Something I have thought of re. "Inerrancy"

[Baptist Believer]

Originally posted by Pastor Larry:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Baptist Believer:
God's word is contained in the context of words... Words by themselves do not carry all the meaning by themselves, but the context of the words joined together form the concepts and meaning which is the word of God.

Think of it this way, I can put every word in this post in alphabetical order, but it wouldn't make that much sense. But by placing words in a certain acceptable order, meaning is transmitted which goes beyond the words themselves.

While the texts we have may have errors here and there, the meaning of the message is not in error.

I agree with all of that, but none of it is the point with respect to inerrancy. </font>[/QUOTE]I disagree… I’ll explain why below.

The words, in their context, are the words that God inspired and are therefore inerrant with respect to anything they talk about.

Let me add that I substantially agree with your statement except to add that the words are fully reliable (a stronger phrase than “inerrant”) with respect to anything they are purposed to talk about.

Since, as you have agreed above, the concepts and meaning of the words in context are truly God’s word, then we must understand that the intent of the words is what is reliable (or “inerrant”), not words or concepts used in a faulty context.

The discussions of inerrancy do not center on hermeneutics (such as you are discussing here) but rather on theology.

I strongly disagree. Since the Bible is written communication from God to humankind, we must take into account the nature of the means of communication in order to make theological affirmations regarding the manner of inspiration and reliability.

This is an issue of theology, whether or not the Bible is true in what it says.

Actually, I don’t think this is really the main issue with many people who disagree. I fully affirm that the Bible is true in what it says – and so do many others who reject various theories of inerrancy. I reject inerrancy because it is too low of a view of scripture and is misguided in it’s method. The doctrine of inerrancy is a reaction against modernism that responded to modernism using the same faulty intellectual tools instead of challenging the rationalism and scientism of the era. I won’t be too critical of those saints who first affirmed inerrancy (I probably would have been one), because they were trying to communicate the reliability of God’s world to their corrupt culture. Today’s corrupt culture has rejected modernism and a newer and more accurate understanding of the reliability of scripture is needed.

The liberal/moderate position is qualified on that ... that the Bible is true when it speaks to matters of faith and doctrine, but not necessarily true when it speaks to other matters, such as history, scientific issues, etc.

Please don’t make generalizations regarding this issue because they won’t hold up very well.

The conservative position is that the Bible is true in whatever it talks about, that it tells the actual state of affairs.

I like what you said here although you may regret it as a poor choice of words:

“…the Bible is true in whatever it talks about…”

You have just affirmed my main point. The purpose of the text must be taken into consideration when we discuss issues of reliability.

This latter is the biblical position. That is what the discussion is about.'

Indeed! Now will someone please tell the Southern Baptist leadership that those who have rejected inerrancy are not necessarily “liberals”?

Your last line is true only in respect to copyist/scribal errors. The original documents from the pen of the author were without error in he whole and in the part.

Yes, but since we don’t have the original manuscripts, it makes little difference in practical terms. I fully affirm that the texts we have now are reliable.

I greatly appreciate the tone and attitude of your post. I think we can both learn some things with constructive discussions like these.

 

[Baptist Believer]

Originally posted by Artimaeus:
The plenary, verbal, inspiration of the scriptures is a clear cut definition. Every letter in every word in every book in the entire Bible (in the original languages) is exactly the letter, word, book, and Bible that God intended.

Then why didn’t God perfectly preserve every letter of the text throughout all the ages and present to us a text without blemish, variant readings and scribal errors?

We have a reliable text today, but we know that there are questionable portions of the text that is commonly accepted for faith and practice.

Inerrancy doesn't mean that God got the gist of what He wanted, the main point, or the useful "message" across.

That’s a distortion of what I was expressing about the message and the concepts being the written word of God. You seem to be imposing some sort of assumptions on what I am saying.

I have never heard any of the groups we are talking about claim that inerrancy means their doctrine is right. They usually claim their doctrine is right because they say this is what the Bible 'means".

