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Chapter 6 ~ Part I: The Call of Gideon
The narrative of the judgeship of Gideon can be divided into two sections:
Part I: The description of the period of Israel's sin and subjugation by the Midianites and their allies until Gideon's call as a deliverer. Through the miracles God works for Gideon, he is able to achieve victory over Israel's enemies (Judg 6:1-8:3).
Part II: The description of Gideon's leadership until his death (8:4-8:28).
Judges 6:1-6 ~ Israel is oppressed by the Midianites and their Allies
In verse 1 we have another of the repeated statements announcing Israel's covenant failures: The Israelites did what is evil in Yahweh's eyes... (2:11; 3:7, 12 [twice]; 4:1; 6:1; 10:6 and 13:1); this time their oppressors are the Midianites and other nomads who lived east of the Jordan River.
Question: Who are the Midianites, how are they related to the children of Israel, and why do they inhabit the lands to the east in the Transjordan (east of the Jordan River)?
Answer: After Sarah's death, Abraham married a woman named Keturah by whom he had five sons. The fourth son by Keturah was Midian. When these sons reached adulthood, Abraham sent them away to "the lands to the east" (Gen 25:6) so they could not present a danger to his one heir and inheritor of the covenant with Yahweh who was Isaac, Abraham's son with Sarah.
The confederation of Midianite tribes was counted among the "peoples of the east" (Judg 6:3, 33; 7:12). They were nomadic tribes that mostly occupied the desert lands in the Arabian Peninsula but their clans and settlements extended as far north as Syria. They formed alliances with the peoples of the Negeb and the Transjordan like the Kenites, Amalekites, Moabites, Ammonites and Ishmaelites (Num 10:29; 25:6, 15, 16-18; Judg 1:16; 6:3, 33; 8:24). The Biblical designation "the land of Midian" (Ex 2:15; Hab 3:7) probably refers to the center of Midianite territory in northwestern Arabia along the Gulf of Aqabah's eastern shore to the east of the Sinai Peninsula (1 Kng 11:18).
Gaza, a Philistine city mentioned in verse 4, was located in southwest Canaan about three miles from the Mediterranean coast. The implication is that the entire land was devastated by the Midianite camel raiders and their allies from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean coast.
Question: In what ways did the Israelites suffer under the continued attacks by the Midianites and their allies?
Answer:
- To escape from Midianite attacks, the people were forced to hide in the mountains and in caves like animals.
- In the planting season their enemies would camp within Israelite territory and constantly raid their villages, destroying their agricultural crops.
- They confiscated the Israelite livestock and pillaged the villages.
Question: Why were they destroying the crop when it was planted instead of waiting for the harvest?
Answer: They were probably raiding at seed time and at harvest. The intention wasn't just to steal from the Israelites; the intention was probably to starve out the Israelites and force them to leave the land.
The inspired writer compares the Midianites and their allies to locusts. This metaphor describes the way the enemy destroyed everything in their path like a plague of locusts. The same comparison will be made in 7:12 to describe the huge numbers of the enemy.
Judge deliverer cycles 1-4 for Gideon are fulfilled in this passage:
- Announcement of Israel's wrong doing (6:1)
- Statement of Yahweh's response (6:2)
- Notice of how long Israel was oppressed by the enemy (6:1a)
- Reference to Israel's repentance in "crying out" to God (6:6-7)
The other parts of the cycle will be fulfilled in: - Announcement of God "raising up" a deliverer (6:11-14)
- Description of how deliverance was achieved (6:33-35; 7:1-25; 8:4-21)
- Concluding statement of how long peace lasted (8:28)
Gideon Thanks God for the Miracle of the Dew (Maarten van Heemskerck)
Judges 6:7-10 ~ A Message from God's Prophet
That the Israelites "cried out" to Yahweh (verses 6-7) is the fourth part of the deliverer cycle. God's response is not to send a deliverer but that He "sent" a "man prophet."
Question: Is there a point the inspired writer wants to make? What is the purpose of explicitly stating that this man-prophet is a man?
Answer: The point is this prophet is a man as opposed to the last prophet mentioned in the Book of Judges, the nabia issa Deborah. The contrast is that this man prophet does not come to set in motion the process of deliverance like the prophetess Deborah. Instead he comes as God's prosecuting attorney to deliver another covenant law-suit indictment in accusing the Israelites of covenant infidelity and in forgetting God's acts as Israel's Savior and divine King.
Question: What is the prophet's message from God?
