Biblical texts do not mean, but we mean with the texts. No interpretation is neutral. All readings are contextual to a different degree. Our task is not to make a perfect or complete meaning but to engage with them critically. No meaning is everlasting or fixed forever.
Given this nature of contextual interpretation, we need to know who we are as readers, what we read in the text, and how we read it. So when we talk about meaning in front of the text, we must recognize all these three elements—reader, reading lens, and text. I wrote this view of interpretation in my book, Biblical Interpretation: Theory, Process, and Criteria (Pickwick, 2013).
With these in mind, we can engage with biblical texts and focus on liberation or social transformation. For example, we can read the Exodus story as a model of liberation for the oppressed. So much of this reading goes well with Jesus’s teaching and ministry for the marginalized and oppressed. Black theology, or liberation theology in general, goes on in this direction. But there is another story we must read alongside it: How can we read Joshua’s conquest narrative of Canaanites? How come Israelites who once were oppressed could become oppressors? Do all Canaanites and animals deserve death? There were some innocent people, children, and babies. Is the God of liberation merely a tribal God for Jews?
Compare this view of God with Paul’s understanding that God is the God of Jews and the God of Gentiles also (Rom 3:29). Ultimately, the question is: How do we understand God in the Bible? Whose God or what kind of God do we read? Essentially, the reader must decide. The bottom line is that the true God is more than what the Bible says or goes beyond it. We, the readers, must engage with various texts responsibly and take a stand.
Think about Matthew 15:21-28. Jesus forcefully denies the Canaanite woman’s request for her daughter’s healing. Not one time but three times with a Jew-first mission or Jewish exclusivism. He said: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” and “It is not fair to throw the children’s food to the dogs.” His saying is wrong or ethically problematic even though he finally allows for her request because of her faith. He represents a perspective of imperialism or triumphalism. At the end of the story, he reverses his view and praises her faith. This story is not merely about the woman’s great faith, which needs explaining, but about the narrow vision of the mission of Jesus and his disciples. The readers must investigate the historical context of Matthew’s Gospel and the historical Jesus’s time and his ministry. They must see the power dynamics in the story, conflicting ideology, and matters of race, gender, class, economics, religion, and culture. By the way, all people in this story need transformation, including Jesus.
The typical reading of this story emphasizes the woman’s faith, especially “submissive, docile faith.” But this kind of obedient, tractable faith condones injustices and evil acts. What bothers me most is not so much the lack of faith as the lack of justice. The woman needs justice! Justice for healing. Justice for family and community. She asked for it through her faith in God. She believed Jesus, the Son of God, was supposed to advocate for the marginalized (italics for emphasis).
The lesson is how we stand on God’s side, not merely having God by our side. Apostle Paul is helpful here, as he presents his radical view of God and politics in 1 Cor 1:27-29: “But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to abolish things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God” (1 Cor 1:27-29).
Liberation movement or social transformation must address all kinds of marginalization, locally and globally, economically and socially, religiously and politically, personally and communally, psychologically and spiritually. Readers of texts must recognize multilayered, intersectionality-woven marginality, stand in front of the text, and witness the power of the gospel in our world today.
