Essays in Understanding the Bible (6): Literal or Figurative?

In this series of essays, Helen Parry explores some basic principles for understanding the Bible. The essays are posted monthly on the LICC website, normally on the third Monday of the month. Since interpretation is not a dry academic exercise but is essential to a proper use of Scripture, each essay is followed by questions for reflection (and discussion with others, where applicable), and suggestions for action.

A minor character in one of Anthony Trollope’s Barchester novels is Mr Quiverful, a struggling 19th-century clergyman with twelve children. What a strange name, we may think. But a knowledge of the Psalms will remind us of one of the expressions of the Lord’s blessing:

‘Sons are a heritage from the Lord,
children (literally: the fruit of the womb) a reward from him.
Like arrows in the hands of a warrior
are sons born in one’s youth.
Blessed is the man
whose quiver is full of them.’ (Psalm 127:3-5)

The image of the quiver is explained by verse 4, in which sons are compared to arrows in the hands of a warrior. So a quiverful represents a goodly number, as many as a man might need. But so many other questions are raised by these verses. Why are sons compared to arrows? Does this simile have any meaning for us today? What about daughters? Is it more blessed to have your children while you are young? Is the use of the word ‘heritage’ meant in a purely biological sense? If children are a reward, does this mean that the childless have in some way displeased God? Does God think of children purely from the point of view of the parents (that is to say, their fathers)? Do children have no worth in themselves?

The first answer to any such questions as these is that we must be careful not to make sweeping statements about ‘the biblical view’, let alone ‘God’s view’, on the basis of a single verse or passage of Scripture. The biblical view, where there is such a thing, is usually nuanced, perhaps not as clear-cut as we might wish. We must take account of the many other things that the Bible may say on a topic before reaching our conclusions.

As we look at these verses from Psalm 127, there are significant cultural points to consider. In both Old and New Testaments, a human being is called a man, followed by the pronoun he. Until recently, our own culture has done the same. Some women take this purely as a cultural convention; others feel demeaned by it. Hence, the recent ‘inclusive language’ translations of the Bible.

In many cultures, even today, a man’s status is largely enhanced by the number of his children, particularly sons. The children are also seen as extra help in the house and on the farm, and as their parents’ insurance policy against penury in old age.

Many of the Psalms were written in times of great instability, when the people of Israel were under constant threat of attack. So the image of the warrior signifies strength and security – universal concerns, though we would not express them in the same way. Sons born to a young man, still active in war, represented reinforcements and additional security.

For all these reasons, children were seen as a blessing; but Trollope’s poor Mr Quiverful seems to have found his children more burden than blessing. Nowadays, social security and contraception have changed the picture yet again.

An important issue that applies to our interpretation of Scripture, and indeed to all verbal communication, is how to understand and apply figurative language. Why, we may wonder, do we complicate communication by using picture language – metaphors and similes – rather than simply saying straightforwardly what we mean? It’s not as simple as that. Indeed, the function of imagery is to clarify, not to obscure, meaning. Familiar images help us to grasp the unfamiliar, concrete images illuminate the abstract. ‘She’s catty’, we say; ‘he’s like a snake in the grass’. A passage of prose writing may be described as ‘purple’, a piece of music in terms of light and shade. We get splitting headaches, pins and needles, a stinking cold. A course of action may have pitfalls, a political ideology be a recipe for disaster. The Lord is portrayed as a father, a shepherd, a light, a rock; the church as a family, a body, a building.

George Orwell, in an essay entitled ‘Politics and the English Language’, quoted a verse from the book of Ecclesiastes: ‘I returned and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all’ (Ecclesiastes 9:11, King James Version). He then translated this into what he called ‘modern English of the worst sort’: ‘Objective consideration of contemporary phenomena compels the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, but that a considerable element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into account.’

We all recognise the style of Orwell’s parody: we hear it from politicians, read it in official documents and wring our hands over it in despair when all we want is to understand (and incidentally that phrase wring our hands is, of course, figurative). We don’t have to analyse the images in Ecclesiastes to understand exactly what the writer is getting at.

Going back to Psalm 127, we see two parallel statements in verse 3:

‘Sons are a heritage from the Lord,
children a reward from him.’

