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Context: Putting Scripture in Its Place
Exploring the Chapter Behind the Verse.
Context looks at verses we know by heart but may not know the people, places, and times that give them meaning. Josh Scott delves into these well-known Scripture verses, exploring their true meanings by examining them in their original biblical context. Through this process, he unveils fresh and enlightening interpretations that are often missed when these Scriptures are taken out of context.
The book can be read alone or used by small groups anytime throughout the year. Components include video teaching sessions featuring Josh Scott and a comprehensive Leader Guide, making this perfect as a six-week group study.
Context looks at verses we know by heart but may not know the people, places, and times that give them meaning. Josh Scott delves into these well-known Scripture verses, exploring their true meanings by examining them in their original biblical context. Through this process, he unveils fresh and enlightening interpretations that are often missed when these Scriptures are taken out of context.
The book can be read alone or used by small groups anytime throughout the year. Components include video teaching sessions featuring Josh Scott and a comprehensive Leader Guide, making this perfect as a six-week group study.
- GenresChristianNonfiction
157 pages, Kindle Edition
Published April 2, 2024
40 people are currently reading
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
April 5, 2024
I remember first hearing Chris Tomlin's inescapable 2010 mega hit, "I Will Follow", with its attention grabbing first chorus ("Where you go, I'll go / where you stay I'll stay...") and thinking... isn't that a verse from Ruth?
"I Will Follow" is a jam, but, those words aren't spoken to God in the Bible, they're spoken by Ruth to her mother-in-law, and even a younger me with fourteen years less knowledge of Scripture knew enough to think, Tomlin's using this line a little out of context.
Context is, of course, both the title and the topic of Josh Scott's second book, and that Ruth verse is one of the examples he digs into here. It's far from the only one: Scott rolls up his sleeves and comes after several of Christianity's most beloved out-of-context inspirational verses, from "I can do all things..." to 1 Corinthians 13's famous 'love' passage, to "I know the plans I have for you" in Jeremiah. I could probably walk into a Hobby Lobby right now and see any of these printed onto wall art and merch, and at least one of them is hanging in my own home right now.
But the way we tend to use these out-of-context feel good quotes (and a few feel-bad ones too) is totally divorced from what the original authors meant by them, and being mindful about the original context is crucial to making sure we don't misuse the Bible to prop up our own ideas.
It would be so easy to write a book like this from a sarcastic, more-educated-than-thou place, but much like with his first book, Bible Stories For Grown-Ups, Josh Scott approaches it with kindness and warmth and a genuine pastoral care. He's not some cold, clinical scholar dissecting the Greek grammar of our most beloved texts (much as I love reading those folks), he's a pastor who loves the Bible and loves the stories in it, and that love is evident on every page of this book.
Reading a Josh Scott book is like hearing a really top shelf sermon that digs into the Bible with honesty and academic rigor and intelligence, but also starts and ends with compassion and a call to make the world better.
I love nerding out on the Bible, and reading a dense academic tome about canon formation or the textual transmission of Hebrew manuscripts, or whatever, but at the end of the day, the most pressing question is always: what does this mean for the way I live and engage with the world? How does this help me love my neighbor better? Or as Josh Scott writes: "Beginning with the context that produced a text then allows us to ask the question we really want to ask, the question that causes us to come to the Bible in the first place: What is this saying to us, today?"
In Context, Scott provides both things: history and Greek definitions and ancient Southwest Asian background, but also thoughtful answers to that most vulnerable of Bible questions: what does this mean for us?
"I Will Follow" is a jam, but, those words aren't spoken to God in the Bible, they're spoken by Ruth to her mother-in-law, and even a younger me with fourteen years less knowledge of Scripture knew enough to think, Tomlin's using this line a little out of context.
Context is, of course, both the title and the topic of Josh Scott's second book, and that Ruth verse is one of the examples he digs into here. It's far from the only one: Scott rolls up his sleeves and comes after several of Christianity's most beloved out-of-context inspirational verses, from "I can do all things..." to 1 Corinthians 13's famous 'love' passage, to "I know the plans I have for you" in Jeremiah. I could probably walk into a Hobby Lobby right now and see any of these printed onto wall art and merch, and at least one of them is hanging in my own home right now.
