Richard B Hays gave a fantastic lecture that Dorothee and I heard entitled, “Four (or Five) Ways Not to Read the Bible”. It was an excellent talk. This was his list:
- An advice column
- A map on how to get to heaven after we die
- A predictive text that tells us what will happen at the end of time
- A source of information about antiquity
- A Rorschach Blot on which oppressors impose their views in order to justify their unfair power
This book is an expansion of this subject which considers the Bible rather as the story of God and how he has dealt with the rebellion in his family.