Inerrant in the original autographs

[IveyLeaguer]

Then let's go back to a worldview that is neither pomo or mo. The Puritan worldview is a good one for starters.

Certainty is not peculiar to modernism, BTW. When I read the Prophets, Jesus and the Apostles, I sense a good amount of certainty from them. And they weren't modernists.

Surely the church would be better off today with a Puritan worldview, and so would society. Both Modernism and Postmodernism are characterized by a refusal to accept what Gods says, to accept the scriptures as they really are, and a desire and willingness to place our own moral judgment on a par with God's. This is the core of liberalism, the ongoing critical attack upon God's Word for the past 150+ years now. And a good example of why inerrancy is important.

BTW, Baptist Believer, most of the Christians I have met over the years are not KJVO and do not hold to the extreme view of inerrancy you describe, and I certainly don't. But I'm sure the extremists exist. The holding of inerrancy is not extreme, however, regardless of its superficial history. It's unreasonable to think the Puritans or the Second Century Church, for that matter, considered the original Autographs errant.

Much of the confusion about inerrancy arises, IMHO, from the inability of people to separate translation difficulties from interpretation problems. Translation issues, on the whole, don't contaminate the Autographs as just about everybody in the thread has indicated, and MSS issues don't rob the best versions of integrity either, as a number of scholars here on the board have pointed out at great length. Yet the majority of the 100+ versions of the English Bible are flawed, some seriously, and the primary culprit is the interpretation and/or manipulation of men. The remnant at the top, the best English versions available, all suffer from inherent translation issues - God saw to that at the Tower of Babel - but are mostly free of interpretative issues. God has preserved His Word.

So you have bonafide versions of the Word of God that maintain its integrity at one end of the spectrum - such as the KJV & NASB - and manipulated, leavened versions contaminated by men at the other - such as the TNIV & The Message. And, of course, most confusing of all, a group of versions with varying degrees and combinations of both of those factors.

 

[Baptist Believer]

I'm too snowed under with responsibilities today to respond in a timely fashion, so I'll have to leave the conversation until tomorrow.

In the meantime, here's an article that does a decent job expressing many of my concerns:

http://www.txbc.org/2000Journals/May2000/May00inerrancydefi.htm

 

[Marcia]

Marcia,

A few questions:

1. How do you know that they are actually copies of the originals? Have you evern seen an original?

2. How do you know that the copies of the originals are close enough to show where there are scribal errors or other variances? Have you ever seen an original?

3. How can you make any determination about the copy without ever seeing the original?

No one has seen an original. Originals have never been found (I've read this in my bibliology book by Norman Geisler, heard it from my pastor, read it in other books, etc.).

If you find a few thousand documents that are essentially the same except with very few differences, you can usually tell what the mistakes are. This is how the text of the Bible has been determined by scholars. Have you not ever studied textual criticism or how it's done?

Out of a total of 75 copies, we have:
My grandmother sewed large white and blue shawls (67 copies)

My grandmother sewed white and bue shawls (5 copies)

My grandmother sewed orange shawls (3 copies)

(Missppelling in 2nd one on purpose) Why do you think there are variances in the numbers in some OT books? Probably scribal errors in copying. We don't have a perfect way to deterimine all this, but can tell a lot of the scribal errors this way. And none of the variances effect major doctrines.

It's not just faith, it's evidence and you can read up on how this is done.

A good place is the link I gave before -- not just that link but that site. The NET Bible discusses a lot of these variances and the pro and con arguments for which ones to use and the various translation disagreements that come up as well.

 

[Marcia]

The position which I am criticizing is that which states that the autographs were perfectly inerrant but the manuscripts we have now may contain some scribal errors. That position is born out of a desire to still claim absolute word for word inerrancy while still acknowledging differing manuscript readings.

That, taken to its conclusion, means that our bibles today are not inerrant - if only the originals were inerrant. What would be the point? The fact that we have a great deal of small differences between manuscripts suggests that those differences do not constitute error.

God did see fit to use people to transmit the scriptures. And He did see fit to use human language. The state of inerrancy of a scripture relates to its meaning and what the Spirit will write on the heart of the believer who reads it - not on the presence of absence of a word here or there.

I think Doc C's use of "infallible" is to be preferred over term "inerrant".

I see your point, Charles, but I also have no problem with saying the original autographs are inerrant but there are scribal errors. I have to respond quite often to agnostics, atheists, satanists, wiccans, New Agers and others coming to my website who attack the veracity of the Bible. I've also had to answer these kind of questions when I do public speaking, so I've had to be prepared.

