom I will give this piece of bread when I have dipped it in the dish.” Then, dipping the piece of bread, he gave it to Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot.” (NIV)
This is the occasion of the Last Supper. How would you paint a picture of this event? In Leonardo DaVinci’s famous rendition of the Last Supper, Christ and His disciples are sitting in chairs at a long, straight table. With a little research, we’ll realize that DaVinci didn’t do his historical and cultural background studies! People in the 1st century Middle Eastern culture of Jesus’ time reclined on mats or low couches around a U-shaped table when they ate a meal together. They would prop themselves up with their elbow so that the other arm was free to take pieces of flatbread and dip them into the central dishes of food. It was common to dip a morsel and give it to someone else as a gesture of sharing and friendship.
This helps us understand why the text says that the disciples were “reclining” at the table. Evidently John and Jesus were reclining next to each other, so that John’s head, if he leaned back to talk, would have been close to Jesus’ chest or shoulder. If Peter was on another side of the table, he could have made eye-contact with John after the Lord said, “One of you is going to betray Me.” Peter could have gestured to John and said, “Ask Him who it is!” When John leaned back, his head was next to Jesus’ head, and he said, “Who is it, Lord?” Probably the Lord said to John in a low voice that the others did not hear, “It is the one to whom I will give this piece of bread...” Jesus then dipped a piece of of the flatbread and handed it to Judas, who was within arm’s reach.
Background Helps Us Interpret Correctly
Studying the historical and cultural background not only helps us better understand the biblical accounts; many times it helps us correctly interpret the Scripture.
John 13:3-12
“Jesus knew that the Father had given him authority over everything and that he had come from God and would return to God. So he got up from the table, took off his robe, wrapped a towel around his waist, and poured water into a basin. Then he began to wash the disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel he had around him. When Jesus came to Simon Peter, Peter said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?”
(v7) Jesus replied, “You don’t understand now what I am doing, but someday you will.”
“No,” Peter protested, “you will never ever wash my feet!”
Jesus replied, “Unless I wash you, you won’t belong to me.”
Simon Peter exclaimed, “Then wash my hands and head as well, Lord, not just my feet!”
(v10) Jesus replied, “A person who has bathed all over does not need to wash, except for the feet, to be entirely clean. And you disciples are clean, but not all of you.” For Jesus knew who would betray him. That is what he meant when he said, “Not all of you are clean.”
After washing their feet, he put on his robe again and sat down and asked, “Do you understand what I was doing?””
This example is also from the Last Supper. Learning the historical and cultural background will help us understand why the Lord washed the disciples’ feet, and what the Lord meant when He said, “A person who has bathed all over does not need to wash, except for the feet, to be entirely clean. And you disciples are clean, but not all of you” (v10).
In that culture, household servants usually washed the soiled feet of guests who had walked in sandals on dusty roads. But the Lord’s statements in verses 7 and 12 indicate that He had much more in mind than just teaching His followers to perform the common courtesies of the day for one another. Verses 8-11 show that Christ intended His foot-washing to be symbolic of another washing: the cleansing from sin. But further knowledge of the culture of that day helps us understand exactly what Jesus was teaching.
In those days, only very wealthy people had anything resembling bathtubs in their own homes. Most people went periodically to the public baths to wash their bodies. Between these visits, frequent foot washings helped clean off the dirt picked up in daily travel.
In verse 10, Jesus referred to both the bath and the foot washings.
The bath represents salvation.
The foot washing represents restoration.
A believer doesn’t take the “bath of salvation” every day. It’s done once-and-for-all when a person trusts in the Lord Jesus Christ as personal Savior. From that time onward, that individual is “cleansed” of sin. Those sins are eternally forgiven. That person is no longer “dirty” in God’s sight because he or she is now identified with Christ. The Lord told Peter that he had already received the bath of salvation (v10). He was clean, and so were the rest of the believing disciples. Only unbelieving Judas was not clean (v11).
Frequent foot-washings picture the daily cleansings we need to keep us in close fellowship with the Lord. Just because we’re eternally forgiven for our sins doesn’t mean we’ve stopped sinning. We need to examine our walk along the dusty roads of this world every day and come to the Lord for foot-washing.
It’s so easy for our fellowship with Him to be broken as we interact with and pick up the dirt of defilement all around us. Within a world system that operates on the principles of pleasure, possessions, power, and prestige (see 1 John 2:16), it’s important that we come to the Lord on a daily basis to place our “soiled feet” into His hands for washing. He never turns us away. “If we confess our sins, He’s faithful and just to forgive our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).
In addition, in obedience to our Lord’s command in verse 14, we should wash one another’s feet with the water of the Word by encouraging and exhorting one another with Scripture. Knowing the historical and cultural background helps us to see the clear distinction that the Lord made between salvation from sin and daily cleansing from sin.
Isaiah 1:18
“Come now, let’s settle this,” says the Lord.“ Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, I will make them as white as wool.”
