Which books are allegory and which books are history?

[PazzoGrande]

Which books are meant to tell us of real events, and which books are parables?

I take it that the New Testament, with the exception of Revelations, is based on real events.

Is Exodus meant to be taken as the actual history of our faith like the Gospels? Or is it meant to be taken as an allegory of the saving God? If it is history, is it reliable, considering how

 

[cc42]

My understnading is that most books of the Bible are meant to be taken literally unless it’s clearly allegorical (like Jesus’ parables) or symbolic like visions in Daniel and Revelation, or poetic (like the Psalms). With that said the Bible is a book to communicate spiritual truths. I think that it’s important to read Exodus and other Old Testament books as stories that really happened but may not have the same historical eye or closeness as the Gospels and New Testament books. The Old Testament should be read to see what light it can shed on the New Testament and should be understood in what light Christ sheds on them. A book like Exodus is literal history but I have read that it may be more of an epic type history. Much of the Exodus for instance should be understood as being a working prophecy or type of Christ’s redemption.

 

[COPLAND_3]

There are going to be people with different takes on this, but this is the take of a traditional Catholic view that you will find in most of the history of Catholic thought.

Genesis - Job are historical in the sense of actual events. Job is part of the poetic books but it is historical

Psalms - Sirach are poetic

Isaiah - Malachi are prophetic, some fulfilled and unfulfilled prophecies.

Matthew - Jude is actual events

Revelation is apocalyptic, and it is actual events but spoken in metaphors and symbolic language.

 

[PazzoGrande]

Genesis - Job are historical in the sense of actual events. Job is part of the poetic books but it is historical

Thanks for the response. Isn’t the creation story in Genesis just allegory though?

 

[patrick457]

Just my personal opinion, but here goes:

To be honest, I don’t think we could neatly pigeonhole Biblical books into the categories of ‘historical’ and ‘allegorical’ as we would like. I mean, one could relate factual history using allegory or some such literary device, and one could speak of symbolic stuff couched under the conceit of narrating ‘history’.

 

[patg]

Thanks for the response. Isn’t the creation story in Genesis just allegory though?

The bible is not a single book, rather it is a collection of writings - like a library. And like a library, it contains many different literary forms. Allegory is one of those forms but there are also myths, legends, poems, didactic fiction, and certainly history. Note that these terms define the literary form of the story, they DO NOT indicate whether the story is true of false. The inspired writings are all true even though many are fictional since there is no reason fiction can’t be a valid vehicle for revelation. These ideas are dogmatically supported by the church in documents such as Dei Verbum (available online). For example:

*To search out the intention of the sacred writers, attention should be given, among other things, to “literary forms.” For truth is set forth and expressed differently in texts which are variously historical, prophetic, poetic, or of other forms of discourse. The interpreter must investigate what meaning the sacred writer intended to express and actually expressed in particular circumstances by using contemporary literary forms in accordance with the situation of his own time and culture. *

The creation stories are more properly categorized as myths, the story of Jonah as didactic fiction, etc. Even the gospels are not assumed to be literal history - you can read the Instruction on the Historical Truth of the Gospels for more insight on this.

 

[patrick457]

The creation stories are more properly categorized as myths, the story of Jonah as didactic fiction, etc. Even the gospels are not assumed to be literal history - you can read the Instruction on the Historical Truth of the Gospels for more insight on this.

Since the word ‘myth’ gets abused and bastardized (excuse the term) all too often nowadays, I’d better also drop this comment.

“Myth” (from the Greek mythos ‘tale’, ‘story’), in its original and true sense, denotes a sacred narrative that tells how the world or mankind came to be in its present form, and which typically involves supernatural beings (like gods) and superhuman entities (like heroes). Myths were transmitted to convey religious or idealized experience, to establish behavioral models, and to teach. Myths may rise as accounts of historical events (usually in a highly-elaborated - ‘mythicized’ - form), as allegory for or personification of natural phenomena, or as an explanation of ritual. In this sense, we could say that certain parts of the Bible - like Genesis - are indeed ‘mythology’ par excellence.

