Exegesis: Simple Definition, Examples, and Mistakes to Avoid

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily match my own. - Dr. Bart D. Ehrman

In the vast field of textual analyses of the Bible, few concepts are as crucial and basic as exegesis. Exegesis is fundamentally about moving from a mere surface-level understanding to deeper, more nuanced insights.

In this article, I’ll give an exegesis definition and explain its history, and methodology, offering a glimpse into its evolution over the centuries. By understanding these elements, readers can gain a more profound appreciation of how biblical texts are analyzed and the importance of rigorous, thoughtful interpretation.

Exegesis Definition and Etymology

Exegesis (pronounced ek·suh·jee·sis) is a Greek word: ex means “from” or “out” and hegeisthai means “to lead or to guide.” This makes sense from a word origin perspective since exegesis is meant to take someone from ignorance about a text to knowledge through interpretation. A person who practices exegesis is called an exegete, and the adjective or descriptive word is exegetical (an exegetical book, for example).

Exegesis, then, simply means interpretation of any text, although people use it most often when referring to the Bible. The whole concept of exegesis assumes that the true meaning of a given text is not entirely obvious and thus needs deciphering. An example comes through an interpretation of this phrase from Psalm 18:29:

By you I can outrun a troop,
and by my God I can leap over a wall.

In the SBL Study Bible, Patrick D. Miller writes that these verses are meant to indicate that God responds appropriately to human action. (Affiliate Disclaimer: We may earn commissions on products you purchase through this page at no additional cost to you. Thank you for supporting our site!) That is, God helps people in the right way for their particular situations. However, in the Sayings of the Desert Fathers, a monk named Poemen (c. 340–450 CE) interprets the passage differently:

The will of man is a brass wall between him and God and a stone of stumbling. When a man renounces it, he is also saying to himself, "By my God, I can leap over the wall."

For Poemen, the “wall” signifies a barrier separating human beings and God which people can overcome with God’s help. Note that the same seemingly simple phrase can be interpreted in completely different ways. This is exegesis. Having defined what exegesis is, let’s look a bit at its history.

A Broad History of Exegesis

The oldest written examples of exegesis we have are from clay tablets written in Mesopotamia between 700 and 100 BCE. These tablets, written in the ancient Near Eastern language of Akkadian, are commentaries on other texts including literary writings, medical treatises and magical texts. In The Exegetical Terminology of Akkadian Commentaries, Uri Gabbay notes that these early commentaries may have influenced rabbinic exegesis of the Hebrew Bible.

In addition, the writings of Greek philosopher Plato (c. 427 – 348 BCE) inspired a large number of commentaries in ancient and medieval times as later philosophers attempted to interpret and elucidate Plato’s conceptual frameworks. As with all exegesis, not all of these later interpreters agreed about the meaning of Plato’s writings.

In terms of biblical exegesis, our main focus in this article, everything starts with midrash, a Jewish method of scriptural exegesis used in the 1st century CE by the writers of both the New Testament and the Dead Sea Scrolls. In The Study of Ancient Judaism, Vol. 1: Mishnah, Midrash, Siddur, Gary Porton defines midrash as "a type of literature, oral or written, which stands in direct relationship to a fixed, canonical text, considered to be the authoritative and revealed word of God by the midrashist and his audience, and in which this canonical text is explicitly cited or clearly alluded to."

We can see midrash at work, for example, in the letters of Paul. In Galatians 4:22-28, Paul says the following:

For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by an enslaved woman and the other by a free woman. One, the child of the enslaved woman, was born according to the flesh; the other, the child of the free woman, was born through the promise. Now this is an allegory: these women are two covenants. One woman, in fact, is Hagar, from Mount Sinai, bearing children for slavery. Now Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present Jerusalem, for she is in slavery with her children. But the other woman corresponds to the Jerusalem above; she is free, and she is our mother… Now you, my brothers and sisters, are children of the promise, like Isaac.

Here, Paul addresses the story from Genesis 16-18 of Hagar, a slave with whom Abraham fathers a child, and his wife Sarah who, despite her advanced age, is promised by God that she will bear a son. Paul, as a midrashist exegete, interprets this story such that each character is a symbol with Hagar’s son Ishmael representing those “enslaved” by the law, while Sarah’s son Isaac, is born free and thus represents those gentiles to whom Paul promises salvation apart from the law.

