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Ah, "figurative interpretation" defence. Except that one or two thousand years ago such "figurative interpretation" was considered an apostasy: people actually

Ah, "figurative interpretation" defence. Except that one or two thousand years ago such "figurative interpretation" was considered an apostasy: people actually believed those stories to factually be true. Try to deny their factual truth, get stoned (with stones).

mistermann 6y ago
There is what is true, and then there is mankind's interpretation/opinion of what is true, which changes over time. And, interpretations do not always have unanimous support for any given point in time. This kinda seems to apply to pretty much everything, not just The Bible.
mcv 6y ago
Not true. During the Middle Ages, 4 levels of interpretation: literal, allegorical, moral and mystical. Of these, the literal was generally seen as the least important. Of course there are parts in the bible that do describe literal history, and those are still very important for context, but a lot of stories are very clearly not literal, and even in the middle ages, an important Christian thinker or cardinal (I forgot who it was and can't find the quote at the moment) said: if our interpretation of scripture conflicts with our observation of the world, then our interpretation must be wrong. He wasn't stoned or burned at the stake for that. And 2000 years ago, it certainly wasn't the Christians who were stoning people. No, the "figurative interpretation", as you call it, has been with us for millennia. Biblical Literalism is only a fairly recent movement, and quite at odds with the bible, Christianity, and reality.
- mistermann 6y ago
  It's interesting how modern rationalists look down their noses at the bible and people's interpretations of it, while being completely unaware of the fact that while doing so, they are interpreting their perception of reality (an interpretation within an interpretation). I suspect a non-trivial part of religion (that has been lost since we have broadly rejected it) is that it explicitly taught various types of humility, in various ways, and then also that from a more abstract/psychological perspective, the cognitive practice of conceptualizing an all powerful, all knowing God may have had beneficial psychological aspects with respect to moderating the (often dangerous) perception of omniscience, that seems to be an evolved and unavoidable consequence of human consciousness. Evidence of this sense of omniscience can be seen everywhere on social media today: widespread self-perceptions of abilities to accurately read minds, predict the future, know everything (including the unknown/top-secret/undiscovered), solve infinitely complex problems with ease, etc. It's weird how this is so obvious, and makes complete logical sense, but encountering someone who does not outright and incredibly passionately reject this idea is incredibly rare. Perhaps this helps explain why religion is so common, always and everywhere - it is socially evolved and doggedly persistent, because it provides genuine superior fitness by offsetting some of the unseen negative aspects that hitched a ride on other evolved traits.

mistermann 6y ago

There is what is true, and then there is mankind's interpretation/opinion of what is true, which changes over time. And, interpretations do not always have unanimous support for any given point in time. This kinda seems to apply to pretty much everything, not just The Bible.

mcv 6y ago

Not true. During the Middle Ages, 4 levels of interpretation: literal, allegorical, moral and mystical. Of these, the literal was generally seen as the least important. Of course there are parts in the bible that do describe literal history, and those are still very important for context, but a lot of stories are very clearly not literal, and even in the middle ages, an important Christian thinker or cardinal (I forgot who it was and can't find the quote at the moment) said: if our interpretation of scripture conflicts with our observation of the world, then our interpretation must be wrong. He wasn't stoned or burned at the stake for that. And 2000 years ago, it certainly wasn't the Christians who were stoning people. No, the "figurative interpretation", as you call it, has been with us for millennia. Biblical Literalism is only a fairly recent movement, and quite at odds with the bible, Christianity, and reality.

mistermann 6y ago
It's interesting how modern rationalists look down their noses at the bible and people's interpretations of it, while being completely unaware of the fact that while doing so, they are interpreting their perception of reality (an interpretation within an interpretation). I suspect a non-trivial part of religion (that has been lost since we have broadly rejected it) is that it explicitly taught various types of humility, in various ways, and then also that from a more abstract/psychological perspective, the cognitive practice of conceptualizing an all powerful, all knowing God may have had beneficial psychological aspects with respect to moderating the (often dangerous) perception of omniscience, that seems to be an evolved and unavoidable consequence of human consciousness. Evidence of this sense of omniscience can be seen everywhere on social media today: widespread self-perceptions of abilities to accurately read minds, predict the future, know everything (including the unknown/top-secret/undiscovered), solve infinitely complex problems with ease, etc. It's weird how this is so obvious, and makes complete logical sense, but encountering someone who does not outright and incredibly passionately reject this idea is incredibly rare. Perhaps this helps explain why religion is so common, always and everywhere - it is socially evolved and doggedly persistent, because it provides genuine superior fitness by offsetting some of the unseen negative aspects that hitched a ride on other evolved traits.