Hmmm . . . I've never heard anyone say this before. Do you really believe that the Bible reflects the way we talk to each other every day? I'm not seeing that . . . at all. I must be misunderstanding you. Sorry.
That's ok, I'll try to clarify for you.
In short, we mean exactly what we say with the exception of our mutual understanding and usage of figurative language. In other words, there is no reason for you to assume I mean anything other than what I say unless I say something we both understand as a figurative phrase that corresponds to a literal meaning in our shared language.
If I said: "The sermon was astonishing", you should understand that as "The sermon was astonishing".
If I said: "The sermon took my breath away", you should understand that as "The sermon was astonishing"
The 1st phrase means exactly what it means.
The 2nd phrase means exactly what the 1st phrase means.
In English, we share a common understanding that the 2nd phrase means what the 1st phrase says. If a foreigner hears me say the 2nd phrase, they might not believe or understand me because the literalistic meaning is so improbable, and in some cases of figurative language, impossible.
This is the challenge with figurative language in the Bible. We sometimes do not understand that a Jewish (or Biblically associated) figure of speech is being used, so we might assume the literalistic interpretation is absurd, and we invoke another (false) meaning to a text that "makes more sense" in our mind. Every figurative usage in the Bible is either already established in the Jewish culture or in a passage of Scripture.
For example,
Daniel 7 clearly says that the
4 beasts are
4 kingdoms and the
10 horns of the 4th beast are
10 kings.
Revelation 17 - the angels tells John the
waters which he saw (earlier) are peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues
(in short,
humanity).
Revelation 12 says that
the dragon is
Satan.
Consider all that, look at how the
beast of
Revelation 13:1-10 is described:
“Then I saw a beast rise out of the sea, having ten horns...And the dragon gave him his power and great authority...the whole earth was amazed and followed after the beast...and they worshiped the beast, saying, “Who is like the beast, and who is able to wage war with him?”...It was also given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them (Revelation 13:1–10)
These symbols are not ambiguous; They are defined either in the passage, somewhere else in the Revelation, or in the Old Testament.
We can objectively understand this passage as something like:
A kingdom will arise out of humanity, composed of ten rulers. Satan will empower it with great authority
and the whole earth will revere it as invincible, and it will be empowered to destroy the saints in war.
Now go read
Daniel 2, 7, 8, 11 and evaluate its legitimacy. The whole Revelation can be understood without ambiguity by just taking God's word at face value and apprehending what we do not (yet) understand.
Now there are many more details I could have mentioned and defined in the
Revelation 13 passage, but I gave just some key points to get the main picture across. The book of Revelation is a timeline of vision, expressed in symbols, and grounded in reality. I know that is an intense example because there are so many Biblically established figures of speech lumped together in the book (518 OT references in 22 chapters). But that is how you go about understanding Biblically established figurative language. As for the (already established) Jewish figures of speech, which are intrinsic to the culture, you can identify many from their usage and association to other things in the Bible, or you can independently study cultural concepts that don't make sense in our language (English).
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