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Biblical Interpretation

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Interpretation presents many challenges that can be difficult to overcome. There seems to be more challenges that arise when interpreting the Bible. Interpreters face many challenges and the validity of their methods are sometimes questioned. Although there are challenges to effective biblical interpretation such as distance of time and geographical location, difference in culture and language, and human pre-understanding and presupposition, these challenges can be overcomed. The challenge of distance of both time and geographical location is a major issue when one is interpreting the Bible. The larger of these two is time. The Bible was written centuries ago when everything was different; even the land and cities looked different when compared to modern day. It is impossible to travel back in time and see what is depicted in the Bible or to talked to the author to clarify confusion about particular texts. Research from Archaeological digs and manuscripts will provide a glimpse into the world of the Bible that seems to be lost, but it will still only be a glimpse …show more content…

There is not always an exact translation from language to language nor is the grammatical structure the exact same. Combined these two challenges and one gets a complicated puzzle that requires time and deep knowledge to crack. It makes it especially difficult that that languages over the years develop and change and since the text of the Bible is ancient it makes the task of interpreting that much harder. There are also words that will not translate over so the translator has to find a substitute for the word that will lack the depth and meaning of the original. Despite the challenges that the difference in language creates it is still possible to translate the Bible and worth the effort. Those who are not fortunate to know the original language have resources to do word studies to better understand the meaning of the

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