Allegorizing Non-Biblical Examples and Speculation About God
The practice of allegorizing—reading one thing as a representation of another—has ancient roots in biblical interpretation, but Christian tradition has consistently distinguished between legitimate typological reading of Scripture and speculative allegorizing that imposes meanings foreign to the text. An allegory involves "a twofold sense—the immediate or historic, which is understood from the words, and the ultimate, which is concerned with the things signified by the words" [1]. When applied to biblical narratives, this method can illuminate genuine connections between Old and New Testament events. When extended to non-biblical examples or used to speculate about God's nature through created analogies, however, it encounters theological boundaries that the tradition has carefully marked.
The Biblical Warrant for Allegory
Scripture itself employs allegorical interpretation in limited, controlled ways. Paul explicitly identifies his reading of Sarah and Hagar as allegorical (Galatians 4:21-31), treating the two women as representing two covenants. This apostolic precedent establishes that allegory has a place in Christian interpretation. Yet Calvin warns that Paul's example "does not mean that he wishes all histories, indiscriminately to be tortured to an allegorical sense, as Origen does; who by hunting everywhere for allegories, corrupts the whole Scripture" [4]. The concern is not with allegory itself but with its indiscriminate application, which renders "the doctrine of Scripture ambiguous and destitute of all certainty and firmness" [6].
The distinction matters because allegory, when unmoored from textual controls, becomes a vehicle for importing foreign ideas into Scripture rather than drawing out its actual meaning. Calvin notes that some interpreters "impelled by a supposed necessity, have resorted to an allegorical sense" when they cannot locate historical referents for biblical descriptions, but he insists this approach allows "Satan, with the deepest subtlety, to introduce into the Church" interpretive methods that undermine scriptural authority [6].
The Prohibition Against Speculating About God Through Created Things
The second commandment's prohibition against making images of God (Exodus 20:4-5) establishes a fundamental principle: God cannot be adequately represented by anything in creation. "To represent God as something in creation was inevitably to end up worshiping the creation rather than the Creator, and this immorality had deadly consequences" [11]. This prohibition extends beyond physical idols to conceptual ones. When interpreters allegorize non-biblical examples to explain God's nature, they risk the same error—projecting created categories onto the uncreated Being.
The biblical witness consistently mocks the notion that created things can represent deity. Jeremiah asks rhetorically, "Will a man make for himself gods which are no gods?" [2]. The prophet's point is not merely that carved images are powerless, but that the entire project of representing the divine through the creaturely is fundamentally misguided. Ibn Ezra identifies "other gods" as "idols, the work of man" [5], emphasizing that any god constructed from human imagination or analogy is by definition not God.
This prohibition has implications for theological method. When Christians allegorize natural phenomena, human relationships, or philosophical concepts to explain divine attributes, they must recognize the severe limitations of such analogies. Clarke observes that pagan worship involved "images that are supposed to be representations of divinities: but these divinities are nothing, the figments of mere fancy; and these images have no corresponding realities" [9]. The same danger attends Christian speculation: an allegorized explanation of God may have "no corresponding reality" to the actual divine nature.
The Image of God and Analogical Limits
Calvin addresses this problem directly when discussing the image of God in humanity. He acknowledges that some theologians, particularly Augustine, have found trinitarian analogies in the human soul's faculties—memory, understanding, and will supposedly corresponding to Father, Son, and Spirit. Calvin grants that "there is something in man which refers to the Father and the Son, and the Spirit," but insists that "a definition of the image of God ought to rest on a firmer basis than such subtleties" [7]. His caution reflects a broader principle: speculative analogies, however clever, cannot bear the weight of doctrinal definition.
The problem intensifies when such speculation moves beyond Scripture's own analogies. Scripture does use created things to reveal aspects of God's character—the heavens declare his glory, a father's love images divine compassion. But these are divinely authorized analogies, given in revelation. Human-invented allegories lack this authorization. To mock what God created is to mock God himself [10], but to claim that our allegorizing of creation accurately represents God's nature is to claim an authority Scripture does not grant.
Historical Warnings Against Allegorical Excess
The patristic and Reformation periods witnessed sustained debate over allegorical interpretation. Origen's method, which found spiritual meanings in nearly every textual detail, became the cautionary example. His approach "extracted smoke out of light" [4], obscuring rather than illuminating Scripture's meaning. The Reformers did not reject allegory wholesale—they recognized its legitimate use in cases like Galatians 4—but they insisted on textual and christological controls.
The danger of uncontrolled allegory appears clearly in disputes over worship. When Hezekiah destroyed the bronze serpent that had become an object of worship (2 Kings 18:4), his opponents accused him of overthrowing God's worship. But "Hezekiah had taken away false gods and superstitious worship, which God abhors" [8]. The serpent, originally a divinely appointed sign, had been allegorized into an object of devotion. The same pattern recurs whenever created things or human concepts are allegorized into representations of God without scriptural warrant.
