To interpret literature II

We were talking about René Girard's triangle, not a proper geometric triangle but a way to view relationships in a text, invented in 1965. Originally it was to show how two individuals in their relationship to the same object, idea, or position also have a relationship between each other. It was later developed to include the type of triangles that people are most prone to think about in a book or a film, the love triangle. But the triangle is much more fundamental than that.
In my own thoughts I began to imagine what interesting forms of topology you would get if you tried to identify all the possible triangles in a text. I started to get an image of many interconnected triangles to describe all the different possible relations. For more complicated stories it would of course not be possible to confine the triangles to just two dimensions, or even three. It is apparent that I am heavily influenced by my background in science.
Our teacher was talking about the triangle and invented an example with a man, a woman and the Bible. She explained how the man's understanding and relationship to the woman was influenced by a book that divide women in two groups Madonna or whore. And the book tell the man that the Madonna is good and desirable while the whore is bad and contemptible.
Now it wasn't the time to get into a long discussion outside the topic, but in my mind I did object to her example. I was surprised that someone that studies literature would use that kind of wording. If she had said “the church” instead of “the Bible” I would have understood it better. Because it is possible to find times and places where the church has indeed interpreted the Bible in this way. It is not even difficult to find these times and places. I would have thought that someone who studies literature would know the difference between what the Bible says and how people interpret the Bible.
There are those that would say that the message in the Bible is rather the opposite. You could read the message in Bible to be that there are no grounds to divide people into groups and assign them different value.
“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.”
Galatians 3:28

To interpret literature I

Since I live in a university city I try to take a few courses now and then. Of course it helps that taking courses at a Swedish university is free. Now I am taking a course in literature with some connection to rhetoric, which is my main topic at the moment. Although I have a background in science I find it rewarding to learn what people do in other areas of academia. It is not always easy to understand what people are talking about before you actually dive into a subject.
When I was studying philosophy I got a very good advice from a teacher. “Just because you don't understand what someone is saying doesn't mean that they are stupid and what they say is nonsense. “ One very important point that he didn't mention is of course that to not understand someone does not exclude the possibility that they are stupid and talk nothing but nonsense. What is important is to give people the benefit of a doubt. In debates you often see how people interpret their opposition's opinion as negative as possible. But this is not the ideal in academia, here you should always extend the best possible interpretation to the text you study.
It is probably even more important for sceptics than for many others to not assume the worst reading of a text. Some sceptics appear to think that just because a text uses terms that they are unfamiliar with, a convoluted form of reasoning, or concern a topic that they consider unscientific the text must be without merit. Since sceptics often encounter texts that have all the above characteristics and that really are nonsense we may to some degree be excused, but non the less it is better to always begin with the assumption that it is your own fault if you don't understand how brilliant a text is.
Now this tirade about strange complicated texts that still may have some kind of understandable message and even value, is not a critique of the course I am taking. Although some theories in the study of literature strike me to be more opinion than tools to reach understanding. This is just the background to my simple observation during our most recent class in the course.