A good Bible Knowledge answer reports what the passage says and what the syllabus teaches about it. A personal ruling is a sentence about what people must or must not do in daily life, and it needs its own support that the question rarely asks for.
This lesson belongs to narrative and teaching in the Bible Knowledge subject guide.
What counts as curriculum explanation?
Curriculum explanation is anything you can trace back to the passage or to a topic your syllabus lists. You could put your finger on the line, or on the heading in your notes.
A ruling has no such line. It starts with words like “so Christians must always” or “it is wrong to ever”, and the claim reaches further than the passage does.
Worked example: one question, two answers
Take the well-known story of the Samaritan who helps an injured traveller (Luke 10:25-37). Your teacher may have assigned a different prescribed passage, but the method is the same for any passage.
Question (4 marks): Explain why Jesus tells this story to the man who asked who his neighbour is.
Answer A, text-based:
- The man asks who his neighbour is (verse 29), so Jesus answers with a story instead of a definition.
- A priest and a Levite see the injured traveller and pass by on the other side (verses 31 and 32).
- The Samaritan stops, treats the wounds and pays for the inn (verses 33 to 35).
- Jesus then asks which of the three was a neighbour, and the man answers “the one who showed mercy” (verses 36 and 37).
Answer B, with a ruling added:
The first three points are the same, but the last line reads: “So every Christian must give money to anyone who asks for help, otherwise they are disobeying Jesus.”
Nothing in the passage says “every”, “anyone who asks” or “disobeying”. The Samaritan helped one person in front of him. The ruling sounds devout, yet it earns no mark and may cost one if the marker reads it as an unsupported claim.
The three-question test
Run this on any sentence before you write it.
- Can I point to a verse or a syllabus topic for this exact claim?
- Does my sentence use “every”, “always”, “never” or “must” more strongly than the source does?
- Am I answering the question asked, or a different question about how people should live?
If the answer to the first is no, or the second is yes, rewrite the sentence as a report. “Jesus ends by telling the man to go and do likewise (verse 37)” is a report. “Everyone must do likewise in every situation” is a ruling.
When the question does ask about application
Some questions ask you to explain how a teaching shows up in daily life. Here application is part of the task.
Keep it tied to the teaching and keep it modest. “Showing mercy to a person in need, as the Samaritan did” follows the passage. A list of rules for everyone does not.
The mistake to watch
Students often add a closing sentence because it feels like a proper ending. The marks are in the body, and the last line is where rulings creep in.
Finish on your last piece of evidence instead. Four supported points beat three supported points and one opinion.
Check yourself
Question: Explain one reason the priest and the Levite are mentioned in the story. Below are two candidate sentences. Which one is a curriculum explanation and which is a ruling? Rewrite the ruling.
- “They pass by on the other side, which shows the traveller received no help from those expected to give it (verses 31 and 32).”
- “Religious leaders must always be the first to help, and any who refuse have failed their faith.”
Answer
Sentence 1 is the curriculum explanation. It uses the verses and claims only what they show.
Sentence 2 is a ruling. “Must always” and “have failed their faith” go beyond the story.
A rewrite: “The priest and the Levite see the traveller and pass by, which sets up the contrast with the Samaritan who stops (verses 31 to 33).”
What to study next
Keep practising on the narrative and teaching practice set, then read how to distinguish speaker, audience and purpose in a passage.
If you want a teacher to review your answers line by line, see online one-to-one Bible Knowledge tuition.