the advice that the only way to interpret scripture, IS WITH SCRIPTURE
It's enormously circular to reinforce scripture with scripture.
It is a version of the classic fallacy: 'The bible is the word of god, we know this because it says so in the bible....'
I can thoroughly understand how an Athiest could feel or think this way Anyold.
Seems logical, as far as logic goes.
But some of us, truely know, there is a presense of something bigger than us, out there.....I can't explain it to a man, because to me it is just female intuition...which I am just stocked and filled with in every day life....but it translates to a spiritual life too, for me.
I view the Bible as a history text of human failures and a guide on how to avoid those short comings, and if you read it with an opened mind, especially The Gospel of Jesus Christ, where Jesus Himself continually condemns the Religious Leaders of the time for interpreting and using Scripture wrongly, for their own means, you too could find great insight in its words and parables and stories.....
To me, it is not the words of Scripture themselves that you test with other words of Scripture...
It is what have you learned about God through these words testing what something else says about God in Scripture..... does it fit with who you know as God or what you know as the "spirit of God"?
If one Scripture seems to condradict another Scripture after you read it in full context then you have a PROBLEM....and it needs to be looked at further to discern the meaning....and using other Scripture that is not contradicted, to help one understand the true meaning....
And YES, I know this is all "subjective" to ones own interpretation of the words in the first place and yahdeedah....but all of us, including you, have to make decisions daily that are subjective to how you interpret the situation...
the Bible is stories about those situations, and how it works out when you make one decision over another....it's a book about right and wrong....we each can use it as a tool or guidance...
because I did not even pick up a Bible until my late twenties or early thirties, when I started reading it, for the most part, many lessons in there, I knew already, because I had already gone through some of those real life trials...much of it was just logic, something I felt I knew already...internally, like "Do unto others as you would want them to do unto you"....
Anyway, it really isn't circular to me...
and good morning my favorite Athiest!
Care