How To Read The Bible

Literalists vs. Contextualist

“The bible means exactly what it says.”--William Jennings Bryan

Not all literalists agree:Example: What is a day?

1. Jehovah Witnesses – a day can be interpreted as a “era”

2. Church of God – a day must mean 24 hours

The Literalist

A literal biblical calendar – creation took place 6,000 years ago

Literalists have a bigger problem – two stories of creation

First, a lesson on body language!

The Contextualist

To understand the creation stories, one must first understand the people and their beliefs :

1. were polytheistic - worshipped the sun, moon, stars, even animals

2. creation happened by chance3. believed the body was evil – it warred against itself4. considered all the days of the week to be of equal

importance

This is the context in which the creation stories were written.

How does a contextualist read the creation stories?

First creation story -- Genesis 1: all – 2: 1-4

Second creation story – Genesis 2: 4 - 25