As, for example, where persons desirous to get over the plain reference to Baptism in St. John iii. 5, try to explain away the term "water" to mean something metaphorically but not actually water.
CHAPTER XII.
METHODS OF INTERPRETING THE NARRATIVE—ASSUMPTIONS OF MEANING TO CERTAIN TERMS.
Returning, then, to the narrative in the Book of Genesis, I think we may take it as clear that the passage stands in such a concise and condensed form, that it is obviously open to be interpreted. Further, that we should not be surprised if the interpretation at the present day, with our vastly increased knowledge of Nature, is different from what it was in earlier times.
I make no apology for repeating this so often, because it is really amazing to see the way in which "anti-theological" writers attack what they suppose to be the interpretation of the narrative, or what some one else supposes to be such, and seem to be satisfied that in so doing they have demolished the credibility of the narrative itself.
If you choose to assume that Creation as spoken of by the sacred writer means some particular thing, or even if the mass of uneducated or unreflecting people assume it and you follow them, I grant at once that the narrative can be readily made out to be wrong.
Permit me, then, to repeat once more, that the narrative is in human language, and uses the human terms "created," "made," and "formed," and that these terms do (as a matter of fact which there is no gainsaying) bear a meaning which is not invariable. Hence, without any glossing or "torturing" of the narrative, we are under the plain obligation to seek to assign to these terms a true meaning with all the light that modern knowledge can afford.