Source: (consider it)
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Thread: biblical inerrancy
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Leprechaun: But I think trying to argue from what the culture was is pretty unconvincing anyway - I want to see the answers in the text...
Amen to that!
-------------------- Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
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Leprechaun
Ship's Poison Elf
# 5408
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by The Psyduck: None of this fits with the inerrantists' account of Scriptural authority. (And I've a pretty good idea what'll be said about this. Go on - let's see if I'm wrong!)
Psy duck, It may just be me, (really, it may just be me, I don't honestly know) but I find I don't understand at least two thrids of what you are posting. Can you explain to me, in words of one syallable, why the approach of hearing God through the text is incompatible with an inerrantist view? I really really don't understand.
-------------------- He hath loved us, He hath loved us, because he would love
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
FishFish: quote: And as there is absolute silence from your point of view, and lots of scriptrue to back up mine, I will stand firm thank you.
Oh, come on, FF - are you looking for verses in which Jesus conytradicts or sets aside preceding Scripture? How likely is that? Er... hang on...
What about: Matthew 5! Yes, folks - Matthew 5!
quote: [21] "You have heard that it was said to the men of old, `You shall not kill; and whoever kills shall be liable to judgment.' [22] But I say to you that every one who is angry with his brother shall be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother shall be liable to the council, and whoever says, `You fool!' shall be liable to the hell of fire.
And again: quote: "It was also said, `Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.' [32] But I say to you that every one who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, makes her an adulteress; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
quote: [38] "You have heard that it was said, `An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.' [39] But I say to you, Do not resist one who is evil. But if any one strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also; [40] and if any one would sue you and take your coat, let him have your cloak as well; [41] and if any one forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. [42] Give to him who begs from you, and do not refuse him who would borrow from you.
And so on.
I don't know of any way of interpreting the Antitheses of the Sermon on the Mount that doesn't involve seeing Jesus as deliberately setting aside the old Law. By contradicting its teachings.
-------------------- The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty. "Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
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Stoo
Mighty Pirate
# 254
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: quote: Originally posted by Leprechaun: But I think trying to argue from what the culture was is pretty unconvincing anyway - I want to see the answers in the text...
Amen to that!
Not too big on the discipline of social history then?
Go on. Explain to me Paul's comments on women in the Church without using culture-based arguments.
It strikes me that when culture is useful to you, you appeal to it. When it doesn't fit in with your view, you say it's not admissable.
I still want to know whether you believe that Jesus thought parts of what we call the Apocrypha to be inerrant.
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by The Psyduck: FishFish: quote: And as there is absolute silence from your point of view, and lots of scriptrue to back up mine, I will stand firm thank you.
Oh, come on, FF - are you looking for verses in which Jesus conytradicts or sets aside preceding Scripture? How likely is that? Er... hang on...
What about: Matthew 5! Yes, folks - Matthew 5! ... I don't know of any way of interpreting the Antitheses of the Sermon on the Mount that doesn't involve seeing Jesus as deliberately setting aside the old Law. By contradicting its teachings.
I've posted on this before - http://forum.ship-of-fools.com/cgi-bin/UBB/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=7;t=000052;p=13#000617
-------------------- Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Stoo: Go on. Explain to me Paul's comments on women in the Church without using culture-based arguments.
Is now a good time to say I don't agree with femail leadership of a church...?
-------------------- Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
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Leprechaun
Ship's Poison Elf
# 5408
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by The Psyduck: I don't know of any way of interpreting the Antitheses of the Sermon on the Mount that doesn't involve seeing Jesus as deliberately setting aside the old Law. By contradicting its teachings.
As FF has said, then you haven't read the rest of this thread. It may not be a way that you agree with, but it is certainly "a way".
-------------------- He hath loved us, He hath loved us, because he would love
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Stoo
Mighty Pirate
# 254
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: Is now a good time to say I don't agree with femail leadership of a church...?
It's a good time to let me know about women prophesying in Church.
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Posts: 5266 | From: the director of "Bikini Traffic School" | Registered: May 2001
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Matt Black: Just a small, pedantic point, but I don't think Enoch quoted by Jude is in the Apocrypha, is it?
Err, yes you're right. It's classed as "Pseudepigrapha", so isn't in any canon of Scripture. Sorry for mistakenly refering to it as Apocrypha
-------------------- Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
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Leprechaun
Ship's Poison Elf
# 5408
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Stoo: Not too big on the discipline of social history then?
Sorry Stoo, before this turns into a big fight, you are quite right to pick me up on what I said. It sounded like I was just falling back on conservative evangelical rhetoric, which I really don't want to do. Let me nuance it slightly. Jesus was obviously not scared to challenge the religious culture of his day. Therefore an argument based on "Jesus would have believed this because everyone believed it then" while an argument I have sympathy with, I don't find conclusive. All I'm saying is that I would like to see some textual examples of Jesus taking a "non-historical" view before I throw my lot in with that. And I am quite willing to say that my own argument based on this is not conclusive either, its just what I would need to convince me.
-------------------- He hath loved us, He hath loved us, because he would love
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
quote: Psy duck, It may just be me, (really, it may just be me, I don't honestly know) but I find I don't understand at least two thrids of what you are posting. Can you explain to me, in words of one syallable, why the approach of hearing God through the text is incompatible with an inerrantist view? I really really don't understand.
Easily done.
Classically, Christians have believed that we meet God and hear him where Scripture is read and preached. God is in control of this encounter, and speaks through the Scriptures, and the human words of the preaching. Through these words, God can speak whatever he wants to His people. Thus God can speak (to use this thread's fave example) of his horror and hatred of genocide, especially genocide done in His name, even through texts which praise the perpetrators of mass-murder. How can this be? Because God reveals himself definitively in Jesus Christ. There is in God nothing contrary to what he says about himself in Christ. The Spirit of Christ directs the reading, preaching and hearing. Where there is a conflict between what the Bible seems to be saying and
On an inerrantist view, what controls the encounter is the Bible. The Bible specifies what we can hear God as saying, and therefore the Bible specifies what God has said. The Bible specifies what room for manoeuvre God has. If it's in the Bible, it has inerrant authority - end of story. It's the difference between God interpreting the Bible, and the Bible interpreting God.
