"It Is Possible To Prove Anything, Using the Bible"

Sometimes I heard people saying that it is possible to prove anything, using the Bible. In principle, it is true if a person ignores basic principles of interpretation of the Bible.

One of these principles is that it is very important to consider the context: the context of the verse, the context of the paragraph, the context of the chapter, the context of the book, and the context of the Bible.

There is an old joke that illustrates the importance of this principle: the Bible says that there is no God. How can it be that the Bible says so? Let's read Psalm 14:1 (NIV): "There is no God." Well, this is only a part of this verse. The whole verse:

"The fool says in his heart,
“There is no God.”
They are corrupt, their deeds are vile;
there is no one who does good."

So, from the context of the verse, it is clear that it is was the fool who says that there is no God. The Bible only quotes the fool's words here.

Now, who is the fool? Modern readers of the Bible may think that the fool is a stupid person. However, in order to understand the meaning of this word it is necessary to consider how this word is used in Psalms and in other Bible books such as Proverbs, checking all the other verses where this word is used. In Psalms and Proverbs, this word is used rather for an immoral person than for a stupid person. The context of Psalms 14:1 also implies that the fool is an immoral and not stupid person.

So, I think this example shows the importance of the context. There are some other frequent errors: http://lemanal.blogspot.com/2008/12/hermeneutical-errors.html