The Myth of Scriptural Literalism

[AV1611VET]

Why?

For the same reason I believe Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue.

 

[Akita Suggagaki]

hence it is the standard for doctrine

2 Tim 4:16 All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness,

But not science.

 

[AV1611VET]

And only those with "Biblical maturity" can agree with you, right?

If they want to.

But don't follow everything I say as Gospel.

Read the Bible for yourself and let It speak to you.

 

[AV1611VET]

Let me remind you allegorists what it says in the OP, as to how we literalists should think:

"“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 the light of related passages and axiomatic and fundamental truths, indicate clearly otherwise.”

For the record, do you allegorists have some kind of rule-of-thumb you follow?

Or was J Dwight Pentecost right, when he said the allegorical method establishes the mindset of the believer as the final authority for his faith and practice?

 

[Pavel Mosko]

In the spirit of the latter, since I desire not to continue a polemical discussion, but rather pursue with you and the OP an edifying discussion of hermeneutics including Patristic literalism in the form of the Antiochene method, how would you compare and contrast the Seven Rules of Hillel with the Antiochene and Alexandrian exegetical techniques which you clearly understand as much and perhaps more than I do. I myself had never seriously considered using the Seven Rules of Hillel for Christian hermeneutics, preferring those methods of Christian provenance, but since you assert that the Rules of Hillel were used by the Apostolic Fathers, in what one assumes to be the early ante-Nicene era, naturally I am keen to know how they relate to those methods I am acquainted with of late ante-Nicene and post Nicene Christian exegesis, from the third century Catechetical Schools in Alexandria, Antioch and to a lesser extent Caesarea in Syria Palestina (Judea).

Sure, I see the rules of Hillel as being a lot like Saint Vincent's Canon describing the nature of Holy Tradition coming from Antiquity, Universality and consensus. But that was a kind of backwards engineering of the Apostolic Tradition, while Hillel's rules show the basic orthodox hermeneutics of Judaism in the years that immediately preceded Jesus and saint Paul. One of the problems people make, is often assuming that Jesus, saint Paul, the Apostles etc. are doing everything impromptu, coming from revelation etc. when there often is a kind of paper trail of precedents going on in Judaism prior. On this type of topic, I like to show the Hillel legend of "hoping on one foot" compared to Jesus "Golden Rule", as well as his sometimes summarizing the point of the commandments etc.

The Whole Law, Standing on One Foot – A Homily for the 31st Sunday of the Year - Community in Mission

Hillel the Elder, sometimes referred to as Rabbi Hillel, was a Jewish religious leader who lived shortly before Jesus’ time. There is a famous story told of him in which he was challenged by a potential convert to teach him the entire Torah while “standing on one foot.” In other words, can you...

blog.adw.org

I Kind of got into this thing years ago, when I bought this Jewish Study Bible and they had this very informative article on something like "Inter-Biblical Interpretation" how the various Biblical writers interpreted the text often going beyond the written text and reading it via revelation or some other Theological development, and it showing theological development taking place in Scripture etc. And this kind of thing is big in the last decade with Michael Heiser and his Second Temple Judaism commentary on things like the Trinity and other kinds of Zeitgeist questions, as well as the EO folks from Ancient Faith Radio, and the "Religion of the Apostles" book that came out 2 years ago. I did a thread on that incidentally.

Religion of the Apostles | with Fr. Stephen De Young

The book looks good! It's the only book written in recent times I've looked to get. After moving a year and a half ago from one state to another over 650+ miles And not knowing what my future is where I'm at, I have not unboxed my book library, and am thinking of doing away with...

www.christianforums.com

I had an early start on this subject back in 1994 when this liberal friend Jim had a big argument with my best friend Stan on the Bible, showing the pagan culture that preceded it using various iconography symbols etc. that are in the Bible. For Jim this was kind of damning, believing that monotheism "evolved" out of paganism. I did not believe that, but it was my 1st education that God was deliberately "baptizing." (utilizing and redefining) various pagan kinds of iconography, tropes, etc. and doing so deliberately to illustrate his own message. By the way this kind of insight is extremely useful when you run across Fundamentalists and others that attack Holidays like Christmas and Pascha for being "pagan", and other kinds of charges of "pagan corruption". I wrote a Blog style essay on that years ago.

Apology for the Christmas Tree

OK I've been trying to find some boards to post some articles/blog posts especially stuff I like to reference for current projects I'm working on and have in mind. I would like to put this one on the actual Apologetics board since it is that except board is more geared to people outside the...

www.christianforums.com

 

[Jipsah]

But there are some who have, and have gotten saved later.

Dang church hoppers!

An allegorist will say, "The Bible says this, BUT It means this."

Yep. Generally to support some dubious doctrine. I consider that the typical response of evangelicals to "Take, eat, this is my body."

