COMMENTS
Have you ever heard someone say, ” Oh, the King James Bible is too hard to read.” Maybe it was something like, “I don’t need to read my Bible; the Holy Spirit guides me.” It seems folks will manufacture any excuse to avoid being in the Word. So let’s take a quick look at these two excuses to see if they have any Biblical basis.
Is the KJV really too hard to understand? My opinion (which does not matter) is no, it is not. Yes, it is full of archaic language; some of the words have different meanings today, and we must be willing to study to read it. The fact is, every version of the Bible requires that we make a real effort to understand it.
Paul said, “We must study or give due diligence to be an approved workman…” that makes the number two excuse invalid. How do we study so we might be approved by God? We rely not on our own skills or strength, but on those of the Holy Spirit (John 14:26): But the Helper (Comforter, Advocate, Intercessor—Counselor, Strengthener, Standby), the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name [in My place, to represent Me and act on My behalf], He will teach you all things. And He will help you remember everything that I have told you. That makes the first excuse invalid. especially in the modern world we live in today.
With technology so abundant and free, there is little excuse for anyone not to be in the world daily. One of the best, easy-to-use (navigate) sites, again in my opinion, is Bible Hub. It is free (they do have a paid version), contains the Bible in numerous versions, commentaries, lexicons, chapter summaries, and more.
The study of the Bible is known as Hermeneutics. Biblical hermeneutics is the study of the principles and methods of interpreting the text of the Bible. Second Timothy 2:15 commands believers to be involved in hermeneutics: “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who . . . correctly handles the word of truth.” The purpose of biblical hermeneutics is to help us to know how to properly interpret, understand, and apply the Bible.1 Hermeneutics is concerned with the big picture, topics like salvation, sin, sovereignty, etc.
The category of study alongside Hermeneutics is Exegesis. Biblical exegesis involves a detailed, methodical study of Scripture to draw out the intended meaning of each text. The English term “exegesis” comes from a Greek word meaning “to guide or lead out.” The process requires careful analysis of language, history, culture, and context to discern what the author originally intended and how the audience first understood the message. As 2 Timothy 2:15 advises, “Make every effort to present yourself approved to God, an unashamed workman who accurately handles the word of truth.”2
Within Exegesis, there is a sub-topic of Parative Exegesis:
Partitive exegesis is a hermeneutical (interpretive) method used in Christian theology—especially in reading passages about Jesus—to distinguish between the divine and human natures of Christ while maintaining their unity in His person.
Core Idea: The practice “parts” or separates biblical statements about Christ into their appropriate nature—either divine or human—without splitting the one person of the Son. It affirms that Jesus is both fully God and fully man, united in person but distinct in nature, without confusion, change, division, or separation.
Purpose: Partitive exegesis arose in the early church to resolve the tension between Christ’s divine attributes (e.g., omnipotence, eternity) and His human experiences (e.g., hunger, death, suffering). It ensures that:
Divine titles and attributes are applied to His divine nature.
Human qualities are applied to His human nature.
Both natures are preserved in the one person of Christ Patheos.
Biblical and Theological Basis: The method is rooted in Scripture’s own way of describing Christ, which sometimes attributes divine titles to human actions (e.g., “the first and the last” in Revelation 1:17–18) or human experiences to divine persons (e.g., “Son of Man ascending to where He was before” in John 6:62).
Early church figures like Origen, Athanasius, the Cappadocians, Cyril of Alexandria, and especially Gregory of Nazianzus developed and defended partitive exegesis. Gregory’s “partitive rule” explicitly assigns sublime, transcendent expressions to the divine nature and more earthly or lowly ones to the human nature, while keeping the one person in view http://www.centerforbaptistrenewal.com.
Example: Divine nature: “Before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58) — eternal, self-existent God.
Human nature: “I thirst” (John 19:28) — human experience of thirst.
Both natures: “Redeemer” or “King” — titles that apply to both Founders Ministries.
Summary: Partitive exegesis is a disciplined, Scripture-based approach to reading about Christ that preserves the distinction between His divine and human natures while affirming their unity. It is a safeguard against heresy and a way to interpret the incarnation faithfully.3
The real-world application of this is not to make everyone a Biblical Scholar, a theologian, or a preacher/teacher. It is, however, commanded by God that we be able to defend our faith (1 Peter 3:15), something we cannot do effectively if we do not fully understand scripture and are unwilling to study it.
What is biblical hermeneutics?
Daily Devotional – Couch Potato Christian – Faithful Steward Ministries and FSM Women’s Outreach
DEVOTION
What Is Partitive Exegesis? How the Church Has Read Scripture on Christ
“You just had to be there!”
We fall back on this excuse when words fail to capture the precise reality of an experience—often a comedic interaction or visual beauty. The reality is that reality itself is often hard to describe. We do our best to describe it with words, but we’ve all experienced the frustration of falling short.
This is especially true when we use our words to describe God. Herman Bavinck asks, “The moment we dare to speak about God, the question arises: How can we?”[1] The same question can be asked of the person of Christ: When we dare to speak about the One who is both infinite God and finite man, how can we?
Scripture tells us Jesus slept, ate, walked, and learned new things. But it also tells us He created the universe, sustains it, and is omniscient. You can see the dilemma—how do we accurately describe Jesus when He has these seemingly contradictory categories?
We can navigate this difficulty through a practice known as partitive exegesis. Partitive exegesis presupposes that Christ’s two natures are unified in His person without confusion, change, division, or separation. Therefore, we must recognize and maintain the distinction between Christ’s two natures when we read the Bible.[2] While that may sound complicated, this practice arises from Scripture itself—it is an inspired way of describing the reality of the incarnation…
Continued via link above
- What is biblical hermeneutics? | GotQuestions.org ↩︎
- What is Biblical Exegesis? ↩︎
- Google Copilot AI-generated response. ↩︎
Discover more from Faithful Steward Ministries and FSM Women's Outreach
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Faithful Steward Ministries and FSM Women's Outreach 