-------------------- The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty. "Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
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AB
Shipmate
# 4060
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: I'm not arguing everything is historically true and innerant - rather that everything is true and innerant in its genre. So, if its genre is history, then yes it is innerant history.
Good, so you are happy with truth being able to be communicated in other means than just facts, that's a start.
But, you see Fish Fish, short of being patronising to the Biblical writers - they simply didn't HAVE a historical genre. It didn't exist. The way we read and understand a historical account is significantly different to the way it was communicated in the 'ancient world'. We have covered this on the thread already and I'll be happy to hunt out page references for you.
quote: If you take my position as explained above, then Jesus doesn't need to explain the snake if its a poetic illustration. But the truths of the poetic narative are still true
Similarly if the listeners would have been able to understand that a truth can be conveyed without a requirement of inerrancy - would Jesus have needed to have explained that there was an error?
quote: Thats not what Jesus says. He says NOT ONE JOT OR TITTLE. Either he means that or he's lying. Are you accusing Jesus of lying?
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrr rrrrrrrrrrrrrggggggggggggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhh. The Law, FF, The Law, he only explicitly claims it of the Law!
Have you read nothing that I have written about this? FFS, please show some respect for my reasoning on this - if I'm mistaken and Jesus is claiming inerrancy of the Bible for the whole thing in this passage, you must explain either how the fulfilling means affirming historically (which you haven't) or why Jesus exempted the Prophets from his one jot blarb (which you haven't).
quote: No, I'm sorry, but I will not agree with this at all! (Not one jot or tittle of it ) Jesus Never criticises the scriptures - fact.
Beeeeeeep, that's the same argument as before. Please explain how that isn't an argument from silence? Jesus NEVER criticises... haven't I given legitimate reasons why he might not need to point out issues?
quote: But he constantly quotes from them and uses them and afirms them and treats them with total authority.
And he can't do that without believing them inerrant?
quote: If he thought there were errors, he would say so. If he thought there were errors, he was naive to say he was coming to fulfill prophecy (prophetic genre - innerant in its genre), and naive to say JOT AND TITTLE in order to give the impression of innernacy. The whole weith of Jesus' teaching is for Biblical authority and without error.
Sigh, so you chose to ignore my entire post and just repeat your own assertions instead. Don't you think you owe the discussion some more respect than that?
AB
[Scroll lock fix] [ 12. March 2004, 13:31: Message edited by: Belisarius ]
-------------------- "This is all that I've known for certain, that God is love. Even if I have been mistaken on this or that point: God is nevertheless love." - Søren Kierkegaard
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
I said: quote: Where there is a conflict between what the Bible seems to be saying and
Hmm. The end dropped off. It should read:
Where there is a conflict between what the Bible seems to be saying and what we know of the nature of God thorugh Christ, it is Christ who is decisive as the touchstone of the truth. Christ as witnessed in the Scriptures, yes. But Christ.
-------------------- The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty. "Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
Posts: 5433 | From: pOsTmOdErN dYsToPiA | Registered: Feb 2002
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Stoo
Mighty Pirate
# 254
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Leprechaun: Therefore an argument based on "Jesus would have believed this because everyone believed it then" while an argument I have sympathy with, I don't find conclusive.
I quite agree, but that's not quite what I'm saying. I'm arguing that if Jesus' contempories believed x to be y, when Jesus talked about x, then their assumptions would be that x was y unless he qualified it.
Unless you can show me that Jesus specifically went out of his way to exclude certain Apocryphal books from his "Law and the Prophets", or that the Jews did not include these books in the "Law and the Prophets", one must conclude that Jesus meant them too. Either that, or he was a very poor communicator.
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Originally posted by The Psyduck:
I don't know of any way of interpreting the Antitheses of the Sermon on the Mount that doesn't involve seeing Jesus as deliberately setting aside the old Law. By contradicting its teachings. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
As FF has said, then you haven't read the rest of this thread. It may not be a way that you agree with, but it is certainly "a way".
You're right. Actually I thought I'd said " convincing way..." which is what I meant. But equally, there is an ignoring of the fact that for most people the easiest way of reading the Antitheses is that Jesus is being critical of the Law.
Which is at least a bit of a challenge to FishFish's: quote: No, I'm sorry, but I will not agree with this at all! (Not one jot or tittle of it ) Jesus Never criticises the scriptures - fact.
Incidentally this is a good reason fro people not to whine too much about things having been covered already on this thread. That's not the way argument works. The same points, made at different junctures in an argument, can lead off - or be dealt with - in quite different ways.
So: I say that the most natural reading of the Antitheses is that Jesus is being critical of the Law. Notwithstanding what verse 17 says.
And this. by the way, connects up with what I said about proof-texting above. Every verse of Scripture is a point at which inerrantist positions are vulnerable.
And that's without bringing up the subject of textual criticism.
-------------------- The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty. "Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
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Jolly Jape
Shipmate
# 3296
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Posted
Lep, good, measured post.
I have some sympathy that there is indeed a great difficulty for us in trying to see things with pre-enlightenment eyes. We tend to err (sic ) on the side of saying that forensic truth had no meaning whatsoever, or in saying that nothing in human attitudes has fundamentally changed over the years. I do think, however, that the Jewish tradition of storytelling (that is that the lessons of the stories are more important than the details they provide) is amply attested, not least by Jesus himself, and I'd be surprised if many Jews of any ages would find much that was objectionable in the piece quoted by Belle. It seems to me to be in the mainstream of Jewish scholarly reflection, rather than a by-product of textual criticism.
But I agree with you that it is more satisfactory to argue from the text than from culture, because of the difficulty in establishing what people are really thinking as they live within that culture. Put bluntly, we can't ask them questions.
