Is The Bible Always To Be Taken Literally?

My life’s work has always been writing, so the use of words is a subject near and dear to my heart.  I know that there are types of writing that stick basically to the facts, like the crime reports I wrote as a police officer and the budgets I wrote as a manager.  I know there is writing that is purely fanciful like the humor essays I wrote for newsletters and books. I know the fiction books I write are purely fanciful, and I know there is much in between all of these that employs both the literal and the not so literal in serious essays, literature, and poetry.  One such document is the Holy Bible.  Please note that I used the term Holy and am in no way trying to diminish that in the things I say here next.

The Bible is often taken literally by some conservative members of the faith, and often to their detriment I think.  Others view the whole book as poetry and fanciful in the far liberal side of what passes for Christianity, to the point that I question what it is that they believe is fact.  It seems clear to me that some parts of the Bible are statements and stories that are given to hyperbole and poetic license, while the majority is designed to be factual reporting and strong exhortation.  When you start talking about hyperbole and poetic license it makes many Christians nervous, after all, that requires interpretation to decide about it…and we don’t want any interpretation.  We want it to say what it says.  Well, I think it still says what it says, even if it is not meant to be a literal fact.

Let’s take an example.  Jesus is quoted as saying “consider the lilies of the field, they toil not and they don’t reap, yet Solomon in all his glory was not clothed as beautifully as these.” (My translation)  Does that mean we should stop the cotton harvest and shut down the Levis factories and go naked?  NO, he is exaggerating for effect.  He wants us not to be obsessed with material wealth.  I think the same goes for turn the other cheek and a number of other things in the Bible.  You have to use some judgment in reading it and take it into context with what the real message is trying to get across.

Now when we get to the issues like Jonah being swallowed by a large fish we might want to go slowly and think about it.  Should we dismiss it as fanciful off the bat?  After all, dinosaurs roamed the earth in the past and we don’t know all about what lurks in the sea even today.  Scientists keep coming up with new discovered species in the deep that shock us all.  I was even shocked as a ranger to know that there were 400 pound sturgeon living at the bottom of the lake I patrolled in my boat.  So who knows what lived and happened back then.  We just know that if God tells us to go somewhere, we better do it…which is the point of the story in the Bible.

I guess what I’m trying to say here is, if you are having trouble with the Bible as a book you can believe…don’t.  It is the inspired Word of God, don’t be fooled by those who try to pick it apart with arguments and say those “literalist” fairy tales aren’t worth reading.