Subject: Torn veil of Mat 15.38 the literal veil? |
Bible Note: John, thank you for taking the time to answer my question. I don't question that the Bible is the inspired word of God and wholly true and accurate; that's not what I meant by "literal." I have been taught and have read that within the boundaries of sound Bible interpretation, there are some things in the Bible that are not literal. They're TRUE, but not literal. For example, Ps. 50:10, that God owns the cattle on a thousand hills.....that probably doesn't mean literally one thousand, but more likely means uncounted or infinite or something like that. When God told Abraham that his descendants would be numbered like the grains of sand on earth or the stars in the sky, He didn't literally mean an exact number, but uncountable (by anyone but God). When Ezekiel and John saw their visions, were all of those descriptive words literal, or representative of an idea? I can't think of other examples right now, but I think you get my point. As I said in my original question, Mark 15:38 (and parallel passages) sounds to me like there's no way to take it except literally. But I'm just an average person studying the Bible and there might be something I don't yet see about this. I can't discern, for example, whether or not the streets in heaven are literally gold, or if the word is intended to evoke imagery. I've read bunches of commentaries about this verse and a lot on the web, but I've found nothing that addresses my questions A and B. |