Basic Hermeneutics

Often when we grab an Old testament text, we quickly seek its relevance to us. We read ""Sons I have reared and brought up, But they have revolted against Me. An ox knows its owner, And a donkey its master's manger, But ... My people do not understand" and then say--"look, we as the church are sinful and rebellious." We imagine that Isaiah was a late twentieth century american preacher. But that, obviously, is not the case. And Isaiah had nothing to say to late American churches. Better rather to imagine that we are 8th century (BC) Jews. We must imagine ourselves in their world, seeing through their eyes; smell what the smelled; fear what they feared. Or better yet, with prophets like Isaiah and Jeremiah, we are to imagine ourselves as YHWH, the pain of his people's apostasy, the stench of their unfaithfulness. Before we ask what does it say?" we should ask "What did it say." The first time travel should be us to the past and from the self to the other, not the past to us.