An Author Interview from Books At a Glance
Greetings, I’m Fred Zaspel, and welcome to another Author Interview here on Books At a Glance. Today we are talking to Dr. Robert Plummer about his very helpful book, 40 Questions About Interpreting the Bible, which has been very successful and is now in its second edition.
Rob, welcome, and congratulations on your helpful and successful book!
Plummer:
Good to visit with you, Fred. Thanks for your interest in the book.
Zaspel:
Give us a brief overview of the book, and with that give us a sense of the variety of questions you address.
Plummer:
I wrote this book to be a textbook to accompany my Introduction to Biblical Interpretation class at Southern Seminary. What is in it is determined by what was in the class at the time. We cover a broad overview of the Bible, the canon, basics on textual criticism, manuscript transmission, my goal in interpreting the Bible, how has it been interpreted throughout history, what is the role of the Holy Spirit, and how is the Bible about Jesus.
And then looking at it in a more traditional hermeneutics fashion at different genres, interpreting Psalms, Proverbs, and the Gospels. In the end, looking more broadly at what the Bible tells us about the future, how to lead a Bible study, how to use the Bible in devotions, does the Bible teach we should be healthy and wealthy, and what are some trends in studying the Bible right now. Each one of these 40 questions is answered in seven to twelve pages. There are also discussion questions at the end and a bibliography of suggested resources to pursue the questions more.
There are quizzes and tests that accompany the book that can be used in high schools or Bible colleges. Discussion guides and lessons plans are all free on 40questions.net. People use this book in their biblical interpretation classes at seminary, or they do a Sunday night series with it. It has organically spread because people have found it useful. It has been translated into Spanish. It is one of the more helpful volumes on interpretation available in Spanish. It is in Chinese, Korean, Portuguese, and Kazak.
Zaspel:
I might clarify here that in teaching us how to interpret the Bible you are trying to teach us how the Bible itself leads us to interpret it. It is not that you are standing “above” Scripture making determinations as to how it ought to be understood. What you are trying to do is show us how the Bible itself leads us to understand it. Scripture may not define things like “genre” or “here’s how to do a word study,” and it may not provide direct instruction like “Here’s how to recognize and interpret typology,” but it is nonetheless our guide to interpretation, and what we want to do is be taught by the Scriptures how to understand the Scriptures, right? Maybe you have a better way of saying this.
Plummer:
Right! In 2 Peter, he tells us that some of Paul’s letters are hard to understand and that ignorant and unstable people distort them, leading even to their own destruction and the damnation of their hearers. Paul wrote letters and we want to understand them rightly. This is true for other Scripture too. There is a proper, right, and godly way to respect what the divinely inspired author was seeking to convey. There is a wrong way as well.
You are right that most traditional hermeneutical principles flow out of a careful reading of the text. The authors indicate how we are to understand their writing. My goal is to faithfully condense this. The authors are speaking to an audience living in a different time period and culture. There are some questions that are not on the surface of the Bible like the canon or how the Bible has been interpreted throughout Scripture.
Zaspel:
Your book was originally released in 2010, and this now is your second edition. What changes have you made here from the previous edition?
Plummer:
To keep it 40 questions we changed some chapters. You can download those. They are still relevant. They are a little more technical and deal with the academic world. I replaced these with a little more practical questions for laymen. In the Hispanic world, I got the feedback to do something on the health and wealth Gospel. I took some questions and condensed them into one chapter.
The bibliographies have been extensively updated even to the year 2021. I site books that are still forthcoming that I know will be useful in the questions. Summaries have been added. There have been hundreds of small changes just to update the language. There are a couple of substantive changes. On the chapter on the reliability of the transmission of the New Testament, I originally drew examples that many draw from F.F. Bruce and his reliable documents. I became convinced as I have read since then that those examples are too dated. I drew from Peter Williams and his work on the reliability of the Gospel with more up-to-date comparisons and charts.
Zaspel:
It seems to me that your book would be very useful as a textbook in seminary or Bible college but also for laymen and church groups. That is not always easy to pull off, but I assume that was your aim, right?
Plummer:
I do not know if I was that focused on my aim upfront. To be honest, it has been used more widely than I anticipated. I am a simple man and I hope I write clearly. I like to take difficult concepts but make sure they are clear. I think that is appealing to people. They do not want dumbed-down inaccurate information but also do not want it to be so hard to wade through that they can not understand.
Zaspel:
Okay, getting to the subject of your book itself, let us begin with a broad perspective of why a book like this is needed. Perhaps “caution” would be the better word here. Give us some samples of misunderstandings of Scripture that could have been avoided with a better understanding of some basic guidelines for interpreting?
