Why I’m still protestant
Ever since I broke away from a “Truly Reformed” type of Protestantism, I’ve been wrestling with whether and why I should continue to be Protestant.
From reading NT Wright, I’ve come to accept a less-than-Lutheran position on justification; I’ve also come to accept a higher view of the sacraments (though this itself is not something in conflict with the magisterial Reformers); I think liturgical worship is better than non-liturgical worship; I’m okay with Eastern doctrines of theosis and non-penal views of the atonement (as long as they don’t exclude penal views); I even think there might be a place, though not an obligation, for a universal bishop (i.e., a Pope). So why am I still a Protestant?
It’s actually very simple for me. Firstly, it’s basically indisputable that both Popes and ecumenical councils, and even the majority of those in the church, have been in error. Everyone accepts this, some just think it sufficient to say the church/Popes eventually got orthodox again (though this doesn’t help avoid the problem). Further, “tradition” in the sense of what people in the church of the past believed or taught, is clearly also fallible. Secondly, Jesus and the Bible never promised that bishops, Popes, ecumenical councils, or the majority of believers, would be infallible. At most, we are promised the church will ultimately never be destroyed, and will be guided by the Spirit; nothing more detailed than that. Thirdly, the prophets (the OT), Jesus, and the Apostles (the NT) are promised infallibility by Jesus (assuming the arguments for inerrancy work).
Ultimately, this makes me Protestant. It’s not that I somehow think written revelation is better than orally received revelation, or that the church (or elders/bishops) is unnecessary to the mission of God in the world, or that materiality is bad, or that God only acts immediately in salvation. It’s just that, as far as I can see, I have no reason to believe that anyone except the prophets, Jesus, and the apostles are infallible.
Have you picked up David Wells’ new book “The Courage to Be Protestant”? I haven’t yet, but I listened to an interview with him about it on The Albert Mohler Radio Program – it was quite good. Anybody I know who has read the book love it.
Personally, I would be very reticent to give up the idea of being Protestant, or Reformed, or Evangelical for that matter. But that’s another (big) discussion.
I haven’t; to be honest, at one point I was ready to get into Wells. I have his book “Above All Earthly Pow’rs” on my shelf, and I think I even started to read it; but Frame’s critiques of him and my direct experience with him were enough to turn me off. I can’t swallow the whole “17-18 C Protestant Orthodoxy is the height of history” kind of thinking…
Andrew wrote: “It’s actually very simple for me. Firstly, it’s basically indisputable that both Popes and ecumenical councils, and even the majority of those in the church, have been in error.” That seems to me to be pretty sweeping statement. I think, for example, that much produced by ecumenical councils has been helpful and correct, in the face of serious doctrinal problems.
“Further ‘tradition’ in the sense of what people in the church of the past believed or taught, is clearly also fallible.” Every church has “tradition” to which they hold to pretty tightly. But much of tradition, while not infallible, is like a keel on a boat–it keeps the church steady. “Tradition” encompasses from the earliest days the New Testament, the Rule of Faith, and the Apostles Creed. These three traditions are necessary and indispensable to any community which seeks to be authentically Christian.
“It’s just that, as far as I can see, I have no reason to believe that anyone except the prophets, Jesus, and the apostles are infallible.” As far as I can see, this is a “Sola Scriptura” argument (unless you accept the Rule of Faith as from the apostles). My problem with the doctrine of infallibility is that there is no infallible hermeneutic because fallible humans are involved in interpreting and applying the text. The doctrine is largely moot–something that we argue about but for all practical purposes isn’t very helpful. Eventually, with such a view, Christians fall into position of it’s just me and my Bible–the “church” devolves into communities of like-minded private interpreters of the Bible–and you end up with motorcycles in a youth meeting and people who think that waving their socks around is a legitimate form of worship.
Andrew,
I like your honest and candid thoughts. I’m curious about what other option other than Protestantism you were considering. Or was it more thinking over whether you still are essentially a Protestant with having no other major Christian tradition in mind?
It’s interesting that when I reread this post I noticed that your two reasons are really just a single reason, which is obviously multifaceted. This would also be probably the most fundamental reason I would hold as well. I think I share more beliefs in common with the Eastern Orthodox than you, and so I don’t think I could tolerate a universal bishop whether or not I viewed it as obligatory.
In response to Dunn:
When you say that Andrew is making a “sweeping statement,” I think if I could speak for Andrew he likely does not mean to brush off the importance of conciliar definitions or decrees as unimportant or irrelevant. He’s definitely someone who really appreciates tradition. However, what I think can be inferred from his post is the view that the supreme authority is found in an infallible source. And since Scripture is our only infallible source, not traditions, or councils, or popes, then we can measure those fallible sources of teaching with the infallible. It may be that councils have reached proper decisions, but since they are not infallible like Scripture the authority they bear is only in as much as they accurately interpret Scripture.
From what I gather from the kinds of remarks you have made, I am assuming you are a Protestant as well. However, I have some concerns with your comments.
Before I get to them I would agree with you about your point that tradition does encompass the New Testament. It also includes the Hebrew Bible. Let us not forget that. The Rule of Faith and the Apostles Creed are different issues though. To use your words, I woulds say that the first two I’ve mentioned are “necessary and indispensable.” When it comes to the Rule of Faith, I would agree but I wouldn’t place it outside of biblical tradition. I wonder how exactly you would define the Rule of Faith. Do you adopt an ecumenical definition? Or did you mean that the Apostles Creed is the Rule of Faith? It seems you would have it as something distinct from the NT and the Apostles Creed though. I’m not sure how much thought you’ve given to defining or identifying it, but it’s not an easy task that’s for sure.
Regarding the Apostles Creed, I disagree with you. It has a long history and is not an ecumenical creed or statement. It’s only a Western creed that does not represent the East. And so, I would not tag it as “necessary” or “indispensable,” whether or not it teaches essential truths.
To come back to tradition and its relation to the Bible. Certainly the Bible is the product of tradition that was divinely inspired. But can we say that of extra- and post-biblical traditions in the same way that we would about Scripture? I ask this because you seem to be equivocating on Andrew’s use of “tradition,” assuming I am understanding his position properly. From what I understand, Andrew was referring to tradition in the sense of the Church’s doctrinal and practical interpretations of Scripture. In other words, how the Church has interpreted and understood Scripture. This would distinguish it from the traditions that compose Scripture.
You’re correct to say that our interpretations of Scripture are not infallible. However, your reason for this is inconsistent. If you claim that it is because we are just mere human beings and hence prone to error, then why not claim the same about the authors of Scripture? If you accept inerrancy and would reply that the authors were moved along by the Holy Spirit, then what of the Holy Spirit’s role in the interpreter? Was the Church not promised that the Holy Spirit would lead it into all truth? My point is not to say that we are infallible interpreters (whether it is to be taken individually or collectively), but to point out the weakness in your argument.
In fact this relates to you bringing up Sola Scriptura, which you have confused with Andrew’s arguments in the post. As much as he would probably uphold Sola Scriptura, you seem to have confused it with infallibility. Really it refers to the conjunction of the authority and sufficiency of Scripture. The former I believe obviously presupposes infallibility, but that’s not the point of the sola. Sufficiency means that the Scriptures contain all of the information necessary for faith and life; they are sufficient to give their own interpretation; and from them, the gospel message can be clearly understood by anyone. So I wonder whether in your view you would adhere to this sola of the Reformation.
You say that the position of Scripture’s infallibility is “largely moot” because of the fallibility of the interpreters. What authority do you attribute to Scripture and why? Don’t you derive its authority from its infallibility? If not, then from what do you derive it? If so, then how is infallibility not practical since it is the very basis for all of Christian doctrine and practice?
