Allegory in Scripture

[thessalonian]

Here is a post I did on a question from another board on allegory I want to share with you.



"Can't we ever take things at face value? "My God, My God why have you forsaken me?" to me has always been Jesus Christ crying out at that point where he had the sins of the world on his shoulders and his father could not look on him, because as it points out in scripture - The Father cannot look on sin. He felt abandoned and alone.

I really would like to understand the point of this thread - but I am not sure my tiny little mind could handle it. I am not trying to be mean or start an argument, but that's a lot of reading between the lines.

It's just like trying to find out what Jesus meant when he said, "It is finished." Three simple words to let the world know he had fulfilled his destiny on earth in dying on the cross for our sins. Why must we make things more complex than what they really should be? "

Can we take things at face value? Yes we can. AMEN! Most definitely Jesus was expressing some level of despair in his humanity at his hopeless situation. Amen. Most definitely one can take great comfort in seeing the way that God led the Jews through the desert and fed them. How they relied complete on him. How he provided them "bread from heaven" and water from a rock. Literally these things have great importance in the way that God dealt with his people at that time. The parting of the Red Sea and the crossing of the Jordan in to the promised land. All wonderful events. Looking at these things simply as God working out literally freeing the Israelites from the Egyptians is an executable way of looking at them. There is great value in our Christian walk in us understanding how God literally and historically worked carried out his plan through men and brought it to fulfillment. So I have no problem with what this poster said. The stories are breathtaking and inspiring and filled with the providence of God AMEN!
But even Jesus and Paul saw more to these stories that the surficial historical facts that, who's that guy that was the head of the NRA, narrated so well. The manna in the desert. Jesus get's real complicated with this. He relates it to himself in John 6. Says Moses and the Israelite were given bread from heaven. Jesus I AM THE BREAD COME DOWN FROM HEAVEN. I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE. Paul the Apostles tells us in Hebrews I believe it is tells us that the Rock that followed the Israelites through the desert, giving them "life-giving water" was Christ. I don't see that anywhere in the Old Testament by a literal interpretation (once again I am not knocking literal interpretation). And what Christian today should not see himself in that journey through the desert. Our desert is life with it's toils and tribulations each day. But God feeds us today. He gives us life-giving water in his word and his manna feeds us (I will get in to that in a later thread if I am still here). The Jews crossed that river Jordan (interestingly enough they crossed at the very place according to tradition where Christ was baptized) in to the promised land. Isn't that our destiny. The promised land. Not a land between a couple of rivers (though literally that was where the Jews ended up, and it is wonderful that God fulfilled his promise to them giving them this land.). The promised land we await is heaven and we know that God will lead us to it as he lead the Jews across the desert in the pillar of fire. These scriptures are nothing if they did not apply to the time of Christ, the time of Augustine and our lives today, more than simply a story of what God did in the past with no real bearing on the future. But haven't you heard the adage, "history repeats itself".

And there is more in scripture. Jesus himself relates his death and resurrection in the Gospels to Jonah spending three days in the belly of a whale (something I alluded to in my previous thread.). Literal, no. Jonah did spend three days in the belly of a whale literally. Jesus sees it allegorically. Allegory was a common literary style in those days when these things were written. It is what Paul was using when he said the "Rock was Christ". There are symbols or metaphors used in the Old Testament. The Jews sacrificed lambs in the Old Testament. These lambs are symbols or metaphors of Christ who is "the lamb of God", the pascal sacrifice of the new covenant. By the way allegory is simply an extended metaphor.

There are also parallels of which the Old Testament is so full of regarding Jesus, that it would make your head spin. John Parallels the life of Jesus with that of Moses in his Gospel. Joshua is essentially the same name as Jesus and his life has parallels to Jesus, bringing the Jews in to the promised land. The Ark of the covenant carried three items. What were they, The Tablets (which Paul allegorically compares to our hearts, "3. being manifested that you are a letter of Christ, cared for by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. ") upon which the 10 commandments were written, the staff or Aaron, and the Holy Bread.

Heb 8 4. having a golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant covered on all sides with gold, in which was a golden jar holding the manna, and Aaron's rod which budded, and the tables of the covenant;

These were also symbols of Christ.

I could go on and on for these are all over scripture. The story slavery of the Israelite for example is used to paint a vivid image in our minds of slavery so that later in the Gospels it can be related to the slavery to sin.
So yes, take the scriptures simply by all means. But if you hunger and thirst for more it is there. If your reject allegory and parallel and the other literary types of the times, your going to miss a lot. For God is infinite and so is his word. He cannot be contained in 127,000 (or however many verses there are in the Bible) discrete statements. I have not exhausted it in 40 years and do not expect to exhaust it in another 40. It feeds me by day and comforts me by night. Praise God! Alleluia!

[phatcatholic]

good work. i added this post and your other one to the [url="http://phorum.phatmass.com/index.php?showtopic=18247"][b]Tracts by Phatmassers[/b][/url] thread.

[thessalonian]

Oh golly gee gosh. I'm a published phatmasser. Thanks.