Why read the Bible literally: take two

2 Peter 2
4 For IF God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell, putting them into gloomy dungeons to be held for judgment:
5 IF he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven other;
6 IF he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly;
7 and IF he rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the filthy lives of lawless men ...
9 IF this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue godly men from trials and ...

2 Peter 3
3 First of all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires.
4 They will say, "Where is this 'coming' he promised? Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation."
5 But they deliberately forget that long ago by God's word the heavens existed and the earth was formed out of water and by water.
6 By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed.
7 By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.

Matthew 24
38 For in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah boarded the ark. 39 They didn't know until the flood came and swept them all away. So this is the way the coming of the Son of Man will be:

Matthew 24
43 But know this: If the homeowner had known what time the thief was coming, he would have stayed alert and not let his house be broken into. 44 This is why you also should get ready, because the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.

Mt 7:3
"Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?

Steve8 writes:My, my, you honestly think that I believe there are NO parables, figures of speech, metaphors and other things in the Bible that aren't meant to be taken literally. I use the same criteria to determine these things as anyone who has been taught in an English (or any language) class does.

Steve8 writes:I guess the bottom line is, Jesus and the apostles (in particular Peter) believed that the Flood had occurred millennia after the fact. I guess I haven't found a better reason to view it as a non-historical event in the millennia since then.

For in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah boarded the ark.

Story of Bear Rock
Well, long, long ago, two young boys found themselves lost in the prairie. You know how it is. They had played ball and whacked it a few hundred yards out of the village. And then they had heard a small animal make a noise and had gone to investigate. They had come to a stream with many colorful pebbles and followed that for a while. They had come to a hill and wanted to see what was on the other side. On the other side they saw a herd of antelope and, of course, had to track them for a while. When they got hungry and thought it was time to go home, the two boys found that they didn't know where they were. They started off in the direction where they thought their village was, but only got farther and farther away from it. At last they curled up beneath a tree and went to sleep.They got up the next morning and walked some more. They were still heading the wrong way. They ate some wild berries and dug up wild turnips, found some chokecherries, and drank water from streams.For three days they walked toward the west. They were footsore, but they survived. Oh how they wished that their parents, or aunts and uncles, or elder brothers and sisters would find them. But nobody did.On the fourth day the boys suddenly had a feeling that they were being followed. They looked around and in the distance saw the bear. This was no ordinary bear, but a giant grizzly so huge that the boys would make only a small mouthful for him, but he had smelled the boys and wanted that mouthful. He kept coming close, and the earth trembled as he gathered speed.The boys started running, looking for a place to hide, but here was no such place and the grizzly was much, much faster than they. They stumbled, and the bear was almost upon them. They could see his red, wide-open jaws full of enormous, wicked teeth. They could smell his hot evil breath.The boys were old enough to have learned to pray, and they called upon the Creator: "Grandfather, have pity, save us."All at once the earth shook and began to rise. The boys rose with it. Out of the earth came a cone of rock going up, up up until it more than a thousand feet high. And the boys were on top of it.
The bear was disappointed to see his meal disappearing into the clouds.Have I said he was a giant bear? This grizzly was so huge that he could almost reach to the top of the rock when he stood on his hind legs. Almost, but not quite. His claws were as large as a tipi's lodge pole. Frantically the bear dug his claws into the side of the rock, trying to get up, trying to get those boys. As he did so, he made big scratches in the sides of the towering rock. He tried every spot, every side. He scratched up the rock all around, but it was no use. They boys watched him wearing himself out, getting tired, giving up. They finally saw him going away, a huge, growling, grunting mountain of fur disappearing over the horizon.The boys were saved. Or were they? How were they to get down? They were humans, not birds who could fly.Some ten years ago, mountain climbers tried to conquer Devil's Tower. They had ropes, and iron hooks called pitons to nail themselves to the rock face, and the managed to get up. But they couldn't get down. They were marooned on that giant basalt cone, and had to be taken off in a helicopter.In the long-ago days the Indians had no helicopters. So how did the two boys get down? The legend does not tell us, but we can be sure that the Great Spirit didn't save those boys only to let them perish of hunger and thirst on the top of the rock.Well, the eagle has always been a friend to our people. So it must have been the eagle that let the boys grab hold of him and carried them safely back to their village.

purpledawn writes:I need you to define what you mean by historical context and also describe the historical context you take into account for the story of Noah and the Flood which determines that the story is to be taken as written. (Only Noah and the Flood)

Steve8 writes:The Bible does not pretend that everything before Adam & Eve's sin and before the Flood was the same as it is now.

My, my, you honestly think that I believe there are NO parables, figures of speech, metaphors and other things in the Bible that aren't meant to be taken literally. I use the same criteria to determine these things as anyone who has been taught in an English (or any language) class does. ...
Like most kinds of writing, there can be things that can be taken literally, and things that aren't.