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[Nonfat Creamer]

Is there a method to discern between biblical metaphor and biblical literality? For those people who are Christians but not biblical literalists, is there a way to reliably decide which passages are meant literally and which are meant as parable? Does it boil down to the study of historical reference outside the bible or is there another method? Examples: Garden of Eden, Book of Revelation, Raising of Lazarus from the dead, Saul's epiphany.

[jimwalton]

Bible believers are often accused of attributing difficult texts to "metaphor," but that's a vast understatement and a reductionistic perspective about the Bible. The Bible is a rich and deep literary collection containing music, poetry, metaphor, allegory, archetypes, parable, hyperbole, metonymy, irony, simile, and many other literary forms, as well as genres such as prayer, prophecy, blessing, covenant language, legal language, etc. "Literally" quickly becomes a word with very little meaning or helpfulness. If a poet says the trees of the field will clap their hands and the mountains will jump for joy, is that literal? Of course not, it's poetry. If a man prays, "God, kill all those people", we may all understand that his prayer is inappropriate, and is not blessed by God, but is it literal? Well, how does that word even apply? And how does it apply to archetype, allegory, parable, and all the others? It's a word that should be dropped from the discussion because it doesn't take us anywhere except to the Land of Misunderstanding.

It's better to think that the Bible should be taken the way the author intended it to be taken. If he was using hyperbole, we're to take it that way. So also allegorically, historically, parabolic, poetic, etc. Our quest is to understand the intent of the author. In that case we'll take the Bible *seriously*, but "literally" doesn't take us anywhere.

Just as in the other disciplines (science, historiography, jurisprudence, and literature, et al.), there are generally-agreed-upon rules (called hermeneutics) that have been found to be reliable techniques to help us interpret the Bible accurately. There are general principles, grammatical ones, historical, and theological principles. Some of these are such things as:

- The Bible interprets itself. Scripture best explains Scripture. Let the Bible speak for itself. See what else it has to say about the same subject to understand what you are reading.
- Biblical examples are authoritative only when supported by a command.
- Interpret words in harmony with their meaning in the times of the author, not necessarily in harmony with their meaning in the times of the reader.
- Interpret a word in relation to its sentence and context
- Interpret a passage in harmony with its context
- When an inanimate object is used to describe a living being, the statement may be considered figurative
- When an expression is out of character with the thing described, the statement may be considered figurative
- historical facts or events become symbols of spiritual truths only if the Scriptures so designate them.

You get the idea. We don't go by instinct or feelings. We don't make uncomfortable teachings "metaphorical". We do our best to discern the intent of the author, and to see literary tools in the appropriate places. Most times it's fairly straightforward, but sometimes it's difficult.

The GARDEN OF EDEN. Treated by the Bible as a literal place, but also loaded with spiritual symbolism. We see events and places like this too. Cities like L.A., Washington D.C., NYC, Paris and Rome are literal places, but we have attributed symbolism to them also. The Garden of Eden was where God chose to make the most holy place of his creation, and where he would meet with the man and woman and reveal himself to them. In that sense, the Garden was like the temple that came later, and the man and woman were His priest and priestess. (There is priestly language in Gen. 2.)

The BOOK OF REVELATION. An extremely difficult book that is widely disagreed about. The literary elements are not clear. Some think it pertained to the Roman Empire, some to history since then (broken down by eras, especially in chapters 2-3), and some to events in the future. Not only that, some think it was combinations of those. Elements through it are interpreted as symbolic, metaphoric, historical, or spiritual. I'm not sure we'll ever sort it out with confidence.

RAISING of LAZARUS from the DEAD. It is written as a historical event, and it has its best sense as a historical event, though it is just pulsing with spiritual truths in imagery, symbolism, prophecy, et al. It's a deep and rich piece of writing, but makes the most sense if it actually happened.

SAUL'S EPIPHANY. That Paul had a spiritual experience that he considered to have actually happened through a physical vision is the most natural way to take it. It's obvious his life was changed. The book of Acts refers to it 3 times, and not as just a spiritual experience.

In other words, we use every tool in the workshop to discern what literary techniques are being used, to study the history, to evaluate the style of the writer and his agenda, the cultural context of the writing, and to interpret according to normal and mutually-acceptable rules of interpretation. There is no fool-proof method, because wherever you gather a group of human beings you get a group of perspectives, no matter what the subject or the discipline. But just as we can generally get scientists to agree that the universe is more likely held together by gravitational forces than by electro-magnetic ones, we can generally get Christians to agree on literary mechanisms in biblical texts.

