Of course it is possible. Do you believe the Christ can feed His followers His flesh?
I certainly do not dismiss the idea because it "sounds" fantastical. I will assume it is literally true until someone can give me a scripturally sound reason why it should be interpreted otherwise.
When science shows that a passage in Scripture is NOT meant to be taken literally, WE must readjust WHAT God is trying to say. Let me quote you a something a smart guy once said...
"It is very important to me to show that the Bible is factually accurate. Yes, today we know that the mustard seed is not the smallest seed, but it was the smallest seed known to any farmer in that part of the world at that time. So, it was factually true to the very limit of any listener's possible ability to understand." a.k.a Forest Keeper, Post #4281
A word to the wise. When science tells us that the Earth was created over a millions of years, we must learn to realize that God wasn't teaching science, anymore than Jesus was teaching botany.
Why do you presume that God would employ error to teach us, TODAY, infallible truth?
Refer to your post above. God uses the information that man has available at the time to teach HIS revelation. The Scripture is a theological book. Thus, the information that man knows at the time is utilized by God without "correcting" man's lack of scientific knowledge. God's point of Scripture is to reveal Himself. Whether He uses stories, myths, parables, history, narrative, or whatever, the inerrant word is often behind the litarary devices that the human authors employ. Generally, we take the Scriptures as literal, unless we can determine that God has used something not meant to be taken as such. For example, aren't poems more expressive of human desires than the coldness of scientific or historical language? Thus, some of God's greatest revelations are found in the Psalms - which use poetic words and ideas to bring across the broad spectrum of human emotion.
The Biblical errors that you and Kosta are claiming are not self-evident. It takes a specific disbelief on your parts to cast those scriptures aside.
We don't disbelieve Scriptures is from God. We believe that God teaches man through even flawed human knowledge. If the author was not aware that the earth was round and said the entire world was flat, does that mean that God lied - since the entire world is not flat? Man's knowledge is not perfect, nor will it ever be. God speaks to us from where we are at.
Did God literally part the Red Sea?
This is a matter of faith, not something that science or history or botany can later disprove as being incorrect. Recognizing these differences will not disrupt your faith. Just because the mustard seed is NOT the smallest seed has nothing to do with the truth of the Resurrection.
I think that once you start throwing out these Biblical accounts because they do not match with what our scientists say today, then you have to throw out a huge portion of the text, and there is no way to know when fact stops and fiction starts.
I thought that when I first came to Christianity. No, we don't have to accept everything that science tells us as infallible. But on the other hand, we should not base our faith on every little detail of the Bible as if those details were revealed by God. Scripture is not that way. Scripture was written by MAN - INSPIRED by God. Man didn't just merely hold the pen/quill. God ensured that His message got written down. But man is often times wrong on what exactly that message is. If one approaches the Bible as a science tract, they will find themselves thoroughly embarrassed and have a lot of explaining to do. I don't find myself in that position because I know God taught man through other men. Whether that information got put into books or by word of mouth, we believe that it came to us through men. God protected what He wanted said, but we must try to recognize the literary genre and knowledge that man had available - through which God spoke to us. For example, is Jonah a parable or a real accounting? Who cares. The message that God wanted said is there - for example, that God's message is often seen more clearly by outsiders than the religiously self-righteous. That God's salvation is for all, not just the Jews. And so forth. IF there was a man named Jonah and he was swallowed by a whale, HOW does that effect my experience of God?
Regards
"For example, is Jonah a parable or a real accounting? Who cares. The message that God wanted said is there - for example, that God's message is often seen more clearly by outsiders than the religiously self-righteous. That God's salvation is for all, not just the Jews. And so forth. IF there was a man named Jonah and he was swallowed by a whale, HOW does that effect my experience of God?"
The significance of Jonah as seen by the Orthodox Church is far more than a simple morality tale as you describe above, although it is certainly also that.
The Prophet Jonah's prayer from the belly of the whale is one of the half-dozen or so passages from the OT most highlighted by the Church. It is one of the Biblical Canticles that form the basis for our hymn-form known as the canon. Therefore, the irmos (or "hook") that starts each ode of the canon ties into that canticle.
The most important typology seen in the life of Jonah is that of Christ's three day burial in the tomb. This is a recurrent theme in our hymnology.
A second theme is that of us being cast about on the sea of life, and of drowning in the abyss, and our need to call out to God for salvation, just as Jonah did. And Jonah's prayer reminds us that God's profound mercy is always waiting for us, and that it is our failure to turn to Him that keeps us from experiencing that mercy: "They that observe vain and false things have abandoned mercy for themselves."
One of the things that I have thought about a fair amount lately as a result of this thread is that the Gospels usually make it clear when Christ is telling a parable. The parables are very general, for the most part, and in these parables there are rarely much specificity of detail, unless there is some point to that detail (such as identifying the Good Samaritan as a Samaritan, rather than some unspecified person.)
Christ's references to Jonah and Ninevah in St. Matthew 12 and St. Luke 11, especially when taken in the context of the entire passages, personally don't strike me as being representing a shift into parable. The specificity of whom he is talking to and of the references he makes, is not at all similar to his telling of parables. He refers to these events as having actually been there to witness them (which of course, as the Lord God of the OT, he was.)
In fact, if we are to take as as a parable Christ's words: "For as Jonas was a sign unto the Ninevites, so shall also the Son of man be to this generation," then the direct equivalency of this statement leads inexorably to Christ saying that his own death and Resurrection would be a parable.
St. John Chrysostom touches on this very point, which is not surprising, given the fact that the Cappadocian Fathers were very consistent in their teaching that the events of human history recorded in Scripture were types -- not in a mythological or allegorical sense, but in God's acting through history to reveal himself to mankind. This is from his 43rd homily explaining the Gospel of St. Matthew:
"But see how exactly He expresses it, even though in a dark saying. For He said not, “In the earth,” but, “In the heart of the earth;” that He might designate His very sepulchre, and that no one might suspect a mere semblance.
And for this intent too did He allow three days, that the fact of His death might be believed. For not by the cross only doth He make it certain, and by the sight of all men, but also by the time of those days.
For to the resurrection indeed all succeeding time was to bear witness; but the cross, unless it had at the time many signs bearing witness to it, would have been disbelieved; and with this disbelief would have gone utter disbelief of the resurrection also.
Therefore He calls it also a sign. But had He not been crucified, the sign would not have been given. For this cause too He brings forward the type, that the truth may be believed.
For tell me, was Jonah in the whale’s belly a mere appearance? Nay, thou canst not say so. Therefore neither was Christ in the heart of the earth such. [i.e. neither was Christ's 3 day burial a mere appearance. -- A.]
Whence it is clear, that they who are diseased in Marcion’s way are children of the devil, blotting out these truths, to avoid the annulling whereof Christ did so many things, while to have them annulled the devil took such manifold pains: I mean, His cross and His passion."
[jo kus to FK] We don't disbelieve Scriptures is from God
When did I say that I don't believe the Scriptures? "Seek and ye shall find," says the Lord. Did not +Thomas doubt and remain an Apostle? Why condemn someone who is struggling from the bottom of his heart but never abandons his faith nonetheless? It is faith after all, and I believe it regardless of what my reason says.
So, why condemn someone who believes Scripture is true and inerrant but not as you see it? I never said I wanted to throw any part out, or intentionally disbelieve? Perhaps you, the accusers, have failed to show that what you believe is the undisputed truth but can't show it?
Nonetheless, I take the position that I am the greatest sinner and this is my burden that I confess. It is not up to me to concern myself with your sins. God knows my intentions and He shall be my Judge.