Tag: Christian theology

Moving Beyond Biblical Literalism

Camaron G. W. SmithLeave a comment

The Bible Is Not One Kind of Book

“The Bible was not meant to be read merely literally. It was meant to be read literarily.”

For many Christians, ‘taking the Bible literally’ is often seen as a sign of faithfulness. Questioning a literal reading can feel like doubting Scripture itself. But this idea quickly runs into trouble, since the Bible is not just one type of book, written in a single style or for a single purpose.

The Bible is a library. Even the word itself reflects this reality. It comes from the Greek phrase ta biblia, meaning “the books”. From the beginning, Scripture was understood as a collection of writings spanning centuries, cultures, authors, and literary styles.

Within its pages, we find poetry, wisdom literature, parables, prophecy, apocalypse, genealogy, narrative, law, and song. Some passages are historical. Others are metaphorical. Some invite reflection. Others provoke imagination.

Psalmists speak of rivers clapping their hands and mountains singing for joy (Psalm 98:8). Jesus says faith can move mountains (Matthew 17:20). Revelation describes beasts rising from the sea. Few Christians insist these are literal descriptions. We instinctively recognise genre.

The issue is not whether the Bible contains truth, but what kind of truth a passage is communicating.

Modern readers often approach Scripture with assumptions shaped more by post-Enlightenment Western culture than the ancient world. We expect precision, science, and factual reporting. Ancient authors were often doing something else.

Old Testament scholar John H. Walton argues that modern readers ask questions that the biblical authors were not trying to answer. These texts are often concerned with meaning, purpose, and theology more than technical description.

This becomes especially clear in books like Genesis, Job, the Psalms, and Revelation. They are not merely reporting information. They are inviting readers into reflection, wisdom, and participation in the story of God.

As Tremper Longman III notes, responsible interpretation requires attention to genre. Different kinds of texts communicate differently.

“Good interpretation asks not just what happened, but what the text is trying to say.”

Literalism, in its modern form, often flattens Scripture into something it never claims to be: a single genre document written with modern expectations in mind.

Biblical Interpretation Has Never Been As Simple As We Imagine

“Modern biblical literalism is often a reaction to modernity, not a reflection of historic Christianity.”

One of the great myths surrounding biblical literalism is that Christians have always interpreted Scripture in a single, straightforward way. History tells a different story.

From early Judaism through the Church, Scripture has been read with depth and diversity. Ancient interpreters saw layers of meaning. A passage could be historical and symbolic at the same time. Jewish traditions long before Christianity engaged Scripture through poetry, symbolism, and pattern. This continued into the early Church.

Origen argued that some passages were designed to push readers beyond surface meaning (On First Principles). Augustine warned against rigid readings that ignored reason and reality (The Literal Meaning of Genesis), even cautioning Christians against making foolish claims about the natural world.

Even the Reformers did not read Scripture the way modern literalism often assumes.

Martin Luther read the Song of Songs not simply as romance, but as a picture of Christ and the Church (Lectures on the Song of Songs). John Calvin argued that God accommodates revelation to human understanding (Commentary on Genesis). He noted that Moses described the world in ways people could grasp, not as a scientific explanation. When Scripture speaks of the sun rising, it uses ordinary human language, not astronomy.

For much of Christian history, interpretation included multiple layers:

  • literal
  • allegorical
  • moral
  • anagogical

Scripture was seen as capable of communicating on multiple levels at once.

This does not mean agreement. It means diversity has always existed.

“There has never been a single, universally agreed ‘plain reading’ of Scripture.”

Modern literalism often emerges as a response to scepticism, treating the Bible like a document that must defend itself through precision and certainty. Ironically, this imposes modern expectations onto ancient texts.

Even Jesus and the New Testament Do Not Read Scripture Hyperliterally

The New Testament authors often interpret the Old Testament in ways that do not fit modern literalism. This is not because they take Scripture lightly, but because they take it deeply. They see patterns, symbols, and trajectories pointing toward Christ.

Jesus regularly moves beyond surface-level readings. When he speaks of destroying the temple (John 2:19), his listeners think in physical terms. John tells us he meant his body. Literalism misses the point. Jesus also teaches through hyperbole and metaphor: mountains moving, camels through needles, eyes torn out. These are not instructions. They are invitations to deeper reflection.

