Bible Study 101

We Are One Body

Brief explanation of why we read the Bible

The Word of God contains no lie and is the purpose for our Salvation. We read scripture to know about Christ and how He saves us; it is without fault. The more we know about Christ, the more we know about ourselves.

St. Jerome said, "Ignorance of Scropture is Ignorance of Christ."

Reliability & Authority of Sources

"All scripture is inspired by God," St. Paul said. Scripture is written by God, in and through the Church. Human hands merely physically wrote it. There are many human persons in God's hands revealing H is glory. The human writers are instrumental authors.

There is one goal of the Bible: to reveal God and His salvation.

Accomodation

Condescention- lowering the Truth to make it understandable
Elevation- taking human basic words and making something glorious

Dogma

Dogma is Truth not known by human sources but revealed by God. It is interpretations of Scripture. Defined dogmas of our faith encapsulate the Church's infalliable interpretation of Scripture. Theology is a further reflection upon that work.

Three Spiritual Senses

allegorical
moral/spiritual
anagogical

The ways to look at Scripture are:

literal
poetical
spiritual

We don't take things literally that are written poetically. We need both literal and spiritual senses to get the most out of Scripture. The Church's dogmas are not something added to scripture, but they are the Church's infalliable interpretation of scripture.

"The Gospel of Mark. It was written by Mark." ~Father Ray

One Body in Christ