Answer: It is a personal message given in seven first person pronouns to remind the Israelites of the miracles God worked to liberated them in the Exodus and the gift of the Promised Land. The message ends in a concluding summary statement:
- It was I who brought you out of Egypt, and
- I led you out of the place of slave-labor.
- I rescued you from the power of the Egyptians and from the power of all who oppressed you ...
- I drove them out before you and
- I gave their country to you.
- And I said to you:
- I am Yahweh your God. You are not to fear the gods of the Amorites in whose country you are now living.
Concluding statement: But you have not listened to my voice.
Seven is one of the so-called "perfect numbers" in Scripture (3, 7, 10 and 12) indicating divine perfection in fulfillment or completion especially in God's plan (for example, seven days in a week and God rested on the seventh day and Jesus' seven saying from the Cross, etc.); see the document "The Significance of Numbers in Scripture.
The summary statement But you have not listened to my voice is repeated from Judges 2:2 and is a reminder of God's warnings that the Israelites must "listen" to God's voice and obey (for example see Dt 4:1; 7:12; 11:13; 15:5; 27:9, etc.) and their promise to be obedient to His commands (Ex 24:3, 7 and Josh 24:16-24). God is frustrated with Israel's cycles of sin, subjugation, supplication and deliverance. The prophet is sent to caution the Israelites against presuming that every descent into apostasy that brings divine judgment can be remedied by an appeal to elicit deliverance.
Gideon's Call (Julius Schnorr von Karolsfeld)
Judges 6:11-16 ~ The Angel of Yahweh appears to Gideon
Up to this point, the coming of Yahweh's messengers has been associated with judgment (2:15 and 6:7-8). But after Yahweh's prophet delivers a message concerning Israel's covenant failures in verses 8-10, God sends another messenger; "the messenger of Yahweh" is a divine messenger who appears with his staff (6:21) sitting under the terebinth tree belonging to Gideon's father in Gideon's village. The terebinth is a tree common to the lower regions of the hill country of Canaan/Israel. Its broad, spreading branches, great size and long life made it a tree that was venerated by the inhabitants of Canaan/Israel.
Gideon's father, Joash, is the leader of the Abiezer clan in the tribe of Manasseh.(1) Despite Gideon's claim (6:15), his family is depicted as prosperous (Judg 6:19, 25, 27) and his father, as the leader of the clan and owner of the terebinth tree he sits dispensing justice like Deborah under her palm (Judg 4:5). You will recall that sitting under Deborah's Palm Tree in 4:5 was the setting for the commissioning of Barak.
Question: Why is it significant that the messenger of Yahweh now takes Joash's place and sits under the tree belonging to Joash?
Answer: Taking Joash's place sends the message that there is now a new authority that is above Joash. It is this authority who will begin the process of deliverance for Israel by commissioning of Gideon as Deborah commissioned Barak sitting under her Palm Tree.
The difficult choice for Gideon will be to whose authority will he submit himself: to his father's authority or to the authority of the messenger/angel of Yahweh? The angel finds Gideon hiding in a wine press threshing grain. A wine press is sunken into the ground and is therefore a more effective hiding place for the grain than a threshing floor. A threshing floor is usually on higher ground where the wind can carry away the chaff that is tossed into the air.
The angel addresses Gideon as "valiant/mighty warrior," a form of address that shocks Gideon because he is not a mighty warrior, he is a farmer.
Question: What is the point of the divine messenger's address?
Answer: The point is that he will become a "valiant warrior" if he obeys God's divine call.
Gideon is hesitant to believe in the divine presence of Yahweh. He is at a disadvantage because he had not been raised to know Yahweh by a faithful Israelite family. His father and the people of his village were apostates who had built an altar to Baal upon which they offered sacrifice. Most Biblical scholars believe that Gideon's name is from the Hebrew verbal root which means to "to tear down" or "to cut off." It is a name that will be fulfilled in his first act as God's agent (verse 25). Gideon does know something of the history of his people since he refers to the Exodus liberation.
Question: In Gideon's rather rude response, of what does he accuse God and is his accusation founded on truth?
Answer: He accused God of abandoning the Israelites; however, the truth is God has not abandoned Israel; the Israelites, like Gideon's father, have abandoned God.
Question: Barak was commissioned by a prophetess of God sitting under a tree to set in motion the deliverance of Israel, but who commissions Gideon?
Answer: God Himself.
Gideon has received an answer to why God has not rescued his people from the Midianites. It is because it was not yet time for a deliverer and now he discovers to his shock that he is that chosen savior!
