Bird's Eye View of the Bible

What You Should Know about ULTIMATE REALITY

BIRD'S EYE
VIEW OF THE
BIBLE

1. The Bible is an ancient library, an old collection of 73 Ancient Near Eastern writings.
2. Not everyone easily understands what the “books” of the Bible teach (2 Peter 3:15-16).
3. It is very important to understand the Bible since God speaks to us through the Bible.
4. God guided the Church to collect carefully ONLY the right “books” but ALL of them.
5. This official Catholic Church collection is called the true CANON of Sacred Scripture.
6. The contents of each “book” were divine from the very first moment of its existence.
7. The Church measures all religious writings by the Faith that comes to us from the Apostles.
8. A Christian group must know its faith before it knows which "books" belong in the Bible.
9. As God's Holy Word, the Bible has many useful and noble purposes (2 Timothy 3:16).
10. Whatever the biblical writers do assert is asserted by God for the sake of our salvation.
11. Whatever the Scriptures do assert for the sake of our salvation is totally without error.
12. The Bible's teachings meant for today are God's Word for all of His people to obey!
13. There can be no higher authority on this earth than the authority of God's teachings.
14. All of God's teachings meant for today have been kept alive for us by the Holy Spirit.
15. The process of their having been handed down to us is called SACRED TRADITION.
16. The true COPYING of the Scriptures from hand to hand is one form of this Tradition.
17. Many of the biblical teachings were proclaimed orally before they were written down.
18. Often the CONTENTS of the Scriptures are this Tradition in its most stabilized form.
19. Every assertion contained in every biblical “book” is inspired by the same Holy Spirit.
20. The divine production of each and every portion of the Bible is called INSPIRATION.
21. The divine teachings within certain parts of the Scriptures are called REVELATION.
22. Everything in the Bible is inspired, but not everything in it has been revealed by God.
23. All of the writings of the Bible can rightly claim a divine origin as well as a human one.
24. Over many years, many human beings, almost all Jewish males, wrote these writings.
25. Later other Israelites and Gentiles played a part in collecting them all into one volume.
26. The 46 “books” written before Jesus’ death are usually called the OLD TESTAMENT.
27. The 27 “books” written after Jesus’ death are usually called the NEW TESTAMENT.
28. The Old Testament prepared God’s people for the Savior, Jesus Christ (John 3:14-16).
29. The New Testament proclaims the Good News of the Savior’s presence and teachings.
30. The holy words of Jesus Christ in our hearts should enrich our lives (Colossians 3:16).
31. PROPER BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION REQUIRES KNOWLEDGE AND SKILL.
32. To interpret the Bible well, we must know its world, its writings and the worth of facts.
33. Today a modern American cannot understand the Scriptures without studying them.
34. He or she cannot study these “books” without knowing how to read them properly.
35. To become skilled in reading the Holy Scriptures properly, we must first READ them!
36. Different expressions of truth lend themselves to different types of communication.
37. Like the modern world, the Ancient Near East developed many ways of sharing truth.
38. The Holy Scriptures contain many different types of ancient literature in their pages.
39. These varying types of literature are commonly called LITERARY FORMS, or genres.
40. Words are signs made of one or more letters with surrounding indicators of meaning.
41. These surrounding indicators of meaning are often called a text’s proper CONTEXT.
42. The basic meaning of a text is whatever the human author(s) intended by its words.
43. This meaning is called the LITERAL-HISTORICAL or LITERAL meaning of a text.
44. It follows from this that every intended figurative meaning is a kind of literal meaning.
45. The three SPIRITUAL meanings of the Bible extend in a natural way the literal one.
46. These go beyond what human agents of God's Word intended to something He intends.
47. An ALLEGORICAL meaning of a Bible text is its divinely-intended symbolic meaning.
48. A MORAL meaning of a Bible text extends the literal into the realm of personal living.
49. An ESCHATOLOGICAL meaning of a Scriptural text is its teaching about the future.
50. A TEXT “understood” without its proper CONTEXT often serves someone’s PRETEXT.