A Possible Error in the Bible?

In regards to Bethyada, that should be “he” not “she”.

ScottL And you cannot defend inerrancy in regards to our English translations, at least if you want to stay within the bounds of the more stringent evangelical view as expressed in places like the Chicago Statement. So I don’t know how we can say that inerrancy applies to the copies and manuscripts ‘in general’. Inerrancy, at least by most evangelical views (as summarised in the Chicago Statement) is quite stringent and applies to the autographs. So to say the copies are ‘generally’ inerrant will lead down the slippery slope path that most evangelicals won’t like.

In the end, I believe God’s word is perfect, faithful, true and God-breathed. The Scripture testifies to this. But I want to understand what those terms mean from the author’s perspective who penned the words, and from God’s intent when He knew He would be communicating through humanity. I am afraid we are reading a modern understanding of inerrancy into Scripture.

I am not certain how much further we should go with this, I am an inerrantist and I agree reasonably with the Chicago statement, but you seem unhappy about what inerrantists mean by inerrancy.

The Chicago statement seems to be getting away from 20th century concepts of verbatim quotes and hyperliteralism.

My view of inerrancy.

God directed authors of Scripture in what to write about, this was not usually dictation, they had freedom in how they wrote, but God prevented them from including error. As God was involved in these people recording his message, it was the recording that was prevented from error, ie. inerrant. Thus the original manuscript.

I believe this because I think Scripture suggests this.

This prevention from error does not extend to the preservation of manuscripts. Thus some manuscripts include variants. Variants do not necessarily mean error, though they may include error. I don’t think God preserved every manuscript from error because the Scripture does not seem to teach this, and some Bible texts clearly have errors.

I don’t happen to think that the lack of originals is a problem for inerrancy because we are extremely confident of what those manuscripts said in most instances.

In as much as a manuscript is the same as the original, it is inerrant. In as much as a translation has the same message as the original, it is inerrant.

Thus the ESV is not fully inerrant. However it is in general inerrant being a faithful translation of an accurate reconstruction of the original text.

Thanks Jason, and I note your comment on the denials. I am not going to go into this particular example here, I need to spend more time on it, both my issue, and my thoughts.

Dave, On infallibility, I agree that theologically it talks to a slightly different idea than inerrancy.

I suggest that one can be an infallibist without being an inerrantist. An inerrantist is also an infallibist.

Example:

An inerrantist would claim that Jonah really was swallowed by a sea creature (though they may recognise 3 days and 3 nights as an idiom possibly referring to other than 72 hours and debate what the creature was), and that he went to Nineveh and preached repentance. And they note the teaching of God’s mercy and love that comes from the story.

An infallibist (who is not an inerrantist) may claim that the story of Jonah being in a sea creature never actually happened but still think there is a message in the book of Jonah about God’s mercy and love for the lost.

Dave, I am not sure Paul meant anything with respect to the NT at the time he wrote this letter. But there is a prophetic element to inspiration and does beg the question of how much the authors knew as they penned under the guidance of the Spirit. So even if he strictly was referring to OT, the statement must necessarily incorporate the letters in the canon written under apostolic authority. Furthermore, this was already a point Paul WAS aware of with respect to his writing, not that he would have envisioned a bound 66 book tome, but that his instruction was authoritative with respect to the revelation of Christ. Even Peter, refers to Paul’s writings as Scripture in 2 Peter 3:16.

Lisa, 2 Timothy 3:16 refers to things that were scriptures when Timothy was a child. See verse 15. That would be the LXX. This does not claim that the Spirit also inspired writings of the apostles, but it doesn’t rule it out either.

Curt, yes the verbal (and written) message is adequate and sufficient, but that doesn’t mean that it is perfect and inerrant in all respects. Language is the best form of communication that we have.
But so far, no one else here has tried to explain why Jesus Himself didn’t write down the gospel.

bethyada –

I do clarify for you that I love the Scriptures. I read them, study them, teach them, preach them and defend them regularly. I love the Scriptures. So please know that I am not attacking you. I am more challenging what I would view as stringent views on things and the desire amongst most evangelicals to ‘rise up and defend’ more stringent view of these things.

You said:

My view of inerrancy.

I believe this because I think Scripture suggests this.

We agree that much of Scripture was not dictation, though I do not deny specific and direct revelations. But how do we really know that God prevented them from including error? You say Scripture suggests this, but I wonder if this is a little eisegesis into passages like 2 Tim 3:16 and 2 Pet 1:21. What we have is that the Scripture is God-breathed and the writers were carried along by the Spirit. But we know this was not always direct revelation. Paul would be sitting in house arrest writing to the Philippians with the wisdom and grace and revelation of an apostle, but I’m not sure he is receiving some ‘direct’ revelation where he is so specifically trying to write down an error free message. And I hear some of these Scripture recorders in the NT didn’t use very good Greek at times. If God would supersede them to make sure they got all the historical data correct, why not make sure they used some decent Greek. Still, at the same time, I very much recognise that every writer was ‘carried along by the Spirit’. For you, this might contradict. For me, I don’t see it having to be a contradiction.

Jesus (living Word) was perfect, yet he came as a human with little human ‘fallacies’ such as body odor and morning breath. Can the Scripture (written Word) not also be seen this way?

