Wednesday, March 15, 2017

Pattern Analysis in the Bible

I believe I am onto something significant regarding the Bible. I'm calling it Pattern Analysis—a way of reading the Bible for greater understanding and meaning. Pattern Analysis includes literary devices such as the chiasm and lists and summarizations; forty devices in all. I'm really excited to start showing this tool later this year but my work is not yet ready.

A year ago I announced that Discovering Emphasis in the Bible is ready for review. I received some comments that basically said I need to dig deeper. At the same time, the Holy Spirit nudged me to develop a catalog of structured themes. I never imagined the extent and beauty that would be revealed to me from this process. They were right, I was not ready.

Today I have completed cataloging 25% of the Bible: 18% of the Old Covenant and 45% of the New. While that is more than 800 structured themes, I'm not done yet. But what I can say is that so far there is not a verse that does not fit into this methodology!

Why is that important to you? Because Pattern Analysis,
  1. organizes Bible passages into complete units,
  2. clarifies the text and often adds new meaning, and
  3. reveals one or typically several emphatic messages in each structure
Pattern Analysis also gives considerable credibility to the thinking that the Holy Spirit inspired the entire Bible. Just as you can look at the signature on a credit card receipt to see if it is from your spouse, so it seems we can use Pattern Analysis to ask, Is this passage from that same source?. Pattern Analysis supports the thinking that there is a Verbal Plenary Inspiration of the Bible.

Through this medium called the Bible Discernments blog, I hope to keep you informed about my progress. Thank you for taking the time to read this. Tom

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