As an aside to FF, I don't see how it is patronising to regard people of any age as in tune with their culture. Indeed they are their culture, in the sense that culture is the collective noun for what societies do. I make no value judgement about the merits of a non-forensic attitude to faith. Indeed, it is in many ways, IMO superior to that that has taken hold since the Enlightenment. I would have thought it was obvious from my posts that I'm not saying, "those primitive first century types," more, "how wise they were then!"
However, we also run into problems when we look at the text, as this thread amply demonstrates. Proof texting seems a bit of a dead end, with one side citing an individual verse, "so there!" whilst the other side retort with their favourite riposte. For myself, I know that a serious treatment of the whole of scripture, and an acceptance of its authority leads me to the inexorable conclusion that it is not, nor does it claim to be, inerrant. I know that you would regard the jettisoning of inerrancy as a major undermining of the foundations of faith. Though I don't think that this logically follows, I can sort of see where you are coming from. It seems to me that we are probably going to come to come to an uneasy truce at the end of this, much as was the case at the end of the PSA thread, and as I'm on shore leave all next week , I won't be contributing to the discussion for a while.
Happy debating
-------------------- To those who have never seen the flow and ebb of God's grace in their lives, it means nothing. To those who have seen it, even fleetingly, even only once - it is life itself. (Adeodatus)
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Leprechaun
Ship's Poison Elf
# 5408
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Stoo: quote: Originally posted by Leprechaun: Therefore an argument based on "Jesus would have believed this because everyone believed it then" while an argument I have sympathy with, I don't find conclusive.
I quite agree, but that's not quite what I'm saying. I'm arguing that if Jesus' contempories believed x to be y, when Jesus talked about x, then their assumptions would be that x was y unless he qualified it.
In a sense Stoo, this is what I have been trying to say all along in a different context. While I can't pretend to know much about the Apocrypha, this argument is exactly what I am trying to say about the character of God as revealed in Joshua et al. If they belived God to be the God revealed in Genesis/Joshua, I would have expected him to make it clear that the God he was talking about was not this God. Not sure where that leaves us. JJ, happy hols, we'll miss you. Psyduck, I understand what you mean now, will post something on it later when I have time...
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Stoo
Mighty Pirate
# 254
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Posted
I see what you're saying, Lep.
I guess I just naturally assume that the entirity of what Christ said qualified the view of the nature of God that his contempories had. It all came down to "If you have seen me, you've seen the Father".
If he does things that contradict the Apocryphal books, then I'd take that as evidence that he didn't count them, alongside the OT as "inerrant".
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Posts: 5266 | From: the director of "Bikini Traffic School" | Registered: May 2001
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by AB: But, you see Fish Fish, short of being patronising to the Biblical writers - they simply didn't HAVE a historical genre. It didn't exist. The way we read and understand a historical account is significantly different to the way it was communicated in the 'ancient world'. We have covered this on the thread already and I'll be happy to hunt out page references for you.
You just can't say "they simply didn't HAVE a historical genre". Genesis 12 - Nehamiah are presented as history. Presented as "this is what happened, guy's". Furthermore, since in Matthew 5 Jesus uses the term "Law" along side "prophets", he seems to be using it in its largest possible scope (ie Law and Prophets = the OT) - so he's saying the Law, i.e. the history, is innerant. (Interestingly he's thus affirming that those so called genocide passages are fine by him...)
quote: Originally posted by AB: Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrr rrrrrrrrrrrrrggggggggggggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhh. The Law, FF, The Law, he only explicitly claims it of the Law!
Have you read nothing that I have written about this? FFS, please show some respect for my reasoning on this - if I'm mistaken and Jesus is claiming inerrancy of the Bible for the whole thing in this passage, you must explain either how the fulfilling means affirming historically (which you haven't) or why Jesus exempted the Prophets from his one jot blarb (which you haven't).
I have read your posts. I've listened. I respect your oppinion. I think you are wrong. And so I've responded.
Let me try again...
How can Jesus fulfill something if he thinks it is in error? If something in the prophets are in error, then they have prophesied something false. They are false prophets. So Jesus would be fulfilling a false prophet.
If Jesus takes the law to be inerant (as you accept), then he believes false prophets to be a massive problem and they are to be stoned (Deuteronmy 13 and 18)! So at very least we'd expect Jesus to correct these false prophets. He doesn't - he says he's come to fulfill them. That is affirming them to be true and without error. I know I'm restating myself - but I can't see what else to do!
And I have mentioned why he misses prophets from the innerancy thing - cos he's talking about the law, and challenging their aproach to the law, and not to the prophets. As he coul look like he's criticicising the law, he shows the law to be innerant and thus their interpretation to be wrong. Again, he's affirming all the Bible, but focussing on the law. I know I'm restating myself - but I can't see what else to do!
quote: And he can't do that without believing them inerrant?
I don't see that he can, No. For the same reason I stand by innerancy. If there are flaws, then the whole foundation of the book as God's word crumbles, and there's little point quoting it, for you might be quoting false teaching or lies.
quote: Sigh, so you chose to ignore my entire post and just repeat your own assertions instead. Don't you think you owe the discussion some more respect than that?
AB
Sorry - I'm trying to interact with your points. But I think you're wrong! I'm trying to answer you. But I can't change my position. I am convinced you're wrong!!! What else can I say?
[Scroll lock fixed] [ 12. March 2004, 17:26: Message edited by: Belisarius ]
-------------------- Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
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Stoo
Mighty Pirate
# 254
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: You just can't say "they simply didn't HAVE a historical genre". Genesis 12 - Nehamiah are presented as history. Presented as "this is what happened, guy's".
The genre "History" was invented by Heroditus. He is universally acknowledged as the first historian.
He never wrote "this happened, guys". He wrote "This is what I think should have happened. This is what this person should have said/done at this particular time to fulfil their moral obligations, to have made an excellent speech, and to make a good story." He freely acknowledges that.
That is what ancient people understood as History. Admittedly, it is a Greek view, but it is reasonable to assume the Jews had this viewpoint too. At the very least, it is foolish to dismiss it as a viewpoint they would not have had.