I've had to learn that responding this way is best because it is, I believe, the most honest. These people who email me bring up issues such as the variances in a number or name (as well as other things which are different but can be answered).

I also believe there is an objective meaning in the text itself for everyone, not just what "the Spirit writes on our heart." The Bible has one meaning but many applications.

 

[Joseph_Botwinick]

No one has seen an original. Originals have never been found (I've read this in my bibliology book by Norman Geisler, heard it from my pastor, read it in other books, etc.).

If you find a few thousand documents that are essentially the same except with very few differences, you can usually tell what the mistakes are. This is how the text of the Bible has been determined by scholars. Have you not ever studied textual criticism or how it's done?

Out of a total of 75 copies, we have:
My grandmother sewed large white and blue shawls (67 copies)

My grandmother sewed white and bue shawls (5 copies)

My grandmother sewed orange shawls (3 copies)

(Missppelling in 2nd one on purpose) Why do you think there are variances in the numbers in some OT books? Probably scribal errors in copying. We don't have a perfect way to deterimine all this, but can tell a lot of the scribal errors this way. And none of the variances effect major doctrines.

It's not just faith, it's evidence and you can read up on how this is done.

A good place is the link I gave before -- not just that link but that site. The NET Bible discusses a lot of these variances and the pro and con arguments for which ones to use and the various translation disagreements that come up as well.

Sorry to tell you this, but your so called evidence only holds up if you start from a point of faith, because you do not have the original to compare the copies to. You don't even know if the copies are from the original that you claim to be inerrant. You take that by faith alone.

Joseph Botwinick

 

[IveyLeaguer]

... here's an article that does a decent job expressing many of my concerns:

http://www.txbc.org/2000Journals/May2000/May00inerrancydefi.htm

I enjoyed reading the article and agree with its primary conclusion, though I'm not sure I accept its premise. For everyone's edification, and in the interest of good discussion, here are the concluding articles of the 1978 Chicago Statement of Biblical Inerrancy that Baptist Believer is referring to. I think it's noteworthy that both Norman Geisler (free-will) and R.C.Sproul (calvinist) were key players of the 300 scholars involved in this work.

The entire document can be found here: http://www.bible-researcher.com/chicago1.html

Chicago Statement of Biblical Inerrancy​

Articles of Affirmation and Denial​

Article I.
WE AFFIRM that the Holy Scriptures are to be received as the authoritative Word of God.
WE DENY that the Scriptures receive their authority from the Church, tradition, or any other human source.

Article II.
WE AFFIRM that the Scriptures are the supreme written norm by which God binds the conscience, and that the authority of the Church is subordinate to that of Scripture.
WE DENY that Church creeds, councils, or declarations have authority greater than or equal to the authority of the Bible.

Article III.
WE AFFIRM that the written Word in its entirety is revelation given by God.
WE DENY that the Bible is merely a witness to revelation, or only becomes revelation in encounter, or depends on the responses of men for its validity.

Article IV.
WE AFFIRM that God who made mankind in His image has used language as a means of revelation.
WE DENY that human language is so limited by our creatureliness that it is rendered inadequate as a vehicle for divine revelation. We further deny that the corruption of human culture and language through sin has thwarted God's work of inspiration.

Article V.
WE AFFIRM that God's revelation within the Holy Scriptures was progressive.
WE DENY that later revelation, which may fulfill earlier revelation, ever corrects or contradicts it. We further deny that any normative revelation has been given since the completion of the New Testament writings.

Article VI.
WE AFFIRM that the whole of Scripture and all its parts, down to the very words of the original, were given by divine inspiration.
WE DENY that the inspiration of Scripture can rightly be affirmed of the whole without the parts, or of some parts but not the whole.

Article VII.
WE AFFIRM that inspiration was the work in which God by His Spirit, through human writers, gave us His Word. The origin of Scripture is divine. The mode of divine inspiration remains largely a mystery to us.
WE DENY that inspiration can be reduced to human insight, or to heightened states of consciousness of any kind.

Article VIII.
WE AFFIRM that God in His work of inspiration utilized the distinctive personalities and literary styles of the writers whom He had chosen and prepared.
WE DENY that God, in causing these writers to use the very words that He chose, overrode their personalities.

Article IX.
WE AFFIRM that inspiration, though not conferring omniscience, guaranteed true and trustworthy utterance on all matters of which the Biblical authors were moved to speak and write.
WE DENY that the finitude or fallenness of these writers, by necessity or otherwise, introduced distortion or falsehood into God's Word.

