Sola Scriptura (Scripture Alone) is an indisputable doctrine in Christianity. If a Christian has no access to a Church, but access to a Bible, that Christian has everything he needs to learn the Christian faith. A small group of Christians, isolated from the rest of the world, yet in possession of a Bible, has everything they need for a complete Christian life.
Not so, says the Catholic Church. Although the Bible is inspired by God, it is not to be privately interpreted. Rather, the job of Biblical interpretation belongs exclusively to the Catholic Church.
One verse they ironically use to prove this is 2 Peter 1:20. Depending on the translation*, it says some variation of "...no prophecy of scripture is of any private interpretation". Catholics usually start and finish in 2 Peter 1:20, hoping they have their opponents dead to rights with it. However, a good habit to get into when reading scripture is to never read just one verse. There are so many heresies based on just one verse, and this is because very few verses should realistically be taken alone. Even the famous John 3:16 can be twisted with enough force.
So, what do we do here? Back up a few verses until it seems wise to stop (modern Bibles are helpful enough to include headings, which very often give you the right idea), and read past the verse in question until, once again, it seems wise to stop. In this case, the heading "The Trustworthy Prophetic Word", at least in my HCSB, begins at verse 16, and verse 21 ends the entire chapter. So, what happens when we read from verses 16-21? To be generous to the Catholic, I will be quoting the NABRE, as this is a Catholic translation.
"We did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we had been eyewitnesses of his majesty. For he received honor and glory from God the Father when that unique declaration came to him from the majestic glory, “This is my Son, my beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” We ourselves heard this voice come from heaven while we were with him on the holy mountain. Moreover, we possess the prophetic message that is altogether reliable. You will do well to be attentive to it, as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. >Know this first of all, that there is no prophecy of scripture that is a matter of personal interpretation,< for no prophecy ever came through human will; but rather human beings moved by the holy Spirit spoke under the influence of God."
The first thing to note here is that a lot of translations (and certainly 5 of the 8 I use for study) have several grammatical clues that verse 20 was never intended to be taken alone. Whether it be the beginning of the verse lacking a capital letter, the end of the verse having a comma, or, in the case of the NKJV, both, the verse itself usually clues the reader in to the fact that this is not necessarily a complete sentence. As you can see above, this is the case even with the NABRE, which ends in a comma. In other words, even if one is not studious enough to get into the habit of reading more than one verse, most translations should give the reader the impression that they ought to take verses 19 and 21 into account, at the very least.
But when we do that, the Catholic case falls apart. Peter isn't telling people not to study the scriptures for themselves, and to instead allow the Catholic Church to do their thinking for them. Rather, he is saying that the prophets, when they gave a prophecy, were not speaking of their own accord. The prophecies of scripture (v20) are the written record of what men spoke under inspiration of the Holy Spirit (v21), which we possess and would do well to heed (v19). When we back up even further to verses 16-18, we see that Peter is using this as justification for his own inspiration, as well as that of the other Apostles. In other words, contrary to the Catholic misquote of 2 Timothy 3:15, the New Testament is equal in authority and inspiration to the Old.
And what does the Old Testament say about reading the scriptures? Quite a bit, actually. Deuteronomy 6:6-7 is an especially powerful verse: "Take to heart these words which I command you today. Keep repeating them to your children. Recite them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you get up." Really? Not only were the Israelites to individually learn the words of the law, but teach it to their children?
Possible Catholic objection: Back up to verse 4, you will see that this only refers to the commandment "Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone! Therefore, you shall love the Lord, your God, with your whole heart, and with your whole being, and with your whole strength."
Simple response: Back up to verse 1 and read the whole passage, you will see that this refers to all that the Lord has commanded, "so that you, that is, you, your child, and your grandchild, may fear the Lord, your God, by keeping, as long as you live, all his statutes and commandments which I enjoin on you, and thus have long life."
By far the best passage for understanding the layman's role in interpreting the scriptures is Psalm 119. It's quite a long one (in fact, it is the longest Psalm), but it is impossible to come away from this with the idea that the scriptures cannot be understood by the layman. A choice extract from it would be verses 97 to 104: "How I love your law, Lord! I study it all day long. Your commandment makes me wiser than my foes, as it is forever with me. I have more insight than all my teachers, because I ponder your testimonies. I have more understanding than my elders, because I keep your precepts. I keep my steps from every evil path, that I may observe your word. From your judgments I do not turn, for you have instructed me. How sweet to my tongue is your promise, sweeter than honey to my mouth! Through your precepts I gain understanding; therefore I hate all false ways."
But if there is any doubt that the Psalmist, who understands more than his enemies, his teachers, and his elders, is a simple man, let us continue to verses 129-130: "Wonderful are your testimonies; therefore I keep them. The revelation of your words sheds light, gives understanding to the simple." The simple, by the word of God, gain understanding. Can the scriptures get more clear than to literally tell you that the simple can gain understanding from them? Knowing just those two little extracts from a 176 verse Psalm, which is literally filled with stuff like that, could a Catholic read it and say "amen"?
No one who tells you the Bible cannot be interpreted by the individual is worth listening to. There are only two possibilities. The first is that they are knowingly false teachers, who want to discourage you from testing them against the scriptures because they know they could not stand that test. The second is that they are deceived by such teachers, and so they know more about their false doctrines than about the scriptures they have also been discouraged from studying.
I shall leave you with the words of John: "Let what you heard from the beginning remain in you. If what you heard from the beginning remains in you, then you will remain in the Son and in the Father. And this is the promise that he made us: eternal life. I write you these things about those who would deceive you. As for you, the anointing that you received from him remains in you, so that you do not need anyone to teach you. But his anointing teaches you about everything and is true and not false; just as it taught you, remain in him. And now, children, remain in him, so that when he appears we may have confidence and not be put to shame by him at his coming. If you consider that he is righteous, you also know that everyone who acts in righteousness is begotten by him." (1 John 2:24-29).
*In hindsight, I should have used the NABRE even in the original image in order to be generous to the Catholic, but I used the KJV because the Catholic who originally inspired this article said it is his personal preference.