Saints LightHard Passages, Handled Honestly
The Bible's hard passages are faced honestly by reading them in context, by their kind of writing, and in the light of Christ, trusting that faith and reason cannot truly contradict.
What this lesson teaches
- Old Testament violence is read in light of God's gradual teaching and of Christ, and never justifies violence today.
- Inerrancy concerns what the authors affirm by the standards of their kind of writing, which resolves many apparent contradictions.
- Faith and science cannot truly conflict; Genesis teaches who created and why, not a modern scientific account.
- It is honest and faithful to admit that some passages remain hard.
Catechism paragraphs this lesson cites
- CCC 107
- CCC 110
- CCC 122
- CCC 159
- CCC 337
CCC means the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Saints Light teaches it in its own words and never quotes it. Look up any paragraph in a printed copy or at vatican.va. See every lesson by paragraph in the Catechism index.
Scripture read in this lesson: Hebrews 1:1; Psalm 18:2 (19:1 in most modern Bibles).
A sample question from this lesson
How does the Church describe some contents of the Old Testament?
- As myths with no truth in them
- As including some incomplete and temporary things, within God's gradual teaching
- As identical in authority to modern law
- As replaced entirely by the New Testament
Show the answer
As including some incomplete and temporary things, within God's gradual teaching. Dei Verbum 15 and CCC 122, summarized in the lesson, describe the Old Testament as including incomplete and temporary things while still bearing witness to God's saving love.
The lesson in the app has three questions, each with an explanation.
Words to know
- Literary genre
- The kind of writing a passage is, such as history, poetry, parable or prophecy, which shapes how it should be read.
More terms in the Catholic glossary. More passages in the Scripture index.
Read the full lesson in the app
"Hard Passages, Handled Honestly" is lesson 10 of The Bible, the Catholic Way. In Saints Light you get the whole teaching, the Scripture quoted in full, all three questions and a step to live it this week.
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Related lessons
- Do Faith and Science Conflict? (Hard Questions)
- What Did the Middle Ages Build? (Church History)