Should We Take the Bible Literally or Figuratively?

CatholicExchange.com ^ | April 17, 2007 | Mary Harwell Sayler

[Salvation]

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Should We Take the Bible Literally or Figuratively?

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April 17, 2007

Question: I started going to a Bible study in our parish and usually enjoy it but am thinking about dropping out. Several people in our group said we should never take the Bible literally, but what's the point of reading the Bible if it doesn't mean what it says?

Discussion: The Bible does mean what it says. However, God's ways can be so mysterious that people do not always understand what's said or why, especially on first reading. Some may write off the whole Bible as being merely symbolic or allegorical, while others take every word as the kind of literal truth you get when you say something like, "The fire is hot." Symbolically, that same fire represents the power, warmth, and enthusiastic fervor poured into Christians by the Holy Spirit. You can approach the flame literally or figuratively, but either way, the fire is "true." 

As the living word of God, the Bible is also true to itself and the spiritual truths expressed in a variety of tones, formats, and literary styles. Many themes and purposes arise in its pages, but the overall goal shows the salvation and redemption of man by the Almighty God, beginning in Genesis and going all the way through the final Amen in Revelation. So as you study the Bible, don't worry about whether you should take the words literally or figuratively. Just take them. Read them. Study them, and get to know what the Biblical record shows about the ongoing relationship between human beings and the God of love.

You might also take another tack in your Bible study. For instance, try thinking of yourself as an investigator or a Christian reporter looking for the who, what, when, where, why, and how of your Judeo-Christian heritage and the life-giving truth of God's loving mercy and forgiveness. As you do this, consider:

the Who of God — i.e., the character and power of the One to Whom you speak;

the what of the conditions, circumstances, or context surrounding the larger spiritual truth that a book or chapter presents;

the when of the past, present, and future as well as the timelessness of eternity in which a Biblical truth or statement affects God's people, including you;

the where of the place and culture from which the text arises;

the why of the law recorded, the wisdom taught, or the prophecy spoken;

the how of the literal, figurative, or poetic words that the inspired writer utilized to tell a story and present a spiritual truth in the most effective way.

Generally speaking, the Who, what, when, where, and why of the Bible will express our Judeo-Christian background and beliefs, whereas the how has more to do with the means by which the Bible presents a spiritual truth. Unlike modern libraries that separate fiction from nonfiction and both genres from poetry, a single book of the Bible may contain an eclectic mix of Godly commands, historical events, poetic lines, and allegorical tales. Between genres, thin lines may overlap, but don't let them trip you up. For instance, if you read something that troubles you or that you don't understand, just do a little research by looking up the verse or passage in a reputable commentary. Better yet, see if the Catechism of the Catholic Church covers that specific topic. To ease the search, just look for a key word on a website that contains the complete Catechism.

Most importantly, begin and end each Bible study session or independent reading with prayer for God to guide the discussion and increase your understanding. Then trust that He will. The same Holy Spirit who scripted the story of God's love into the Holy Scriptures knows how to write His word into your spirit today.

 

© Copyright 2007 Catholic ExchangeMary Sayler has studied the Bible since early childhood and leads discussion groups in her local parish. In addition to being a poet, freelancer, and assignment writer for the religious markets, she works with other writers and poets through her website http://www.catholicpoetsandwriters.com/.

[pgyanke]

I'm sorry. Your post is "exhibit #1" in why Christ gave us His Church to help us understand His Word.

I'm going to apply the much abused Occam's Razor to this situation:

Which is more likely:

That Christ rose on the Third Day after His Crucifixion as He said He would...

John 2:18 The Jews, therefore, answered, and said to him: What sign dost thou shew unto us, seeing thou dost these things? 19 Jesus answered and said to them: Destroy this temple; and in three days I will raise it up. 20 The Jews then said: Six and forty years was this temple in building; and wilt thou raise it up in three days? 21 But he spoke of the temple of his body. 22 When therefore he was risen again from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this: and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had said.

