Literalism is taking every word of scripture as literal. Not just as true or factual, but literal. Metaphors become literal. Poetry, proverb, and prophecy: literal.

We associate literalism with fundamentalists and the modern evangelical movement. But evangelicals aren’t the only kind.

It frustrates many atheists to no end when I invite them to describe the God they don’t believe in—and I say “neither do I.”

Or sometimes, when we gather in church, we struggle to speak of God at all! Because every time we open our mouths, the words limit our vision.

This is all literalism.

Literalism is the byproduct of enlightenment modernism—and is found any time we struggle with truth.

Because the Enlightenment taught us the way to verify evidentiary truth. It helped us isolate the parts of an atom and cure deadly diseases.

It also taught us to isolate certain aspects of our world, define and catagorize them for evaluation, and narrow our attention to observable reality.

In short, if we could prove it, then it is true.

This is also modernism’s limitation.

It is like living with blinders, preventing us from seeing other kinds of truth and other means for determining what is true.

And when modernism can’t define truth, it also refuses to validate other forms of understanding truth.

Seeing the risen Christ isn’t enough. Touching him isn’t enough. We need to replicate the study throughout history to verify its truth.

Literalism is mindnumbing. 

On purpose. It doesn’t want us thinking. And ultimately, neither does modernism.

It rewards novel thoughts as long as they are verifiable and ultimately align with the broader expectations. In this way, modernism’s wider project of defining the nature of the world is as fundamentalist as young earth Christians—because the preservation of the project and its methodology is always required.

Thank God we have other options.

For all its flaws, postmodernism at least offers us the tools for breaking out of this mental prison—without necessarily abandoning the virtues of the project.

We can begin to seek truth beyond absolute truth. And find in it, a far richer (and more human) experience.