History of the Old Testament and Typology

G. W.H. Lampe believed that the ordinary Bible reader a century ago would have read the account of Isaac's sacrifice as a story about the Father's gift of His only Son for man's salvation. The reader would have seen the real importance of the passage being understood typically or spiritually. Lampe noted that a century ago people thought that Moses was not his own master in the way he wrote, but he was moved and directed by the Holy Spirit. In narrating this episode, he was being guided to write what Lampe calls "a first lesson for a Christian lectionary".

Lampe added that a century ago people would have seen the crossing of the Red Sea as an actual account expressed in type and imagery of the redemption of Christians from bondage to the devil, and of their entry into the inheritance won for them through Christ. Lampe concluded that a century ago people found a coherent pattern running through every part of Scripture; every part of it spoke to them of Christ and of the Christian life. Lampe argued that typology was traditionally understood as the real meaning of the Old Testament, and meaning read into it by the Holy Spirit even though no one in the Old Testament could have understood it. Of course Lampe rejects this whole approach to writing Old Testament Theology. He believes that this kind of typology is old-fashioned and it's no longer to be pursued.

I must agree and disagree with Lampe. In disagreeing, intrinsically, the Bible testifies that it's a book about Jesus. When Christ rose from the dead, He taught those on the road concerning His fulfillment of the Old Testament. Furthermore, the New Testament is obviously about Jesus. The Bible therefore is a book about Jesus, and every verse points to Him in some form or fashion in the "analogy of faith". In agreement, the Old Testament cannot be typed continually as if every verse has a hidden meaning. The goal isn't to act as if the Old Testament has hidden meanings throughout. Though the Old Testament does have hidden meanings, the only way we know this is because of Christ, the Apostles, and other New Testament writers. So, if there are anymore types present in the Old Testament that they did not mention, then we did not need to know them, and they are indiscernible to our uninspired minds. We are filled with the Holy Spirit, but we are not divinely inspired as if our Words have scriptural authority like Christ and the Apostles.