How Jesus Read the Bible

Jesus had a Bible: the Law of Moses, the prophets and the Psalms. He heard them read aloud every Sabbath and quoted them constantly. So it is fair to ask how he read them. Did every line carry the same weight, or did he have a key?

This lesson shows how Jesus read the rest of Scripture, so we can read it the same way. Be ready: he read it very differently from the way many of us were taught. Being Centered means reading your Bible the way he read his.

Read it3 min

In his hometown synagogue, Jesus was handed the scroll of Isaiah. He chose the passage himself.

He was asked which commandment in the whole Law was the greatest. His answer gave a key to all of it.

When the religious leaders objected to him eating with tax collectors, he sent them back to their own Bible with an assignment.

In the Sermon on the Mount, he quoted the Law six times and went deeper each time. Here are two of them.

The world behind the words4 min

In Jesus' day, the question of how to read the Scriptures was alive and argued over. Teachers debated which commandments mattered most, and how to apply ancient laws to new situations. The Pharisees, often pictured as villains, were serious, devout readers who wanted every part of life to honor God. Jesus argued with them precisely because they cared so much about the same Scriptures he did.

Notice what Jesus did with the Law in the Sermon on the Mount. He began, "Don't think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I didn't come to destroy, but to fulfill" Matthew 5:17. Then, six times, he quoted a command and took it further. "You shall not murder" became a warning about anger. "An eye for an eye," a law first given to limit revenge Exodus 21:24, became "turn to him the other also." "Love your neighbor" became "love your enemies."

He did not read the Law as a list of rules to be applied one at a time. He read it for its purpose. When his disciples were criticized for picking grain on the Sabbath, he pointed to David, who once ate the holy bread of the Tabernacle when he was hungry, and he quoted the prophet Hosea a second time.

In Mark, he put it in one sentence: "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" Mark 2:27.

He did the same with divorce. When the Pharisees pointed to the law of Moses that allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce Deuteronomy 24:1, Jesus did not deny that Moses wrote it. He explained why.

"For your hardness of heart." Jesus read even the words of Moses by asking what God intended "from the beginning," and he treated some laws as concessions to human weakness.

Look again at what he read in Nazareth. Isaiah's sentence ends: "to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor and the day of vengeance of our God" Isaiah 61:2. Jesus stopped reading in the middle of that sentence. He proclaimed the year of the Lord's favor, closed the scroll and sat down. He left the vengeance unread.

How it drifted5 min

Jesus was not the only teacher of his time to sum up Scripture this way. The Talmud tells a story about Hillel, one of the most respected rabbis of the generation before Jesus. A man came to him and asked to be taught the whole Torah while standing on one foot.

Jesus said something very close: "Whatever you desire for men to do to you, you shall also do to them; for this is the law and the prophets" Matthew 7:12. Both teachers read the Scriptures with a center. Over the centuries, Christians often lost theirs, and the history runs in three stages.

Hidden meanings. Around 230, the brilliant scholar Origen of Alexandria taught that Scripture has layers, like a person has a body, a soul and a spirit: a literal sense, a moral sense and a spiritual one. Medieval teachers expanded this into four senses and taught it with a rhyme. Allegory produced beautiful readings, but it also meant almost any verse could be made to mean almost anything.

Single verses as weapons. Around 408, Augustine of Hippo defended using imperial force against a rival Christian group, the Donatists. One of the verses he leaned on was a line from a parable of Jesus about a banquet: "compel them to come in" Luke 14:23. A sentence about a host filling his dinner table became a justification for coercion. Later centuries used the same verse the same way.

A flat Bible. The Reformers of the 1500s rejected allegory run wild and taught that "Scripture interprets Scripture": clear passages should explain unclear ones. Luther went further and gave a test for the whole Bible.

In the modern era, many churches came to treat the Bible as a single, level collection of true statements. In 1978, more than two hundred evangelical leaders signed the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, which affirms that Scripture is without error in all that it teaches. The statement itself asks readers to pay attention to each passage's literary form and to let Scripture interpret Scripture. But in popular use, the idea that every verse is equally true often slid into the idea that every verse is equally weighty, so that a line from Leviticus and a teaching of Jesus could be quoted as if they settled a question in the same way.

Honest objections3 min

"Jesus said he didn't come to abolish the Law. You can't pick and choose." He did say that, and this lesson takes it seriously. But read the rest of the chapter: he "fulfills" the Law by going to its heart, not by applying each line the same way. He set aside the letter of the Sabbath for the sake of a hungry man and a sick one, and he treated the divorce law as a concession "for your hardness of heart." To read the way Jesus read is to follow his choices.

"All of the Bible is God's word, so all of it has equal authority." Many Christians believe the whole Bible is inspired, and this book does not ask anyone to stop. But even the Bible's own writers ranked its parts. Jesus named the greatest commandment and said the rest "depend on" it. He told the religious leaders to "go and learn" what "I desire mercy, and not sacrifice" means, putting one line from Hosea above the whole system of sacrifices. If Jesus weighed Scripture, then weighing it is not disrespect.

Measured against the center2 min

Measured against the center, the flat Bible does not hold. Jesus named the greatest commandment and said the rest depends on it. He sent experts back to learn "I desire mercy." He set aside the letter of the Sabbath for hungry and sick people, called a law of Moses a concession to hard hearts, and closed the scroll before the day of vengeance. A way of reading that lets any verse settle any question is not his way.

This may be hard news if you were taught that "the Bible says it, and that settles it." It does not mean the rest of Scripture is worthless. It means Jesus is the lens. Following him here means asking of every passage what he asked: what is this for, and does it hang on love?

A keeper1 min

When a rule and a person collide, choose the person. Jesus said it about the Sabbath, the most sacred rule of his day.

Rules exist for people, not the other way around. "I desire mercy, and not sacrifice" works as a test in any setting: a workplace policy, a family rule, a church tradition. If keeping the rule means hurting the person it was meant to protect, mercy wins.

For you as a believer, this is how Jesus read your Bible. Read it the same way, and let mercy have the last word over any verse that seems to deny it.

Reflect2 min

1. When you read a hard passage in the Bible, what question do you usually ask about it?
2. Is there a verse you have heard used to hurt someone? What would Jesus' "I desire mercy" do to that use of it?
3. Jesus stopped reading Isaiah before "the day of vengeance." Which parts of Scripture do you dwell on, and which do you skip past?

Take your time with each one. There is space to write your answers in the book and the PDF.

Practice this week1 min

This week, whenever you read or hear a Bible verse, from a sermon, a post or a sign, ask two questions: "Does this hang on love of God and love of neighbor?" and "How did Jesus read passages like this?" Write down one verse where the answer surprised you.

Talk it over1 min

• What would change if you read every passage through Matthew 22:40 (Follow Me §16)?
• Why do you think Jesus stopped reading before "the day of vengeance"?
• Can you think of a verse you've heard used the way Augustine used "compel them to come in"?

A quiet moment1 min

Remember it

"Go and learn what this means: I desire mercy." Matthew 9:13. Jesus gave the religious experts homework, and the homework was one line from Hosea.

A lens over the center: a clear circle laid over the center, with loose strips scattered all around it. Read everything through him.

1. What did Jesus say the whole law and the prophets depend on?
   Loving God and loving your neighbor (Matthew 22:37-40).
2. What line did Jesus leave out when he read Isaiah in Nazareth?
   "The day of vengeance of our God" (Isaiah 61:2).
3. What was Luther's test for every book of the Bible?
   Whether it preaches Christ.

Show the answers