Question: What two reasons does Gideon give for not being able to accept the commission?
Answer: His clan is the weakest (probably meaning the least numerous) in the tribe of Manasseh and he is not his father's heir.
Judges 6:17-24 ~ Gideon Asks for a Sign
Gideon is beginning to believe that it is indeed Yahweh or His messenger who has called him, but he must be sure so he speaks respectively of how privileged he is to have found favor with God (like the heroes Noah, Abraham and Moses before him in Gen 6:8; 18:3 and Ex 33:12), and he requests a divine "sign" so he can be certain. He asks Yahweh to wait until he returns with an offering and God graciously agrees. The food offering Gideon brings is disproportionally large. The flour to make the bread alone was the equivalent to about 22 liters. The food was probably intended to be eaten in a communal meal as a sign of friendship. This was a common custom as in Isaac's meal with Abimelech (Gen 26:29-30) or Jacob's meal with Laban (Gen 31:53-54), but Gideon knows that the way the offering is received will be the "sign" he is looking for.
Question: Yahweh accepts the offering and uses it to provide the "sign" Gideon requested. What does He command Gideon to do with the offering and what are the three "signs" of divinity that Gideon receives?
Answer: Yahweh commands Gideon to place the pot of meat and unleavened bread rounds in the basket on a rock and to pour the broth over them. Then, touching the tip of His staff to the rock, God gave three signs of His divinity:
- He does not consume the food as a human man would do.
- He consumes the food offering in fire.
- He miraculously vanishes.
Question: What is Gideon's reaction and why is he afraid?
Answer: It is understood that any sinful human who comes face to face with God cannot survive His awesome holiness that is so far removed from human unworthiness. Anyone who remains alive after seeing God is therefore astonished and overwhelmed with gratitude since it is a favor God rarely grants. Gideon is afraid because he fears he will not survive the experience.
In Gideon's accusation that God had abandoned Israel because He had not saved them from their enemies as He had in the Exodus liberation, Gideon was indirectly alluding to a deliverer from that time.
Judges 6:25-32 ~ Gideon Destroys the Altar of Baal
Question: Yahweh gives Gideon his first test of obedience. What is he commanded to do and why? How does this test concern his relationship with God and with his father?
Answer: He his commanded to make war against the Canaanite cult of Baal by demolishing the town's altar to Baal and to cut down the cult object associated with it that are sponsored by his father. Then, he is to build an altar to Yahweh in its place and offer in sacrifice the seven-year-old-bull of his father which is to be burnt on the wood of the cult object. Gideon must choose pleasing his divine father over pleasing his physical father.
Gideon not only passes his test of obedience, but he fulfills the meaning of his name from the verb "to tear down." Sacrifice and worship were restricted to take place at God's altar of sacrifice at His Sanctuary unless permission was expressly given by God to erect an altar and offer sacrifice at another location (prohibition: Lev 17:1-7; Dt 12:11-12; exception as in the covenant renewal ceremony in Josh 8:30-35).
As Gideon feared, the townspeople were angry when they discovered the Baal altar was destroyed.
Question: How did they threaten Gideon and how did his father defend him?
Answer: The people threaten to kill Gideon, but his father defends him by arguing that if Baal is a true god he will defend himself and if not, he is obviously false.
Gideon's father has to choose between the townspeople or his son, but fundamentally, he must choose between Baal and Yahweh. His son's courageous act has left him no middle ground. He cannot serve both Baal and Yahweh. He chooses his son and Yahweh and further declares his choice by threatening to execute anyone who attempts to defend Baal. This is a pivotal moment in salvation history for Joash and the people of Ophrah.
Question: What is God's point in destroying the people's pagan altar and pagan cult object?
Answer: The real problem that the Israelites are facing is not their oppression by the Midianites but the lack of their relationship with Yahweh.
Judges 6:33-40 ~ The Midianite Invasion and Gideon's Sign of the Fleece
As Gideon is undergoing his ordeal in his hometown, the Transjordan enemies of Israel have launched an attack by invading across the Jordan from the east and setting up their war camp in the Jezreel, a valley containing some of the best arable land west of the Jordan River.
Question: How does God prepare His divinely chosen deliverer?
Answer: God "clothes" Gideon with His divine spirit.
In the New Covenant in Christ Jesus God fills and indwells His people with His Holy Spirit (for example see Acts 2:4; 4:8, 31; Rom 8:11), but in the Old Covenant the usual expression is that God's spirit "rested" or "clothed/came upon" God's chosen ones (i.e., Num 11:25-26; 1 Sam 10:6; 16:13).
