Many of the problems we deal with in life relate to the problem of interpretation. We misinterpret our bodily appetites and satisfy cravings in a less than optimal way, eating too much or engaging in sexual immorality when our needs and longings can be more effectively fulfilled in less damaging ways. We misinterpret the behaviors and conversation of others, failing to note the context the message was made, or failing to distinguish the tone of a message or the rationale for the behavior. We get caught up in the moment so much that we forget to make our intentions and standards and boundaries clear, leading to frustration and difficulty later on. We read texts and interact with media and fail to properly screen the material for bias and inefficient jargon that has been added to a message to give it a gravity and weight that it does not bear on the basis of its own naked and unaided arguments, thus giving incentive to others to engage in dishonest rhetoric. We fail to distinguish in our mind that which we know from our own isolated anecdotal experience, that which has a solid basis in faith or empirical evidence, and that which has no more firm basis in reality than the airy castles in the clouds I imagined as a daydreaming child. We are led astray by our longings, our hopes, our fears, our doubts, and so it is natural for us to look askance on interpretation and consider it somehow less than legitimate on those few occasions when we can actually discern that interpretation is going on.

Yet interpretation is continually necessary in our lives, and this appears to be an inescapable facet of our existence, for a variety of reasons. It is worthwhile at least to tackle this necessity so that we can properly recognize how ubiquitous interpretation is in our lives and properly appreciate its value. At an essential level, everything we have to work with in this world is based on interpretation. Our interaction with the outside world, even with regards to sense data, is itself indirect. What we see, for example, comes into our eyes, and what falls into the visible spectrum and not in the blind spots are sent on through the optic nerve into the brain, which recombines what we see into a picture, subject to various assumptions as to what is background what is the figure that we are looking at. There is a whole class of optical illusions that take advantage of the processes by which the mind makes sense of the world around us to give us something that looks plausible but that which we know to be impossible. Other classes of optical tricks show us occasions where there is an ambiguity as to what we are looking at which leads us to possibly see the same picture two or more ways, and where the way our mind works can itself be determined indirectly through the interpretation that is given to the ambiguous images. Our other senses work much the same, where our various sensory organs take certain data points and send that information through nerves to the brain, and where an interpretation is given almost instantaneously (this soup is too salty, the window is cold, the music is too loud, for example). At every level, the level of sensitivity we have to certain stimuli can dramatically affect the interpretation that we give. Damage to sensory organs can make it impossible to come to interpretations at all. For example, one of my aunts had such severe nose damage due to a car accident than she has no sense of smell or taste and all because the nerves responsible for those senses are no longer able to send information to the brain, which can make eating food more dangerous because the usual clues that help keep us safe that come from food are absent.

What is true for the sensory data that we take in from the world extends to other areas of life as well. Anything that our mind thinks of is itself interpretation. Our emotions, which we often interpret from physiological reactions to people or situations, are also interpretations. At times our thoughts and feelings and actions may be appropriate, but at times they may not be. Those of us, for example, that labor through existence with the repercussions and consequences of trauma often have extremely sensitive responses to sudden touch or people coming from behind us, while for others without such burdens this may be funny or amusing. The context of our life experiences helps us determine when we feel unsafe or threatened, and may make our experience in the world full of a lot more danger and worry and anxiety than those whose experiences have been less painful and traumatic. These feelings are certainly real, in that they have physical consequences, but they may not be in accordance with the reality of the situation. Both oversensitivity and undersensitivity have their risks and dangers. Yet the feelings and thoughts and beliefs by which we operate are themselves based on interpretations that we make, or that we accept from others around us. They are real insofar as they reflect our own internal reality, but our ability to understand the world outside is itself fraught with considerable risk and bias that we are often unable to recognize. This is also true to everyone else, and having a good idea of the perspectives that others bring, insofar as we can actually determine this, will help us to act in ways that will best communicate our intentions and our own internal reality to them, so as to communicate concern effectively but not to spread unnecessary alarm.

Yet it is in communication where our reliance upon interpretation is perhaps most obvious. What we think and feel and believe must be communicated to others through body language, through tone, and through symbolic communication (words, pictures, and the like). Interpretation is required in profound ways to try to set down what message is being sent, and what it means. A wide variety of models of communication seek to demonstrate the processes and components of that relationship between the sender, the message, and the recipient, and what interpretations are valid about that process. At every step of the way the possibility of error is present, whether it is in the nature of an honest misunderstanding or more deliberate attempts at deception, whether of ourselves or others. And yet we have no choice but to rely on communication if we want to understand what is going on with others, for it is through their behavior, their tone, and their spoken and written words, that we have any basis for understanding what is going on in their minds and hearts, and how we then are to respond to that which we can see. This necessity of communication, and the inherent flaws and imperfections and corruptibility of that communication, mean that any attempts in this world to gain a total understanding of ourselves and others is likely to be in vain, even if we seek through our technology to take advantage of more and more sense data, subject of course to more and more interpretation of that which is beyond our ability to directly sense.

