I disagree. Children do not take things literally, children just don’t have a concept of what is literal and what isn’t. I could show my daughter that there is nothing under the bed all that I want, but to her there will always be monsters under the bed, because she doesn’t separate emotional reality from the reality we understand through evidence. The literal truth barely interests her, as she doesn’t have the tools to systematically evaluate it. She lives in a world defined by metaphors and emotions.
I don’t think the OP’s premise is true. I haven’t read all the Doctors of the Catholic Church, but I’ve read St. Augustine’s Confessions and part of City of God*, and random other bits from those early theologians. They frequently base their reasonings on lines from scripture taken very literally. I don’t recall any cases of Augustine interpreting a line of scripture metaphorically. For them, scripture was the basic material upon which they erected their structures of logical reasoning about the faith. I think they did take it quite literally.
That’s not to say that intellectual fashions have not come and gone at different times and in different places in the world. I don’t doubt that there was a revival of biblical literalism in the 19th century. But it seems to me absurd to think that was the first and only time that happened.
*I never finished it. mea culpa
I’d just like to add that the Jews, who have been using the old testament for longer than Christians, have a long history of believing the Bible needs to be interpretted, and that there was stuff our ancestors understood that we have lost. There is even some little Jewish heresy that is not recognized to be part of Judaism that doesn’t respect interpretation. I think there are still a few of them living in the hills of Israel. But mainstream Judaism for thousands of years has recognized that parts of the Bible are allegorical, and parts need to be understood in context that is not always written down.
I remember taking an Art History class. The prof discussed the use of Perspective and its introduction to Western Art around the 1300’s, via Brunelleschi, etc.
The point the professor made was that the “space of the canvas” was populated very differently by artists prior to the introduction of perspective - objects were of different sizes or positioning in the space based on reasons other than depicting them in a “3D space.”
Once perspective was introduced, these alternate approaches were largely abandoned and 3D-space “accuracy” was expected - well, until rules started getting broken again as “modern” art approaches were developed.
It feels like this discussion is similar. Not sure what to do with that observation, but thought the similarity was worth mentioning…
Then there are extremely few true Christians, as I have never met a Christian who followed the clear Biblical rules about what foods are wholesome, or who followed the clear Biblican rules on when sex is allowed, or who kept any of the other thousands of rather clearly-stated laws that Orthodox Jews follow.
I loved “Confessions”. I never started “City of God”. I guess you aren’t recommending it. 
It wasn’t, but Darwin was hardly the first thing that set them off. One thing we forget is that the idea of evolution had been gaining ground for pretty much the entire 19th century; Origin of Species explained how species evolved, and backed up the explanation with a detailed argument.
But the proto-inerrantists of the early 19th century were arguing against the evidence for evolution every step of the way, and its proponents had to make their case in a way that proved the churchmen wrong, e.g. asking, if all land animals extant had been on Noah’s Ark, why some of those animals were found in places like Australia and South America, but neither they nor any trace of their past presence showed up any place in between Mt. Ararat and their current habitat.
As you say, it may not have been inerrancy as we know it, but it was close enough for government work.
I think you’re both right in a sense. The concept of the literal accurate truth wasn’t really much of a concept until the advent of science.
And… it’s a rather childlike understanding of religion (and science) that would lead someone to think that there needs to be some sort of literal truth definition for the Bible. It’s like the EXACT opposite of Stephen Jay Gould’s idea of non-overlapping magisteria for science and religion. Where Gould posits that science and religion both have “a legitimate magisterium, or domain of teaching authority” that don’t overlap each other, the Biblical literalists are claiming that it’s all one in the same, and that the Bible is the final word in ALL things.
Clearly this is not so; the business with the cubits and pi shows this not to be the case- the Biblical account wasn’t ever meant to be a geometrical account, but merely a literary description, and for people who didn’t actually have decimal numbers, pi *is *roughly equal to 3. But that doesn’t mean that it *is *3, merely that for the purposes of the narrative, 3 was close enough.
And… as for the idea that the Church Fathers took the Bible literally… I think you’re not seeing the forest for the trees. Augustine did quote scripture and use it literally… in the course of making an interpretative point that the City of Man might fall, but that the City of God would endure. In other words, the uses of scripture literally were as sources for his book, not as answers in their own right.
This is a fundamental difference- had Augustine been a modern-day literalist, City of God wouldn’t have been written; there would be no point to him, since the Bible contains everything necessary without any need for interpretation.
I give up. I’m making the point that literalists don’t actually literally interpret the Bible, and you and MfM are making non-sequitirs. Have fun.
The Bible does not say where the measurements were taken in relation to the brim or body. That is extra-Biblical info.