Article X.
WE AFFIRM that inspiration, strictly speaking, applies only to the autographic text of Scripture, which in the providence of God can be ascertained from available manuscripts with great accuracy. We further affirm that copies and translations of Scripture are the Word of God to the extent that they faithfully represent the original.
WE DENY that any essential element of the Christian faith is affected by the absence of the autographs. We further deny that this absence renders the assertion of Biblical inerrancy invalid or irrelevant.

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 XII.
WE AFFIRM that Scripture in its entirety is inerrant, being free from all falsehood, fraud, or deceit.
WE DENY that Biblical infallibility and inerrancy are limited to spiritual, religious, or redemptive themes, exclusive of assertions in the fields of history and science. We further deny that scientific hypotheses about earth history may properly be used to overturn the teaching of Scripture on creation and the flood.

Article XIII.
WE AFFIRM the propriety of using inerrancy as a theological term with reference to the complete truthfulness of Scripture.
WE DENY that it is proper to evaluate Scripture according to standards of truth and error that are alien to its usage or purpose. We further deny that inerrancy is negated by Biblical phenomena such as a lack of modern technical precision, irregularities of grammar or spelling, observational descriptions of nature, the reporting of falsehoods, the use of hyperbole and round numbers, the topical arrangement of material, variant selections of material in parallel accounts, or the use of free citations.

Article XIV.
WE AFFIRM the unity and internal consistency of Scripture.
WE DENY that alleged errors and discrepancies that have not yet been resolved vitiate the truth claims of the Bible.

Article XV.
WE AFFIRM that the doctrine of inerrancy is grounded in the teaching of the Bible about inspiration.
WE DENY that Jesus' teaching about Scripture may be dismissed by appeals to accommodation or to any natural limitation of His humanity.

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 XVII.
WE AFFIRM that the Holy Spirit bears witness to the Scriptures, assuring believers of the truthfulness of God's written Word.
WE DENY that this witness of the Holy Spirit operates in isolation from or against Scripture.

Article XVIII.
WE AFFIRM that the text of Scripture is to be interpreted by grammatico-historical exegesis, taking account of its literary forms and devices, and that Scripture is to interpret Scripture.
WE DENY the legitimacy of any treatment of the text or quest for sources lying behind it that leads to relativizing, dehistoricizing, or discounting its teaching, or rejecting its claims to authorship.

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.

 

[Marcia]

Sorry to tell you this, but your so called evidence only holds up if you start from a point of faith, because you do not have the original to compare the copies to. You don't even know if the copies are from the original that you claim to be inerrant. You take that by faith alone.

Joseph Botwinick

The manuscripts were clearly copies of something since they all say essentially the same thing. I think that's pretty much a given.

True, there is no original that has been found (and probably a good thing, too, as then people could say it was tampered with and there is no "pure" original) but my point was that we could tell what the original says based on the copies. The copies themselves give evidence that there is an original.

John Wenham asks why it is that, in spite of the "great diversity" in our copies, the texts are still relativity homogeneous. He responds, "The only satisfactory answer seems to be that its homogeneity stems from an exceedingly early text-virtually, that is, from the autographs."5 The resulting text is 99.99 percent accurate, and the remaining questions do not affect any area of cardinal Christian doctrine.
http://www.apologetics.com/default.jsp?bodycontent=/articles/historical_apologetics/habermas-nt.html

 

[IveyLeaguer]

Sorry to tell you this, but your so called evidence only holds up if you start from a point of faith, because you do not have the original to compare the copies to. You don't even know if the copies are from the original that you claim to be inerrant. You take that by faith alone.

Proof, or evidence, is not limited to the physical or tangible realm alone. Hopefully this thread will get somewhere and cover some of that. As Marcia said, you can read about it. One example is above, in Article X of the Chicago Statement.

 

[Marcia]

Does anyone question Shakespeare, Caesar's writings, Homer, etc. - yet we have no originals for them. But nobody is saying we need "faith" to believe their writings are real and based on originals.

