rustic, antediluvian, allegories

I was not familiar with the word flagitious before coming across it above. I did not even know what it meant. But it was the right answer choice because neither rustic nor dubious made sense in the above context: rustic is typically used with respect to a place while dubious times barely stands a chance of making sense, well, at least above.

Antediluvian is the correct choice for the second blank because the part of the sentence is about a period before a great flood. Allegories is also the correct choice for blank three because neither equivocations nor platitudes made sense and because allegories stand in contrast to the reconstruction of the past.

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The Biblical portrayal of (i)_________ times preceding the great deluge stands in stark contrast to the ancient Greek representation of the (ii)_________ past as a Golden Age from which humanity has slowly descended into godless chaos. Such observations can easily give rise to the notion that stories about the past are less faithful attempts at reconstruction than (iii) _________ , ex­pressing both our cultural fears and hopes.

A contrast between the Greek representation of the Golden Age and the Biblical portrayal of the times preceding the flood is established in the paragraph. This means that the times portrayed in the Bible should be un-Golden, and the word is flagitious, which means criminal or villainous. It is definitely not dubious or rustic and these can be eliminated easily to choose flagitious.

The second blank:

Now, we need a word which describes the past. Since both the Bible and the Greeks are talking about the times preceding the great deluge, the word is clearly antediluvian.

The third blank:

We need word that is of the same category as stories, so allegories is correct choice. An allegory is a story, poem, or picture that can be interpreted to reveal a hidden meaning, typically a moral or political one.Also equivocations refer to ambiguous language which conceals the truth and platitudes refer to remarks or statements, especially ones with a moral content, which have been used too often to be interesting or thoughtful. So these two can be eliminated.

If we know time cannot be rustic, that is all for this question.

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Carcass, can you please explain how we can translate flagitious in this context?

plagues.

The representation of the biblical plagues or natural calamity

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