@vulcanlogician I was just rereading through our earlier exchange in the thread and I realized I totally missed one of the specific things you asked. You mentioned the feeding story.
Do I think the whole thing is an allegory? As of this moment, no. I don’t have any issues believing that Jesus could multiply food at given times. But again that is a conclusion based on a decision in faith that I hold to, namely, if Jesus is God, which I believe by faith, then he wouldn’t have any problems carrying out such a task even though it’s not something we see happening regularly by any means. That’s a simple take of how I look at that.
That’s not to say that nothing in the account is allegorized, however. Do I believe Jesus actually used bread and fish? I’m open to the possibility that the food he actually multiplied might not have been bread and fish, but that bread and fish was used in the narrative for their symbolism. I’d say the same thing about the numbers. All the numbers in both feeding narratives seem to have some sort of ancient numerological meaning, making it more likely that the numbers were allegorical in the narratives.
So that’s how I currently approach the feeding narratives. I’m open to allegory in the narrative details, but I also don’t have an issue believing that Jesus could perform a miracle of multiplication either, so I still choose to embrace in faith that he did such a thing on some level.
Do I think the whole thing is an allegory? As of this moment, no. I don’t have any issues believing that Jesus could multiply food at given times. But again that is a conclusion based on a decision in faith that I hold to, namely, if Jesus is God, which I believe by faith, then he wouldn’t have any problems carrying out such a task even though it’s not something we see happening regularly by any means. That’s a simple take of how I look at that.
That’s not to say that nothing in the account is allegorized, however. Do I believe Jesus actually used bread and fish? I’m open to the possibility that the food he actually multiplied might not have been bread and fish, but that bread and fish was used in the narrative for their symbolism. I’d say the same thing about the numbers. All the numbers in both feeding narratives seem to have some sort of ancient numerological meaning, making it more likely that the numbers were allegorical in the narratives.
So that’s how I currently approach the feeding narratives. I’m open to allegory in the narrative details, but I also don’t have an issue believing that Jesus could perform a miracle of multiplication either, so I still choose to embrace in faith that he did such a thing on some level.