Yes, but too often they claim that just because the other group does not accept their interpretation that they don’t “believe the Bible” and then attack the other group with the excuse of “inerrancy”. That’s been the history of the Southern Baptist Convention over the last 25 years.

Inerrancy itself does NOT mean that the "MESSAGE" is without error, it means that the words (even the letters) are without error.

…in the original manuscripts. (At least, that’s what most “inerrantists” believe).

Now if the words are without error then the "message" is also without error. You CANNOT have one without the other.

If the words are not in context, then the message is in error. The words themselves cannot carry inspiration without context.

Originally posted by Baptist Believer:

God's word is contained in the context of words... Words by themselves do not carry all the meaning by themselves, but the context of the words joined together form the concepts and meaning which is the word of God.

The concept that God inspired the "message" and the words aren't also inspired is a denial of the inspiration of scripture. Paul made a big deal about whether a word was plural or not.

I never said that the words are not part of what is inspired. But words themselves are inadequate without context. And please tone down the accusations of my alleged “denial of the inspiration of scripture”. You allegation is based on a faulty assumption and is a faulty conclusion.

Gal 3:16 Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ.

Without the message the words are meaningless… but, without the words, the message is meaningless

Hmmm… Do you realize that by placing inspiration on the words in the original languages that you are saying here that the only way the message can be expressed is through the original words?

Of course, I don’t think that’s what you mean to say.

Can I tell the gospel story without using the exact words of Jesus, the gospel writers, and the Bible and still faithfully present the message and truth of God?

Think about that before you answer.

If you say yes, then you actually believe that the gospel transcends the words in our Bible. If you say no, then you have discounted all of the translations of the biblical texts.

…also because I can say it means anything I want to, just as many are doing with the word inerrancy.

This is probably a good time to agree upon a definition.

Is this acceptable?

Inerrancy – Without error, non-errant. In Christianity, inerrancy states that the Bible, in its original documents, is without error regarding facts, names, dates, and any other revealed information. Inerrancy does not extend to the copies of the biblical manuscripts.

Reference: http://www.carm.org/dictionary/dic_i-k.htm#Inerrancy

 

[Pastor Larry]

Originally posted by Baptist Believer:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />The words, in their context, are the words that God inspired and are therefore inerrant with respect to anything they talk about.

Let me add that I substantially agree with your statement except to add that the words are fully reliable (a stronger phrase than “inerrant”) with respect to anything they are purposed to talk about.

Since, as you have agreed above, the concepts and meaning of the words in context are truly God’s word, then we must understand that the intent of the words is what is reliable (or “inerrant”), not words or concepts used in a faulty context.</font>[/QUOTE]I sense, with the qualifications that you are giving, that we are far apart on this issue. I do agree that the "intent" of the words is reliable, but I think that is too weak a word. A newspaper account may be reliable, but that is not the same as "inerrant. If someone misdefines or misunderstands a word, that does not compromise the inerrancy of the text. The text is still inerrant; it is the person who is at fault.

The limitation of "purpose" is somewhat of a slippery eel, it seems to me. While I am a firm believer in the single meaning of authorial intent hermeneutic, I can't see that this is the best way to characterize it. Whatever is included is included for a "purpose." There are no extraneous or unnecessary words, allusions, illustrations, or references. All that it records is true.

I strongly disagree. Since the Bible is written communication from God to humankind, we must take into account the nature of the means of communication in order to make theological affirmations regarding the manner of inspiration and reliability.

I am not sure I follow you here. This sounds like what some others have said, i.e., that becuase man wrote it, it may indeed have some errors due to his lack of knowledge or understanding. That is a distinction that I cannot buy. But I don't know if that is what you meant. Again, I believe that Scripture is true in whatever it says. That does not necessarily mean precise or clear. We should not read modern day precision and knowledge back on the Scripture and claim the Scriptures are wrong because they word it in a different way. I fear that is too often done.