Paul continues this pattern. He reads Sarah and Hagar allegorically (Galatians 4), and describes Christ as the rock in the wilderness (1 Corinthians 10:4). These are theological readings, not literal ones.

Matthew does the same. He applies Hosea 11:1 to Jesus, even though Hosea is clearly referring to Israel’s past. Matthew reads typologically, presenting Jesus as embodying Israel’s story. He does something similar with Jeremiah 31:15, applying it to Herod’s massacre (Matthew 2:17-18). This also echoes the Exodus narrative, where Pharaoh kills Hebrew children.

Matthew is not just quoting predictions. He is drawing patterns.

  • Israel suffers.
  • Israel comes out of Egypt.
  • Israel enters the wilderness.

Jesus relives this story.

This was normal in the Jewish world of the first century. The issue is not seriousness. It is recognising the kind of reading Scripture invites.

Literalism Often Creates Fragile Faith

“Many people do not lose faith because Scripture failed, but because their framework for reading it could not hold.”

Modern literalism often tries to protect Scripture but ends up weakening faith. When every passage must function as science, history, or precision, the system becomes fragile. One challenge can feel like everything is collapsing. This is especially clear with Genesis.

Many were taught it must function as a scientific account of origins. When that clashes with modern knowledge, people feel forced to choose between reality and faith. But this is a false choice created by the framework, not the Bible.

John H. Walton argues that Genesis is concerned with function and meaning, not scientific mechanics.

The same issue appears elsewhere:

  • Proverbs are treated as guarantees.
  • Revelation is treated as a predictive code.
  • Poetry is treated as science.

Literalism often shrinks Scripture, and when cracks appear, people feel betrayed. A richer understanding of Scripture does not weaken faith. It strengthens it.

When Literalism Becomes Harmful

“The question is not just what a text says, but what it produces.”

The problem with literalism is not just intellectual. It can become harmful. Throughout history, rigid interpretations have been used to justify abuse, control, and injustice. This is not a problem with Scripture itself, but with how it is read. A flat reading struggles with the Bible’s movement and development. Scripture is a story moving toward Christ.

Jesus consistently resists rigid interpretation. He prioritises mercy, restoration, and human flourishing. “The Sabbath was made for man” (Mark 2:27). In the Sermon on the Mount, he deepens the law beyond behaviour into the heart. Literalism can confuse faithfulness with control. Texts become tools of enforcement rather than tools of transformation.

This is especially damaging around:

  • shame
  • power
  • mental health
  • fear

“People are often taught how to be afraid of being wrong, rather than how to love God.”

This raises a deeper question:

What kind of person is this interpretation producing?

Scripture points to Christ. And Christ becomes the lens through which Scripture is read. The goal is not information, but transformation.

Toward A Better Way Of Reading Scripture

“Scripture is not just meant to be understood. It is meant to form us.”

Rejecting literalism does not mean abandoning Scripture. It means reading it more faithfully. The Bible is not a modern textbook. It is a collection of human texts through which God reveals himself.

Reading well requires asking:

  • What kind of text is this?
  • What is it doing?
  • How would it have been understood?
  • How does it point to Christ?

It requires humility. No one reads Scripture neutrally. It requires comfort with mystery. The Bible does not offer simplistic certainty. It invites wisdom, trust, and transformation. Historically, Scripture was meditated on, not just analysed.

A healthy reading holds together:

  • literary awareness
  • context
  • theology
  • community
  • formation

Its poetry deepens. Its tension becomes meaningful. Its humanity becomes part of its beauty. The Bible was never meant to produce certainty alone. It was meant to form a people capable of love, wisdom, justice, and communion with God. And perhaps that is not a departure from Scripture, but a return to reading it well.

A Theology of The Elder Scrolls: Part I

Camaron G. W. SmithLeave a comment
Abstract sacred artwork of an Elder Scroll splitting into five glowing scrolls—gold, silver, red, green, purple—whose crossing light beams form a radiant centre against a deep indigo sky, symbolising fractured prophecy and contested truths in The Elder Scrolls.

