Interpreting the bible without training is a bit like finding a
specific address in a foreign city with neither map nor knowledge of
the language. You might stumble across the right answer, but in the
meantime you've put yourself at the mercy of every ignoramus in town,
with no way of telling the savant from the fool. Finding your way
through the English Bible, you're entirely under the tyranny of the
translators.
-- Laurie R. King A Monstrous Regiment of Women
p.53-54