But the way we tend to use these out-of-context feel good quotes (and a few feel-bad ones too) is totally divorced from what the original authors meant by them, and being mindful about the original context is crucial to making sure we don't misuse the Bible to prop up our own ideas.
It would be so easy to write a book like this from a sarcastic, more-educated-than-thou place, but much like with his first book, Bible Stories For Grown-Ups, Josh Scott approaches it with kindness and warmth and a genuine pastoral care. He's not some cold, clinical scholar dissecting the Greek grammar of our most beloved texts (much as I love reading those folks), he's a pastor who loves the Bible and loves the stories in it, and that love is evident on every page of this book.
Reading a Josh Scott book is like hearing a really top shelf sermon that digs into the Bible with honesty and academic rigor and intelligence, but also starts and ends with compassion and a call to make the world better.
I love nerding out on the Bible, and reading a dense academic tome about canon formation or the textual transmission of Hebrew manuscripts, or whatever, but at the end of the day, the most pressing question is always: what does this mean for the way I live and engage with the world? How does this help me love my neighbor better? Or as Josh Scott writes: "Beginning with the context that produced a text then allows us to ask the question we really want to ask, the question that causes us to come to the Bible in the first place: What is this saying to us, today?"
In Context, Scott provides both things: history and Greek definitions and ancient Southwest Asian background, but also thoughtful answers to that most vulnerable of Bible questions: what does this mean for us?
May 2, 2024
This was such an interesting book and video series. Highly recommend for small groups. This really has changed the way I will look at scripture.
February 24, 2025
I’d gladly give Context five stars but there were too many printing mistakes. (I’m an old newspaper guy.) The book is a really good deep dive into Scripture and I wish I’d read it long ago. I’ll gladly keep following Mr. Scott’s work.
May 4, 2025
The book Context by Josh Scott
I liked this book. I do kind of wish he included more examples, though. I think he could have possibly left out “I know the plans I have for you” and the “I can do all things through Christ”, only because these two examples are everywhere. You cannot look up online examples of reading the bible out of context, without rightfully seeing these two examples. Ha. When I teach high school students to read the bible in context, I use these two examples—they are perfect illustrations of the problem of how people read the bible out of context, and a careful reading of the verses that went before is enough to help students start seeing how the context determines the meaning. Anyhow, I was hoping for more tidy examples that pack a punch. I like that he provided the context on Sodom, revealing the sin was inhospitality, and the context of 1 Corinthians 13. I think my favorite was his wonderful section on Ruth.
The context of Ruth:
The author of Deuteronomy 23 clearly hates the Moabites and writes that no Moabite nor any of their descendants may ever enter the assembly of the Lord, and Israelites are never to seek friendship with them. Why? because of an offense—they failed to bring bread to the Israelites when they came out of Egypt. Basic message: take offense, never forget, never forgive, hate them now, teach your children to hate them, make sure you always hate them, making no exceptions. God wants you to hate—it is your moral obligation.
Later, Ezra and Nehemiah use this text for reforms, expelling all foreigners from Israel and requiring all the men to divorce women with “impure blood”.
Fascinatingly, the repugnant reforms of Ezra and Nehemiah are the context for the book of Ruth. Scholars generally agree that it was written post-exile.
The author of Ruth never misses an opportunity to emphasize the fact that Ruth was a Moabite throughout the story, lest a reader forget.
Anyhow, what is fascinating is
We have an irredeemable and evil command given in Deut 23 that only bears bad fruit if observed.
We have leaders using the command to justify xenophobia, racism, and hatred of the outsider.
Yet at the same time, we have some author who composes a story to protest against the powers that be and the mainstream opinion.
And all of these are compiled TOGETHER in what would become holy scriptures.
Biblical texts are written over almost a 1000-year period, which means some biblical authors had the advantage of hindsight. Some concepts of God and laws could be judged by their fruits. The law in Deut 23:3-6 was a bad tree and it bore very bad fruit, and it is wonderful that those working in the tradition countered it.
