On the Difficulty of Paradigm Shifts (Part 2: A Modernistic Bible)
The biggest challenge in any paradigm shift is getting one’s mind to accept the fundamental reorientation. For instance, relativity theory in modern physics invited people to consider that some of their basic, intuitive perceptions of the world were not correct. For both scientists and the larger society the transition was difficult.
In the Bible reading world, change is also hard. The chapter and verse system (c&v) has been comprehensively applied and is deeply ingrained. By now our use of it is second nature, reflexive. It has become more than the way we see the Bible—it has become part of the Bible itself for many of us.
Losing it can seem unimaginable. Or, perhaps it can seem imaginable only in part. Some folks have said to me, “Reading without c&v is OK, I can see that. But studying the Bible without it? I can’t see how.” It is exetremely interesting that we seem to believe that we can study the Bible without reading it. But this is what the additives have led to.
One essential element in paradigm shifts is coming to see that the old paradigm is deficient. Openness to new paradigms comes from acknowledging the limitations and even failures of the previous way of seeing things.
I have already mentioned all the specific problems with c&v (see the Why Would You Do That? blog from June 26, 2007). In many ways, a c&v Bible is a modernistic Bible. It is not an accident that the c&v imposition historically came along with the rise of modernism. It is a systematician’s dream. In speaking of the rationalistic character of modern culture in another context, Eviatar Zerubavel has written that it is “precise, punctual, calculable, standard, bureaucratic, rigid, invariant, finely coordinated, and routine.” A modernistic emphasis on the measurable leads directly to a sense of control and manipulation.
Isn’t this realistically what we’ve done with the Scriptures? A modernistic Bible is a Bible we can handle. We can navigate it quickly and powerfully through an in-depth system of shortcuts and time-savers. We can find the little pieces we want and move on. And so this immense, mysterious, living book of books becomes bite-sized and manageable.
But the downside to this control we think we’ve gained over the Bible is real. The damage is significant. We have lost touch with the books, letters and songs that the biblical authors have actually written. It is our little systems that we know more than the Bible itself.
It is time to emancipate ourselves from this mental slavery. There is another way. We do not have to rely on chapters and verses. The biblical authors themselves didn’t need them. The church has done without them for most of its history.
This paradigm shift is not easy and it will not happen overnight. But it can be done. The next time you read a passage from the Bible, take a minute and imagine how you might refer to it without a chapter and verse reference. How might you tell someone else what and where you’re reading? How and where does that passage fit into its immediately larger context? What would a natural, organic reference to it be?
Free your mind.
-Glenn
In the Bible reading world, change is also hard. The chapter and verse system (c&v) has been comprehensively applied and is deeply ingrained. By now our use of it is second nature, reflexive. It has become more than the way we see the Bible—it has become part of the Bible itself for many of us.
Losing it can seem unimaginable. Or, perhaps it can seem imaginable only in part. Some folks have said to me, “Reading without c&v is OK, I can see that. But studying the Bible without it? I can’t see how.” It is exetremely interesting that we seem to believe that we can study the Bible without reading it. But this is what the additives have led to.
One essential element in paradigm shifts is coming to see that the old paradigm is deficient. Openness to new paradigms comes from acknowledging the limitations and even failures of the previous way of seeing things.
I have already mentioned all the specific problems with c&v (see the Why Would You Do That? blog from June 26, 2007). In many ways, a c&v Bible is a modernistic Bible. It is not an accident that the c&v imposition historically came along with the rise of modernism. It is a systematician’s dream. In speaking of the rationalistic character of modern culture in another context, Eviatar Zerubavel has written that it is “precise, punctual, calculable, standard, bureaucratic, rigid, invariant, finely coordinated, and routine.” A modernistic emphasis on the measurable leads directly to a sense of control and manipulation.
Isn’t this realistically what we’ve done with the Scriptures? A modernistic Bible is a Bible we can handle. We can navigate it quickly and powerfully through an in-depth system of shortcuts and time-savers. We can find the little pieces we want and move on. And so this immense, mysterious, living book of books becomes bite-sized and manageable.
But the downside to this control we think we’ve gained over the Bible is real. The damage is significant. We have lost touch with the books, letters and songs that the biblical authors have actually written. It is our little systems that we know more than the Bible itself.
It is time to emancipate ourselves from this mental slavery. There is another way. We do not have to rely on chapters and verses. The biblical authors themselves didn’t need them. The church has done without them for most of its history.
This paradigm shift is not easy and it will not happen overnight. But it can be done. The next time you read a passage from the Bible, take a minute and imagine how you might refer to it without a chapter and verse reference. How might you tell someone else what and where you’re reading? How and where does that passage fit into its immediately larger context? What would a natural, organic reference to it be?
Free your mind.
-Glenn
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