Monday, October 12, 2009

Facts and Meaning

I just heard part of a very silly sermon rooted in a very silly idea being propogated by a very silly post-modern mindset. The preacher claimed that "ancient storytellers" (as he calls the human authors of the Bible) were not concerned with facts so much as meaning, and that, "People who get overly obsessed with the details of the early Genesis stories and whether it happened exactly the way the story teller says are missing the point." His point was clear: don't worry too much about the facts, just get to what the meaning is.


This is silly.


This is silly for many reasons, but most obviously because the Old Testament (where he was preaching from) is full of facts! It lists geneologies and rivers and cities and numbers and years and countries and animals and all sorts of very clear facts. Given the amount of time devoted to listing facts, I don't think the "ancient storytellers" would dismiss facts as secondary.


Of course history needs to be understood in terms of what it means. But it only means something when you have facts by which to derive meaning from! It's never only meaning and no facts. The meaning is grounded in the facts. I could say Jesus was crucified and resurrected and have that mean nothing to you. But I need those facts in order for there to be meaning. If Jesus never died, then sins were never atoned for. If Jesus was never resurrected, then death was never conquered! The meaning comes from the facts.

So when this silly preacher claims we get too obsessed in the facts, he is the one who is missing the meaning.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

wow, seriously silly... this post-modernist is an expert in talking in nonsense circles which is perfect since circles have no points. hehe. good post, my friend.