But I tell you, Elijah has come, and they have done to him everything they wished, just as it is written about him. – Mark 9:13

Today’s Scripture Reading (September 10, 2014): Mark 9

I struggle with a very literal interpretation of the Bible. I understand why we want to follow a literal interpretation. It makes sense and it seems easy – this is what the Bible says and so this is what the Bible means. It is a very similar argument to the one that declares that a certain translation of the Bible is the one that is holy and meant to be followed. The practice makes it easy to preach from because it removes the problem of translation and the question of whether or not the translators have got it right.

I really do understand the strength of the approach, but at the same time I think the practice is irresponsible. The Bible was written in a different time, a different culture, and in a different language. And I believe that God wants us to wrestle with all of these things as we interpret the instructions that he has given to us in the Bible. And as far as a literal interpretation of the Bible is concerned, it is also something that I believe we are supposed to wrestle with. Over and above all of this, even the Bible does not interpret itself literally.

This passage is a good example of the Bible interpreting itself in a nonliteral way. The expectation that Elijah would precede the coming of the Messiah is from Malachi 4:5.  “See, I will send the prophet Elijah to you before that great and dreadful day of the Lord comes” (Malachi 4:5 – NIV). So the expectation of the people, a very literal expectation, was that before the coming of the Messiah Elijah would arrive. It is no wonder that the followers of Jesus are a little confused. If Jesus really is the Messiah, then where is Elijah? Doesn’t Elijah have to come before the Messiah?

Jesus does not argue that they are wrong. Their interpretation of the words of Malachi that Elijah had to precede the Messiah was correct, but Malachi was not talking about the literal return of the great Hebrew prophet. Jesus says that Malachi was speaking of a type of prophet that would be of the same mold as Elijah. While the people were waiting for the literal return of Elijah, Jesus declares that they had missed the coming of the man that Malachi was really speaking of, the one that we know of as John the Baptist. John was not the reincarnation of Elijah. He was not Elijah returning from heaven on a chariot of fire. But he was a prophet that had been called by God to minister to Israel in the role and the spirit of Elijah. And Jesus says that Israel did what they wanted with this type of Elijah. They ignored him, and in the end they killed their new Elijah. And now that their Elijah had come, it truly was the “great and dreadful day of the Lord.”

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Matthew 18