Julius Caesar's The Gallic Wars (10 manuscripts remain, with the earliest one dating to 1,000 years after the original autograph); Pliny the Younger's Natural History (7 manuscripts; 750 years elapsed); Thucydides' History (8 manuscripts; 1,300 years elapsed); Herodotus' History (8 manuscripts; 1,350 years elapsed); Plato (7 manuscripts; 1,300 years); and Tacitus' Annals (20 manuscripts; 1,000 years). 6

Renowned Bible scholar F.F. Bruce declares:

• There is no body of ancient literature in the world which enjoys such a wealth of good textual attestation as the New Testament. 7

Homer's Iliad, the most renowned book of ancient Greece, is the second best-preserved literary work of all antiquity, with 643 copies of manuscript support discovered to date. In those copies, there are 764 disputed lines of text, as compared to 40 lines in all the New Testament manuscripts. 8 In fact, many people are unaware that there are no surviving manuscripts of any of William Shakespeare's 37 plays (written in the 1600's), and scholars have been forced to fill some gaps in his works
http://www.allaboutthejourney.org/bible-manuscripts.htm

Also see
http://people.clemson.edu/~sf/books/apology/Chapter4.html
http://www.carm.org/evidence/textualevidence.htm

 

[Joseph_Botwinick]

Proof, or evidence, is not limited to the physical or tangible realm alone. Hopefully this thread will get somewhere and cover some of that. As Marcia said, you can read about it. One example is above, in Article X of the Chicago Statement.

Ivy,

I wholeheartedly subscribe to the CSI, and am in fact, currently re-reading a book by RC Sproul on the inerrancy of Scripture where he gives a detailed commentary on each point of the document called "Scripture Alone: The Evangelical Doctrine". Stating that it is by faith alone that we accept the Scripture as inerrant in no way disagrees with Article X.

Joseph Botwinick

 

[Joseph_Botwinick]

The manuscripts were clearly copies of something since they all say essentially the same thing. I think that's pretty much a given.

Marcia,

I don't disagree that they are copies of something. That is obvious. That they are copies of ultimately the original autographs of Scripture is taken by faith since we do not have the original to compare it to.

Joseph Botwinick

 

[Joseph_Botwinick]

Does anyone question Shakespeare, Caesar's writings, Homer, etc. - yet we have no originals for them. But nobody is saying we need "faith" to believe their writings are real and based on originals.



Also see
http://people.clemson.edu/~sf/books/apology/Chapter4.html
http://www.carm.org/evidence/textualevidence.htm
[/size]

1. To an extent, whether you are to admit it or not, without an orginal autograph of something, you are taking it as faith that the copies are from Shakespeare, Ceaser, etc...

2. People don't talk about taking the above literature by faith because none of those writings claim to be the Word of God, and therefore, don't matter as much.

Joseph Botwinick

 

[IveyLeaguer]

Joseph Botwinick:

I wholeheartedly subscribe to the CSI, and am in fact, currently re-reading a book by RC Sproul on the inerrancy of Scripture where he gives a detailed commentary on each point of the document called "Scripture Alone: The Evangelical Doctrine". Stating that it is by faith alone that we accept the Scripture as inerrant in no way disagrees with Article X.

No, I see what you mean. But it is important to note that 'faith alone' is not the only way to apprehend Biblical inerrancy. Physical evidence and logic can be major players in the quest, and often are, as Article X suggests.

 

[Marcia]

1. To an extent, whether you are to admit it or not, without an orginal autograph of something, you are taking it as faith that the copies are from Shakespeare, Ceaser, etc...

2. People don't talk about taking the above literature by faith because none of those writings claim to be the Word of God, and therefore, don't matter as much.

<Side note: I see this new format automatically removes quotes when you quote a post which really keeps down the length of posts! :thumbs: >

I can see your point, Joseph. I still wouldn't say though, that's it all a matter of faith. I think it is reasonable to deduce from the evidence of many manuscript copies that an original existed. It's deductive thinking, using reason and logic, which I think God expects us to use.

Faith does comes in as far as whether to believe it is the word of God or not.

 

[IveyLeaguer]

What does everyone think about liberalism and inerrancy? Is there a solid connection?

Liberalism of all kinds pretty much requires rejection of a straight-up interpretation of the Scriptures, but are most liberals offended by the idea of inerrancy?

 

[Pipedude]

Earlier posts have objected to "inerrancy" as a modern theological misstep. In truth, it is a modern word for what God's people have always believed about revelation and inspiration. The word became necessary because apostates within the churches were muddying the water with weaselisms.

The most enlightening book I've read on this topic, and I've read several, is Stewart Custer's Does Inspiration Demand Inerrancy?.

 

[John of Japan]

Earlier posts have objected to "inerrancy" as a modern theological misstep. In truth, it is a modern word for what God's people have always believed about revelation and inspiration. The word became necessary because apostates within the churches were muddying the water with weaselisms.

