On inerrancy

by John Norton

I

cannot accept that the Bible is inerrant, by any plain meaning of that word. I take inerrant to mean “without error.” The Bible cannot be said to be inerrant, either in its original or copied or translated form.

This is not to say that the Bible is uninspired. The Bible was inspired (enthused, stimulated, stirred, moved, motivated) in its creation. It continues to be inspired and inspire as it is read by faithful readers today.

I am not a biblical scholar but it became obvious to me as a young adult that the Bible is full of contradictions, internal problems or errors. Therefore it is not inerrant.

Some problems in the Bible can only be explained by accepting that errors were made in the copying of the Bible as it was passed down from generation to generation during ancient and medieval times. Some of these copying errors were unintentional and others were intentional. Some of these changes are innocuous but others more significant.

Other errors can only be explained by tracing back to the authors and admitting that the authors made mistakes. Again, some of these errors or mistakes are innocuous but others more significant.

With respect to its translated form in English, anyone with knowledge of more than one language will understand how ridiculous it is to speak about an “inerrant” translation of anything. Translations from the Greek to modern languages do not just substitute one word for another. The process is more like an art than a science and some translations are more literal with respect to words while others focus on the meaning of a sentence or paragraph. All translators have agendas and most, if not all, translations bear the marks of their translator’s agenda in greater or less degree.

I don’t intend to write a book here and attempt to prove my conclusions. But, as illustrations, here are a couple examples:

1. Example of text added to complete the story

The most ancient Greek manuscripts do not contain Mark 16:9-20. This fact is now accepted even by most conservative scholars and is noted in the margin in the New International Version.

So who added the text of verses 9-20, and why? No one knows for certain, but (most) scholars accept the theory that is most plausible, namely that someone wrote in the ending of Mark because they recognized that it was deficient without it.

Consider how Mark 16 ends if verse 8 is accepted as the original ending: the women run to the tomb and an angel tells them that Jesus is risen and that they should go tell the disciples but, instead, the women are afraid and flee and tell no one. The end. Nothing here about the male disciples finding out and in fact verse 8 says that the women tell no one. And there are no stories here about Jesus being seen by many people or appearing to anyone at all. Jesus is simply missing.

So scholars suggest that early Christians, recognizing the deficiencies in Mark, tried to fix it by adding the ending that appears in verses 9-20. This added ending made it into the Medieval texts and through into the King James Version of the English Bible. The result is that many of our forebears thought that these verses were as “original” as any other part of Mark’s gospel. Some have taken verses 17-18 literally and tried to pick up snakes as proof of their faith.

Can it be said then that verses 9-20 are inerrant? And can it even be said that the ending of Mark 16 at verse 8 is the inerrant version? Did we lose the original ending? Or was an ending never written and why? Perhaps the ending was not written because the author died or got distracted before completing it. Or perhaps it was not written because the author did not know any more of the story.

2. An innocuous example of what is probably just an error by the original author

In Mark 2:26 it states that, “In the days of Abiathar the high priest, [David] entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread…” However, a review of the Old Testament reveals that Abiathar’s father, Ahimelech, was the high priest at the time David entered the Temple and ate the bread.

So why the error? A conservative commentary I have states, in attempting to explain how both could be correct, that Mark must have had some unique insight into the history of Israel that is not known in the Old Testament, and further that both persons must have been co-high priests at the time.

Sure, anything is possible. But most scholars today would accept that the author of Mark 2:26 just got it wrong. He probably thought he knew it and just got the father’s name mixed up with the son’s name. He got it wrong.

Innocuous? Yes.

Inerrant? No.

3. An example of an intentional change made with an agenda, detected and reversed

Acts 17:4 states that some Thessalonian Jews were persuaded to join Paul and Silas along with a large number of gentiles and “not a few prominent women.” In the Middle Ages, transcripts were changed to read “wives” instead of prominent women.

Why make the change? Scholars today think that given the low place women were given in society and in the church in medieval times, scribes had trouble accepting that women could be “prominent.” These Medieval scribes thought it better that these women be put in their rightful place, from “prominent women” to “wives.”

This is one change that does not appear in modern English translations today. All the ancient texts (prior to the Medieval change) show that it should read “prominent women,” and so the interpreters of modern English translations have just included the original.

This text change was an intentional change made with an anti-feminine agenda. It was a big deal in Medieval texts of the Bible, and many medieval Christians who turned to their “inerrant Bible” read the unoriginal version.

Conclusion

I realize that this is difficult stuff for most evangelical Christians to accept given the high view of the Bible in evangelical Christianity. But it is a summary of where the academic community is in terms of biblical studies. These facts can be ignored or denied but without much credibility.

This has led me to a radical rethinking of the Bible: It is a human book and recognized by Christians down through the centuries as sacred text. It is inspired but it is certainly not inerrant.

Perhaps more significantly, I have been rethinking the high view given the Bible by evangelicals. I have become increasingly aware that other Christian traditions, including my own Salvation Army / Methodist heritage in John Wesley, did not give the Bible a place higher than other sources of Christian truth such as tradition, reason and experience. And now today, with tools and new skills not available to Christians in times past, we are finding that perhaps they were right to not do so.

Writer: John Norton lives in London, Ontario, Canada with his wife and two children and they can usually be found on Sunday mornings at their local Anglican church. John works as a lawyer and previously worked as a Salvation Army officer in Russia.

