Shortly after introducing the Constitution, politicians along with the entire judicial branch wondered how strict they should be with its “contents”. Should they take what it says literally? Example: “Since it doesn’t say you have the right to Death, you can’t commit suicide.” Or did they want to take it a little “looser”? Example: “Since the Constitution says any man has the right to Life, it’s only logical that you have the right to Death.”
Now, ignoring the examples of suicide, I’d to turn this “loose” constructionism and “strict” constructionism to the Bible.
Are you a “loose” constructionist, meaning you believe that the Bible has a few metaphors or loose interpretations here and there? Or are you a “strict” constructionist, meaning you believe pretty much everything in the Bible is interpreted literally?
I, for one, am a loose constructionist.
Ironically Yours, Blade and Blood
That’s an interesting approach
My answer: neither
Reason: because the
literal meaning & the
literal sense are not the same thing.
For example, the Flood story uses words in their literal meaning: mabbul in Hebrew does mean “flood (of water)”, & is translated as such, correctly; it’s not a flood of anything else, such as congratulations, or riches, or woes, or whatever: the word is used in its
proper sense, not in any
metaphorical or transferred sense.
That however does not tell us whether the flood was a real event. Words can be used in their proper sense in a work of fiction: the Misty Mountains in Tolkien are mountains in the proper sense - they are not metaphorical or allegorical - but they are fictitious even so: they exist only in the invented world of the books they occur in. What makes them convincing, is that they are like yet unlike mountains in the so-called “real world” we live in.
As for the historical reality of things in the Bible: in the Flood narrative in Genesis, there are lots of real things:
- Ararat is the Biblical name for the area called Urartu in Assyrian historical texts
- men are real
- so are animals
- so is rain
- & floods
- whether they are all real as combined in that narrative, is another matter: “men in general” exist in reality - it does not follow that this particular man existed in reality, especially as his age is given as 600. It is conceivable that he existed, whether or not he was that age, whether or not he was called Noah: the name is unlikely, as it is Hebrew - & Hebrew is a dialect of Canaanite: so it is far more recent than the date at which the Flood is set.
That something is in the Bible, does not make it actually existent: a seven-headed dragon is as fabulous in the Book of Revelation as any dragon outside the Bible. Being “in the Bible” does not change what things are, but how God uses them - & He is as able to reveal His Will by using a tale about a dragon or a flood, as by working through so-called history. The
literary genre to which a text belongs does not affect its value as a means of God’s working.
More important than the issue of historicality is the issue of what the text means theologically: of itself, a flood, however extensive, is of no theological importance. This story is important, not because it happened (
that is not terribly important), but
because God speaks through it.
The Bible is “the work of human hands” & hearts & minds - as such, it is written as a human book, because it is a human book. Therefore, it uses the same resources of language & meaning as texts from the - very long - period during which it was formed. So it includes a great variety of
- types of literature
such as:
- hymns
- proverbs
- laments
- letters
- apocalypses
- myths
- predictions
- prophecy
- law
- gospels
- parable
- satire
- etc.
- in many combinations. It also includes many
- figures of speech & rhetorical devices - such as:
- hyperbole
- anaphora
- hendiadys
- chiasmus
- inclusion
- etc.
All of these should be taken in their literal sense, as the sorts of expression they are. So hyperbole is hyperbole, not straight description; so when we come across the million-strong army of Zerah the Ethiopian, that is not a straighforward statistic: it is exaggeration for effect; it is one of many: other examples include those in Numbers 1 & 26 - they needn’t be altered, not because they are historically factual, but because the exaggeration is for a theological effect - it shows us something about Israel’s God; speciffically, that He is faithful. Only secondarily is the emphasis on man.
The difficulty is to work out what is being said in each text - & that, is the work of a life-time;because there are always hidden depths in the Bible:it has an infinite capacity to surprise. I’t like a country that grows the more it is explored.
Any good to you
?