Still, if God was so particular about preserving the originals to be completely without error in any shape or form, then we really need to ask why He didn’t preserve those texts through the centuries, since they are the perfect documents, or why He didn’t ‘carry along’ the copyists over the centuries? For me, this shows that God is not anal (sorry for such a harsh word) in regards to inerrancy. In the end, the Scripture is God-breathed, faithful, reliable, authoritative and true – and I believe we can apply this across our manuscripts and translations even. At least the Spirit of God in me testifies to the God-breathedness, faithfulness, reliability and truth of the ESV copy I read every day.

Dave Z:
This is the very best succinct articulation I have ever seen of the problems with inerrancy, and the merits of infallibility. Amazing.

Lisa wrote: “the statement must necessarily incorporate the letters in the canon written under apostolic authority. “

Why? Because “there is a prophetic element to inspiration,” as you say? Says who? Says the Protestant theologians? Does scripture teach this?

Lisa wrote: “this was already a point Paul WAS aware of with respect to his writing”

This is a problem, because Paul was also aware that some of his writing is merely his own advice, and not commandments from God; as he explicitly writes. So Paul was also aware of this with respect to his writing. So if we’re going to take Paul’s word on one thing, why not take his word on this point, as well?

So what does 2Tim3:16 refer to? Two options:
First: The expanded Septuagint canon with Apocrypha; which, as I noted, is NOT merely a translation of the Hebrew, but rather a completely different textual tradition than the Masoretic Text. But that’s only if you assume the traditional evangelical position that Paul did in fact author 1/2 Tim and Titus.

Second: An alternative view that would make 2Tim3:16 also refer to the New Testament epistles and gospels would be the critical scholarship view, that maintains that 1/2 Tim and Titus were penned much later, under Paul’s name. A literalist would have a problem with this position, because the letter says that Paul wrote it. But in those times, it was not “plagiarism” to do a writing under a certain person’s “school of thought,” and ascribe their name to it — which would therefore not render the writings as “deceptive” in authorship. Plato, for example, writes all of his philosophy by inserting it into the mouth of Socrates.

Anyway, I’m partly playing Devil’s Advocate here, but it’s still worth pointing out. Why do we hold the doctrine of scripture that we hold? Perhaps we should critically examine why exactly we understand the things that we do.

Let’s heed the words of Jesus: “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me.”

It is Jesus Christ who is the “author and perfecter of our faith,” not the writings that testify to him.

As Aaron Rathburn alludes to and/or states, issues/questions of inerrancy cannot sidestep or ignore issues or questions related to 1. the canon and 2. the Septuagint vs. Masoretic Text when it comes to the Old Testament. I.e., before you can claim that the Scripture is inerrant, you must explain what you mean by “Scripture” – and why. It’s not as simple or as neat and tidy as some believe or would like, as our Scriptures weren’t delivered to us with a table of contents and by angels on gold tablets. For many if not most books we don’t even know the authors with certainty.

We need to understand the meaning of ‘God breathed.’ If it is simply ‘inspired by God’s spirit,’ that does not necessarily imply a direct immediate inspiration. For example, in 2 Peter 3:15-16 Paul is said to write ‘according to the wisdom given him.’ This could just as well be wisdom that was gained over time in his Christian experience and not necessarily a direct inspirational experience.

The case of Revelation is instructive. John was ‘in the Spirit’ when a great voice told him to write the things that he sees. So John, in an altered state (a trance), is given visions that he describes in his own words. The voice didn’t tell him to ‘write what I tell you to write.’ Whether John did his actual writing during the visions or afterwards doesn’t change the fact that Revelation is in John’s own words (except of course, where John records words that he hears or reads).

In I Corinthians 7, where Paul says four times that he is not writing a command from the Lord but his own advice, he also gives other instructions that he does identify as a command from the Lord. He does not, however, tell how that command came to him. It might have been in a special inspirational event, or it might just as well have been something he learned over a period of time.

There seems to be little in the NT to suggest that the writers were seized by the Spirit and compelled to write. Certainly the gospel of Luke is a compilation of reliable accounts as a credible historian would research. Luke relies on his own first-hand knowledge and on reliable sources. He does not acknowledge special guidance by the Spirit. We would like to see such acknowledgment for our understanding of inspiration.

EricW –

This probably sums up my biggest concern with inerrancy from an evangelical perspective, as with other issues: It’s not as simple or as neat and tidy as some believe or would like, as our Scriptures weren’t delivered to us with a table of contents and by angels on gold tablets.

When I read something like Grudem’s Systematic Theology and his words on inerrancy, it seems so very forced to make a nice and clean cut package. We, as evangelicals, don’t like things being a little ‘messy’ and ‘un-neat’.

DaveZ –

Your quote in comment 100 was very good.

Lisa writes:

An infallibist (who is not an inerrantist) may claim that the story of Jonah being in a sea creature never actually happened but still think there is a message in the book of Jonah about God’s mercy and love for the lost.,

I don’t really know where most infallibists would stand, but I would not dismiss the literal truth of the Jonah passage. That is far beyond what I would see as the borders, if you will, of infallibility. I’m talking about stuff like CMP’s original post addresses.

Do you have examples of someone, an author perhaps or professor, who claims infallibility, yet would dismiss something like Jonah’s story?

Rayner, yes – Luke specifically claims investigation, not inspiration. But that’s not to say God did not inspire. God could even have influenced who Luke spoke to in his investigation.

I sometimes wonder if there are implications to the fact that the scriture writers did not use a special term for “scriptures,” instead using the common Greek term “graphe.” We have developed a special term, “scripture,” but what they used was a much more generic “writings.” We CHOOSE to translate that as “scripture.” Maybe for good reason, but it carries an implication of authority that would seem to be less specific in the originals.