[Pretend I'm human]

> that have been found to be reliable techniques

How is that judged?

[jimwalton]

They are the same techniques used in literary and historical disciplines, and have been deemed to be reliable and reasonable techniques to use to judge the meaning of a text. For instance, understanding the author's vantage point and agenda guide to the interpretive template. Understanding the text's ideology is a guide to proper understanding. Imagery in the text is best determined by how closely it fits the text's themes, agenda, and historical context. And so on. As far as historiography, there are tests in the discipline to determine credibility:

- Intention
- ability
- character of the writers
- consistency
- bias
- cover-up potential
- corroboration
- adverse witness

The same principles and techniques are applied to biblical studies.

[Yoo halloo]

> Biblical examples are authoritative only when supported by a command.

Exodus 22:18 "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live". Is it literal or figurative? Do we still have to kill witches?

[jimwalton]

It was literal, but is no longer to be taken literally. In the days of Exodus, they were expected to literally kill witches. It explains the fear of the witch of Endor in 1 Samuel 28.9. It must have at least happened some of the time for her to react as she did.

While witchcraft is equally condemned in the New Testament days (Acts 13.10; 19.19), there is no hint in the NT that witches should be executed. We can assume that the rule had its place in the days of the OT (preserving the young community from such dangerous influences), but by the days of the NT their understanding of the rules had changed. God still abhorred witchcraft, but capital punishment was no longer the course of action. And therefore, neither are we expected still to kill witches. The command applies to a specific time, but not to ours.

[Yummy Yummy]

Your comment implies that absolutely no portion of the Bible can be construed literally even if it may also have a valid metaphorical or parabolic interpretation. Simply because the Bible uses such a lavish complexity of literary forms to describe how a woman's previous (or future) sexual partners have large genitalia and ejaculate as powerfully as horses does not mean we necessarily conclude that the author intended to convey that the woman or those men never even existed.

Thus, there could very much be a literal interpretation from even verses that very clearly fall into the category of other literary devices. Which may be why OP asks what is the most reliable way to identify which verses have absolutely zero literal interpretation and to determine the degree of literal interpretation for those verses that do.

[jimwalton]

Then I have miscommunicated. There is certainly a place for literal interpretation, and it is the valid interpretation in many places. There are also many places where we can interpret the Scriptures on many levels, both literally and figuratively/symbolically/metaphorically/etc. What I was saying was that to look at the Bible shallowly and unlayered (that it is either all literal or all worthless) is not a valid approach to the Bible. It is a much more complex and treasured compendium of writings than that. I agree with you that using literary forms doesn't automatically negate the historicity of the characters or the events. I thought I said such in my explanations, for instance, of the Garden of Eden: a literal place in a literal time, but also steeped in symbols, prophetic and spiritual images. Texts, characters, and stories can easily be multi-leveled. Washington, D.C. may be a symbol of power, an archetype of corruption, and also a metaphor of political savvy while at the same time being a real place occupying land in both geography and history.

> Which may be why OP asks what is the most reliable way to identify which verses have absolutely zero literal interpretation and to determine the degree of literal interpretation for those verses that do.

My apologies if I misunderstood the intent of the original poster. It seemed he/she was assuming that we had two choices: metaphor or literal. I was responding that the choices are far richer than that. You may be placing your own interpretive template on the OP, assuming he or she was trying to distinguish "absolute zero literal interpretation" vs. "degree of literal interpretation." As I re-read the OP, I'm not sure I see all that in the post. Maybe it is, but maybe not.

[Science is My God]

That is some serious creative interpretation.

[jimwalton]

Not creative at all. It's good Bible interpretation. The Bible is not a simple and simplistic text, but a multi-layered one. Too many people approach the Bible reductionistically, treating it more like a book for babies. But, hey, even Sesame Street, the quintessential children's program, has hidden adult meanings in some of their children's songs and skits. Many texts in the Bible are considered to be great literature and should be treated interpretively as such. They are rich repositories of literary styles and deep teachings. To treat it as a simple piece of mindless nothingness is surely to misunderstand what it is saying.