Reflecting on Deut 23:3-6, we see that hatred can easily move beyond those who commit the wrong, to an entire people group. We learn that we can quickly overgeneralize and, from some bad experiences, we can conclude the entire group is BAD. WE then, bizarrely, can not only hate everyone alive, but also declare contempt to ALL future generations, believing that every child born will be born guilty.
Imagine having one bad experience with someone who is Chinese, then concluding that all Chinese are bad, and that all future Chinese people will be bad. Suppose I think I am obligated to hate and never forgive all Chinese people now, but how can I make sure my descendants hate all Chinese people? Once I die, what if people forgive the Chinese—what if my people dared to love and treat one with civility, and to enter into a friendship with them? Gasp…
Lord forbid! Oh, here is an idea, I can claim that God almighty commanded us to hate ALL of them now forever and to NEVER forgive. To love God is to always hate them, forever.
If I can get people to think God commanded this, then this is my best hope for making this hatred enduring.
Interestingly, the author of Deuteronomy, who hated Moabites and wanted all his people to hate them, likely saw himself as just and righteous. Like Cain, he inverted right and wrong. Moabites did something wrong, which led him to dehumanize and devalue all Moabites, and viewing all of them as bad, he could see them all worthy of punishment and hatred—and this is simply “justice”. Now he is trying to make sure all his descendants do justice and walk in righteousness, which to him means to hate and never forgive.
What is tragic is, to make his hatred authoritative and lasting, he put it in Torah, believed to be God’s law.
So now, think of the power of tradition and authority for those who came after. Rather than thinking, is this good and godly? Things are just obeyed. If anyone questions it, just as the original author could use bad rationalizations to justify hating an entire people group forever, regardless, so anyone wanting to defend the text can do the same.
Fortunately, a lot of people ignore and overlook it, then and in the future. But the passage REMAINS there, and leaders like Ezra or Nehemiah used it to make hatred of the outsider the law of the land. A lot of people would just go along. To do otherwise would seem to undermine the text. But that is precisely what some individuals, like the author of Ruth, did.
Ruth is an individual, and the story creates sympathy for her. Jews consider David their greatest king, and connecting David with her forces people to be like “Would it be reasonable to reject, hate, and condemn David because his ancestor was a Moabite? No… It thus undermines and shows the absurdity of the prooftext that was being used as a weapon and was used for evil. Yet it provides no alternative reading of Deut 23:3-6. The toxic text remains. The verse is evil; to forever hate the Moabites is a loaded gun—a deadly weapon that is just sitting there, waiting for the wrong person to come along, after Ezra and Ruth were composed.
There are lots of deadly weapons sitting in the bible, most of them are ignored. But they are there.
In light of this, Christians need to know how to approach the bible, so no one gets hurt. Since evil texts were not cut out of the bible, it means Christians MUST be able to recognize them as bad and interpret them as illustrations of religion working as a force of evil and as a warning, lest we do the same.
Sometimes, authors straight up contradict other texts more directly, but stories like Ruth and Jonah work more like parables. Those who created these stories critically assessed the fruit of weapon texts in their own scripture, and they made up stories that illustrated just how toxic, irrational, and/or evil these notions were. Again, I love how Jews included them in the bible.
These Protest books give us a way forward, for it is clear they are respecting and working within the system more broadly, while undermining and challenging toxic parts.
We must be willing to do the same.
That means recognizing parts that are bad, and which play out in horrible ways, and result in absurd conclusions, and are dangerous and evil. Bad fruit is bad fruit regardless. Even if words are put in God’s mouth or commands supposedly come from God, if they are bad, they are bad. If it claims God does things that are bad, since God is not bad, he did not do them. We shall know an idea by its fruit. We have time on our side, we can look at how ideas have played out in history. When the fruit is bad, it indicates the idea is bad.
Now, we can also protest by crafting illustrations and stories that clearly reveal that the straightforward reading or traditional interpretation of a text is dangerous, harmful, and must be rejected.