Plummer:
In my early years at Southern Seminary, I was one of the few faculty that was always on campus since I did not have an office at home. The dean’s secretary found that out and would transfer all the calls that came into the seminary. Some of them were very interesting. I wish I could make another book, 40 strange questions. One guy who called was very troubled. He called about some text that was hyperbolic. It was an example of exaggeration in Scripture. He was confused and thought his children could not call him father because only God is their Father. He was someone who was trying to literally obey the Bible but was confused about how to live it out.
I try to examine different approaches to Revelation and the millennium. Some do not know there are different views. Some have been taught simplistically about the Old Testament. There are misunderstandings that people have that we hopefully correct. I have just found that it ends up answering questions that people had or questions they did not know they had.
Zaspel:
What bearing do the important doctrines of inspiration and inerrancy have on interpretation?
Plummer:
I contend for the view that the Bible is completely truthful in all that it teaches, it is inerrant. I contend for verbal plenary inspiration; every word is the exact word that God wanted to be written. Sometimes the Lord does dictate to the writers but usually, it is through human means that he has superintended. Throughout most of the book, I assume inerrancy. If someone comes from another background of not believing the authority of the Bible, my book is not going to be viewed positively by them.
The Scripture is the scepter through which Jesus rules his kingdom. We come with reverence and humility even though we may have questions. These are foundational that you either share or argue about. A lot of unity flows from an understanding of inerrancy and inspiration.
Zaspel:
Let’s talk to the newer Bible reader. He has not had formal Bible college or seminary training, but he is a faithful reader of the Scriptures, and now he asks you how he could make his time in the Word more profitable. What are some basic pointers you would offer?
Plummer:
I tell a parable at the end of the book. Imagine it is a hot day and you see a wonderful popsicle, it is just what you want. You put it in your mouth and feel a cellophane wrapper on your tongue. That is the experience if you just read my book. This book is a setup for reading the Bible. The Bible is honey and worth more than gold. My book is a midwife to bring you to the Bible where there is life, truth, relationship with God, and conviction by the Holy Spirit. The most important thing is you read the Bible more than you read my book. I talk about some practical aspects to devotionally read the Bible, prayerfully and meditatively.
Someone who does not know the Bible at all, sometimes it can be a real enigma. Maybe they have a translation they do not understand. I start by answering what the Bible is. I try to help people understand how it is organized, its purpose, the chronology behind its composition. Very personally, I go over that God is revealing himself through the Bible and he is calling you to respond in repentance and faith. These questions can lead to more spiritually personal and challenging questions. We can also look at the historical evidence of what might be popular in the culture and explore the facts.
Zaspel:
What is the role of prayer, the Holy Spirit, and practical godliness in interpreting the Bible? And what is the role of more “academic” studies?
Plummer:
I am grateful God is not in the business of making religious hypocrites, but he wants us to be his sons and daughters who intimately walk with him. We know that one of the temporal punishments that God gives for rebellion is a darkening of the mind. In Romans 1, people gave themselves to sin, God released them to a darkened mind and more sin. We must approach the Scriptures with reverence and in relationship with God. We know that he is a personal God and that we must walk with him and repent of our sins. We will then desire and walk in the truth. In the book, I address this in numerous ways. One way is by looking at Martin Luther. He wrote this delightful essay about how to be a theologian. How to read the Bible and understand what it means. He looks at Psalms 119 as the model for prayer, mediation, and difficulties.
Zaspel:
Your last question is, “What are Some Modern-Day Trends in Biblical Interpretation?” Can you at least sample that for us a bit?
Plummer:
I deal with some more traditional modern-day trends that someone reading it might not be familiar with, for example, source criticism or historical criticism. I give a paragraph so they can understand what those are. I deal with more recent trends. For example, rhetorical criticism, which is more popular since the 70s and 80s, uses rhetorical categories to analyze books of the Bible. Sometimes people claim the authors were using those.
The theological interpretation of Scripture movement has been going on since maybe 2005. It rejects a lot of more traditional academic studies of the Bible, calling for more devotional study. I try to explain the diversity of that movement. How some parts of it will uncritically accept the interpretation of the early fathers, even if they are allegorical. I think that is a mistake. There are some good things in the TIS movement and some things I would caution against.
Reception history is a trend where people study the way a particular text has been understood throughout church history rather than seeking to explain the text and what it really means. And then intertextuality, the way the particular texts are picked up and used in other parts of the Bible. I try to help people understand what is going on. In the end, I am glad I could provide the most updated information for both New and Old Testament studies. Baker has the State of New Testament and Old Testament series. They give a survey of what is going on in the field. There are resources that will help people get up to date at the highest level.
Zaspel:
We are talking to Dr. Robert Plummer about his excellent book, 40 Questions about Interpreting the Bible. It is an excellent resource and a profitable investment for every Christian and every church. It is now in its second edition, and if you want to read your Bible more profitably, we encourage you to get a copy soon.
Rob, thanks for your faithful work, and thanks for talking to us today.
Plummer:
Thanks for having me!
