Context Matters: New Testament BackgroundsSýnishorn

A Little 'Background' to Start

The Bible is an inspired writing. Because God inspired it, we can expect to meet God in its pages. Because it’s a writing, good reading skills can help us better understand what we are reading.

Many scholars and church leaders point out that the Bible was written for us, but not to us. The original authors of the New Testament books were writing to an audience far removed from us. They wrote in a different language than ours and addressed people living in a vastly different historical and cultural context than ours. Knowing and understanding the historical and cultural background of Scripture can unlock new insights into the Bible.

We don’t need to know all the possible background information to understand what the writers are saying. The Bible is clear and understandable in essential matters of salvation and daily living. In fact, we probably need to do a better job of practicing what we do understand from it! However, knowing the cultural and historical background of the Bible can help us understand better what is going on in a passage by revealing information that the original audience would have known. But, that might not be obvious to us as modern readers.

Take, for example, the story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well in John 4. Women usually went to wells in groups and at a different time than John indicates. The fact that this woman was alone at the well at that particular time probably indicates that she was a moral outcast. No religious Jew would ask this woman a question like Jesus did because Jews considered Samaritan women unclean even if they weren’t immoral.

The Samaritan woman’s acknowledgment that Jesus was a prophet is significant because Samaritans didn’t believe in prophets. Her question about worship points to a difference between Samaritans who believed Mount Gerizim was the proper place for worship and Jews who believed God must be worshipped at the Temple in Jerusalem—a place where Samaritans were unwelcome.

Jesus’s response points to a time when everyone—Jews and Samaritans alike—will worship the Father in spirit and truth.

All Scripture is for all time, but it is not for all circumstances. Knowing the cultural and historical background of a passage can help us correctly apply the Bible to different circumstances in our own lives.

Watch Craig Keener introduce the New Testament background study below.