Many efforts in Biblical interpretation seek to stress the unity of scripture. This means that there is a focus on seeing a singular plan across the entire story, from Genesis to Revelation. Often, such readings emphasise an overarching scheme or plan for history, reaching its fulfillment in the arrival of Jesus. This concept of a unifying design often then leads to the emphasis on unifying ideas. The understanding is then that the Bible must have absolute unity/consistency in its beliefs in order to be a reliable source of information.

However, there are numbers of occasions in the Bible where there are differences in language, opinion, perspective, circumstance and even theology, or belief about God! This is because the Bible is written over a substantial range of time periods and cultures, and that the authors of Hebrew Scripture, in particular, did not know about many of the events of the New Testament. 

This may seem a radical claim, especially if you come from a faith tradition that considers God as the author of scripture. However, despite the often-quoted 2 Timothy 3:16 being used as a proof-statement, there is no statement that God literally planned and dictated the text of the Bible, in the same way that Islam believes the Qu'ran was dictated to Mohammad. Rather, the point is that inspired scripture comes from God. It doesn't matter that it was written by diverse people in diverse ways, with diverse views. What we have can be considered inspired. Therefore, value and learning can be found regardless of factual matter or internal agreement.

On this page, we will discuss some of the ways in which the Bible has been received and read by Christians.