Prodigal Son

About a week ago, I had the best phone conversation in my life. My dad had told me that this guy named Pastor Ken could give very influential arguments about the validity of Christianity- so naturally, I wanted to put that to the test. I was confident that my arguments were essentially flawless, and that confidence did not fade in the least until our conversation was drawing to an end. But some time after, I began to realize that he had influenced my thoughts without me being aware of it. This new development disturbed my mind greatly, and so I decided to, after a year or so of agnosticism, reevaluate my status in regards to Christianity- or, more accurately, the Bible.

(Note- everything written below this line is original thought, with little to no influence from Pastor Ken)

The truth is that I did not renounce Christianity because I wanted to, but because I needed to. Specifically, it conflicted with my highest normal value, which is- of course- honesty. Modern interpretations of the Bible clearly contradict, and are inconsistent in more ways than one- as well as having views of morality that could easily be considered evil, if one were to look at it face-value, and without religious bias. Arguments that I have had for this can be found in Theistic Imperfection, true tribulations, and Ranting About Christianity. If measured based on a traditional interpretation (which would be essentially reading the Bible literally), God's word is destine to appear to not only contradict but undermine itself- which would clearly invalidate whatever worth it would have otherwise- at least concerning whether or not it is the word of God. For these reasons, I renounced Christianity; after all, I cannot bear to lie to myself. But (apparently) after thinking things over, I become aware of many important things:

The Bible presents itself on the premise that God in his Greatness cannot in any way be imagined by finite beings such as ourself. This is only natural, as God is inherently infinite. That being the case, no part of him can be presented to us literally while maintaining accuracy- actually, it would be quite the opposite. My reasoning for this, is because every word he speaks have infinite underlying knowledge, wisdom, and insights backing it- in accordance with he nature. This being the case, there is probably a never-ending stream of wisdom and understanding floating around in dormant state, just waiting to be discovered. Keeping this in mind, anyone who would stereotype God's word into a few select meanings that "sound right" could be considered conceited in that way- considering that, even as God's children, we are still "only human"- we have limitations and make mistakes.

Therefore, with respect to our God's infinite nature, the Bible should be interpreted using methods that "reach to the heavens" in their potential. In other words, the utilization of metaphors (which ironically- I just used in the line above) Metaphorical interpretations truly are infinite- especially when one considers the capacity of metaphors to compliment each other ceaselessly. Extremes can be easily compromised when metaphor come into play. For example, even though (when read literally) God contradicts himself several times over, this would only be evident face value. Take the same passages and reevaluate them using a metaphorical interpretation- and another possibility would surface than can prove just as obvious; It might be that he appears to contradict himself to endow wisdom and illustrate concepts for us, and likely giving certain values an emphasis by means of hyperbolizing. It isn't too unlikely that God would require such methods, when we consider how we compare to him in terms of potential. In the same way, all of the contradictions, inconsistencies, and conflicts of morality can stay within reasonable bounds metaphorically; this would most definitely not be the case if the Bible was taken literally.

Furthermore, not only does the Bible never say anything even along the lines of (i.e.) "The word of God should only/must be interpreted literally"; but throughout the Bible, metaphors are greatly encouraged. All of the Books Of Wisdom are "chalk-full" of metaphors, and Jesus himself regularly told Parables- which took the form of elaborate metaphors, "to convey spiritual and moral matters." Although I can't remember offhand, several verses of the Bible I read collectively presented the idea that "It is God's desire that each of his children interpret his word in their own way. In this fashion, each will discover a piece of his great wisdom, and his glory will penetrate the hearts of all those who seek to find it, if only just a glimpse." (I made that up from scratch, sounds cool, doesn't it?)

Another thing to consider is that- just as our human limitations would not afford us the ability to accurately understand God's Word face-value...in the same way, we cannot even begin to grasp his motives and master plan. For that reason, we have no right to judge whether or not God is good or evil, or whether or not he makes mistakes. In reality, as the creator of all things, God cannot do "evil", as it would not even be wrong for someone to destroy their creations (that's common sense- and that's about the worst God can do). But even if he could do evil, that should be irrelevant to us. We are his creations, and as such should do his will to the best of out ability. Because he is who he is, for us to even attempt to judge his character would amount to Blasphemy. Regardless of the means, ends, or anything in-between, "that he willed it" is that that is necessary for it to be good. If the Bible is to be interpreted metaphorically (at this point a "given"), The bulk of this post would imply that, other than going in the same general direction, everyone has, or could potentially have a different interpretations. This would make an exchange of extremes in respect to the different interpretations inevitable- and even might extend to a point comparable with the stereotypical extremes of "good" and "evil".

It is possible that God's perfection may require that which could be perceived as "evil", but in the grand scheme of things, this too is fundamentally irrelevant. However, it does hint at the final consideration: One of my core beliefs is that "reality is fundamentally unknowable" (Metaphysical Non-Reductionism. This being the case, anything I believe about reality is potentially a lie, which implies that it actually doesn't matter what I believe. Christianity has (by far) the most historical validity, [alleged?] supernatural phenomena, and literary inspiration out of any other belief system to date. In other words, it should be painfully obvious that even if Christianity was not true, (from my perspective) it would be the next best/closest thing. In addition, these logical modifications that I have defined in this post bring things to a level that I could easily transition back into a Christian lifestyle, since these perspectives are compatible with that which I have decided to believe for this last year. All this considered, I've made the decision to once again be a Christian, keeping in mind these new perspectives. The prodigal son returns (p.s. - for those who didn't realize, "The Prodigal Son" is also a parable by Jesus. With all the underlying meanings, it makes for a great title, doesn't it? :)