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Posts: 5266 | From: the director of "Bikini Traffic School" | Registered: May 2001
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dyfrig
Blue Scarfed Menace
# 15
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Posted
Could our friendly host please edit the "aaarrgg...." above as its length has broken the screen lock and my disability settings mean it's virtually impossible for me to read this page.
ta
-------------------- "He was wrong in the long run, but then, who isn't?" - Tony Judt
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Stoo: quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: You just can't say "they simply didn't HAVE a historical genre". Genesis 12 - Nehamiah are presented as history. Presented as "this is what happened, guy's".
The genre "History" was invented by Heroditus. He is universally acknowledged as the first historian.
He never wrote "this happened, guys". He wrote "This is what I think should have happened. This is what this person should have said/done at this particular time to fulfil their moral obligations, to have made an excellent speech, and to make a good story." He freely acknowledges that.
That is what ancient people understood as History. Admittedly, it is a Greek view, but it is reasonable to assume the Jews had this viewpoint too. At the very least, it is foolish to dismiss it as a viewpoint they would not have had.
I'm not sure who you are correcting here! But anyway, Heroditus may be acknowledged as the first historian. But not by me. Every one of the Jewish history books predates him. And I see nothing to change my belief that they were presented and accepted as true records of what had happened in the past.
-------------------- Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
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AB
Shipmate
# 4060
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Posted
Eeek, soz dyfrig, my frustration got the better of me - and being a web designer should have known the trouble all of those letters would cause. My apologies, all.
AB
-------------------- "This is all that I've known for certain, that God is love. Even if I have been mistaken on this or that point: God is nevertheless love." - Søren Kierkegaard
Posts: 513 | From: not so sunny Warwickshire | Registered: Feb 2003
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Stoo
Mighty Pirate
# 254
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: I see nothing to change my belief that they were presented and accepted as true records of what had happened in the past.
I'm not asking you to change your belief. Just to acknowledge that the genre of History isn't as set in stone as you're pretending. By all means still believe that they are historically accurate, but don't claim that because they are "history" they must be. It's clearly not the case.
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Posts: 5266 | From: the director of "Bikini Traffic School" | Registered: May 2001
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Stoo: quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: I see nothing to change my belief that they were presented and accepted as true records of what had happened in the past.
I'm not asking you to change your belief. Just to acknowledge that the genre of History isn't as set in stone as you're pretending. By all means still believe that they are historically accurate, but don't claim that because they are "history" they must be. It's clearly not the case.
I think I understand, and I think I agree. By saying Jewish texts were in the history genre, I mean the Jewish history genre - and so within that genre and that way of writing they are historically accurate and innerant (as Jesus affirms in Mat 5:17... ) [ 12. March 2004, 11:03: Message edited by: Fish Fish ]
-------------------- Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
I think the closest we have to a modern western understanding of history (crudely: a presentation of the events as close as possible to what actually happened and commentary on those events) is Luke/Acts. Even there though, it's described as an "orderly account" with the intention of providing certainty regarding what his readers had been taught. An "orderly account" doesn't need to be ordered in terms of chronological order, it could just as easily be thematically. And, giving certainty could just be that he's giving a definitive statement of the important teaching and deeds of Christ as opposed to potentially misleading accounts circulating at the time. Certainly he makes no attempt at giving a complete account (which a modern history would do), and there seems little attempt at objectivity (though he's less explicit than John who wrote that others may believe, that is certainly his agenda).
-------------------- Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
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dyfrig
Blue Scarfed Menace
# 15
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by AB: Eeek, soz dyfrig, my frustration got the better of me - and being a web designer should have known the trouble all of those letters would cause. My apologies, all.
AB
May you be cursed to spend eternity discussing inerrancy in Dead Horses.
Oh, I see you already have been. Never mind.
-------------------- "He was wrong in the long run, but then, who isn't?" - Tony Judt
Posts: 6917 | From: pob dydd Iau, am hanner dydd | Registered: Apr 2001
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Stoo
Mighty Pirate
# 254
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: the Jewish history genre
Ok, that's fine.
Let's get literary then (my subject), rather than theological.
What defines the Jewish history genre? How do we know that the history in the Jewish history genre is somewhat akin to modern history, rather than the history of the ancients? What can we verify it against?
Prove to me that I should see Jewish history as intricately accurate, rather than just broadly accurate. You can do this by appealing to comparitive accounts in their neighbours if you like, or archaeology. Please, however, try not to provide evidence from Christian sites, as they tend to be rather biassed.
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Posts: 5266 | From: the director of "Bikini Traffic School" | Registered: May 2001
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Stoo: quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: the Jewish history genre
Ok, that's fine.
Let's get literary then (my subject), rather than theological.
What defines the Jewish history genre? How do we know that the history in the Jewish history genre is somewhat akin to modern history, rather than the history of the ancients? What can we verify it against?
Prove to me that I should see Jewish history as intricately accurate, rather than just broadly accurate. You can do this by appealing to comparitive accounts in their neighbours if you like, or archaeology. Please, however, try not to provide evidence from Christian sites, as they tend to be rather biassed.
I'm sorry, this is not my area of expertise, so I can't begin to argue this. I could research it, but I'm sorry not to have the time to. So I'll bow out of this part of the discussion I'm afraid! Sorry!
-------------------- Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by AB: they simply didn't HAVE a historical genre. It didn't exist. The way we read and understand a historical account is significantly different to the way it was communicated in the 'ancient world'.
Nonsense. They not only had a historical genre, they had at least two. Chronicles is clearly a different genre from Samuel/Kings.
It isn't exactly the same kind of writing that we call "history" (not that that is a single simple thing) but it is a historical genre.
-------------------- Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Belle
Shipmate
# 4792
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Posted
I am sure there are plenty of orthodox Jews who take the stance that it's all literally true. However, the point my friend was making is that it doesn't matter if it actually happened that way - spiritually, for the Jewish people, it is still true. And the law still stands - as well as the covenant.
quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Your problem is what Jesus said about the Law!! (Matthew 5:17-18). If you really want to read the Bible "in the light of the revelation of God in Christ Jesus" then you should treat the Bible as he did. And since no one has shown anywhere where Jesus corrects the Bible he had, (rather than poor interpretations of the Bible), then I'll still treat every jot and tittle as accurate just as he did.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Originally posted by Callan:
Two things.
