Knowledge of the Biblical Languages
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There are, perhaps, two main dangers facing followers of the Messianic
faith today. The first is the temptation to throw out all things
"Christian" as utterly corrupt and tarnished; the second is the
temptation to embrace all things "Jewish" as enlightened and pure.
But there is a third danger of which we need to be aware---the
possibility and, indeed, the likelihood of an unconscious embracing of
dubious values and attitudes which we have inherited from our
Christian (or, for that matter, Jewish) background.
The inherited Christian attitude which concerns us here is the one
concerning the biblical languages, the one which tells us that
ordinary folk like us have no business learning anything of the
original languages of the Bible, because this should be and must be
left to the "experts", the priests, ministers, and gatekeepers of the
truth who tell us what the Bible says, because it is too dangerous to
let the common folk acquire any of this knowledge for themselves,
/even if their intellectual abilities would allow such a thing/.
Note that you will surely never find this printed in the creedal
statements of any church. That is not the point. The unspoken value
and attitude is nevertheless present.
The statement by Pratico and Van Pelt is quoted above to demonstrate
this attitude within the wider Christian culture. There is nothing
"wrong" in what they say, yet it does betray the kind of attitude I
have just described, the attitude whereby the special elect are, by
and large, the only ones expected to have any type of systematic
knowledge of the biblical languages. Furthermore, and most
importantly, we have /internalised/ these values, so that we
/ourselves/ do not believe we can or should know anything of the
languages of the Bible, and tellingly, /we have no desire/ to acquire
this knowledge.
But as Messianics, we know better than most that we cannot and should
not rely on any elite to tell us what Scripture says, because this is
the same as telling us /what to believe/. As Messianics, we know that
key portions of Scripture have been systematically misinterpreted and
/mistranslated/. Even the original text of Scripture has not been
entirely immune from deliberate corruption by Church scribes who did
not want the Scripture to say what it says.
In the face of this, it is obvious that we cannot blindly rely on
"experts" to tell us what Scripture says, as if our translations are
error free and entirely reliable. The idea that only an elite has
access to the Bible in its original languages is one that comes
directly from the Catholic Church, which has always jealously guarded
its authority and power over the ignorant.
We must therefore take some responsibility for our own knowledge of
what Scripture says, to the extent we are able. Very few of us are
incapable of learning anything about the biblical languages, and many
of us have the ability to acquire a considerable level of expertise.
It is absolutely not the case that one needs to have some "special"
ability or gift with languages: that is just a lie we tell ourselves
because of our having been conditioned into internalising these
harmful cultural values that result in our continued ignorance over
time and over generations.
Be warned: the high priesthood will tell you, sooner or later, that,
"a little knowledge is a dangerous thing." You need to know that that
is a simple lie. A little knowledge certainly /can/ be a dangerous
thing when used /foolishly/. If you know the limits of your knowledge,
lean on the Spirit, and wisely avoid dogmatism and closing one's mind
on points about which you are not sure, then all will be well. The
rest falls under the banner of minor mistakes, which we all make and
which are part of life for all of us who do not wish to remain
ignorant.