Given that we need to interpret, and that this process is subject to error, there are at least a few implications that we should readily understand. The first is that our need to interpret forecloses the possibility of absolute knowledge as human beings. In both social and physical phenomena, for example, the fact that we observe something has an effect on what we observe. At times, in fact, we may not be able to know all of the pertinent qualities of a given phenomenon because that which it takes to record one quality may itself preclude the knowledge of the other. Uncertainty is an intrinsic aspect of our existence, and where there is uncertainty, we must find some way of grasping the limitations of perception and understanding. The reality of bounds to our understanding itself ought to carry with it consequences in our own behavior and our judgment of ourselves and others. If we are placed in a world that we cannot fully understand, with senses that are subject to immense frailty and error, and where communication is challenging because of the possibility of errors at every step of the way, this ought to be taken into account when we look at ourselves and others. We ought to be humble about our own understanding, seeing the great extent to which we labor in ignorance and uncertainty. The expansion of frontiers only increases what is there to be known and recognized, and gives us still more to be ignorant of or deceived about, and so there is no room for arrogance in our accounting for our own understanding of ourselves or our world. So much of how we see the world is based in what we have been taught, and there are both innocent and malevolent errors in much of that. Our humility about ourselves ought also to lead to mercy and compassion for others, seeing as others labor under the same conditions that we do. Seeing that we cannot avoid uncertainty, we therefore ought to give, where possible, benefit of the doubt. We ought not, at any rate, to present unnecessary barriers to being understood. If we use difficult language, let us speak clearly enough that the words we use may be looked up in dictionaries, or that the point we are making may be understood in context if not every part of it is clear to understand. Let us not aim to deceive, at any rate.

At times, it may be hard to determine any meaning that a text can have that makes any sense. This happens most often when the sender themselves does not have a clear grasp of what they are trying to communicate or the language or form in which they are trying to communicate. For example, as a sixth grade student I attempted to draw a beautiful horse eating grass on a hill, and ended up drawing an ugly and deformed horse on a blighted lunarscape. The drawing won an award for best surrealist drawing, but entirely failed to communicate my intent, turning what was meant as a beautiful and pleasant picture into something that was ugly and quite honestly a bit disturbing. At other times, too many meanings may come from a given text. Quite frequently, for example, when I write about conceptual and theoretical matters, I have several meanings and layers of text immediately in mind, because all are applicable to the given subject at hand. There are, in addition to the intended layers of meaning, other layers of meaning that are not intentional but that are permissible layers of meaning because they also apply. In addition to this, there are also layers of meaning that not only are not intended, but that are expressly not legitimate and permissible readings of the text and which do violence to its intents and purposes. Yet just because a given interpretation is specifically forbidden does not mean that it will not be seen in a text, especially if a reader views a text with an unfriendly interpretation, as can occasionally be the case. When we judge a text, we do so in light of our own worldviews, our own belief systems, our own experiences, and these will differ from that of the original author of the text. Just as our own humility helps us take ourselves less seriously (at least theoretically), so to our knowledge of the differences between where we stand and where others stand ought to make us more compassionate and less judgmental of others, seeing as they are beings who labor under various pressures and misunderstandings just as we do. As we seek mercy for ourselves, so also we ought to be merciful to others.

How then, do we interpret better? First, let our humility and graciousness allow us to interpret kinder, while also leaving us open to future data that would allow us to change our interpretations in the light of future information, or the fact that people change (even in unfriendly ways, sometimes). After setting a bias for the good (and intentionally so), let us then seek to gather perspective that allows us, like a painter, to better understand that which is in view. This perspective can be gained from viewing someone over time and seeing whether they are consistent, as well as examining the accounts of many people who view the same person or phenomenon, to see if there are either consistent records or a wide variance that suggests a difficulty in correctly understanding what is being viewed. We may ourselves be difficult to understand because we do not show enough of ourselves, or because untangling and appreciating the layers of our existence requires more time and effort than most people are willing to give, no matter how willing we are to share ourselves with them. Ultimately, we are not the judges of others, or even of ourselves. Yet we will be judged in large part on how willing we are to act kindly and graciously to others, and to serve their needs such as we understand them. We may never be able to understand ourselves fully, or interpret what others say perfectly, but love covers a multitude of errors, and also motivates us to make them in a less systematically flawed way. If it is unreasonable for others to expect perfection from such imperfect beings as we are, at least it should be reasonable that they should expect us to be honest, considerate, and decent. God willing, that will be enough for us to communicate that which most needs to be said, and maybe even, at some point, to receive the sort of message we particularly long to hear, even if we must long wait in vain.