It is entirely anachronistic to say that Jesus treated the Bible in any way, given that the OT canon had not been set and the NT canon not written. Saying that we should treat the Bible as Jesus did is a non-sequitur.
Can you explain how Jesus' comments in Matthew can be reconciled with his declaration in Mark 7 that all foods were clean, his treatment of the sabbath and his repudiation of the Mosaic Law on the issue of divorce? --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by Fish Fish:
Again, we've covered this one - in (very flawed) summary, Jesus is not contradicting the law but pushing the principle behind the law - holiness. Cos we've discussed it before, I shan't do so again now. Sorry.
In clear defiance of Fish Fish's desire not to discuss this again, I just wondered if this doesn't illustrate the point of both sides very well. When Jesus appears to be restating the law - he says very clearly that he's not doing so. Fish Fish here seems to use the argument I would use - that Jesus is not contradicting the law but illustrating that the principle behind the law overrides the letter of the law. Now, surely our position on this is so close as to be very little different - coming at it from both sides of the argument. In fact, I am becoming convinced that Fish Fish actually has no claim to call him/herself an inerrantist!
From this example it would seem that Jesus in fact is not an inerrantist. He's pointing to the eternal truths behind the literal text. Treating the bible as errant isn't to say it's all rubbish or can be ignored. Perhaps it does allow for more positions (as I think Leprechaun said) but it doesn't allow for the Bible to be treated with less reverence. Of course we will get it wrong sometimes - but I don't believe either approach protects us from error. We're human and thus flawed. We don't have perfect understanding.
-------------------- where am I going... and why am I in this handbasket?
Posts: 318 | From: Kent, UK | Registered: Aug 2003
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: [QUOTE]Originally posted by Stoo: [qb] Heroditus may be acknowledged as the first historian. But not by me. Every one of the Jewish history books predates him.
No they don't. Herodotos is roughly contemporary with the events described in Esther, Ezra & Nehemiah & so even on the most conservative OT datings precedes those books and also the final version of Chronicles.
-------------------- Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Stoo: The genre "History" was invented by Heroditus. He is universally acknowledged as the first historian.
The genre "Greek History" may have been. But the genre(s) "Jewish History" is different.
quote:
He never wrote "this happened, guys". He wrote "This is what I think should have happened. This is what this person should have said/done at this particular time to fulfil their moral obligations, to have made an excellent speech, and to make a good story." He freely acknowledges that.
He did sometimes write "this happened". And he is often careful to acknowledge his sources.
Some of it is more or less "I met this bloke in a bar in Egypt and he told me that... so I copy it here. But I don't believe it myself"
-------------------- Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Callan
Shipmate
# 525
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Posted
I think that Herodotus is considered to be the first historian, not because he was the first person to write about the past, but he was the first historian in the sense that he tends to compare different accounts and 'fess up if he's not sure about things.
Herodotus is a different sort of historian than, say the author of 1&2 Samuel and both are different from a modern historian. If Herodotus was writing today his History would be classed with good historical fiction (Graves, Renault, Vidal, Massie) inasmuch as he's done his research but he feels free to make stuff up in order to keep the narrative going. 1&2 Samuel, OTOH, would be found in the theology department, inasmuch, as the author is telling us about God's role in the history of Israel rather than objectively trying to find out what happened.
Not, mark you, that I'm saying that either Herodotus or 1 & 2 Samuel are valueless as history but that their authors had a different methodology to contemporary historians.
-------------------- How easy it would be to live in England, if only one did not love her. - G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 9757 | From: Citizen of the World | Registered: Jun 2001
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AB
Shipmate
# 4060
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by ken: quote: Originally posted by AB: they simply didn't HAVE a historical genre. It didn't exist. The way we read and understand a historical account is significantly different to the way it was communicated in the 'ancient world'.
Nonsense. They not only had a historical genre, they had at least two. Chronicles is clearly a different genre from Samuel/Kings.
It isn't exactly the same kind of writing that we call "history" (not that that is a single simple thing) but it is a historical genre.
Ah yes Ken, I realise. That was the point I was going for, though granted I didn't explain it well enough!
AB
-------------------- "This is all that I've known for certain, that God is love. Even if I have been mistaken on this or that point: God is nevertheless love." - Søren Kierkegaard
Posts: 513 | From: not so sunny Warwickshire | Registered: Feb 2003
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Fish Fish: How can Jesus fulfill something if he thinks it is in error? If something in the prophets are in error, then they have prophesied something false. They are false prophets. So Jesus would be fulfilling a false prophet.
If Jesus takes the law to be inerant (as you accept), then he believes false prophets to be a massive problem and they are to be stoned (Deuteronmy 13 and 18)! So at very least we'd expect Jesus to correct these false prophets. He doesn't - he says he's come to fulfill them. That is affirming them to be true and without error. I know I'm restating myself - but I can't see what else to do!
AB, I'm interested to know what you think of this slight progression of my argument - how, if Jesus treats the Law as innerant, he would treat false prophecy?
-------------------- Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
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Chapelhead*
Ship’s Photographer
# 1143
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Posted
One of the prophesies the ‘inerrant’ bible tells us Jesus fulfilled is referred to in Matthew 2:23.
quote: and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets: "He will be called a Nazarene."
However this ‘prophesy’ does not appear anywhere in the OT. So it seems the NT is incorrect on this point, or Jesus fulfilled a non-inerrant prophesy and the argument about prophesy having to be inerrant falls.
-------------------- Benedikt Gott Geschickt!
Posts: 7082 | From: Turbolift Control. | Registered: Aug 2001
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AB
Shipmate
# 4060
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Posted
Well we are just back to old chestnut about truth not necessarily being encapsulated by facts. False teaching clearly is an issue for Jesus but this is not necessarily confined to errancy or not - the way he dealt with the false teaching of the Pharisees (who were righteous in terms of the law and committed to scriptural purity), for one example. And lest we forget that he taught us how we should spot false teachers, by their fruit, not necessarily by what they proclaim.