37 Comments to On inerrancy

1. This is a good post, John. Thanks for the time you’ve put into it.

   I would add another point that’s closely related to your second: the author has assumed things accepted as correct at the time but not accepted as such today. For example, people in the ancient near east generally believed the world began as a huge ocean which somehow gave birth to dry land. This is the view of the authors of Genesis 1 and Psalm 24, who attributed the creation act to Yahweh/Elohim.

   Today we we have a much more complicated story that also accounts for the presence of the water. The biblical account is based on a wrong assumption, and thus some of the ‘facts’ are wrong; however, my examples are quite correct when they point to God as the author of it all.
Cameron Horsburgh on July 24th, 2008

2. This is good John. The Bible is not a magic book and we are not to view it as such. To do so would make us no different than pagans with magic rites and rituals.

   I recently heard a devotional for kids where the person doing the devotional told the kids that God wrote this book. Even the kids didn’t buy that. God did not write it. He inspired it. People wrote it. Sinful, flawed, errant people, all trying to work it out.

   Thanks for putting it on the line here. And really, as you’ve already said, your piece is very much in line with most orthodox biblical scholars today who are still very much guided by the biblical witness but who refuse to shut down their brains when approaching it.
   Dion
Dion Oxford on July 24th, 2008

3. very true. i think a good parallel for the God’s Word/Man’s Word Bible we have, whatever translation or paraphrase you happen to be reading, is the fully God/fully man nature of Christ. hard to wrap our heads around. it’s hard to wrap our heads around errors in Scripture as well. but they’re there.

   however, this in no way diminishes the Bible. we do have to be careful with certain passages and words we use, but just because Mark, or whoever wrote Mark, got a father or son High Priest fact wrong, and the Evangelical crowd behind the evangelical NIV have an evangelical agenda, does not mean the Bible should take a backseat. it’s full or errors, changes, and “artistic licsence” you could say. but so are our lives. used by God non the less.

   bigger questions for me are: “don’t we believe God can work through the human-made errors in scripture?” and “aren’t there timeless truths and pearls of wisdom among the errors in scripture?”

   i’ve never really fully known the meaning of this expression, but i think it applies here and sounds cool, and someone correct me if i’m wrong: we can’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.
mark braye on July 24th, 2008

4. I wrote a post on this topic just yesterday (7/23/08). Please visit and tell me what you think. Thanks and blessings to you.
Don R on July 24th, 2008

5. Thanks John – good thoughts.

   This is a good place for me to say sorry to Geoff for not responding to an earlier post about inerrancy: things got a little busy this side of the pond. The conversation seemed to be in the wrong thread anyway.

   John (and other commentators here), a pressing question for you is this: if the biblical authors made errors as per your examples, why do you (presumably) accept far more implausible claims in their writings such as the virgin birth of a person and his being raised from the dead? You have no other source for these truth claims.

   I’m suggesting that, in making reason your primary source of truth, you ought to be rejecting the most unreasonable claims made in scripture, especially those which defy scientifically informed rationality.

   I would add that your first two examples are speculative hypotheses (you present them as such) and your third is an example of error in translation. Not much of a challenge here to those who believe the autograph manuscripts were inerrant.

   You are wrong about John Wesley’s method: in his Quadrilateral, scripture is primary and the sole source of truth; tradition, reason and experience are balanced together in the task of interpreting scripture.
Matt Clifton on July 24th, 2008

6. I agree with you John that the bible is not inerrant. I wrote something on this in the current Officer magazine. You are right to resist the biblolatry that exists in some evangelical circles.

   However, I must demur with several of your rather sweeping observations, because I’m pretty much with Matt on this topic(except that I don’t know how one would know that the original autographs were inerrant, we don’t have any).

   I do not accept that “the Bible is full of contradictions, internal problems or errors”. Contains them? Yes (how much did David really pay for Aruanah’s threshing floor?). Full of them? No. Thematically, the New Testament is remarkably consistent with itself as is the Old Testament.

   I also need to point out that wives and women is exactly the same Greek word so that can hardly be an error. Just a choice really.

   The SA tradition was always, at least as I understood it, that Scripture was primary and reason, imagination, tradition, expreience are all secondary.

   I am also dubious aboout much modern biblical scholarship. Read C.S Lewis’ “Fern Seeds and Elephants” becaue I share his view exactly. Imagine the surprise of all those NT critics when they find Paul really did write Ephesians! “the weight of cumulative evidence” and “consensus of modern scholarship” both mean ’stuff we love to specualate about but don’t really know but we like to act is if we do’.

   Finally, how we approach the bible depends, in some measure, on how think of God. If God is the living God, and his grace is always at work in the world, and the Spirit is powerful and active, we can believe that the Biblical record is inspired. We can beleive that the Spirit still works in the Christian community amongst translators and scholars and in fact has always done so.

   To say that Bible is just a collection of individual stories about what ancient people thought might be true or wanted to be true about God and Jesus; a rather spotty anthology riddled with contradictions, is at the end of the day, to hold a pretty low view of God’s ability and desire to communicate to his people. In my opinion anyway.
Grant on July 25th, 2008

7. Preach it, Matt!
Phil on July 25th, 2008

8. Thanks for raising the issue John and for clearly presenting your position. However, I would take Matt Clifton’s view here. I’m comfortable that ‘inerrancy’ describes something very important about the nature of Scripture, though that doesn’t mean that I ignore the difficulties. However, for each of the difficulties, I have found that there are often at least several possible explanations available in the Christian academic press, which are consistent with inerrancy.

