What is the problem with interpreting the Bible literally?

Answer 1

I think the problem may be with interpreting. Many go wrong not because The Bible says one thing but they want another. It's been that problem from the very beginning we want what we are told is not good for us. We would like to feel we have the right to debate topics which we do not have the qualifications to discuss. To me a simple point is we wish to interpret what it is to take a life and end it but can we give it back? So why do we feel we have the right to discuss the question? Because we wish to impose our views or avoid some consequences for our actions. Therefore I'll interpret what something says to justify what I want instead of doing what is right. We will take land if it's for the greater good. Well what if the mall or building is run by incompetent people or the highway adds to pollution is that really for the greater good or just what some unqualified person thought at the time? So many things in the Bible do not need explaining yet people can't or won't follow them why jump to controversial items that we feel need interpreting. Let's start with the easy get those right then move on to the hard.

Answer 2

(The following answer concerns the Hebrew Bible.)

The Hebrew Bible has always been handed down with its oral interpretation. For example, "An eye for an eye" (Exodus ch.21) has always meant monetary compensation (Talmud, Bava Kama 83b).

"An ox or a donkey falling into a pit" (Exodus 22) has always been understood as examples meant to allude to all animals (Talmud, Bava Kama 52).

"God's eyes" (Deuteronomy 11:12), and similar anthropomorphic expressions, have always been interpreted as not meaning physical things or actual organs (Rashi commentary on Exodus 19:18).

The Song of Songs has always been seen as an allegory of God's love, not referring to any young couple at all (Rashi commentary, Talmud Berakhot 57b).

A too-literal understanding of the Hebrew Bible would be liable to contravene these and thousands of other such oral traditions.

Even where the simple meaning of the verse may be taken as is, interpreting it only as such will cause one to lose the vast repository of information contained in the Oral Torah. For example, what kind of man was Nimrod the hunter (Genesis ch.10)? Why is his hunting mentioned?

What are the frontlets (Deuteronomy ch.6)?

Why did God choose Abraham and Moses? Wasn't that arbitrary?

What exactly was the blessing that was pronounced in Exodus 39:43?

The answers to these and tens of thousands of other such questions are to be found in the Jewish traditions.

See also the Links.

Link: Were we created?

Link: Evidence of the Exodus

Link: Archaeology

Answer 3

Most people somehow manage to interpret the Bible literally without being conscious of any problem in doing so. For example, Leon R. Kass (The Beginning of Wisdom) says that the second creation story in Genesis (verses 2:4b-25) departs from the first (verses 1:1-2:4a) not only in content but also in tone, mood and orientation. Yet pious readers believe that the text cannot contain contradictions and insist it can be read literally. That the first account reports the creation of animals before the creation of man and the second reports the creation of animals after the creation of man is a mystery best left to others.

Reading the Bible literally means we see that man first appeared on earth some six thousand years ago. One problem with this is that we have substantial archaeological and fossil evidence that modern man existed many thousands of years before the Bible begins. Reading the story of Abraham literally means, for example, the Philistines must have already established a presence in the southern Levant a thousand years before they actually began to arrive.

Reading the story of the Exodus from Egypt and the conquest of Canaan literally would mean that we could expect to find some evidence in the many documents we have from Egypt, some archaeological evidence that plausibly supports the historicity of the event or some historical evidence that acknowledges that a unified conquest of Canaan took place. Here the problem is that the Egyptian records and the archaeological and historical evidence refutes the possibility of an Exodus from Egypt as described in the Bible. Nearly all scholars say the Hebrew people were actually rural Canaanites who left the region of the rich coastal cities and migrated peacefully into the hitherto sparsely populated hinterland, centuries later developing their traditions of a glorious past.

Reading the nativity stories in Matthew and Luke literally means we have to find an explanation as to why in one account Joseph's father is called Jacob, while in the other account he is called Heli. One creative solution is to say that Luke's genealogy is that of Mary - in spite of Luke 3:23.