When biblical authors do this, their stories are just put along with the main text. However, when I create a story that illustrates a really bad notion that comes from the bible, I have to try and spin some other less toxic reading from the text—for example, to show a way to read Genesis 3 that is non-Augustinian and a way to read the flood story that distances God from the violence. I can do so with these. I can also find a figurative approach for Joshua. However, passages commanding perpetual hatred of the Moabites are another matter, and 1 Samuel, which has God wanting Saul to commit genocide against a people because of a sin 400 years old. These are harder, if not impossible, to turn into something less repugnant. Interestingly, it was Duet that commanded perpetual hatred of the Amalekites, and then it is God who reminds and then punishes Saul for not being thorough in his genocide, and sends an evil spirit to torment him. Anyhow, these evils are so blatantly placed in God’s mouth and are so central to the narrative flow. There is no perfect spin job.
Instead, it is necessary to straight up say these passages are evil, placed there by evil men to justify evil. They teach us how easily we can justify evil, attribute evil to God, and use religion to justify evil. And then they show the dangers of tradition—leading good people to justify and defend evil and possibly engage in evil—all with a clean conscience—as the bible has inverted right and wrong, and gave them a way that seems “right”, but is the way of death.
We must be vigilant. We must be willing to call evil evil.
I liked this book. I do kind of wish he included more examples, though. I think he could have possibly left out “I know the plans I have for you” and the “I can do all things through Christ”, only because these two examples are everywhere. You cannot look up online examples of reading the bible out of context, without rightfully seeing these two examples. Ha. When I teach high school students to read the bible in context, I use these two examples—they are perfect illustrations of the problem of how people read the bible out of context, and a careful reading of the verses that went before is enough to help students start seeing how the context determines the meaning. Anyhow, I was hoping for more tidy examples that pack a punch. I like that he provided the context on Sodom, revealing the sin was inhospitality, and the context of 1 Corinthians 13. I think my favorite was his wonderful section on Ruth.
The context of Ruth:
The author of Deuteronomy 23 clearly hates the Moabites and writes that no Moabite nor any of their descendants may ever enter the assembly of the Lord, and Israelites are never to seek friendship with them. Why? because of an offense—they failed to bring bread to the Israelites when they came out of Egypt. Basic message: take offense, never forget, never forgive, hate them now, teach your children to hate them, make sure you always hate them, making no exceptions. God wants you to hate—it is your moral obligation.
Later, Ezra and Nehemiah use this text for reforms, expelling all foreigners from Israel and requiring all the men to divorce women with “impure blood”.
Fascinatingly, the repugnant reforms of Ezra and Nehemiah are the context for the book of Ruth. Scholars generally agree that it was written post-exile.
The author of Ruth never misses an opportunity to emphasize the fact that Ruth was a Moabite throughout the story, lest a reader forget.
Anyhow, what is fascinating is
We have an irredeemable and evil command given in Deut 23 that only bears bad fruit if observed.
We have leaders using the command to justify xenophobia, racism, and hatred of the outsider.
Yet at the same time, we have some author who composes a story to protest against the powers that be and the mainstream opinion.
And all of these are compiled TOGETHER in what would become holy scriptures.
Biblical texts are written over almost a 1000-year period, which means some biblical authors had the advantage of hindsight. Some concepts of God and laws could be judged by their fruits. The law in Deut 23:3-6 was a bad tree and it bore very bad fruit, and it is wonderful that those working in the tradition countered it.
Reflecting on Deut 23:3-6, we see that hatred can easily move beyond those who commit the wrong, to an entire people group. We learn that we can quickly overgeneralize and, from some bad experiences, we can conclude the entire group is BAD. WE then, bizarrely, can not only hate everyone alive, but also declare contempt to ALL future generations, believing that every child born will be born guilty.
