We interrupt this series for a brief word from our writer.
I was challenged today.
The person who challenged me is a friend who is very dedicated to the Lord's work, but does not know how to use the english language.
This friend, in the course of our conversation, proclaimed, "Well I take the Bible completely literally."
Really?
How about you?
Many Christians think there is some kind of virtue in believing that the Bible is to be taken literally in its evry word.
That's because they don't literally mean literally.
But if we are going to communicate with each other, we must agree on what certain words mean. We can't go changing them to mean what we want them to mean when we want them to mean that.
"Literal" does not mean "almost true," "true in principle," or "virtually true."
Literal means: adhering to fact or to the ordinary construction or primary meaning of a term or expression.
"Joe," I hear you complain, "You can't mean that a rank conservative right winger like yourself doesn't take the Bible literally in every instance! That's...that's...that's herasy!"
Yes I do mean that.
And neither do you.
Wanna bet?
The Bible say Jesus is the Lamb of God.
Literally a four legged creature with wool all over Him.
Is that the Jesus you worship?
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20 comments:
you are one smart cookie Joe.
when I was reading your post, a book in the bible, came to mind,
Song of Solomon, chapter 5 v4
now if I took what it says (kjv)Literally, it would really gross me out big time! ;-D
janice
Hmmm...maybe we should come up with a Bible terminology dictionary type blog that we can refer to so that we can know what each other is really meaning...course those exist in book form too...but, not everyone has access to those.
Good point Joe, I'm going to use the Lamb of God thing, :-)
i didn't mean to laugh, but your illustration was funny. that was a good point.
The proverbs of Solomon the son of David, king of Israel;
2To know wisdom and instruction; to perceive the words of understanding;
3To receive the instruction of wisdom, justice, and judgment, and equity;
4To give subtilty to the simple, to the young man knowledge and discretion.
In verse 4 I once got into an arguement with my ex about whether "simple" meant "ignorant" (my interpretation) or "easy" (his interpretation). I think the verse actually applied to him...
I suffered through the "fundy" takeover of the SBC back in the '80s. I was attending Boyce Bible School at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary here in Louisville, during Roy Lee Honeycutt's final years as Seminary President. I found fundamentalism to be at its core, an intellectual laziness: people wanted to be told what to believe, rather than doing the work of figuring it out for themselves. And of course, the "power brokers" were more than willing to tell the sheep what to believe, and drew them into their megachurces in droves.
My favorite fundy was a guy attending Boyce at the same time; he pastored a church in Tennessee. He simply refused to accept that we can have a personal relationship with God, because "God isn't a person".
Great post Joe.
Joe,
Did God tell someone to call you at midnight again?
You have a good way with laying down the truth,brother. It should cause us to draw our own conclusions easily and instantly.
brother John
Joe, you always make me think...
jeff h: "I found fundamentalism to be at its core, an intellectual laziness"
You are the first person I have ever heard express it this way.
I am a rank fundamentalist...I believe, fundamentally, Jesus Christ.
Too many "fundamentalists" really are intellectually lazy.
j wendell: My phone regularly rings at midnight. (Or is that just the ringing in my ear?)
My children often take it literally, and it's so cute. Nathaniel says Jesus is in his tummy and there's a power cord in there too.
You know, the modernists came in touting the idea that the plain, clear meaning of scripture is not really what it means. It means something different, figuratively speaking all the time.
Example: a woman I know says she believes Jesus rose from the dead, but she doesn't really believe in the ressurection. She believes Jesus "rose in our hearts". She doesn't take the creation account literal ... or anything that is of a supernatural nature.
So... then you get people like your friend. Well intentioned ... because he wants to believe all that God has said ... he may be in danger of throwing out many important principles of Bible reading, I think.
I personally would rather deal with his type than the other.
Some have objected to the term "literal interpretation" based on a misunderstanding of what is meant by the phrase.
Literal interpretation does not mean the student of Scripture overlooks figurative language. in fact, a thorough knowledge of figures of speech is vital to literal interpretation.
By literal interpretation, exegetes mean "normal" as opposed to "abnormal". Words, phrases and sentences are not to be given a meaning which is not intended by the author.
Literal interpretation takes into account idiom, symbols and symbolic language, and figures of speech and attributes unto them the meaning that was intended by the author as would be understood by the intended audience.
The "literal" approach stands in distinction to the "spiritualizing" and "allegorizing" approach to interpretation that has been a staple of Covenant theology, especially as it treats prophecy and distinctions between Israel and the Church.
When you hear dispensational theologians use the phrase "literal interpretation" you now know what it means. It most definitly does not mean a "wooden" interpretation as some mistakenly suppose who have not studied the hermeneutical literature in which the word "literal" has been popularized.
I do agree that the word "literal" can be misleading, especially in light of the way it is used commonly. Perhaps the terms "plain" or "normal" would be alternatives, but they too have their shortcomings.
"Literal interpretation" will do just fine when we all come to understand just how that phrase is used in the literature.
Just my two cents worth,
God bless!
Antonio
Joe~
I think Antonio has hit the nail on the head! Not literally of course. As Lewis Sperry Chafer used to say, "If the Bible passage makes good sense, seek no other sense."
antonio!: You are, of course, absolutely (and literally) correct!
However, an abundance of Christians do not understand the difference between taking the Bible literally and interpreting the Bible literally.
While that may seem like semantics, it works itself out in a form of legalism that says, "The Bible means what I take it to mean regardless of what it meant when God inspired it."
Such people love to "take on" others, using scripture to prove their "points."
They are really modern day Elihus, Bildads,Zophars and Eliphazes, about whom God said, "My wrath is kindled against thee..."
j wendell: Did Lewis Sperry Chafer really used to say that? So did I.
"When the plain sense of Scripture makes common sense, seek no other sense; therefore, take every word at its primary, ordinary, usual, literal meaning unless the facts of the immediate context, studied in light of related passages and axiomatic truths, indicate clearly otherwise"
The Golden Rule of Interpretation
Dr. David L. Cooper
A website about him
pure genius!
Of course I don't mean that in the literal sense, just the colloquial usage.
Always tickled me about Hal Lindsey getting clever clever about the fact that he, unlike others, took the book of Revelation literally. Because he really, truly does believe that a giant beast with lots of heads and horns is going to come out of the sea... he's even got harbour patrols on the look-out. Honest.
Antonio is right once again. I stand corrected. He got the whole quote and the right quotee.
Uh, Darlene, if your kid has a power cord in his belly, you should probably take him to the ER.
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