You deserve to know my science for interpreting sacred texts. It is called a “hermeneutic.” Without an honest and declared hermeneutic, we have no consistency or authority in our interpretation of the Bible. My methodology is very simple; I will try to interpret Scripture the way that Jesus did.
Even more than telling us exactly what to see in the Scriptures, Jesus taught us how to see, what to emphasize, and also what could be de-emphasized, or even ignored. Jesus is himself our hermeneutic, and he was in no way a fundamentalist or literalist. He was a man of the Spirit. Just watch him and watch how he does it (which means you must have some knowledge of his Scriptures!).
Jesus consistently ignored or even denied exclusionary, punitive, and triumphalistic texts in his own Jewish Bible in favor of texts that emphasized inclusion, mercy, and justice for the oppressed. He had a deeper and wider eye that knew what passages were creating a highway for God and which passages were merely cultural, self-serving, and legalistic additions. When Christians state that every line in the Bible is of equal importance and inspiration, they are being very unlike Jesus . . . .
Jesus read the inspired text in an inspired way, which is precisely why he was accused of “teaching with authority and not like our scribes” (Matthew 7:29).
~Richard Rohr, Yes, And…: Daily Meditations
The voluntary self-gift of Jesus on the cross was his free acceptance—and act of solidarity—with all of creation in its weakness and imperfection. He chose to become a divine brother to humanity, and by giving himself to God totally, he invites all of his brothers and sisters with him into that same relationship of belonging to everything. “Chosen in Christ from all eternity” is the way Ephesians puts it (1:4).
The raising up of Jesus (which is the correct way to say it) is the confirmation of God’s standing and universal relationship with what he created. The Jews brilliantly called it “a covenant” or “a testament” and it is one, consistent, and forever between God and humanity. Any “new” covenant or “new testament” is just when you finally get the first promise or covenant made to Israel—but now all the way through and now including everybody!
Jesus stands forever as our Promise, our Guarantee, and our Victory (1 Corinthians 1:30) of what God is doing everywhere and all the time. The only way you can absent yourself from this victory is to stand alone and apart. Inside communion you are forever safe and saved.
~Adapted from Richard Rohr, Radical Grace: Daily Meditations
We must finally go back to the ultimate Christian source for our principle—the central doctrine of the Trinity itself. Yes, God is “One,” just as our Jewish ancestors taught us (Deuteronomy 6:4), and yet the further, more subtle level is that this oneness is, in fact, the radical love union between three completely distinct “persons” of the Trinity. What is sometimes called the first philosophic problem of “the one and the many” is overcome in God’s very nature. God is a mystery of relationship, and this relationship is foundationally and essentially love. The three persons of the Trinity are not uniform—but quite distinct—and yet completely oned in total outpouring and perfect receiving.
Further, our word “person,” now referring to an individual human being, was actually first used in Greek-based Trinitarian theology (persona = stage mask or a “sounding through”), and later then applied also to us! So we also are not autonomous beings, but soundings through, seemingly separate but radically one, too, just as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are. The implications could make for years of [contemplation]. We really are created in God’s “image and likeness” (Genesis 1:26f), much more than we ever imagined. Trinity is our universal template for the nature of reality and for how to “one”!
~Adapted from Richard Rohr, Oneing, “The Perennial Tradition”
