Until the modern dubious or ill-nuanced idea that authorial intention is unimportant or secondary to reader response, all literature was written with an intention to convey some idea to a primary set of readers or audience.

This means that reading first century documents (all of the New Testament) with a peculiarly 21st century interpretation or slant must be a misreading, since the primary audience back then would have no clue about such a reading, rendering the documents meaningless and worthless in their time unless the document clearly suggests a much later or distant time (for example Daniel 12:4 in the Old Testament).

None of the seals in Revelation could be the 21st century pandemic of COVID-19 because that would be totally meaningless to the primary first century readers of the book and its author as well.

So then, a basic reading guide is to remember what the text could/would have meant to the original audience and, only secondarily, what we today can get from that original understanding/reading.

So, proper interpretation of any text must reckon with the author’s intention regarding meaning for the primary audience.

Application of that meaning/ intention may be plural and dependent on the current reader, but the interpretation or meaning of the text must take recourse to the writer’s intended meaning as detectable through use of language at the time of writing and his concerns for context and audience.

Put differently, meaning now is dependent on meaning then, the two crucial horizons for proper interpretation — the back then and the right now.

The Olivet Discourse recorded in Matthew 24 (Mark 13 and Luke 21) has been terribly read by most evangelical preachers as dealing primarily or exclusively with the second coming of Jesus.

If the context of these texts is read in a responsible literary manner this view is demolished. It has been my lot to re-educate church folk on reading the text in light of its context at Keswick Convention Bible Readings in Barbados and several parishes in Jamaica.

The demanding teaching tactic I use is to ask the congregation to imagine that the only manuscript of Matthew’s gospel they have received has only the first two verses, and they must use those verses to decide on context and prophetic text.

I beg them to forget any sermon/study they have been exposed to on the passage and look at those two verses with ‘virgin eyes’ as if seeing them for the first time.

Consider the following: Context: Admiration of the buildings of the temple by the disciples — “…and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple.” (Matthew 24:1b; Mark 13:1; Luke 215) Prophetic text: “I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another that shall not be thrown down.”

(Matthew 24:2; Mark 13:2; Luke 21:6) Meaning of text: The buildings of the temple would be destroyed. We need to clarify as well, the questions (three not just one) put to Jesus by his disciples: 1.) “When will these things be?” When will the buildings of the Temple be destroyed? (Matthew 24:3; Mark 13:4; Luke 21:7) 2) “What will be the sign that these things are about to be fulfilled?”

What will be the sign that the buildings of the temple are about to be destroyed? (Mark 13:4; Luke 21:7) 3) What will be the sign of your coming, and/even of the end of the age? (Uniquely Matthew 24:3) The primary concern of these texts is not the second coming of Jesus at all.

Check the questions put to Jesus after his dismal prophecy about the temple. The primary issue is the destruction of the temple and secondarily the timing of that destruction; and only in a tertiary sense, the second coming.

The tribulation later in the passage had to do with the great turmoil arising from the war between the Jews and the Romans (AD 66-70), verified in history, not our current or future global woes. Now, Revelation, despite its grotesque imagery and reading difficulty for some, is said by the author to involve things that must soon come to pass. I call this feature of the book, ‘soonism’ (a coinage I know), but he also documents current realities in his day (1:19 “things which are”). Now preachers today read the text with the feature of futurism almost exclusively.

Revelation, then, involves both commentary and prophecy. Some prophesied events, John says “must shortly take place” (1:1; 2:16; 3:11; 22:6); “the time is near” (1:3; 22:10).

Even the ‘coming’ mentioned in Revelation 22:20 is to happen soon or quickly and need not be other than a sudden coming in judgement upon first century spiritually bankrupt Judaism (the religion of the Jews).

Pastors, we need to teach our people to read and think critically, and my upcoming online course on critical thinking should prove helpful in this regard.

Rev Clinton Chisholm served as tutor in philosophy at The University of the West Indies, Mona campus, and as tutor in business ethics at the University of Technology, Jamaica. He is also a former academic dean at the Caribbean Graduate School of Theology. Send comments to the Jamaica Observer or clintchis@yahoo. com.