How would you define "foolish mistakes"? Is that a reference to people whose theology doesn't agree with yours? Most of what you or I might consider to be "foolish mistakes" were made by people who were trying to create "systematic theology". Even if a person were to lay aside every Bible commentary and read first the Gospels, then the Epistles, then the Psalms and then the rest of the Bible, he would understand the Bible differently than if he begins in Genesis and reads the books in the order in which they occur in the King James translation. Most people are influenced by what they have heard you or me or somebody else say about the meaning of scripture and then, as they read the Bible, are "influenced" in the sense of trying to get everything they read to fit with what they have been taught. Some of those assumptions have been around for more than a thousand years. Some people have been taught (or have assumed) that the Christian church is the true continuation of Israel. Others have been taught (or have assumed) that the Christian church replaced Israel as the object of the Lord's supreme regard. There are people who believe Jesus is the true Messiah but who, because of such assumptions, interpret the Bible very differently from each other. Then there is the question of methods. What method of interpretation do you use? The historicist method? The futurist method? Some other method? I like to study the history of theology, trying to trace ideas back as far as I can and trying to understand the context in which those ideas came to be taught as doctrines. I've only been doing that for about a half century so I have a lot more studying to do.
Lovely.
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How would you define "foolish mistakes"? Is that a reference to people whose theology doesn't agree with yours?
Most of what you or I might consider to be "foolish mistakes" were made by people who were trying to create "systematic theology".
Even if a person were to lay aside every Bible commentary and read first the Gospels, then the Epistles, then the Psalms and then the rest of the Bible, he would understand the Bible differently than if he begins in Genesis and reads the books in the order in which they occur in the King James translation.
Most people are influenced by what they have heard you or me or somebody else say about the meaning of scripture and then, as they read the Bible, are "influenced" in the sense of trying to get everything they read to fit with what they have been taught.
Some of those assumptions have been around for more than a thousand years. Some people have been taught (or have assumed) that the Christian church is the true continuation of Israel. Others have been taught (or have assumed) that the Christian church replaced Israel as the object of the Lord's supreme regard. There are people who believe Jesus is the true Messiah but who, because of such assumptions, interpret the Bible very differently from each other.
Then there is the question of methods. What method of interpretation do you use? The historicist method? The futurist method? Some other method?
I like to study the history of theology, trying to trace ideas back as far as I can and trying to understand the context in which those ideas came to be taught as doctrines. I've only been doing that for about a half century so I have a lot more studying to do.