W
- Status
S
StarSapphire
Guest
Eh? 
W
Warrenton
Guest
We’re the only literalists.
S
StarSapphire
Guest
We are? Since when? I knew I’d wandered in and out of my religion rather erratically, but when did that literalistic requirement crop up?
W
Warrenton
Guest
I would not say it’s a requirement. It’s more of a tradition.
None other than St. Augustine (good Roman that he was) found much of the Old Testament, and especially Genesis, ridiculous. Origen also found the accounts embarassing. Accordingly, they worked out a rationalistic way to interpret it.
The Greek fathers, however, took a different view, and St. John Chrysostom observed that those who tended to the allegorical view of things changed the meaning of all sorts of things to suit the allegory, like fortune tellers who interpret dreams!
I’m not saying anyone is a bad Catholic for taking an allegorical view of scripture. The novel “A god strolling in the cool of the evening” (catch the refefence???
shows a typical, educated Roman’s view of scripture, when he reads them after their confiscation by the authorities. There is a reason we’re called Roman Catholic.But it’s not the exclusive Catholic way - and the Church has not preserved the entire bible simply because it felt they were instructive allegories.
G
grannymh
Guest
Look at it this way. Catholicism has the guts to declare the Divine Revealation in the first three chapters of Genesis and stick to it. In this sense, they are promoting the literal truth with no “buts” about it.
W
wisdomseeker
Guest
since some people begin to question the Truth of Scriptures. you know, when the Church comes out and have to defend the Truth against heresies.
C
COPLAND_3
Guest
By these footnotes from the Aquinas Study Bible you will see that the Fathers of the Church had no doubts that Cain and Abel are historical sites.google.com/site/aquinasstudybible/home/genesis/gen-1/gen-2/gen-3/gen-4
In 1987 I had this same thing happen in my first R.E. class.
Also Adam and Eve didn’t exist and neither did the flood or Noah’s Ark.
If they continue to chip away they will get to the point where they say Jesus didn’t die on the Cross.
I always find it strange that many people nowadays call their son Cain but I have never known anybody to call their son Abel.
G
grannymh
Guest
That point is the goal.
S
StarSapphire
Guest
I cannot accept that. Closing the doors to an inquiring mind and battening down the hatches because you fear attack is not religion, it’s fundamentalism. Moreover it’s counter intuitive - these texts were written down extremely late in their lifecycle. I could go in to depth on the use of allegory in Middle Eastern verbal histories to relay messages, religious, historical and metaphorical, right down to the point until they were written down, indeed I would draw your attention to flood mythologies in the Middle East, they are remarkable in their consistencies and probably refer to a very historical flood event. But this is not the thread for it. Until then they were organic. Even Jesus spoke in parables so that he could talk to people in allegories they could understand.
And the reference to Aquinas actually reinforces the point - we have always questioned, we have always wondered, we have always probed the text and tried to reason with it. We have never just read it verbatim and condemned all discussion of it. I see absolutely no reason to accept Genesis as allegory - in fact why, if it’s so damaging to do so - does this reinforce my faith, not destroy it? That message - the loss of innocence and the expulsion from the paradise of that innocence - that has more powerful resonance and immediacy to me than anything directly related to ‘factual text’. Painfully so.
It worries me, if we do not seek to find God in all things. We must open our mind to receive him, not close it. If we shut down and block all attempts to discuss we do ourselves more damage, we come across as dogmatic and arrogant, neither of which Jesus encouraged. He let people find their own way, spoke to them in a language and even defied the Old Testament himself. The Old Testament Laws said to stone a woman to death. Jesus told them that whoever was without sin could cast the first stone. They all went on their way and he let her go with advice not to do it again. Ours is a religion of openness and compassion, that is why it has survived so long. We only need fear questioning, allegories, if we fear our faith and religion is not strong enough, in its own essence, to survive. And I certainly have no fear of it. I know it will, and being open to discussion is one of its strengths.
And the reference to Aquinas actually reinforces the point - we have always questioned, we have always wondered, we have always probed the text and tried to reason with it. We have never just read it verbatim and condemned all discussion of it. I see absolutely no reason to accept Genesis as allegory - in fact why, if it’s so damaging to do so - does this reinforce my faith, not destroy it? That message - the loss of innocence and the expulsion from the paradise of that innocence - that has more powerful resonance and immediacy to me than anything directly related to ‘factual text’. Painfully so.
It worries me, if we do not seek to find God in all things. We must open our mind to receive him, not close it. If we shut down and block all attempts to discuss we do ourselves more damage, we come across as dogmatic and arrogant, neither of which Jesus encouraged. He let people find their own way, spoke to them in a language and even defied the Old Testament himself. The Old Testament Laws said to stone a woman to death. Jesus told them that whoever was without sin could cast the first stone. They all went on their way and he let her go with advice not to do it again. Ours is a religion of openness and compassion, that is why it has survived so long. We only need fear questioning, allegories, if we fear our faith and religion is not strong enough, in its own essence, to survive. And I certainly have no fear of it. I know it will, and being open to discussion is one of its strengths.
