Further thoughts on the nature of Holy Scripture

While the Bible is a Story, we must not press the analogy too far. That path leads to the Liberals, who seem to consider the whole thing a collection of pious fables, no different than any other of a score of "sacred books" -- inspiring, with moral teachings from which we can choose at our pleasure, but with no basis in reality. But the Bible is different from the Koran, the Bhagavad Gita, the Book of Mormon, and all the rest; it is based in sober, factual history.

One cannot take this too far, either. It would be too much to presume that the Creation took place in six literal twenty-four hour days, precisely as described in Genesis 1 (and ignoring the differing account in Genesis 2).

I think that Genesis 12 is a key transition between the distant past, based on oral transmission through many generations and brought into its current form by Moses or some other writer(s), and a more recent time wherein the stories have not passed through so many generations. I have no doubt that the succeeding chapters provide a faithful portrait of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and the God who called them to be his own people, through whom all the families of the earth would be blessed.

Some bits of the Story, old and more recent, are more important to the "plot" than others. For example, I would not bet my life on the factuality of Joshua 10:12-14. But I would, and have, on I Corinthians 15:1-8.

This Story, as Tolkien said in the passage quoted last time, has entered the primary reality in which we live. The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth. Many details are uncertain, because the stories as we have them are attempts to convey in words the inexpressible. It is difficult to harmonize the accounts of the Four Gospels; at the least, they differ in detail, often drastically so. But behind these stories, as well as the other stories of the Old and New Testaments, is plain sober reality. There was a day, a genuine historical day every bit as real as this day in which I sit at my computer and write this essay, wherein the children of Israel "saw the Egyptians dead upon the sea shore" (Exodus 14:30). There was another day not long after when Moses came down from Mt. Sinai, a real place that is still with us, bearing two tables of stone written by the hand of God.

And, preeminently, there was a day, a Sunday, when Mary Magdalene and others saw the risen Lord Jesus Christ, whom they knew to be dead. They had seen him die, and there was no doubt. And now, there was no doubt that he was alive, in plain fact.

Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again.
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From The Two Towers; Samwise Gamgee is speaking:
"The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. Frodo: adventures, as I used to call them. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting and life was a bit dull, a kind of a sport, as you might say. But that's not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Folk seem to have been just landed in them, usually – their paths were laid that way, as you put it. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn't. And if they had, we shouldn't know, because they'd have been forgotten. We hear about those as just went on – and not all to a good end, mind you; at least not to what folk inside a story and not outside it call a good end. You know, coming home, and finding things all right, though not quite the same – like old Mr. Bilbo. But those aren't always the best tales to hear, though they may be the best tales to get landed in! I wonder what sort of a tale we've fallen into?"

"I wonder," said Frodo. "But I don't know. And that's the way of a real tale. Take any one that you're fond of. You may know, or guess, what kind of a tale it is, happy-ending or sad-ending, but the people in it don't know. And you don't want them to."

"No sir, of course not. . . [Sam recounts part of the tale of Beren and the Silmaril as an example] "Why, to think of it, we're in the same tale still! Don't the great tales never end?"

"No, they never end as tales," said Frodo. "But the people in them come, and go when their part's ended."


The Holy Father, Benedict XVI, has for some time been using his weekly General Audience in the square of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome to speak about some of the saints of the church. He began the series, as one might expect, with St. Peter, and then the other Apostles, and other New Testament figures. From there, he continued with Clement of Rome and other post-Apostolic Christians, and has moved onward through the centuries to (at present) the late Middle Ages. The series continues.

The saints are the bridge between the New Testament and our own time. In every generation, there have been those who have served the Lord, known to us and unknown. And in them, the Story has continued.

Now, after all these thousands of years, it is our turn. What will they say of us when our time is done? More to the point, what will the Author say?