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Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes: Removing Cultural Blinders to Better Understand the Bible, by E. Randolph Richards, Brandon J. O'B
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What was clear to the original readers of Scripture is not always clear to us. Because of the cultural distance between the biblical world and our contemporary setting, we often bring modern Western biases to the text. For example: When Western readers hear Paul exhorting women to "dress modestly," we automatically think in terms of sexual modesty. But most women in that culture would never wear racy clothing. The context suggests that Paul is likely more concerned about economic modesty—that Christian women not flaunt their wealth through expensive clothes, braided hair, and gold jewelry. Some readers might assume that Moses married "below himself" because his wife was a dark-skinned Cushite. Actually, Hebrews were the slave race, not the Cushites, who were highly respected. Aaron and Miriam probably thought Moses was being presumptuous by marrying "above himself." Western individualism leads us to assume that Mary and Joseph traveled alone to Bethlehem. What went without saying was that they were likely accompanied by a large entourage of extended family. Biblical scholars Brandon O'Brien and Randy Richards shed light on the ways that Western readers often misunderstand the cultural dynamics of the Bible. They identify nine key areas where modern Westerners have significantly different assumptions about what might be going on in a text. Drawing on their own cross cultural experience in global mission, O'Brien and Richards show how better self-awareness and understanding of cultural differences in language, time, and social mores allow us to see the Bible in fresh and unexpected ways. Getting beyond our own cultural assumptions is increasingly important for being Christians in our interconnected and globalized world. Learn to read Scripture as a member of the global body of Christ.
- Sales Rank: #1121370 in Books
- Published on: 2016-06-07
- Released on: 2016-06-07
- Formats: Audiobook, MP3 Audio, Unabridged
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 6.75" h x .50" w x 5.25" l,
- Running time: 9 Hours
- Binding: MP3 CD
Review
"Whether rules over relationships or correctness over community, respective Western and non-Western worldviews may differ on appropriate conduct, discretion, and exceptions. Randolph and O'Brien write with grace and clarity. Though evangelical, they steer clear of moral or political agendas and give no hint of anti-Western sentiments; they even suggest someone write a complementary sequel: Misreading Scripture with Eastern Eyes. Their extensive range of biblical and contemporary samples makes this an excellent resource for confessional Bible study contexts or an entry-level textbook in undergraduate courses on biblical interpretation." (Martin W. Mittelstadt, Religious Studies Review 39, no. 2, June 2013)
"Written in engaging prose, Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes is a must-have for students of the Bible, and especially students of biblical apologetics. Any seasoned traveler knows that when someone visits a foreign country for the first time, he or she will be well served by a competent guide. When it comes to the social world of the Bible, Richards and O'Brien serve as tour guides par excellence." (James Patrick Holding, Christian Research Journal 36, no. 5)
"For many, [this] book will offer a dose of humility with hope. One is encouraged to admit, 'I don't know' while at the same time is spurred on to study the Bible more. Missionaries will be challenged to think more theologically and to listen respectfully to nationals who live around them. Theologians will be forced to consider how the adage 'context is king' applies to their own worldview. This is a perfect book to discuss within small groups at church or as teams on the mission field." (Jackson Wu, Evangelical Missions Quarterly, July 2013)
"This is an outstanding treatment of a complex and important topic. . . . This would make a good textbook for courses in hermeneutics or biblical interpretation, cultural studies, prolegomena, or theological method, as well as small-group studies in a local church. The book is written at a level that educated laypeople as well as pastors, teachers, and scholars will find helpful." (Glenn Rl. Kreider, Bibliotheca Sacra, October–December 2013)
"A politely confrontational book that bids you trade in your cultural spectacles and rethink how your worldview distorts your scriptural conclusions. Sex, money, food, self-focus, prejudices, and much more: developed with apt storytelling and enlightening examples." (Worship Leader Magazine, May 2013)
