From an in-depth answer to 1 Timothy 4:1-5 and about interpretation.

Well, here we go.

Everything is capable of being interpreted.

Literally everything.

But not everything should be or need be.
And IF it should be there are only two possible ways of interpreting it:

What did this mean to the author?

Or

What does this mean to me?

There are of course subcategories but above all these are it. And it is possible also to have both of these but if so the first must supersede the second always and many more questions asked.

If I said to you “that’s cool.” Sans any other info you could rightly interpret that literally as addressing temperature or colloquially as addressing excellence. With no more information than is presented in the few words themselves one would be completely justified in interpreting this random phrase.

Art is often this way, and for some odd reason folk treat Scripture similarly but for no justifiable reason.

If we approach Scripture first with the question “what does this mean to me?” We will artificially invent a million different meanings because we each will be filtering the text through our private viewpoint and experience.

Again we would not do this with anything else. And not because the Bible is so sacred that we treat it differently but because that means of thinking is insane and self-fulfilling.

Since the Bible is not some secret code that applies differently to whoever happens to be reading it in whatever age or region of the world they happen to reside in, we can not rightly justify starting with “what does this mean to me?”

For the purposes of intellectual integrity, our thoughts don’t matter at the moment, because the words on the page are the product of someone else’s mind.

So while they are capable of interpretation the first question is “should they be interpreted?”

If yes, then “how and why?” Do I interpret them to mean what the author intended or do I interpret them as meaning whatever possible combination of meanings those words he wrote could be rendered as meaning? And again, why?

Why would we interpret a passage to mean what the author likely intended? Because it’s the only reasonable explanation. The author doesn’t know any of us and wasn’t writing specifically to us about us and our ideas.

We are hearing the one half of a conversation already in progress, being had with someone else.

Since that is the case, interpretation is required to get the rest of the context of the conversation.

But if we interpret it as we would have it mean or as it could have possibly been rendered to mean outside of the context of those involved and the scenario the conversation is taking place in, we will inevitably make a major mess of it.

Interpretation has to be based on author’s intent. Rather than reader’s reception. Otherwise we will make messy implications and miss the message.

So who is the author of 1 Timothy then? This question is everything to interpretation. Who is speaking makes all the difference in what we see as his intended meaning.

We are tempted to simply say

Saint Paul the Apostle.

And while that might work as a colloquialism, nevertheless that is our interpretation of who he was. And it is a modern English interpretation of a Greco-Roman interpretation of the Hebrew man himself.

The author was infact the Sheliach Sha’ul of the Kedoshim. If we bypass the Greco-Roman middleman in the interpretation we would say Sha’ul the Emissary of the Set-Apart ones.

A man trained more than almost anyone of his generation in the Torah and better. Had he not followed Yeshua, he would be revered by all rabbinic Judaism as the greatest sage in history.

When we look at his life and ministry throughout the book of Acts we see him living as a Torah teacher and at the end of his life (ie after he had written all his epistles including 1Timothy) he volunteers to tell the crowd that he still is a Jew and a Pharisee of Pharisees. And he tells them all that he has never believed nor taught anything contrary to the Torah to that very day.

Therefore by the life and testimony of the author himself (not to mention we have no reason to believe otherwise) 1 Timothy can not be interpreted contrary to the Torah.

So when Sha’ul says to Timothy that some will depart from the faith following doctrines of demons should we interpret that those people are following the Torah ( the teaching, principles and instructions of the Heavenly Father and His Messiah)?

Why would we think that?

These people are said to depart the faith as opposed to those who practice it.

Sha’ul tells Timothy these people will speak lies in hypocrisy. Are we really to think the words the Creator spoke about the nature of His own creatures is lies when we repeat them?

Why would we think that?

Sha’ul tells Timothy these people will be, “Forbidding to marry, to abstain from meats, which Elohim has created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth.”

Torah observant people do not forbid marriage so why would we think this passage is talking about Torah observant people?

And if this verse was written without the opener about marriage and written in a vacuum maybe one could possible interpret that it is wrong to forbid certain meats.

But Sha’ul didn’t write this passage in a vacuum. He added the clarifier after. Not just meats. Meats “which Elohim created to be received…”

The author said that he never taught against the Torah. And the Torah tells us which meats Elohim created to be received…and which were to be regarded by His people as abomination.

“For every creature of Elohim good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving.”

Nothing is to be refused if received with thanksgiving? Really? Nothing at all?

What if we were offered a plate of 💩 ?

Nothing is to be refused if it is received with thanksgiving.

How about if we are handed hemlock?

Should we receive it with thanksgiving because Sha’ul said nothing is to be refused?

Someone would be quick to say, “Obviously Sha’ul wasn’t saying poop and poison when he said nothing is to be refused. We have to interpret in his context.”

Exactly. No one would think he means that we should eat poison on purpose or feces or human flesh or any other obvious thing.

Yet we are taught to automatically assume Sha’ul is including all the things the Torah considers abomination so heinous we aren’t even supposed to touch their carcasses let alone eat.

Why should we not consider the context when it is as obvious what Sha’ul would be saying?

“For it is sanctified by the Word of Elohim and prayer.”

Again we have to ask what did the Word of Elohim say is sanctified meat?

In Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14 He lists what is sanctified meat.

And can we honestly expect that the Almighty is going to hear a prayer of thanks for meat He told us is not considered food, is considered abomination and told us not to eat it?

How can we ask Him to bless and sanctify what He said not to do?

Interpretation is important when necessary but we have to take extreme care to interpret according to the author’s intent.

And what’s more we have to take even greater caution when others ignorant of the Torah have already interpreted the text for us with total disregard for the foundational bases for all doctrine and discipline.

As a wise person once said, “Before we read what ‘Paul’ wrote, we have to read what ‘Paul’ read.