So, my point of departure is the question, how much to read literally and how much allegorically (if those are, roughly, the two options)? Taking it all literally seems absurd, but taking it all allegorically makes it too vague or abstract to be special. And I'm looking for a way to read it that keeps it as a very special book.
I think a common approach, here, is, "Interpret a passage literally unless otherwise indicated," which is a principled approach, I suppose, but I think a case could be made for, "Interpret a passage allegorically unless otherwise indicated," especially with the use of parables in the Gospel to consider.
However, I have a more, err, artistic way of looking at the question. First, I thought of Jesus Christ as the Word. Of course "Logos" has other translations but I feel "Word" is the most important one. Anyway, I thought that we might interpret the literal-allegorical dichotomy as corresponding to the human-divine dual nature of the Son. Now, on this view, the most literal section of Scripture is the set of the Gospels, because these deal with the Son's human nature. Also, the miracle that is most important is the Resurrection, so having it certified literal under our reading is what we are trying to indicate in our understanding of the matter.
Now, allowing this as such, I would suggest that we think of the meaning of the Son, as the Word, radiating out across the pages of the book like light. At the outermost edge of this light, the Bible is the most allegorical. This is plainly true of the Book of Revelation. Now Genesis turns out this way too, here, and I think this is reasonable as things stand. (For example, the separation of light and dark independently of the sun, refers to the creation of Heaven and Hell, maybe.) And going inward towards the Gospels, the other sections become more and more literal or direct. So Exodus/the conquest-of-Canaan story is true enough regardless of the lack of archaeological evidence in favor of it as a literal event (it might be glossed as a parable about the overwhelming effectiveness of monotheism versus polytheism, i.e. as soon as a culture has monotheism suitably conveyed to it, all polytheists are "killed" because more or less converted; so whenever Jews brought their faith to a new area, it mimetically dominated the infused culture). On the other end, the epistles, which are very analytically, continue to deal much with abstractions and principles and so on. Finally, nearest the center, the prophecies of old and the Acts of the new eras, are the most concrete short of the description of the salvation of the world itself.
Just my two or three cents, I suppose...
I think a common approach, here, is, "Interpret a passage literally unless otherwise indicated," which is a principled approach, I suppose, but I think a case could be made for, "Interpret a passage allegorically unless otherwise indicated," especially with the use of parables in the Gospel to consider.
However, I have a more, err, artistic way of looking at the question. First, I thought of Jesus Christ as the Word. Of course "Logos" has other translations but I feel "Word" is the most important one. Anyway, I thought that we might interpret the literal-allegorical dichotomy as corresponding to the human-divine dual nature of the Son. Now, on this view, the most literal section of Scripture is the set of the Gospels, because these deal with the Son's human nature. Also, the miracle that is most important is the Resurrection, so having it certified literal under our reading is what we are trying to indicate in our understanding of the matter.
Now, allowing this as such, I would suggest that we think of the meaning of the Son, as the Word, radiating out across the pages of the book like light. At the outermost edge of this light, the Bible is the most allegorical. This is plainly true of the Book of Revelation. Now Genesis turns out this way too, here, and I think this is reasonable as things stand. (For example, the separation of light and dark independently of the sun, refers to the creation of Heaven and Hell, maybe.) And going inward towards the Gospels, the other sections become more and more literal or direct. So Exodus/the conquest-of-Canaan story is true enough regardless of the lack of archaeological evidence in favor of it as a literal event (it might be glossed as a parable about the overwhelming effectiveness of monotheism versus polytheism, i.e. as soon as a culture has monotheism suitably conveyed to it, all polytheists are "killed" because more or less converted; so whenever Jews brought their faith to a new area, it mimetically dominated the infused culture). On the other end, the epistles, which are very analytically, continue to deal much with abstractions and principles and so on. Finally, nearest the center, the prophecies of old and the Acts of the new eras, are the most concrete short of the description of the salvation of the world itself.
Just my two or three cents, I suppose...
