Hard core fundamentalist right wing christens have been pushing for years the idea that one must take a literal interpretation of the Bible if one is to be considered a “true christen.” You must take every single word, every story, every paragraph and line, to be absolute, literal truth or else you are nothing but a false believer who merely pays lip service to a religion you do not really believe. Many times I have pointed out the flaws in interpreting the Bible in such a way only to be told to leave and return when I have “reexamined my beliefs.” It’s sad, really, to look at the Bible in such a simple and straight forward manner instead of trying to pry the deeper meanings out of the words of God. To take the Bible as literal truth would be to reduce it to nothing more than a child’s book, void of all depth and complexity. That is like reading C.S. Lewis’s “Chronicles of Narnia” and thinking that the character of Aslan was really just a lion, or J.R.R Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” and think that the Ents are nothing more than talking trees; they aren’t. Many times in such stories characters are used as symbols of something else, Aslan to symbolize Jesus and the Ents to symbolize the natural world and its struggle to fight off industrialization; the Bible can be interpreted in much the same way. For instance, did Noah’s flood actually happen? Did God come down from heaven and decide to flood the world and save one of every animal and pack them onto a tiny boat? Maybe it did, I’m not saying it didn’t, but then again maybe, more likely actually, it did not, and that’s okay. The fact that it may not be an actual historical account does not take away from the moral of the story, the meaning God intended. Jesus Himself used parables to convey to the people just what it was He was trying to say in a way that everyone could understand, it is really so much of a stretch to think God may have worked that way since the creation of man? I, for one, do not believe so.
6 comments:
Jonathan,
I appreciate very much what you're saying, but I want to raise a couple of issues that immediately crop up. One of course is, how do you decide which stories really happened and which ones didn't? Do we just reinterpret all of the stories which just seem too hard to believe? Do we reinterpret all stories with a supernatural element such as miracles or stories with angelic beings?
I personally feel there needs to be a good reason for reinterpreting stories which seem to be of historical events as being non-historical. The flood, for example, seems to me to likely be a historical event. The fact that so many other cultures have similar flood stories has always seemed to me like good evidence that there actually was a flood. However, I don't believe it covered the entire planet for many reasons, one of which is that the Hebrew word "erets" can have many different meanings besides "earth," including land, country, and so forth. But there apparently is geological evidence for a massive ancient flood in the Mediterranean basin, though not everywhere else. So with the flood, it's important to realize that there are more alternatives than that a) it didn't happen or b) that it did happen and covered the entire planet. Those aren't the only two legitimate options available.
The problem, I think, is not in reading the Bible too literally, but in reading it too simplistically. But this mistake can be made just as easily by someone who wants to eliminate all of the supernatural elements from it but retain some sort of symbolic or moral meaning. I also believe that if you make the Resurrection, for example, to be a non-historical event (which many people obviously do), rather than finding a deeper "spiritual" meaning, you actually make Christianity to be based on a lie. It's clear that the New Testament writers considered this to be a historical event and that many of them had encountered the risen Christ afterwards in bodily form.
Just as an aside, is there a reason why you use "christen" as the spelling for "Christian"? Just curious, thought I'd ask.
"One of course is, how do you decide which stories really happened and which ones didn't?"
I'd take the New Testament stories as truth as they are the ones which result from Jesus's teachings and are from a closer time period. and they’re not nearly as farfetched as the ones in the old testament.
"Do we just reinterpret all of the stories which just seem too hard to believe? Do we reinterpret all stories with a supernatural element such as miracles or stories with angelic beings?"
When it comes to the Old Testament I don't think it really matter if ANY of the stories are true, although a lot undoubtedly are. I’d say check the historical record, if history supports the story then it’s true, if not you shouldn't take it as literal truth JUST because its in the Bible.
"I personally feel there needs to be a good reason for reinterpreting stories which seem to be of historical events as being non-historical."
If historical evidence supports the story then its true, if not you shouldn't believe it just because you found it in the Bible. I mean, do you really think there's an actual angel standing in from of the garden of Eden in cause someone stumbles upon it? That can't be really true, but that’s okay cause that’s not the point.
"It's clear that the New Testament writers considered this to be a historical event and that many of them had encountered the risen Christ afterwards in bodily form."
New Testament is safe; I’d say that’s pretty much historical, as for the old I can't say.
"Just as an aside, is there a reason why you use "christen" as the spelling for "Christian"? Just curious, thought I'd ask."
Other then the fact that I'm a bad speller and my spell check told me to do it that way? lol.
Jonathan,
I'm just curious how much OT history you're actually familiar with. So far all of your objections that I've seen come from the early part of Genesis. Many Christian thinkers throughout history have interpreted these passages in various ways, including allegorical and whatnot. But how familiar are you with the OT historical books? It's just interesting to me to find a Christian with such a disparate view of the respective histories of the OT and the NT. I see that you're a younger guy, so I'm just wondering if this is sort of a new trend in Christian theology or something.
"I'm just curious how much OT history you're actually familiar with."
I'm not a scholar or anything, but I know it well enough. My interests are more politics than anything else; this post was just a set up for another post I'm going to write about evolution.
now don't get me wrong, I know a lot of the OT is supported by historical data, and because of that a lot of it is, in fact, true, but what I'm saying is that some of the stories, such as Cain and Able (yeah, I know, early genesis again, but it is the part I know best) doesn’t HAVE to be true, it could simply be another story told to get a point across.
"I see that you're a younger guy, so I'm just wondering if this is sort of a new trend in Christian theology or something."
I don't know about that, personally I don't know anyone who believes like I do, all my Christian friends think I’m crazy, but that’s alright with me, we get along just fine otherwise. I just look at all the evil the Christian church has done in the past, all the misinterpretations of the Bible, and have thought "hey, if they didn't take everything so literal we'd be a lot better off." A more liberal interpretation just makes more sense to me.
Jonathan,
For what it's worth, a lot of my views would be considered heterodox by many North American evangelicals. There's a lot of different Christian viewpoints in the world (not to mention church history) than the narrow views of American fundamentalism. At the same time, evangelicalism contains a lot of truth also.
I don't think the problem historically has been taking the Bible too literally, though. If Christians were to take the teachings of Jesus literally and put them into practice (which has been done from time to time), the results would be revolutionary. But I think I know what you mean. The real problem as I see it is when Christianity is reduced to a set of doctrinal beliefs rather than a lifestyle of radical discipleship.
thats exactly what i'm talking about.
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