That He was removed from the Cross on the eve of the Sabbath (setting of the sun on the day before Saturday) as recorded and the women came to prepare His Body after the Sabbath (rising of the sun on Sunday) as recorded and found the tomb empty.

or

That the Catholic Church and every splinter Christian denomination since is wrong despite 2000 years of study and debate.

[pgyanke]

Funny. I keep asking for Catholic sources for your quotes and the only place I can reference for the quotes (according to Google) is "SabbathTruth.com". They are referenced exactly as you have posted them (repeatedly) so I doubt you are doing anything more than cutting and pasting from this site.

Once again, as was shown with your first attempt on this thread, your source is suspect. Point me to a Catholic source for your quotes of Catholic theologians or bug off.

[magisterium]

Indeed, it has. But, since you post this excerpt - presumably - for our edification, let’s use it. Notice that Fr. O’Brien makes the claim that there is nothing citable in the New Testament specifically “authorizing” the change. This is true, as far as it goes. But, as other posters have already noted, there is New Testament evidence that Sunday worship had already begun to occur (Acts 20:7, Colossians 2:16). Fr. O’Brien goes on to state that, while there may be no proof text regarding Sunday worship, it nevertheless had become customary even during the Apostolic Age to have the weekly observances transferred to Sunday. You cite his quote about lack of biblical directives in this matter as a self-damning piece of evidence, while you evidently have failed to note that he clearly notes a first century origin for the practice. He bases his source for the authority to change to Sunday worship on the authority of the Church itself. The early Church thought it more fitting to commemorate the completion of the passion and resurrection of Jesus than the completion of the original acts of creation, and, by its own authority, vested in the Apostles, it did just that.

And why not? The entire New Testament is riddled with examples of the abrogation of Jewish dietary laws, circumcision and the like. The command in Exodus 20 to worship God is certainly universal in its scope, but the command to worship on the Sabbath day is restricted to the Israelites, as it is a commemoration for them only. The specific day, as opposed to the principal of worshiping God, is akin to the dietary laws and other things that the Church dispensed with on its own authority coupled with direction for God.

The problem here is that the Catholic Church recognizes the authority of the Apostles and their successors to actually govern the Church, while you obviously do not. Nearly all of the major debates here on FR come down to the question of “authority.” Clearly, though, if Sunday worship was pretty near universal by the second century, and there is nothing in Scripture directly commanding it, then such a change must have come from the authority of the Church at this very early date. It is incumbent on you, at this point, to demonstrate in the 21st Century how you know better than our Christian ancestors in the 1st and 2nd Centuries in this and so many other matters. You would do well to demonstrate further how the Providence of God is not fatally violated by ruptures in “essentials” from such a very early date that were only rectified 15 centuries or more from the Church’s founding. So much for Matthew 28:16-20.

The same authority of the Church demonstrated in Matthew 28, John 20 and 21, Acts 15, and 1Cor 11, among others, evidently felt itself competent to address the issue of which day would be utlized to fulfill the Christian obligation to worship God in common. It is the same authority, by the way, that was in play when the 4th century Church codified the canon of Scripture. That you recognize the Book they canonized without recognizing their role as authentic interpreters of revelation overall is the heart of your problem. That you do not recognize anything enacted by the early Church that does not find itself specifically laid out in “shalt and shalt not” form in the New Testament leaves you with a very tenuous understanding of Scripture as a whole. It robs you of so much benefit from the Scriptures you cherish, as 2Peter 3:16 makes plain.

Bottom line: it does not matter that you cannot find a direct command in Scripture ordering the Apostles to change the common worship day. History says they did. The fact that they did this on their own authority (guided, presumably, by the Holy Spirit), in similar fashion to what they did in Acts 15 about other matters, speaks volumes.

[pgyanke]

VERY nicely put. God bless you.

[Zionist Conspirator]

Some may write off the whole Bible as being merely symbolic or allegorical, while others take every word as the kind of literal truth you get when you say something like, "The fire is hot." Symbolically, that same fire represents the power, warmth, and enthusiastic fervor poured into Christians by the Holy Spirit. You can approach the flame literally or figuratively, but either way, the fire is "true."