The big stumbling block for me in terms of Catholicism is the papacy. I’d like to believe that most popes were honest servants of God but there were also the Medici popes who exploited the Vatican in an astonishing way. The problem is, no matter how honest and humble you are, a position like that concentrates so much power (for life no less) in one person’s hands. It’s just dangerous to me.
The problem with Protestantism though is quite the opposite it seems to have separatism bred in the bone. While I understand what drove the original reformation, protestants have seemed to solve every dispute since through further subdivision. Many conservative protestants seem upset by the emerging church (or is it emergent? I can’t keep track) but it’s sort of inevitable isn’t it that someone inside protestantism would want another sort of reformation.
Ok. I looked up “Apostles Creed”. It is a Western formula. In most of its main points it derives from and conforms to the Rule of Faith and therefore is not essential, though an important, western summary of several essential points of faith. As for the Rule of Faith, it is a tradition which was passed down orally. There is no exact formulation of it, though it is largely consistent in its main points: cf. s.v., Encyclopedia of Early Christianity. For longer treatment, see R. P. C. Hanson, Tradition in the Early Church, 1962. It is not the same as the New Testament, but in fact was argued by Irenaeus as the essential teaching of the faith, as passed from apostles to bishops and safeguarded church from impostors–especially, the various gnostics of his day.
The Bible doesn’t derive it’s authority from its infallibility. It derives its authority from Jesus and the Apostles. It is authoritative, it’s profitable for doctrine and Christian practice, and it’s inspired by the Holy Spirit. I prefer such positive formulations over against such red herrings as “infallibility” or “inerrancy”. Often, the fiercest proponents of infallibility are not arguing so much for an infallible Bible, so much as for an infallible hermeneutic and a way to eliminate more liberal (though still “evangelical”) interpretations — e.g., in the feminist debate. It is not a practical doctrine to say the Bible is inerrant, because we have no “inerrant” MSS, but very real human witnesses–copied by fallible humans–to the text. This is the historic reality. I try to conform my views to what is the truth on the ground.
As for Sola Scriptura, I am trying to grasp Andrew’s position. He was the one who said only prophets, Jesus and Apostles are infallible, and that is why he remains a Protestant. If this is a confusion of his position, I apologize. Perhaps Andrew could clarify this point.
I do not believe in Sola Scriptura, at least as Greg Armstrong has explained, and I would not call myself “reform”. In this day and age of post-modern interpretations of Scripture, I believe that there must be limits. The seemingly infinite variety of conflicting interpretations of Bible belies the position that the Scriptures are sufficient to give their own interpretation, or that anyone reading the gospel can understand it. The gnostics, in the early church, likewise were great exegetes of both the Old and New Testaments. But they were completely wrong. Therefore, I would argue that we need a basic theological underpinning for interpreting the Bible. And I understand that that is tantamount to putting a theological tradition on a level equal to Scripture. So be it. I agree with Dan, that Protestantism leads to “separatism bred to the bone”, and we see it in the new productions of Protestant faculties of theology, the books and papers that they produce on the Bible which diverge so happily from all orthodox/catholic tradition.
I do believe the Holy Spirit will lead us into all truth. But that truth will be consistent with good Christian theology. In the early church, that good theology was called the Rule of Faith.
Infallibility is not the basis of all Christian doctrine and practice. There isn’t even a biblical basis for that position. The basis of Christian doctrine and practice is Jesus, the living Word of God.
P.W. Dunn:
I’m not going to beat the dead horse of inerrancy in this comment; if you want to continue that discussion, perhaps you could go back through the endless discussions we’ve already had on this blog about it, and then add your thoughts. Suffice it to say for me, it’s pretty clear that the writers of Scripture (the prophets, the apostles) were not Barthians when it came to scripture. So I see no reason to be. It’s the mainstream historic position of the church (the same church you are appealing to in the Rule of Faith) that the scriptures are inerrant/infallible/true, so I rest my case with that for now.
I think the proliferation of heresy is a lamentable thing, but I don’t think it can be stopped by appealing to an infallible authority that doesn’t exist. And consider the implications of this:
“The seemingly infinite variety of conflicting interpretations of Bible belies the position that the Scriptures are sufficient to give their own interpretation, or that anyone reading the gospel can understand it.”
Essentially what this means is that the apostles were not good enough at communicating the gospel so we need the post-apostolic church to help them out. Somehow what they wrote was not clearly against gnosticism (one wonders what John meant when he said “anyone who denies that the Son has come in the flesh is the antichrist…”), so we need Irenaeus and co. to improve their communication of the gospel. This is what all insufficiency-of-scripture positions come down to. From my point of view, if the apostles couldn’t do it, we have no hope…
And one can’t chalk up this insufficiency to the inherent obscurity of language, because any living magisterium, or codified tradition, is also communicated/communicates through language; everything must be interpreted. What one has to be saying is that what the apostles said wasn’t good enough, we need some extra words from non-apostles to be sufficiently instructed. As well, it implies that what the non-apostles said WAS good enough (since apparently the Rule of Faith is sufficient, and we don’t need a further Rule of the Rule of Faith to clarify what the first Rule of Faith said), it seems to imply that the sub-apostolic church was simply better than the apostles at communicating the gospel. Does that make sense?
And BTW, I agree with the rule of faith because it is a correct summary of what the apostles said; if someone could prove historically that any particular form of it came from the apostles, I would accept it as having equivalent authority with scripture. But frankly this doesn’t change my position; it just adds a little creed which can be reproduced verbatim from scripture to the canon, which is to really add nothing that isn’t already there.
I don’t see how the Rule of Faith is somehow “clearer” than scripture; it’s just shorter.
Greg:
To answer your first question, I’ve considered being Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and just about every form of Protestant you can name (Pentecostal, Lutheran, Anglican, Wesleyan/Holiness, Anabaptist, to name a few big ones). When an ideology loses its hold, I think its probably natural to go through a period of disorientation. But as it stands right now, I’m comfortable in a roughly Reformed Protestant tradition, though with a more chastened attachment to it than before. Besides most of the positions I mentioned in the main post have precedents somewhere in the Reformed tradition anyway, so I have no really strong reason to look for a different one.
As for the Pope: I’d be okay with something like an international discussion facilitator that was respected by all (something like how the Archbishop of Canterbury functions in the C of E), when there are major conflicts within the church. But I wouldn’t give that person any authority greater than a local elder, and perhaps not even that much. Their authority would probably be the same that a very holy layman/woman might have: a respect earned because of wisdom and character. I don’t know how the logistics of all that would work though, nor do I think it will exist any time soon, if it ever does.
As for the EO thing: you’re right, I think you might agree with more EO distinctives than I do (I don’t believe in the essence/energies distinction, I’m fine with the filioque, and I don’t have a problem with original guilt, though I’m not sure if I believe it), but I do appreciate a few of them, like their cosmic and mystical approaches to salvation.
Bravo. Perfect.
As I only learned of this blog from Keith recently, you will forgive me for not know what is or is not a dead. I was only trying to respond to the questions that Greg Armstrong asked me. I will just reiterate that a positive formula is helpful. To say the Scriptures are true is helpful. To say they are inerrant is a red herring.
Let’s try this from another angle: The post-apostolic church is not merely helping us understand what the apostles communicated, it is a part of their communication–because they invested in training people through catechism as their main way of transmitting the Christian faith and teaching. The written revelation which we have in the New Testament was being developed during this period.
That oral communication, from person to person, is an incarnation of the Gospel message. That is essential. The Bible alone dropped from outer space is not sufficient. Otherwise, God didn’t have to send Jesus Christ to incarnate his message. So yes, we in a sense we do need Irenaeus and Co. These apostolic representatives in the early church were the defenders of true Christianity in their day.
And I wonder if you really can understand the line that you quote from 1 John without Irenaeus. How did you know it was against gnosticism?
