Don't assume a parable narrates something that actually happened. Recognize that apocalyptic is filled with symbols. Expect a lot of metaphors in poetry. Don't treat a proverb as an exception-less absolute.

In the New Testament alone there are Gospels, acts, epistles, and an apocalypse. Gospels contain literary forms like miracles, parables, pronouncements, proverbs, farewell discourses, annunciations, and so on. Epistles can be apologetic, commendatory, friendship-oriented, exhortational, diatribes.

The Bible itself claims that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

With every literary genre or form come some conventional expectations that the biblical authors either follow or deviate from.

No one actually lives as if there is no objective truth.