A similar method of exegesis is used in the book of Hebrews to interpret a passage from Psalm 95:7-11:

O that today you would listen to his voice!
Do not harden your hearts…
Therefore in my anger I swore,
“They shall not enter my rest.”

The author of Hebrews writes that if his Christian readers do not harden their hearts “today,” they will be saved and the day of the Messiah’s return will arrive soon.

Early Christian fathers would take this midrashic exegesis and expand on it. The 3rd-century scholar and theologian Origen of Alexandria, for instance, wrote that there were three different senses of biblical interpretation, each appropriate to different levels of understanding. The literal sense was the lowest level, merely reading the narratives and understanding what happened. The moral sense was higher than the literal, a figurative interpretation used to glean ethical lessons from the stories of the Bible. But the highest sense was the spiritual, in which the interpreter read the stories allegorically, often reading Christ and his significance into them, just as Paul had.

Later interpreters added a fourth sense of Scripture which they called the typological. This form of exegesis made connections between the events of Christ's life as told in the Gospels and the well-known stories of the Old Testament.

These categories of biblical exegesis would continue to expand and grow. Protestant German scholars in the 18th century, for instance, used what they called the historical-grammatical method, analyzing the grammatical style of a passage to find the author’s true intent.

There are, of course, many more types of biblical exegesis, far too many to mention, in fact. For that reason, I’ll limit myself to examining just a few modern exegetical techniques.

Biblical Exegesis Methods

Canonical Exegesis

This is one of many theological exegetical approaches to the Bible that looks at the meaning the overall Biblical canon, assumed to be in its divinely-intended final form, has for Christians. Proponents of this method believe that, while the texts themselves are significant, even their order has divine significance, all pointing ultimately to Christ regardless of if a given text explicitly mentions him.

The originator of this approach, Brevard Childs, said the authors of biblical texts had done their best to erase their own “footprints” in their writings, thus leaving behind nothing but God’s inspired word rather than their own human input.

Pre-Critical Exegesis

This approach opposes the modern historical-critical approach which tries — by understanding the time, place, and culture in which a document was written — to understand the true intentions of its author. Instead, pre-critical exegesis maintains that the biblical writings can be taken at face-value and that their divinely-inspired meanings can transcend any original authorial intentions.

In Taking the Long View: Christian Theology in Historical Perspective, David Steinmetz argues for the validity of this type of theological exegesis, saying that pre-critical exegesis rests on “the refusal to bind the meaning of any pericope [biblical passage] to the intention, whether explicit of merely half-formed, of its human author.” The assumption is that God’s inspiration conveys the texts’ true meaning to all readers, far beyond what the original authors could have imagined.

Exegetical Preaching

Like the two methods above, this approach is a theological form of exegesis. Exegetical preaching involves a pastor or priest using one or more methods of exegesis on a passage of Scripture and then revealing that discovered theological meaning to their congregation. Most, if not all, preachers use exegetical preaching unless they somehow ignore Scripture altogether in their sermons.

Textual Exegesis

More commonly known as textual criticism, this historical method attempts to discover the history of a biblical passage or book by analyzing all extant manuscripts to find the most likely original version. It goes without saying that this type of exegesis, to ensure accuracy, has to occur in the original languages.

Bart Ehrman, a long-time textual critic, explains that this has to be done because “we don’t have the originals or copies of the originals but only copies of copies of copies of the originals.” It is the highly technical job of textual exegetes to discover what these original writings said and interpret them accordingly.

Having defined a few current exegetical forms, I’ll now turn to the differences between exegesis and a few other terms with which it is sometimes confused.

Exegesis vs. Eisegesis

Eisegesis is the opposite of exegesis. While exegesis presumes that there is a meaning — theological, historical, or otherwise — inherent in the text, eisegesis (Greek: eis means “into”) involves inserting one’s personal life or conclusions into the text, unsubstantiated by the text’s contents. 

For this reason, eisegesis is often viewed as a mistake by both theological and historical interpreters. From a theological standpoint, biblical exegetes warn that the meanings of Scripture have long been established and bringing in a new, highly-personalized meaning removes that vital authority. From a historical standpoint, eisegesis ignores the scholars who have spent more than a century learning about the context shaping the produced writings, thus omitting key elements.

This method also brings with it the possibility of something called narcigesis. This is a recently coined term, a combination of “narcissism” and “eisegesis.” One Christian website defines it as “the explanation of the Bible in a way that shows excessive interest in oneself and prioritizes one’s own ideas” or “makes it all about oneself.” I can see how this could be a theological concern, but I have to confess that I don’t fully understand the difference between this and plain old eisegesis.