The Epistemological Problem
At root, the issue is epistemological: How do we know God? Scripture claims that God has revealed himself definitively in Christ and in the written Word. Speculation about God through non-biblical allegories assumes we can know God through our own analogical reasoning. But this reverses the proper order. We do not reason from creation to Creator and then allegorize our findings back onto Scripture. Rather, Scripture interprets creation for us, showing us what creation reveals and what it conceals about God.
The Stoic and Epicurean philosophers in Athens illustrate this problem. When Paul preached, they accused him of "advocating foreign deities" [3] because his message did not fit their philosophical categories. Their speculative systems, however sophisticated, could not accommodate the revealed truth of resurrection. Similarly, when Christians allegorize non-biblical examples to explain God, they risk forcing revelation into categories it was meant to shatter.
The tradition's caution about allegorizing non-biblical examples and speculating about God through created analogies reflects a commitment to revelation's priority. God has spoken; our task is to hear and understand, not to construct alternative explanations through clever analogies. Where Scripture itself uses creation to reveal God, we follow gratefully. Where it does not, we acknowledge the limits of our knowledge and resist the temptation to fill the silence with speculation.
Sources
- Smith's Bible Dictionary “Smith's Bible Dictionary: Allegory — a figure of speech, which has been defined by Bishop Marsh, in accordance with its etymology as, "a representation of one thing which is intended to excite the representation of another thing." ("A figurative representation containing a meaning other than and in addition to the literal." "A fable or parable; is a short allegory with one definite moral."--Encyc. Brit.) In every allegory there is a twofold sense--the immediate or historic, which is understood from the words, and the ultimate, which is concerned with the things signified by the words. The alle”
- Jeremiah “Jeremiah 16:20 (BBE) — Will a man make for himself gods which are no gods?”
- Acts “Some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also were conversing with him. Some said, “What does this babbler want to say?” Others said, “He seems to be advocating foreign deities,” because he preached Jesus and the resurrection. -- Acts 17:18”
- CCEL (Reformed) “Calvin, Commentary on Genesis, Vol. 1 (Gen 1-23), section 25.13: But because I have before declared, that this history is more profoundly considered by Paul, the sum of it is here briefly to be collected. In the first place, he says, that what is here read, was written allegorically: not that he wishes all histories, indiscriminately to be tortured to an allegorical sense, as Origin does; who by hunting everywhere for allegories, corrupts the whole Scripture; and others, too eagerly emulating his example, have extracted smoke out of light. And not only has the simplicity of Scripture been viti”
- Sefaria (Jewish (Rationalist)) “Abraham Ibn Ezra on Deuteronomy 17:3: OTHER GODS. Idols, the work of man.”
- CCEL (Reformed) “Calvin, Commentary on Genesis, Vol. 1 (Gen 1-23), section 6.17: not have been placed opposite to Judea, towards the east. We must, however, entirely reject the allegories of Origin, and of others like him, which Satan, with the deepest subtlety, has endeavored to introduce into the Church, for the purpose of rendering the doctrine of Scripture ambiguous and destitute of all certainty and firmness. It may be, indeed, that some, impelled by a supposed necessity, have resorted to an allegorical sense, because they never found in the world such a place as is described by Moses: but we see that the”
- CCEL (Reformed) “Calvin, Commentary on Genesis, Vol. 1 (Gen 1-23), section 5.31: and fourteenth books on the Trinity, also the eleventh book of the “City of God.” I acknowledge, indeed, that there is something in man which refers to the Father and the Son, and the Spirit: and I have no difficulty in admitting the above distinction of the faculties of the soul: although the simpler division into two parts, which is more used in Scripture, is better adapted to the sound doctrine of piety; but a definition of the image of God ought to rest on a firmer basis than such subtleties. As for myself, before I define the”
- CCEL (Reformed) “Calvin, Commentary on Isaiah, Vol. 3, section 4.14: to us, that, imitating the example of Hezekiah, we may stand unshaken against such accusations and slanders. So far as relates to the last clause, in which Rabshakeh reproaches him with having overturned the worship of God, 36 36 Our author refers to the charges contained in the 7 th verse of this chapter. — Ed. every person must plainly see how slanderous is that charge; for Hezekiah had taken away false gods and superstitious 37 37 “ Les idols et l’idolatrie .” “Idols and idolatry.” worship, which God abhors. ( 2 Kings 18:4 .) But we need n”
- 1 Corinthians (Methodist/Wesleyan) “Adam Clarke on 1 Corinthians 8:5: There be that are called gods - There are many images that are supposed to be representations of divinities: but these divinities are nothing, the figments of mere fancy; and these images have no corresponding realities. Whether in heaven or in earth - As the sun, moon, planets, stars, the ocean, rivers, trees, etc. And thus there are, nominally, gods many, and lords many.”
- Proverbs (Protestant academic) “Tyndale House on Proverbs 17:5: 17:5 To make fun of what God created is to mock God.”
- Exodus (Protestant academic) “Tyndale House on Exodus 20:4: 20:4 Not making an image of God is the first step toward recognizing that he is transcendent—that he is the Creator of the universe and distinct from it. To represent God as something in creation was inevitably to end up worshiping the creation rather than the Creator, and this immorality had deadly consequences (Rom 1:18-25).”