False prophets, those who claim to speak from God but don't are obviously in for a rough time, the Bible tells us so in enough places. But is their offence the same as factual inaccuracy in a written record of the prophets - especially when factual accuracy is not necessarily required (as per our argument)? No, of course not.
AB
-------------------- "This is all that I've known for certain, that God is love. Even if I have been mistaken on this or that point: God is nevertheless love." - Søren Kierkegaard
Posts: 513 | From: not so sunny Warwickshire | Registered: Feb 2003
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TonyK
Host Emeritus
# 35
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by dyfrig: Could our friendly host please edit the "aaarrgg...."
Sorry for not responding, Dyfrig - I can't always access the Boards from the office, and today was one of those days.
Thanks, Bel, for coming to the rescue
Yours aye ... TonyK D H Host
Posts: 2717 | From: Gloucestershire | Registered: May 2001
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Fish Fish
Shipmate
# 5448
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by AB: False prophets, those who claim to speak from God but don't are obviously in for a rough time, the Bible tells us so in enough places. But is their offence the same as factual inaccuracy in a written record of the prophets - especially when factual accuracy is not necessarily required (as per our argument)? No, of course not.
AB
Why isn't factual innacuracy false prophecy? If a prophet is from God, thier prophecy will be accurate. If not, it won't. Your "of course not" seems rather confident to me!
-------------------- Thought about changing my name - but it would be a shame to lose all the credibility and good will I have on the Ship...
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
I think part of the problem is a moisconception about how Biblical prophecy works. In fact, about how the Bible works.
The understanding of prophecy that FishFish seems to be working with is that a (true) prophecy is a predictive utterance with a one-to-one correspondence between it and a future event, a correspondence vindicated by the occurrence of the event as specified. I'm not saying that this understanding isn't to be found in the Bible: it clearly is, e.g. at Deuteronomy 18:15-22. (Mind you, it's worth remembering that Deuteronomy 13: 1ff envisages a false prophet inciting rebellion against God on the basis of a true prophecy!!So it's not clear cut - and in any case the test in Deut. 18 is hardly one you can apply in a forensic way to a suspected false prophet on remand!)
But the real point is that if you see prophecy as a one-to-one correspondence between word and event, you aren't seeing it as the Bible sees it. I've mentioned before this "excess" in the prophetic word, which means that even beyond the event the prophecy refers to, the word is capable of going on and finding further fulfilment.
The example that came up earlier was that of the prophecies of (deutero-)Isaiah, which are clearly set in the context of the Babylonian exile, and the Servant Songs embedded in them, the original reference of which is an incredibly complex area of OT scholarly debate.
And yet, the 'excess' of these prophecies is taken up in complex ways into the New Testament, and from a New Testament perspective, the question of their truth or falsity doesn't arise - because they are Scripture. They play interpretatively on the ministry of Jesus Christ, supplying categories to understand not only him but also John the Baptist, and the whole unfolding of the ministry. If they were simply understood as 'inerrant prophecies', they would have reached their sell-by date when Cyrus reached Babylon. Or maybe when Zerubabel reached Jerusalem.
In other words, inerrancy is nothing much to do with the meaning of Biblical prophecy. The real Biblical understanding of prophecy is that when someone speaks authentically in God's name, God can fill and refill their words with new and unexpected meaning. Inerrancy, at the level on which the Bible works, is quite simply meaningless. The Bible sees itself as full of multiple, inumerable strands and levels of meaning which God in his sovereign freedom can emphasize and de-emphasize at will, and which those who speak in God's name are called to wrestle with according to the awful responsibility of trying to say what God wants said in a particular context.
Asking if the Bible is inerrant is a bit like asking if it's green with pink spots. It's a meaningless question. It's nothing to do with how the Bible works. Either within itself - because these things are accessible, amazingly enough, to critical scholarship - or within the Church.
Wanting the Bible to be inerrant is a bit like wanting to go down the flume at the swimming-pool wearing a safety-belt. It may make you feel less nervous, but it's got nothing to do with the reality of the situation.
For me, the big question is whether we can trust God or not. I suspect that's the case for inerrantists, too, and I respect that. But I don't, for the life of me, see why we need to see the Bible as 'inerrant'. No-one in their right minds denies that it's a collection of documents which contain the religious history of a people, and a huge amount of the fruits of their wrestling with their God, and also the foundational documents of a World Religion founded (whatever its subsequent record) on the proposition that God is Love, and that the lifestyle of Jesus of Nazareth is normative. Way beyond that virtually all of us on this thread are happy to consider authoritative in a deep sense for us personally, and to understand it as in a real sense inspired by God, however we'd explain that.
Nobody's saying that the Bible is 'a pack of lies' (which would be as meaningless, I think, as to say that it's inerrant) and nobody's suggesting that God has just taken any old book as a basis for his interaction with us, as though the Yellow Pages or a Jilly Cooper would have done just as well. The Bible is what it is. Why does it have to be inerrant to have 'authority'? Calvin says that you should listen to the Minister as though God himself were in the pulpit. That's not because the Minister is inerrant - or even particularly good: the Second Helvetic Confession says that God's Word is to be heard vel ex ore malorum ministrorum: "even from the mouths of bad Ministers." (And thank God for that!)
The inerrantist position is essentially an Enlightenment position because it believes that a one-to-one correspondence is possible between the truth and its expression in language. Those days are gone. Truth isn't like that, Never was. Wasn't in the Bible. It's time to trust God and move on.
-------------------- The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty. "Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
Posts: 5433 | From: pOsTmOdErN dYsToPiA | Registered: Feb 2002
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Leprechaun
Ship's Poison Elf
# 5408
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by The Psyduck: No-one in their right minds denies that it's a collection of documents which contain the religious history of a people, and a huge amount of the fruits of their wrestling with their God, and also the foundational documents of a World Religion founded (whatever its subsequent record) on the proposition that God is Love, and that the lifestyle of Jesus of Nazareth is normative.
