Abstract

The practice of commentary and interpretation in a faith community implies at the very least the acceptance of writings that have become normative in some way for the life and beliefs of that community even before a final canonization as ‘Holy Scripture’. Interpreters were influenced by a variety of factors, such as the need to explain the Scriptures to later generations unfamiliar with the language or attitudes of the original works, and the desire to harmonize both apparent discrepancies between Scripture and contemporary custom or teaching, and also inconsistencies within Scripture itself.