Speaking in Parables: A Study in Metaphor and Theology

by Sallie McFague

"This book is not only absorbingly readable but important. For its themes engage effectively with main dilemmas not only of formal theology but of current piety and witness."
– Amos N. Wilder, Andover Newton Quarterly "This book is immensely valuable for its persuasive illustrations of the parabolic and metaphoric imagination. McFague attends both to the interpretive and the evaluative levels of hermeneutics. Her readings of specific parables, poems, stories, and autobiographies are insightful and relevant to her thesis that what religious language 'says' is 'conceptually imperceivable and inexpressible.'"
– Mary Gerhart, Journal of the American Academy of Religion "It is at the very least a fine guide to one important direction that theological hermeneutics might take, and more than that, it testifies confidently to the presence of still unplumbed resources of the biblical word and its secular counterpart that are there for the imagination's appropriation."
– Robert Detweiler, Religious Studies Review "Everyone interested in theology will be stimulated by Sallie McFague's mediating theological position and the form of thinking and discourse she espouses. Those interested in the intercourse between theology and literature will be stimulated by the way she links the two and the perceptive way she handles her literary examples. Biblical scholars will undoubtedly note her primacy of the parables as the central corpus of the biblical records. Preachers of the church will be strengthened by the concern McFague has for the Christian community and the importance of the word through the words of the preachers. With this variety of concerns, Speaking in Parables will have a deservedly wide reading and, perhaps even more important, wide discussion."
– Ronald E. Sleeth, Perkins School of Theology Journal

Genres: Theology, Philosophy, Spirituality

196 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1975

About the author

Sallie McFague (born 1933) was an American feminist Christian theologian.

Reviews

[Brenton · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of the most important early studies of literature and theology in the critical era. Sallie McFague, recently deceased, carves out a "metaphorical theology" experienced through the imagination with parables as the central and paradigmatic way of telling stories, of doing theology, and of understanding our lives in Christ. I am a critical realist, so I cannot go with McFague to her epistemological place in this book. And I don't quite understand the privilege of parables, though the implications of understanding Jesus as the Parable of God are profound. I am inclined to think she is write about parabolic theology; it is the reductionism to mere parable that disturbs me.
Any student of literature and theology should read this book--even more than her later, more important studies like Models of God and Metaphorical Theology.
Notably, this book deals extensively with Inklings like Owen Barfield, J.R.R. Tolkien, Charles Williams, and C.S. Lewis.
This book is in most theological libraries, available on Amazon and other booksellers, and available free here: https://www.religion-online.org/book/....

[Stef Rozitis · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was probably revolutionary in the 70s (when it was published) but reading it in 2020 after having heard about it for 2 decades and more it was disappointingly conservative, even pious. For example she seems to view Augustine as some sort of hero or paragon.

This is authentically from the faith I grew up with, and probably a necessary push back towards the art and poetry of philosophy/faith instead of treating it as a science or dogma, but I feel quite removed from most of the exemplars she investigates. Of course I was a baby in the 70s and so missed a whole lot of context (like how conservative a woman theologian writing in that time probably had to sound). In some ways it may be good that there was no room for me in theology and I had to find a different discipline, though the way has been hard and painful