The most enlightening book I've read on this topic, and I've read several, is Stewart Custer's Does Inspiration Demand Inerrancy?.

Well said, Pipedude. Custer's book is a good one. And as he says, theopneustos ("God-breathed," 2 Tim. 3:16) inspiration does demand inerrancy.

Even evangelicals who reject Fundamentalism agree on this. Francis Schaeffer, in commenting on the inerrancy statement of the Lausanne Covenant as far back as 1976, when this controversy was just beginning, made inerrancy the sine qua non of Evangelicalism. In other words, to this great theologian cum philosopher, if you don't believe in inerrancy you are not an evangelical. Call yourself something else.

"Holding to a strong view of Scripture or not holding to it is the watershed of the evangelical world. The first direction in which we must face is to say most lovingly but clearly: Evangelicalism is not consistently evangelical unless there is a line drawn between those who take a full view of Scripture and those who do not" (No Final Conflict, p. 13).

"There is the danger of evangelicalism becoming less than evangelical, of its not really holding to the Bible as being without error in all that it affirms. We are then left with the victory of the existential methodology (neo-orthodoxy--JOJ) under the name of evangelicalism. Holding to a strong view of Scripture or not holding to it is the watershed of the evangelical world" (ibid, 48).

 

[Dave]

Innerancy is essential to a proper understanding of scripture as well. Those who don't believe in innerancy can argue almost anything by throwing away certain scriptures that "must be in error".

Is it too much to believe that God would preserve His word through the ages? Particularly when we see all the manuscript evidence that we have.

So yes it is a matter of faith, and also evidence. It is also an essential doctrine of the Christian faith. Heresy comes from not accepting the innerancy of scripture.

 

[John of Japan]

Innerancy is essential to a proper understanding of scripture as well. Those who don't believe in innerancy can argue almost anything by throwing away certain scriptures that "must be in error".

Is it too much to believe that God would preserve His word through the ages? Particularly when we see all the manuscript evidence that we have.

So yes it is a matter of faith, and also evidence. It is also an essential doctrine of the Christian faith. Heresy comes from not accepting the innerancy of scripture.

Well said, Dave. :thumbs: And that is why it the doctrine is the sine qua non of evangelical/fundamental Christianity. If you don't believe in inerrancy you have started down the proverbial slippery slope, and have no solid place left to stand.

 

[IveyLeaguer]

Pipedude, JoJ, Dave, Marcia:

Good posts. Very clear and well expressed. Good references.

Pipedude: Earlier posts have objected to "inerrancy" as a modern theological misstep. In truth, it is a modern word for what God's people have always believed about revelation and inspiration. The word became necessary because apostates within the churches were muddying the water with weaselisms.

Weaselisms. :laugh: What a great description. I love that.

And I would say the current apostate church stands on the shoulders of the apostates you describe.

Dave: (Inerrancy) is also an essential doctrine of the Christian faith ...

Agreed.

John of Japan: Well said, Dave. And that is why it the doctrine is the sine qua non of evangelical/fundamental Christianity. If you don't believe in inerrancy you have started down the proverbial slippery slope, and have no solid place left to stand.

Yes, I couldn't say it any better. I wonder if you guys (generic :flower: - you too, Marcia, you're one of us) can find any weakness in the following thought process. It's late and this is fast, but I really wanna know what ya'll think:

Voluminous manuscript evidence points to inerrancy in the original autographs. Logic itself, in any number of ways, also points to and demands inerrancy.

For instance, the scriptures claim to be inspired and authored by God the Holy Ghost. If that is true, then either the sciptures are inerrant in the originals, or God had nothing to do with the original autographs, in which case we should trash our Bibles and all the extra-Biblical material that is dependent upon them. That is to say, it is impossible, by definition, for God to lie or err, and therefore impossible for Him to inspire error, for if He did He would cease to be God, which is impossible. The claim of inspiration itself demands God's ability to carry out His authorship of the original autographs using human vessels. Hence, if God had anything AT ALL to do with the Bible, logic demands that the original autographs are, again by definition, inerrant.

So there is no middle ground here. If the originals contain one, single error, then by definition God cannot be the Author of them and further, had nothing to do with them, in which case the Bible is a fraud. An argument can be made that God has not preserved His Word, but no argument can be made against original inerrancy while simultaneously associating God with the scriptures. Further, there is no preservation argument possible without inerrancy, for without inerrancy there is nothing to preserve.

Finally, the same voluminous evidence, physical and otherwise, points to God's preservation of His Word, including various translations and versions, to the extent that they represent the original MSS.