How much Greco-Roman history do you need to know to read your Bible? If you don’t know anything about Ancient Near Eastern legal codes, can you really understand your Old Testament? If someone picked up a Bible at a hotel, would they even be able to understand anything that it claims? While these questions might seem a bit extreme, some rhetoric coming from well-intentioned Christian scholars could very well leave faithful, simple believers with that impression.

The Bible is an ancient document, and it was written to a people who no longer exist. In fact, it was written to a number of different peoples, all of whom no longer exist. Because of this, scholars, pastors, and commentaries love to give us the cultural and historical background. What did first-century Jews think about money or adoption? But is the background information necessary, helpful, or distracting?

My answer is a bit of a cop out. Yes, depending on the text being studied and the background information being used, historical and cultural context can be necessary, helpful, or distracting. On the whole, I think that it is normally helpful. Sometimes, in the rarest of circumstances, it is necessary. When theologians and academics are careless or ideologically driven, it can be distracting or worse. For the rest of this post, I will share some examples from each category. Hopefully these examples can help you get an idea of how you should think about the use of historical and cultural background when interpreting Scripture.

When Is It Helpful?

I find that most of the time, studying the historical and cultural background does not radically change my understanding of a passage. Normally it brings into clearer focus what I already understood the passage to be saying. Sometimes it might highlight a certain part of the text that I hadn’t noticed. In other words, I wasn’t reading Scripture wrongly without the background, but I was able to read it better with the background. I’ve heard the analogy used of watching the Super Bowl on a fuzzy, old-fashioned tube TV vs watching it in Ultra HD. You see the same game, but the second way you see it more clearly. (Technically, this was used as an illustration for using Greek or Hebrew in Bible study, but I’m borrowing the analogy for the current discussion).

Take for example adoption. In America, the word adoption calls up images of small babies being accepted and brought into a family. For us, adoption is about someone who is helpless being embraced by people who want them. This isn’t wrong, but in the ancient world, it wouldn’t have been the main focus. In the ancient world, adoption was normally of adults, and it was normally for inheritance purposes. People were adopted so that they could inherit the estate of their adopted father. Often this would have been a competent servant, or perhaps even someone’s favorite illegitimate son. Nero himself was adopted so that he could be emperor. With this in mind, it’s not surprising that both passages that describe us as being adopted by God (Ephesians 1:5; Romans 8:14-15) also describe us as having an inheritance from God (Ephesians 1:11; Romans 8:16-17).

Other times, background information simply helps a passage come alive. I had always found it a little odd that the disciples said, “Look at these great stones!” when visiting the temple (Mark 13:1). On a recent trip to Israel, I got an up close and personal look at the massive stones that Herod somehow moved great distances and stacked to create an impressive wall surrounding the temple. I stood there with my head tilted all the way back thinking to myself, “Wow, look at those stones!” Suddenly the disciples’ response made sense. Did that change the way I understood the Olivet Discourse? No, but it helped it come alive to me in a new way.

When Is It Necessary?

Although I am hesitant to admit it, I do think there might be some rare cases when knowing the cultural and historical background is necessary to understand a passage. Let me be quick to observe that most of this necessary context is in the Bible itself. Properly understanding the Old Testament prophets, for example, means knowing the history of Israel and Judah. Their messages often assume a knowledge of contemporary political events, all of which happened thousands of years ago from our perspective. Fortunately, we have not one but two accounts of Israel’s history! Might there be other historical documents that shed light on these books? Perhaps, but most if not all of the necessary information is already in the Bible, put there by our wise God to explain the background for careful readers of His Word. We could add to this the explanation of biblical customs, like in Ruth 4:7 or Mark 7:3.

But do we ever need to go outside of the Bible? Once again, I hesitatingly and perhaps somewhat grudgingly acknowledge that yes, there might be such cases. The main example that comes to mind is when translating passages into cultures that don’t have words or concepts in the Bible. What if you are in the desert and no one has seen snow? What if you are in a place where there are no sheep, or for that matter shepherds? In such situations, obviously outside background knowledge will be important and even necessary for understanding God’s Word. In my personal study, however, I have found very few instances where that has been the case for me. Normally, the meaning of a passage is not going to totally change because of something I learn about the cultural or historical setting of a text.

When Is It Distracting?

Sometimes the historical and cultural background can be distracting. This happens in a number of ways. First, people can just straight up get the historical and cultural background wrong. For many years it was popular to say that the “eye of a needle” was a gate in the walls of Jerusalem that required a camel to remove everything and get on its knees to pass through. This was used to help explain Jesus’ statement that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 19:23-24). The resulting image is powerful. In order to enter the kingdom of heaven, wealthy people must remove everything else that they might be holding onto and get on their knees. The only problem? It’s totally made up. We have zero historical evidence of a gate called the eye of a needle. The point is not that a rich man must humble himself, the point is that it is impossible. Camels can’t go through the eye of a needle, because camels are large animals and the eye of a needle is something you put a single thread through. But “with God, all things are possible” (19:26).

On other occasions, the problem is that while the historical or cultural background is technically accurate, it is used to distort the obvious meaning of a passage. For example, some try to wiggle free of Paul’s clear injunctions that a woman should not teach or exercise spiritual authority over men by appealing to the historical context (1 Timothy 2:12). Timothy was serving in Ephesus, we are reminded. And in Ephesus, there was a cult of Artemis that strongly emphasized the leadership of women. Therefore, Paul’s injunction against female leadership was not a blanket instruction for all time, but was directed at abuses of leadership by women in Ephesus because of the pagan cult.

Now, that historical background may all be true. I’m not saying there wasn’t a cult of Artemis, and I’m not saying that this cult didn’t influence the young church. I am saying that Paul never discussed this. Paul grounds his command in creation – God created Adam first, and furthermore Eve was deceived (1 Timothy 2:13-14). To try and limit Paul’s instructions to a specific situation cuts against what he himself is clearly doing. The background isn’t wrong, but is being asked to do more than it legitimately can.

Finally, cultural and historical background can give the impression that if you don’t know a bunch of things in addition to the Bible, you can never really know your Bible. I’m not opposed to biblical scholarship. I have learned much and been greatly helped by biblical scholarship. But sometimes I find myself muttering towards biblical scholars the words of Job: “No doubt you are the people, and wisdom will die with you” (Job 12:2). If we’re not careful, scholars can become the new priestly class who explain to you what your Bible is actually saying. We wouldn’t want normal Christians going around thinking they can understand the Bible without the help of a scholar.

The Conclusion of the Matter

So what is the point of this long, somewhat meandering post? I would say there are two truths that I’m trying to keep in tension here. First, you can study the Bible. You don’t need to be an expert, you don’t need hundreds of dollars of resources, the ordinary Christian who works the day shift at Costco can go home, open their Bible, and understand what they are reading. At the same time, you will often be helped if you can dig into the background a little. There are many tools available, including print and online resources, sermons, hopefully a good pastor and/or spiritual mentor, and a host of videos and podcasts. Choose good resources, but once you’ve done that use those resources.

So will the historical and cultural background be a help or hindrance to your study of God’s Word? A help, if used correctly, and a hindrance, if asked to do too much. The most important context is the context of Scripture itself, but other details can help us fill in the picture a little more. So above all, read your Bible. And if you can, poke around a little into the background of the passage. What you find just might help the text become a little clearer.

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Ben Hicks is the Associate Pastor at Colonial Hills Baptist Church in Indianapolis. This article originally appeared on his Substack.