Aristotle is worth reading. The Poetics is no exception even though is fragmentary nature means that there is much that is lost to us. The style, in fact, resembles nothing so much as a speaker’s notes. But there is much to be gained from the man who was known for many years simply as The Philosopher.

Two interesting comments:

1. On metaphor

The greatest thing by far is to be a master of metaphor. It is the one thing that cannot be learnt from others; and it is also a sign of genius, since a good metaphor implies an intuitive perception of the similarity in dissimilars.

— Aristotle, The Poetics

The most visible portion of a sermon is the ‘illustration’, which is generally an extended story that helps the listeners understand the point being made. Sometimes, of course, an illustration can become too visible and take the focus away from the point. But metaphor is not open to this criticism.

Take an introductory passage by Charles Spurgeon as an example of metaphor-filled preaching:

Oh, there is in contemplating Christ a balm for every wound; in musing on the Father, there is a quietus for every grief; and in the influence of the Holy Ghost there is a balm for every sore. Would you lose your sorrows? Would you drown your cares? Then go, plunge yourself in the Godhead’s deepest sea; be lost in his immensity; and you shall come forth as from a couch of rest, refreshed and invigorated. I know of nothing which can so comfort the soul; so calm the swelling billows of grief and sorrow; so speak peace to the winds of trial, as a devout musing upon the subject of the Godhead. It is to that subject that I invite you this morning.

— Spurgeon, “The Immutability of God”

While Spurgeon’s rather florid style is not one to be wholly embraced today, bringing more metaphor into an otherwise straightforward paragraph or address might well be a refreshing change from the occasionally rigid Statement-Illustration-Application sermon model.

(See also The Riches of Spurgeon by William Shishko.)

2. On contradictions in literature

One should best avoid the fault of which Glaucon speaks: ‘They start with some improbable presumption; and having so decreed it themselves, proceed to draw inferences and censure the poet as though he had actually said whatever they happen to believe, if his statement conflicts with their own notion of things.’

— Aristotle, The Poetics

It is a fairly straightforward principle of literary interpretation that one allows the text one is reading to have the benefit of the doubt. The principle is also known as Puddenhead’s Rule: Do not assume that the Reader is more intelligent than the Author. It is pleasant to find Aristotle in agreement.

An example of a violation of Puddenhead’s Rule is in the way some people have interpreted 1 Kings 7.23:

Then [Hiram acting for Solomon] made the sea of cast metal. It was round, ten cubits from brim to brim, and five cubits high, and a line of thirty cubits measured its circumference. (ESV)

As we all know that the circumference of a circle is equal to π × diameter of the circle, we would expect the circumference to be 31.4159… Some, eager to find a problem with the Bible, have contended that 1 Kings 7.23 is inaccurate. In fact, by Puddenhead’s Rule, it is more reasonable to suppose that instead of rounding the circumference at 31.4159, 31.4 or 31, the author rounded the circumference at 30. (There are also further speculations on the accuracy of the verse.)

There are of course many more comments Aristotle makes on Greek poetry that transcend his original subject. (Cicero spoke of Aristotle’s work as a ‘river of gold’.) Even if his style is not as glorious as the poets he writes of nor as visionary as his philosophic predecessors, nonetheless in my opinion a few moments prospecting by the banks of his golden river are repaid in full.