On Fundamentalism

Is there a more irritating phrase in existence than "The Bible says it, I believe it."? I've seen the bumper sticker on many cars, and heard it used in debates and sermons. Perhaps the most irritating thing about it is that it contains a very crucial grain of truth - as a believer I am convinced that the bible is the truest expression of reality that we are going to find, and thus is, for all intents and purposes, true. But what is truth? More importantly, what is biblical truth? For instance, there is what I've seen referred to as the "newspaper account" truth, in the sense that if I were to tell you that I attended church on Sunday, it would be a description (if very vague) of an event that in fact did occur. I could of course add details to this - that I played the cello in the worship band, which started rehearsal at around 8:45, and that the pastor wore a dark jacket and tie. Now, these details one could trust or not based on how they perceive my memory, but I am at least attempting here as best I can to provide a factual account, one that could be corroborated or not by witnesses. However, and this is especially important where the bible is concerned, there are also what I might call here allegorical truths, poetic truths, philosophical truths - those that express big ideas that are true, but perhaps not in the sense mentioned above.

Let's take, for example, what's been called "the Fall". Now, if one is to believe the literal, newspaper view of things, a woman ate an actual, literal apple in the garden of Eden, sin came into the world, and all of humanity was born from two people. I don't believe this story at all in that sense, as our best science has shown us that humanity's birth was a far more complicated matter taking a far greater amount of time. That said, does this mean that the story of the Fall is not true? Clearly not. Even by most non-Christian standards of behavior, man is a fallen race. By Christian (and many other religions) standards he is even more depraved. The story in Genesis very effectively tells us this truth, and beautifully depicts it by having Adam and Eve eat the apple that is supposed to grant the knowledge of good and evil, and it does exactly that. We have fallen not only because we fail to obey God's just rule, but also because we have tried to be like Him.

I think one of the best descriptions of the difficulty in understanding the truth of scripture is to be found in the Confessions of Saint Augustine. I don't have my copy with me (so I can't point out exactly where), but in the final 3 books he dissects the Book of Genesis, going so far as to devote quite a few pages to just the first couple sentences. He points out quite a few different meanings that could be gleaned from these passages, some of which he dismisses out of hand and others he deems far more likely. And that's just in the first few sentences.

I'd also like to point out a small logical difficulty I've discovered in the letters of Paul recently. There is an admonishment in the first letter to the Corinthians that women are not to speak in church (1 Corinthians 14:33). However, at the very end of the letter to the Colossians, buries in a list of greetings and acknowledgments, there is to be found thus: "Give my greetings to the brothers at Laodicea, and to Nympha and the church in her house." (Colossians, 4:15, ESV). One could, I suppose, make the argument that she may have been just a hostess; that said, as is pointed out here, why would he then not greet the pastor? While there can be arguments made on both sides of the issue, this clearly throws a wrench into the whole "women may not speak in church" idea. As is often pointed out, the letters of Paul were letters to various communities, with differing issues. Some scholars have theorized that the women in Corinth were a chatty, gossipy lot and thus the admonishment was not so much to women in general but to THOSE women (certainly a contentious point). However, as can be found at the above link, there are a number of women church leaders mentioned in the new testament. If Paul had wanted these to stop, why encourage them? It seems odd, to say the least.

These are difficult issues, which is exactly my argument: reading scripture is a very difficult undertaking. And exactly how a Christian is supposed to behave is a very complicated thing to determine, if one is looking for rules to follow. As Paul states in Romans 14:13, "resolve this, not to put a stumbling block or a cause to fall in your brother's way." The passage makes clear to us that we are to always operate, not according to some set code of rules, but in love for God and for our brothers and sisters in Christ. If you wish to live by the absolute letter of scripture, it almost becomes like the Judaism to be found in the Book of Leviticus (I phrase it thus because I realize that, just like Christianity, there are different sects of Judaism with some different practices), a religion with a great many rules and regulations; Jesus came to fulfill the law, not to create a new one, aside from "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind" (Matthew 22:37).