A lot less than meets the eye

Prevarication is a theological art form. Canny theologians will talk and write as if things are "just so" when they're perfectly aware that they're simply manipulating metaphor. It keeps potential critics at bay by laying down a fog of obfuscation. A clever wordsmith can blandly pontificate on Adam, Eve and Original Sin, but when you confront them about misleading the folk in the pews they simply stick their highly educated snooters in the air and infer that it's you who has the problem, what with being a bit thick and unsubtle. Their slippery approach is apparently a sign of their superior insight.

Well, that is plain bulldust. Dishonest, manipulative, and ultimately self-defeating.

Did you know I have a PhD dear?

Then again, there's the rare bird who reverses the approach. They have already painted themselves into a literalist corner which they're now forced to aggressively defend, but their pride and arrogance forces them to nonetheless put on a considered and scholarly veneer in a Hyacinth Bucket sort of way. They might seek out reputable scholars so they can bask in their reflected glory, they might cherry-pick respectable sources for citations, but in the end it's all about image and not substance.

In short, there's a lot less there than meets the eye.

(It would be unkind to focus on a particular example I suppose, so instead I'll just change the subject and ask if you've seen the current issue of David Hulme's Vision magazine.)

So which do you think is preferable, to be knowledgeable and two-faced (so you don't scare the riff-raff), or wooden-minded and two-faced (so you don't scare the people whose status you aspire to)?