Accepting Scripture 2 Timothy 3:16 and 1 Corinthians 2:12-13

Question:

These two verses came up when discussing traditional Christian views on the concrete and verbatim nature in which one should accept the Bible. Your thoughts, please!
2 TIMOTHY 3:16: "All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness."
 
1 CORINTHIANS 2:12-13: "Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit that is from God, so that we may understand the gifts bestowed on us by God. And we speak of these things in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual things to those who are spiritual."
 
 

Comment:

Let's look at these in reverse order from the way in which you list them, since 1 Corinthians was written earlier. And I don't think we can fully appreciate what Paul is saying in his first letter to the church in Corinth without adding verse 2:14: "Those who are unspiritual do not receive the gifts of God's Spirit, for they are foolishness to them, and they are unable to understand them because they are spiritually discerned."   Paul's central point in this passage relates strongly, I think, to Jesus' suggestion (in Matthew 7:6) that we not cast our "pearls before swine." There are those who are ready to hear and understand the universal spiritual principles that Jesus taught and demonstrated; they are “awake” to the spiritual dimension of life. Others are not. Yet. The people Jesus metaphorically refer to as “swine” Paul describes as “those who are unspiritual.” There is no condemnation involved; those people will continue their spiritual unfoldment as we continue ours (and we all experience “swine” consciousness at one point or another). The point that both teachers make is that it is a waste of energy to try to communicate spiritually with people who are not yet ready to “hear” at that level.   I'm not sure what that has to do with “accepting the Bible.” Remember, first, that to Paul there was no such thing as a Bible. There were the Jewish Scriptures, of course, but to Paul they were limited because Jesus Christ had broken through to a new dimension in our collective relationship to God. That new dimension had not yet been codified into the collection of writings that would become the New Testament—that would only happen more than two centuries later. So he could not possibly be telling Corinthians how to approach Scripture. They were living in a Greek city known for its commitment to the pleasures of life and to a number of “mystery religions.” I hear Paul simply telling them not to waste their time and energy trying to change people who are not ready to accept the change.   The passage from 2 Timothy comes later, from the very end of Paul's ministry. He is imprisoned in Rome, approaching death, and writing to his favorite student, offering a kind of spiritual legacy. By this time the idea of a “scripture” of the spiritual path of Jesus Christ is more prevalent, if unofficial. Paul's early letters are being circulated, and the oral traditions of the life and ministry of Jesus have begun to be written down into a variety of different Gospels. Paul's point here is clearly that these writings are helpful. They are “useful,” he writes.  They are “inspired by God.” That's not to say they are written by God, as many fundamentalists believe today. I hear Paul affirming what Unity has taught and believed for over a century: The Bible is a collection of inspired writings that can help us understand more about the spiritual journey that brings all of us, as spiritual beings, into human expression. It's also interesting to note that Paul's description of “scripture” is not necessarily limited to Jewish or Christian writings; whatever is "inspired by God" —that is, written by men as expressions of universal spiritual truth—can be helpful to our personal process.   Nothing here suggests that we allow Scripture to become more powerful than our own creative Oneness with our Source. Many people have made of Scripture precisely the kind of “false idol” that we are warned against in the First Commandment. Paul had no Christian Scripture to draw from, but I can't believe he would ever have been comfortable with the idea that any writings could be more important, more divine than the personal essence of Jesus' message—"Christ in you, the hope of glory" (Colossians 1:27).   Blessings!

Rev. Ed