I also agree that God is evidently not as fixated on inerrancy as we are, as he did not inspire inerrant copies, but allowed errors to creep in, even if we have (mostly) recovered the original text. And may I point out, even that is recent. What about inerrancy and even reliability in the centuries before modern textual criticism?

My point is that inerrancy is evidently non-essential. So it certainly seems inappropriate that modern evangelicals sometimes make it a litmus test for orthodoxy.

I’m beginning to see inerrancy as an archetype of eisegesis.

Yes, that’s the right way to look at the infallibility/inerrancy of Paul.

When he wrote his letter declaring that “all scripture is God-breathed”, he certainly did not consider his letters to constitute “scripture”. And he went to great lengths in his letters to portray himself as a fallible human being.

To claim otherwise would be to claim that Paul somehow became infallible after his conversion, and that every line he wrote in his pastoral letters carried the same weight as one of the ten commandments. Paul would have been HORRIFIED at any such insinuation.

The apostles lived to proclaim the infallibility of the Old Testament, and to faithfully proclaim their witness to the life, death, and resurrection of Christ (which REALLY HAPPENED). They didn’t live to create or proclaim new scripture.

IMO, this is a primary reason that we can trust the New Testament. The level of intellectual honesty in narrating the fallibility of the protagonists is unmatched in any other religious work. Peter taking sides with the Judaizers, Paul quarreling with others over doctrine, and so on. The early fathers are not presented as some idolized and infallible forces of nature; they are presented as humans.

This doesn’t mean that we can dismiss what they said, of course. The apostles such as Peter and Paul are perhaps the greatest pastors the Church has ever had, and we need to accord them at least as much respect as we are commanded to show to our current pastors. We respect them because God ordained them as our Church fathers, though — not because they are infallible conduits of new scripture.

DaveZ –

You said – I’m beginning to see inerrancy as an archetype of eisegesis.

Yes, that is what I wonder about. Are we reading this kind of theology into words like theopneustos? It seems a very forced eisegesis. We are quite good at that.

Oops, that was not a quote from Lisa – sorry

Gotta agree/disagree with Josua. I agree that Paul, as a person, was never infallible, before or after conversion. But I disagree with the conclusional leap – I do think God spoke infallibly through him as Paul wrote scripture. I do not believe the Bible, ether OT or NT is a simply human book. God reveals and guides, and we can debate interpretation, but “carried along in the Holy Spirit” is a pretty strong image, emphasis on “carried.”

Also Paul was very clear about his authority as an apostle, and he spoke and wrote authoritatively. That said, there were certainly some who did not hold him or his writings in very high esteem, as we see in 2 Cor. Yet, I think it equally certain that some did.

Article XI.

WE AFFIRM that Scripture, having been given by divine inspiration, is infallible, so that, far from misleading us, it is true and reliable in all the matters it addresses.

WE DENY that it is possible for the Bible to be at the same time infallible and errant in its assertions. Infallibility and inerrancy may be distinguished, but not separated.

Article XVI.

WE AFFIRM that the doctrine of inerrancy has been integral to the Church’s faith throughout its history.

WE DENY that inerrancy is a doctrine invented by scholastic Protestantism, or is a reactionary position postulated in response to negative higher criticism.

Article XIX.

WE AFFIRM that a confession of the full authority, infallibility, and inerrancy of Scripture is vital to a sound understanding of the whole of the Christian faith. We further affirm that such confession should lead to increasing conformity to the image of Christ.

WE DENY that such confession is necessary for salvation. However, we further deny that inerrancy can be rejected without grave consequences, both to the individual and to the Church.

Questions re-asked, hoping for response:

How many of us obey Paul or would even agree with Paul on this: “But if her husband dies, she is free to marry anyone she wishes, but he must belong to the Lord. In my judgment, she is happier if she stays as she is– and I think that I too have the Spirit of God.

Do we all agree widows are happier if they stay single? Or that that is God’s perspective?

How about this: 7:29 What I mean, brothers, is that the time is short. From now on those who have wives should live as if they had none;”

I know that if I tried that, I wouldn’t have to live as if I had none for very long…

How many of us preach that verse?

I want to know, from a verbal plenary inerrantist, maybe Curt or Lisa or whoever, if those passages communicate God’s opinion or Paul’s.

Dave Z wrote: “Do you have examples of someone, an author perhaps or professor, who claims infallibility, yet would dismiss something like Jonah’s story?”

If Jesus taught the people using parables, I would not be opposed to the book of Jonah also teaching us by way of a parable. But no, “infallibility” does not necessitate “non-historical-reality.”

But for example, I am less inclined to think of Genesis 1-11 as the literary genre of “historical documentation,” so much as perhaps “parable to communicate truth.” The literature is radically different from Genesis 12-50, and further.

Dave Z wrote: “So it certainly seems inappropriate that modern evangelicals sometimes make it a litmus test for orthodoxy.”

Exactly. I believe in a literal hell, a literal Satan, eternal punishment (not annihilationism), non-universalism, the resurrection, etc etc., and I get conservatives that call me liberal (!) because I don’t believe in inerrancy. It’s really more “orthodox” not to!

“I’m beginning to see inerrancy as an archetype of eisegesis.”

Bingo.