This kind of parallelism is an essential characteristic of Hebrew poetry. In this case, the second clause says virtually the same as the first. We are not expected to analyse the differences, but rather to grasp the point: that children are a blessing from God. Among innumerable similar examples, here is one from Psalm 126:

‘Those who sow in tears
will reap with songs of joy.
He who goes out weeping,
carrying seed to sow,
will return with songs of joy,
carrying sheaves with him.’ (Psalm 126:5-6)

In other instances, the parallel clauses may express a contrast. Thus, the writer sums up at the end of Psalm 1:

‘For the Lord watches over the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked will perish.’ (Psalm 1:6)

Or the second clause adds a further idea:

‘Blessed are those whose strength is in you,
who have set their hearts on pilgrimage.’ (Psalm 84:5)

A further example of figurative language, much used in Scripture, is hyperbole – exaggeration for the sake of emphasis. We use hyperbole all the time in our everyday speech. ‘You said the supermarket was just round the corner, but it’s miles away’ (both statements, no doubt, hyperbolic). Because we believe that the Bible is true, we hesitate to accuse it of exaggeration; but hyperbole is intended to emphasise, not to deceive. We need to beware of interpreting it literally.

After the young, inexperienced David had killed Goliath, the women came out celebrating. ‘Saul has slain his thousands, and David his tens of thousands’, they sang (1 Samuel 18:7). Solomon was unmatched in wisdom and wealth, and ‘the whole world sought audience with Solomon to hear the wisdom God had put in his heart’ (1 Kings 10:24). Jesus habitually used hyperbole. Did he mean it literally when he said, ‘If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away’ (Matthew 5:29)? Or ‘Everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields for my sake will receive a hundred times as much’ (Matthew 19:29)?

We always have to be open to the possibility that, in our literal-mindedness, we may be interpreting as literal things that are intended to be understood figuratively. The fact that something is expressed figuratively doesn’t make it untrue. If a mother says to her child ‘I could eat you up’, the love is genuine even though the expression is not intended literally.

One of our great obsessions today is with the interpretation of the first three chapters of Genesis. The structure, particularly of chapter 1, might suggest that the writer has adopted a literary form and style that his contemporaries would have recognised as ‘poetic’. We, who do not necessarily recognise the form, may miss this clue. We may think that it is only in the past century or two that people have presumed to question the literal interpretation of the creation narrative, and may be surprised that the 2nd-century theologian Origen wrote: ‘Who could be found as silly as to believe that God, after the manner of a farmer, “planted trees in a paradise eastward in Eden”? And when God is said to “walk in the paradise in the evening”... I do not think anyone will doubt that these are figurative expressions which indicate certain mysteries through a semblance of history.’

This may give us food for thought. The theological truth of the creation narrative remains intact, whether we read the text literally or figuratively. Job is another book whose narrative structure may suggest that it is a literary composition. The body of the book is framed by chapters that look like the prologue and epilogue of a medieval mystery play: a dramatic embodiment of the age-long battle between good and evil. We must not necessarily from this derive a belief that God literally hands over a virtuous man to Satan in response to a childish provocation. The purpose of the book, with its soaring poetry, is, rather, to challenge the reader: When suffering comes, how will we respond to it?

Recognising figurative language is not a slippery slope that leads to a denial of the authority of Scripture. Rather, it liberates us to explore God’s revelation in greater breadth and depth.

For personal reflection:

Almost every verse of the book of Proverbs uses parallelism, sometimes for reinforcement, sometimes for contrast, and sometimes for adding a further idea. Read Proverbs 16:16-22 and consider the function of the parallel statements. Reflect on the application of verses 16, 18 and 19 in your own life and culture.

For group discussion:

Read Psalm 91. Consider the imagery. Read 2 Corinthians 11:24-29. Discuss how Paul’s experience compares with the ideal picture in Psalm 91. What conclusions can you draw from this? Although we cannot derive from Psalm 91 universal promises of physical protection, what does the psalm show about the character of God, and how we should live?

For action:

As you go through the day, look out for, and reflect on, examples of figurative language in other people’s conversation (and your own), and in advertisements, newspaper headlines and articles.

Helen Parry

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