"A fascinating guide for any serious Bible reader! Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes reveals the 'habits of the mind' that might blind us to the Bible's intended message. Richards and O'Brien unpack the intricacies and nuances of cultural communication to help people better understand the Bible. To help you know--and live--the Christian life more faithfully." (Nikki Toyama-Szeto, Urbana program director, coauthor of Partnering with the Global Church)
"Richards and O'Brien open our eyes to the crosscultural nature of the Bible. Their book is a helpful resource in understanding Scripture on its own terms, without imposing our assumptions on the biblical authors and their first readers." (Lindsay Olesberg, author, The Bible Study Handbook, and senior associate for Scripture engagement, Lausanne Movement)
"The authors of Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes make a convincing case that those who trust in the Bible should (for biblical reasons) be more self-conscious about themselves. Their demonstration of how unself-conscious mores influence the understanding of Scripture is as helpful as the many insights they draw from Scripture itself. This is a good book for better understanding ourselves, the Christian world as it now exists and the Bible." (Mark A. Noll, Francis A. McAnaney Professor of History, University of Notre Dame, coauthor, Clouds of Witnesses: Christian Voices from Africa and Asia)
"Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes is an important book that comes along at a critical moment in global evangelical history. Helpful examples reveal our cultural tendencies and biases that could hinder a deeper reading of Scripture. The authors help us to recognize our blind spots and offer insight that honors the intention of Scripture to be read in the context of community. I am grateful to the authors for their effort to be self-reflective and engage in a critical examination of our engagement with Scripture from within Western culture." (Soong-Chan Rah, Milton B. Engebretson Associate Professor of Church Growth and Evangelism at North Park Theological Seminary, author of The Next Evangelicalism: Freeing the Church from Western Cultural Captivity)
"This is a revolutionary book for evangelical Bible-believers. If its readers end the book motivated to ask the questions it invites and even inspired to identify other possible misreadings because of Western cultural blinders that have not been discussed, they will be more ready to live out the kind of biblically faithful, Christ-honoring and God-fearing lives that they desire to and that the world needs." (Amos Yong, J. Rodman Williams Professor of Theology, Regent University School of Divinity, Virginia)
"Randy Richards and Brandon O'Brien have written a useful and enjoyable book, which makes excellent use of good stories to illustrate the points they make. The reader will leave the book with plenty of challenging questions to ask about approaches to Scripture. Interesting, thoughtful, and user-friendly." (Philip Jenkins, distinguished professor of history, co-director for the program on historical studies of religion, Institute for Studies of Religion, Baylor University, author of The Next Christendom)
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Most helpful customer reviews
67 of 69 people found the following review helpful.
Change Your Glasses
By Nick Peters
Everywhere you go, people are the same. Right? Oh there are some basic differences of course, but if you cut any of us, we bleed. Mankind really hasn't changed that much in all the years we've been around. When we read Aristotle or Cicero or Moses, we are reading someone was pretty similar to us and had the exact same struggles we do. We can regularly see it in their own writings can't we?
Or, maybe we don't. We just think we do.
Misreading Scripture With Western Eyes (MSWWE from now on) is a book that helps to expose us to the fact that people are not like us. The authors, E. Randolph Richards and Brandon O'Brien, show numerous examples of the way our culture misreads the Bible based on our Western presuppositions and that people in other cultures are quite different. This can be shown to be the case in Biblical times, but also in modern times as Richards has several examples in his book from his missionary service in Indonesia.
For instance, if you had an affair, would you feel guilty? Here in the West, you would. In Indonesia, there would be no guilt until everyone else said you did something wrong. What time does that church event start? Here, you could say "Mid-day" and most people would be there at Noon. There, you'd say "Mid-day" and most people would show up when it started to get hot. If you say "All people serving in the church must be eighteen", here it'd be a strict rule. Over there, there would be exceptions.