Truth Unites and Divides:
The Catholics got a lot of things wrong in their councils for 1,000 years. Don’t think that evangelicals can’t get anything wrong in their councils, either ;-).

Aaron Rathburn: “The Catholics got a lot of things wrong in their councils for 1,000 years. Don’t think that evangelicals can’t get anything wrong in their councils, either.”

Upholding inerrancy isn’t wrong.

For those inclined or interested in a more recent discussion of inerrancy where the debate gets a bit more technical than here, please go here and look at the last 5 or 6 threads or so, starting at May 19, 2009. You’ll also see Aaron Rathburn participating in them.

I understand that it does have some authority, but we cannot act as if the Chicago statement itself is inerrant.

TUaD, thanks for the link. Looks quite interesting at a quick glance. No time now, but I do look forward to digging deeper.

Saying that God spoke infallibly through Paul is not the same as stating that all of Paul’s writings were infallibly the decrees of God. Paul, being sensitive to such idolatrous conclusions, was often careful to couch his words with qualifiers like “I wish”.

Paul’s fallibility was, in fact, one of the ways that God spoke infallibly to us. People who fail to realize this unique aspect of Hebrew scriptural tradition are at a disadvantage. And this theme repeats far back into OT. What was the story of Moses’s inability to communicate, and reliance on Aaron, if not a commentary on inerrancy and infallibility?

Rayner wrote:

Curt, yes the verbal (and written) message is adequate and sufficient, but that doesn’t mean that it is perfect and inerrant in all respects.

Rayner, I wasn’t using the sufficiency of verbal communication as a point of defense for inerrancy. I was only responding to your comments that seemed (to me) to call into question its sufficiency.

But so far, no one else here has tried to explain why Jesus Himself didn’t write down the gospel.

I’m at a loss here. How exactly does that affect the inerrancy of Scripture?

Dave Z,

Your quote in post 100 is interesting, but obviously written from the viewpoint of someone who strongly prefers infallibility (or at least their understanding of it) to inerrancy. And I don’t think all of the conclusions are necessarily justified.

You asked:

I want to know, from a verbal plenary inerrantist, maybe Curt or Lisa or whoever, if those passages communicate God’s opinion or Paul’s.

I addressed this earlier in post 86. (Not too well apparently 🙂 ) 3 quick recaps in response:

1. I see this as exegetical question. As an inerrantist, I have no problem with Paul expressing his opinion on some issue. And inerrancy no more demands that this also be God’s opinion than it does any other statement recorded in Scripture. The exegetical issue that must be resolved is: Was Paul stating a personal opinion here or was he giving instruction? [We can get into the interpretation of this specific passage if you’d like, but I think it’s beside the point.]

2. Even if Paul was directly giving a specific instruction, we still have to apply the passage to us today. Even if Paul infallibly—under inspiration of the Holy Spirit—told the believers to greet one another with a holy kiss, this doesn’t mean we apply that to us today in a woodenly literal manner. [How much of a possible instruction to widows was specific to their unique historical context? I’m not arguing anything here, but it’s something that would need to be considered in interpreting the passage.]

3. This is an issue to be resolved for anyone who believes in the inspiration of Scripture. Is the passage you asked about part of inspired Scripture or merely the writings of a first century teacher (even if profoundly respected)? Does the Bible include both inspired passages and uninspired passages? And, if so, how do we sort them out? Do we become the judge of what is, and what is not, inspired by God? I don’t think your question applies only to inerrantists.

Dave Z wrote:

I sometimes wonder if there are implications to the fact that the scriture writers did not use a special term for “scriptures,” instead using the common Greek term “graphe.” We have developed a special term, “scripture,” but what they used was a much more generic “writings.” We CHOOSE to translate that as “scripture.” Maybe for good reason, but it carries an implication of authority that would seem to be less specific in the originals.

I’m not sure of the point here. Do we take 2 Timothy 3:16 as meaning that all writings are inspired by God? Is that the limit of the semantic range of graphe? And if a specific usage is intended, do you contend that it didn’t include an implied authority?

I think a more germane issue to discuss is ScottL’s question of what exactly does theopneustos mean? Maybe having a more clear understanding of the nature and extent of the inspiration of Scripture (or sacred writings [2 Timothy 3:15]) will add light to our discussion of the nature and extent of the infallibility of Scripture.

I’m beginning to see inerrancy as an archetype of eisegesis.

That’s quite a statement! So biblical interpretation was free of eisegesis before the inerrantists arrived on the scene? I think there’s plenty of room for humility in this area from all theological viewpoints.

One more question for Dave Z (Sorry, but I haven’t been able to post all day!):

My point is that inerrancy is evidently non-essential. So it certainly seems inappropriate that modern evangelicals sometimes make it a litmus test for orthodoxy.

Do you also consider the infallibility of Scripture to be evidently non-essential? And would you consider it inappropriate to make the infallibility of Scripture some form of litmus test?

Aaron, do you suppose that as Samuel recorded God’s covenant promise as he delivered to David in 2 Samuel 7:12-17 that they had Jesus in mind as Luke wrote in Luke 1:31-33? The very process of inspiration means there is a prophetic element as God superintended the process for what he wants known. The fullness of the propheticity may not have been known to the author or at least in its fullness at the time of the recording, but that does not negate a prophetic element. I am not imposing anything on Scripture that it does not already do.

