There are no answers in Genesis

[Angrboda]

I don't know the answer to this question, so I'll just throw it out there for anyone to answer.  Can a case be made from pre-first-century Talmud that the old testament should be interpreted along lines similar to Neo's, that it is more allusion and metaphor, a spiritual message consisting primarily of pseudo-historical accounts that function as allegory first, and as history second?

I can't answer because I don't know what pre-first-century Jew to read.  But it bears noting that we have a major contributor from the 1st whom I believe to be an influence on Christianity in Philo of Alexandria.  He wrote volumes on allegorical interpretation of Genesis.  It's very interesting and preciously naive.  I'm a huge fan.  From Philo, you get the impression that the first step toward finding "a son of God," which is how he described the Logos, is to stop thinking of Genesis as mere history.

Philo of Alexandria

Well, this is the problem I have with Neo. It's fine to approach the bible as containing much more than history, but it's incoherent to approach it as making no historical claims whatsoever. The answer, as always, lies somewhere in the middle. Unfortunately, Neo insists that where he draws the line is objectively defensible and he shits on anybody who dares question his divine wisdom. It's even more unfortunate as Neo's doing so appears to be a transparent case of an interpretational stance and defense of said stance driven by 21st-century political needs that he has, quite irrespective of how they might relate to what is true or can reasonably be defended. In short, Neo is a typical conservative Christian, inventing the God that he needs, as opposed to the God that might be or is.

[Angrboda]

And FWIW, I seem to recall something about worshipping false idols, but perhaps I'm confusing my sources, and that in fact comes instead from the Lord Of The Rings.

[Fake Messiah]

From the time I was very young, I saw the Bible stories as being quite similar to Aesop's Fables. Stories to teach a lesson. I didn't buy into the Bible stories as reality for the same reason I didn't think grasshoppers and ants were talking to one another. I don't think I was even in school yet when I made that connection.

Never once did I think Jonah lived in the belly of a whale, never once did I think the animals marched onto a big boat two-by-two, and the list goes on.

Stories with a purpose that was not to teach historical reality. Sure, some settings were real, don't most authors draw from what is around them? Maybe not sci-fi, but you get the idea.

But did your Sunday School teachers ever tell you that Jonah and the whale (or any other story from the Bible) never happened and that it is only a metaphor?

[Jehanne]

Also explain why the text of Genesis underwent redactions, changes and edits over the centuries before settling on its final form circa 150 BCE?

As Angrboda already hinted at: If anything can be figurative in the bible, why not the existence of god? Its maybe just a metaphor for........pick and choose.

In my opinion, I think that most believers, even a significant minority of religious fundamentalists, covertly think their religious faith to be bullshit, but they "profess" belief for psychological, social, sexual, economic, political, familial, etc., reasons.

[brewer]

And FWIW, I seem to recall something about worshipping false idols, but perhaps I'm confusing my sources, and that in fact comes instead from the Lord Of The Rings.

[arewethereyet]

From the time I was very young, I saw the Bible stories as being quite similar to Aesop's Fables.  Stories to teach a lesson.  I didn't buy into the Bible stories as reality for the same reason I didn't think grasshoppers and ants were talking to one another.  I don't think I was even in school yet when I made that connection.

Never once did I think Jonah lived in the belly of a whale, never once did I think the animals marched onto a big boat two-by-two, and the list goes on.

Stories with a purpose that was not to teach historical reality.  Sure, some settings were real, don't most authors draw from what is around them?  Maybe not sci-fi, but you get the idea.

But did your Sunday School teachers ever tell you that Jonah and the whale (or any other story from the Bible) never happened and that it is only a metaphor?

No, they didn't.  Not in catechism classes or through my many years at full Catholic schools.

[Jehanne]

And FWIW, I seem to recall something about worshipping false idols, but perhaps I'm confusing my sources, and that in fact comes instead from the Lord Of The Rings.

Cosmic vagina?

[arewethereyet]

Cosmic vagina?

Seems to be inflamed.   Should get that looked at.

[Angrboda]

Cosmic vagina?

Seems to be inflamed.   Should get that looked at.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

But did your Sunday School teachers ever tell you that Jonah and the whale (or any other story from the Bible) never happened and that it is only a metaphor?

No, they didn't.  Not in catechism classes or through my many years at full Catholic schools.

Same-same.  I was always taught what Adam and Eve did, not that it was a parable concerning something else. When we were taught that Jesus died after being nailed to a cross, or what happened to Jezebel or that JTB ate bugs, it was explained to us that these were actual historical events with moral lessons behind them.

I can't think of a single Bible story that wasn't related to us as historic fact (apart from parables so labeled). 

Boru