Whereas a literalist will say, "The Bible says this, AND it means this."

Careful there. "And" means "also" as well.

There's a subtle ... but major ... difference.

See above.

 

[Xeno.of.athens]

For the same reason I believe Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue.

Have you checked the details in the book using the internet?

 

[Akita Suggagaki]

Or was J Dwight Pentecost right, when he said the allegorical method establishes the mindset of the believer as the final authority for his faith and practice?

"Read the Bible for yourself and let It speak to you."

That is true for literalists as well. Or have you plucked an eye out yet?

 

[The Liturgist]

One of the problems people make, is often assuming that Jesus, saint Paul, the Apostles etc. are doing everything impromptu, coming from revelation etc. when there often is a kind of paper trail of precedents going on in Judaism prior.

Indeed, one example of this in the Early Church being the threefold daily prayers, which were moved into dawn, dusk and the night due to the danger of assembling after Emperor Nero and later augmented by the Hours and subdivided, but essentially the Synagogue system of morning, midday and evening prayers is reflected by Matins, Vespers and Compline. Also we see traces of the Jewish lectionary, with the two Old Testament lessons in the Assyrian Church of the East in several instances matching or approximating the Torah and haftarah (reading from elsewhere in the Tanakh to supplement the prior Torah reading) pairings in the Jewish liturgy as defined by the Babylonian Talmud, which was of course composed in Seleucia-Cstesiphon where the Church of the East, which consisted initially to a great extent of Jewish converts in Edessa, Nineveh, Seleucia-Cstesiphon which replaced old Babylon when the river shifted, and was likewise abandoned and replaced by Baghdad when it shifted back (thus Baghdad is adjacent to the ruins of Old Babylon, which has not made archaeologists happy), and Kerala, India, as you know. Also we see the concept of the lectionary itself adapted from Judaism, and the Epistle lesson followed by the Gospel which is ubiquitous even in churches that read the Old Testament first (which historically was limited to the Syriac speaking churches, the Gallican rite churches in Europe, and to a limited extent, on some occasions the Old Testament was read instead of the Epistles in the Roman Rite and its derivatives like the Anglican and Lutheran liturgy, before the mid 20th century, when Protestant liturgies like the 1964 Methodist Book of Worship added a Psalm and Old Testament lesson to its lectionary, and then the Roman Catholics did the same thing and split it over three years, this leading us to the disastrously bad Revised Common Lectionary which casts a dark shadow over the Western Church. In the Eastern Orthodox and Coptic churches, the Old Testament is used at Vespers and in the three services from the Holy Psalmody (which correspond with Vespers, Compline and Lauds, respectively, but then so do the Morning and Evening Raising of Incense and the 11th and 12th Hour and the Prayer of the Veil from the Agpeya, this being due to the Coptic church combining two forms of ancient Eastern monastic offices which existed in the simple form of the Agpeya and the complex form of Psalmody mentioned in the Philokalia by an author talking about interior prayer, which the Eastern Orthodox accomplished through the Jesus Prayer and the Copts by memorizing and praying all the Psalms in the Agpeya, or using an arrow prayer like the Jesus Prayer, such as Kyrie Eleison, and the Jesus Prayer itself due to ecumenical reconciliation with the Eastern Orthodox in recent years). This was also the case in the Roman church, where Old Testament lessons were read at the Divine Offices, but the problem there was that outside of monasteries, the Divine Office became a devotion used by priests, and the Catholic Church has been repeatedly unsuccessful at changing that, despite massive reforms intended to encourage lay attendance at parishes after Vatican II, the Liturgy of the Hours as they call it is still not used by most parishes.

The Anglicans were successful however, particularly with Evensong, and the plan for Mattins and Evensong was inspired by a proposed revision of the Divine Office by a Cardinal Quinones of Spain.

Likewise, one of the oldest Eucharistic liturgies, that of Saints Addai and Mari, is structurally similar to the form of Jewish blessings for meals known as Berakoth Prayers. This again makes sense as it was used by the Church of the East which is one of the Eastern churches with many descendants of Jewish converts to this day (the others being the Syriac Orthodox, the Indian Orthodox, which used to be part of the Church of the East, and the Antiochian Orthodox.*

So I am unsurprised of the influence of Hillel on early hermeneutics and regard Hillel as more reliable than say, Flavius Josephus.

