Bonus Episode: Jennifer Garcia Bashaw & Aaron Higashi - Nobody “Just Reads” the Bible
This is a teaser of our February 2026 bonus episode! In this episode of The Bible for Normal People, Pete and Jared are joined by longtime friends of the podcast Jennifer Garcia Bashaw and Aaron Higashi for a lively conversation about, of all things, interpreting the Bible. Together, they explore metaphors that celebrate the diversity of biblical interpretation, wrestle with the complexities of relativism, and invite listeners to move beyond inerrancy toward a more expansive, life-giving view of Scripture.
Want to hear the rest of the episode? Join our online community the Society of Normal People and you'll get access to our library of over 50 classes, bonus episodes, exclusive scholar Q&As, and a community asking tough questions about the Bible and faith. Head to www.thebiblefornormalpeople.com/join and become a member of SoNP for as little as $12/month and support us as we bring the best in biblical scholarship to everyday people.
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[Bible] Bonus Episode: Jennifer Garcia Bashaw & Aaron Higashi - Nobody “Just Reads” the Bible - Transcript
Pete: You're listening to The Bible for Normal People, the only God-ordained podcast on the internet. I'm Pete Enns.
Jared: And I'm Jared Byas
On today's episode of the Bible for Normal People, we're talking about how no one just reads the Bible with Dr. Jennifer Garcia Bashaw and Dr. Aaron Higashi.
Together, they have a book on how to interpret the Bible called Serving Up Scripture. If you've been around The Bible for Normal People for very long, you'll know that both Aaron and Jennifer are former nerds-in-residence, and we're very excited to welcome them back to the podcast as our guests today.
Pete: Right. Well, let's get into the episode.
Jared: All right. Well, welcome Jennifer and Aaron to the podcast. It is great to have you. You are friends of the podcast. You've been around, we've talked about the Bible with you guys so many times, but we haven't done it quite like this. We're excited to have you on.
Jennifer: Thanks. I'm excited to be here.
Pete: Great.
Well, you know, listen, you guys have an approach to biblical interpretation that uses cooking. Of all things, cooking, as sort of a driving metaphor, and I, I, first of all, I find that very interesting and very compelling. Um, but what, um, what, what are you trying to solve? You know, what, what, what, what are you, what is it doing for you in terms of just your whole approach to biblical interpretation?
Aaron: Uh, it does a bunch of things for us. I mean, the, the primary reason that we're using cooking as a metaphor is because it helps shed light on parts of the interpretive process that are otherwise very difficult to speak about. Um, if you think about biblical interpretation as a matter of following rules, then it's very difficult to understand why an interpreter's experience, their history, their preferences, their upbringing matters in the interpretive process.
Just follow the rules. That's all you gotta do. But when we talk about interpretation like cooking, uh, it becomes much more evident that a person's upbringing is gonna matter. Their tastes matter, their culture matters. The ingredients that they have available to them matters. And so too, when we interpret your experiences growing up matter, the context in which your interpreting matters, your personal tastes and biases, all those things are gonna factor into your interpretation.
And similarly how, uh, describing interpretation as cooking also helps us make sense of why people interpret the same passage differently, again, in comparison to rule following. If we interpret the Bible by following rules, then differences between different people's approaches or different results and interpretation can only be because someone failed to follow the rules.
They did something wrong. How dare you not correctly follow the rules? You made an error. But if we talk about biblical interpretation in terms of cooking, then of course there are lots of reasons why people are gonna prepare different dishes on different occasions, or even take the same basic ingredient and prepare it in different ways for different people.
So too, when we interpret the Bible, there are reasons why people take the same passage and read it in different ways on different occasions. So it, it gives us a lot of ways to get at things that are happening under the hood of interpretation so that people can become aware of those and take control of them in their own lives.
Jared: Well, let's maybe back up then, and, and you, I wanna make sure I'm getting clear on this because. You use the, the idea of cooking and then when I, when you said different people do it different ways, I was thinking of like recipes where it's like, well, no, those kind of are like rules. Like if you, you know, you need this much of this ingredient, and if you do that consistently, you get the same thing.
But you were talking about it in the broader sense of your tastes being different. So I wanna tie that in a little bit to biblical interpretation, because I think a lot of people have heard. Other people say, you know, we don't interpret the Bible, we just read it.
Um, what's the difference between that and why is it important for people to recognize that they're interpreting the Bible? Meaning, why is it important for people to realize that this is about taste and all these contexts matter, not just follow the recipe and you get the exact results? Um, so talk about how interpretation works.
Jennifer: Well, the biggest problem with interpretation is that most people don't know they're doing it or they say we're just reading the Bible. Um, but they're really interpreting. Um, and so what we're trying to do is get them to be more aware of the whole process of interpretation and what is going on in the back of their brains, um, from their history.
And their experiences and their culture, um, so that they know that, oh, we actually are interpreting. And I think talking about cooking, um, is a way to help people understand, oh, we bring so much into the kitchen when we're cooking, like our experiences and our family life and things like that. And so if they can make that connection, then people can realize, oh, I'm not just reading the Bible.
Nobody just reads the Bible. They are interpreting it.
Jared: Right. So maybe to extend that metaphor so I can make sure I understand. The recipe, sure, that's like you follow these, but kind of what recipes you use. How often you as a family, you know, our family, we have like the same couple of things every week where another family, they would never have that.
