Ebook Our Misunderstood Bible

No book is, in its more important truths, easier to understand than the Bible. Yet, at the same time, no book has suffered more than the Bible from being misunderstood at important points, as well as in other particulars. Some of these misunderstandings are easily accounted for, and might be easily removed; others are not easily accounted for, yet have prevailed, without being accounted for, from generation to generation.

There are many difficulties growing out of the radical differences between Oriental and Occidental methods of thought and speech, and customs and practises. Even such terms as "love" and "hate" can hardly be comprehended by a Westerner, as an Easterner would employ them, and on such a difference as this two schools of theology might array themselves in determined and persistent opposition. Again, the Oriental method of poetic imagery in ordinary speech is well nigh incomprehensible to the Occidental, accustomed as he is to cling to the letter of the text that killeth, as over against the spirit of a figure or an illustration that would give life.