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The Problems with Claiming to Interpret the Bible Literally

by Max Aplin
1/27/2025 / Bible Studies

There are many Christians who claim that their method of interpreting the Bible is to take it literally. They don’t qualify this in any way. They just say that they interpret the Bible literally.

Those who make this claim usually mean well. They want to stand by what Scripture is teaching. And they are rightly opposed to unwarranted spiritualising interpretations that deny biblical truth.

However, there are two big problems with claiming to interpret the Bible literally without qualifying this.

A strange definition of ‘literal’

The first problem is that Christians who say they interpret Scripture literally are using the words ‘literal’ and ‘literally’ in a very strange way.

Like all believers, these Christians accept that the Bible contains many figures of speech, including numerous examples of metaphor. A metaphor is a figure of speech in which something is said to be a thing that in reality it is not.

For example, in Psalm 18:2 David says:

‘The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.’

This verse is full of metaphors. David metaphorically describes God as a rock, a fortress, a shield, a horn and a stronghold.

Every Christian would agree that these are metaphors. No believer would claim, for example, that David thought the LORD was actually made out of rock, whether limestone, granite or whatever. Instead, every Christian would accept that this is a metaphor.

Christians who say that they take a literal interpretation of Scripture are including metaphors like those in Psalm 18:2 under the heading of what they mean by ‘literal’. However, for modern English speakers generally, literal means that the thing in question really is what it is said to be, and that there is no figure of speech involved. In other words, for the vast majority of English speakers, to use a metaphor is precisely not to speak literally, and to speak literally is precisely not to use a metaphor or other figure of speech.

For Christians to use the words ‘literal’ and ‘literally’ in a very different way from how everyone else uses them is just going to lead to confusion. It can also help make the Christian faith seem inaccessible to non-Christians. We should therefore use these words in the same way that everyone else does.

Those Christians who say that they take a literal interpretation of the Bible really mean that they take a plain-sense interpretation. They mean that they take passages in the most straightforward and natural way. This plain sense will usually be literal (in the proper sense of ‘literal’), but at other times it will be metaphorical or will involve another figure of speech.

It would be a step in the right direction if everyone who says that they take a literal interpretation of Scripture said instead that they take a plain-sense interpretation of Scripture.

No one always interprets Scripture in the plain sense

There is also a second problem with Christians saying that they interpret the Bible literally (by which they mean that they interpret it in the plain sense, as I have just explained). This is that no Christian does in fact consistently take a plain-sense interpretation of Scripture.

There are biblical prophecies which are so obviously not supposed to be interpreted in the plain sense, that it is extremely rare to find any Christian who interprets them in the plain sense. And there is surely no Christian at all who would interpret all passages of this kind in the plain sense.

A good example of this sort of prophecy can be found in Ezekiel 37:24, where we read:

‘My servant David will be king over them, and they will all have one shepherd.’

This verse refers to king David, and the plain sense of these words is that the actual king David is being referred to.

However, Ezekiel spoke these words hundreds of years after David died, so it makes no sense to think that this prophecy is referring to the actual David.

In fact, ‘David’ here refers figuratively to Jesus, who is the royal son of David (e.g., Luke 18:38).

This is an example, then, of a biblical prophecy that should not be interpreted in the plain sense. And I have never even heard of any Christian who takes this prophecy in the plain sense.

Another example of a prophecy that should certainly not be interpreted in the plain sense is found in Matthew’s Gospel, in Matthew 12:40, where Jesus states:

‘For just as Jonah was in the sea monster’s stomach for three days and three nights, so the Son of Man will be in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights.’

Being in the heart of the earth is a reference to the time between Jesus’ death and resurrection. And the plain sense of three days and three nights is approximately 72 hours. Yet this same Gospel portrays the time between Jesus’ death and resurrection as roughly 35-40 hours (Matt 27:46-28:7)!

There is a remarkable lack of precision in Jesus’ words here that seems strange to modern Westerners but which would have been at home in first century Jewish culture.

Jesus’ reference to being in the earth for three days and three nights in Matthew 12:40 is clearly not supposed to be understood in the plain sense, as almost all Christians agree.

Summing up

For two reasons, then, those who say that they take a literal interpretation of the Bible are making a mistake. When they say ‘literal’, they really mean ‘in the plain sense’. And they have failed to recognise that no Christian does in fact consistently take a plain-sense interpretation of biblical prophecies.

End-times prophecies

There are many Christians who would accept the points I have made so far, but who nevertheless insist that biblical end-times prophecies should always be interpreted in the plain sense. They don’t stop to consider if a more symbolic interpretation of an end-times prophecy might be the correct one.

Those who do this are motivated in part by their opposition to the wrongful spiritualising of biblical prophecies found in some heretical circles.

For example, there are people who spiritualise the prophecies of Jesus’ return by saying that these prophecies really just symbolise His victory over evil. They say that we should therefore not expect Him to visibly return to earth at some point in the future.

It is right to vigorously oppose unwarranted spiritualising interpretations like these. However, it is a big over-reaction to insist, without further consideration, that all end-times prophecies must be interpreted in the plain sense. This is a classic case of opposing one extreme by going to the other extreme.

When Scripture itself interprets its own prophecies, the interpretations range from the strictly literal to the highly symbolic. As far as end-times prophecies are concerned, therefore, we would most probably expect the same to be true.

This means that unless it is immediately obvious that we should interpret a given prophecy in the plain sense, we should be cautious and open to either a plain-sense or non-plain-sense fulfillment. Any other approach fails to do justice to what we find in the Bible itself.