Well, out of my right mind then. I was beginning to suspect this thread had driven me to it.
quote: Those days are gone. Truth isn't like that, Never was. Wasn't in the Bible. It's time to trust God and move on.
Well, thank goodness you've sorted that out for us then. To sum up your argument: quote: I am right. Everyone who disagrees with me is stupid for asking the wrong question..
Moving on...
-------------------- He hath loved us, He hath loved us, because he would love
Posts: 3097 | From: England - far from home... | Registered: Jan 2004
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
quote: No-one in their right minds denies that it's a collection of documents which contain the religious history of a people, and a huge amount of the fruits of their wrestling with their God, and also the foundational documents of a World Religion founded (whatever its subsequent record) on the proposition that God is Love, and that the lifestyle of Jesus of Nazareth is normative.
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Well, out of my right mind then. I was beginning to suspect this thread had driven me to it.
You mean that you deny that this is so? I'm not saying that this is all the Bible is. I'm saying that there are certain things that everyone believes about the Bible, whether they are Christians or atheists, or anyone else. I'm not saying that this is all the Bible is - just that I can't see that anyone, even someone who claimed that the Bible was inerrantly inspired, could possibly deny that it's also these things. Are you really saying that, however else you see them, the Book of Job and the Book of Proverbs, to say nothing of the Psalms, are not "the fruits of [Israel's] wrestling with their God" (even if you hold that David wrote Psalms)?
Even if you hold that the Bible is inerrantly inspired, don't you also see the New Testament as also a collection of the foundational documents of a World Religion founded (whatever its subsequent record) on the proposition that God is Love, and that the lifestyle of Jesus of Nazareth is normative?
The point I was making - and I thought making clearly enough - was that quote: Nobody's saying that the Bible is 'a pack of lies' (which would be as meaningless, I think, as to say that it's inerrant) and nobody's suggesting that God has just taken any old book as a basis for his interaction with us, as though the Yellow Pages or a Jilly Cooper would have done just as well. The Bible is what it is.
I think that implicit in your position is the assumption that only an inerrancy-stance takes the Bible seriously enough. I was making the point that the vast majority of people, even atheists and agnostics (and I mean no offence to atheists and agnostics in saying that!) treat the Bible very seriously on a large number of levels. For you to suggest, as I feel you have, that without the last level, which you add, that of an inerrant authority, the Bible just isn't being taken seriously, is unsustainable.
You appear to assume that I'm saying that anyone who sees the Bible as anything more than " collection of documents which contain ...blah, blah, what I said..." isn't in their right mind. Re-read my post. That's not what I said.
Nor's this:
quote: To sum up your argument:
quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I am right. Everyone who disagrees with me is stupid for asking the wrong question..
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I didn't say that. But there is a post on this thread which says something remarkably similar. quote: Sorry - I'm trying to interact with your points. But I think you're wrong! I'm trying to answer you. But I can't change my position. I am convinced you're wrong!!! What else can I say?
Don't get me wrong. I don't want to trade insults or get personal. I certainly don't think you are stupid (that's an insinuation that's unwarranted from my post, and to be honest I think you should retract it.) And, by the way, the accusation that I'm saying that I'm right is way off the mark. I'm not saying that I have the unque truth so you can't possibly have it. My position is that your position is untenable, because the only reason that we could possibly have in this debate for believing that the Bible is inerrant would be that the Bible itself says that it's inerrant, and I don't believe that you can demonstrate that the Bible does present itself as inerrant. The whole thrust of my post was to demonstrate that in all the most crucial ways, the Bible 'thinks' in a whole range of ways that simply contradict the assertion that it presents itself as inerrant.
And then I said that the whole logic of the inerrantist position is dependent on a modernist understanding of truth (and language), which didn't exist when the Bible came into existence, and is widely discredited in our own culture.
That's clearly what I meant by: quote: Those days are gone. Truth isn't like that, Never was.
If you want to take this personally, that's fine. But that's not how I meant it, and I think that you'll see that if you re-read what I actually wrote.
-------------------- The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty. "Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
Posts: 5433 | From: pOsTmOdErN dYsToPiA | Registered: Feb 2002
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
FishFish: I misread a post of yours as by Leprechaun, and though I didn't attribute it, I could have given the impression that It was his and not yours. I apologise for this.
-------------------- The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty. "Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
Posts: 5433 | From: pOsTmOdErN dYsToPiA | Registered: Feb 2002
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Leprechaun
Ship's Poison Elf
# 5408
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by ...psyduck...: Are you really saying that, however else you see them, the Book of Job and the Book of Proverbs, to say nothing of the Psalms, are not "the fruits of [Israel's] wrestling with their God" (even if you hold that David wrote Psalms)?
Psyduck. I may have taken you wrongly. Perhaps I did read your post how you said I read it. I think what i want to say is that there are many important things I believe about the Bible, and in my mind, the ones you picked while true are not the most important. As it happens, inerrant is one of the most important to me, and your "anyone who has a brain can see that it never claims to be inerrant" attitude I did find offensive. I may not have convinced you, but I thought (hoped) I had demonstrated on this thread that you don't have to commit theological suicide to believe it. If I haven't, well, more fool me.
quote: Even if you hold that the Bible is inerrantly inspired, don't you also see the New Testament as also a collection of the foundational documents of a World Religion founded (whatever its subsequent record) on the proposition that God is Love
Yes, with you so far. quote: and that the lifestyle of Jesus of Nazareth is normative?
No, no and a thousand times no. That is the last way I would sum up the message of Christianity. Sorry. quote: I think that implicit in your position is the assumption that only an inerrancy-stance takes the Bible seriously enough. I was making the point that the vast majority of people, even atheists and agnostics (and I mean no offence to atheists and agnostics in saying that!) treat the Bible very seriously on a large number of levels. For you to suggest, as I feel you have, that without the last level, which you add, that of an inerrant authority, the Bible just isn't being taken seriously, is unsustainable.