Dave, the short answer regarding 1 Corinthians 7 is that we have to take at face value Paul’s statement of his words being a command rather than a requirement. But no, I don’t think it falls outside of the purview of inspiration. There is no reason to believe that inspiration stops because Paul is providing a recommendation particularly as it is in the context of his instruction under the auspices of his apostolic authority. To say that since it is a recommendation, it is therefore not inspired would ascribe to a dictationist view of inspiration.

Also a side note: as we discussed on my last post, I don’t think the recommendation is that single people are better off but that devotion to the Lord is of chief importance so folks should make sure they are in the best scenario to secure that devotion. For the single person, their attention is undivided unless of course, they are distracted with fleshly desires. If that’s the case they should marry.

ScottL And I hear some of these Scripture recorders in the NT didn’t use very good Greek at times. If God would supersede them to make sure they got all the historical data correct, why not make sure they used some decent Greek.

Your argument here and elsewhere is based on your joining, and at times, conflating concepts.

It seems you are saying that if God was going to ensure inerrancy of the originals then he would also ensure inerrancy of copies in every case. But this does not follow. And there are logical reasons why God may not ensure inerrant preservation.

Similarly with your comment above, if God was going to ensure inerrancy of the autographs then he would ensure excellent grammar. This does not follow either. If God is using men to give his message but not via dictation, then the message will come from their mouths and how they speak.

Would you dismiss a court witness because he spoke in broken English? Would suboptimal grammar mean that what he said was untrue?

It is important to note that impreciseness, ambiguity, and incompleteness are not errors. Error is stating something that is counterfactual. For example your comment here:

Jesus (living Word) was perfect, yet he came as a human with little human ‘fallacies’ such as body odor and morning breath. Can the Scripture (written Word) not also be seen this way?

These aren’t fallacies. Putting aside the cultural argument that body odor is not necessarily offensive, even if Jesus cut himself and had scars from childhood, how it then in anyway related to error?

Inerrant means without error. It does not mean some artificial idea about perfection.

I thought Daniel Wallace did his PhD on 2 Timothy 3:16 and the meaning of “inspired”? I couldn’t find anything on bible.org. Is this correct?

Bethyada, it was a journal article for ETS (1986) entitled The Relation of Theopneustos to Graphe in 2 Timothy 3:16. Looks like I’m going to the library tomorrow. Thanks 🙂

I looked up his dissertation, which is entitled The Article with Multiple Substantives Connected by kai in the New Testament.

DaveZ Do you have examples of someone, an author perhaps or professor, who claims infallibility, yet would dismiss something like Jonah’s story?

My pastor is an infallibist but not an inerrantist. I am not certain whether he would believe in the literalness of Jonah. He may do now, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t previously. He is aware that some don’t think it is literal and he doesn’t think it is an issue.

God is evidently not as fixated on inerrancy as we are, as he did not inspire inerrant copies, but allowed errors to creep in, even if we have (mostly) recovered the original text. And may I point out, even that is recent. What about inerrancy and even reliability in the centuries before modern textual criticism?

The theology of inerrancy is not dependant on preservation. Even now we don’t have inerrant texts. We may have recovered the NT but the OT is less exact. Further, translation introduces some errors. But the text we have now, and the texts we have had since they were written and close to the originals. We have always had accurate enough versions such that we can rely on them.

And the concept of inerrancy is not new. As I linked to above, a good argument can be made for Jesus believing in inerrancy.

That was quick Lisa. It would be useful for someone to summarise what Daniel Wallace claims the Greek says about the meaning given all this debate here. Of course he could. But I don’t personally wish to request of him the time involved.

Perhaps if there is a summary in the paper that could be reproduced verbatim, a new post would be useful. 🙂

Just a few keystrokes on the DTS library site did the trick 😉 Besides what else does a nerdy seminary student have to do on a Friday evening.

I love a good challenge, btw, especially when it comes to defending the honor of God’s word. But c’mon, we are talking about Dan Wallace. I’m not sure my little brain is up to the task but we shall see.

Lisa wrote: “do you suppose that as Samuel recorded God’s covenant promise as he delivered to David in 2 Samuel 7:12-17 that they had Jesus in mind as Luke wrote in Luke 1:31-33? The very process of inspiration means there is a prophetic element as God superintended the process for what he wants known.”

Here’s the problem: Luke 1 is NOT the fulfillment of 2Sam7. Jesus Christ is.

That has nothing to do with the inspiration of the New Testament, it only testifies prophetically to Jesus. And then Luke 1 also testifies to Jesus.

(As a side note, Samual actually dies in 1Sam25, so he didn’t write it. But I knew what you meant.)

“I love a good challenge, btw, especially when it comes to defending the honor of God’s word.”

What do you think I’m doing? Defending God’s word ;-). I’m doing the same thing that you would do to a King-James-Onlyist: defending God’s truth from incorrect interpretations of it ;-).

bethyada –

You said:

It seems you are saying that if God was going to ensure inerrancy of the originals then he would also ensure inerrancy of copies in every case. But this does not follow. And there are logical reasons why God may not ensure inerrant preservation.

But do you see the explanatory hoops we have to jump through to explain to one another and the world that our God had the originals come out perfectly pristine and without error, but He couldn’t preserve such a perfection with the copies. This perhaps makes God look silly. Of course, nowhere do we find God saying He had to preserve perfection with the scribes, but I am not sure we can find somewhere that God says He has to preserve perfection in the original recording of Scripture.

