Interpretation Allows for Change

In On Christian Teaching, Augustine demonstrates how flexible religion can be, even with a seemingly inflexible body of written word and law. In Augustine's view, Scripture can be interpreted either literally or figuratively, and figurative interpretation comes into play when the literal meaning of the passage doesn't fit with the theme of God's love (80). What he means by this is that some passages, mostly in the Old Testament, seem to encourage violence or other "bad" things, and only by interpreting them figuratively is he able to make sense of them according to what he sees as the basic message of the Bible. For example, he uses Jeremiah 1:10, "Behold today I have established you over nations and kingdoms, to uproot and destroy, to lay waste and scatter," to say that the literal uprooting and destroying, etc., only applies to kingdoms of sin, not real kingdoms. In this way, God isn't seen as violent only toward sin and not toward other people or kingdoms; therefore, his goodness and love is upheld (76-77). The fact that Augustine can, in effect, pick and choose which passages from the Bible to believe while still affirming the truth of the whole Bible, shows quite clearly that the use of metaphor or allegory--like we discussed before--makes it easy to change some aspects of a religious belief while retaining the basic form and name of the religion itself.

Augustine goes on to say that commands in the Bible must be interpreted also according to historical and cultural context, explaining that the more important aspect in an action is the motive, not the act itself. Therefore, if one follows the motive of the people in the Bible, the outcome in the current culture may be completely different than what the Bible describes (81-82). Again, Augustine is using his method of interpretation to change the literal meaning of Scriptural passages to fit what he wants it to mean. If he didn't use this method of contextual reference, he would have to find some other way to explain why he and other members of his culture did not follow every single law of the Hebrews. This ability to change laws' application is very useful for religions, because it doesn't devalue the whole religion just because certain laws aren't followed anymore. Similarly, Augustine discusses symbolic language in Scripture and describes how words sometimes have very different meanings in different passages and contexts. This further supports his tendency to allow Scripture's meanings to change. However, when he uses other passages to determine those meanings (like he recommends), I believe he is actually doing what he says he's doing--restoring the intended meaning to the passages(86-87).

While his intentions are to bring out the true and intended meaning of Scripture, Augustine is actually imposing his own opinions on the text. I personally support most of his reasoning behind the methods he uses, but I do realize that what he concludes is probably often not what was intended by the passages because he takes such a subjective instead of objective view of them.