No one in the world has ever, does now, or will ever, interpret the every single word of the Bible as being of the same sense as "the fire is hot." This is a straw man created to justify the rejection of things recorded in the Bible that are outside the purview of modern science and outside our own experiences (the six day creation, the age of the ancients, Noah's Flood, the Tower of Babel, etc.).

It's a good thing those liberal German Protestants discovered how primitive and exclusively allegorical the Bible is. What would Catholics have done without them?

[magisterium]

Thank you. God bless you and yours, as well.

Christ is risen!

[Running On Empty]

I just had a chance to read this and want to say thanks for posting it.

I’m always grateful for contributions like this.

[MarkBsnr]

Hmm, it appears that your whole trailer park is waiting with bated breath for my reply.

Saying that you have the Holy Spirit within you is not enough. Being baptized is not enough. Wandering around waving your hands in the air proclaiming that you are saved and posturing like the Pharisees in front of the church isn’t enough.

Actually read your Bible instead of pounding it. It quite clearly states that sheep will be separated from the goats on the right hand versus the left hand. And the judgement of separation will be deeds - judged by God Almighty, not by any human being, and by the rules of God Almighty, not any human being - after your death and not before.

This notion of saving one’s soul before death would be amusing on a juvenile level, worthy of National Lampoon type snickers, if it wasn’t so deadly serious and imperilling of your immortal soul. Even St. Peter professed Faith and Hope - the hope of eternal salvation, but not the certainty since the Judgement does not belong to him, but rather to Him.

I have asked many here within the reference of these passages how they think that they’ll fare when faced with placement with either the sheep or the goats. I either get stuffy silence or aggrieved anger. If you don’t feed the least of His children when they’re hungry, or clothe them, or comfort them, etc. then you will be thrown into the everlasting lake of fire created for satan and his angels.

Hopping around like a crazed ape waving a baptismal certificate doesn’t get you a pass in life. But it’s too easy and too dear to the hearts of the arrogant and the lazy. And that has been the real attraction of the Protestant Reformation and the Devil-led splitting of the Church that has gone on since then.

You go ahead and wave your hall pass when you stand in front of the Lamb of God. It’d be amusing if it weren’t so tragic.

[MarkBsnr]

It’s a good thing those liberal German Protestants discovered how primitive and exclusively allegorical the Bible is. What would Catholics have done without them?

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Keep about the business of bringing the Word of Christ to the world. You know, what Jesus charged us to do.

[kerryusama04]

Why don’t you ask magesterium if the quote is in he/she/it’s book? Perhaps you could get off your ass and go to the library? That’s where I went ot verify the stuff.

[pgyanke]

Three things:

1) I'm working for a living and posting as able. Going to the Library to track down your inanities isn't about to happen.

2) Rather than being snippy with me why don't you try answering Magesterium? I thought he gave you a very nice reply.

3) Your chip is showing.

[kerryusama04]

Thank you for finally concedng my point. Now that you have admitted that I, Chris a.k.a kerryusama04, is right and you and the rest of your merry band of Catholics are wrong. Now that it has been established in your mind that the Church swapped to Sabbath for Sunday, it is not incumbent upon me to do aything but to say:

I told you so.

Now, tell me, if Church is not bound by the 10 Commandments, how does the Church get off using scripture as its source of supposed "authority". How can a church say that one scripture gives it power to bind and loose, while blatantly breaking God's Commandments and teaching others to do so? We have now arrived at the foundation of my original post. Why would a Catholic read the Bible at all if the Catholic Church can pick and choose which parts it wishes to adhere to?

[magisterium]

I think this has been addressed on numerous previous threads, but I’ll encapsulate the Catholic position on this again for you.

