Yes, but we also say it IS raining cats and dogs, when it isn’t really. The Bible is full of metaphor, and nowhere is it more apparent than in Jesus’s parables – He used metaphor all the time. It doesn’t seem like much of a “proof” to me.
CentralFLJames;4052739:
Perhaps. But its not consistent with Jewish tradition to run from staggering odds (ref. David and Goliath) much less a metaphor is it?
How do you explain the Jews refusing to follow him in John 6:66
? Where they running away in fear from a mere loaf of bread and a cup of wine?
James, I’m not “explaining” it – I’m just saying that there is room for error about this. Church scholars know that the first three gospels are grouped together for a reason – and John is separate because it was written later. For “facts” they rely on the first three much more than John, which they view as less reliable for factual information.
However, I’ve just looked up these passages in three Bibles and they are all quite different, which is interesting. The “gist” is the same, but the language itself seems to be a little fuzzy.
Still, on the topic of metaphors – was Peter literally a rock? In the parable of the seeds sown on good soil, rocky soil, hard soil, etc, don’t we understand that we are not literally seeds? We extrapolate into metaphor, as it was clear Jesus, in nearly all of his teaching, intended.
In the John passages above, the metaphor is nourishment – spiritual nourishment from God. And I wonder about the (almost fundamentalist Protestant) attachment to literalism in this case, when such literalism is not promoted in all other cases.
But as far as the Jews, it’s easy for us to look back in hindsight, from the position of beliefs we already hold. But consider the Jews of the day. If I were there at the time, those words might have sounded like an exhortation to cannibalism!!! Eat my flesh and drink my blood? Some if not most would have been disgusted or worse, considered the idea to be a heinous sin.
Still, you might consider that the Jews who had taken the time to listen were trying to make sense of the metaphor, and it wasn’t clear to them. It was difficult so they left (John 6:66). It’s understandable. Would you waste your time hanging with someone who appeared to be raving about cannibalism and not making his metaphors more clear?
In my current Bible studies I am learning that this cannibalism idea, among other things, is what stimulated the later persecutions of early Christians. That, and the “love feasts,” which were attended by “brothers and sisters” who kissed each other. People thought they were orgies, and along with the cannibalism, they were outraged.
Regardless, I’m not sure the word
is or
am is, in itself “proof”. If that were the case, you would have to go through the Bible (or especially the New Testament, or even just Jesus’s words) and claim that EVERY time he said
is or
am he meant it literally. I don’t think that claim can be made.
What this tells me is that the Church itself, in the
centuries of doctrinal struggle after Jesus’s death, decided which
is was real, and which
is was not.
So I can say that to belong to the Catholic Church is to accept its teachings, but that the actual intentions of Jesus are still mysterious and open to interpretation when viewed directly – and that is, after the Gutenberg press and translations of the Bible began to be circulated widely, outside the monopoly of Church.
In a nutshell, I don’t think the Church controls God, His meanings, or His intentions. God is in charge. And the Church, as always, is still filled with, and run by, human sinners who make mistakes. Thus as humans we can never really say what
is – we can only say what we believe.
To me it remains a mystery and although I may belong to the Church, the higher authority is God himself.
) all day long (like this, http://bestsmileys.com/violent/10.gif ) and it will never, ever make me guilty of your body and blood, will it?