   Whatever our current view, may God by is Holy Spirit cause his Word to be lived out in greater measure in each of our lives, that Jesus Christ may be glorified.
Bernard on July 25th, 2008

9. I find N. T. Wright helpful on this topic (e.g. this article ).

   In particular, the following advice really helped me:

   “I take it as a method in my biblical studies that if I turn a corner and find myself saying, ‘Well, in that case, that verse is wrong’ that I must have turned a wrong corner somewhere. But that does not mean that I impose what I think is right on to that bit of the Bible. It means, instead, that I am forced to live with that text uncomfortably, sometimes literally for years (this is sober autobiography), until suddenly I come round a different corner and that verse makes a lot of sense; sense that I wouldn’t have got if I had insisted on imposing my initial view on it from day one.”
Matt Clifton on July 25th, 2008

10. Bernard wrote: “However, for each of the difficulties, I have found that there are often at least several possible explanations available in the Christian academic press, which are consistent with inerrancy.”

    This is often true, but too often ’studying the Bible’ becomes an exercise in trying to reconcile biblical passages that appear to be in tension. The best example are the nativity narratives in Mark and Luke — try reading each of them with no reference to the other. It’s not that easy, because we’re so used to trying to shoehorn each of the stories into a harmonious whole.

    For example, were Mary and Joseph married when Jesus was born? Where did they live before he was born? Did they return to Nazareth after Jesus’ presentation in the Temple, or had they always lived in Bethlehem, continue to live in Bethlehem for several months after Jesus’ birth, escape to Egypt then finally resettle in Nazareth?

    It is quite possible to come up with explanations that allow for all of these things to have happened. However, the intellectual gymnastics required is quite complex and relies on each narrative having certain silences—for example, Matthew never states that the family lived in Bethlehem before the birth of Jesus. That is implied by the context. You would have no idea that the family was in town temporarily without Luke’s Gospel. In Luke the family return to Nazareth in a timely fashion because that’s where they live; in Matthew, they go there simply because the political situation necessitates it, and only after several years in Egypt.

    I think it’s far better to treat each gospel account as a standalone story. Their authors certainly thought of them that way. Matthew and Luke wrote for separate audiences, and I seriously doubt they wrote hoping the other author would get his (?) book out soon so the narrative could be complete!

    That does leave us with a small problem, though: which version bears the closest similarity to historical reality? Matthew? Luke? Neither?

    Thankfully, that’s not the question I find myself asking. If I ignore the question of harmony and allow myself to read each story on its own merits I discover deep truth and spiritual insight. I find this approach to the Scripture far more satisfying than an attempt to allay the fear that I’m not going to be able to reconcile passages that were never going to agree.
Cameron Horsburgh on July 25th, 2008

11. Thanks for the comments. It is appreciated.

    My responses here are directed to everyone but largely come out of the comments left by Matt.

    Matt, I presented the examples I gave as “hypothesis” (not “speculative” though, as you suggest) because they are in fact only theories. These theories, like all theories, might be wrong and replaced by a better explanation. But before we too quickly disparage these “mere” theories, let’s remember that gravity and the earth as a sphere are “only” theories too. Everything we know as historical fact and scientific truth are just mere theories. Although these explanations are hypothesis, they have the weight of learned history behind them and until replaced are the best we have. Common sense suggests that many of these theories are more certain than others.

    I realize that contemporary biblical scholarship is not as clean and easy as “inerrancy”. It is much easier to just declare contemporary biblical scholarship as “lost” and to re-affirm a blind belief in the Bible as inerrant. But that doesn’t make inerrancy correct. It also means that non-Christians will relegate Christianity to the dumpster of history since it cannot defend its assertions. I think we need to be much more engaged with biblical scholarship.

    Matt, you ask about accepting “far more implausible claims” in the Bible, such as the virgin birth, and the fact that there is “no other source for these truth claims.” Are you asking if I believe they are facts that actually happened? If that is your question, my answer is that I don’t know if they are facts of history. If they are not facts of history, I would suggest they could be true metaphorically (as are many parts of the Bible, for example, most of Song of Solomon and the Book of Revelation). I don’t think accepting them or not accepting as facts of history makes me more or less a Christian.

    We know what the Bible says about the virgin birth, for example. We also know a few of the gospel writers (not all of them, surprisingly) suggest that Jesus was born of a virgin mother and that the gospel writers were trying to do all they could to show that Jesus was a special person. We also know that many early Christians debated the issue and that it was an issue not settled by the Church until several hundred years after the gospels were written and only after Constantine converted to Christianity and wished there to be a single creed for the empire. We also know that a virgin birth makes no sense in terms of anything we can imagine in our world today. So the answer is that I just don’t know if it is factual history. I think this humble response is the proper one and does not diminish Christianity or my faith.

    I would suggest that Wesley was likely more Catholic/Anglican in his approach to authority and did not elevate the Bible to the much higher place given it by subsequent 20th century evangelicals. I think it is significant that our Salvation Army doctrine #1 refers to inspiration and not inerrancy. Many other new denominations of the time adopted the language of inerrancy, which the Army wisely (I suggest) did not. I would like to think that Railton and Catherine B were intentional in that regard (I assume WB was not the doctrinal thinker among the trio of SA founders?).

    The question then for us is this, what is meant by “inspiration”? It is a loaded theological word and can in plain English mean several things. Was this multiple meaning of the word “inspiration” one of the reasons it was adopted in doctrine #1? Was it to avoid locking the Army into one theological position on the Bible? Or did GSR and CB have a meaning in mind? Even if they intended a certain meaning, does that apply for all time or can Salvationists adopt other meanings?

