How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth: Fourth Edition

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Your Bible, whatever translation you use, which is your beginning point, is in fact the end result of much scholarly work. Another example takes the plain meaning of the story of the rich young man (Mark 10:17–22) as precisely the opposite of "what it actually says" and attributes the "interpretation" to the Holy Spirit. Its discussion of translations and the translation process is good (though biased because both of them are on the NIV translation board and so, unsurprisingly, they applaud the NIV and downplay its major competitors like the ESV). Very good explanation, discussion and inputting reader to have more knowledge of how to understand the bible. I'd long understood that most abuses of biblical quotation and interpretation centered around either proof-texting, or a simple lack of thorough reading (not reading the verse before and after the verse in question, never mind taking the time to read the full paragraph or chapter it's actually found in.

This is hands-down the best treatment of hermeneutics (or bible-study or exegesis) that I've ever come across. If they were going to hear it, it could only have come through events and in language they could have understood. We cannot claim not to interpret (“it just means what it says so no interpretation is necessary”) because we are all doing it all the time. How To Read Your Bible For All Its Worth is strongly academic, yet structured well enough to walk laymen through some progressive comprehension on the basis and basics of biblical interpretation.

Though other works of this genre are more comprehensive in scope, Fee and Stuart have written a lucid and intellectually remunerative guide to interpretation.

Their primary rule is: "a text cannot mean what it never could have meant to its author or [original] readers. The fundamental guiding principles they offer are helpful and should absolutely allow people to think more clearly about how the text can be understood and used. The idea that more than a handful of translations are useful to attack a passage from various angles allowed me to see how each one could be a study aid in its own way. We also tend to think that -our understanding- is the same thing as the Holy Spirit's or human author's -intent-.

Apocalyptic literature is satiated with symbolism and approaching such texts should not commence without a "proper degree of humility. How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth I consider it to be a cornerstone towards the better understanding of the writings and the teachings contained within the Holy Bible. A redeeming aspect was the treatment of the conceptualization of the understanding of the "kingdom of God" as both a present and future event; an oft overlooked foundational element of the gospel accounts. That being said, I think their initial rule is broken, which means how they interpret the Bible, especially the OT, will be defective from the beginning.