Exegesis vs. Hermeneutics

When we talk about biblical interpretation, these two terms always come up. Since we’ve already discussed the meaning of exegesis, what are hermeneutics? Are the two terms equivalent?

Hermeneutics is the field of study concerned with types of interpretation. It doesn’t only apply to the Bible, but it is essential to biblical interpretation. While exegesis is the actual act of pulling meaning from the text, hermeneutics is the discussion and decision of which method or “lens” will bring the best interpretation.

When examining a Biblical passage I find difficult to understand, I first have to make a hermeneutical decision: What method will I use to interpret this? Paul, in his reading of the Abraham story in Genesis, chose an allegorical method of interpretation. That done, he used it as an exegete to interpret the story of Abraham as referring to Christ and Christians rather than merely as a literal story of a guy with two sons by two women.

Exegesis vs. Exposition

While exegesis is the interpretation of a text, exposition is the explanation one gives, orally or in writing, of their particular interpretation. In my explanation of exegetical preaching above, the exegesis happens while the preacher reads the biblical text. The preaching or writing, explaining the exegesis and its implications to others, is exposition.

Seven Mistakes to Avoid While Doing Exegesis

It should be obvious by this point that I am not a theologian but a historian of Christianity. As such, I acknowledge my bias for historical-critical readings of biblical texts. For this reason, the mistakes I think you should avoid will be based upon historical methods of exegesis. I’m taking these, by the way, from Biblical Exegesis: A Beginner's Handbook by John Hayes and Carl Holladay. It’s an excellent primer for anyone interested in the topic.

When we interpret biblical writings, it’s important to remember that we were not the authors’ intended audience. We are therefore what Hayes and Holladay call “third-party readers,” trying to understand earlier conversations which had nothing to do with our time and place.

Any reading of the Bible in a modern language like English is a translation and, therefore, an interpretation. For English, I highly recommend the NRSV translation, made by teams of reputable scholars well-versed in the ancient biblical languages of Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek.

There is plenty of information out there about the ancient cultures in which these texts were written. Take advantage of free websites like Bible Odyssey and other resources to learn about them.

Read up on the history of the time periods in which biblical texts were written to understand better the authors’ contexts and assumptions.

Some books of the Bible had parts written in different historical eras. The first half of Isaiah, for example, was written in the 6th century BCE while chapters 40-66 were written in the 8th century BCE. These were very different eras and relied on different assumptions and historical situations.

Every manuscript we have of a biblical book is a copy of a copy of a copy, on and on. Fortunately, we have the work of textual critics to help us know what the originals (probably) said.

Even when we read the texts, we’re so accustomed to reading through the lenses of our traditions that we often don’t see what’s really there. I grew up reading the Bible but didn’t realize until grad school that there are two completely different creation stories in Genesis. This is a common experience. Try instead to look at what is really present in the text.

Conclusion

The Bible is a highly complex set of ancient writings. Interpreting it requires several things, no matter your motivation. Exegesis is the act of deriving meaning from biblical texts. Whether you’re looking into the historical context of each writing or merely wanting spiritual inspiration, an exegetical method is a must.

While exegesis has been around almost as long as writing, the forerunner to biblical exegesis was Jewish midrash, a form of spiritually interpreting the Hebrew Bible used by rabbinic Jews and the New Testament authors. Later Christian thinkers would learn from and expand upon it.

Early Christian exegete Origen of Alexandria denoted several senses of interpretation for the Bible. These included the literal, in which the reader merely understood the biblical story as a narrative, the moral, in which ethical lessons were derived from each story, and the spiritual, in which the narrative could be seen as indicating the presence of Christ in history through allegorical interpretation.

Modern exegesis includes historical methods like textual criticism, examining multiple manuscripts of biblical writings to determine what the original might have said. It also concerns theological methods such as the canonical method, which assumes the fixed canon of Scripture was divinely ordained and thus contains all necessary meaning, and pre-critical exegesis, in which readers derive meaning from the text without reference to any perceived intention of the original author.

While discussing exegesis vs. eisegesis, most exegetes agree that eisegesis, the introduction of meaning into the text rather than taking meaning from the textual elements themselves, is ill-advised. Any exegete who reads the Bible carefully, however, will be richly rewarded with an endlessly complex set of ideas and information.