    The concept of inspiration might be worth exploring.

    As for the quote from NT Wright, I admire the romanticism of suggesting that where we disagree with the Bible we should not impose what we think is right on the Bible. That sounds fine but it cannot be right. He is suggesting that we should just “do it” even if it doesn’t make any sense to us now – and trust that because it is the Bible that it is true even though our reason tells us otherwise. Wright himself does not follow his own teaching surely.

    For example, should we just follow through and “do” the following verses?

    - “For everyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death.” (Lev 20:9)

    - “You may buy the strangers who live among you and their families…; they may be your property.” (Lev 25:45)

    - If you hear that some have gone out and served other gods… you shall put them to the sword. (Deut 13:12-16)

    Most of us would not ascribe to these values today. I would go so far as to say they are wrong and immoral values that need to be rejected. Yet they are in the Bible and were once considered the moral law for Israel.

    But what about some New Testament examples from the Gospels?

    Jesus said, Do not think I have come to bring peace on the earth; I have not come to bring peace but a sword. For I have come to set man against his father, and daughter against her mother. (Matt 10:34-37) Yet I would say that bringing families together is better than separating them, even if they differ on religious views. Jesus seemed to show disdain and even denial of those family members who did not agree with him (Mark 3:34), yet I would suggest that today we hold diversity, dialogue and community as higher values.

    Or another example, Jesus urged followers to live without care for the future (Luke 12:22-29). In other words, Jesus was teaching dependence on God and on the community. Jesus was teaching a utopian ideal that has not been realized, such as giving all we have to the poor (Matt 19:21) or lending/giving to our enemies (Luke 6:34). To do these things is to be irresponsible and to ignore the responsibilities we have to our own children, our family, our local church and the wider world. We must be good stewarts of the resources we have been given. Today we realize that we are responsible for one another and for the environment. Look at what is happening to the environment! We must take responsibility, not abdicate it as Jesus was suggesting.

    Don’t get me wrong here. I’m not suggesting that Jesus was wrong to say what he said about his mother and brothers. I’m not suggesting Jesus was wrong to tell his disciples to live without care for the future. It was good advice for the context. But it is not good advice for us today and we can use common sense to see it is so.

    Why don’t we do these teachings of Jesus? I suggest we don’t because our reason tells us they don’t make sense today.
John Norton (Canada) on July 26th, 2008

12. This is such an interesting discussion with each of us unwilling and/or unable to hear the voices of each other. The 2 inevitable camps have emerged (conservative and not-so conservative) and cheerleaders for each camp have come forward (like ‘Preach it Matt’ kinds of comments) to lend support to the different views. I do hope at the end of the day it’s clear that we each are trying to follow Jesus and be obediant to Him no matter if we think the Bible is ‘inerrant’ or not. I’m not even sure we’re even working on the same definition of what ‘inerrant’ really means. This reveals the weaknesses and assumptions made by parties having an online discussion but not really knowing each other as people. I suspect we’ve already labelled each other as flaming liberal heretics or wing-nut conservative fundamentalists. I continue to repent of the labels I place on others.

    I think we can all agree that the Bible is divinely inspired by God and are authoratative words that should guide our lives. We can also hopefully all agree that whether or not there are some human errors in the text (which I still maintain is the case) that God is revealing Himself to us through this book and that the Spirit guided those who were given the responsibility of carrying on the biblical witness through more than 1000 years before it got actually written down in its final form.

    So from there, to carry on the discussion/debate, I’d like to address some of Matt’s comments. I do think that NT Wright would shudder to know that he is being mis-quoted and taken out of context in order to argue for inerrancy. Even a cursory glance at his stuff would never bring us to that assumption. The piece that Matt quoted from is so obviously an argument for the authority of scripture despite it’s many human flaws. To make NT Wright your poster child for arguing inerrancy is an obvious case of taking a belief, whether true or not, and making a text fit that belief no matter what the context. This is so ‘evangelical’ and we unfortunately use the Bible and anything else we can find for this kind of argument all the time.

    To address another of Matt’s comments/questions,
    “John (and other commentators here), a pressing question for you is this: if the biblical authors made errors as per your examples, why do you (presumably) accept far more implausible claims in their writings such as the virgin birth of a person and his being raised from the dead? You have no other source for these truth claims.”
    This is a very good and perhaps the most important question. Most biblical scholarship that assumes that the Bible is not inerrant, seperates the Bible into 2 categories. The problem is, I can’t remember the academic categories that are commonly used. So for this, I will use laymans terms of ‘minor’ stuff and ‘major’ stuff. Minor stuff would be discussions around topics like if there were 2 women at the tomb or a man or an angel or 2 angels or whatever. These are things that are ‘minor’ issues and don’t make a difference to the overall point of the narrative. The ‘major’ stuff is related to the overarching themes of the biblical witness; that all of history points to Jesus and what He did and who He was and that He overcomes everything, including death. Jesus was fully human and fully God. Nothing in the biblical witness contradicts this as this is the very essence of what we as Christians believe to be true.

    I’m not sure where or how to end this comment so I guess I’ll just stop here knowing full well that due to the nature of this discussion I most likely have left myself wide open for dispute.

    Shalom,
    Dion
Dion Oxford on July 26th, 2008

13. I hesitate as well, Dion, to enter this fray for fear of getting sucked into more argumentativeness. I do hope you know that my “Preach it, Matt” comment was in good fun, not meant to deride either party (liberal flamos or right-wing nutjobs).