He used human beings in both the original recording and in scribal copying. But somehow the 40 men or so that originally wrote these things got the ‘free pass’ of being covered by God’s inerrancy insurance policy. Yet the hundreds of scribes copying over the manuscripts had to deal with their humanity and copy errors.

I tend to sense that describing the Scriptures as God-breathed and infallible will be faithful to Him and honest with the world, rather than trying to label it as inerrant and, thus, have to do the dance of explaining all the nuances.

Similarly with your comment above, if God was going to ensure inerrancy of the autographs then he would ensure excellent grammar. This does not follow either. If God is using men to give his message but not via dictation, then the message will come from their mouths and how they speak.

Would you dismiss a court witness because he spoke in broken English? Would suboptimal grammar mean that what he said was untrue?

But the inerrantist says God made sure the recorders of Scripture got it right in every single nuance with regards to history, science, archeology, etc. That’s a lot of superintending we need on God’s part. But God couldn’t supersede the grammatical inconsistencies of some of these writers?

Now, I know this proves nothing. All I am pointing out is that this seems to add to the already exhausting list of trying to explain inerrancy. Infallibility seems to not need such explanations. We can continue to conclude His word is God-breathed, faithful, reliable and trustworthy and not have to explain the list of intricacies with inerrancy.

Curt, thanks for clarifying for me what you meant about adequate and sufficient.

Regarding Jesus writing scripture, I’m speculating that He may have foreseen the problems we’re having with inerrancy when dealing with a human language—that it is in fact an impossible quest. Better to be picking over the work of human authors than that of the Son of God.

Did the people who decided to include a book in the canon – e.g., Revelation, Hebrews – do so because, among other things, it was determined to be inerrant and God-breathed? If inerrancy and God-breathedness were not some of the criteria used to include a book, did the book become considered to be inerrant and God-breathed once it was included in the canon as Scripture?

Was a book that was Scripture to some churches/groups – e.g., 1 Clement, some of the Apocrypha – included because, along with other things, it was believed or said to be inerrant and God-breathed? If so, did it lose its assumption and/or actual fact of inerrancy and God-breathedness when other groups later on decided it was not to be part of the Church’s Scripture?

Eric –

Very good observations and questions in comment 138 above. Of course, we are not looking to be cynical here. But these are real observations and questions to consider. This is why I believe inerrancy is our attempt to make things nice and neatly packaged. But it isn’t so nice and neat. The Scripture testifies to Christ, but thankfully our devotion is ultimately to Christ. As Aaron quoted John 5:39 earlier – You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me.

I’m loving this thread, but I may not be able to post much in the next week or two. I’m supposed to be going on vacation, but it may turn into a staycation with day trips, so we’ll see.

Curt, let me say that you have raised some thought provoking points. I’ll address a couple here.

Again, inerrancy is not my primary issue. I’m trying to fine-tune my understanding of the nature and extent of inspiration (which impacts inerrancy), so I’m looking forward to how this thread addresses that. It touches on the debate over ipsissima vox and ipsissima verba.

I think most evangelicals would lean towards vox, but I’m not sure. The blog that TUaD linked to earlier seems to take the verba approach.

I guess what I’m wondering is something like this – “Did God place into the mind of the writer what he wanted written?” (Of course, then we can debate whether it was word-for-word, as verbal plenary would seem to require, or conceptual, expressed by the writer in his own words) IOW, did God prompt Paul to give his opinion? “Paul, write this down.” Does it then have divine authority? What is the impact on our understanding and interpretation of Scripture if we believe some portions are merely the author’s opinon? OTOH, If they have divine authority, how does that play out?

Kind of an extreme example, but if Paul expresses his opinion in 1 Cor 7, then why not 2 Tim. 3:16? Is the opinion thing a slippery slope?

My point with graphe is that is is less tightly focused than our term scripture. If I say “Scripture” in this discussion, I’m sure everyone thinks of a 66 book canon. But if I say writings, I may be including the Fathers or the apocrypha. “Scripture” has a specificity that “writings” does not have. When Paul says “writings” we don’t really know to what extent that applies – what writings did he have in mind? We seem to take it prophetically to mean our 66 book canon. But was the development of the canon inspired? How about the somewhat different canon of other Christian traditions? It seems extremely presumptous to take a hard line on that, but it goes to the heart of what is inspired and what is inerrant or infallible. We apply 2 Tim. 3:16 to OUR understanding of canon, which, again sounds like eisegesis.

My use of archetype was in the sense of “good example” of, or “model” of, eisegesis rather than “origin.” Sometimes the argument seems to start from a belief in inerrancy, then involves a hunt for proof texts and other support.

Hopefully I can keep an eye on this thread. I’m finding it helpful. Curt, I especially appreciate your involvement.

@Dave Z: Do you have a blog? I would personally be interested in reading a fully-fleshed out essay on the topic from you. I really think the topic deserves more than the simplistic “either/or” litmus tests that often are proposed.

Regarding “ipsissima vox”, I have always thought it is important that much of scripture is recorded as history (i.e. the narrative had to be put in words, since it was experiential rather than linguistic at start). The Haggadah is the supreme example, and the commandment to “tell your sons”. Each family undoubtedly had a slightly different way of telling the story, but the fact that the story really happened was far more important than linguistic nuance. In fact, the alarmingly deconstructionist Seders that we often see today are proof that having a canonical scriptural text is no guarantee of fidelity — one is certain that none of the Hebrews in the first generation or two after the Exodus would have dared such revisionist tellings, even though they had no canonical text.

