One must take note how, in everyday language, we communicate with other people in ordinary and ‘spoken language’. This helps us get our message across to them efficiently and with as little effort as possible. With the passage of time, there has been a conscious move in all languages from a laboured and ornate style of expression in writing and speech to a much simpler, direct, and to-the-point writing. Trying to read a book written in English, Urdu, or any other language, a few decades ago, will confirm for you that we are living in much simpler and more efficiently expressive times.
For example, my mother once told me that one of her friends told her, “I had to change my daughter’s wedding lunch to a wedding dinner, instead.” Simple enough, right? But, she said, in Urdu, “I had to hide the blazing Sun and choose the serene Moonlight for this event.” Similarly, my English professor told me that in the time of the great English essayist, Thomas B. Macaulay (around 1859), people would invite each other to go for a walk, and not say, “Would you like to go for a walk?” Instead, they would say something like, “Would you like to perambulate your lower extremes?”
You know what a perambulator, or ‘pram’, is and can probably guess that “lower extremes” are your legs. Even today, I have seen lawyers telling the court of law, “My Lord! I will take it under advisement,” instead of saying, “Mr. Justice so-and-so, I will consider it carefully.”
Now, let us move from the expressions used by the common people like us to the expressions used by the Scriptures, although those are addressed to common people. It may be easier to see the difference if I say it as follows: Literal expressions denote what they mean, in the common usage or dictionary sense. Figurative expressions connote the additional layers of meaning that exist. But why is figurative language (i.e., similes and metaphors) used to begin with? What is the purpose?
The purpose of using figurative language is twofold: (a) to evoke an emotional response in the audience, and (b) to get them to pay attention to the central message. Now, as in everything in life, there are benefits as well as risks attached to using figurative language. First, I will take up the benefits and then the risks that entail in using similes and metaphors:
Benefits of using figurative language: It makes the presentation of those topics beautiful, attractive, and persuasive. It is due to these benefits that the scriptures use figurative language.
Potential risks of figurative usage: Common people may take the figures of speech quite literally and may be seriously misguided. These are usually termed as the “literalists” and, due to their misguidance, they may cause harm to a large part of the belief system (as is the case with many non-Ahmadi Muslims) who deny the truth of the Promised Messiah (as) by suppressing figurative meaning and taking things literally, which suits their denial strategy.
An example of the risks of figurative language that misleads the literalists
Let me first give an example from the Old Testament of the Bible.
Leviticus (13: 47-59) has a text that is titled, “Law of the Plague of Leprosy in a Garment.” It even sounds apparently absurd, i.e., how can there be a plague of leprosy that is trapped within an article of clothing? And why is there a ‘law’ to rectify that strange plague in relation to a garment? Surely, this has to be a case of metaphoric language of the Scripture, which those who insist on taking the literal meaning of everything have run away with, and are spending valuable time and efforts of Old Testament scholars in unravelling this self-created mystery of the literalists. Here is that mind-numbing passage and the detailed treatment of this mysterious disease from the Old Testament1:
47 And when the plague of leprosy is in a garment, whether it be a woolen garment, or a linen garment;
48 or in the warp, or in the woof, whether they be of linen, or of wool; or in a skin, or in any thing made of skin.
49 If the plague be greenish or reddish in the garment, or in the skin, or in the warp, or in the woof, or in any thing of skin, it is the plague of leprosy, and shall be shown unto the priest.
50 And the priest shall look upon the plague, and shut up that which hath the plague seven days.
51 And he shall look on the plague on the seventh day: if the plague be spread in the garment, or in the warp, or in the woof, or in the skin, whatever service skin is used for, the plague is a malignant leprosy: it is unclean.
52 And he shall burn the garment, or the warp, or the woof, whether it be of wool or of linen, or any thing of skin, wherein the plague is; for it is a malignant leprosy; it shall be burnt in the fire.
53 And if the priest shall look, and, behold, the plague be not spread in the garment, or in the warp, or in the woof, or in any thing of skin;
54 Then the priest shall command that they wash the thing wherein the plague is, and he shall shut it up seven days more.
55 And the priest shall look, after that the plague is washed; and, behold, if the plague have not changed its colour, and the plague be not spread, it is unclean; thou shalt burn it in the fire; it is a fret, whether the bareness be within or without.
56 And if the priest look, and, behold, the plague be dim after the washing thereof, then he shall rend it out of the garment, or out of the skin, or out of the warp, or out of the woof.
57 And if it appear still in the garment, or in the warp, or in the woof, or in any thing of skin, it is breaking out, thou shalt burn that wherein the plague is with fire.
58 And the garment, or the warp, or the woof, or whatsoever thing of skin it be, which thou shalt wash, if the plague be departed from them, then it shall be washed the second time, and shall be clean.
59 This is the law of the plague of leprosy in a garment of wool or linen, or in the warp, or in the woof, or in any thing of skin, to pronounce it clean, or to pronounce it unclean.
(Source: https://biblehub.com/jps/leviticus/13.htm).
Do you want to see how moving to a different version New International Version (NIV) of the same reference, Leviticus (13:47-59), can drastically change the previous description from the disease of leprosy to mildew, which is a type of fungus that deposits itself upon plants or leather. It has nothing to do with disease. So, how could the same passage from Leviticus (13:47-59) admit of two such disparate meanings? It is apparently a case of misinterpreting the metaphors of one version of the Old Testament against the other version of it. Leprosy versus mildew; what does one believe, and why? Let me just mention that it is not an issue associated with the Old Testament. I can give evidence of an even more acute case from the New Testament, i.e., the use, misuse, and misinterpretation of the phrase “Son of God”, a unique description of Jesus Christ, which is the central tenet of Christianity and the basis of the Trinity.
But let us return to the leprosy versus mildew issue I have touched upon earlier.
Clarification from the Ancient Jewish Sources
The ancient Jewish sources clarify that the word “leprosy” used in the Old Testament portion of the Bible is actually far from what modern medical science means by the health condition called leprosy (or, Hansen’s Disease). So, what is the solution to the apparently strange or misplaced use of these terms in the Torah or the Old Testament portion of the Bible? Rabbi Shurpin writes that “The sages explain that tzaraat was actually a supernatural affliction that would usually come about due to a number of sins, most notably the sin of speaking lashon hara, evil speech2.”
Does the reader see how “speaking ill of someone,” which may be morally described as a sin, became leprosy, a physical disease?
Conclusion
In the next article, I plan to examine the case of the New Testament Bible and demonstrate how, unlike the Bible, no such confusion can arise regarding the use of metaphors or similes in the Holy Qur’an. This is because God Almighty, as stated within the Holy Qur’an itself, guarantees its textual protection and the safeguarding of its meaning.