Imagine having one bad experience with someone who is Chinese, then concluding that all Chinese are bad, and that all future Chinese people will be bad. Suppose I think I am obligated to hate and never forgive all Chinese people now, but how can I make sure my descendants hate all Chinese people? Once I die, what if people forgive the Chinese—what if my people dared to love and treat one with civility, and to enter into a friendship with them? Gasp…
Lord forbid! Oh, here is an idea, I can claim that God almighty commanded us to hate ALL of them now forever and to NEVER forgive. To love God is to always hate them, forever.
If I can get people to think God commanded this, then this is my best hope for making this hatred enduring.
Interestingly, the author of Deuteronomy, who hated Moabites and wanted all his people to hate them, likely saw himself as just and righteous. Like Cain, he inverted right and wrong. Moabites did something wrong, which led him to dehumanize and devalue all Moabites, and viewing all of them as bad, he could see them all worthy of punishment and hatred—and this is simply “justice”. Now he is trying to make sure all his descendants do justice and walk in righteousness, which to him means to hate and never forgive.
What is tragic is, to make his hatred authoritative and lasting, he put it in Torah, believed to be God’s law.
So now, think of the power of tradition and authority for those who came after. Rather than thinking, is this good and godly? Things are just obeyed. If anyone questions it, just as the original author could use bad rationalizations to justify hating an entire people group forever, regardless, so anyone wanting to defend the text can do the same.
Fortunately, a lot of people ignore and overlook it, then and in the future. But the passage REMAINS there, and leaders like Ezra or Nehemiah used it to make hatred of the outsider the law of the land. A lot of people would just go along. To do otherwise would seem to undermine the text. But that is precisely what some individuals, like the author of Ruth, did.
Ruth is an individual, and the story creates sympathy for her. Jews consider David their greatest king, and connecting David with her forces people to be like “Would it be reasonable to reject, hate, and condemn David because his ancestor was a Moabite? No… It thus undermines and shows the absurdity of the prooftext that was being used as a weapon and was used for evil. Yet it provides no alternative reading of Deut 23:3-6. The toxic text remains. The verse is evil; to forever hate the Moabites is a loaded gun—a deadly weapon that is just sitting there, waiting for the wrong person to come along, after Ezra and Ruth were composed.
There are lots of deadly weapons sitting in the bible, most of them are ignored. But they are there.
In light of this, Christians need to know how to approach the bible, so no one gets hurt. Since evil texts were not cut out of the bible, it means Christians MUST be able to recognize them as bad and interpret them as illustrations of religion working as a force of evil and as a warning, lest we do the same.
Sometimes, authors straight up contradict other texts more directly, but stories like Ruth and Jonah work more like parables. Those who created these stories critically assessed the fruit of weapon texts in their own scripture, and they made up stories that illustrated just how toxic, irrational, and/or evil these notions were. Again, I love how Jews included them in the bible.
These Protest books give us a way forward, for it is clear they are respecting and working within the system more broadly, while undermining and challenging toxic parts.
We must be willing to do the same.
That means recognizing parts that are bad, and which play out in horrible ways, and result in absurd conclusions, and are dangerous and evil. Bad fruit is bad fruit regardless. Even if words are put in God’s mouth or commands supposedly come from God, if they are bad, they are bad. If it claims God does things that are bad, since God is not bad, he did not do them. We shall know an idea by its fruit. We have time on our side, we can look at how ideas have played out in history. When the fruit is bad, it indicates the idea is bad.
Now, we can also protest by crafting illustrations and stories that clearly reveal that the straightforward reading or traditional interpretation of a text is dangerous, harmful, and must be rejected.
When biblical authors do this, their stories are just put along with the main text. However, when I create a story that illustrates a really bad notion that comes from the bible, I have to try and spin some other less toxic reading from the text—for example, to show a way to read Genesis 3 that is non-Augustinian and a way to read the flood story that distances God from the violence. I can do so with these. I can also find a figurative approach for Joshua. However, passages commanding perpetual hatred of the Moabites are another matter, and 1 Samuel, which has God wanting Saul to commit genocide against a people because of a sin 400 years old. These are harder, if not impossible, to turn into something less repugnant. Interestingly, it was Duet that commanded perpetual hatred of the Amalekites, and then it is God who reminds and then punishes Saul for not being thorough in his genocide, and sends an evil spirit to torment him. Anyhow, these evils are so blatantly placed in God’s mouth and are so central to the narrative flow. There is no perfect spin job.
