The basic form of my question is: Is the Bible a literal account of past events, or is it a manual for ethical behaviour presented in metaphorical form?
I think, quite decisively, that it is the latter. Stories within the Bible contradict one another; if the Bible's writers meant it to act as a literal account, they created it rather badly. However, if the reader takes each individual story as a piece of metaphorically stated advice, the narrative as a whole works out much better.
Of course, some of this advice is now radically outdated. The advice regarding disobedient children found in Deuteronomy 21:18-21 ("If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son...Then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him...And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die") obviously would not be remotely suitable for the modern age. As such, contemporary Christians would need to reinterpret certain verses, in order to adapt the Bible to fit a contemporary setting.
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