Hermeneutics, Method, and Epistemology in a World of Fractured Voices

A World of Fractured Voices

Tamriel doesn’t begin with a single creation story. It begins with many, and they rarely agree. Ask an Altmer, a Khajiit, a Nord, a Dunmer, a Yokudan, or an Imperial, and you’ll get a different version of how the world began and what it means. Each account is told with conviction, yet each undermines the others. Theology in Tamriel starts, not with certainty, but with a clash of voices.

  • The Altmeri Account — The Monomyth
    The High Elves see themselves as descended from the Aedra, divine beings who gave of themselves to shape the world. It was both noble and tragic: “Anuiel, who was Anu’s soul, became the many. Padomay, who was Anu’s brother, became the few. And their interplay created the et’Ada, the original spirits, who sacrificed themselves to give birth to the world.” (The Monomyth)
    For the Altmer, creation is a fall from divinity, and mortality is a kind of exile.
  • The Khajiiti Account — Words of Clan Mother Ahnissi
    The Khajiit remember creation through moons and shadows. Their matriarch tells how Jone and Jode danced the world into being: “When Ahnur and Fadomai were still in love, Ahnur gave birth to many children. Fadomai was tricked by Lorkhaj, who made her give birth to the Great Darkness. Yet out of her pain came Jone and Jode, the moons, who guide us still.” (Words of Clan Mother Ahnissi)
    For the Khajiit, Lorkhaj is no simple villain but the Moon Beast, betrayer and patron, curse, and blessing at once.
  • The Nordic Account — The Five Songs of King Wulfharth
    The Nords sing of Shor, their name for Lorkhan, as a warrior-father who carved out the world for the sake of men: “Shor made the world from the corpse of a god, and men rose from the earth, strong and free. But the elves hated this world, and they betrayed Shor, striking him down.” (The Five Songs of King Wulfharth)
    What the Altmer see as tragedy, the Nords see as triumph. The world is a gift won through blood and betrayal.
  • The Dunmeri Accounts — The 36 Lessons of Vivec and Velothi Tradition
    The Chimer abandoned the Aedra for the Daedra, believing the so-called “Ancestors” had betrayed mortals. Their prophet Vivec recasts creation as paradox: “The world is illusion, but the world is also true. To know this is CHIM.” (36 Lessons of Vivec, Sermon 12)
    For the Dunmer, the world is not simply wound or gift, but a puzzle to be unravelled.
  • The Yokudan Account — Satakal the Worldskin
    The Redguards, heirs of the Yokudans, remember creation as an endless cycle of devouring and rebirth. In their myth, Satakal the Worldskin consumes each world, and only those who learn the Walkabout escape to the next: “Satakal ate itself over and over, and every time a world was devoured a new world came to be.” (Satakal the Worldskin)
    Creation here is not a single act, but an eternal cycle of death and renewal.
  • The Imperial Synthesis — The Annotated Anuad
    The Empire, ever the administrator, tried to weave the rival myths into one “official” story: “Anu, the Everything, was in himself all things. Padomay, the Nothing, was his brother. Their conflict gave rise to the et’Ada, the Original Spirits, who then gave birth to Nirn.” (The Annotated Anuad)
    But even here, the contradictions remain. Lorkhan is both a deceiver and a necessary architect. The Imperial voice tidies, but cannot silence, the discord.

In Tamriel, creation is remembered as a tragedy and triumph, a betrayal and a gift, a prison and a puzzle. Every account claims to tell the truth. None agree. This fractured chorus is not a flaw. It is the theology.

Hermeneutics: Reading Amid Contradiction

Theology in Tamriel begins in a library, not a creed. One cannot simply ask, “What do the people believe?” because the answer depends on which book, song, or sermon you open. Vivec’s riddled sermons conceal as much as they reveal. The Nords glorify Shor; the Altmer vilify him. Even prophecy refuses clarity:

“The Scrolls change, and their meaning is never fixed. To read one is to risk madness.” (Divining the Elder Scrolls)

The hermeneutic task, then, is discernment. Truth must be sifted from contradiction, carried through paradox, wrestled from unreliable narrators.