*It should be noted that before becoming de facto autocephalous the Church of the East like the Armenian and Georgian churches was an autonomous church under the Omophorion, or for the sake of readers who don’t know what an Omophorion is, we can liken it to an umbrella, of the Patriarch of Antioch. Hence the use of the title Catholicos by the Patriarchs of the Church of the East, the Georgian Orthodox and the Armenian Apostolic Church as this title originally meant “vice-Patriarch.” Later the Syriac Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch, due to confusion of its Catholicos in Iraq with the Patriarch of the Church of the East, changed the title to Maphruno, the meaning of which I forget, but this word is Anglicized as Maphrian, and today, the Maphrian leads the Jacobite Syriac Orthodox Church under the Patriarch of Antioch in India (while the title Catholicos is now used by the leader of the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church, also known as the Indian Orthodox Church, which is in schism with the Jacobite Church, but both are also collectively called Indian Orthodox or Syriac Orthodox or Malankara Orthodox, along with the Malankara Independent Syrian Church in Thoyizoor).

 

[The Liturgist]

100%

With all due respect, every neutral academic and most Baptist theologians and seminary professors, who have no love for the Roman Catholic Church, dismiss it as rubbish. It is a mere hypothesis with no proof to back it up, and much evidence to refute it. Only a small minority of Baptists known as Landmark Baptists believe in the Trail of Blood Hypothesis, and I am assuming you are a member of that movement. Fortunately most Landmark Baptists would not say it is necessary for salvation to agree with the Trail of Blood.

 

[AV1611VET]

... and I am assuming you are a member of that movement.

That's a negative.

I'm an Independent Fundamental Baptist.

 

[Pavel Mosko]

Indeed, one example of this in the Early Church being the threefold daily prayers, which were moved into dawn, dusk and the night due to the danger of assembling after Emperor Nero and later augmented by the Hours and subdivided, but essentially the Synagogue system of morning, midday and evening prayers is reflected by Matins, Vespers and Compline.

That's nice info. For me a big touchstone was reading Protestant commentaries on the book of Acts, the chapter where Deacons were appointed was always made out to be a kind of pragmatic common-sense solution akin to when Jethro urged Moses to delegate lower-level judges to handle the easy cases of disputes of the Children of Israel while he did the harder higher court ones. It wasn't until, I got into Orthodoxy and began reading EO articles where I had it pointed out to me that the Deacon was a continuation of the Synagogue Chomash, rabbinical assistant, which in turn was an adaptation and lifting of the Levite from the Tabernacle and Temple. There was a really great article that covered that and pointed out how Christ ministry with the Apostles and his larger group of 70 followers mirrored what was also true in earlier Judaism with Moses and Aaron and the Tabernacle, as well as the later temple. It also showed how the early ministry of the Bishop, with the presbyters and choir etc. often directly mirrored the organization of Jesus and that of Earlier Judaism.


If there was one thing I would do differently today than in the past, is I would keep an archive binder of printouts of those web sites as I find them to always have them on hand, rather than just memorizing the basic gist of them.

 

[rturner76]

I think some parts of scripture are littoral, some are artistic, some are historic, and some are figurative. It is up to the reader to figure out which is what. There are some things that I think just can't be taken literally. There are some things that were meant to be taken as art. like the Song of Soloman which is a poem, and Proverbs and Psalms which can be used both as teaching and art. The vastness and depth of the Bible is so deep that it really can't be completely digested until it is broken down into the pieces it was written in.

 

[AV1611VET]

I think some parts of scripture are littoral, some are artistic, some are historic, and some are figurative. It is up to the reader to figure out which is what. There are some things that I think just can't be taken literally. There are some things that were meant to be taken as art. like the Song of Soloman which is a poem, and Proverbs and Psalms which can be used both as teaching and art. The vastness and depth of the Bible is so deep that it really can't be completely digested until it is broken down into the pieces it was written in.

The Bible almost always alerts us, either beforehand or afterwards, when something isn't literal.

 

[Jipsah]

Let me remind you allegorists

That would include you, since you believe that our Lord can't possibly have meant what he said about the bread and wine being His Body and Blood. You can accept that He spoke the universe into existence, but when He says "Take, eat this is my body", then that violates your notions of "common sense", so you have to chuck it though your metaphorizer. He just had to have meant something else.

what it says in the OP, as to how we literalists should think:

Except when you don't.

For the record, do you allegorists have some kind of rule-of-thumb you follow?

Sure. If our Lord said it, it's literal unless it's in the form of a commandment, which "take, eat..." is.

Or was J Dwight Pentecost right, when he said the allegorical method establishes the mindset of the believer as the final authority for his faith and practice?

Ask you yourself that, you're the one who feels the need to allegorize our Lord's teaching on the Eucharist.

 

[Jipsah]

What is not true - is your allegation that the way Protestants come to understand what a given Bible text means is to first go see what the Catholic church teaches on that text and then to come up with some interpretation of it that is in opposition to what the Catholic church says.

that is absolutely a fiction

Interesting, considering that anyone said any such thing. There are some Protestants who will move heaven and earth to avoid agreeing with the Roman Catholics on anything, and who will often go to ridiculous lengths to avoid anything that they perceive as "too Catholic". The SDAs appear to be one of those.
Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you

Are you talking about "confecting the body, blood, soul and divinity of Christ"? And asking what is objectionable about it.???

