The Potential Danger of Literalism

[Vance]

St. Augustine:

At the outset, you must be very careful lest you take figurative expression literally. What the apostle says pertains to this problem: “for the letter killeth, but the spirit quikeneth.” That is, when that which is said figuratively is taken as though it were literal, it is understood carnally [carnalia]. Nor can anything more appropriately be called the death of the soul than that condition in which the thing which distinguishes us from beasts, which is understanding, is subjected to the flesh in the passing of the letter [hoc est, intelligentia carni subjicitur sequndo litteram] (On Christian Doctrine 3. 5).​

We know that St. Augustine did not believe the six days of creation should be read literally. He also pointed out that, when determining the proper reading of a Scripture, we should always take into consideration the evidence discovered from nature, and be willing to adjust our fallible, human interpretation so that it fits with what God's Creation is telling us.

 

[Stinker]

The book of Genesis has to be literally. It poses no problem whatsoever to anyone who has not been suckered into the general theory of Evolution.

There are a couple of books in the Bible that one has to be careful about literal interpretations, and those are Ezekiel & Revelation.

 

[gluadys]

The book of Genesis has to be literally. It poses no problem whatsoever to anyone who has not been suckered into the general theory of Evolution.

It poses a lot of problems to those who do not accept evolution or geology. It means one has to interpret the character of God or of creation to say either that God was not honest when creating or that God gave us no reliable means of knowing creation.

There are a couple of books in the Bible that one has to be careful about literal interpretations, and those are Ezekiel & Revelation.

And I have often seen these interpreted literally as well---with specific application to our time, rather than to the time in which they were written.

 

[Vance]

Song of Solomon?

Many Christians read this NOT as an erotic love poem (literal), but a discussion of Christ and His Bride the Church (figurative).

How about in Genesis itself. It says that "God breathed". Now, do you read this literally to mean that God had a physical body with lungs and actually breathed out of these corporeal lungs? OR, do you think this reference to "breathing" is figurative for some act of God OTHER THAN literally using physical breath out of physical lungs?

It SAYS "God breathed", after all, and makes no explicit mention that it should be read figuratively.

Ironically, one of your fellow YEC's was just complaining that a TE was creating a strawman version of a YEC by saying that YEC's insist on reading everything literally, since no YEC's actually do that. You are proving him wrong.

 

[Durden Singer]

I've found that if you don't take into account modern "knowledge" it's fairly easy to read the Bible and work out what's literal and what isn't. In most cases.

 

[Vance]

I've found that if you don't take into account modern "knowledge" it's fairly easy to read the Bible and work out what's literal and what isn't. In most cases.

Or at least you can determine what you THINK is meant to be read literally which, if you DON'T take these cultural and literary issues into consideration, will usually be wrong.

That is why one of the gifts of the Spirit is "teaching" and one of the offices of the Church is the role of "teacher". If every Christian could independently gain every insight possible from Scripture, there would be no need of a gift, and no need for this role in the Church body.

 

[MLML]

St. Augustine:

At the outset, you must be very careful lest you take figurative expression literally. What the apostle says pertains to this problem: “for the letter killeth, but the spirit quikeneth.” That is, when that which is said figuratively is taken as though it were literal, it is understood carnally [carnalia]. Nor can anything more appropriately be called the death of the soul than that condition in which the thing which distinguishes us from beasts, which is understanding, is subjected to the flesh in the passing of the letter [hoc est, intelligentia carni subjicitur sequndo litteram] (On Christian Doctrine 3. 5).​

We know that St. Augustine did not believe the six days of creation should be read literally. He also pointed out that, when determining the proper reading of a Scripture, we should always take into consideration the evidence discovered from nature, and be willing to adjust our fallible, human interpretation so that it fits with what God's Creation is telling us.

