Whether Jesus Is Literally a Door
A serious response to a, uh, “serious” argument
It seems that Jesus is literally a door.
Objection: Our Lord says in John 10:9, “I am the door.” Meanwhile, the Judicious Divine says of interpretation, “I hold it as a most infallible rule in expounding Sacred Scripture, that where a literal construction will stand, the farthest from the letter is commonly the worst.”1
Now, the primary signification of “door” is of “[a]n opening or passage into a house, or other building, or into any room, apartment or closet, by which persons enter.”2 According to this definition it is impossible that Christ, by either His divine or His human nature, be truly a door, since He is not an opening into a building or anything of the sort. However, this is not the only signification of “door.” For “door” can also refer to any “avenue; passage; means of approach or access.”3
Under this signification, Christ is indeed literally the door to salvation, for He is the means by which men access salvation as an end. Since, again, where a literal construction will stand, anything further from the letter is worse, the words of our Lord should be interpreted as a literal saying.
But contrary to this, our Lord also said, “If anyone enters by Me, he…will go in and out and find pasture.” But those who make use of Christ as a means of access to salvation will not literally find pasture. Therefore neither is Christ literally said to be their door.
I respond that the true meaning of a saying must be judged according to the intention of him who spoke it. But our Lord said of being a door, “I am the door of the sheep” and also that, while He was preceded by thieves and robbers, the sheep through Him go in and out and find pasture. But “sheep,” “thieves,” and “pasture” are all said figuratively. Therefore “I am the door” was also said in a figurative mode. So the sense of the text is, “Just as sheep travel through a gate (or door) as a means to find pasture as an end, so also men make use of Christ as a means to salvation as an end.”
Reply to objection: It must granted that, where a literal construction of a saying of Scripture will stand, the further from the letter of the text is commonly the worst. It may also be granted that “door” signifies secondarily the abstracted notion of a “means,” apart from any spatial or material doorway. This, however, appears to be transferred by analogy from the primary signification. For just as one must use a door in order to enter or exit an enclosed room, so also one must make use of a means to achieve an end. Thus the extended sense of “door” as a means in general is more fittingly deemed to be a conventional metaphorical predication of the primary signification.
Even if we hold, however, that a means of access in general may be a proper signification of “door,” it does not follow that a literal construction stands for the Lord’s saying, “I am the door.” For the interpretation of a saying stands, not by how it fits the letter of the words alone, but also by how it fits the use of the saying in a particular discourse. For example, while perhaps in general “I am blue” could stand literally, for a man might from some cause actually have blue skin, it would not stand if he said prior to this, “I have been not been feeling myself lately and am unhappy.” In such a case, it is clear from what else was said that “blue” is said metaphorically, even though “I am blue” simply might be able to stand literally.
In our Lord’s discourse in John 10, what He said prior to this and following it makes certain that He says “door” metaphorically, for the reasons that have already been said.
Richard Hooker, The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, Book V, ch. LIX.
Noah Webster’s 1828 dictionary.
Ibid.