The Pleistocene epoch is a geological time period that lasted from about 2.6 million to 11,700 years ago. It is most known for the repeated glacial cycles, often referred to as the "Ice Age". This period saw dramatic climate fluctuations, including periods of glacial advance and retreat across large portions of the globe.
Too,
Early humans and wolves likely formed a partnership that proved advantageous for both species. Wolves may have initially been attracted to human campsites for food, and over time, a symbiotic relationship developed where wolves helped with hunting and defense, while humans provided food and protection. This relationship eventually led to the domestication of wolves into dogs.
And lastly,
In the tale of Romulus and Remus we can hear echoes of Cain and Abel's brotherhood that was eventually broken by a dispute eventuating in the murder of Abel by his brother Cain. One might ask which came first? Rome's tale or Israel's narrative in Genesis? Or did each have a common ancestral linkage far earlier in the recollections of ancient Mesopotamian minds which spread over time from the Steppes of Euro-Asia?Romulus and Remus are legendary twin brothers whose story explains the founding of Rome. According to the myth, they were abandoned as infants, nursed by a she-wolf, and raised by a shepherd. After growing up, they decided to found a city, but quarreled, and Romulus killed Remus. Romulus then became the first king of Rome and named the city after himself.
WHY THE BIBLE IS IMPORTANT
In Part 1 I put up the following table showing why reading the bible literally can help preserve the beliefs of fundamental and evangelical Christianity:
📖 Should We Read the Bible Literally?
✅ PRO: Arguments For Reading the Bible Literally
Argument | Explanation |
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1. Preserves Authority | Literal reading is believed to uphold the Bible’s truthfulness as the Word of God, preventing dilution or distortion by subjective interpretation. |
2. Protects Core Doctrines | Doctrines like the resurrection, incarnation, and second coming often rely on a literal interpretation to maintain their theological weight. |
3. Resists Relativism | Literalism offers a fixed standard in contrast to interpretive pluralism, which can lead to conflicting meanings and loss of theological coherence. (Me: Disagree. Literalism's usage has proven to very pliable/fluid as well) |
4. Historical Anchoring | Literal readings ground events in time and space (e.g., Exodus, the Crucifixion), reinforcing faith in God's action in real history. |
5. Accessibility | A plain reading makes Scripture understandable to everyday believers without requiring scholarly or symbolic analysis. (Me: Disagree. Oftentimes it proves to be quite perplexing) |
6. Evangelistic Urgency | Many evangelical missions are driven by a literal interpretation of judgment, salvation, and eternal destiny. |
❌ CON: Arguments Against Reading the Bible Literally
Argument | Explanation |
---|---|
1. Misunderstands Genre | The Bible includes poetry, parables, apocalyptic visions, and mythic narratives—genres not meant to be read literally (e.g., Psalms, Revelation, Job). |
2. Ignores Cultural Context | Ancient texts were written in a worldview foreign to modern readers. Literalism flattens metaphor, symbolism, and cultural nuance. |
3. Leads to Contradictions | Literal readings can create theological and historical inconsistencies (e.g., two different creation accounts, differing genealogies). |
4. Inhibits Theological Growth | Treating Scripture as frozen prevents evolving understandings of justice, ethics, gender, ecology, and divine love. |
5. Fails to Grasp Depth | Literalism may reduce rich metaphors (e.g., “God is a rock”) to absurdities or shallow readings, missing poetic theological insight. |
6. Encourages Dogmatism | A rigid literal stance can promote exclusion, legalism, and resistance to spiritual discernment or dialogue. |
And so, as a past fundamentalist and evangelic, I must reject the practice and attitude of approaching the bible from a literalist perspective. It is deeply unhelpful to the Christian faith; it makes the bible an "a-historical" (or super-historical) collection of ancient writings; and loses the God of it's pages in the fanciful pages of the human mind.
Christians then yearn for purity in their "biblical" faith and yet at the very base of the Christian culture lies its own philosophical underpinnings forcing to the surface their own kind of subjectivities related to their faith. Thus and thus, the traditional Christian faith is as much a subjective expression of belief and practice as that of their accusals of others practicing the same. And once realizing this in mine own examination of a bibliology based on literalism I knew I needed to find another avenue or approach to my Christian belief in God....
Processual faith-living questions unloving authoritarian structures; demands justice and inclusivity; purposely disconnects from rigid dogmatic systems; longs for spiritual paths which breathe responsible freedom; keeps the bible sacred but not static; views God not as all powerful but as all loving; is grounded in the ancient faiths of its past communities while reserving the right to question those community's objectives and beliefs; and, describes a Christian faith as an evolving, never-ending-and-generative-practice, of giving and receiving.
The Processual Christian faith is:
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Relational over authoritarian: It critiques unloving structures that enforce control in the name of God.
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Justice-oriented and inclusive: It moves beyond tribal or nationalistic boundaries to embrace the full breadth of human dignity and planetary kinship.
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Critical of rigid dogma: It values flexibility, creativity, and transformation in place of immutable systems.
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Drawn to spiritual freedom: Not a freedom of license, but one of responsibility, reciprocity, and generative becoming.
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Reverent yet dynamic with Scripture: The Bible is sacred as testimony of evolving human-divine relationship, not as a static rulebook.
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God as persuasive Love, not coercive Power: God does not control but lures creation toward beauty, wholeness, and novelty.
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Grounded in tradition but not bound by it: It listens to the ancients while recognizing the right—and need—to critique and move beyond their limitations.
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A faithing rather than a faith: A living, open-ended, co-creative process of becoming, healing, reconciling, and loving.
✦ Contrast with Evangelical Claim to Objectivity
Your closing point is especially astute: Evangelical Christianity’s assertion of doctrinal objectivity is itself deeply enculturated—a product of Enlightenment rationalism, Reformed scholasticism, and Western metaphysics (e.g., substance dualism, juridical justice, etc.).
In contrast:
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Process philosophy does not hide its commitments. It owns its subjectivity and honors the interplay between perception, value, and change.
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Rather than pretending to be above history, process theology walks within history—embodied, limited, evolving, but faithful.
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Its rigor lies in its honesty—not in eliminating complexity, but in embracing it with clarity and relational intelligence.
✦ Your Statement as a Process Creed (Poetic Form)
Here’s your summary reframed as a kind of processual creed in poetic rhythm:
We untangle the knots of creedal dogma -
longing for the freedom bearing godly responsibility.
Nor see God as all-controlling in Sovereignty,
but as all-loving, all-luring, all-becoming Sovereign.
but dare to axe or prune what no longer bears good fruit.
of giving and receiving,
of becoming with God,
with the world,
with one another