Likewise, it seems important that Joseph said “interpretation of dreams belongs to God”.

ScottL But do you see the explanatory hoops we have to jump through to explain to one another and the world that our God had the originals come out perfectly pristine and without error, but He couldn’t preserve such a perfection with the copies. This perhaps makes God look silly. Of course, nowhere do we find God saying He had to preserve perfection with the scribes, but I am not sure we can find somewhere that God says He has to preserve perfection in the original recording of Scripture.

Do you see the explanatory hoops we have to jump through to explain to one another and the world that God created the world perfect but that he did not prevent man from falling and now the world is broken. This perhaps makes God look silly.

It matters little whether the world mocks the truth, I am not trying to defend what I think makes God look the best to the world, that hate him after all; I am trying to defend what I think is true and be faithful to my God.

Further you are conflating to meanings of perfection. Inerrant is “perfect” in that it is without error, but it doesn’t mean “perfection” in the “ideal” or “excellent” sense. Now the Bible may also be “ideal” or “excellent,” but these are not synonyms for inerrant.

He used human beings in both the original recording and in scribal copying. But somehow the 40 men or so that originally wrote these things got the ‘free pass’ of being covered by God’s inerrancy insurance policy. Yet the hundreds of scribes copying over the manuscripts had to deal with their humanity and copy errors.

And perhaps God was involved in some preservation, but he wasn’t in all situations. If a scribe prayed before copying then God may have been more active in preservation, than someone who was trying to conform the Bible to his theology and didn’t mind tampering with Scripture to do. The authors of the Scriptures were God’s servants; many copyists were, but not all.

God can preserve, the question is not whether he can, it is whether he did.

I tend to sense that describing the Scriptures as God-breathed and infallible will be faithful to Him and honest with the world, rather than trying to label it as inerrant and, thus, have to do the dance of explaining all the nuances.

And yet inerrancy gives us reason to believe infallibility.

But the inerrantist says God made sure the recorders of Scripture got it right in every single nuance with regards to history, science, archeology, etc. That’s a lot of superintending we need on God’s part. But God couldn’t supersede the grammatical inconsistencies of some of these writers?

Firstly it is not that hard when you are an eyewitness. And historical science and archaeology are modern fields which attempt to recreate the past, but they were living in it. They didn’t need to know pottery styles of the ages.

More importantly, history is an issue of fact, grammar isn’t factual like this. Word meanings, style and grammar changes. And if fact such variation in style proves authenticity. False historical data removes authenticity.

All I am pointing out is that this seems to add to the already exhausting list of trying to explain inerrancy. Infallibility seems to not need such explanations. We can continue to conclude His word is God-breathed, faithful, reliable and trustworthy and not have to explain the list of intricacies with inerrancy.

So do we stop defending the trinity and propose a single God? That would be a simpler concept to defend. Defend what you think is true, not what is simpler. And above you even admit your version is “not neat and nice.”

But inerrancy is really not too difficult a concept. It is certainly simpler than the incarnation, penal substitution, or the trinity.

It says the Bible is without error of fact.

Then an inerrancy sceptic says, “Well I explain this passage from the Watchtower translation”

“I mean the Bible in the original languages, clearly the translation here is questionable”

“Well what about this passage?”

“It is not in the original”

“Well the Bible says, ‘There is no God’ ”

“It is reporting the comment of a fool, not making a statement of truth. The Bible is not claiming the comments of all people it reports are truthful”

“Well Jesus says he is a door”

“That is a metaphor”

“So you are saying that inerrancy applies to the original languages, the original manuscripts, with application to context, and not including metaphors?”

“Yes”

“Seems like a lot of qualifications to me”

***
There is no end of exceptions that an inerrancy sceptic can raise. In fact for any topic there can always be a thousand qualifications.

But for the inerrantist, these aren’t qualifications that are added to inerrancy. They are implicit already in their mind.

So, what about the example I gave in post 17:

http://www.reclaimingthemind.org/blog/2009/07/a-possible-error-in-the-bible/comment-page-3/#comment-28797

Paul writes “just as it is written,” but when you examine what he then writes, you see it’s an amalgamation of Isaiah 28:16 and Isaiah 8:14 and does not conform perfectly either to the Hebrew text or the Greek text of those verses in wording or morphology.

I.e., it’s not “just as it is written.”

In fact, there is no place in the Old Testament where what Paul writes is written that way. This is not like Romans 3:10-18 where he strings together a series of verses one after the other. In Romans 9:33 he sandwiches in part of Isaiah 8:14 between the beginning and ending words of Isaiah 28:16 to change the meaning of Isaiah 28:16.

Is Paul’s statement “just as it is written” an error and/or is his citation/use of those verses in error or erroneous or improper or incorrect?

Dave Z,
Thanks for a thoughtful response. I think most of us are just trying to work out what really is the nature and extent of the infallibility of Scripture. And the challenges from different perspectives help us think through these issues. I don’t have time right now for much of a response myself, but I do have one thought. You wrote:

Of course, then we can debate whether it was word-for-word, as verbal plenary would seem to require, or conceptual, expressed by the writer in his own words

I just want to point out again that I have no problem with the writer expressing in his own words the concepts that God has given him. I think the only place in Scripture we have dictation would be “Thus saith the Lord” type prophecy. I would just clarify that the process of divine inspiration would keep the writer’s expression of God’s concept free from error—but still in their words utilizing their styles and expressions. (Consider it a divine Editor maybe.)

