Literal vs. figurative

This isn't so much of a rant as just a jotting down of impressions. If you want something that's passionate and (kind of) well thought out, look elsewhere.


So on my way to work today, there was a story on the radio about the Tea Party in Michigan; something to do with a Democratic plot to start a fake Tea Party to split the vote on the right (which, if true, is vile). Anyway, one quote that struck me was an actual Tea Party member saying something along the lines of: "We don't want a political party; we just want to elect politicians who believe in the Constitution." Huh. Maybe I'm hopelessly naive, but I guess I thought that most politicians currently in office, on both sides of the aisle, do "believe in the Constitution." Why else would they bother being politicians?

Then I realized that the subtext behind the woman's statement was that there's pretty much only one way to interpret the Constitution, and that the Tea Party wants to elect politicians who believe in the Constitution in the "right" way. Which also got me started thinking about people who take the Bible literally, or at least who believe that there is only one way to interpret it.

I really don't want to make any value judgments about people who believe in a "strict" interpretation of either the Constitution or the Bible. But for me that kind of concrete thinking just doesn't work. I'm glad it works for them. I just can't imagine having that kind of certainty, that there is only one way to look at things and that my way is the right way.

So then I started thinking about concrete/literal thought versus abstract/figurative thought. It seems like some people believe that the former is better, more real. Which is true a lot of the time. In the real world, you have to put real food on the table, or you really will starve.

But I also think that there is something powerful about figurative thought that can feed the human soul. That sometimes literalism needs to be put aside so that the metaphor can speak to us more loudly. I think that millenia of human art speaks to this: sometimes a painting of a lilypad contains more lilypad-truthiness than a picture of one, or even the real thing. Sometimes there is more Truth to be found in the figurative than the literal.

Hence my Facebook status today.

Liz asked about the status as I was writing this, and after I explained (poorly) my train of thought, she wondered aloud whether those people who prefer concrete or literal interpretations might not also have less interest in art (or, as she put it, "less art in their lives"). It's an interesting question...