Gideon calls for the blowing of the ram's horn (shofar) signal to rally the tribes to war. His own tribe of Manasseh is the first to respond followed by the northern tribes of Asher, Zebulun and Naphtali. The tribe of Manasseh occupied lands on both sides of the Jordan River. Gideon's clan lives on the west side but the clans on the east side also rallied for war (Judg 7:23).
Gideon has another crisis of faith and asks God for another sign to authenticate his mission. The sign is not to answer the question of when or how he should lead the Israelites into battle but if he should lead them at all. God does not even rebuke Gideon. Gideon's imperfections only serve to magnify for us an appreciation for God's grace.
Question: What two ways does he offer a test for a sign of God's divine Presence with him in his mission? What is the answer?
Answer: He presents a wool fleece with the request that the night dew only fall on the fleece and not on the ground. When this fleece-test is fulfilled he asks for the reverse. God, in His patience, grants the second sign and the fleece remains dry while the ground is wet. Gideon has his answer: God is with him.
It is not unexpected that the dew should collect on the fleece which Gideon realizes; it is then that he asks for the reverse sign. The miracle for Gideon is in the reverse sign.
Question: Why does Gideon need further proof that God has called him when he has seen the earlier signs like the fire theophany and is now "covered" with God's Spirit? How is Gideon like all of us?
Answer: Like all of us, Gideon is still a fallen human being who struggles to maintain his faith and to render obedience to God. Being "clothed" in the Spirit of God in Gideon's case or being baptized in the Holy Spirit in the case of a person who has received the Sacrament of Baptism does not change our personalities nor are we rendered immune from sin and doubt. The path of salvation is one of continual conversion and continual submission.
Chapter 7: Gideon's Campaign against the Midianites and their Allies
Judges 7:1-8 ~ Yahweh Prepares Gideon's Army
Gideon's military camp is south of the enemy camp but at a higher elevation so he has a good view of the large enemy camp (7:8, 9). That there are too many people with you...' God says for the intended victory in our human understanding seems incredible, but ours is an incredible God.
Question: Why does God announce that He will reduce the number of Israelite warriors?
Answer: He does not want to Israelites to claim the victory through their superior numbers but instead to acknowledge that their victory is through God's intervention.
Question: How many times does God reduce their numbers and how many warriors are left?
Answer: He reduced their numbers twice until there were only 300 men left.
The number three hundred may be literal or symbolic. It is the multiplication of the two perfect numbers three and ten. In sacred Scripture the number three represents that which is solid, real, substantial, and something in its completeness, and ten is the number of divine order. God has reduced the Israelite army to the perfect number of men to create a force of commandos who can surprise the enemy by striking quickly and with deadly force.
Judges 7:9-15 ~ Yahweh Gives Gideon Encouragement
Having the advantage of viewing the enemy camp from a higher location must have unnerved Gideon. Gideon is still the reluctant and fearful deliverer. He is not yet the "valiant warrior" that God wants him to be. God works with us as we are and knows what greatness we are capable of even when we lack courage or self-confidence.
Question: Why does God send Gideon down in secret into the enemy camp?
Answer: Knowing Gideon's fears, God gives him a sign of encouragement from the camp of the enemy.
God knows our fears and weaknesses as well as our strengths. God also encouraged His chosen agent Joshua before his first battle in Joshua 5:13-15. God even allows Gideon to take his servant with him in the same way Moses was allowed to have his brother Aaron with him for moral support (Ex 4:13-17). We are reminded that it is not fearlessness that is the indispensable requirement for God's deliverer to achieve victory, but it is obedience to God that is necessary.
Judges 7:16-22 ~ Gideon's Surprise Attack
Gideon divided his men into three companies of a hundred warriors with each warrior carrying a ram's horn and an empty pitcher with a lighted torch inside. Notice they are not carrying swords in their hands. It is the third night watch when they go down to encircle the enemy camp. Prior to the Roman conquest of the Levant in 68 BC, the Israelites observed the 12 night hours divided into three "watch" periods. The third watch was from about 2 AM to dawn, so it was about 2 AM at "the beginning of the third watch" when the Israelites set out. They encircle the enemy camp, and when Gideon and his men blew their horns and smash their pots followed by the other two groups, the sudden noise and flashes of light in the darkness startled and unnerved the enemy who in their panic turned their weapons on each other. Gideon has deployed his men but God has achieved the victory.
