Excellent read on removing cultural blinders
Misreading Scripture Western Eyes ebook
I had a basic understanding of what to expect from this book. The first half met those expectation, but the last half challenged me in ways I wasn't expecting.
I had always thought myself a fairly well educated lay-person. I understand the group vs individual, I understood that custom and society deeply influence much of what's said in Scripture, and how very important it was not to project my cultural values and norms onto it. I knew all the before reading this book.
And yet....
I find that I had missed the mark quite badly. Finding out how much of my western cultural up-bringing affected how I read the Bible was much like how I imagine a fish would feel suddenly realizing it was wet. They took me out of myself--my culture--for just long enough for me to realize it was there. I can not tell you how uncomfortable this made me! It was not the truth-y-ness of it that bothered me, but the fact that I can not help but see the implications of what they were saying every where I look in the [Western] church. (Much like a fish, once realizing it's wet, can not help but feel wet all the time!)
For this reason alone I highly recommend this book. Maybe you won't agree with some of what they're saying (because there are theological implications there), but you'll find that it will alter how you perceive the world around you. It will make you more aware of yourself and you'll see the "yeast" of our cultural "leavening" the church in ways you really never dreamed of.
I encouraged my husband to read this book too. He said it was very well done. He knew most of the concepts covered, but said it was done in a very down-to-earth style and would be an excellent introduction for people unfamiliar with this topic. He's already recommended it to at least one person he knows.
Highly recommended! Very much worth your time and money.
Category Article pressure washer
Richards and O'Brien provide excellent insights into our assumptions about the Bible and how to apply it contextually. This is a must read for all who teach and preach the Bible as well as for anyone who seeks to better apply scripture to their lives.
It is great to see such a book. I don't know if ever there was a book written that talks about all the variety of things it talks about. There are Bible culture books around and I recommend "Life in Biblical Israel" as one of them, but this covers a lot of ground and important and relevant ground. I really enjoyed Chapters 7 and 8 the most. This should be required reading of anyone in the church. The questions at the end of each chapter are great questions, and should not be ignored, what a fruitful Bible Study this would be, lively too!
It almost border on overemphazing "group thinking" as a cultural pattern, but it is such an important thing for Americans to learn for those newer to this field of cultural studies it is priceless.
I will definitely make this required next time I have a chance to lead a Bible study and we will take it slowly. It is that important.
A few quibbles about some things they said is in order - They interpreted Jesus's talking about making people's burdens light as referring to being weighed down by sin, but when a Rabbi used the word "yoke" it referred to being under a teacher. Many were under the teaching of certain Pharisees and Scribes that bound people's hands with backwards laws. So it is not about sin, it is about being burdened by authority figures that are only looking out for themselves.
The authors also wanted us to see how we are being hypocrites by willing to give the shirts off our backs for those overseas on a missions trip, but not willing to lift a pinky for homeless people back here looking for a handout. By way of agreement I do want to say you SHOULD always offer a meal for someone who asks for it! BUT never money. That is the sure way to tell if they are in need, if they refuse a meal they are not as needy as they say they are. Many prefer that lifestyle here because of all the places to keep warm and get a free bite to eat. Other countries have no such places or abundance of food thrown away in the trash.
Also they almost equate tolerance with hypocrisy. They are right when it comes to talking to other Christians or family members that we should not be as tolerant as we are, but when you are in mixed company, at work let's say, being tolerant with things that are not generally thought of as wrong or universally wrong is actually a good witness. If one is tolerant one can still say they disagree with another's lifestyle or religious views, but as a tolerant person it means listening to other's first and always talking to someone in a spirit of love
They prematurely jumped to the "group mentality" with Proverbs 22:6 about training one's child in the way he should go. More than likely the focus should be on more how it is translated not the group vs individual approach. I like how the Geneva Bible translates it - Teach a child in the trade of his way, and when he is old, he shall not depart from it. See Ted Hildebrandt's view on this as well, it is something similar. Also the LXX is missing this verse, so most Christians back then would not have known about it.
Finally I am glad they talked about the gender issue which is very relevant and they do it a fair enough way, though I would argue that people would not have thought about first born rights when Paul said that Man was made first, then Woman in I Timothy. No one in that culture was that dumb. Even if the woman was born first, the first born male would still have received the double portion, and if he was the only male, the whole portion! So that argument does not fly.
I spent a little time on critiquing, but I only do that if it is especially influential or a really good book, or both! I hope it is both!
As a Christian apologetics specialist who finds great value in bringing the Bible's original contexts to light, I can't recommend this enough. There are plenty of good scholarly books on this subject, by authors like Bruce Malina and John Pilch, but Richards and O'Brien do their work with a perspective that is relatively fresh.
They give us the rundown on cultural facets of the Biblical world -- like honor and shame, collectivism, patronage, and so on -- that make it so vastly different than the world of the West. What makes this book special is that the authors have spent a good deal of time ministering in Indonesia, which gives them the chance to illustrate some of those differences with real-life examples from a parallel culture. This has unique value for understanding the cultural differences in real life terms, as well as giving an extra push against those who claim that you might just be making all this sort of stuff up, or that Biblical people were actually no different than a modern Westerner, and they just lied about being honor/shame oriented, etc. (Yes -- I've had people say that. Really.)
There's one more reason to buy it: It will encourage IVP and other publishers to produce like it. Encourage them to do so -- buy a wheelbarrow, then fill it with copies of this.