Why does Luke 17:26 demand a literal reading of the flood? The meaning Christ uses doesn't change in a literal or non-literal reading so how can his words be used to support either position? I don't say this to challenge the literal or for that matter a non-literal reading but instead to show that neither is Christ's focus, nor should it be ours. Peter uses the flood account as a baptism metaphor so if we use that as a hermeneutic heuristic it's literalness is simply not the focus.
Luke 17:26. Just as it was in the days of Noah, so too it will be in the days of the Son of Man.
27. They were eating and drinking, and marrying and being given in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed all of them.
28. Likewise, just as it was in the days of Lot: they were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building,
29. but on the day that Lot left Sodom, it rained fire and sulfur from heaven and destroyed all of them
30. –It will be like that on the day that the Son of Man is revealed.
In this passage, we find Jesus being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and his answering their question by reminding them of two historical events and telling the Pharisees that it will be “like that on the day that the Son of Man is revealed.” Sound hermeneutics requires that the two historical events actually occurred in order for the future event to be a real event. Furthermore, sound hermeneutics requires that the two historical events be literal events in order for the future event to be a literal event.
1 Peter 3:18. For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God. He was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit,
19. in which also he went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison,
20. who in former times did not obey, when God waited patiently in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were saved through water.
21. And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you—not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
22. who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers made subject to him.
In this passage, we find Peter saying that the flood prefigured (Greek: ἀντίτυπον) salvation through water baptism. Therefore, if the flood was not a literal event, neither is water baptism a literal event.
My friends down south in Chattanooga call this kind of teaching hogwash! In my opinion, they are being overly polite.
Upvote
0