    I do think this is an important debate. I am not qualified to speak authoritatively on the issue. Others I know who have done so well (Ravi Zacharias, for one) have convinced me that it is vitally important to hold the word of God in highest regard.

    I have been reading John 17 lately and Jesus seems to place utmost importance on His words, God’s words and the truth.

    I would like to know, John, what you do with His prayer there.

    “I gave them the words You gave me.”

    “Sanctify them by the truth; Your word is truth.”

    Notice He doesn’t say that God’s word contains truth, but that it is truth.

    From what I understand you to be saying, Jesus’ words to His disciples were only relevant for that time period? It follows then that everything is up for grab. I have a hard time accepting that.
Phil on July 26th, 2008

14. An interesting discussion here. I fear the errant/inerrant debate is somewhat missing the point. I don’t think Christians are called to see the Bible as some sort of static historical document that we dissect to see whether it contains any errors or not. All that is a very one-dimensional cerebral approach to scripture that simply puts it in a strait-jacket.

    I prefer to see the Bible as ‘living word’ (Hebrews 4:12). It is a document that like the incarnation of Jesus ‘the Word’ is both human and divine. To reduce it to a word perfect divine document (as Muslims see the Qu’ran) is to rob it of all we know of the way the trinitarian Godhead flows and works through creation. God is not some distant being giving us dictation from afar, he is with us, in us and working through us. To reduce it to some kind of inspired human document only robs it of its rightful place above other writings that are clearly inspired.

    The Bible is neither errant nor inerrant - it’s a living document when connected to a living relationship between God and person (and community). The interaction of humankind with scripture in the power of the Holy Spirit reveals the truth that lies within. Scripture read without the relational presence of God becomes errant all to easily and this can happen as much in church as out of it, as history proves and we will all have experienced at some time.
Nick Coke on July 26th, 2008

15. Beautiful, thoughtful words Nick. I’m pretty sure we’ve never met but I checked out your website and want to encourage you in what you’re doing.
    Nice to make your acquaintance.

    Nice to chat with you too Phil.

    Dion
Dion Oxford on July 26th, 2008

16. Phil,

    Was Jesus referring to the Bible in John 17? My reading suggests he was talking about the teaching which he received from the Father. Whilst certainly related, that is quite a different thing.

    I’d be interested if anyone could shed light on the use of the term ‘the Word of God’ to refer to Scripture.

    The teachings of Jesus bring another interesting facet to the ‘original manuscripts’ debate. Now, I’m not trying to be curmudgeonly here. I’ve wondered how this is dealt with for some time, and I may be misunderstanding the ‘inerrantist’ position.

    I think most would agree that Jesus spoke mainly (if not exclusively) in Aramaic, yet the vast majority of his words were recorded in Greek. Does the inerrantist position suggest that the translation from Aramaic to Greek was error free?
Cameron Horsburgh on July 27th, 2008

17. This is an excellent post, and an equally excellent series of responses – the Rubicon at it very best.

    I would like to insert another important word into the dialogue – infallible.

    It seems to me that rather than revisiting the endless circle of biblical errancy versus inerrancy, the far more effective and powerful concept is infallibility – the Bible does not, cannot, will not fail in accomplishing its intended purposes.

    I believe the Bible is inspired and infallible – what do you think?

    Richard Munn
Richard Munn on July 27th, 2008

18. I agree with Dion’s comments and concerns regarding fellowship and debate in the right spirit. I know some of you personally or know of you and I recognize that many of you are involved in full time ministry and service in the Army/Church. You are in the “frontlines”. I have the greatest of respect for you in your work.

    I do think debate is healthy for us and I think we are disagreeing and that is okay.
John Norton on July 27th, 2008

19. John, you seem to suggest (I trust I am not misinterpreting you here) that all contemporary Biblical scholarship takes the view that the Scriptures are errant. This is not the case as there are many such scholars who view Scripture as inerrant. They may be in the minority (I do not know that is the case, but I assume it is) but I’m sure they do not hold that view just because of blind belief, but for very valid reasons. They also engage with their peers, which I would agree with you, needs to be done.

    Speaking for myself, I believe the Scriptures to be inerrant because that is what I see them teaching about themselves. I recognise that I may be wrong in my understanding of their teaching, but to date, I have not come across any convincing evidence, either internal or external, to the contrary. If the Lord had chosen to give us the original Scriptures in an errant form then I would accept them as such, and use them to grow in my love for Him and my neighbour. However, as I understand them to be inerrant, I aim for the same objective, but on a different basis.

    Thanks again for your challenges, which I trust are stimulating us to grow in our understanding of the nature of God’s Word.
Bernard on July 27th, 2008

20. Thanks John for those warm words, and I extend them likewise to you and others. But for my part, there has been no cause for concern, at least when the issue itself has been debated. This has simply been a normal, constructive, valuable debate.

    However, Dion, these comments were hard to take:

    “each of us unwilling and/or unable to hear the voices of each other”
    “I suspect we’ve already labelled each other as flaming liberal heretics or wing-nut conservative fundamentalists”

    I see no grounds at all for these remarks. I’m baffled as to why you said these unpleasant things about us, and saddened too.

    Now onto the issue under discussion. Firstly, N. T. Wright. Clearly he was neither misquoted (I copied/pasted exactly what he said) nor taken out of context (I made no interpretive comments and gave you the entire context by linking you to the article!). Had I wanted to make him a “poster child for arguing inerrancy”, I would hardly have linked to an article in which he explicitly distances himself from the term ‘inerrancy’. All I said is that I found his advice helpful. I hope you and others did too.