On the contrary, Augustine believed either a six day creation or an instanteous creation to be true. Why? Because the Bible speaks of both. Obviously this wasn't clear the first time around, so lets try again:

----
Looking at Augustine's own words, taken from his Genesis commentary, we read, "In this narrative of creation Holy Scripture has said of the Creator that He completed His works in six days, and elsewhere, without contradicting this, it has been written of the same Creator that He created all things together . . . Why then was there any need for six distinct days to be set forth in the narrative one after the other? The reason is that those who cannot understand the meaning of the text, He created all things together, cannot understand the meaning of the Scripture unless the narrative proceeds slowly step by step . . . For this Scripture text that narrates the works of God according to the days mentioned above, and that Scripture text that says God created all things together, are both true."
----

Notice a few things in the above statements made by Augustine himself:

First, Augustine acknowledges the Bible teaches a six day creation.

Secondly, Augustine acknowledges the Bible speaks of God creating all things together.

Thirdly, notice that Augustine says both six day creation and all things created together are both true.

Now if you could please post and cite, where I can go look this up and read it for myself, where Augustine actually says this:

"He also pointed out that, when determining the proper reading of a Scripture, we should always take into consideration the evidence discovered from nature, and be willing to adjust our fallible, human interpretation so that it fits with what God's Creation is telling us."

Furthermore show where Augustine said we should fit it with the scientists interpretation of God's Creation.

You realize what you have said:

We know that St. Augustine did not believe the six days of creation should be read literally.

contradicts what Augustine wrote in his book, commenting on Genesis. So please cite where Augustine said creation is not six days but rather billions as you and others claim. Show me where he contradicts himself and says six days is not true, since he says it is in his book.

Point is Vance, Augustine believed an instantaneous creation because the Bible says "God created all things together." So, if you really want to stay with Augustinian thinking, then you will find where the Bible says God created over billions of years. Otherwise you and others are creating a doctrine of men with no basis in Scripture whatsoever.

 

[Maccie]

I've found that if you don't take into account modern "knowledge" it's fairly easy to read the Bible and work out what's literal and what isn't. In most cases.

I take it that the inverted commas around 'knowledge' mean you don't consider it real knowledge?

Right, so we should follow the Bible for our medical treatment, transport, etc. etc. And of course, there's no mention of electricity, physics. bio-genetics, etc. in the Bible, either. So we can ignore all these modern examples of 'knowledge'?

 

[TwinCrier]

It poses a lot of problems to those who do not accept evolution or geology. It means one has to interpret the character of God or of creation to say either that God was not honest when creating or that God gave us no reliable means of knowing creation.



And I have often seen these interpreted literally as well---with specific application to our time, rather than to the time in which they were written.

How could God possibly be more honest then telling us exactly how He created us and our planet: in 6 days.

 

[TwinCrier]

I take it that the inverted commas around 'knowledge' mean you don't consider it real knowledge?

Right, so we should follow the Bible for our medical treatment, transport, etc. etc. And of course, there's no mention of electricity, physics. bio-genetics, etc. in the Bible, either. So we can ignore all these modern examples of 'knowledge'?

Here we go again with the old "If you don't believe in evolution you should shut off your computer" business. Just because someone discovers the genome or invents a combustion engine doesn't mean they know all the secrets of the universe. If God wanted me to believe He took millions of years to creat the Earth, He should have said so.

 

[California Tim]

It poses a lot of problems to those who do not accept evolution or geology. It means one has to interpret the character of God or of creation to say either that God was not honest when creating or that God gave us no reliable means of knowing creation.

Based on what? To claim God is "dishonest" because His ways don't agree with man's ways or man's conclusions of what is supposedly "fact" is hard to justify by scripture:

"For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
Nor are your ways My ways," says the Lord.
"For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
So are My ways higher than your ways,
And My thoughts than your thoughts. (Isaiah 55:8-9)​

 

[herev]

Here we go again with the old "If you don't believe in evolution you should shut off your computer" business. Just because someone discovers the genome or invents a combustion engine doesn't mean they know all the secrets of the universe. If God wanted me to believe He took millions of years to creat the Earth, He should have said so.

he did, he wrote it in his creation

 

[Vance]

Doesn't Psalms say that the Earth and Heavens speak to us of God?

