Biblical Literalists

I know several people, friends and relatives of mine, good people, but people who I have a basic disagreement with. You see these people claim and believe that the Bible, every last word of it, has to be followed directly and specifically. They believe that every word of the Bible represents the Word of God and therefore every word in the Bible is perfect, divinely inspired, and represents how we should live our daily lives.

First of all we have to remember that the Bible itself has undergone many changes throughout its history. The inclusion and exclusion of several books of the Bible has generated considerable discussion, even in the early days of Christianity. Even today different denominations read different versions of the Bible so we still don't consensus on what the Bible is and so it seems the literalists would have to agree that what is the Word of God is still up for debate.

Furthermore I have been unable to find anyone who agrees with and follows every word of the Bible. It is pretty difficult to find anyone who thinks it is OK to sell your daughters into slavery or that your child should be stoned by the town elders if they misbehave. I have also found it hard to locate many Biblical literalists who think eating shellfish is an abomination, I know several literalists who eat pork as well. Of course the wearing of blended fabrics isn't even thought about these days. There may be some individuals who follow every word in the Bible, but I haven't met any so far.

But that may not be a problem. You see I, and the Biblical literalists I know are Christians, and as Christians we follow the teaching of Jesus Christ and try to live our lives in a way that follows the example set out by Christ. This is where it gets interesting because Christ actually instructed his followers to not follow some of the commands laid out in the Bible.

For example the Old Testament tells us to seek revenge from our enemies but Christ tells us, in a very direct way, to not follow these words. Even the Old Testament ban on eating pork is challenged in the New Testament. If Christ tells us, as Christians, to not follow some of the directives found in the Old Testament how can we then think that the Bible is perfect and every word equally valuable?

For some this may a difficult question, but for me it is quite simple. The Bible, all of it, gives us great insight into how we should live our lives as Christians. At the same time this is a book that was written thousands of years ago and some of it may not apply to us today. The Bible is a living document and we should treat it as such, God created a world that changes, thankfully he also provided us with a text that is deep and wide enough to show us how to relate to the world we live in, even all these years later.

Christ told us to follow the Ten Commandments and to love one another. There are no exceptions in either of these statements, we must follow all of the Ten Commandments and we must love one another, no matter who they are or who we are. This gives us enough of a starting point to live by and I doubt there will be any debate on this.