The Player as Theologian

TES doesn’t just hand down these texts; it makes the player hold them. You might read The Monomyth in an Imperial library, only to find a bard in Windhelm singing Shor’s defiance, or an Ashlander dismissing Vivec’s sermons as lies. The game never tells you, which is “true.” Instead, it places you in the position of theologian gathering stories, comparing them, discerning patterns, and learning to live with contradictions you cannot resolve.

In this sense, TES turns every player into a pilgrim-reader. The task is not to possess final answers, but to walk among testimonies and weigh them.

Methodology: Theology as Pilgrimage, Not System

If theology often aims at coherence, theology in TES must be walked as pilgrimage. The Imperials’ Anuad gestures at system, but it cannot silence the Nords’ defiance or the Khajiiti moon-myths.

A theology of Tamriel can’t be written as one definitive voice. It must take the form of journeying through competing testimonies, living with tension as the method itself. Theology here is less a blueprint and more a pilgrimage through paradox.

Epistemology: Knowing Through Unreliable Narrators

In Tamriel, knowledge is not primarily about propositions but about relationships and allegiances. The unreliable narrator is not a mistake. It is the way truth appears. The Five Songs of King Wulfharth contradict themselves. Vivec insists “the world is illusion, but the world is also true” (36 Lessons of Vivec, Sermon 12). The Elder Scrolls themselves change with each reading.

To know is not to possess certainty but to live inside a story, to commit to a patron, to follow a path. The Khajiit trust the moons because their lives are woven into their phases. The Nords trust Shor because his story shapes their courage. Knowledge in Tamriel is lived allegiance, even when the stories clash.

Thus epistemology in TES is not propositional but relational. To know is to live inside a story, to commit to a patron, to walk a path, even while knowing that path contradicts another. Knowledge is not the absence of unreliability, but the courage to live with it.

Why This Matters

Without attending to method, a theology of TES would collapse into fan cataloguing a list of gods, myths, and cultures without coherence. Beginning with hermeneutics, methodology, and epistemology reminds us that these contradictions are not problems to be explained away, but the very form of Tamrielic revelation.

This matters because it teaches us how to read. It teaches us to hold paradox without panic, to see myth as meaning-bearing, to discern in fractured voices rather than demand a single answer. And this posture, once learned in Tamriel, can shape how we approach knowledge, faith, and story in our own world.

A Christian Glance: Contradiction, Myth, and the Shape of True Knowledge

For Christians, this way of knowing is not so strange. Scripture itself is full of tensions that don’t resolve neatly.

Consider the genealogies. Matthew traces Jesus’ line through Solomon and shapes it into symbolic groups of fourteen (Mt 1:1–17). Luke traces it instead through Nathan, another son of David, stretching back to Adam, “the son of God” (Lk 3:38). The lists diverge entirely after David. Both cannot be historically identical, yet both are true in what they proclaim: Matthew presents Jesus as Israel’s royal heir, Luke as the universal Son of Adam.

Or consider the words from the cross. In Matthew and Mark, Jesus dies with a cry of abandonment: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46; Mk 15:34). In Luke, he breathes his last in trust: “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit” (Lk 23:46). In John, it is triumph: “It is finished” (Jn 19:30). These final words cannot be collapsed into one, yet the church preserved them all, as if contradiction itself was revelation: Christ’s death was both forsakenness and faith, defeat and victory.

These contradictions are not mistakes. They are invitations. They tell us that truth is not a tidy system but a mystery large enough to hold paradox. Knowing God is not mastering a set of airtight propositions, but learning to dwell faithfully in a story that resists simplification. Faith is the courage to inhabit contradiction, trusting that meaning is held in God.

Here, TES can sharpen Christian eyes. Tamriel’s fractured myths train us to see unreliable narration as a space where truth can still break through. For Christians, it may even be a more authentic way of engaging with knowledge: not by erasing tension, but by receiving it as part of how God chooses to reveal himself.

The Task Ahead

The first doctrine, then, is method. Both The Elder Scrolls and Scripture confront us with unreliability, contradiction, and the need for discernment. In Tamriel, the contradictions remain open. In Scripture, they are preserved as sacred testimony. Both demand that we read, not as consumers of facts, but as pilgrims seeking meaning.

In the next part, we turn to the heart of TES theology: Who, or what is God? Anu and Padomay, the primordial twins? The Aedra and Daedra? Or is divinity itself a riddle with no single answer?