EricW,
If inerrancy and God-breathedness were not some of the criteria used to include a book, did the book become considered to be inerrant and God-breathed once it was included in the canon as Scripture?

I agree that a closer look at the criteria used to consider a writing canonical could be very helpful in this discussion. Obviously we wouldn’t be looking for the same terms we’re currently using, but seeking out the understanding that the early church had and how that best corresponds to our different understandings today.

ScottL,
Back in my days as a skeptic, I would have happily questioned why you could trust that Scripture is “God-breathed, faithful, reliable and trustworthy” if you can’t be completely sure of the manuscript copies. Sorry, but I think you’re in the same boat with the rest of us!

I, too, would like to read more about Dan Wallace’s take on this. I don’t have the time right now to dig it out—but Lisa’s a seminary student, so she should have plenty of time for that sort of thing, right? 🙂

BTW, Dave Z, I’d like to read more about Roger Olson’s understanding of “dynamic inspiration.” Could you point me to a source for that?

@Curt – I am thinking the citation is from Olson’s “Westminster Handbook to Evangelical Theology”, and is not originated by Olson, but is just documented by him.

Olson cites I. Howard Marshall and Clark Pinnock as being major proponents of the dynamic view, which is described as:

“On the one hand, God is the ultimate author of scripture, such that the product ultimately comes from him. On the other hand, it comes from him in various ways, including the human collection and editing of sources.”

The Pinnock book he cites is “The Scripture Principle”, and about it he says “Scripture is the product of both divine initiative and guidance through the people of God leading to the production of a normative text…”

I’m quite a novice and probably far too credulous on things, but my first reaction is that it sounds like common sense. BTW, I am halfway through Olson’s “Arminian Theology” right now and finding it to be excellent.

Dave wrote:

“I guess what I’m wondering is something like this – “Did God place into the mind of the writer what he wanted written?” (Of course, then we can debate whether it was word-for-word, as verbal plenary would seem to require, or conceptual, expressed by the writer in his own words) IOW, did God prompt Paul to give his opinion? “Paul, write this down.” Does it then have divine authority? What is the impact on our understanding and interpretation of Scripture if we believe some portions are merely the author’s opinon? OTOH, If they have divine authority, how does that play out?”

First, my understanding of verbal plenary is not so much word for word, but an expression of propositional thought utilizing human language. As Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 2:13, the Spirit is conveying spiritual thoughts for spiritual words. So utilizing the author’s own orchestration of words, as they are moved along by the Spirit as described in 2 Peter 1:20-21, the expression of propositional truth that is 100% conveyed by the Spirit is produced in such a way to reflect the author’s perspective. This ensures the propositional truth is error free but still gives merit to human authorship. The opinion, I believe, is shaped within the context of such inspiration by Paul, as an authorized agent to transmit God’s breathed out word, and therefore is no less authoritative, even though it is not a requirement. Or at least that is my take, anyway.

Then Dave wrote:

“My point with graphe is that is is less tightly focused than our term scripture. If I say “Scripture” in this discussion, I’m sure everyone thinks of a 66 book canon. But if I say writings, I may be including the Fathers or the apocrypha. “Scripture” has a specificity that “writings” does not have. When Paul says “writings” we don’t really know to what extent that applies – what writings did he have in mind? We seem to take it prophetically to mean our 66 book canon. But was the development of the canon inspired? How about the somewhat different canon of other Christian traditions? It seems extremely presumptous to take a hard line on that, but it goes to the heart of what is inspired and what is inerrant or infallible. We apply 2 Tim. 3:16 to OUR understanding of canon, which, again sounds like eisegesis.”

I have not gotten my hand’s on Dan Wallace’s article but Geisler and Nix support the fact that graphe in 2 Timothy 3:16 must be Scripture and not just writings. They write

“It is clear from the usage of this term that the locus of inspiration is in the written record rather than in the ideas or conepts or even oral expressions of the writer. Although the word graphe itself can have a more general usage than a canonical writing, nevertheless, the context clearly indicates that the entire Old Testament is in view…the term theopneustos is an adjective that belongs to a special class called “verbal adjectives”… to be con’t

Quote continued

“…It is grammatically possible to take theopneustos as descriptive of graphe…but there are reasons to reject this possibility in favor of the much better substantiated “All Scripture is inspired by God” [Geisler and Nix, A General Introduction to the Bible, p 35]

By this assertion, I take it to mean that graphe must have in fact referred to as the inspired authoritative writings from God Himself through the auspices of his authorized agents. In correction of what I said earlier, Paul was referring to the OT but does not negate applicability to Scripture in development at the time of the letter’s authorship.

And I am curious as to your question “But was the development of the canon inspired?”, in what sense do you mean? My understanding is that the canon was not developed but recognized as those writings that were considered legitimatly inspired by God. If by the process you mean the development of actual divine writings, I would say that inspiration also extends to the historical development of divine authorship through orchestration of events. Afterall, if God wanted to insure accurately conveying his revelation, would he not also superintend the entire process?

And Curt, sure I have time between the one summer class I’m taking, single parenting, working and assisting with writing small group curriculum…piece of cake 😉

Seriously, didn’t make it to the library as I’d hoped. But my goal is to get my hands on that article on Monday…hopefully.

Also to all, I apologize for the lack of formatting quotes. I need to figure out how the html codes work so I can properly distinguish quotes from my own writing. Any suggestions for html for dummies? Thank 🙂