 

[gluadys]

How could God possibly be more honest then telling us exactly how He created us and our planet: in 6 days.

The sentence does not compute.

If those six days occurred 6,000 or so years ago, while creation itself witnesses to a creation which occurred billions of years ago, one or the other testimony is not honest.

If God actually said 6 days about 6,000 years ago in scripture, but 4.5 billion years ago in the solar system, God is contradicting himself.

I know that science did not invent the 4.5 billion years. There is no reason for that to happen. And I do not believe God contradicts himself. Hence, I take it that the interpretation of scripture which leads to 6 days about 6,000 years ago does not correctly reflect what God says in scripture.

So I study scripture with fresh eyes to determine what God is really saying in scripture.

 

[gluadys]

Based on what? To claim God is "dishonest" because His ways don't agree with man's ways or man's conclusions of what is supposedly "fact" is hard to justify by scripture:

"For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
Nor are your ways My ways," says the Lord.
"For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
So are My ways higher than your ways,
And My thoughts than your thoughts. (Isaiah 55:8-9)​

But I am not making that claim.

What I am saying is that this is the claim which YECism forces. YECism cannot accept that God is speaking truth in the works of his hands. And YECism claims that if one does recognize the testimony of creation as true, one is denying the testimony of scripture and therefore calling God a liar.

That is why I do not support a YECist interpretation of scripture. I don't believe that God is being dishonest in either scripture or creation.

 

[Didaskomenos]

On the contrary, Augustine believed either a six day creation or an instanteous creation to be true. Why? Because the Bible speaks of both. Obviously this wasn't clear the first time around, so lets try again:
<snip> <snip><snip>
Secondly, Augustine acknowledges the Bible speaks of God creating all things together.
<snip><snip><snip>

I'm trying to see how an instantaneous creation is involved in Augustine's statements at all. He's setting up six days vs. simultaneous creation, not six days vs. instantaneous creation. He points out that in a six day framework, all things are being made together as a coordinated act of creation, even though the narrative represents the stages on a temporal scale of six days. We theistic evolutionists might maintain equally as forcefully that God created all things together, but took billions of years doing it. That view is actually slightly more intuitive than having things created in sequence, yet together.

Now if you could please post and cite, where I can go look this up and read it for myself, where Augustine actually says this:

Quote:

Originally Posted by: Vance

"He also pointed out that, when determining the proper reading of a Scripture, we should always take into consideration the evidence discovered from nature, and be willing to adjust our fallible, human interpretation so that it fits with what God's Creation is telling us."

This, as far as I know, is not stated explicitly, but is undeniably implied in the following passage. Augustine, in his Literal Meaning of Genesis, argued quite forcefully that we must interpret the Bible in ways that don't offend the sensibilities of those who have knowledge about science:

"Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he holds to as being certain from reason and experience. Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods on facts which they themselves have learned from experience and the light of reason?

Reckless and incompetent expounders of Holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books. For then, to defend their utterly foolish and obviously untrue statements, they will try to call upon Holy Scripture for proof and even recite from memory many passages which they think support their position, although 'they understand neither what they say nor the things about which they make assertions'."

Underlying this is certainly an admonition not to interpret the Scripture in ways that are demonstrably false and ridiculous. Hence, we have an extrabiblical plumbline to influence our biblical interpretation.

 

[Vance]

Yes, it is implied there, but he does more specifically set out his four bases for interpretation as well, and I think it is in that same book (which, IIRC, is an unfinished book). I read it many moons ago, but it was referred to specifically in a recent lecture series I was listening to on the History of Science. I will track it down.

 

[Vance]

1. Why do YOU believe that those Church Fathers who DIDN'T believe in a six day creation were wrong? And why do you think that the Apostles did not read the Scripture figuratively, since the manner in which it is discussed in the NT is exactly how they WOULD have discussed it whether they believed it was literal or figurative.

