Long response that want to qualify, that something is not there, is just a waste. Good luck.
I’ll be sure to keep them all long from now on. 
I remember Bhante outlining this in a class I took with him. It is very similar to a traditional Christian approach I was taught:
- Literal/Historical
- Moral
- Allegorical
- Anagogical
Now, of course, there is a big battle between traditional Christian approaches to scripture and the historical-critical methods that arised over the last couple centuries.
I would love to be able to apply a historical-critical approach to Buddhist suttas, but that apparatus hasn’t really been developed yet within Buddhist scholarship. After reading the sutta I look around on this site and online to see if anything has been written that helps set the sutta within this historical-critical context. I want to find anything I can that will help me understand the sutta as it was understood when it was written. A lot of the value I find in the suttas is they challenge contemporary categories of thought we may take for granted.
After understanding the sutta as best as I can on its own terms, I ask if it has anthing I need to consider in my life and practice.
First, I ask myself if I believe the claims made in the sutta. If the sutta, for example, makes claims of supernatural powers, I ask myself if I believe those claims are factual, allegorial, or the product of hagiography.
On a personal level practice level, I ask if I have direct experience with what the sutta is discussing. In cases where I find I have direct experience the suttas come across as very precise. When the suttas are discussing things that involve practitioners further on the path than me, I try to avoid theorizing on what it saying about those later steps.
On a moral level, I ask if the sutta is recommeding an ethical approach to life in general or to a given situation. I try to fully understand what ethics the sutta advocates and why, and then I decide if I agree with those ethics and want to incorporate them into my life.
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