Instead, it is necessary to straight up say these passages are evil, placed there by evil men to justify evil. They teach us how easily we can justify evil, attribute evil to God, and use religion to justify evil. And then they show the dangers of tradition—leading good people to justify and defend evil and possibly engage in evil—all with a clean conscience—as the bible has inverted right and wrong, and gave them a way that seems “right”, but is the way of death.
We must be vigilant. We must be willing to call evil evil.
April 22, 2024
If we say we want to take the Bible seriously, then we need to honor the origins and context of the Bible to do so. Every story, letter, book, and sermon included in scripture was written to a specific group or person, and Josh’s book is a gentle reminder that while we are not the “intended recipients” of the original work, we are able to make sense of and appreciate the wisdom held within. Leaving scriptures in their context creates a richer, more powerful understanding of the Bible and leads us into a healthier, more generous and grounded faith. This book is 10 stars, not 5, because the complexity of the context is made clear and accessible with his easy to understand writing style.
May 1, 2024
An easy read with a meaningful impact, Josh engages with scripture the way Jesus exemplified: through the lens of love. This book is the perfect example of how progressive Christianity not only takes the Bible seriously, but strives to make the world a better, more loving and inclusive place through a religious tradition that so often gets caught up in dogma and harmful theology. “Context” offers a thoughtful perspective that seeks to redeem a judgmental and rigid religion through thorough research, leading to a more accurate and loving interpretation of scripture. This book is a good place to start for reimagining the positive impact religion should have in the world.
July 14, 2025
This book is a quick and easy read, yet it covers some difficult and important topics. There are so many passages of scripture that have been taken out of context, making their understood meaning wrong and harmful. This book covers just six of the most misinterpreted passages, providing the background that is necessary to see how they would have been understood by their original audiences. I learned a lot from this little book, not just about these specific verses, but about how to examine passages in the Bible more thoroughly and accurately. I recommend this book for anyone who is struggling with the Bible, and anyone who thinks they already know it all.
October 19, 2024
Loved this! I’m one to always examine the context of a Bible story or passage. Josh Scott does his homework to truly examine in depth some well known stories that we often misinterpret through our prejudices or general lack of knowledge of the times and context in which they were written. Plus, my Sunday School class has examined this and really had great discussions. I can’t wait for another book from this pastor/author.
November 15, 2024
Content is solid, but I struggled a little with the writing style. I found some of the sentences a bit too long to allow me to focus. This is the second book by this author I’ve read and didn’t have that problem before, so I’m not sure if there was a difference or if I just had more trouble focusing this time!
February 28, 2025
Excellent resource for anyone seeking clarity and perspective in a relationship with God, as well as how to live a more impactful life in the world today. The author gives many examples from his own study and experience which I could relate to having been raised in a similar very traditional church setting and system of theology. Reading and discussing with my spouse has been a very constructive (and liberating) process which we will continue with his other books. Highly recommended!
November 7, 2024
I learned a lot -- new ways of looking at scripture that I have known all my life! It is interesting how understanding the time and place in which something was written -- and for what purpose-- can change how we understand it.
April 17, 2025
So, I’m a liberal Christian, if you didn’t know that about me.
And context is everything. I’m not one of those people who believes that if I pray, and open the Bible randomly, the answer will come to me.
And this author spoke to me.
And context is everything. I’m not one of those people who believes that if I pray, and open the Bible randomly, the answer will come to me.
And this author spoke to me.
July 6, 2024
I feel like I’m taking a shot with the Bible every time I read Josh Scott’s writing. 10/10. Highly recommend no matter your relationship to the Bible.
January 13, 2025
A great resource on six parts of the Bible, how they have been abused, and how they should be contextually understood to properly apply them.
April 30, 2025
All of Josh's books are excellent. A valuable tool in any theology library or church library to help one continue to grow in faith.
August 23, 2025
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