If you
re arguing about the doctrine of transubstantiation here you might want to direct it solely to those to believe it. Being that it's a Roman Catholic doctrine, most here do not.

"24 And when he had given thanks, he brake it, and said, Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of me.

Are you talking about the "REAL Presence" of Matt 18:20 For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.”

Wow, I guess in the SDA Bible that replaces this: Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you

So we actually HAVE a text for "do this in REMEMBRANCE of ME" in 1 Cor 11

Neat that you can distill all the relevant verses down to one line, and then dismiss everything else based on one word from a description of a doctrine (transubstantiation) that most of us don't really care about. U\I'll bet you could have the whole New Testament pared down to to pamphlet size given enough time.
Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you

1 Cor 11:
23 For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me.”

1 Cor 11:
23 For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you"

Didn't need that "this is my body" part then, right? "He can't have really meant that". Besides that, it's just too Catholic, and SDAs are deadly serious about Not Being Catholic.
Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you

25 In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.” 26 For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes

25 In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood

Remembrance is the same term that we find in Heb 10:3 "reminder"

And "in my blood" means "in my blood". Unvisible in Your Bible, apparently.

3 But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year.

No one but you has mentioned "sacrifices". What precisely are you talking about?
Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you

Not a sacrifice, but a memorial.

Again, no one mentioned a "sacrifice" but you. And not just a memorial, but His Body and Blood. Read thwe whole thing, for crying out loud!
Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you

Not a recapitulation of sins - but a reminder.
How is this even a little bit confusing?

TNo one here confused but you as far as I can tell. His Body, His Blood, His Words. Take 'em or leave 'em.
Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you

 

[ViaCrucis]

I'm going to go with metaphorical on this one.

After all, the context says:

Matthew 26:26 And when they were taking food, Jesus took bread and, after blessing it, he gave the broken bread to the disciples and said, Take it; this is my body.

What are they holding in their hands?

Bread ... right?

One doesn't have to be a Rhodes scholar to know what's going on here.

By that rationale then Jesus isn't God. After all, what was nailed to the cross? Human flesh right? Well there you go, since a human being was nailed to the cross then Jesus can't be God.

"But!" One protests, "Of course He was human, but He is also God" And right you would be. The Person of Jesus is both God and human. That His human flesh was nailed to the cross doesn't change the fact that, and this is true, God was nailed to the cross and bled His blood for us.

So our Lord takes bread, and then says, "This is My body", you argue it is called bread and therefore it can't be His body, but Jesus says it is His body. So which is it, bread or body?

Why not believe what the Scripture says? This bread is His body.

If you can believe that Jesus is both God and man, because the Scripture tells you so. Then why can't you believe the Scriptures when it says it is bread and body?

Why not just believe what the Bible says?

-CryptoLutheran

 

[The Liturgist]

I think some parts of scripture are littoral, some are artistic, some are historic, and some are figurative. It is up to the reader to figure out which is what. There are some things that I think just can't be taken literally. There are some things that were meant to be taken as art. like the Song of Soloman which is a poem, and Proverbs and Psalms which can be used both as teaching and art. The vastness and depth of the Bible is so deep that it really can't be completely digested until it is broken down into the pieces it was written in.

I agree entirely.

By the way, a minor typo in your post: I am sure you are aware that littoral refers to coastal waters and things pertaining to the coast, as opposed to literal, which is the word you wanted, but other members might not be aware of this.

 

[AV1611VET]

By that rationale then Jesus isn't God. After all, what was nailed to the cross? Human flesh right? Well there you go, since a human being was nailed to the cross then Jesus can't be God.

When Jesus hung on the Cross, He said:

Matthew 27:46 And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

This is the MIDDLE STATEMENT on the Cross, and the exact moment His heart burst inside His chest cavity.

Psalm 69:20 Reproach hath broken my heart; and I am full of heaviness: and I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none.

Yet, with no functioning heart, He uttered three more statements on the Cross over a period of time.

So yes, Jesus was God on the Cross.

 

[AV1611VET]

So our Lord takes bread, and then says, "This is My body", you argue it is called bread and therefore it can't be His body, but Jesus says it is His body. So which is it, bread or body?

Matthew 26:26 And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body.

Bread literally; body figuratively; obviously.

As I said, one doesn't need to be a Rhodes scholar to ascertain this.

Specifically, it is a metaphor: the direct comparison of dissimilar things to create more vivid imagery or understanding.

We are under the blood of Christ.

That doesn't mean we're drowning.