Complex sentence: Midrash exegesis was largely in the nature of homiletics, expounding the Bible not in order to investigate its actual meaning and to understand the documents of the past but to find religious, moral instruction, and sustenance for the thoughts and feelings of the present.
Split into simpler sentences: Midrash exegesis was largely in the nature of homiletics, expounding the Bible not in order to investigate its actual meaning and to understand the documents of the past. This was done to find religious, moral instruction, and sustenance for the thoughts and feelings of the present.