Much of this seems foreign to our experience, and for good reason. It is. One of the greatest signs of this is our intense individualism where we think everything has to be about us. There is even a chapter in the book on how people take a passage like Jeremiah 29:11 and make it to be about God having a personal plan for them. Somehow, all those Israelites that died during the attack of Nebuchadnezzar missed that.
The authors also bring out important realities of the system that was around then and is still around in most countries today, such as the honor/shame system and the patron/client system. Consider the story of David and Bathsheba. That is a story we all learn something from, but when it is read through the lens of honor and shame, all of a sudden several new facets of the story show up that the Western reader would not notice.
What does this mean? It means that there's further reason to drop this nonsense idea that so many have that all we need is to just have the Bible. Now of course, the Bible contains all that is necessary for faith and practice, but if you want to know all that it contains, you will have to study it well, and for many people, that is anathema, and is in fact part of the individualism that we have today. If God wants ME to get something out of the Bible, He will make it plain to ME.
When speaking about the patron/client model then, we actually make it seem like the problem is that God isn't doing what He's supposed to be doing. If an atheist wishes to discuss the problem of divine hiddenness, it's always that God is hiding Himself, instead of realizing that maybe God has revealed Himself and we are the ones hiding from Him. Skeptics today make the most outlandish claims about what they think God is required to do, such as a cross on the moon or everyone having the same dream at the same time, not aware that all of these are actions that would require further explanation through the social context of each culture.
The ideas that could be embraced if we would but study are monumental. How much different will you approach a text like Romans 8:28 if you realize that God is your patron working all things for good. Now I do have a small disagreement with the authors. I do think God does work all things for individual good. The caveat I would add is that some of that might not happen until in what I call, the after-death. Many people will die with suffering on them that I think God will redeem in eternity. I do agree with their collectivist approach and would contend that all those God will work the good for are Israel. The true Israel is really Jesus Christ and all who are "in Him" are in Israel. (I would even contend at this point that Romans could be about identifying who Israel is.)
I am not really including quotes on this because I find quotes to be inadequate for this one. There are such large pieces of thought that you need the whole context to see them all. I think the reader not familiar with the social context will learn something from every chapter, and I think many of us who already are will have our insights greatly expanded by reading this book.
The authors also do not resolve many of the difficulties. They present the scenario and they leave it to you and I to work out the difficulties in our own reading of Scripture and try to learn to read with new eyes. The authors also give points to ponder at the end to show how we can avoid doing what we've been doing. What questions can we start bringing to the text that will help us understand it?
Also, the authors do present points of application for us to consider, which can also make this book an excellent choice for small groups at churches. (All churches could be greatly benefited by having a small group that is based around this book.) The authors don't want to make this just a detached scholarly work, but they want it to be one that will engage us and force us to come to the text and see if we have been projecting our own culture on to it.
Many works in this field have been extremely scholarly, and I applaud those, but I am thankful now that when someone asks me one book I can recommend on the topic, I will not have to hesitate. MSWWE is on the top of the list!
In Christ,
Nick Peters
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful.
A must-have for your personal library!
By H. Kittleman
I couldn't be happier that I found this book. I've wanted to find a book that would explain the cultural context of the scriptures, and this book does that plus it explains what views we have that "go without saying" in our western culture. It does site examples of scriptures that are commonly misread because of our western assumptions and what's not explained in the scriptures because of the authors' eastern assumptions, but it's not a complete commentary - its main focus is to educate and inform so that we westerners can read the scriptures with an awareness of our unconscious assumptions and also to realize that when there's something in the Bible that doesn't make sense to us, it's probably because we're missing a key understanding of the cultural context.
The other great thing is that the authors' writing style is very easy to read. I find myself looking forward to reading this and making time to read a few pages as I can, and sometimes reading more than I intended. This is definitely a book worth keeping and reading more than once.
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful.
A complicated issue explained in easy-to-understand terms
By Nicole K
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.
See all 257 customer reviews...
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