I reject inerrancy because it is too low of a view of scripture and is misguided in it’s method. The doctrine of inerrancy is a reaction against modernism that responded to modernism using the same faulty intellectual tools instead of challenging the rationalism and scientism of the era. I won’t be too critical of those saints who first affirmed inerrancy (I probably would have been one), because they were trying to communicate the reliability of God’s world to their corrupt culture. Today’s corrupt culture has rejected modernism and a newer and more accurate understanding of the reliability of scripture is needed.

I understand what you are saying. However, I can't see that inerrancy is too low a view. I am not sure how it gets any higher. I am not sure how a newer and more accurate understanding of the reliability of Scripture can be found. Something is either true, or it is not. IMO, what we need is a return to the authority of Scripture.

There have been many who have abused this authority. But that was an abuse of it, not a recognition of it. We must maintain that difference (which is related to what this thread began over).

We also need a healthy dose of legitimate application, something far too often missing all across the theological spectrum. The right/conservative side tends not to give enough application; the left/liberal side tends to give illegitimate application because they miss the point and authority of the text. (See below on generalizations). Neither is acceptable.

Please don’t make generalizations regarding this issue because they won’t hold up very well.

I realize my comments were simplistics. They are called generalizations becuase they give the general views. I think on that basis they stand, although there is admittedly a spectrum from one end to the other. I realize not all are gathered on either end.

You have just affirmed my main point. The purpose of the text must be taken into consideration when we discuss issues of reliability.

Perhaps you can explain more in depth exactly what you mean by this. I am not following you with it.

Indeed! Now will someone please tell the Southern Baptist leadership that those who have rejected inerrancy are not necessarily “liberals”?

Someone who is a southern Baptist would have to do that. However, I think they would have a hard time making the case. The liberals certainly haven't down well making their own case and they know exactly what the believe. How will a critic make a better case for it??

I fully affirm that the texts we have now are reliable.

As do I. And this is a place where I would be comfortable with the term reliable.0

I greatly appreciate the tone and attitude of your post. I think we can both learn some things with constructive discussions like these.

I appreciate your tone as well. Hopefully this will continue to be productive.

 

[Paul of Eugene]

I can honestly say I think the Bible is inerrant when properly interpreted. But to me that is kind of a cop out.

We all see instances where two people take the same verses and insist they mean different things. Examples abound all over this board.

So what's the point of saying that?

There comes a time when we find ourselves adopting a strained interpretation in order to preserve inerrancy. Sure we can do that. Is that honest? How many examples of doing that does it take before we concede perhaps we're merely rationalizing?

When one of us stands in the pulpit and proclaims the Word of God are we granted inerrancy? Doesn't God inspire preachers to preach the right thing, even tho we don't view them as inerrant?

When a translator translates scriptures to the best of his ability and publishes the result, don't we generally refuse to call the result inerrant? Instead, we study alternate translations, the greek, the hebrew, and attempt to discern the best translation we can for ourselves, the best insight we can gain.

When an editor compiles a greek text of the new testament, is he granted inerrancy? We generally think not; we generally consider his honest efforts to choose between alternate readings a worthwhile task, we pray for God to help him, we don't call him inerrant, even as we commend him for his scholarship and use his work as our biblical text.

When a copyist of olden days prepared a new manuscript did God grant him inerrancy as he copied? The variations in the manuscripts that have come down to us bear testimony He did not grant that, even though we can tell they did a very good job.

The inerrancy we generally claim is for the original manuscripts only. Since they are lost to us, it is perhaps a moot point to make that claim. It is perhaps even a strange thing to insist on if, like so many of us, we concede all the other links in the chain of our revelation do not rise to the level of inerrancy.

If person A believes God inspired men who did a great job but not necessarily an inerrant job of recording the original manuscript, and person B believes God inspired men who did an inerrant job of recording the original manuscript, but both concede the original happens to be lost, what is the practical difference between these two views?

 

[Johnv]

We all see instances where two people take the same verses and insist they mean different things. Examples abound all over this board.

