Was Jesus many messages Literal or symbolic?

I've always thought of it as symbolic. But I've run into a lot of people that will argue until they're blue in the face that it's literal, so...

Bible exegetes fall into several camps, the most complicated of which is that which avers that every passage of scripture has four dimensions.

1. The information gained by a superficial reading of the text. Id est: who, what, where, when, etc.

2. There are day-to-day teachings that will help the seeker find acceptance and purification as he finds Christ as Saviour, becomes more Christlike and Godly on his journey to perfection.

3. Spiritual truths that are symbolic in nature and accessible only to those who have reached a certain degree of spiritual maturity. This is useful as a light unto the feet of the spiritual pilgrim in his journey to eternal life.

4. Profound spiritual truths that lie deep within the scripture and that are accessible only to the spiritually attuned, and provide insights that are concealed from the 'natural man.' These confirm and expand the faith of believers.

QUILL

both

The literal part is that he healed the blind man. the symbolic part is that their are a lot of people who are spiritually blind and only a touch from Christ can open there spiritually blinded eyes. The more you study the bible the more you discover its simple message, and yet there are complexities that inspire awe to any one who is serious about discovering the truth about Jesus. I would suggest reading a case fro Christ by Lee Strobel you can get his book at any christian book store or you can order it from his web site.

He did literally cure him of his blindness - but that is also a spiritual truth that those who see the light of who He is also see - the scales fall from their eyes, they have a spiritual awakening of the truth! The Holy Spirit reveals to you deep revelations when you ask Jesus into your life and submit to Him - it's quite awesome!

His message is simple. It's in the bible. You were born with a sin nature which was passed down to you from your father through Adam. At some point in your life you disobeyed God's commandments. This has eternally separated you from your Creator. He wants you back, but first you have to deal with that sin issue. Problem is you cannot pay for your own sins. God's law requires that the shedding of innocent blood is the only way to pay for sins. You're not innocent. So God became man in the form of Jesus of Nazareth. Because Jesus had no earthy father, He was born without that sin nature. He lead a sinless life and paid in full the ultimate price to set you free from the eternal consequences of your sins. Now you need to make a choice. You can believe that Jesus is who He says He is (the Savior of the world) and trust in Him for your salvation. If you do, Jesus will take full responsibility for your eternal future. This allows God the Father to lawfully dismiss the case against you. Of course you can also deny Jesus. In this case, God the Father has no choice but to allow you to take full responsibility for your own eternal future. And because you cannot pay for your own sins in full, you will spend an eternity trying, but never succeeding. More info at the link below ...

Some were literal, and some were symbolic.

The healign of the blind man was an actualy event. (There were several, actually.)

The difference is often found in the wording and details.

"There was a man..." often identifies a parable lesson.

"There was a certain man..." usually identifies an actualy event.

I think things like curing the blind man or other disabled people were literal. I don't know if stories like the prodigal son and things like that were literal or not.

Jesus used to speak in Parables which are symbolic, in some other cases He spoke directly but those were less common.

He literally opened the blind man's understanding...his inner compehension...

The Christ shifted the blind man's paradigm...

The blind man's perspective was so changed that he actually realized his own reasons for being born blind and healed himself...

We are all Sons and Daughters Of God/Goddess each can realise this for themselves.....but a price must be paid, the destruction of conditioning by a world that wants to own you, thus, "I am in the world but not of the world".