Stumbling Over Scripture (Continued)

I used to be a vigorous defender of the literal truth of every word of the Bible and was well versed in arguments against many of the popular criticisms. My reasoning was as thorough as it was enthusiastic and it kept my own doubts at bay for many years. Eventually the old questions re-emerged, however, and I rediscovered the mystery that makes living with God such an entrancing adventure. Mystery so easily becomes lost in the rational certainties of literalist arguments, which reduce the words of ancient prophets and historians to a lifeless pseudo-science. Reopening those writings with questions in my mind I began to see the writers as men with lives like my own. They were not holy robots, incapable of independent thought or sinful deed and, of course, they never claimed in their writings that they were so. The problem was that my desire for hard-edged certainty had blinded me to the evidence that was laid out before me. The people who wrote the scriptures were not encumbered with the dogma that clouded the views of reverential commentators from later times. They were not afraid to cross reference their works to books, like the book of Jashar (See Note 1), that would subsequently be lost. They did not see any problem with titling their songs with the suggestion that they should be sung to tunes (See Note 2) which would soon be forgotten. They wrote for their own time with immediate objectives in mind and the reason for the survival of their works is that they touched such chords with the people of their time that they preserved them and passed them on.

//Continued