Toon TheologyFive questions the filters don't settle
Applied honestly, the four filters sort most commands cleanly. Five they cannot. Each turns on a further decision about how to read, and each is left open here rather than quietly decided.
These are neither on the list of commands to obey nor dismissed from it. They are set aside because the honest answer depends on something the filters cannot decide on their own.
For reflection
- Lending at interest — Exodus 22:25 and Leviticus 25:35–37 forbid interest to a poor fellow Israelite; Deuteronomy 23:19–20 allows it to foreigners. A rule for Israel's covenant economy, or a standing principle of not profiting from the needy?
- Head coverings — 1 Corinthians 11:2–16 grounds the practice in the order of creation, but also appeals to "nature" and to custom. Particular to Corinth, or for every culture?
- Women's speech in the assembly — 1 Corinthians 14:34–35 and 1 Timothy 2:11–12. Universal, or particular to situations in Corinth and Ephesus? It turns on whether the first filter applies.
- The holy kiss and foot-washing — Romans 16:16 and John 13:14–15. Commanded forms, or the expressions one culture gave to a standing command to love?
- Anointing the sick — James 5:14 tells the sick believer to call the elders. A command to the individual, but one that depends on an act only church leaders perform.
Over to you
Which of these five would you decide, and what would you need to know to decide it?