T is for Theology, or the study of the nature of God and religious truth including rational inquiry into religious questions.

In Wikipedia, the first thing it says before diving into the explanation is, “Not to be confused with Religious studies.” Boy, now I really appreciate that.

You might have guessed this is where I’d be going today, however-when I opened the lesson today on How to Study the Bible, I did not realize what I’d be getting!

For one, it’s a two day -hour long each session, taught by a Jewish professor, who is hard at first to understand until you listen for a while.

Second, it’s not easy to follow, since I wasn’t planning on becoming a professor myself! In other words, I’ve bitten off way more than I can chew -at least in a couple of sittings. I could barely even take notes because it wasn’t clear-cut conversation the way I’m used to it being.

Now that isn’t to say I’m giving up, I just realize now the need for Bible study classes since interpreting the Bible with all of its symbols, chasms of time, doctrines, and literal vs symbolic meaning would take me years and a library of books to understand.

An interesting point the professor made today was how shelves of books that were written concerning the timing of The Rapture are now all out of date, because, quite simply, The Rapture is not a dateable event!

What I thought I’d be learning was more of a guide on how to read the Bible, not how to study it. And since I won’t be here ( at least in Texas) long enough to get involved in a real classroom setting, I will have to look for a way to do online study.

I think what would suit me more is something like a daily devotional along with related verses plus Bible study, which is much different than say, rising, saying a prayer, and trying to read a passage or a chapter from the Bible. After all, I’m not going to seminary or college, I just want to learn more about the Bible and a proper way to read/ study it.

David has a chronological Bible. Maybe that is more like what I’m looking for?

I will listen to the second hour tomorrow, because now that I’ve been introduced and rather enjoy the professor’s sense of humor, I’m going to follow through.

The four points I learned about today would take an entire new post just to try and explain. Simply put though, he talked about these four things:

The Golden Rule of Interpretation

The Law of Double Referance

The Law of Recurrence

The Law of Context

I’ve decided that studying the Bible is a lot like peeling an onion. There’s a lot of layers there!