The Bible was not meant to be literally interpreted.

Very compelling, I applaud my opponents strong defense of a non literal interpretation of scripture. However he fails to delineate where the literal ends and the metaphor, allegory, simile and irony begins and then flows back into the literal. Leaving interpretation of the proposed metaphor and allegory completely up to each individual. The results of which are a dilution of organized Christianity, which we can clearly see occurring today. At this point most Christians will be yelling at their computer screens "What about the Holy Spirit". The Holy Spirit was promised by Jesus before he left the earth to be here amongst his followers, acting as a comforter, a guide, and a tool for discernment. However the existence of over 20,000 Christian denominations, filled with Christians, honestly seeking the will of God, and completely disagreeing about that will is damning to the existence of a discerning spirit, perhaps it was just allegory? At this point it will be valuable to explore why Christianity changed its view on literal interpretation of scripture in the mid twentieth century. It should strike Christians as odd that scriptural interpretation was considered literal for all its existence until the last 70-160 years. Why the change? My opponent addresses a part of it when discussing hermeneutics. Scientific discoveries forced a new understanding of the bible, primarily because they contradicted the literal interpretation. At this point Christians were forced to either reject the mounting scientific evidence or adjust their opinion of the bible as historical and accurate. The resulting hybrid theology of sometimes literal and sometimes allegorical gives them the wiggle room they require to simultaneously embrace the evidence of science and their faith in the God. Unfortunately it also creates a completely subjective interpretation of scripture that results in widely varying doctrines. This is a terrible problem for Christianity, because of its claims of a single God with perfect will. Seventh-day Adventists, Jehovah's Witnesses, Pentecostals and Mormons are the result of this new approach to scriptural interpretation. (Note the time frame in which they were founded) Each found 'old truths' which were hidden to the larger Christian community and claim that they have a more complete interpretation of the bible as a result. The resulting conflicts in doctrine lead to disillusionment of the Christian message and the bible itself, primarily because there is no Godly Translation service which definitively interprets metaphor from historical account or literal directives from God. How can a Christian counter the claims of Joseph Smith about the divinity of Christ, if the scripture is open to an allegorical interpretation without a key to determine what is literal and what isn't? Is God's will purely subjective? If so, Where is God's omniscience? Is God only a human expression of the unknown? If not, how does an allegorical view of scripture support that belief? Onto the parts of the bible which clearly utilize metaphor and allegory. I argue that when ever this happens the bible ALWAYS prepares the reader by telling them that the tool is in use. For instance, Jesus utilized parables to teach deeper spiritual meaning. However when reading the bible the author always notes that Jesus was speaking in parable so as not to confuse the reader. In the old Testament, metaphor and allegory appear in dreams, but once again these dreams are prefaced with terms like "then Pharaoh had a dream, or Daniel had a vision" The reader is informed that the bible is about to use allegory and metaphor, but it is framed in a literal event, like a dream, vision or the telling of a parable. If the book of Genesis, began with a similar disclaimer, then it would be fair to claim that its claims of the existence of the earth and vegetation prior to the existence of the sun and stars, had deeper meaning and was not literal, however, no such disclaimer exists, therefore it MUST be taken literally. Hermeneutics: The biggest problem with the utility of Hermeneutics is that it leads to subjectivity, not a better understanding of the nature of God. The non literal approach to Genesis 1:1-31, 2:1-3 listed was beneficial to the follower, however, it is just as easy to utilize hermeneutics to develop a completely different understanding of the nature of God from the same text. For instance. Observation and interpretation can remain the same, however Evaluation could lead one to come to the conclusion that God is unforgiving towards those who question his authority and ignore his law. That the addition of the flood story was an indictment against humanity as was the story of the tower of babel. Showing that the nature of God is vindictive and merciless. The application of this evaluation would be horrific of course, and in many cases has been exactly that. You and I both agree that incorrect evaluation and interpretation of the scripture is not beneficial for humanity, however I argue that the utility of a non literal approach to scripture leads to increased subjectivity thus a dramatic increase in bad theology and incorrect doctrine as seen by the dramatic increase in denominations and more recently the non-denominational approach which is leading to secularism, and ultimately Atheism. Case in point, myself. You said: the important thing is that we understand what God is telling us through the Bible and that we don't let arguments about the literal truth of the Bible distract us from that goal. Perhaps, with a bit of humility, we can admit that only God knows all the right answers. I submit that 'the understanding of what God meant in the bible' is in direct conflict with adopting an allegorical approach to it, primarily due to the subjective nature of personal interpretation. Wonderful debate thus far, it is clear that my opponent and I are both very interested in benefit for humanity, but with different approaches....