“As I only learned of this blog from Keith recently, you will forgive me for not know what is or is not a dead. I was only trying to respond to the questions that Greg Armstrong asked me. I will just reiterate that a positive formula is helpful. To say the Scriptures are true is helpful. To say they are inerrant is a red herring.”
I didn’t mean to blame you for anything, so there is no need for forgiveness. I’m only expressing that I don’t wish to rehash something that I have discussed very extensively here, especially since you haven’t really offered an argument against the position of inerrancy other than to say it’s wrong. For me, to say the scriptures are true is to say that they are always true, and to say they are always true is the same thing as saying they are inerrant (without error).
“The post-apostolic church is not merely helping us understand what the apostles communicated, it is a part of their communication–because they invested in training people through catechism as their main way of transmitting the Christian faith and teaching.”
But the post-apostolic church as it existed in history cannot simply be equated with the apostle’s communication, unless you want to say that everything everyone said in the post-apostolic church was correct. They carried on the words of the apostles, yes, but that does not mean they added something that was lacking in those words.
“That oral communication, from person to person, is an incarnation of the Gospel message. That is essential. ”
It was essential in the days when the NT was not finished, but at this point, since as far as I’ve seen in my reading, there’s nothing in the oral tradition passed down by the apostles that was not also in their written work, it is no longer necessary. Even if you want to argue that some parts of oral tradition were given directly by the apostles (you’d have to make a specific historical argument that a certain set of words were given by an apostle), then as far as I’m concerned you’ll have only succeeded in making the canon a little bigger (though not in the substance of what it says). For me the oral/written thing is really not the real issue; it’s the apostolic/not-apostolic thing. My problem with various RC traditions (Purgatory, Marian doctrines, etc.) is not that they are (allegedly) based on oral, non-written tradition from the apostles, but that there’s no good historical reason to believe they are *apostolic* doctrines, regardless of in what form they were handed down. The fact that Catholics have moved away from a partim-partim view of tradition to a Newmanesque/organic view is, to me, essentially an admission of this fact (now we are to believe they are apostolic essentially because the magisterium says so, not because anyone can prove them through evidence of an unbroken oral handing-on of these doctrines).
“And I wonder if you really can understand the line that you quote from 1 John without Irenaeus. How did you know it was against gnosticism?”
Well, I know from historical research and personal experience that gnosticism is based on an aversion to fleshly things, and I can read that John says it’s part of the essence of the gospel to believe God came in flesh (thus, God is not opposed to flesh). Do I need more information than that?
I should correct myself: you did offer one argument against inerrancy, that it was useless without infallible interpreters. All I can say to that is: we have a better chance of getting at truth with an infallible document interpreted fallibly than with a fallible document interpreted fallibly, even if we don’t have an infallible document interpreted infallibly. So I would still say there is some benefit if inerrancy is true.
Of course, I don’t think the fact that inerrancy is misunderstood or abused to mean that the interpreter is always correct is a valid argument against inerrancy.
P.W. Dunn:
I have one more thought. In your first comment you said the following:
“Every church has “tradition” to which they hold to pretty tightly. But much of tradition, while not infallible, is like a keel on a boat–it keeps the church steady.”
What I want to point out is that you admit these traditions are not infallible; you also say that the scriptures are not infallible. This means that, in principle, and a priori, neither scripture nor church tradition is necessarily true just because it is scripture or church tradition. Now, unless you are going to say the magisterium or the church as a whole is infallible (which I doubt you will), you are condemning the church to far more possible disunity than I am. I at least have one standard that must be true just because of what it is: Scripture (/the apostolic communication). But you have nothing. You’re left with your own personal judgments, and the personal judgments of others, on the Christ-experience or the historical Jesus, or something similarly Barthian. How is that more conducive to church unity than my position? It seems to me that you have less sure guidance than I do…
Andrew. Thanks. It is not the same to say the Scriptures are true and that they are inerrant. Logically, inerrancy requires a much greater burden of proof. For example, in reading John’s Gospel, I found the kinds of grammatical ambiguities that I would penalize a student for making. That is a kind of error. But you must have covered these things on the other pages of this blog. I did however offer two kinds of practical arguments regarding my position (hermeneutics–you now acknowledged this one, no inerrant text for the Bible).
“It was essential in the days when the NT was … it is no longer necessary.” Even today, without the community of believers, the Bible is largely opaque to people. We depend on the context of the teaching and interpretive community of God (including the historic community) to understand the Bible.
I agree with you regarding apostolicity and various non-apostolic doctrines that make it into the church, not least of which, later RC traditions. If you are unable to overlook such accretions, then it wise not to become a Roman Catholic.
The historical research on gnosticism remains greatly dependent on Irenaeus’s five books Against Heresies, though scholars are often reluctant to admit this. For example, scholarly interpretations of Nag Hammadi library rely mostly on Irenaeus to determine the provenance of the various documents.
“All I can say to that is: we have a better chance of getting at truth with an infallible document interpreted fallibly than with a fallible document interpreted fallibly, even if we don’t have an infallible document interpreted infallibly.” But which infallible document are you talking about? All we have are MSS with their many errors of transcription, which require painstaking and time consuming work to recover an alleged, infallible original. I am trying to deal with the facts on the ground.
Hi Andrew: I think your last question, “How is that more conducive to church unity than my position? It seems to me that you have less sure guidance than I do…” gets to the crux of the matter. I am not sure why it is that you insist on infallibility. And that’s the reason for my original questions on your post. I have stood in defense both of the Bible and of tradition. I’m not insisting that either be infallible in order to be true. Teachers don’t fail students who make a few mistakes on exams. If they have learned the material satisfactorily, then that is sufficient. It reminds me of speaking French to native speakers of the language: in the middle of saying something important, they might stop me to correct my grammar, but they did not deal with the substance of what I had to say.
Dunn:
You wrote: “The Bible doesn’t derive it’s authority from its infallibility. It derives its authority from Jesus and the Apostles.”
Mentioning the apostles I think is redundant because they derive their authority from Jesus. Where does Jesus get his authority from? Is it not his divinity and the Father? And why should we look to God as the supreme authority except it be that he can only speak truth because of his immutable character? Hence, the Scripture “he cannot lie.” And we know that God is the author of Scripture, so then how can the Scriptures be false?
From what you’ve said already I would guess you would say either that God is not the author of Scripture, which is heretical, or that because it was also authored by humans it must contain errors. Giving you the benefit of the doubt I will assume you will pose the latter response. Since you raise a number of times the issue of scribal transmission errors. The problem is that you equate even so-called “grammatical” imperfections as “a kind of error.” But grammatical awkwardness or abnormalities should not be equated with falsehood. I say this because the doctrine of inerrancy is the assertion that the Scriptures are true. Grammar does not deal with truth and falsehood, but form.
You seem to have confused inerrancy with something other than the truthfulness of Scripture. That’s just not true though. The term “inerrancy” or “infallibility” derives from an apologetic context, but it’s meaning is not different than the positive affirmation of its truthfulness, which you say you prefer.
When you use the analogy of being corrected when speaking French, you say that the correction did not deal with the “substance” of what you were saying. Similarly I could also claim this analogy to reiterate the point that grammatical awkwardness is not tantamount to speaking falsehood. I’m not sure why you say you’ve stood in defense of Scripture and tradition when you’ve argued that Scripture is not completely true. And you’ve based this on transmission issues when none of us are claiming that the transmission process was infallible. Moreover, the transmission issues are not on the whole very difficult.
You also say that infallibility is unnecessary. Then on what basis do you believe the Scriptures to be true, even if not infallible? If the Scriptures are fallible, then how do you determine which teachings are true and which are false? What do you appeal to? Do you just count the supposed contradictions and inconsistencies as false and all the consistent teaching as true? Even if you were to do that by giving it the benefit of the doubt, what reason would you even have for that position? That would just be arbitrary and well-wishing. The issue is that your position is inconsistent, arbitrary, and requires a baseless trust.
