Excellent piece, short yet flowered with elements of personification carefully crafted by the novelist.
I must commend you on your dexterity in the use of imagery, but I am however not satisfied with this comparison, I guess you can edit it cause it's not balanced.

the contentions between doing what he had been taught in his Christian faith and doing what he had been taught by much older scripture - celibate and sinless or tainted with blasphemy.

Christian faith and older scripture.

By the way is there a thing like older scripture?

Looking forward to hearing from you soon.