Paul's Use of the Old Testament: Context of Miscontext?

In the book of Romans, like the rest of his writings, Paul draws on several Old Testament sources to make a point. While he seems familiar enough with books like Psalms, Isaiah, Hosea, or Jeremiah to quote them, his USE of singular verses to support his points sometimes leave us more confused than when we STARTED reading his letters.

Of course, Paul isn't the only one who does this! The Gospels, general epistles, and apocalyptic writings all pull out single, Old Testament verses to illustrate or support things that don't always make sense to modern readers.

On Truth Be Told, we spend A LOT of time making sure we get the context right when interpreting a section of scripture. I'm constantly saying things like: read the verses before and after, understand the line of reasoning from the whole chapter, go read the whole BOOK if you have to - ALWAYS read things in context.

So, what do we do with this fact that the New Testament writers feel perfectly comfortable plucking one single verse out of an Old Testament writing and applying it somewhere else we wouldn't expect if this isn't how WE should be studying our Bible?

Do these guys just get a pass because they were important, or is something else going on here?

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