Greg:
You downplay the textual issue. If only 2% of the text of the New Testament is affected, at best one can say is that the Bible is 98% infallible. That is not a helpful or practical doctrine.
Your own view is not based on the Bible such as it is, but upon a bit of scholasticism. God never lies, he cannot lie; he is the author of the Bible, therefore the Bible is also inerrant.
In spoken communication, grammatical errors are less serious because the hearer can ask for clarifications from the speaker. In written communication, after the death of the author, grammatical problems are more substantial and are often not merely a question of form but also of meaning.
To maintain the essential reliability and trustworthiness of the Bible is substantially different in practical terms than insisting upon its infallibility or inerrancy. A new believer who is told that the Bible is inerrant will fret over small problems of historical or scientific accuracy. The skeptic ridicules the Bible over such issues. And what about the sincere believer who discovers the true nature of NT text—does that person not become an antagonist of evangelical faith (Bart Ehrman). To say that the Bible is a divine guide and a witness to Jesus Christ would largely avert such problems.
How do I deal with my doctrine of the trustworthiness of Scripture as opposed to infallibility? A preference for clearer passages over ambiguous, for textually sure passages over against uncertain variants, etc.
As a preface, I agree with Greg’s most recent comment 100%.
“Even today, without the community of believers, the Bible is largely opaque to people. We depend on the context of the teaching and interpretive community of God (including the historic community) to understand the Bible.”
Which is still not the same as saying those teachers are some how equal in authority to scripture; they are still, in principle, fallible and correctable by anyone on the basis of scripture.
“The historical research on gnosticism remains greatly dependent on Irenaeus’s five books Against Heresies, though scholars are often reluctant to admit this. For example, scholarly interpretations of Nag Hammadi library rely mostly on Irenaeus to determine the provenance of the various documents.”
Using Irenaeus as a historical source to understand the character of gnosticism does not at all mean he has intrinsic authority, anymore than me citing Tacitus to learn about the early Barbarians implies that he has authority in the church.
“I am not sure why it is that you insist on infallibility.”
My reasons aside, this avoids the argument I was making in that comment: you chide my view, because of its lower view of tradition, for being conducive to sectarianism, but if anything yours is more conducive. There is no infallible standard in your view; tradition is just as open to individual challenge as scripture is (it’s not infallible, after all), so how is it supposed to put an end to the Protestant problem of endless splitting?
“Your own view is not based on the Bible such as it is, but upon a bit of scholasticism. God never lies, he cannot lie; he is the author of the Bible, therefore the Bible is also inerrant.”
This is basically just dodging the point.
“A new believer who is told that the Bible is inerrant will fret over small problems of historical or scientific accuracy. ”
Only if such a believer believes they must demonstrate the inerrancy of scripture in every circumstance, instead of having faith that it is true even if they aren’t capable of completely defending it at every turn.
“A preference for clearer passages over ambiguous, for textually sure passages over against uncertain variants, etc.”
But what does it matter whether a passage is clearer? If the scriptures are not infallible, a very clear passage can be clearly wrong. Textually certain passages could be textually certain false doctrines. There’s no reason to treat the scriptures as an authority in themselves; you need to establish on other grounds why we should accept any particular teaching of scripture.
I said that the basis of biblical authority is that it is a witness to Jesus Christ, the living Word of God. I maintain the trustworthiness of scripture, and I have never said that the Bible teaches false doctrines. Where are you getting this? It is a straw man argument.
“I said that the basis of biblical authority is that it is a witness to Jesus Christ, the living Word of God.”
So we presume the truth of any person or document which claims to witness to Jesus Christ? I doubt you mean something as simple as that. Wouldn’t Watchtower Tracts and the Book of Mormon thereby qualify for our presumption of their truth?
If we’re just treating scripture as a fallible human witness like any other fallible human witness, why is there a presumption that the clearer passages are somehow more likely to be true than obscure passages, or even more, that the passages which we are more certain were in the original testimony are somehow more likely to be true? Is that how we normally treat witnesses? The more eloquent they are, the more likely they are speaking the truth? Or the more we are able to hear the words coming out of their mouth with clarity, the more likely they are telling the truth? Ordinarily those concerns have nothing to do with whether someone is likely to be telling the truth, in, say, a court of law.
I also never said that you said the bible taught false doctrines; my point is that if you jettison the idea that the scripture is always true, there is no reason to think that in any given place it might not be false (even the clear and textually certain places); one would have to appeal to something beyond scripture to support scripture’s teachings.
To clarify: I’m making an argument about your consistency, not what you intend to believe.
Dunn, you said:
“You downplay the textual issue. If only 2% of the text of the New Testament is affected, at best one can say is that the Bible is 98% infallible. That is not a helpful or practical doctrine.”
Firstly, if what I have done is called “downplaying” textual issues it’s only because of your disproportionate “up-playing.” But with the way you speak of “textual issues” in such a broad and sweeping manner, as if all kinds of “textual issues” represent blemishes in the text, it makes me wonder if you’re just either untrained in Hebrew and unacquainted with Scripture in its original languages or if you’re just being intellectually dishonest and unwilling to really wrestle with the issues. You might think this is harsh. I understand that you’re just trying to speak of the issues in a general manner and so have to sacrifice some precision, but I think you’re going much further than that by including grammatical issues (I’m not saying “error” here for a reason) and transmission errors. Both of these do not impugn the integrity of the texts when we speak of their truth value.
And since you’ve kept on insisting on “grammatical errors” as the key problem in all of this, why not give us an example of a grammatical “error” which affects the message of the text in such a way that it teaches something false. It makes me wonder if you think awkwardness of language or abnormalities should also be judged as “errors.” Is Mark full of “errors” because of his simple, untrained use of Greek? Or are any of the other NT authors teaching falsehood when they employ Hebrew idioms in Greek? Or how about the Psalms. Is it an “error” on the part of the psalmists to leave out certain words in order to preserve the meter in the Hebrew poetry? We all know that poetry in all languages does strange things with words, grammar, and arrangement. Should one genre or style be judged as the “correct” one? And are exceptions never permitted? It just makes me wonder how much you’ve actually wrestled with these issues personally and not just read or heard about them.
Or prove me wrong and show that I’m “downplaying” these things.
You also said:
“In spoken communication, grammatical errors are less serious because the hearer can ask for clarifications from the speaker. In written communication, after the death of the author, grammatical problems are more substantial and are often not merely a question of form but also of meaning.”
Why do you assume that in spoken communication or in written (with living authors) that one can just ask the speaker? This if anything is most often not the case. Death doesn’t really matter here. It only means that a writer can’t go back and make an alteration himself. But all of this discussion is missing the point because you’re still asserting that grammatical issues in the text are so problematic in the biblical texts that they actually result in expressing false ideas. Give me an example of a grammatical issue in the text that unambiguously conveys a false idea. Or else all that I could conclude from your arguments is that up until now you’ve just uncritically accepted what you’ve been taught or read.
Now you’re correct in saying that there is a big difference in practice between holding the Bible as reliable and as inerrant. This is true, but I think this contradicts your earliest arguments about inerrancy as having no practical value.
As a result, you say that the “new believer” will “fret” over textual minutiae. Andrew’s response is correct. I would also like to point out that if you have thought any of my comments here as being too harsh, notice that you have framed this discussion in terms of spiritual and intellectual maturity.
You say that the “skeptic” will “ridicule the Bible.” Of course he does. He’s a skeptic so he’s intellectually dishonest and so unwilling to be at all generous with his approach to understanding the text and unwilling to seek a fuller understanding in order to seek the text’s integrity. I’m not sure how to relate the skeptic to a believer unless you’re for some odd reason advocating him as a model for the “sincere” believer or a proper intellectual.
