allegorizing

Philo's allegorizing, in which he was continuing an earlier tradition, had little effect in later Jewish thought, in part because the Jewish culture of Alexandria had dispersed by the fourth century.

Perhaps because "Mason & Dixon" is loosely based on real historical figures, Mr. Pynchon's penchant for willful allegorizing is less noticeable in this volume, and his central characters possess an emotional amplitude missing in his earlier books.

The New Yorker 's Louis Menand calls Paradise "the strangest and most original book that Morrison has written," then criticizes it for its lack of cohesion, its failed forays into magical realism, and its willful allegorizing.

According to Roman Catholic theologian George Montague, while the Alexandrian school could be accused of mere allegorizing of the Biblical texts, the Antiochenes could be accused, probably unfairly, of opening the way to a rationalism that minimized mystery.

More pointedly political allegorizing of the Tory message includes a figure representing Shaftesbury "with Fiend's Wings, and snakes twisted round his body; he is encompassed by several fanatical rebellious heads, who suck poison from him, which runs out of a tap in his side."