In them ye have life

"Ye search the scriptures because ye think that in them ye have life. But they testify of me."

This is not so much an argument against scriptural authority as it is against a Christ-less reading of Scripture. I think his point is this: "They testify of me; if you're reading them and not getting me, then you're not getting life. I am the life!"

The difference isn't that they turn to a book and we turn to some inward mystical experience; the difference is that they read without understanding and we read with understanding: it's about Jesus Christ. I get that; they didn't. I, in my reading, will get life. Jesus is not standing in front of me today in person as he was for them. Until he returns, this Word, "which testifies of [him]," is the absolute best thing I could have. Peter affirms that the written word is "more sure" than experience and witness, "whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts: Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake [as they were] moved by the Holy Ghost."

Just a thought.