Now the “sincere believer,” when he “discovers the true nature of the NT text” will end up like Bart Ehrman. I’m not sure I understand you correctly here. Do you mean to say that if a believer is intellectually sincere and believes in the inerrancy of the NT, that when he comes to a fuller understanding of textual issues he will abandon the faith like Ehrman? Correct me if I’m wrong but I thought that was the best way to understand what you were saying here. If so, then you must conclude that Andrew and I are intellectually disingenuous because we are familiar with the textual issues and believe in inerrancy. I don’t mind the charge. I just think it’s unfounded.
Obviously I would agree with Andrew’s latest comment. And lest my comment here might draw attention away from the force of his, I would like to repeat his final point:
“If the scriptures are not infallible, a very clear passage can be clearly wrong. Textually certain passages could be textually certain false doctrines. There’s no reason to treat the scriptures as an authority in themselves; you need to establish on other grounds why we should accept any particular teaching of scripture.”
So what are those grounds?
I just wanted to say that I hadn’t seen the two previous comments before my last one while I wrote that comment. So I wasn’t deliberately trying to ignore anything said in them.
This is a great discussion lads. Sorry Dan and I haven’t jumped in, but we were both at his wedding yesterday. I just logged on now at 730 on Sat.
Perhaps it would be good to do a post with all the inerrancy articles on them?
P.W. Dunn:
I want to apologize for my antagonistic tone in some of these comments. I hope you can forgive me.
Andrew: No worries. I do still have a few more responses but am otherwise occupied. Peter
Keith,
This is what you get when type “inerrancy” into the search bar: http://civitatedei.wordpress.com/?s=inerrancy&x=0&y=0
I think that covers most of the discussions we had here.
Andrew: No worries. Peter
Greg,
Earlier you said this:
“But with the way you speak of “textual issues” in such a broad and sweeping manner, as if all kinds of “textual issues” represent blemishes in the text, it makes me wonder if you’re just either untrained in Hebrew and unacquainted with Scripture in its original languages or if you’re just being intellectually dishonest and unwilling to really wrestle with the issues.”
PW Dunn has a PhD in NT from Cambridge. He teaches in seminaries….
Just to let you know.
The state of the biblical text and the science of textual criticism must have an impact on our doctrine of the Bible. Most inerrantists concede this point by saying that it is only the inspired autographs which are inerrant. My point is that we don’t have the autographs. We have the copies with their transmission variants. That means that there is a degree of uncertainty about what is the original text, and that makes the question of infallibility an academic, not a practical question. For in the process of doing exegesis, the first scientific question that we must ask in every case is whether we are working with the original text.
I once taught a seminar on NT textual criticism to two Bayaka Pygmies and their translation consultant who were assigned by ATCATBA (the Bible translation association of Central African Republic) to translate the Bible into their language. After learning about the many variants in the New Testament, Barthelemy said that he was greatly encouraged, because before he heard this, he had great fear that he might inadvertently make a mistake in translating and that God would be angry with him. But once he learned that there was certain level of precision which was missing even in the NT text, it was as though he was relieved of a great burden.
But this gets to another point. Even if the original text was inerrant or infallible, who amongst us claims that there is even the remote possibility of an inerrant translation of the Bible? –except perhaps certain KJV only fanatics. Human language lacks the precision necessary to do so. That is my point about grammar—no one speaks with absolute precision nor is it possible so to write. Perhaps, I am saying that my discomfort with calling the Biblical text inerrant is that nothing said or written in our human languages is capable of inerrancy according to any meaningful definition of the term. And even if it were at times possible to write inerrantly, it is impossible to read and interpret inerrantly. Yet God has deigned to communicate with us humans, who are fallen so far from his perfection, by inspiring human authors. These authors then wrote to the best of their abilities what God moved them to write. Some wrote with greater precision and elegance than others. But in every step of the process, the humanity of the writers, of their secretaries, and of the scribes who copied by hand their writings, imposed itself upon the text. It could be no other way because of the nature of the language.
And I think that is why God chose finally to make a better way. Rather than speak through prophets, or through written documents, he sent his own Son, the Logos of God. Then, Jesus Christ in turn trained 12 disciples to carry on his work. This is an incarnation of the Good News, from logos to flesh, from flesh to flesh, and so forth. The New Testament is only a pale reflection of the glory of God’s ultimate revelation, His Son Jesus Christ; so we also have a human connection with those first Christians through a long lineage of disciples who carried the message from person to person right into our own generation. And these are guided all along the way by the living presence of the Holy Spirit. The New Testament is a great aid in this process because it has to a degree codified the tradition of the apostles. Yet the living witness of Christians with a genetic connection to the apostles was also necessary to preserve the church through threats of heretics who would often cite the Bible against Christians. The Judaizers, the Gnostics, Marcion, and Arius (to name just a few) relied on proof texts supported by logical arguments for their positions. So we are greatly indebted to Paul, Irenaeus, Athanasius et al. who preserved the church from these threats.
There are those who claim that the perfect which was to come in 1 Cor 13 was the NT. I beg to differ. The Bible is a compilation of God’s revelations to humans through various times and places, but it is written in our form of communication, human language. It is a fallen form of communication which is imperfect. Had he refused to allow his revelation to come to us in a fallen form, he would not have been able to communicate at all (except of course through Jesus). But God loves us, and choses to speak to us, even if that message can be misconstrued, miscopied, and in some cases awkwardly or inaccurately composed by the servants he’s chosen as his prophets.
I think the convo’s gone off the rails, not that that’s a bad thing. But Andrew, to come back to your original post, the more I think about it, the more I wonder if it matters at all.
So much of the doctrine we argue over doesn’t matter. For example, the predestination vs free will argument, doesn’t really matter because ultimately we’re just supposed to witness to and love people. The answer to the question doesn’t change what obedience is… love and pursue people. That’s all.
Same with something like transubstantiation… respect the sacraments and realize it’s a holy act that unites us with Christ’s suffering and sacrifice. Our understanding of the doctrine really doesn’t change what we do or how we do it.
With church, find a local body that is bearing spiritual fruit. If it respects your preferences (liturgy, contemporary worship, great kids programs, etc), then great, but I think that’s icing on the cake and God might have you join a body that is an affront to your preferences so that you might change, grow, or even develop new preferences; He likes to rock the boat like that.
All we were ever called to was fellowship with the brethren we’re in proximity to: to love God and love others. Doctrine, we’ll always be figuring out as we grow in Him (even the apostles disagreed with each other at times).
There are no Catholics or Protestants or anything else: simply those who are covered by the blood, and those who are not.
Then the poor ghetto soul who stole a Gideon’s New Testament from a motel or the Chinese widow on the run with Bible held together with tape and prayers is hopelessly lost to a future plagued with heresies and misdirected faith…
What on earth would Christ send us a Helper for if we must lean on the erudite for any hope at laying hold of Truth? What place has the Spirit if not to guide us through the Scriptures, even apart from the Glowing Light of the Institution and it’s Experts?
No. I will trust in He that comes in the Name of the Father at the request of the Son. It is for this very reason – for guidance and interpretation – that He has come and makes Himself available to all who bear the mark of the King!
P.W. Dunn:
While the imperfection of the transmission and interpretation process is significant, I don’t see how that makes the truth of the scriptures a merely “academic” issue.
“Perhaps, I am saying that my discomfort with calling the Biblical text inerrant is that nothing said or written in our human languages is capable of inerrancy according to any meaningful definition of the term.”
That’s not really sensible. You can say lots of true things with human language.
“And these are guided all along the way by the living presence of the Holy Spirit.”