    I think it likely Wright moves away from the term ‘inerrancy’ because in common usage it’s loaded with exegetical/hermeneutical connotations that he would reject. But we don’t find him asserting errors and contradictions either. You know from the quote and the article what he does instead, and I’m very warm to that.

    John, thanks for your reasoned thinking on the virgin birth. I couldn’t help wondering why you did not refer to the resurrection, as this is really the biggest challenge.

    Your verses from the gospels raise hermeneutical questions and we’re all working that stuff out. Ironically, you use the verses in such a way as to presuppose inerrancy on two levels: firstly, the verses quote without error what Jesus said and, secondly, what Jesus said was ethically inerrant in its first century context. That illustrates for me the incoherence of the position. The Bible is reliable here and unreliable there, but how is the distinction legitimately made?

    Dion, your answer was that some scholars attempt to separate the scriptures into two categories: major/minor. At face value, this appears deeply unattractive. How can anyone say, “this is major and therefore inerrant and this is minor and therefore possibly errant.” The texts, stories and themes are so deeply and intricately related and interdependent. How can this major/minor division be made without doing great violence to the scriptures?

    The heart of it for me is that when I approach the scriptures, which reveal Christ and lead me to abide in him and follow him, I need to know they are wholly true and reliable for that purpose. That means I don’t believe, for example, they were given to teach us the sciences. To illustrate: with a form-critical approach to Genesis I find that the point is not to supplant modern science with an ancient Near Eastern cosmology or to believe in things like talking snakes, but to invite God to shape my understanding of him and the human predicament through the drama. On the other hand, when, form-critically, I find the resurrection presented plainly as an historical event, not a myth or metaphor, I believe it, however scientifically incredible it may be.

    Phil, because of imprecision of meaning within any language, I believe the words of Jesus are ipsissima vox (the exact voice), not always ipsissima verba (the exact words). When it comes to Hebrew and Aramaic words spoken by Jesus, I take the translations into Greek to be of high enough quality to be relied upon.

    I’m with my friend Nick, wanting to add that the encounter with the living God in scripture necessarily provokes an energetic tussle with all the difficult and jarring things that appear ugly and unreasonable about him. It must be a vital element in the dynamics of the relationship. I struggle, for example, to accept that “Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire” and “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” were spoken by the same person. Despite the impulse of reason, I don’t conclude the one I don’t like is an error. I choose instead to journey with the unease, trusting it will in time carry me to new depths in my knowledge of Christ.

    N. T. Wright from the same great article:

    “Because, again and again, we find that, as we submit to scripture, as we wrestle with the bits that don’t make sense, and as we hand through to a new sense that we haven’t thought of or seen before, God breathes into our nostrils his own breath—the breath of life. And we become living beings—a church recreated in his image, more fully human, thinking, alive beings.”

    Thanks everyone for the ‘iron sharpens iron’ conversation. Good stuff.
Matt Clifton on July 27th, 2008

21. After some time away, it’s nice to return and find the Rubicon continues to generate engaging dialogue amongst thoughtful people.

    I used to believe that the Bible was inerrant - and then I read it and that view was changed forever. However, I also count myself amongst those who find the scriptures both inspired and inspiring. The challenge for me is the problem of interpretation: if the Bible really reflects both the good and bad of the various social contexts in which it was written, then on what basis do we discern God’s word?

    It’s very easy to slip into total subjectivity and simply attribute to God those parts that affirm the views we already hold and reject those that contradict us. At the same time, even those with the ‘highest’ views of scripture don’t really hold all of it in equal esteem. The Wesleyan quadrilateral is a helpful tool, but falls short of providing a consistent hermeneutic principle - though perhaps that’s not a bad thing as different contexts may demand different interpretations. Isn’t that what gave us the rich variety of theology that makes up the Bible in the first place?

    Regards, JDK
Jason Davies-Kildea on July 28th, 2008

22. lots of interesting and informing conversation here. fun. helpful.

    just to chime in again, and this may be a trite example, but movies that are “inspired by a true story” are not documentaries, they are still feature films. does this take away from the story? i don’t think so. so if the Bible is not Israel’s version of The Globe and Mail or The New York Times or simply a history book, does that take away from the story of God and people, the story of salvation, and the good news of Jesus Christ? no.

    note: i know the analogy to modern media doesn’t even really work because we all know they want to sell papers, they report what they want, and we’ve all heard stories of respected journalists, print and otherwise, who have been mistaken or have lied.
mark braye on July 28th, 2008

23. On reflection, a little caveat to my endorsement of Nick’s comment.

    Nick, if I say that Jesus is wholly reliable, free from error and self-contradiction, is that reverence or reduction?

    Likewise with the scriptures. I think you’ve unfairly caricatured those whose Spirit-led, dynamic engagement with the living word is happily married to confidence in its thorough reliability. It doesn’t have to be word-imperfect to come alive.
Matt Clifton on July 28th, 2008

24. A good starting point in this discussion, might have been a clear and accurate definition of inerrancy, as a doctrine. As expected, Wikipedia does a pretty good job: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_inerrancy

    Good, tough debate, even to the point of some “slinging of darts”, is not a bad thing, as long as it doesn’t get overly personal. I don’t think that any of the comments listed here as part of the discussion has been in this vein.