As the enemy flees toward the fords of the Jordan River, Gideon doesn't want any to escape. He musters the warriors that had been dismissed from the first raid. He is also aware that the enemy may attempt to cross the Jordan by going south into the lands of Ephraim, and so he sends messengers to the Ephraimite clans to pursue the enemy. The Ephraimites cover the fords as far south as Beth-Barah, an unknown site but presumably on the southern border of Ephraim. The names of the sites where the two Midianite chieftains were killed on the west side of the Jordan are still known in the time of the inspired writer. Gideon has already crossed over the Jordan River into the Transjordan where he will continue the fight. The Ephraimites bring Gideon the heads of the Midianite chieftains to his camp as proof of their success.
Question: What is interesting about the place name of the site where the Midianite chieftain Zeeb/Wolf was killed in relation to the beginning of the story of Gideon?
Answer: The story began with Gideon hiding in a winepress when God first called him "Valiant Warrior." Now, with his first victory with the help of God, his story has come full circle at another winepress and he has become the "Valiant Warrior" God called him to be.
Judges 8:1-3 ~ The Ephraimites Take Offense
This seemingly out-of-place section which breaks up the momentum of the war narrative will be important later for two reasons:
- It demonstrates Gideon's humble nature and diplomatic skills which will be contrasted with the events in the next section of the narrative (8:4-17).
- It shows the Ephraimites' sensitivity to their place among their tribal brothers that will lead to trouble in Judges 12:1-6 and later in Israel's history during the period of the United Monarchy.
Ephraim and Manasseh were the half-tribes of Joseph. Ephraim was supposed to have precedence over their brother tribe of Manasseh even though Manasseh was Joseph's first born (Gen 48:10-14). The Ephraimites were very jealous of this prerogative and they perceived it as a slight that a member of the lessor tribe of Manasseh did not call upon them at the first of the battle against the Midianites and their allies. Their challenge to Gideon is insulting since no one from Ephraim had the initiative or the divine call to take up the fight against Israel's enemies
Question: How does Gideon respond to their challenge? Notice the imagery he uses in the metaphors of "gleaning" and "vintage."
Answer: Gideon handles the dispute with grace and diplomacy. He acknowledges the supremacy of Ephraim in verse 2b and gives credit for the victory to God. He uses the double metaphor of gleaning (what is gathered up after the harvest) and vintage (the grape harvest itself), but he uses the metaphors in an unusual context by saying in this case the "gleaning" or the capture of the enemy chieftains by the Ephraimites, is greater than the "vintage," the initial "harvesting" of the enemy in the battle he led.
His humble response placates them. Up to this point he has been the model of the Mosaic hero: humble, fearful of offending God, reverent, and obedient. He has also been in a continual discourse with God. Part II will reveal changes in Gideon's character, and we no longer have evidence of God's direct interaction with His deliverer.
Chapter 8:4-35 ~ Part II: Gideon's Campaign in the Transjordan
Judges 8:4-9 ~ Gideon Pursues the Enemy to the East Side of the Jordan
Either the narrative is now out of sequence and we return to when Gideon and his men crossed the Jordan into the Transjordan lands before the incident with the Ephraimites in 7:25-8:1-3 or this is a different campaign. The three hundred selected in 7:1-8 apparently continue to be Gideon's vanguard commando force. They pursue the Midianites and the allies across the Jordan into the region of the Transjordan on the east side of the river near the village of Succoth and Penuel to the east of Succoth. These sites are also mentioned in the Jacob narrative; it was at Penuel where Jacob wrestled with God (see Gen 32:23-31 and 33:17). The villages are located in the tribal lands of Gad and are occupied by Israelites from that tribe (Josh 13:24-28). When Gideon requests food for his exhausted men, his request is rudely denied by both towns.
Question: How is Gideon's response to their rudeness different from his response to the Ephraimites?
Answer: He makes no attempt to court their support and instead threatens them.
Judges 8:13-21 ~ Gideon's Acts of Revenge
After defeating the Midianites and their allies, Gideon returned west toward the two Israelite towns of Gad to fulfill his threat with chilling ruthlessness. His men capture a young man from Succoth and force him to write down the names of the chieftains and elders of his town (notice that the young man is literate; there is historical evidence of the literacy of Israelites in this early period). Gideon kills the seventy-seven (probably a symbolic number) elders of Succoth but his violence escalates against Penuel where he not only tears down the tower but slaughters all the men of the town. After years of war and military success, how has Gideon's character changed? He is no longer the humble and diplomatic young deliverer he was in his first campaign. His is now confident, arrogant, and cruel.