But you’ve given no reason to think that they’d be preserved from any particular error by this guidance; in fact your reasoning about the inspiration of the scriptures (it was written by a human, therefore unlikely to be inerrant) would work the other direction, as far as I can see. So I’m not sure how this is somehow better than the “previous” way of working.
Let me ask this question a different way: if the falliblity of the scriptures required a new way of revelation, one of a person-to-person (under the guidance of the Spirit) method, and yet those persons are also fallible, how is this supposed to solve the problem generated by sola scriptura (private interpretation generating schism)?
I’m actually just as concerned with church unity as you are; I’m not pointing this out to be anal. I really think that your position, which is essentially that scripture, tradition, and the church (corporately and individually) are all fallible (which is not the same thing as saying they are completely false), will be more likely to cause splintering in the church than my view, which at least says that the first of these three is infallible.
“Human language lacks the precision necessary to do so.[make a perfect translation]”
That is actually disputed. It may not be practical to make a perfect translation, but that does not mean that it is impossible. Anyone who holds the position that there is a natural semantic metalanguage believes that perfect translations are not only possible in some instances, but in absolutely every instance.
“Perhaps, I am saying that my discomfort with calling the Biblical text inerrant is that nothing said or written in our human languages is capable of inerrancy according to any meaningful definition of the term.”
I have heard this before, but I have yet to see any proof. Besides, I have written a short inerrant work before. So I already know that it is possible.
“And even if it were at times possible to write inerrantly, it is impossible to read and interpret inerrantly.”
That’s a pretty strong statement. Since I know of many instances in which someone has read my inerrant work inerrantly, I already know that this is false. Besides, you do not provide any proof.
As an aside I should point out that an inerrant work is simply a work that makes no errors of fact at all. It means nothing more than that, and nothing less. The big ‘controversy’ surrounding inerrancy deals with the scope of inerrancy, not its nature. Some wish to restrict the inerrant content of the Bible to include only “matters of faith and practice” and allow errors of fact in scientific and historical matters.
Matt:
Could you elaborate on the metalanguage view? It sounds very interesting to me…
Andrew,
The natural semantic metalanguage view is a relatively recent view (1970’s) in linguistics. Here is a brief statement of the position:
http://www.une.edu.au/bcss/linguistics/nsm/semantics-in-brief.php
Basically, the theory posits that there are a set of words that have the exact same meaning in absolutely every language. These simple words (such as bad, good, know, think, like, some, etc.) can be combined using a universal grammar to form each and every concept found in every language. These simple words are known as semantic primes because they cannot be adequately defined using any other words in the language. Scholars dispute over how much of this is accurate, but it is a respected position in linguistics.
NB: citations of N. F. Gier are from http://www.class.uidaho.edu/ngier/gre6.htm which I found interesting because his essay agrees on several points with what I have written in this discussion so far.
Andrew wrote: “That’s not really sensible. You can say lots of true things with human language.” The Bible says true things. But that doesn’t make it inerrant. Here is someone who says something similar: “Difficult though it may be to understand, God chose to make his authority relevant to his creatures by means that necessitate some element of fallibility” (Dewey M. Beegle; cited by N. F. Gier). Also, Paul says, “For in him all the fulness of God was pleased to dwell” (Col 1.19).
Andrew wrote: “But you’ve given no reason to think that they’d be preserved from any particular error by this guidance; in fact your reasoning about the inspiration of the scriptures (it was written by a human, therefore unlikely to be inerrant) would work the other direction, as far as I can see. So I’m not sure how this is somehow better than the “previous” way of working.” You seem to think that it is necessary to have an infallible source of authority in order to have unity in the church. Whatever happened to Christ being the head of the Church? He is the infallible source of authority in the church, not the Bible. “There is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, …” Jesus in Matthew claims that the little ones have access in prayer to the Father (angels being those who carry prayers to God in Jewish belief; cf. Matt 18.10). If we have such great access to God the Father through Jesus Christ, why are you looking for an infallible source of authority? I am not saying that the Bible is not useful or doesn’t play a role. Au contraire. But rather, if you are looking for an infallible source of authority in the church, look to Jesus (Heb 12.2).
Andrew wrote: “While the imperfection of the transmission and interpretation process is significant, I don’t see how that makes the truth of the scriptures a merely “academic” issue.” I wasn’t talking about the “truth” of the scriptures. I believe them to be true. I said that the doctrine of the Bible’s inerrancy is an academic matter—or a moot point, as we do not have the alleged inerrant text. It is in the realm of what would-have-beens, which means it’s not the Bible that’s read in my church every week that’s inerrant, but something else that no one has.
Andrew wrote, quoting me: ‘Your [of Greg Armstrong] own view is not based on the Bible such as it is, but upon a bit of scholasticism. God never lies, he cannot lie; he is the author of the Bible, therefore the Bible is also inerrant.’ “This is basically just dodging the point.” Which point am I dodging? I am basing my point of view on the empirical evidence of the biblical text, on the way it is as opposed to on some deduction regarding the way it must be. Clark Pinnock is quoted by Ngier as saying, “In the last analysis the inerrancy theory is a logical deduction not well supported exegetically. Those who press it hard are elevating reason over Scripture…”
Matthew wrote: “Besides, I have written a short inerrant work before. So I already know that it is possible.” Is this a joke? N. F. Gier writes: “By insisting on detailed inerrancy evangelicals have in effect deified the Bible: they have made it into a divine entity. Nothing humans have ever written is without error. Granted, any person can say or write self-evident truths like ‘all circles are round,’ or a human writer could get many historical facts right, but writing flawless history would require a divine author. To say that a thing is perfect is to say that it is divine.” Perhaps you would be willing to post your inerrant text, so that we can see it. I did read with keen interest your recent posting, “Modernism: Bad Points”. Is this an example of inerrancy?
Matthew wrote: “That’s a pretty strong statement. Since I know of many instances in which someone has read my inerrant work inerrantly, I already know that this is false. Besides, you do not provide any proof.”
I admit that I spoke strongly about the ability to read and interpret inerrantly—but I suppose that comes from the certain basic humility which is necessary for good biblical interpretation. The ability to interpret a text is impaired by the levels of separation between the writer and the reader. If the readers are contemporaries who speak the same mother tongue and who belong to the same culture, it is possible to write short, banal texts that will be perfectly understood. As the degrees of separation increase, the more difficult it becomes. The levels of separation from our biblical writers are very serious–two-thousand years or more; the Greek and the Hebrew of the Bible is not really spoken any more by modern speakers of the language, because languages evolve. The research of words in the Hebrew Bible not infrequently requires the study of dead languages on tablets surviving the ravages of time: but such dead languages are cognates of Hebrew, and it would be like trying to understand an English word based upon its French usage (e.g., “preservative”). The Greek Bible requires painstaking research in the vestiges of the language that have come to us on papyrus or preserved by medieval scribes. As someone who does translation of ancient Greek, it is indeed impossible to make a perfect translation—maybe with footnotes, one would be able to express the range of nuance in the original, but some of the richness of the original language is most often sacrificed for the sake of clarity in the target language. And it is impossible to know with certainty the diction and grammar of the every word or phrase in any given passage of the New Testament. Even the translation of such trivial words as articles, particles and prepositions is a question of academic debate, to which translators are often forced to make a best guess as to the meaning of their usage in any given context. Certain linguists may say it is theoretically possible to make a perfect translation, but that provides little comfort to the translator of ancient text. If a perfect translation of the Bible were possible, why do we even find it necessary to force MDiv students to study Greek or Hebrew?
