Did you “accidentally” not see the quotes from the Catholic Encyclopedia that make it clear the manner in which you interpret the Deluge story is incorrect?
Did you also not see the quote from Fr. Jaki, who was a member of the Pontifical Academy of Science who also makes it clear that a literalist interpretation of the Deluge is not reasonable or accurate.
The Bible contains many literary genres through which the inspired writers communicate their message. Each *genus litterarium *has it’s own way of communicating. If you do not correctly and fully recognize the *genus litterarium
and how it works, *thenyou are not reading the text as it was intended to read. Apparently, you read under the false belief that since the biblical text is inerrant than it must be historical. However, their is no justification for that position based on the history of biblical exegesis.
For example, are you aware that Origen, St. Augustine, St. Gregory of Nyssa and his school taught that Genesis 1 cannot be interpreted as creation in a literal six days? Furthermore, St. Thomas Aquinas said a direct creation in six days is favored “by a superficial reading of Scripture.”
In addition, St. Thomas Aquinas teaches in the
Summa Theologica that the literal sense in Scripture is the basis for the other senses intended by the sacred writers. It would seem that you are stuck not actually on the literal sense but a literalism, which does not take one very far into the meaning.
Also, are you aware that the Vatican does not agree with literalistic reading of Scripture. Here is a quote from
*Dei Verbum *( *Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation)
*
12. However, since God speaks in Sacred Scripture through men in human fashion, the interpreter of Sacred Scripture, in order to see clearly what God wanted to communicate to us, should carefully investigate what meaning the sacred writers really intended, and what God wanted to manifest by means of their words.
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. For the correct understanding of what the sacred author wanted to assert, due attention must be paid to the customary and characteristic styles of feeling, speaking and narrating which prevailed at the time of the sacred writer, and to the patterns men normally employed at that period in their everyday dealings with one another.
I think you are discounting what the Church teaches about reading the Bible and holding fast to your own ideas without learning from the Church.
