Catholic Examples of Why the Bible Should Not Be Read Literally

Apologetics 101: Answering Your Questions Nigh the Organized religion

Question: Do Catholics take the Bible literally?

Reply: Yes, we do. Now, I know I just sent a lot of "Spirit of Vatican Two" folks into spasms by saying that, but they demand not fear, every bit I'll explain momentarily.  From the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC), paragraph #115, we read, "According to an ancient tradition, one tin distinguish between two senses of Scripture: the literal and the spiritual, the latter being subdivided into the allegorical, moral, and anagogical senses [more on those below]."

Paragraph #116 of the Catechism gives united states more on the literal sense of Scripture, "The literal sense is the meaning conveyed by the words of Scripture and discovered by exegesis, post-obit the rules of sound interpretation: 'All other senses of Sacred Scripture are based on the literal.'"

Okay, what is existence said here? Yes, Catholics take the Bible literally.  What that means, though, as the Catechism states, is that we look for the meaning that the author of any given Scripture passage meant to convey, we don't just expect at the words on the page and take them at face value.  An example: If I said that I went to a concert last dark and there were a million people there, does that hateful that I am trying to tell you that in that location were exactly one one thousand thousand people at the concert?  No, of class not.  Everyone in our particular culture would accept that to mean that I went to a concert last night and information technology was admittedly inundation with people.  That could mean hundreds, or even thousands, depending on the size of the loonshit where the concert was held, merely it definitely does non mean exactly ane one thousand thousand people, even though I really said there were a million people there.

This is what is known every bit an idiom of speech – using words that, taken at confront value, actually hateful i thing, to hateful something else.  Another example: Oftentimes, when watching the weather reports on the local news, you'll hear the conditions person say something along the lines of, "The sun came up at 5:33 this morning."  Everyone knows what that means.  Yet, that word – sunrise – taken at just a surface meaning, actually implies that the weather guy or gal thinks the sun is revolving around the globe.  The truth is, the dominicus does not rise in the morning.  What really happens is that the earth'southward rotation causes people to exist able to come across the sun at a item time each morning. But, instead of proverb, "The globe'south rotation caused the dominicus to come up into view at five:33 this morning time," we only say "the dominicus rose at 5:33 this morning," and everyone knows the pregnant nosotros are intending to convey.

Once more, we often utilize language in a way that conveys meanings that are different from the surface meanings of the words we use.  Every civilization, every linguistic communication, in every fourth dimension, has had their own detail idioms of spoken language.  Which is why reading the Bible and figuring out what this or that passage means, figuring out the "literal" interpretation of the passage, tin can sometimes exist very difficult.  The folks who wrote the Old Attestation used idioms of speech.  The folks who wrote the New Testament used idioms of speech.  The problem is, that as English-speaking 21st century Americans, we don't necessarily know what the idioms used past Hebrews and Greeks in the first century and earlier mean.

Think about it: Let's say some archeologist, 2 chiliad years in the future, whose native linguistic communication is Japanese, was excavating the site of a 21st century American library and came across a book that had the phrase, "Information technology was raining cats and dogs," in it.  What is he to brand of that?  Is the volume speaking of some strange meteorological miracle where cats and dogs were falling from the sky like pelting?  How is he supposed to figure out what that phrase means?

Well, he has to do what we have to sometimes do today when trying to figure out exactly what this or that passage of the Bible ways.  He has to dig a scrap deeper to find the author's intent (CCC #110).  He has to take into account the historical conditions of the fourth dimension and the culture of the author.  He has to have into account the type of literary genre the book was written in – is it historical narrative, poesy, or some other style of literary expression?  He needs to investigate 21st century English more deeply, then on.  Basically, he has to practice his homework. We accept to practise the same when reading the Bible.

All of that is to say that, yes, Catholics take the Bible literally.  As the Canon says, the literal sense of Scripture is what all the other senses of Scripture are based on.  So, if nosotros don't get the literal sense right, and so we don't get the spiritual sense correct.  Simply, we do not just look at the words on the page and necessarily take them at face value. If we were to do that, nosotros might not properly understand what the author was trying to tell us.  The literal significant of a passage is the meaning the author of that passage intended to convey.  It tin can sometimes exist difficult to discern.  That's why we have to look to authentic Catholic Scripture scholarship for help, and, even more importantly, that's why we take to wait to the Magisterium of the Catholic Church for help, in agreement the Scriptures.