Nowadays however, when people speak of ‘myth’ the connotation usually is something like “fictional fairytales (which are highly scientifically irrational so as to be laughable, which only backward, infantile fundamentalist kooks could ever take seriously, which have no place in the modern world and serious discussion of which would be an utterly stupid and pointless waste of one’s time).” When some people attack the Bible as ‘myth’ they usually mean it in this latter sense. Which I (as one who studies religions in general) find rather annoying and…I would refrain from commenting further lest I type something uncharitable.

 

[COPLAND_3]

Just my personal opinion, but here goes:

To be honest, I don’t think we could neatly pigeonhole Biblical books into the categories of ‘historical’ and ‘allegorical’ as we would like. I mean, one could relate factual history using allegory or some such literary device, and one could speak of symbolic stuff couched under the conceit of narrating ‘history’.

Very well said!

 

[COPLAND_3]

Thanks for the response. Isn’t the creation story in Genesis just allegory though?

No, creation really happened, its a record of God creating the universe. To be considered allegorical it would be considered to be speaking one thing but meaning something else in a deeper symbolical sense. But the creation story is about creation. But within the description of creation there are at times the use of metaphors, which Scripture uses a lot for many things, but that does not mean allegory. The “days” of creation is probably a metaphor for a period of time, not literally a 24 hour day.

 

[PazzoGrande]

No, creation really happened, its a record of God creating the universe.

But as I understand it, it still isn’t a literal account.

The second story of creation in Genesis that tells the story of how man and woman were made, correct me if I’m wrong, but the Church does not teach that it historically, literally happened that man was created out of soil immediately in the human form or that woman was actually created from man’s rib. Rather we believe that evolution in the creation of man is entirely possible.

As such, Genesis – at least not all of Genesis – isn’t historical and isn’t literal.

 

[cc42]

The creation account is meant to teach theological truths and foreshadow Christ’s passion so it is historical but uses allegorical or typological elements.

 

[edwest2]

Thanks for the response. Isn’t the creation story in Genesis just allegory though?

That’s asked a lot here.

"Real History

"The argument is that all of this is real history, it is simply ordered topically rather than chronologically, and the ancient audience of Genesis, it is argued, would have understood it as such.

"Even if Genesis 1 records God’s work in a topical fashion, it still records God’s work—things God really did.

"The Catechism explains that “Scripture presents the work of the Creator symbolically as a succession of six days of divine ‘work,’ concluded by the ‘rest’ of the seventh day” (CCC 337), but “nothing exists that does not owe its existence to God the Creator. The world began when God’s word drew it out of nothingness; all existent beings, all of nature, and all human history is rooted in this primordial event, the very genesis by which the world was constituted and time begun” (CCC 338).

"It is impossible to dismiss the events of Genesis 1 as a mere legend. They are accounts of real history, even if they are told in a style of historical writing that Westerners do not typically use.

"Adam and Eve: Real People

“It is equally impermissible to dismiss the story of Adam and Eve and the fall (Gen. 2–3) as a fiction. A question often raised in this context is whether the human race descended from an original pair of two human beings (a teaching known as monogenism) or a pool of early human couples (a teaching known as polygenism).”

Peace,
Ed

 

[edwest2]

But as I understand it, it still isn’t a literal account.

The second story of creation in Genesis that tells the story of how man and woman were made, correct me if I’m wrong, but the Church does not teach that it historically, literally happened that man was created out of soil immediately in the human form or that woman was actually created from man’s rib. Rather we believe that evolution in the creation of man is entirely possible.

As such, Genesis – at least not all of Genesis – isn’t historical and isn’t literal.

Don’t lump all Catholics into the “we believe” category.

From Arcanum by Pope Leo XIII:

“We record what is to all known, and cannot be doubted by any, that God, on the sixth day of creation, having made man from the slime of the earth, and having breathed into his face the breath of life, gave him a companion, whom He miraculously took from the side of Adam when he was locked in sleep.”

Peace,
Ed