Towards a Hermeneutic of Love
When I was in high school, I began attending conferences which focused on “applied biblical studies” at the local university. While the title of this multi-day series of talks might lead some to believe the event to be filled with nothing more than dry, academic papers and quite possibly the worst place to find a high school student, this couldn’t be further from the truth.
Instead of boredom, I found men and women who made the pages of the bible come to life. For the first time, I saw the story of my life as part of a larger story. This was far beyond what I experienced in my religion classes in school, and for the first time, I understood reality radically shifting as I encountered what was Good, True, and Beautiful in a way that was accessible to me and demanded my participation and response.
While many of the speakers were obviously well-trained academics, I didn’t feel like I was in a classroom when I listened to them. Instead, I felt like I was catching a glimpse of what was “behind the curtain” of the universe. I was not only hearing God’s word anew, but I was also seeing how I could live it as I began to realize that the events that took place over 2000 years ago still reverberate through time and propel us toward eternity each day.
After my first exposure to the living and vibrant Word of God, I yearned to learn more. The highlight of my summer for the next several years was having the opportunity to hear from these men and women who made the bible become real to me.
So what was the difference between what I was learning in my grade school and high school courses versus what I was exposed to at this conference whose name sounds less appealing than watching grass grow?
I think the primary difference is that the speakers at this event weren’t simply looking at the bible as an ancient text in need of analysis. Instead, they were seeing it as a love letter from a parent to a child… or from a spouse to his beloved. In other words, the lens through which they saw these words mattered. The books of the bible can be read through a cold, analytic lens that simply looks at the historicity, social reality, or literary forms found within the text. While this approach has value, if we want to have a meaningful encounter with the Word of God, we need to read it through the lens of the Author, interpreting it through the loving voice through which he speaks to us.
Having this hermeneutic, this interpretive lens through which we hear our God speaking love into our lives through his Word, is not relegated to scripture. In fact, if we practice living out and seeing the world around us through this hermeneutic of love, our sufferings and joys, our daily interactions with family, friends, and strangers, and even the thoughts we have about ourselves, can be reframed within a lens that recognizes the beauty and brokenness of those around us, thus promoting us to respond with the same love we are given.
In the same way that different hermeneutical lenses can be used to focus on different elements of scriptural texts, we can take on unhealthy or unrealistic lenses when interpreting the world around us. The wounds that we inflict upon ourselves or that were inflicted upon us by others can lead us to see the world through a variety of lenses or hermeneutics such as...
The hermeneutic of suspicion or accusation. This lens leads us to constantly criticize others or think that everyone around us is motivated by selfish motives and are only kind to us in order to use us for their own ends. This lens can push us to quickly blame others or accuse them of having a false interpretation of our own motives.
We can also take on the hermeneutic of guilt or shame - insisting that I am never good enough or that I am only good enough if ________. This lens does great harm to our own person as we place an excessive amount of responsibility on ourselves or on those close to us to fulfill some sort of unrealistic need, and when this need is ultimately unmet, this lens reinforces the cyclic motion of thinking, “well of course I didn’t get x,y, or z… I’m not good enough for that.”
Hermeneutic of self-assurance. This lens is similar to the hermeneutic of guilt or shame, but instead of interpreting our experiences as a sign of our insignificance, the hermeneutic of self-assurance convinces us that we are owed everything. When we see the world through this lens we are quick to do anything to justify our actions - we can lie, cheat, steal in order to maintain the cheap facade of reputation. Argumentativeness or short-tempered outbursts that come from a place of self-defense are common.
Hermeneutic of power or violence. It is incredibly dangerous to see the interactions we have with others through this lens as it creates a sort of competition that necessitates winners and losers. We convince ourselves that we need to be the strongest, the smartest, or the most violent in order to achieve a false sense of superiority over others. Instead of seeing others as persons, we see those around us as potential aggressors and interpret every word or action that comes in our direction as an act of violence that deserves some kind of verbal or physical retribution.
These lenses do nothing but reinforce unhealthy relationships between ourselves and God, our neighbor, and how we see our own person. We need a healthier way of interpreting the world around us, we need the hermeneutic of love. When we can see the world as God does and interpret the experiences we have through this lens of love it allows us to maneuver through the complexities of life without the added burden of self-hatred or hatred of others. With the hermeneutic of love we take on a perspective that relies not on shame, guilt, accusation, or suspicion; instead our first response is patience, kindness, self-denial, and humility. Instead of relying on the temporary feeling of self-justifying euphoria that comes with hating ourselves or others, the hermeneutic of love offers a lasting satisfaction of self-knowledge through seeing ourselves through God’s eyes - the eyes of love.
As we root ourselves in being seen though the tender gaze of our Father, our own eyes can see more. Instead of the narrow view of the world proposed by unhealthy hermeneutics, the lens of love allows us to see how vivid, deep, and outright beautiful the world can be. At the same time we are able to interpret the sufferings, sorrows, and injustices experienced personally or by those around us in a way that recognizes the brokenness in each of us and our neighbor and still begs for patience, kindness, and self-sacrifice. Instead of limiting those who hurt us or others to two-dimensional figures that only deserve to be hated, we can begin to see the whole person - fragmented by the same unrealistic hermeneutics that we ourselves can fall victim to.
The lens of love firmly sets us in reality. This interpretive principle allows us to catch a glimpse of eternity through every action, through every encounter, through every thought. Instead of narrowing our field of vision of God, others, and ourselves through lenses that distort and lead to a gray existence, embrace the weight of reality revealed by God as we see the world through the eyes of him who made us... the eyes of love.
-Fr. Matthew