That's all kind of part of it. It's not so much that, you know, we're not saying there aren't particular ways or tools of interpretation, it's just that there's other ingredients in the mix and you're bringing all that to it.
Aaron: Yeah. I mean, even, even when we cook with a recipe or bake with a recipe, um, you can ask questions about why the recipe is set up that way.
Pete: Mm-hmm.
Aaron: Or where that recipe came from. You know, if you inherit like your grandparents' bread recipe, for example, um, you can follow the instructions and get the result, but that's not gonna tell you out of the culture, out of which that came from. Why do they have access to the particular ingredients that they had access to?
Why is it set up to taste a particular way? Um, so even there, even in following a recipe, you lose some of the information about why it was put together in the way that it was. Same too, if you try and interpret the Bible by following rules. You follow the same rules as somebody else. You're gonna get a similar result, but you're still cut off from all that culture and history that gave you the recipe to begin with.
Pete: Mm-hmm. Right?
Aaron: In fact, you, you, you, you, you forget that there's a recipe there and that comes from a particular time and place, and that makes it very difficult to then change the recipe. For example, if the recipe starts making something that's hurting you and your community and you're like, I've, so all I can do is make things according to the recipe.
Because you've forgotten that it comes from a place. But when you're reminded of that, then you can say, you know what? We need to change this recipe. We need to make it healthier. We need to improve upon it. We need to do something.
Jared: So one, one more clarification on this before we move on from this idea.
I'm not sure I heard, uh, clearly. What's the difference between interpreting and just reading it? Because I do, again, like you said, I think for a lot of people, they just don't have that awareness that that's what they're doing. Like what is the activity of interpreting? And how is that different than I just, I just read it.
Aaron: Uh, ostensibly, when a person is just reading, they're not active in the process. They're just pointing to the words on the page, and when they're interpreting, they're active in the process. So when a person says they're just reading, they're trying to disavow any role that they're playing in the process.
In the book, we talk about how interpretation is a matter of asking questions of the text. Sometimes these are very basic narrative questions, like, you know, who is the main character here? What are they doing? What's gonna happen next? What happened before? Uh, but they can also be much more sophisticated questions about genre and rhetorical style or theological questions about who is God here?
Who is God here for me versus who is God here for the original audience? Ideological questions like, what's the relationship between power and gender, or race and class? So there are a whole set of, uh, questions that we can bring to the text, but when people say they're just reading, they're either ignorant of the fact that they are choosing which questions to ask, or they're intentionally lying about the fact that they're choosing which questions to ask of the text.
Pete: Mm-hmm.
Aaron: It's either ignorance or malice. Now, either way it's not good, but we want people to be aware that they are in fact making choices about which questions to bring to the text, both so that they can. Ask those questions better and so that they feel empowered to ask different questions if they're so inclined.
Pete: Well, let me, um, I just, this is a curious thing for me, and I don't know if you guys have any insights on this, but like, who would ever actually think I'm just reading it, you know, like, where did that idea, I don't think we do that with most anything else, but when it comes to the Bible, all of a sudden it's, it's clear, it's plain, there's no interpretation needed.
Do you have any thoughts about where that idea might have arisen? I don't mean what century or specifically, just like what sort of mentality would create an idea like that?
Jennifer: I mean, I think it has to do with the idea of tradition that when we, like we're listening to pastors or we're listening to what people tell us, um, something is, um, it gets sort of solidified in their brain.
And so they think they're reading something. And this has been, I mean, the case since pastors and priests have been interpreting scripture. So it's been through all of history. They just hear, they hear what people, what people, uh, tell them that are their authority figures. Um, and then when they start actually reading it, you know, printing press and all of that, then they just assume that that is what it says.
What is already has already been taught to them. So that's, I feel like that's been going on for a really long time.
Jared: And also, I, I think you, you maybe can't divorce. I don't know what you guys think about this, but you can't divorce, I think, um, a certain way of thinking about the Bible from this idea as well, which is if we're getting absolute or universal truth from the text, there's no variation on that.
And so. What's in, what's inerrant or what is without error, is the text itself not an interpretation? So I think it adds a layer of complexity to admit that we are interpreting, because now we have to cast suspicion on the interpretation. It's like, well if the, if the text is inerrant that is safe and gives us this security, but if we're saying, okay, but that's locked away from us and somebody has to interpret the text, we're not gonna go as far as to say somebody's interpretation is inherent. So then we're kind of cut off from that inherent text we're, it's like, well, that's fine and good.
We have an inherent text, but we can't, we don't have access to it. 'cause somebody's gotta interpret it and that person's gonna be fallible.
Pete: Unless you’re Roman Catholic. I don't mean that in a funny way. I just mean that that's sort of the safeguard.
Jared: Well, I think the Roman Catholic tradition has recognized that and, uh, kind of created traditions to account for it, where I feel like in the evangelical tradition.
Pete: Coming outta the reformation.
Jared: Yeah, you can, can't really say that. So I don't know. I, that's just me thinking off the top of my head, but I feel like there's something that we need to just read it.
Pete: Mm-hmm.
Jared: To make it clear. Because other ways we have to admit that there is something between the text and me that isn't inerrant.
Mm-hmm. And that throws the whole system outta whack, I feel like.
Jennifer: It makes the process and the Bible so human.
Jared: Yeah.
Jennifer: And that's scary to people. They want it to be divine.