Benjamin Allison wrote: “What on earth would Christ send us a Helper for if we must lean on the erudite for any hope at laying hold of Truth?” Erudite Christians serve a useful function in the body of Christ to provide scientific insight into the historical and grammatical meaning of the Bible and to provide texts and apparati for the Hebrew and Greek. If you want to claim independence from scholars then you would indeed be unable to read the Bible, because translations of the Bible have been in recent times translated by Bible scholars of varying degrees of expertise. But laying hold of Truth does not depend on scholars any more than on the Bible, for the Truth is Jesus himself, who often makes himself known to people without their having to read the Bible.
P.W. Dunn:
I’m a little concerned that you’re quoting an argument from a flagrant unbeliever (Nick Gier) against me… it does not help persuade me of your position…
“God chose to make his authority relevant to his creatures by means that necessitate some element of fallibility”
The necessity of this has yet to be demonstrated, as far as I can tell.
“You seem to think that it is necessary to have an infallible source of authority in order to have unity in the church.”
Let me put this another way, then: I see no reason whatever that my original position would somehow contribute to the splintering of the church more than yours. Can you explain why it would?
“But rather, if you are looking for an infallible source of authority in the church, look to Jesus (Heb 12.2).”
This is ironic, since I have been arguing all along the the Scriptures are the instantiation of God’s authority over the church, while your original position was that the scriptures are insufficient to govern the church towards unity and truth without an authoritative-interpreter-church and its tradition to supplement it.
“Which point am I dodging? I am basing my point of view on the empirical evidence of the biblical text, on the way it is as opposed to on some deduction regarding the way it must be. Clark Pinnock is quoted by Ngier as saying, “In the last analysis the inerrancy theory is a logical deduction not well supported exegetically. Those who press it hard are elevating reason over Scripture…””
But, in the abstract, deductive reason gives more certainty that inductive reason, so why should we go with inductive over deductive? Further, I think the inference is a fair one: 1 Peter says that the Scriptures are reliable because the prophets spoke from God; this implicitly assumes that speaking from God has something to do with truth, as if speaking form God somehow guaranteed truth. If speaking from God guarantees truth, and we affirm all the Scriptures are spoken from God (cf. 2 Tim 3 as well as 1 Pet 2), then it’s eminently reasonable to conclude that all the Scriptures are true, and with more certainty than any empirical/inductive study could provide.
“Matthew wrote: “Besides, I have written a short inerrant work before. So I already know that it is possible.” Is this a joke?”
Gier admits that it is possible to write a short inerrant text; this means that it’s logically possible to write a long one. All you can do is say that it is unlikely; but with the supposition that God is the author of Scripture, I’d say his infallibility overrides any probability that a long text would likely be errant somewhere. That God is infallible is necessary because God is perfect; that long texts are fallible is only a probable truth, if that.
“I said that the doctrine of the Bible’s inerrancy is an academic matter—or a moot point, as we do not have the alleged inerrant text.”
Actually, I’m certain you can’t prove that; again, on the supposition that there originally was an inerrant text, all you can prove is that we have other texts in addition to the inerrant text, at most. To prove otherwise you would have to have positive evidence that no manuscript completely reflects the autographa.
“As the degrees of separation increase, the more difficult it becomes.”
The admission that it is possible to perfectly interpret a text undercuts your original claim, that having imperfect readers makes a perfect text completely useless; at most you can argue that it makes it less useful than it would be with imperfect interpreters.
“And it is impossible to know with certainty the diction and grammar of the every word or phrase in any given passage of the New Testament.”
Textual criticism and linguistics never give logical certainties; I can’t imagine how you could justify that “impossible” in any strong sense.
“If a perfect translation of the Bible were possible, why do we even find it necessary to force MDiv students to study Greek or Hebrew?”
That assumes that everything that is possible is easy, doesn’t it?
Hi Andrew: Alas, I bow to your superior persistence. I have said what I can, and now, to go further would require repetition. Let me just say, however:
Whether Ngier is a unbeliever, flagrant or not, is not even germane. The Ngier article was interesting but that is not an endorsement of either the person nor even the entirety of his article–besides, what I had written in this blog up to that point was before encountering Ngier’s article. I have on occasion made favorable reference to Bart Ehrman’s SBL paper (from about 4 years ago) on the Secret Gospel of Mark. At a scholarly level, one discourses with friends and enemies alike. I thought you were at least attempting to do some kind of scholarship on this blog. If I had the wrong impression, mea culpa.
I should probably justify my comment a bit more:
I know a bit more about Nick Gier than what I let on; he’s not just a flagrant unbeliever, he’s a person who has persistently harassed and lied about Doug Wilson, a pastor/theologian/blogger living in Moscow that Keith (I think it would be fair to say) and I greatly admire. Gier is not your average unbeliever to me, he’s a completely unreliable and hostile witness. Ehrman is a far better opponent in my mind. But I should have made that clearer before.
However, I think it should be clear that I didn’t actually dismiss anything Gier said because he was an unbeliever; I did respond to every point you made by quoting him. So I don’t think it’s fair to imply that I’m unwilling to do civil scholarship with friends and enemies alike. If I had simply insulted you or refused to continue, I could see that as justified, but I didn’t in fact do that.
Thanks for your persistent and knowledgeable interaction (and, BTW, to make it clear, I consider you a “friend”, not an “enemy”; I hope that is also clear).
God bless.
Andrew: To be sure, friends. Peter
“Is this a joke?”
No. It was a very short series of sentences containing simple truths that could be easily checked or that I was completely certain of. I could try and find it, but I believe it has vanished. (I do not claim that any of my posts are inerrant. If you believe you have found an error, then point it out.)
“The ability to interpret a text is impaired by the levels of separation between the writer and the reader…As the degrees of separation increase, the more difficult it becomes.”
I agree. But this is not enough to support your position. You need to claim that it is absolutely impossible. For the moment that completely accurate interpretation is possible, then so is inerrant interpretation.
“If a perfect translation of the Bible were possible, why do we even find it necessary to force MDiv students to study Greek or Hebrew?”
The possibility I am speaking of would require knowledge of English, Greek and Hebrew that we do not presently have. In any case, I also claimed that such a perfect translation would be impractical. For one thing it would be many time longer than the original. It would be 10-100 times longer than the original text. So it is possible, in principle, but no more than that (right now at least).
It appears that you are merely pointing out the difficulty of writing an inerrant text when it covers a wide range of controversial topics in depth. You also point out the difficulty in translating and interpreting a text written a long time ago in a different culture. I agree with these points, but that is not sufficient to create problems with a doctrine of inerrancy. Where are your reasons for the strong claims you are making?
“In any case, I also claimed that such a perfect translation would be impractical. For one thing it would be many time longer than the original. It would be 10-100 times longer than the original text.” Thank you Matthew, because you have just supported my argument that infallibility is not a practical doctrine. But you also proved for me that a perfect translation is also impossible, because excessive verbosity is also an error.
“The possibility I am speaking of would require knowledge of English, Greek and Hebrew that we do not presently have.” The knowledge of Greek and Hebrew that we don’t have died with the people who spoke the language of that period. So it will not be available until the final Resurrection–and then we won’t care, because when we see face to face, we won’t need that which is seen dimly as in a mirror (1 Cor 13.8-10).
Just a follow up on that last point: something 10-100 times longer is not considered a translation. It is called a commentary (or in some cases, a targum). If a perfect translation is impossible, a perfect commentary, being longer, is even more impossible to make.
By the way, I thought it very funny that your inerrant text is probably lost! You will have to try to reconstitute to the best of your text critical facilities.
“But you also proved for me that a perfect translation is also impossible, because excessive verbosity is also an error.”
Um, no. First, the extra words are required in order to make the translation perfect. So they are not excessive. Second, having lots of words is not an error. An error is a mistake of fact such as claiming that 2+2=9, that the moon is green or that Julius Caesar lived one hundred years ago.
“you have just supported my argument that infallibility is not a practical doctrine.”