REALLY? I HAD NO IDEA!!! SHOCKINGZ!!! Oh, except that I actually said that this argument was very logical. What I pointed out was that it relies on extra-Biblical info.
How about we actually sees what he does?
Which is exactly what I did. I pointed out a common literalist argument which actually incorporates extra-Biblical info. And for reasons which are beyond me, you have decided to respond to some other point that exists only in your head.
This is a total aside from the debate, of course, but what I always liked about this parable was how Jesus flips the question around.
The question that Jesus is responding to is: “But who is my neighbor?”
And the question Jesus asks in reply, after the telling of the parable, is “who was a neighbor to this man?” Sweet.
I’m going to have to touch on this a bit more. This whole pi=3 thing is a topic that pops up routinely in literalist apologetic circles. The fact that you are in here lecturing me that the “Bible does not say that pi is 3” indicates to me that you are not familiar in the least with literalist apologetics. If you were, you would actually recognize the argument I was talking about. Because it’s not my argument. So, I don’t need a lecture from you about what the Bible says about pi. What it shows me is that you are completely ignorant about exactly the sorts of arguments that literalists routinely make, so spare me the lectures. You obviously don’t know that much about literalist arguments.
[nitpick]
True, but then he’s in trouble with the mathematicians, since pi isn’t actually 3.14, but rather an irrational, transcendental number that rounds to 3.14.
[/nitpick]
Ok, yes. In my original post where I brought this up, I made sure to use “approx.” I slipped up and used the word “actually” here instead. So, let’s make sure to clarify your nitpick with that info.
I don’t see what is so hard about this:
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Literalists claim that when the Bible and the real world seem to conflict, that the Bible takes precedence and humans are in error.
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So, I rehash a common argument in literalist circles.
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Then I point out that way literalists routinely resolve this particular argument is to start with the assumption that humans are correct and bring in extra-Biblical info to resolve the apparent contradiction. Which is the opposite of what was claimed in point 1.
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Then a couple of people waltz in to tell me that I don’t understand the Bible, as if the argument I was examining was actually my argument. Because I guess when you examine other people’s arguments, they think that is the same thing as embracing one side of the argument.
I literally do not understand your point or your argument at all.
Certainly their belief in the literalness of the Bible hasn’t kept modern-day literalists from writing their own books, whether they are felt to be necessary or not.
I tried to research this. According to Wikipedia,
Also, this page claims that
though I don’t think it really explained in a general way how/why that is.
This page looks like it might be useful if someone takes the time to explore it, though I have not yet done so: “We’ve gathered here a few places where issues of Biblical interpretation are discussed directly.”
This current thread is similar to the thread from 2013: Is Biblical literalism really a recent phenomenon?
I recently read a collection of some of the writings of Galileo. He spent quite a bit of effort responding to literalists who were denouncing him. I was struck by one of his arguments, which was that the Church already took a non-literalist position on the Bible, basically what **Thudlow Boink **just said about St. Augustine: What is important is not the actual words used, but the underlying metaphorical truth. Unfortunately I don’t have the book any more so I can’t provide anything more specific.
Exactly. If two verses are in conflict, then one is “this is the word of the Lord!!” and the other is “what the Bible really means here is…”
If I’m ever in the neighborhood of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, I’m going to ask to see their gizmo that tells them which verses fall into which category. (I wonder if it looks like the Urim and the Thummim - now there’s a suggestion that would give them apoplexy!)
Similarly with Old Testament non-dietary laws (they use Peter’s vision in Acts 10 as a work-around for the dietary laws, as I’m sure you know, despite the fact that even Peter, whose vision it was, was explicit that this vision was about people, and not food). What Leviticus says about gays? The word of the Lord! Deuteronomy’s requirement of having a rail around the roof of your house? Not so much, with varying explanations as to why. And all extra-Biblical, as you say.
Let me just clarify that I see what you’re doing (especially because it seems like we’ve both beaten our heads against this particular wall), and agree with the gist of your argument.
The math geek in me just couldn’t let the ‘actually 3.14’ slide, and I apologize for any confusion that may have resulted, but I did label it as a nitpick…
That rail around the roof is pretty practical, though, especially if you have the sort of roof people walk on.
Ah, ok. I apologize for my tone.
But, yes, this is a wall I’ve beaten my head into before. Maybe not in this thread necessarily, but I see this all the time in the news media. There’s a tendency to take the claim of “literalism” at face value, when the so-called “literalists” are just doing what everyone else is doing. And I think that skews the debate in a weird way, since that moves the argument to the “literalists” home court, where they get to make any fanciful claim that they want to without having it analyzed. I’ll give them credit, though. It’s a very clever tactic that the “literalists” are using to set the terms of the debate.