I've always felt like metaphorical interpretations are way more meaningful than literal ones. If a story is metaphorical, then it's describing some general concept that is applicable to your life. If it's literal, then it's just some weird thing that happened once a long time ago, who really cares. Very weird to me that the most zealous religious people are also intent on stripping all meaning and significance from their texts, but then again, maybe not so surprising all things considered.