I was reading C. Matthew McMahon's Retraction article today. One of the things mentioned was baptists read the bible by starting with the New Testament then reading the Old. I am wondering if anyone can maybe clarify some of this understanding the the Old Testament before the New. I ask because as a baptist it has been drilled into my head that the New Testament always interprets the Old.

Anyways I'm not sure Dr. McMahon posts on the PB very often anymore but can somebody provide me some insight into the hermenuetical differences here?

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Bryan Riddle
1689 London Baptist Confession
Bethel Baptist Church Owasso, Oklahoma

The NT does, indeed, interpret the OT. So your understanding of CMM's statement is not quite accurate, IMO.

What CMM is saying is that it is common today to focus on the NT as though it was basic, primary, fundamental stuff which you read FIRST, acquiring as thorough a connection to revelation as is required of anyone for excellence in apprehension; and then read the OT (as time or antiquarian interests permit) and filter everything through a grid created by a "pristine" NT-provided understanding.

But that's not the way a first century Apostle, or any believer back then would have read their (OT) Bible, especially prior to the inscripturation of NT revelation. They read and comprehended the OT as had generations previous; each new book and prophesy having for 1500 years added depth and insight.

So, the NT (as Jesus' Messianic teachings and Spirit taught and illuminated) elaborates, clarifies, and extends and completes OT revelation, at least as far as needed for this period of history. (The 2nd Coming is another revelatory event, and will bring its own divine Acts and interpretive Word.) So, what CMM is saying is: read the Bible from front to back. The latter parts will bring clarity and development to the former, and the former will add depth and richness to the latter.

Of course, one can read the Gospels, or Epistles with salvific profit, even without the fullness of revelation. But to think one has all he needs for comprehensive Scripture understanding (much less, teaching) in the NT alone is to adopt a stance that what the Apostle's and first Christians possessed as a theological inheritance was superfluous.

__________________
Rev. Bruce G. Buchanan
ChainOLakes Presbyterian Church, CentralLake, MI


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