Bishop John Shelby Spong wrote a great book on interpreting the gospels via literally which is an unfortunate error. The fundamental interpretation of the Bible is not based on the 1st century Jewish historical background. Jesus and disciples lived in the 1st century Judea and Galilee. They preached to the Jewish people in the 1st century Palestine. The Christians in last two thousands years have viewed the stories of Jesus as literal (real and true stories). They are interpreting the gospels from their different cultural viewpoints (Greco-Roman, then later Medieval, and today Modern Fundamentalism). To understand the gospels, we must approach it allegorically as the first century Jews did.

For example, Jesus did not rise from the dead. But this story parallel the story of Elijah going to heaven on the chariot of fire. Here is other example, Jesus did not actually feed 5,000 people with unlimited bread. It parallel the story of Moses where manna is sent from heaven. All of stories in the gospels, are exactly that, just stories that the 1st century Jewish audience will understand and resonate with. Jesus was merely a man. He was not endowed with god-like powers. The stories were added unto Jesus' legend during the oral period of early days of Jesus' sect. When those stories after being adapted and re-told many times was finally written down by Greek writers in a different language and in places far away from the birthplace of Jesus.

To summarize my point, Christians today who leave their fundamental church usually still interpret the Bible literally. This is an erroneous heresy. You should change your interpretation approach to allegorically. Jesus' stories are not real but they are inspiring! "Liberal" Christians should not interpret the Bible literally.

Spong's book can be found at amazon.com: "Biblical Literalism: A Gentile Heresy" by John Shelby Spong

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