    Though I am loathe to employ the revolution metaphor as it has been overused (and has become slightly ridiculous), Catherine Booth did say: “It won’t do for people who lead a revolution to be thin-skinned”.
Geoff Ryan on July 28th, 2008

25. Richard thanks for your definition of infallible! I’ve always had difficulty with the circles that seem to suggest that the Bible is both inerrant and infallible and am pleased to see a good reasoned discussion here over what is so often an emotive subject!
Graeme Smith on July 28th, 2008

26. Thanks for the encouragement Dion - much appreciated.

    And thanks Matt for the ‘heads up’ about the brilliant Tom Wright article - a great read. I felt his last couple of paragraphs illuminated my earlier comment, albeit a clumsy effort on my part. Wright says: ‘I am saying that we mustn’t belittle scripture by bringing the world’s models of authority into it.’ I would suggest that to insist inerrancy as a measure of authority is to make that mistake. Inerrancy proves nothing about the Bible at all. Scripture is scripture - or as I said before ‘living word’ and that transcends inerrancy.

    In my context this is a constant point of dialogue with Muslim friends and neighbours who contend that the Bible is inferior to the Qu’ran because it contains errors (as they see it). But how much more beautiful than a dictated inerrant book thrust down from heaven is the Bible with all the tension and earthly reality still intact. Matt, your image of an ‘energetic tussle’ is spot on in my experience of struggling with Scripture.
Nick Coke on July 28th, 2008

27. Thanks Nick. Have you had a look at Geoff’s link - this paragraph speaks to your comments:

    “Proponents of biblical inerrancy generally do not teach that the Bible was dictated directly by God, but that God used the “distinctive personalities and literary styles of the writers” of scripture and that God’s inspiration guided them to flawlessly project his message through their own language and personality.”
Matt Clifton on July 28th, 2008

28. Matt - I actually wrote my last comment before your caveat to my earlier post had come up! Just to clarify - I suspect I have been unfair in my caricature - partly emerging out of my context as my last post explained but also in my desire to say that focusing on inerrancy somehow misses the point for me. There is always a feeling that we must insist inerrancy to prove the legitamcy of the Bible. I still contend that it isn’t inerrancy that proves the worth of scripture - it is something greater than that. This is not to say that the Bible isn’t inerrant as defined in your quote above - for me it’s just the wrong question to ask.
Nick Coke on July 29th, 2008

29. I’ve really enjoyed reading N.T. Wright over the last couple of years and so was interested to see him quoted. In a couple of different seminars of his I’ve listened to (available at the site Matt linked) Wright made a couple of remarks that made me smile. One was to say that about 20% of what he says probably has errors in it – the problem is he doesn’t know which 20%!
    The other comment he made, more in line with this thread, was the fact that the whole inerrancy debate seems to be predominately a North American conversation and not of such high profile across this side of the Atlantic (is that fair to say, Matt, Nick, Graeme?). Which begs the question, what is the purpose of the debate?
    Is the purpose to say the Bible does have errors, therefore why would I put my faith in it or the god it claims to represent? If my faith could be destroyed simply by a few verses containing errors then really it is no faith at all.
    I’m afraid, for me, the argument over proving or disproving inerrancy in Scripture smacks of Enlightenment tendencies towards finding sure and certain provable facts over sure and certain provable faith.
    What I love about the Bible is the way it demands a choice from the reader from verse one: ‘In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth…’ Now, if I can get my mind around that then it is not much of a stretch to believe that the Red Sea could be parted, an axe head could float, a donkey could talk, a virgin give birth or a dead man be resurrected just like he said he would. How hard would it be for a creator god to put a coin in a fish’s mouth?
    Is the Bible inerrant? Whether it is or isn’t I don’t need it to be! When discussing how we view Scripture I prefer Wright’s emphasis on authority and Richard Munn’s view of reliability.
Marcus Mylechreest on July 29th, 2008

30. “I still contend that it isn’t inerrancy that proves the worth of scripture - it is something greater than that.”

    Nick, I couldn’t agree more. But questions of inerrancy remain vital and crucial. If I can propose the resurrection (historical event) as a line in the sand none of us here would cross, then we all need at least some degree of inerrancy. Marcus, no amount of faith is going to survive this event being fantasy, conspiracy or sophisticated redaction.

    So the question we’re all working through, even those who claim not to be asking it, is what scope inerrancy has. It may be limited to certain key events and theological themes. It may be the hardcore “complete accuracy of Scripture, including the historical and scientific parts” (not my view btw). Or somewhere in between.

    Which leads me to ask the Father to renew and deepen wisdom and understanding in us all. May this good debate serve that end.
Matt Clifton on July 29th, 2008

31. Marcus, whilst I would agree with Bishop Tom that debate is predominately a North American one, the question is still important for us to tackle with. Matt’s illustration of the resurrection shows just how important it is! However, I’m not sure that the point is to prove the Bible’s inerrancy, in fact this is pretty much impossible to do.

    I think this is where Richard’s definition of infallibility could play a part. The idea that “the Bible does not, cannot, will not fail in accomplishing its intended purposes.”

    I sometimes feel that those who need to prove the Bible’s inerrancy are trying to do so to prove beyond any doubt that it is the true Word of God. The proof of its real value though is that throughout the centuries that we have had it, the text has proved its true source time and time again by the fruit that it has born in the life of people and communities. Maybe we need to accept that the “proof of the pudding is in the eating.” If we allow the text to feed us in the way that it is supposed to, then we don’t have to worry quite so much about how it was made in the first place!
Graeme Smith on July 30th, 2008

32. Matt, the resurrection is indeed a line in the sand. But if it has been included in the Jesus narrative in error, then it’s a pretty big error which has dramatically changed the world and an error which was foretold and expected. And an error which all the dead in Christ will experience! The inerancy debate as we know it today was obviously a non-issue for early believers as they had no full collection of documents to debate over.

