Opus 2024-368: Is God a Literalist?

Does God always speak literally?  Does He ever use figures of speech?  I’m referring to such things as the words “never”, “always,” “forever” and such expressions.

In my every day life my wife likes to say that I “never wipe the counter”.  She likes to say that I “always forget ______.”  I think you get the idea.  Just because I didn’t do it in the five minutes before she gets excited, that means I never did it.  

We all do this.  For some of us hyperbole is a way of life.  That itself is possible hyperbole.

So the question is, “Does God speak this way?”  When He says to David, that the covenant will be forever, does He mean literally forever or figuratively forever?  Take this as one example,

(2Sa 7:16-7 KJV)  And thine house and thy kingdom shall be established for ever before thee: thy throne shall be established for ever.  According to all these words, and according to all this vision, so did Nathan speak unto David.

That would seem straightforward.  What complicates the issue is other places where He seems to put “if” statements into the proclamation.  Here God is talking to Solomon.

(2Ch 7:17-21 KJV)  And as for thee, if thou wilt walk before me, as David thy father walked, and do according to all that I have commanded thee, and shalt observe my statutes and my judgments; Then will I stablish the throne of thy kingdom, according as I have covenanted with David thy father, saying, There shall not fail thee a man to be ruler in Israel.  But if ye turn away, and forsake my statutes and my commandments, which I have set before you, and shall go and serve other gods, and worship them; Then will I pluck them up by the roots out of my land which I have given them; and this house, which I have sanctified for my name, will I cast out of my sight, and will make it to be a proverb and a byword among all nations.  And this house, which is high, shall be an astonishment to every one that passeth by it; so that he shall say, Why hath the LORD done thus unto this land, and unto this house?  And it shall be answered, Because they forsook the LORD God of their fathers, which brought them forth out of the land of Egypt, and laid hold on other gods, and worshipped them, and served them: therefore hath he brought all this evil upon them.

Solomon is the direct descendant of David.  He is the one to whom the throne must pass.  Notice, though, that with David the “shall be established forever” becomes an “if” statement.  Is God confused?  Does He change His mind?  Or is it simply a figure of speech that everyone who was not committed to a theological position could understand?

Of course this could be another one of those both/and situations rather than either/or.  I don’t have an easy answer but I am aware of the question.

homo unius libri