H - Close reading
- In literary criticism, close reading is the careful, sustained interpretation of a brief passage of a text. A close reading emphasizes the single and the particular over the general, effected by close attention to individual words, the syntax, and the order in which the sentences unfold ideas, as the reader scans the line of text. [1]
Close reading the Bible goes beyond the practices in literary criticism. The purpose in reading the Bible is to know the invisible God through the word, works, life, death, resurrection and indwelling Spirit of Christ.
The Bible is the recorded Word of God. It does not just record the word of God when it says he spoke. Every element within the Bible is his word which he designed to reveal something about himself. Sometimes the literary critic pays closer attention to the literature than the original author did. This is never the case for the Bible. God intended for it all to speak of Jesus. [2]
The works of God are not just recorded when it says that God did something. The mystery hidden in the literal demonstrates that he was working behind the scenes. He did not just work in history to move things toward the cross, but he worked in history to write the mystery within the history.
Consider how he developed the Hebrew language to be able to express multiple ideas withing the same words and sentences. He worked around the people of history, nudging here and there for his hidden will to be accomplished in the text. He worked in the lives of the authors so they would observe and record precise details using precise words to paint the hidden picture.
Observing his works in his word is proof that there is a God and that the Bible is his word. No human could have produced the mystery, and none could impose it after the fact. The hidden pictures in the scripture are there by the very hand of God imposed upon his creation; behind the scenes, working to create the mystery which would be revealed at the cross.
We observe the facts surrounding the life, death and resurrection of Christ, which validate the hidden mystery.
These things can all be observed using the methods of 'close reading' in literary criticism. There is one thing that sets reading the Bible apart from all that.
The Indwelling Spirit
We have been promised that the Holy Spirit will guide us in all truth. [3] As we read the Bible using the techniques of close reading, we learn to pay attention to his voice.
With pencil in hand, we highlight those things which stand out in our mind, confident that they are the things that God wants to reveal to us. Look at this verse:
- Joh 21:2 There were together Simon Peter, and Thomas called Didymus, and Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, and the [sons] of Zebedee, and two other of his disciples.
Why seven men, and why these seven men? Since seven is the number of completeness; Peter was leading the whole of the disciples astray, even though he only had six others with him. The message is not that he was leading the 11 or 12 astray, but that he was leading all disciples everywhere in every time, astray. In what way?
They returned to their old way of life as fishermen like a dog returning to his vomit. [4] [5]
They went at night, in the darknness as a symbol of them living a lifestyle presuming upon the grace of God. [6] [7]
They were fishing on the left side of the boat (where goats are), representing the flesh. [8]
And he was naked, representing living like an animal by instinct, and exposing his fleshly sin. [9]
Jesus was not going to let Peter's backsliding and guilt ruin his plans for the church. Peter became the human symbol of the grace of God. Having denied Christ three times in word, works and life (the hints of the number 3), he had been forgiven three times. He restored Peter not only as the individual, but as a symbol of restoring all disciples everywhere and in every time.
What do you see pop out from your practice of close reading? Hear his voice and chase the meaning he intended for you to discover. WAIT! I said his intended meaning is intended for you personally to discover. But I did not say that it was a meaning just for you! When you discover it, you can share it with others and they can validate that is speaks of Christ as the Messiah, the Son of the living God, and that it is THE intended purpose of scripture. He gives you the honor of discovering it. [10]
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References
- ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_reading
- ↑ Joh 5:39 Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.
- ↑ Joh 16:13 Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, [that] shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.
- ↑ Joh 21:3 Simon Peter saith unto them, I go a fishing. They say unto him, We also go with thee. They went forth, and entered into a ship immediately; and that night they caught nothing.
- ↑ Pr 26:11 ¶ As a dog returneth to his vomit, [so] a fool returneth to his folly.
- ↑ Joh 21:3 Simon Peter saith unto them, I go a fishing. They say unto him, We also go with thee. They went forth, and entered into a ship immediately; and that night they caught nothing.
- ↑ Joh 3:19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
- ↑ Mt 25:33 And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.
- ↑ Joh 21:7 Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved saith unto Peter, It is the Lord. Now when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girt [his] fisher’s coat [unto him], (for he was naked,) and did cast himself into the sea.
- ↑ Pr 25:2 ¶ [It is] the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings [is] to search out a matter.
