The Bible can be interpreted many different ways. Some will argue that it’s symbolic. Many say that only bits and pieces are relevant to the world today. Others will say that it is completely fictional. This confusion is creating madness! Christians have debated the correct approach to interpreting the Bible for centuries. There is only one right answer:  everything in the Bible should be taken literally.  

Trying to find hidden meanings and symbolism within the Bible is impossible and difficult. People have been trying that for decades and they still haven’t come up with any solid answers. That is because there is no way to be sure which arguments about biblical symbolism are correct. None can be proven or backed up literally by the Bible. If everyone just gave up on their personal attempts to figure out what it means and took the Bible literally, they could put more time and effort into applying what it says to their lives. There are crystal clear instructions on daily living in the Bible that seem to slip the minds of many Christians. The Bible is at it purest when taken literally because the words were written and translated exactly as they were for a reason. All of the different versions can be taken literally and will still have the same meaning. There is no way any of the slight differences in wording from version to version has any effect on the literal meaning.

The Bible is important because it is Earth’s literary link to God and Jesus. Even though the New Testament was written over one hundred years after Jesus died, it still accurately captures Jesus’ ideas (Kelly 52). It is very easy to keep track of exactly what someone said word for word for over one hundred years, or even longer. Evangelicals believe that everything you need to know is in the Bible (Johnson 374). It seems to be working for them so far. They all seem happy and content with life. That should be credited to their superior understanding of how to interpret the Bible and live a biblical based life. However, even they don’t take every scripture literally, so there is room for improvement for us all.

The beginning of the Bible answers the popular question of how Earth, Heaven and the mankind got here. In a nutshell, God made them all by himself in six days. Soon after that, God created woman from man as stated in the book of Genesis, “The man gave names to all cattle, and to the birds of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for the man there was not found a helper fit for him. So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh; and the rib which the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man” (Gen. 2:20-22). The role of women was clearly presented from the start. They are supposed to aid men because the first woman was put on this Earth to help him. Women doing anything besides assisting men would be unbiblical and sacrilegious. Women have no place doing anything on their own. When the first woman, Eve, made her own decision about eating the forbidden fruit, she single-handedly caused a huge curse to the human race. That alone proves that women need to stay out of leadership positions. ). Women were created just for men and need to be treated as no more than mere accessories. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians states, “Wives, be subject to your husbands as to the Lord” (Eph. 5:22). This unmistakably spells out that women are supposed to be men’s slaves. If a married woman wished to live her life according to the Bible, she would blindly subject herself to her husband at all times. The Bible explains the reason for this in Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, “For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man” (1 Cor. 11:8-9). Every man deserves a woman to assist him in his daily life.

A woman’s menstrual period is an extremely unsanitary and filthy time of the month that should be approached with great caution. The book of Leviticus says, “When a woman has a discharge of blood which is her regular discharge from her body, she shall be in her impurity for seven days, and whoever touches her bed shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and be unclean until the evening. And whoever touches anything upon which she sits, when he touches it he shall be unclean until the evening. And if any man lies with her, and her impurity is on him, he shall be unclean for seven days; and every bed on which he lies will be unclean” (Lev. 15:19-24). Vaginal blood is disgusting and undoubtedly impure. Any children, husbands or guests who touch a bed or a chair that woman on her period has slept in or sat on needs to wash their clothes and take a bath. That’s not impossible or even hard to understand. It wouldn’t be a waste of water either; it is completely necessary to wash away any impurities a fully clothed woman may have left on a chair when she was having her period. If a man dared to have sex with a woman on her period, he would be unclean for seven days no matter how hard he scrubbed himself. Maybe the best way to deal with women when they are having their periods is to keep them in quarantine until their seven days are up. That way no one else has to worry about being unclean.

The book of Exodus discusses feasts and a day of rest, which most people today ignore. “Six days you shall work, but on the seventh day you shall rest; in plowing time and in harvest you shall rest. And you shall observe the feast of weeks, the first fruits of wheat harvest, and the feast of ingathering at the year’s end” (Ex. 34:21-22). Under no circumstances should people do anything except rest on the seventh day of the week. The Bible does not support that sort of behavior. The feasts of the week and the feast of ingathering at the end of the year should be observed by Christians. The Jews celebrate Shavuoth, and so should all Christians. Today, most Christians are too concerned with going to work and doing daily chores when they should be feasting and resting. There is no excuse for not feasting and resting when the Bible says it is an appropriate time.

Today many Catholics go to confession for sins, and many Protestants say The Confession before taking communion and think it suffices. Some people even dare to just pray silently and confess their sins during silent prayer. This is ludicrous when the Bible has instructions for sin offerings. The book of Leviticus states, “But if he cannot afford a lamb, then he shall bring, as his guilt offering to the Lord for the sin which he has committed, two turtledoves or two pigeons, one for a sin offering and the other for a burnt offering. He shall bring them to a priest, who shall offer first the one of the sin offering; he shall wring its head from its neck, but shall not sever it, and he shall sprinkle some of the blood of the sin offering on the side of the altar, while the rest of the blood shall be drained out at the base of the altar; it is a sin offering (Lev. 5:7-9). The Bible says the way to atonement of sins is through an animal blood sacrifice preformed by a priest. Wringing a bird’s neck for enough blood to sprinkle without severing the head might sound tricky, but don’t be fooled by false logic. This feat was done successfully back when Moses wrote Leviticus so surely it can be done today. Catching turtledoves or pigeons may also appear to be a challenge. However, with a cage, a net and a little elbow grease, it can be done. Pigeons aren’t very fast animals as it is. They are often found today clustered in urban areas just waiting to be caught and used as a sin offering.

Taking the Bible literally doesn’t involve reading into things or trying to figure out what the authors meant. It isn’t difficult to do either. The authors meant exactly what they said; otherwise they would have said something else. When people try to reinterpret the Bible, they are ignoring the fact that it has already been laid out for them and translated perfectly.  




Works Cited
Holy Bible. The Revised Standard Version. New York: American Bible Society, 1970.
Kelly, J.N.D. Early Christian Doctrines. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1978.
Johnson, Paul. A History of Christianity. New York: Macmillian, 1976.