Your entire post is one big "begging the question".

2. Right, the Holy Spirit never changes, and the Spirit would never teach contradictory matters. So, how is it that the Church Fathers, and great Christian thinkers and men of God have differed on this issue for 2,000 years? How is it that Spirit-filled and Spirit-led Christians can believe differently now? How can I feel fully at peace with a figurative view, and an acceptance of evolution and an old earth after Spirit-led and prayerful study, and you can feel fully at peace with a different view? The only reason I can see is that the Spirit does not view this as a critical issue and ALLOWS us to reach different conclusions and hold different beliefs, just as the Church Fathers did and just as Christians througout history have. So, why should we now make it a salvation issue, as so many YEC's do today?

3. I have never heard ANY person on these boards say that Jesus or the Apostles were wrong on anything. Where are you getting this? Are you begging the question again?

4. God can not lie, and can never be a liar, and no one on these forums has ever said otherwise. What is said is that God can NOT have created the world recently because to do so would be to have created deceitfully, which GOD CAN NOT DO.

5. The Bible being true would never be damaging to Christianity. Again, I am not sure where you get this idea since no one here has ever said that. What IS damaging to Christianity is the dogmatic teaching going on today that if evolution and an old earth are true, then Scripture is NOT true. This teaching is incredibly damaging to Christianity.

6. You once again have it all wrong and are telling falsehoods about your fellow Christians. There has never been expressions of doubts about the truths in God's Scripture, just debate over what those truths are. You know this is our position, so to say that we simply "doubt scripture" is a knowingly false representation of our beliefs. Now, tell me, how is that not lying?

7. I would suggest you do a little reading up on the history of Biblical interpretation and the breadth and diversity of that interpretation over the centuries. I think you have a belief that the way YOU interpret Scripture is the way most Christians have been interpreting Scripture for 2,000 years. It is more like this century. You seem to think YOUR particular Christian beliefs are all that should be discussed or held, as if your particular beliefs ARE Christianity. I can see you believing that your position is correct, that is fine, but you show no respect whatsoever to the beliefs held by millions of other Christians around the world, and treat those beliefs as if they are non-Christian and even heretical. This is the type of judgmentalism that the Bible condemns, not to mention very prideful and hubristic.

Christianity is a big place, my friend, and you just live in a tiny corner of it. Christianity has a long history, and you are only living in a small fraction of it. Don't act as if your little corner and your moment in time is the be-all and end-all of Christian thought and belief.

 

[Didaskomenos]

Mind giving the page number you found this on or the site you found this on?

Just try plugging a quote from it in to Google. It's all over the internet. Try this page: http://www.holycross.edu/departments/religiousstudies/alaffey/Augustine-Genesis.htm

As to your other remarks, need I bother responding? Or was the goodbye final? It's not as if we don't respond to practically every concern of yours in dozens of threads a month.

 

[rmwilliamsll]

on topic essay at: http://www.counterpunch.com/davis01082005.html

Literalism is the linchpin of fundamentalism; the literalization, if you will, of the founding psychological need. For an absolute certitude that can be established at the level of facts that will admit of no ambiguity or interpretation. (Fundamentalists, ironically, are the true positivists.) But to eliminate ambiguity and confusion one must attack its source. Figurative language. That is the danger that must be avoided at all costs because in place of the literal figurative language introduces the play of meaning. The need to sustain complex connections at the level of thought (not fact) through the evolution of mental abilities that are necessarily connected with developing all the metaphoric resources of language. The literal in contrast puts an end to thought. It offers the mind a way to shut down, to reify itself. It thereby exorcises the greatest fear: interpretation and its inevitable result, the conflict of interpretations and with it the terror of being forever bereft of dogmatic certitudes. A metaphor is the lighting flash of an intelligence that sees, as Aristotle asserts, connections that can only be sustained by a thought that thereby liberates itself from the immediate.