science, religion, metaphor, and history 123by opening things up. Varieties of language (“dictions”) are necessary to ex-
press the limitless multiplicity of reality. If properly used, the languages (“dic-
tions”) need not contradict one another. Those who view the world only on a
purely overt cognitive level deprive themselves of a rich hoard of understand-
ing. Metaphors serve a purpose that “standard discursive language will not and
cannot serve.”^31
Metaphor is proper to understanding the history of religion. Metaphors
that are intentional to ultimate truth are “depth-metaphors.” There are a vast
number of types of metaphor. For one example, a metaphor can be humorous:
“the stars in the sky are dandruff on God’s black shirt.” By a depth-metaphor
I mean one that is intended by the author (or can be helpfully understood by
the reader) as referring to a deeper reality than that of the words or phrases
used. (“Deeper reality” is not a term understood by modern physicalists.) A
metaphor can be brilliant even though trivial, and a metaphor can be stupid
even though aimed at depth: it is not the quality of the metaphor that is in
question here but rather its aim. Metaphors can aim at deeper understanding
of humanity, the cosmos, and God, and these are the metaphors that I char-
acterize as “depth-metaphors.”
Traditional use of language differs from general modern usage. Moderns
think in terms of dichotomies between true and false, fact and fiction; we are
baffled by terms such as “more real” and “more perfect”; we assume that a so-
called “fact” relates “to outside reality” while a metaphor is subjective and
unrelated “to outside reality.” Such modern assumptions impose a barrier to
understanding, particularly in the use of the term “literal.” Consider a common
statement such as “that’s the literal truth,” usually intending something like
“that’s what actually happened.” In its root, “literal” means “letter for letter.”
The word leads to a simple and common problem in understanding the word,
particularly as it relates to the Bible.^32 In Christian tradition, the term “literal
meaning” in regard to the Bible does not imply modern scientific or historical
meaning but rather both what the writer of the text intends and what God
intends—which can be historical or metaphorical. For example, Augustine’s
bookThe Literal Interpretation of Genesis, written in 401, will surprise anyone
thinking of Bryant and the Scopes trial: Augustine does not pin down the text
to simplistic meanings but rather opens it up (as much as he is able) to what
God intends by Genesis, and that, he knew, is largely metaphorical. The tra-
ditional mode does not so much analyze, reduce, and narrow down toward
definition as it uses metaphor to expand and open out meaning. But that’s not
what God said? Or is it? “God, like the writers of the texts themselves, is
perfectly capable of metaphor and irony.”^33 The program put forward by de-
constructionists that the intent of the author of a text is irrelevant is, to say the
least, an obstruction to understanding concepts.
I use the term “metaphorical ontology” to refer to a truth statement
couched in metaphor rather than in scientific terms.^34 Metaphorical ontology