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"When they had rowed about five and twenty or thirty stadia they see Jesus walking
about over the sea (on the bank or shore, which is higher than the sea) and near the ship
(which kept near the shore)."
The explanation offered for the feeding of the 5,000 is that the disciples began to share
out the bread and fish, and so following their example the whole multitude shared round
what they had and all were satisfied! We need give no further notice of this system.
Closely allied with the naturalistic system is the Rationalist mode of interpretation,
which does not seek from the Scriptures its teaching but receives only that which squares
with some previously accepted philosophy. "An external standard is set up to which
Scripture must bend" (Davidson).
This description also applies to that system that selects its specimen texts and quietly
says nothing about others that may not support the special view advocated. In other
words "usage" is ignored".
(7) The Mythical System.
This system proceeds on the assumption that the histories and biographies of
Scriptures are not necessarily actual occurrences, but myths. In the Life of Jesus by
Strauss and by Weisse, 1838A.D., the mythical system is given full scope. The
genealogies of Christ given in Matthew and Luke merely indicate that there is a
connection between Judaism and the new message of salvation. Joseph is neither the real
father nor the step father of the Saviour, he symbolizes the relation of Judaism and
Christianity. The historic sense is entirely lost. In the words of Strauss, either "the
divine cannot have taken place in such a way, or that which has so taken place cannot
have been divine". The apostle Paul speaks of the teachers of the last days who:
"shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned into fables (myths)"
(II Tim. 4: 4).
(8) The Apologetic and Dogmatic System.
The objection to this system is that instead of approaching the Scriptures to discover
what they teach, it approaches Scripture to discover proofs for doctrine already
formulated and held. It is no justification of this system that many of the doctrines thus
supported turn out to be Scriptural; the doctrine may be right but the procedure is wrong.
We are not to ransack the Bible to find proof texts, but to humbly and earnestly give heed
to its own statements of truth and desire them all without reserve and without partiality;
Usage again!
(9) The Grammatico-historical System.
"Nearly all the treatises on hermeneutics", says Moses Stuart, "since the days of
Ernesti, have laid it down as a maxim which cannot be controverted, that the Bible is to
be interpreted in the same manner, that is, by the same principle, as all other books . . . . .
these principles are coeval with nature . . . . . the person addressed has always been an