Analogy

Examples of Analogies, or Reverse Analogies

I'll share a scary Biblical story example:

STORY

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Take the scary story in the Bible Old Testament (Judges chp 19-21) about the concubine from Bethlehem who ran away from her Levite owner. The man catches up with her on her way back home to live with her father. As the man and his concubine are returning home, they, and their donkeys, finally find a place to spend the night at a stranger's home in a Benjamite town. There was no place to spend the night at the town square there. The stranger has a virgin daughter.

During the night, local Benjamite perverts try to get in the door to have sex with the man who owns the concubine. Fearing rape himself, he opens the door and pushes his concubine outside with the rapists and locks the door all night. The rapists have their way with the woman all night and ravage her to death.

Next morning, the owner of the concubine is not that concerned his concubine wife was killed, but wants the death avenged anyway. So he cuts her up into 12 pieces with his knife and sends a piece to each of the 12 different tribes of Israel.

Israel collectively demands that the Benjamites hand over the rapists, but they refuse. So Israel collectively kills all Benjamite men, women, and children except for a remnant of men.

Israel does not wish to see the tribe of Benjamin become extinct, so they tell the remnant of men left alive to go kidnap wives for themselves, which they do.

RAPE, MURDER, DISMEMBERMENT, HARBORING CRIMINALS, KIDNAPPING.

Nice story! Thanks God for sharing it!

"Now isn't that Special." - Church Lady, Saturday Night Live

DISCUSSION

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But wait. Perhaps this story is a multifaceted reverse analogy.

Yes, it is very much like a very difficult platform dive in Olympic competition.

The concubine is a reverse analogy of Christ Jesus the Messiah.

An earthly concubine woman belongs to an earthly man and has no inheritance, whereas, conversely, Jesus was a heavenly man who belonged to God and inherited everything from God.

The unconcerned husband of the dead concubine wife is a reverse analogy of our very concerned Heavenly Father God. God is very concerned for our Salvation. The reason it appears that the husband of the concubine is unconcerned over her death at the hands of evil men is because, according to Isaiah Ch. 53, It pleased God for Jesus to die. God sort of threw Jesus out of Heaven to Earth (so to speak) and locked the door so that Jesus would die at the hands of evil men.

The cutting up of the concubine (Jesus) into 12 pieces represents the 12 Disciples (branches) cut off from the main vine Jesus after his death. The 12 pieces (Disciples) are sent to the House of Israel. The Jews don't like what they see and hear in this story, nor did they like hearing the Gospel and seeing the Miracles being performed by the Disciples centuries later.

The change of heart of the Jews (House of Israel) desiring the remnant of Benjamites left alive to be perpetuated through the kidnapping of wives represents the ruthless Pharisee Saul turned Apostle Paul becoming a Christian himself and starting Gentile churches which become the surrogate Brides of Christ.

The Apostle Paul was a Benjamite. He says it himself in his letters.

This story is interesting because it mentions a virgin, and donkeys, and straw, and Bethlehem, the town where Christ Jesus the Messiah was born. And the husband and his concubine wife have trouble finding lodging in the town square. Kind of reminiscent of the virgin birth of Jesus. No room at the Inn.

Finally, we have to ask why would 65,000 Israelites have to die to avenge for the death of 1 concubine woman. The answer is that, not that the many died for Jesus (a reverse concubine), but rather Jesus died for the many.

It explains one object or process in terms of another. The aptness of the analogy isgenerally a point of subtle judgment. Some analogies are more valid than others. Comparing anapple to the space shuttle is not likely to be an effective analogy. Explaining the Internet byreference to a highway system might make a better analogy. In the following analogy, a bodyinfection is compared with an invading army of attack organisms.

Example:

The immune response of billions of cellular defenders is carried out by different kinds of white bloodcells, all of which are continuously being produced in the bone marrow. Neutrophils, one type ofwhite blood cell, travel in the blood stream to areas of invasion, attacking and ingesting pathogens. Macrophages, or "big eaters," take up stations in tissues and act as scavengers, devouring pathogensand worn-out cells. Natural killer cells directly destroy virus-infected cells and cells that have turnedcancerous. When lymph nodes are actively involved in fighting an invasion of microorganisms, theyfill with lymphocytes.