Question: What has happened to Gideon? How is he no longer the image of a Mosaic liberator?
Answer: It appears that his successes have delivered him into the sin of pride. He is no longer the humble deliverer in the image of Moses.
Judges 8:22-28 ~ Israel's Offer to Gideon and his Refusal
For the first time we learn that Ishmaelites were among the allies of the Midianites.
Question: Who are the Ishmaelites?
Answer: They are the desert nomads who are the descendants of Ishmael, the son of Abraham and Sarah's Egyptian slave girl Hagar.
The seventeen hundred shekels of gold in verse 26 amount to about 49 pounds of gold.
Question: The Israelites offer to make Gideon king over them. What is his answer?
Answer: To his credit, Gideon refuses and acknowledges Yahweh as the only king over Israel but he asks for a king's ransom in gold as a donation from each warrior.
Question: What does Gideon do with the gold?
Answer: He makes a gold object and sets it up in his hometown where the altar of Baal used to stand.
Question: Gideon's request for gold earrings is eerily similar to what other request for gold earrings used to make an object of idol worship?
Answer: It is reminiscent of Aaron's request for the earrings of the Israelites to make the idol of the Golden Calf.
The Gideon narrative cycle concludes with the announcement of the years of peace brought by Gideon's judgeship: 28 Thus Midian was humbled before the Israelites. He did not raise his head again, and the country had peace for forty years, as long as Gideon lived.
Judges 8:28-35 ~ Israel Relapses into Idolatry
These verses serve as the conclusion of the Gideon narrative and as the introduction to the story of Gideon's son Abimelech. After Gideon's death the people began to worship idols again. The sin of idolatry in the Bible is imaged as both adultery and prostitution (i.e., Jer 3:8-9; 5:7; Ez 16:1, 30-43; 23:37). Baal-Berith was the god of covenant oaths and contracts and therefore a deity important to merchants. Israel, engaged in doing trade with the Canaanites, was making covenants in violation of Deuteronomy 7:3. They had forgotten God's mighty works on their behalf and the works of His deliverer Gideon. The Israelites lacked both faith and gratitude. But for the first time in the narratives of the Judges, 8:27 makes it clear that the descent of the people into the "sin cycle" begins not after the judge's death but during the judge's own lifetime, and the judge is himself a contributor to it! It foreshadows the evil that is to come.
Ruth, Boaz, Naomi (Philip Hermogenes Calderon)
CHALLENGE: “By allowing Catholics to interpret the six days of Genesis 1 in a symbolic way (CCC 337), the Church sets a dangerous precedent that could undermine the Faith. If this is symbolic, how do you know other things—such as the Resurrection aren’t?“
DEFENSE: Everyone recognizes that Scripture contains symbolism. It’s a matter of correctly identifying it.
It can be tempting to reflexively classify things in Scripture as literal (or symbolic) to avoid sorting out the difference, but we must undertake this task.
Humans use both literal and symbolic speech, and we constantly discern the difference, often without being conscious of it. If someone says we need to “roll out the red carpet” for a dignitary, English speakers intuitively recognize this is a non-literal way of saying he needs to be given a special welcome. It is an expression known for its non-literal use in English.
When we encounter writing from other cultures, it can be harder to tell literal from symbolic since we are less familiar with their literary conventions, but it can be done. All recognize that the biblical prophets used symbols and Jesus told parables. This shows we can learn to recognize non-literal forms in Scripture. Often symbols are identified by cues in the text that reveal they are not literal.
For example, the creation of the sun on the fourth day, when the sun’s presence is what makes it day, is a cue the days of Genesis 1 are not literal (see Day 90). No human witnessed the creation of the world, and Genesis, written somewhere around 1000 B.C., was penned long after the event. Genesis 1 is more likely to be non-literal than a text written soon after an event and using eyewitness testimony.
The latter is what we have with the Resurrection of Jesus. The New Testament was written within a few decades of the Resurrection and was composed by or in consultation with eyewitnesses (cf. Luke 1:2, John 21:24). It also contains emphatic statements about the Resurrection’s reality (cf. 1 Cor. 15:1–20). We need have no fear that recognizing parts of Scripture are symbolic will undermine the Faith any more than Jesus’ use of parables does.
Jimmy Akin, A Daily Defense: 365 Days (Plus One) to Becoming a Better Apologist
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