Michael Pahl has written a superb and thought-provoking article, here, partly in response to my inerrancy series. In the comments, I suggest perhaps an adjustment to the Trent definition of truth in relation to Scripture, that, albeit with a good deal of qualification, I affirmed in my podcast – but I’m only experimenting with this.
posted by Chris Tilling @ 10:52 AM
5 comments
I am New Testament Tutor for St Mellitus College and St Paul's Theological Centre, London. In my postgraduate research (under the supervision of Max Turner) I’m working on a thesis that concerns the christological significance of the language Paul used to describe the relationship between risen Lord and believer. My blog, Chrisendom, is primarily occupied with biblical and theological themes – especially those Apostle Paul shaped, but I try as best as I can to squeeze in a decent amount of inappropriate baloney on the way. For more about me, click here for my interview with biblioblogs' Jim West.
5 Comments:
MP says:
"I also deny the idea that inerrancy somehow acts as a sure safeguard for doctrinal orthodoxy or personal faith. "
I emphatically agree here. The inerrancy camp can only view the inerrancy deniers as involved in a negative journey of questioning and rejecting established truths. It is as if the end result of inquiry should inevitably lead back to their same theological ideas whether one believes in inerrancy or not, so the effort looks superfluous at best. But I repeat Thoreau's saying "a man sits as many risks as he runs". Understanding the revelation of God involves the pursuit of the truth. Ignoring this pursuit can, no, must lead to serious doctrinal and perhaps moral error. Changes are indeed going to be necessary as a result of all this. For my part I don't know how one can continue as an evangelical by any recognizable North American definition.
So those who reject inerrancy must be brave enough to honestly face the consequences of what they have done. Too many evangelicals it seems are getting cozy with this inerrancy denial bit, but nevertheless falsely comfort themselves with arguments like "it doesn't make a difference anyway". They tend to go on taking the Scriptures in a straightforward historical non-contradictory way deriving doctrine right off the face of the text(even someone such as Wright in the gospels in my opinion). Many apparently change very little in theological outlook i.e. remain quite conservative. Many still often oppose the difficult but by now well-established findings of historical and scientific research as it touches on the Scriptures and its history.
I wonder if this evasion is accomplished by your phrase "generally reliable account" or MP's God ensured "trustworthiness". It seems you both want an inerrant process of revelation built on an admittedly errant text, so you argue for 'close enough'. Besides my feeling that the Scriptures are not close enough, I feel like these are retreats similar to "a God of the gaps" move. They seem like attempts to isolate an area where God is ensuring the human process of composition and selection is not a finite, contingent exercise. It seems we need something that grapples with the fact that there is "contingency all the way down" from writing to interpreting.
I am obviously well to the left of you and MP. Indeed, I may have become a liberal still in denial.
I seriously appreciate these comments David!
falsely comfort themselves with arguments like "it doesn't make a difference anyway".
I think you're right, and the question, for me at least, sharpens my focus and attention on what hermeneutics are and how important they are. It suggests that the sublations in the text demonstrate not a tension, but a choice between and either / or. Possibly. This is new territory for me.
They tend to go on taking the Scriptures in a straightforward historical non-contradictory way deriving doctrine right off the face of the text(even someone such as Wright in the gospels in my opinion).
I think it depends what we are looking at in the texts. Some are more historically errant than others. The creation accounts, for example. There is a high degree of interpretation, and (as there were no eyewitnesses!), historical content at a minimum. The fall of Judah in 2 Kings 25, however, is more raw history, less interpretation, and reads like a painful close account of what actually happened. Where one puts the gospel accounts in this is a question, but there Wright’s project isn’t, in my opinion, without its justification. Bauckham has a new book coming out soon on the gospels, so I’ll be interested to read what he has to say.
I wonder if this evasion is accomplished by your phrase "generally reliable account" or MP's God ensured "trustworthiness".
My phrase was ‘a broadly accurate text’, and I want to affirm this in terms of what God wants to accomplish through the text. However, it is also saying something about the historical nature of the texts, a statement I make based on theological suppositions – reasons far more sustainable, at least, than those insisting on inerrancy I think.
It seems you both want an inerrant process of revelation built on an admittedly errant text, so you argue for 'close enough'.
Yes, I thought about my original affirmation of the Trent definition in a similar light, and decided perhaps to swap the words ‘without error’ with ‘sufficiently’. So, nothing is inerrant, as you say, it goes all the way down. This is where a strong pneumatological thrust becomes an important affirmation to stop a slide into a theological nihilism.
Besides my feeling that the Scriptures are not close enough.
As I mentioned above, I think it depends on what we focus on in the Scriptures. And the gospel accounts, I feel, are broadly accurate. Is there theological interpretation and that which is unhistorical in the gospels? Yes, but only to a degree I think. We have more than Bultmann’s version of Paul, that ‘it is enough Jesus existed’! Thus, though my affirmation of a broadly accurate text has its theological presuppositions, in terms of the gospels, it is one I think fits what the gospels are. Certainly not inerrant, but also not arbitrary.
I am obviously well to the left of you and MP. Indeed, I may have become a liberal still in denial.
Well, liberal’s don’t get to go to heaven, so get your wife to give you a good telling off!
Thanks for these thoughts again, and my comments come just after I’ve woken up before my necessary shot of caffeine, so I hope they make sense.
>>>>my comments come just after I’ve woken up before my necessary shot of caffeine<<<<
My comments come after nearly 30 days of Lent with only water to drink. I may have gone completely insane.
I have written some very basic thoughts on the subject of inerrancy here.
Oh, poor you David!!
Thanks for the link, Alastair, I'll get round to reading that when I have a bit more time.
I had a skim and saw you disagreed with me. The CHEEK of it!
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