    What I am saying is that just because the name of a priest may have been mistakenly included doesn’t also cause the foundational elements to also be a mistake. So of course Matt, you’re right about inerrancy regarding the resurrection - but is that just regarding the event and its theological significance or does it include the details too? Does it matter who got to the tomb first? No, of course not. What matters is the tomb was empty!

    As it has already been said, working from a same understanding of what is meant by the word ‘inerrancy’ is what is needed. The wikipedia article gives a helpful definition, but we all know that wiki sites are not inerrant

    The thought of the scope of inerancy may lead to some other article someone could write. What are the very basics of the Bible that are needed in order to sustain faith?
Marcus Mylechreest on July 30th, 2008

33. I realize this discussion thread is getting old and perhaps dead, so maybe this post is not helpful. But I’ve been reflecting on Richard Munn’s comments re: “infallible” as a better term to describe the Bible than “inerrant”. Of course these are just words, but I’ve been giving it some thought.

    When I think of the word infallible of course I immediately think of the papacy, which is not a helpful image for me.

    I tend to think of infallible as a higher claim than inerrant, which is further problematic.

    Inerrant just means it has no errors.

    But I don’t just think the Bible just has minor errors (in names, etc.). The
    Bible actually has some teachings that are wrong (a few examples pointed out in my prior comments). That makes it fallible. Not infallible.

    I think a better distinction is to separate the term “Word of God” from the
    “Bible”. We make a mistake when we equate the “Word of God” with the
    Bible, as if they were synonymous.

    The “Word of God” is in orthodox theology better identified in the
    person of Jesus, not the Bible. The Bible is just a document that
    speaks about Jesus.

    The “Word of God” is something that is “infallible” in the sense that obviously if it is God’s word than it is without error in pointing us to the truth.

    But I would not want to equate that with the Bible, which has errors and fallible teaching precisely because it was written, edited, preserved and translated by human authors which have inserted their own agendas.

    Is that helpful?
John Norton (Canada) on August 2nd, 2008

34. “The Bible actually has some teachings that are wrong.”

    And here is where I jump off.

    I am amazed at the arrogance of this statement. That is not a personal attack on you, John, for I know that there are others who would hold your views. It is a verbal condemnation of the thought and not the person (I hate that I have to clarify that, but I want to be sure.)

    The earlier quote from N.T. Wright is, I think, appropriate here again:

    “I take it as a method in my biblical studies that if I turn a corner and find myself saying, ‘Well, in that case, that verse is wrong’ that I must have turned a wrong corner somewhere. But that does not mean that I impose what I think is right on to that bit of the Bible. It means, instead, that I am forced to live with that text uncomfortably, sometimes literally for years (this is sober autobiography), until suddenly I come round a different corner and that verse makes a lot of sense; sense that I wouldn’t have got if I had insisted on imposing my initial view on it from day one.”

    John, you began your article with a statement of what you cannot accept. If I may submit a counter:

    I cannot accept that the God who created such an ordered universe, who called such perfection into being by the word of His power, would give us any other Text than one that is perfectly infallible and totally non-contradictory. If He speaks and I do not understand, it is the creature and not the Creator that is to blame.
Phil on August 2nd, 2008

35. James McGrath’s been hosting a similar discussion to this one of late, but in the context of fundamentalism. Some might find it useful. His most recent post asks the exact question we seem to be dealing with here: what is our agenda in claiming the Bible is [in]errant?

    Here’s the relevant post on the topic—there are links there to the wider discussion.

    http://exploringourmatrix.blogspot.com/2008/08/hidden-agenda.html
Cameron Horsburgh on August 3rd, 2008

36. Excellent final thought there Phil.

    John, I understand your concern with the word infallible, although the Roman Catholic theology around the Pope’s infallibility is actually often misunderstood! However, if we go back to Richard’s quote that “the Bible does not, cannot, will not fail in accomplishing its intended purposes” then this adds a new dimension to infallibility.

    The problem with all language of infallibility and inerrancy is that we are trying to put into human words, ideas about God who cannot, ultimately and inerrantly be described by such basic language!
Graeme Smith on August 3rd, 2008

37. John, in response to your point that Jesus is the Word of God, I would indeed agree that he is the Living Word of God. But we know him only as he is revealed in the written Word of God (the Scriptures, both Old and New Testaments). It is they that bear witness of him (John5v39). If they are fallible in some of their teachings, then they may be fallible in what they teach about Jesus. We are then unable to be sure that we can trust what we think we might know about Jesus. However, Jesus himself said that the Scripture, could not be broken (John 10v35). Therefore we truly find the Living Word in the Written Word.

    Article XIX of the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy (see http://www.bible-researcher.com/chicago1.html) makes this challenging statement:-

    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.

    One further comment which I have just read on the Armybarmy blog, and find helpful,is:

    ‘My buddy is not in to inerrancy, or even infallibility. I wonder if he’ll accept reliability? The Bible is a reliable document prophetically, scientifically, geographically, historically, and spiritually (and more). That is, it is accurate on those subjects whenever it touches on them. So you can rely on it.’

    When we come to the Scritures we can have absolute confidence that we can rely on what that they teach, and in particular, in what the reveal of Jesus, to know whom is eternal life.
Bernard on August 3rd, 2008

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