Catholics do not believe in “once saved, always saved” models. We believe that it is certainly possible to lose one’s salvation right up to the moment of death. This only makes sense, since life itself is a trial. Indeed, we believe that the fundamentally unjust and/or sinful actions that good Christians are often subjected to demonstrate that fact, and that the temptations - to which we all are subject - to give in to, or compromise with, those injustices and sins are best explained by the fact that we are here, in large measure, to overcome such obstacles for - ultimately - the glory of God. So, from our POV, it is much easier to explain the trials and hardships Christians must endure for decades after embracing Christ in this fashion than it is to say that a 20-year-old (for instance) “gets saved” and then has to endure decades of hardship and injustice anyway. We say: “To what purpose?” Not only does his inevitable subsequent sin seem to run counter to his predetermined salvation, but we wonder why his salvation isn’t immediately followed by entry into Heaven, since there is no real purpose to further earthly struggles.

Alright, then, so what is the Catholic take on salvation? Well, while we don’t believe in “absolute assurance” of salvation, we do believe in “moral assurance.” For sake of illustration, I’ll use myself as an example. At the moment, I believe that I am in a state of grace, having recently been to confession and having no subsequent mortal sins to account for (to the best of my knowledge). If I were to die right now, or at least without having committed any further mortal sins, I am pretty sure that I will spend my eternity in Heaven. HOWEVER! I am 49-years-old, in reasonably good health. I could easily live another 20, 30, maybe 40 years. While I can pray for strength and grace to overcome the trials that await me, I have no absolute certainty that I will not succumb to at least some of them. From an everday observation-level, my committing future sins seems pretty inevitable. And so it is with everyone in the normal sphere of things. Saint Paul was right about that in Romans 3:23!

The point to trials is to overcome them and grow in holiness and Christian witness in the process. We grope and stumble our way through life, gradually overcoming our sinful inclinations (primarily) through the graces imparted to us through the Sacraments, particularly Confession and the Eucharist. But we are not robots or automatons; we can resist those graces if we insist on such foolhardiness, and persist in our sins. If those sins are “mortal” (1John 5:16-17 makes such a distinction) then Heaven will not be our reward if we die in such a state. The choice is ours to cooperate with God’s grace or not.

Ultimately, we believe, this common-sense observation of the practical ramifications of the world God set us in better answers our purpose for being here than declaring that people can be once and always saved even in the midst of ongoing sin and pointless earthly trials. We believe the ordinary means of forgiveness for sin can be found in John 20:22-23, and that, taking the point of Matthew 18:22 to heart, the forgiveness in John 20 can be sought multiple times, provided we are sorry for our sins.

Given that outlook, shared throughout *all* of the Christian Era by *all* churches (Catholic and Orthodox) that can trace an unbroken connection to the Apostles, then, no, we don’t believe we can definitively state where we’ll end up if we plan on living very long. And we believe with equal vigor that you can’t, either

[kerryusama04]

Either get YOUR facts straight or continue on your path to embarassing yourself. Why am I going to do one iota of reference work to prove something that has been well established just to satiate your sensibilities. The mature thing for you to do would be to shut up until you do YOUR OWN research.

[pgyanke]

This is why I didn't take your bait. Magisterium answered you very clearly and the only way you could respond so snidely is to have completely ignored what he (and others on this thread) have endeavored to teach you. You are a petulent child.

Once again I ask you: Why do you deny to the Church today the same authority it rightly exercised in denying circumcision at the Council of Jerusalem? Circumcision and Sabbath observance are both signs of the old covenant.

[kerryusama04]

I won and I am done. All you can do is try to take me on tangets where you think I am doctrinally weak. Since you have clearly demonstrated that you aren’t going to believe anything I say, regardless of how well researched the point, what point could there be in answering your posts? You have staked out a position that Jesus Himself could not shake you from, what difference am I going to make?

[pgyanke]

Speaking of embarassment... when are you going to address the issues instead of posting obscure quotes from dubious sources?

[Religion Moderator]

Discuss the issues all you want, but do NOT make it personal.

[pgyanke]

I won...

And they say self-esteem has to be earned...

Since you have clearly demonstrated that you aren’t going to believe anything I say...

I've been trying to engage you in an actual conversation. You have been answered numerous times on this thread... and you have ignored the answers. Sorry, FRiend, it is you who are staked on a position that will accept no input.

God bless you.

[pgyanke]

Trying very hard to keep it out of the personal.