We are now making a major shift in our journey with the text. OBSERVATION has two key elements. First, “seeing what is found in the biblical text?” The second role of Observation is reshaping the Book, Paragraph and Sentence level observations into the form of text-driven questions. Thus, Observation = What does the text say?”

Now we are embarking on the task of Interpretation. This in its simplest form is to use research tools to answer the questions raised in Observation. Thus, INTERPRETATION = “What did the text mean?” Yes, it's a historical endeavor where we try to enter the world of the original recipients and then to grasp the meaning of the text through an ancient worldview.

Outcomes

First, we will dig into the acronym CIE - Context is Everything. In this module we will explore three different contexts; (1) Literary, (2) Cultural and (3) Historical. Second, we will discover the world of word studies. No longer will you consult “Webster’s Dictionary.” For that resource is the meaning of an English word. From now on, you will be consulting Greek and Hebrew Lexicons (fancy name for dictionary).