Infallibility does not require a perfect translation in order to be practical. Andrew has already pointed out the practical benefits – and the practical consequences of rejecting it.
“The knowledge of Greek and Hebrew that we don’t have died with the people who spoke the language of that period.”
Although that is a possibility, it is certainly not something that you know. Until we have unearthed every document from that period and translated them all we will not be able to determine such a thing.
“Just a follow up on that last point: something 10-100 times longer is not considered a translation. It is called a commentary (or in some cases, a targum). If a perfect translation is impossible, a perfect commentary, being longer, is even more impossible to make.”
I strongly suggest that you look up the natural semantic metalanguage theory before making these sorts of criticisms. It is indeed a translation and not a commentary. The length comes from defining each word in terms of the metalanguage and using those definitions to place the entire text into the metalanguage. A commentary is not formed just by length. Neither is a translation not formed just by reason of length. If this were a targum I would have said so.
Matthew wrote: “It was a very short series of sentences containing simple truths that could be easily checked or that I was completely certain of.” The writing of truisms is also an error in most circumstances. I’d have to see your inerrant text to test it for truisms.
As the “perfect” translation being 10-100 times longer than the original, it would destroy its readability and aesthetic value. Imagine expecting people to stay for a sermon that is 5-50 hours long. But wait, the lectionary readings alone would take 1-10 hours!
“Although that is a possibility, it is certainly not something that you know. Until we have unearthed every document from that period and translated them all we will not be able to determine such a thing.” There are actually very few antique texts surviving the ravages of time, and while scholars may hope to make further discoveries, there is the continual problem of decay; the longer it takes to find what little exists, the less will be recoverable or helpful upon discovery. Papyrology is also not an exact science and while you may believe that new discoveries might theoretically lead to the ability to make a perfect biblical translation, it would in many cases just increase the number of unanswerable questions.
“I strongly suggest that you look up the natural semantic metalanguage theory before making these sorts of criticisms.” I already know enough based on your summary of the theory: “Basically, the theory posits that there are a set of words that have the exact same meaning in absolutely every language. These simple words (such as bad, good, know, think, like, some, etc.) can be combined using a universal grammar to form each and every concept found in every language.” The word “good” doesn’t even mean the same thing to everyone speaking English, how can it mean the same thing to people absolutely every language? The theory is based upon a false premise.
“As the “perfect” translation being 10-100 times longer than the original, it would destroy its readability and aesthetic value.”
I agree. That is precisely why such a translation is not something that could ever completely replace the imperfect translations we have now.
“Papyrology is also not an exact science and while you may believe that new discoveries might theoretically lead to the ability to make a perfect biblical translation, it would in many cases just increase the number of unanswerable questions.”
That is certainly a possibility. Without further investigation you cannot simply rule out the possibility that the required understanding of the language will be found. That was all I was claiming. And although it may be a merely theoretical possibility, that is enough to undermine your strong assertion of impossibility.
“The word “good” doesn’t even mean the same thing to everyone speaking English, how can it mean the same thing to people absolutely every language?”
My summary of NSM is strictly inaccurate. To be precise, there are certain concepts that are expressed in every language. These concepts can be expressed by multiple words, or by the same word in different contexts, or by one word in a specific context. So not every use of the word “good” counts as an expression of the NSM word GOOD. This is why I suggested that you look up the theory. Linguists are not going to make the sort of obvious error that you thought they made.
I agree that the word “good” does not mean the same thing to everyone who speaks English. But that (although controversial among philosophers of language) is a different issue from the meaning of the word GOOD.
I think this discussion could perhaps be made more fruitful if it revolved around what the Scriptures said about themselves.
I’d like to see what PW Dunn says about that and how it relates to his doctrine of inspiration.
Cheers.
I’m not ignoring their function – we’re all parts of the body. I’m simply saying they’re unnecessary for right living and right understanding. When Christ asked for a Helper to be sent, He didn’t ask for universities to be built and diplomas to be printed; rather He asked that the Spirit come and indwell every believer, in order that all who come would have access to correct belief, thus, correct living. Obedience leans on understanding; of this the Spirit is a guarantor and He requires no substitute.
Erudite Christians were not/are not necessary for me to have a copy of the Scriptures in my language; all that’s needed is someone who’s bilingual and has a lot of time on their hands!
This is at the heart of the matter for me:
Either you believe the God played an active role in the creation of the Scriptures, or you do not. Either you believe He inspired the authors and preserved their minds and memories, or you do not. It is either God’s book – God’s work – or it is not. If it is His work, correctness or lack there of is a directl reflection of His abilities. If it is not His work, then why are we wasting our time putting stock in its teaching at all?
Is God a sloppy author? Does He have the power to raise the dead, yet not the might to see a few blots of inks speak accurately?
I am both grieved and scared that believers can’t plainly see the certain consequences of not regarding Scriptures as infallible testimony to obedience and right living. When one leaves room for “probably nots,” they are charting their own course, guided by their own wisdom.
That the Scriptures are completely correct is not a new line of thinking – it is not a product of anything in recent history – it is as old as the Church Fathers. No, in fact, it older, being found on the pages of the Book itself, as Keith so rightly implies. If it lies, it is sin. If it is sin, we are all lost.
Benjamin Allison:
The Hebrew and Greek of the Bible are antique languages and therefore their accurate translation requires scholarship. You’ll not find any bilingual person that speaks biblical Hebrew or Koine Greek.
I believe that God was active in the creation of Scriptures. I agree with Paul in 2 Tim 3.16. I’ve said as much. But I do not agree with the doctrine of inerrancy. But that does not mean that I believe the Bible lies. How many times do I have to say that?
There have been a succession of languages between here and there. The English versions of the Scriptures we have were translated by scholars from ancient texts, and I’m thankful for that, yet I do not think this was necessary for us to have had the Scriptures in our language today. It is a gift to be sure, but certainly faith and right understanding does not require the institution – my point is that it is not necessary, not that it hasn’t been useful.
But what are you using to draw the line between what you accept and what you do not? Where does license leave off and surrender being? How can you assert that this over here is in error, but this over here is most certainly true? What’s the criteria, and are those criteria justified by the Scriptures themselves (or do you feel they don’t need to be)?
Hey Benjamin: Most people recognize that a translation of translation is not a preferable method of receiving a message. It is best to make translations from the original document, otherwise you accumulate misunderstandings. But I guess you must have a point, since even a translation of a translation with all its problems would still be an adequate Bible. Many of the first missionary Bibles were translations of a English (or other) Bible into a tribal language. These Bibles, with all their flaws, were a great aid to the new churches.
I don’t typically draw the lines that you’re talking about. To me, “All scripture” is inspired, etc. That’s what Paul is saying. Yet with textual criticism the first task is to determine what was the original text. For that, scholars are a great help.
This passage troubled me Ben. Why do you presume that inerrancy is a matter of God’s power? If you believe in God having anything like omnipotence, then surely he could just appear before us all at the same time and say, “I’m God!” That may sound trite, but it’s true, is it not? Why did God choose to communicate through a text anyway? Language is such an imperfect tool as it is. Why did he incarnate himself in a barnyard? Why did he speak in parables? Who knows the mind of God. No one, but I fear you are dangerously close to pretending to know it when you speak in this manner.
True, no one knows the mind of God, but His sheep hear His voice.
What is imperfect about a barnyard? What is imperfect with a parable? How does this relate to God attending to the writing of His testimony to us to ensure that it is true? This is a matter of truth.
Barnyard and parables are not untrue… I’m not sure your point bears out…
It’s not about perfection it’s about God making choices that have at one point or another baffled people. Inerrantists do have arguments to go on, but claiming that God wouldn’t do something that doesn’t conform to human expectations of God is not one of them.
I see. Dan, 100% agreement. Deut 29:29 is one of my favourite verses.
I love that God confounds the wise.