W
Warrenton
Guest
Other stories are also remarkable for all being different from the accounts in Genesis.
Of course he did; no one ever believed that the good Samaritan actually existed.
Under this model, we need to account for how people go from thinking a parable is actual history, to back again.
That’s curious. Rather like generations of people knowing The Archers is just a story, then thinking they were real, then another generation deciding that it’s a story. Certainly it’s possible, but it is odd.
You’re absolutely right.
Although I hold with St. Chrysostom that the stories are true (or perhapsps we should say, historically accurate), and have found that adopting this view provides surprising intellectual support for my faith, I respect any Catholic’s right to interpret them differently. I have already provided sources in St. Augustine, and Origen (who certainly influenced later exegesis) that follow precisely the reasoning you adopt. Indeed, I think one of Origen’s points was that a literal interpretation makes evangelizing more difficult, because civilised men and women (Romans!) won’t take the stories seriously.
As Catholics, it is the moral teaching of the Church to which we must asset, not the means the teaching is derived. An English judge, advising another judge, long ago said “Your judgment will almost always be correct although your reasoning will almost certainy be wrong.” Though I am not saying my reasoning is wrong (!) all Catholics can concur in the judgment of the Church.
That is what is “fundamental” about our faith.
G
grannymh
Guest
Original sin is more than loss of innocence.
To understand what the Catholic Church actually teaches, one needs to spend a great deal of time studying paragraphs 355 - 421 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition. This means serious study of the whole and not bits and pieces.
To understand what the Catholic Church actually teaches, one needs to spend a great deal of time studying paragraphs 355 - 421 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition. This means serious study of the whole and not bits and pieces.
G
garysibio
Guest
You are correct; your son’s teacher is wrong. The Bible is clear. Cain and Abel were two very real brothers. Cain murdered Abel.
E
EJM
Guest
J
johnbres2
Guest
of course it is allegorical and you are absolutely correct. It is possible that in the Jewish stories that were handed down generation to generation, the earliest stories of all, and the first people in those stories, were named Adam and Eve. In other words, there certainly were other people, but the very first known stories concerned two people named Adam and Eve, who had sons Cain and Abel. Of course there were other people around as well for them to marry.
H
hockeyfan
Guest
First off, you are filling in the blanks when you start talking about the “first few generations.” If you point out that Eve may have had 9 children, although this is possible, you are starting to move out of the literal interpretation of the story yourself. Second, Genesis 4 implies that Cain was the oldest son, and certainly says that he was older then Abel. It also adds at the end of the story that Seth was Abel’s replacement. If there were other sons why would Adam need a replacement son?
What do you mean by not you do not do Noah?
Are you referring to one of those cutesy Adam and Eve children’s books?
I don’t recognize any Catholic doctrine in what you are saying.
With all due respect, I have not condescended to you, and I expect the same respect. When I post, I try to use thoughtful arguments backed by evidence. I am Catholic, I teach CCD, have taught Confirmation for 12 years, and sponsored 3 people to be Confirmed.
Pope John Paul 2 gave out a message on evolution that says this. ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/JP961022.HTM
Or from the Catechism of the Catholic Church 115-118
How Catholic is that?
H
hockeyfan
Guest
I just read that, and I don’t see allegory ruled out.
H
hockeyfan
Guest
I find that more realistic.
S
StarSapphire
Guest
That is exactly what I said. The word was shoved in their direction, but they still all waffled on regardless. So God sends his son, sits them down, and carefully explains to them, in parables so perhaps they may, through viewing the stories in versions they could understand, finally get the point.
Genesis had already tried, Isaiah had already tried. Figuring it might take a bit more oomph, we get the Son, just to make sure, Finally they get it and one of the world’s most successful belief systems is born. To make people understand anything you have to speak to them in a language they will understood. A few are given the gift of insight and understanding, but the rest usually need a little bit more help.
But to assume that the entire Old Testament is fact is just that, an assumption, an assumption to which even, and particularly, the original church never subscribed. In fact, understanding many of the original stories as allegories (I refer to Old Testament, not new, I see a considerable difference between first and second hand accounts of what was palpably a real person - after all, something happened 2,000 years ago that changed the course of history for all mankind) actually enriches them. I have learned a great deal, not just about my faith, my beliefs, my religion and God, but also about myself, human nature and the power of the spirit. In fact, again I agree with Jung. The symbolism of archetypes in culture can, in one image, a snake, a tree, Eden, are far more powerful than any simple one ‘historical fact’. An archetype can express a thousand words in just one potent image.
I really want to discuss Noah and middle eastern flood mythologies… But I’ll steer clear of that for a while I think
- Status