At present, what well-nigh these spiritual sense of Scripture that I mentioned above?  The Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) tells us that not only does the text of Scripture reveal to us things about God and His plan of salvation (the literal sense), but that the "realities and events" about which Scripture speaks can, in and of themselves, be signs that farther our knowledge of God and His plan (CCC #117).  For example, 1 Peter 3:20-21 speaks of Noah's ark as a sign of Baptism.  People were "saved through h2o."  This meaning behind the literal meaning is known equally the spiritual sense of Scripture.

The Catechism tells united states of america that at that place are iii spiritual senses of Scripture: the allegorical, the moral, and the anagogical (CCC #117).  The emblematic sense refers to how any given event in the Bible tin can be understood in a more than profound style by recognizing its "significance in Christ."  For example, is there anything allegorical – anything that speaks to us of Christ – in the story of the Passover repast?  Indeed there is.  Nosotros can come across the Passover repast in a more significant way when we recognize information technology as a sign pointing to the Passion and expiry of Christ.  You have the slaughter of a spotless lamb whose blood would relieve the people of Israel from death.  You have a lamb whose bones were not to exist cleaved (John xix:36; Exodus 12:46).  A lamb that had to be eaten (the Eucharist).  Looking at biblical events with an eye to how they might acquire deeper significance in Christ helps us to understand that God reveals His programme to us not merely through words, but through events as well.

The moral sense of Scripture is that which leads us to "act justly."  An obvious case of this is the story of God giving Moses the 10 Commandments.  In the New Testament, we accept the story of the retainer who owed much to his master and the master forgave him of his entire debt, simply then that servant turned effectually and did non forgive someone who owed him a much smaller debt. The principal, when he hears of this, gets angry with the start servant and reimposes the debt upon him and tosses him in jail. Nosotros are taught that we must forgive in guild to receive forgiveness.

The third spiritual sense is the anagogical sense.  The anagogical leads us to "view events and realities in terms of their eternal significance."  The instance the Catechism gives is that of the Church on earth existence a sign of the heavenly Jerusalem.  Another example would exist the story of Sodom and Gomorrah – of how wickedness leads to devastation, not necessarily concrete destruction as in the case of those two cities, simply more importantly, to spiritual destruction.  The parable of the Dissipated Son is another case.  It tells the states that nosotros must plow abroad from sin and to the Father in a spirit of repentance in order to be accepted into the Father's business firm – heaven.

Equally mentioned, these three spiritual senses depend on the literal sense.  Problems in the interpretation of the Bible take come when someone interprets the Bible in only a literal sense, not recognizing that the events of Scripture point to certain realities in the plan of salvation in a way that goes beyond just what the words on the pages say.  This is a more fundamentalist style of interpretation.

On the other stop, withal, issues in the estimation of the Bible have arisen when someone interprets the Bible in a completely spiritual sense and minimizes, or even dismisses, the literal sense of Scripture.  This is specially true when it comes to the stories constitute in Genesis.  I've had theologians say things along the lines of, "Well, nosotros know Adam and Eve didn't actually exist, that's but a story fabricated up past different writers to convey a particular theological message."  Really?!  Or, I've been told many times, and read in many places, that Jesus didn't actually work any miracles, that the miracle accounts were inserted into the Gospels by His followers many decades afterward His death to, in essence, help them convey a transcendent message most the Christ and the Christian religion.

Sorry, but if the miracles are non true, if the literal sense makes no sense, then the simply meaning the spiritual senses can have are whatever someone makes upwardly.  How exactly is it, one might ask, that God conveys meaning through events that never happened?  Overly spiritualizing the Scriptures has really led to a loss of faith.  After all, if what the Scriptures tell us really isn't true, then on what does one pivot their faith?

Catholics have the Bible in the literal sense, and in the spiritual sense.  The latter depends on the former; the old is given deeper pregnant and significance by the latter. Both are important to a proper understanding of Scripture.

John Martignoni is a nationally-known Catholic apologist and Bible scholar. He is the Founder and President of the Bible Christian Society,  where you lot can observe lots of gratis apologetics materials — CD's, mp3 downloads, eastward-newsletters, and more, and host of EWTN's "Open Line" airing on Mondays at 3 p.m. EST.

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Source: https://aleteia.org/2015/09/01/do-catholics-take-the-bible-literally/

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