This prophecy, given by the Lord to His people through the prophet Isaiah, has been misapplied and used as a reference to the blood of Christ and cleansing from sin. Although the blood of Jesus Christ does indeed cleanse us from sin, Isaiah 1:18 was not referring to the blood of Christ when it mentioned “scarlet” and “crimson.”
In Isaiah’s day, scarlet or crimson was a colorfast dye. If this dye was splashed on a garment, it was impossible to remove the stain. So God was drawing a lesson from this well-known dye. In effect, He was saying to the people of Israel, “Because you’ve gone away from me, your spiritual and moral condition is like an indelible stain. If you turn back to Me, we can change this situation. Even though your sins are like a permanent scarlet stain, I can make them white as snow. Though your sins are like the indelible crimson stains that you can’t get out of a garment, I will remove them and make them as white as clean wool.”
What an amazing promise! See how historical and cultural background can be helpful for interpreting Scripture?
Background Helps Us Make Better Applications
Luke 4:16-20
“When he came to the village of Nazareth, his boyhood home, he went as usual to the synagogue on the Sabbath and stood up to read the Scriptures. The scroll of Isaiah the prophet was handed to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where this was written: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released, that the blind will see, that the oppressed will be set free, and that the time of the Lord’s favor has come.” He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the attendant, and sat down. All eyes in the synagogue looked at him intently.”
This passage was used in a daily devotional calendar I read. Unfortunately, the author didn’t do his background and cultural studies. After quoting Luke 4:16-20, where the Lord stood to read the Scripture and then sat down to teach, the author made this application: “He sat down. Some of us have never learned to stand up, and some of us have never learned to sit down. We need to learn both. Some of us need to learn to stand up, speak up, and then shut up and sit down, instead of just going on and on.”
Well, it’s true that some of us do need to learn to stand up and say something for the Lord. And in interacting with others, we need to be concise and considerate, allowing others a chance to speak. All that is true - but it’s definitely not a good application of Luke 4:16-20! In this passage, the Lord was following the custom of the Jewish teachers of that day. In the synagogue, the rabbi would stand to read Scripture, and then sit down to teach the Scripture. This text simply describes the Lord following the custom of the day. It has nothing at all to do with standing up, speaking up, and then being quiet.
What would be a good application from this passage? Maybe one practical application would be: when you visit a church that follows a particular custom or format in their services, adapt to it. Don’t criticize or try to change a good and useful custom.
Matthew 5:13
“You are the salt of the earth. But what good is salt if it has lost its flavor? Can you make it salty again? It will be thrown out and trampled underfoot as worthless.”
Jesus said in Matthew 5:13, “You are the salt of the earth.” Does this mean we should leave a flavorful taste in people’s mouths? We definitely want to make a good impression, but that’s not the meaning of this verse. Does it mean that we are just small grains in a large world? Again, there may be some truth to that application, but it’s not the meaning of the verse. So in what way are we the salt of the earth?
Learning a little background in the use of salt at the time of Christ helps. Before the days of refrigeration, you couldn’t store meat in a refrigerator or freezer. Salt was used as a preservative. Your only chance for delaying the decay of your meat was to saturate it with salt.
As the “salt of the earth,” Christians are to minimize the spread of moral corruption and spiritual decay in this world. Our lives are to have the effect of salt. Even though spiritual decay and moral corruption surrounds us, we are to uphold and preserve the good, and prevent the advance of sin and wickedness as much as possible. Our presence in the office, college dorm, locker room, or job site should, to some degree, stifle the spread of sinful ideas, stories, and actions. Are you a grain of salt in the segment of society where God has placed you?
Colossians 4:6 says that our speech or conversation must not only be gracious, but also guarded and powerful - “seasoned with salt.” Sometimes this takes courage. Salt is not a preservative because it “cures” decay. Rather, by its very nature, it prevents the spread of corruption. As Christians we cannot cure this world of sin, but our influence can help reduce the moral and spiritual decay that’s present in this world. If you’re a Christian, then you’re a grain of salt that God has placed in your place of employment, or school, or wherever you are.
Jesus said that salt could become tasteless or lose its flavor. In those days, salt was often mixed with earthy deposits from the Dead Sea salt flats. The salt could dissolve out, leaving only a tasteless and useless residue. When salt lost its power, it could be no longer used as a preservative. It wasn’t good for anything and was thrown out the front door and walked on! If we get sidetracked and sucked into the worldly culture, we can lose our “saltiness.” Instead of preventing the spread of decay, we can become part of the problem. We’ve fallen down on the job, and in essence, the enemy has walked all over us.
So knowing the historical and cultural background surrounding any text of Scripture is important for properly interpreting that Scripture. Background will help to preserve us from making incorrect interpretations, and can guide us in determining the correct interpretation. Then, when we have the correct interpretation, we can move on to make a proper application of Scripture for today!