aLL CHRISTIANS TAKE THE BIBLE LITERALLY?

Question

What do Christians who view the bible metaphorically think of Christians who take its stories literally?

Answer 1

I think certain parts of the bible are symbolic like Revelations. Jesus even tells us in the first few chapters that the lamps are the churches and the flames were the angels of the 7 churches. That's sets the stage of how to read the rest of the book. I think people who take that book literaly are wrong like the Jehovah's saying that 144,000 Jehovah's Witnesses are going to heaven. I can tell you what the 144,000 is symbolic for. It means simply all of Israel from both covenants, the old and the new. 12 represents the 12 sons of Jacob and it also represents the 12 apostles of jesus. And 12 squared is 144,000. And another word for square is complete. So he's saying that all of Israel will be saved.

Answer 2

Wow! What a question!

A couple preliminaries:

1. The Bible is a collection of books, a library, that has been bound together under the covers of one book.

2. The Bible contains many different kinds of writings. (Think of a newspaper: news, recipes, weather, comics.) Knowing the kind of writing, helps obtain the meaning. Consider you don't read the sports the way you do a recipe or you don't read the comics the way you read the front page. The same is true regarding the Bible.

3. Some of those books were written to be taken literally; others were meant to be taken metaphorically.
Why? The authors at that time connected together events that were similar in one respect and placed them side by side. (Almost like stringing pearls on a necklace.)

4. The real trick is knowing which books to take literally and which to take metaphorically.
One clue is to ask the question: Does this incident remind me of any other incident in the Bible?

Example:
As Jesus is baptized the voice of the Father is heard and the Holy Spirit comes down in the form of a dove.
Does this remind us of any other water incident?

You might call to mind the Genesis story when the Spirit of God hovered over the water. Could it be the gospel writer wants us to make that connection? It's possible. If he does want us to make that connection, what is he saying? He could be saying that Jesus' Baptism in some way indicates a New Creation, since the Spirit of God hovered over the waters at the beginning of Creation and now we have that same Spirit hovering over Jesus.

Note: We have the literal story of Jesus' Baptism, while as we read it we see or hear echoes of other Biblical stories which makes us consider that the gospel writer might be impling more than what appears on the surface.

Does the literal meaning invalidate the metaphorical? No!
Does the metaphorical invalidate the literal? No, again.
The two approaches complement each other. To get the full meaning it is first necessary to look at the literal meaning; then it is necessary to look for connections with other stories.

What do Christians think about this? It's possible to view the Bible entirely from a literal standpoint, but it's impossible to view the Bible only from a metaphorical perspective. The metaphorical builds on the literal.

What do I think? Let people believe what they want to believe.

Answer 3

People will take it the way they want. If a particular verse says, for example, "You shall not kill men of the Earth" (not a real verse), then a Christian may take it literally and kill women instead.

A real verse from the Bible that people abuse and take advantage of says "Be not drunk with wine." Many Christians, unfortunately, take this literally, so they get drunk with beer instead.

Or someone could find a metaphoric interpretation more convenient to them than the literal translation, so they abide by the metaphoric sense. Does this sound OK to you? Since when was it OK to interpret the Bible whatever way you want, or more precisely, whatever way fits your needs and that you prefer?

Answer 4

As a Christian who takes the Bible literally, I don't think a person who views the Bible metaphorically or as one big fairytale that teaches people moral responsibility is a Christian at all.

Answer 5

I don't know a Christian who takes the Bible metaphorically, only non-believers. But taking it metaphorically is very problematic in that it becomes hard to discern what you're suppossed to take litterally or not. Besides, God never told us to take any part of His Word for anything but perfect and true.

Answer 6

Christians who take the Bible literally are the problem with Christianity today.

All problems Christians have (with science, the people on this board, other religions) lead back to the rigidity that this creates.

Answer 7

I believe as Christians we are supposed to take the word of God as truth and stand firm on it. Anyone who does not do this needs to get right with God. Reading the bible should be something that a Christian never finishes doing. I can read the same scripture and get a different meaning out of it a number of times. But I still see it all as the literal truth of God.

Answer 8

Well, Christians who take the bible metaphorically only mean the Old Testament. There is just as much contradiction, absurdity and impossible nonsense in the New Testament. As Christians, they still have to believe all the Jesus was god and died for your sins bullshit.

So, in my mind, they are still delusional, though at a different end of the continuum.

Answer 9

i also view the bible mostly metaphorically for its moral purposes. like the yahoo user above many people told me i was wrong i showed them the dictionary definition of religion

1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.


as you see the FIRST definition of the dictionary for religion clearly states often containing a moral code.

the people who told me i was wrong said u cant DEFINE religion. and i said whatever, you keep on hating people because the bible says to and ill keep an open mind and not judge people (like it says in the bible)

so idunno. it just depends

Answer 10

When i was Christian, i alway saw it metaphorically, i saw it as a way to get a moral across. I was told by a lot of people that was wrong.

So i dunno what they think of people who take it literally, i may have been the only one to take it metaphorically.