Description
From back cover:
How often have you encountered some bizarre doctrine only to be stunned to hear a Bible verse quoted to support it? With new religious cults springing up almost daily and old ones growing rapidly, this is more and more common. How are they seemingly able to twist Scripture to mean something orthodox Christians have never believed it to mean in two thousand years? James Sire, author of The Universe Next Door and Naming the Elephant: Worldview as a Concept, has isolated twenty separate kinds of reading errors which are characteristically made by cultists as they interpret the Bible. He covers the full range from simple misquotation to complex argumentation which links one slightly eccentric interpretation to another, mixes in a few orthodox readings and ends with a conclusion totally foreign to the biblical world view. Sire also handles twisted translation, overspecification, virtue by association, ignoring the context and others. A book to help us all become better readers of the Scriptures.
Table of Contents
Chapter l The Methodology of Misreading: An Introduction
Attack on the Bible
A Methodology of Misreading
The Purpose of the Book
The Authority of Scripture
A Question of Tone
Cult: A Loaded Term
What the Doctor Ordered
Chapter 2 World-View Confusion: A Preliminary View
A Jesus for Everyone
World-View Confusion: Defined
Paul and Barnabas: Hermes and Zeus
Zen and the Art of Biblical Interpretation Multiple Misreading
Chapter 3 The Text of Scripture
Misreading No. 1: Inaccurate Quotation
Misreading No. 2: Twisted Translation
Chapter 4 Scripture as Rhetoric
Misreading No. 3: The Biblical Hook
The Biblical Hook and Mormon Apologetics
God the Father: A New Revelation
True Wisdom: James 1:5 Revisited
A Second Hook
Avoiding the Hook
Chapter 5 Scripture as Literature
Misreading No. 4: Ignoring the Immediate Context
Misreading No. 5: Collapsing Contexts
Misreading No. 6: Overspecification
Misreading No. 7: Word Play
Misreading No. 8: The Figurative Fallacy
Misreading No. 9: Speculative Readings of Predictive Prophecy
The Natural Literary Guards
Chapter 6 Scripture as Evidence
Misreading No. 10: Saying but Not Citing
Misreading No. 11: Selective Citing
Misreading No. 12: Inadequate Evidence Argument and Evidence
Chapter 7 Reasoning from Scripture
Misreading No. 1S: Confused Definition
Misreading No. 14: Ignoring Alternative Explanations
Misreading No. 15: The Obvious Fallacy
Misreading No. 16: Virtue by Association
Chapter 8 The Authority of the Bible
Misreading No. 17: Esoteric Interpretation
Misreading No. 18: Supplementing Biblical Authority
Misreading No. 19: Rejecting Biblical Authority
Captive to the Word of God
Chapter 9 World-View Confusion: The Heart of the Matter
Misreading No. 20: World-View Confusion
Cult Theology and World-View Confusion
John 1:1-4: Jesus, the Logos and the Cults
The Key to Understanding World-View Confusion
Chapter 10 The Discipleship of the Word
An Open Heart and Mind
A Method of Approach
Appendix I A Brief Definition of Twenty Reading Errors
Appendix I I John 1:1 and the New World Translation
Notes
General Index
Bible Index |