I think part of that is also attributable to the fact that the Bible speaks to each person individually through the Holy Spirit within each person. That's what makes the Bible the Living Word. Sure, we can debate what the Bible says, but too often, we debate what the Bible says to us individually. There's no reason for us to debate that.

 

[Artimaeus]

Originally posted by Baptist Believer
Then why didn’t God perfectly preserve every letter of the text throughout all the ages and present to us a text without blemish, variant readings and scribal errors?

Could be any number of reasons including the fact that people would worship the "relic" ala the Shroud of Torin, but that has nothing to do with the fact that it was minutely inspired in the original.

We have a reliable text today, but we know that there are questionable portions of the text that is commonly accepted for faith and practice.

Reliability is a good thing but without inerrancy we have no idea what it is reliable with.

That’s a distortion of what I was expressing about the message and the concepts being the written word of God. You seem to be imposing some sort of assumptions on what I am saying.

I may very well be mistaken but, there seems to be a dicotomy being made between the words and the message as though these two were separate things. It is the words that convey the message. That is the purpose in stringing together words in a certain order, to convey a thought. It seems that some (maybe not you in particular) are saying that there is a message, thought, concept, idea, etc. which is the "real" word of God, and that the particular words used to convey that thought are not themselves inspired, just the thought behind them. This, to me, is a denial of inspiration, since inspiration means that He inspired the words as well as the thought.

If the words are not in context, then the message is in error. The words themselves cannot carry inspiration without context.

But that's just it, the words ARE in context. It is ONLY the words that can carry inspiration because it is ONLY the words that were recorded, and it is ONLY the words that we can read. God intended that we receive the message. The words are the building blocks and the foundation and the medium to carry those thoughts. If the words aren't inerrant then neither is the thought. You cannot get inerrant thoughts from errant words.

Hmmm… Do you realize that by placing inspiration on the words in the original languages that you are saying here that the only way the message can be expressed is through the original words?

Of course, I don’t think that’s what you mean to say. [Big Grin]

I am saying that the only way the message can be expressed "inerrantly" is through the original words. It can be expressed "reliably" through translation, of course, but not inerrantly, hence the expression, "in the original languages".

Can I tell the gospel story without using the exact words of Jesus, the gospel writers, and the Bible and still faithfully present the message and truth of God?

Think about that before you answer.

If you say yes, then you actually believe that the gospel transcends the words in our Bible. If you say no, then you have discounted all of the translations of the biblical texts.

Can you tell it as well? No (It was inerrant)
Can you tell it well enough? Yes (Ours are reliable)

Is this acceptable?

Inerrancy – Without error, non-errant. In Christianity, inerrancy states that the Bible, in its original documents, is without error regarding facts, names, dates, and any other revealed information. Inerrancy does not extend to the copies of the biblical manuscripts.

Inerrancy – Without error, non-errant. In Christianity, inerrancy states that the Bible, in its original documents, is without error. Inerrancy does not extend to the copies of the biblical manuscripts. (or translations either)

I will not accept any qualifiers. It is without errors (period). No mispellings, no juxtaposition of letters, no extra words, not unneccessary words, not one word too few, no words which did not precisely fit the context, etc.

I intended no personal attack on you, Baptist Believer, I am just responding to a concept as set forth in these discussions, after all, my efforts are certainly not inerrant.

 

[Artimaeus]

Originally posted by Johnv:
We all see instances where two people take the same verses and insist they mean different things. Examples abound all over this board.

I think part of that is also attributable to the fact that the Bible speaks to each person individually through the Holy Spirit within each person. That's what makes the Bible the Living Word. Sure, we can debate what the Bible says, but too often, we debate what the Bible says to us individually. There's no reason for us to debate that.

One verse can, indeed, have several applications to different people and can, at times, elicit different responses at different times to the same person.

There is very little significant debate as to what it says, generally the debate is on what it means. If I says it means "A" and you say it means "B", we both might be right (or both wrong) but, if I say it means "A" and your say it means "NOT A" then at least one of us is wrong. This is where the emotional debate comes it.