A story about reading important stories

Once, when I was taking notes for a disabled student at uni (maybe not so much like the recording angel), one of the professors was talking about the book 'Gulliver's Travels'. 

The psychology professor in question was a force of nature and not unlikable, spending bleak months reading Jung and interpreting his own dreams in deep secret diaries. Everything you would want a professor to be really. Not an unfriendly guy but not without faults.

He said (about the book Gullivers Travels and hating the Jack Black comedy film he had been forced to see) - "What kind of hermeneutic should we approach this text with?"

Hermeneutics remains just a turgid/jargon word for 'How you read a text' - usually it is applied to the Bible. It's jargon - a word which is meant to exclude, used by liberal elites and right wing academics (do they exist?). Or religious arses.

Now, you may, or may not have some dusty Bible app. An app with cobwebs all over it, or at least being put in the background to increase the performance of your phone. Maybe you even have some physical one. I don't know - I'm blind to your lives. And, by the way - colourblind.


I'll get to my point - I'm really convinced that because God created us as story-loving (and creating) humans that we should read the Bible in story or narrative terms, rather than mathematically, esoterically, linguistically, etc etc etc (although these things have their place within story).

Literally (!) we are created to form our lives and other lives through story - this, I'm 99% sure is how we are supposed to read the Bible.

By the way, I would extend this to psychology (and even the other disciplines) too. Rather than CBT or mindfulness etc, etc, etc, we should approach our own lives and mental health through a narrative lens. For example, in history/anthropology/sociology - what is the theory of evolution? It is a story. Whether it is a better one than creation or not is your decision. Metanarratives eh?

If the hermeneutic God wants was not through story then why did he speak in parables? So tell your stories. And even his. 

Let's go further so that I can really share my pearls of folly before lovely people....

God said something like, 'In your patience you possess your souls'.

One woman said to me after I said that... 'I think I mustn't have a soul then'. It was a witty response, but I replied, 'Yes, you do.' (That's a quick story too.)

We are interpreting our whole life stories through patience and a kind of wrapping up of periods of difficulty etc into a few words, despite our many thoughts and actions.

Let's go even further - so that my pearls of folly at least help whatever we are - if we are seeing our life stories through patience (along with the lives of others) then I ask this question -

To what extent are we patient with God (as he is with us)? By which I mean, we're pretty patient with God at times too you know? (Although, I guess, he wins in the patience/endurance competition.)

Why does he have to win everything?

Let's go one step further please - if we are supposed to approach the Bible narratively, then how the hell are we supposed to approach God (being as he is scary)? The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, they say. (Errr... okay... makes him really approachable doesn't it?).

Tell your story. It's important. You are significant. (Unless you are an arrogant vocal arse, in which case please keep shtum for a while. Yes, government, I'm talking to you. With your banning of basic freedoms and the rumours of corruption).

Here's another rumour for you (rumours are stories) - God is going to help us.

Please tell your story.