Sir, I respectfully disagree. I believe that all sorts of people "take the Bible seriously" as you put it. I think that what I have been arguing on this thread is that only a view that sees at the very least as authoritative, and in my view, inerrant, takes it seriously AS THE WORD OF GOD. If any view of the Bible allows me to disapply some of what ( I believe) God has said, to myself, IMO, it does not take it seriously enough. I have presented that as my case all along, as respectfully and thoughtfully as I could, and I have stated on numerous occasions that that is why this issue matters to me.
quote: Sorry - I'm trying to interact with your points. But I think you're wrong! I'm trying to answer you. But I can't change my position. I am convinced you're wrong!!! What else can I say?
As you said below, I did not write this. If you have a problem with it, I suggest you take it up with the author.
quote:
Don't get me wrong. I don't want to trade insults or get personal. I certainly don't think you are stupid (that's an insinuation that's unwarranted from my post, and to be honest I think you should retract it.)
Well I am not going to. Your post implied that all of this is a dead discussion for those who understand truth properly. This insinuates that I either can't or haven't bothered considering this issue. Neither are true.
quote: The whole thrust of my post was to demonstrate that in all the most crucial ways, the Bible 'thinks' in a whole range of ways that simply contradict the assertion that it presents itself as inerrant.
The "thrust of your post" was that there are a number of issues if only inerrantists had considered them properly we would come round to your way of thinking. You act like I've never read a book on textual criticism or prophetic fulfilment. I HAVE! And I don't see how your comments about prophecy have anything to do with inerrancy - they just seem like an excuse to show off your huge breadth of theological reading.
Psyduck, I don't want to get personal either, but honestly, just stating parts of your opinion as fact that any fool could see if they really thought about it, doesn't either progress the debate OR convince me of your position. Sorry for the rashness of my last post, but I have wrestled through these issues long and hard, and find the implication that I haven't as patronising in the extreme. [ 14. March 2004, 19:31: Message edited by: Leprechaun ]
Posts: 3097 | From: England - far from home... | Registered: Jan 2004
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
# 2270
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Posted
quote: I think what i want to say is that there are many important things I believe about the Bible, and in my mind, the ones you picked while true are not the most important.
No, I'd absolutely agree. That's not how I presented them. I was offering a 'hierarchy' of levels of belief. 1) Nobody with any sense denies that the Bible is "the fruits of [Israel's] wrestling with their God" (paradoxically, I don't know of any atheists - and I know a good few! - who'd be unhappy with that!!) and the New Testament as a collection of the foundational documents of a World Religion founded (whatever its subsequent record) on the proposition that God is Love &c. 2) "Way beyond that virtually all of us on this thread are happy to consider authoritative in a deep sense for us personally, and to understand it as in a real sense inspired by God, however we'd explain that." (This I take to be the basic shared Christian position.) 3) There is the belief that the Bible is inerrant.
My point was that for those of us at level 2, there's just no perceived need to go to level 3. It adds nothing. As a matter of fact, if I’m not misrepresenting him (the argument’s in David Kelsey’s Uses of Scripture in Recent Theology B B Warfield, a principal theorist of inerrancy and verbal inspiration, holds that these doctrines actually add nothing to the substance of the Christian faith, and that the only reason (he says!) we’re obliged to believe them is that (he says!) that’s what the Bible itself teaches.
I hope it's obvious now what my answer is going to be to this point of yours: quote: quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- and that the lifestyle of Jesus of Nazareth is normative?
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No, no and a thousand times no. That is the last way I would sum up the message of Christianity. Sorry.
Me too. But I do maintain that for all Christians, the lifestyle of Jesus of Nazareth is normative - and a norm we all fall short of. I don't see how you can have discipleship that isn't modeled on Jesus' lifestyle. But I certainly wouldn't see this as "summing up the message of Christianity". (There are Christians who would, I'll grant you that.) It is, though, something that virtually everyone, I think, would agree about in some meaningul sense. And that's why I included it with the 'level 1 beliefs' above.
quote: [I said] For you to suggest, as I feel you have, that without the last level, which you add, that of an inerrant authority, the Bible just isn't being taken seriously, is unsustainable.
[You said]Sir, I respectfully disagree. I believe that all sorts of people "take the Bible seriously" as you put it.
But then you say: quote: I think that what I have been arguing on this thread is that only a view that sees at the very least as authoritative, and in my view, inerrant , takes it seriously AS THE WORD OF GOD. (emphasis mine)
You see, I think this is you saying what I said you said: quote: that without the last level, which you add, that of an inerrant authority, the Bible just isn't being taken seriously
Because I am intensely serious about taking the Bible as the Word of God, and I don't take it as such in the way that you do. Which is really the point at issue.
This next bit is subtle. You say: quote: Your post implied that all of this is a dead discussion for those who understand truth properly. This insinuates that I either can't or haven't bothered considering this issue. Neither are true.
Actually, I see how you could take what I said that way. It isn't what I meant, though, and I invite you to re-read it in the light of the following.
I'm not saying that this is a dead discussion for those who understand truth properly. I am saying that it seems to me that this is your position, because you - it seems to me - have a view that truth is one thing, and that it's related to language in only one way. Therefore a text can have one completely accurate mode of relationship to the truth, independent of interpretation. And the Bible is guaranteed to have this one truthful mode of relationship – and if the Bible is errant, the guarantee is worthless. What I'm saying - and I'm referring particularly to the prophetic texts which are used over again in different settings to tell different truths - is that the Bible's approach to truth is usually narrative, and always many-sided and complex. Is John the Baptist Elijah? Is John the Baptist the 'Voice Crying'? Why is Rachel weeping ofr her children in Jeremiah, and again in Matthew 2?
I'm not saying that you don't have the correct understanding of the truth. I'm saying that you are under a misapprehension that there is a 'correct understanding' in your sense of Biblical truth. The Bible tells the truth about God over and over again in all sorts of ways, some of which bump into each other and are contradictory. You say - if I understand you correctly - that the Bible cannot be contradictory, at least when properly interpreted, because the Bible is inerrantly true. I say that truth is contradictory, that there's no good reason to simplify truth to a non-contradictory lowest common denominator, and that if you try to do that, you miss a great deal of what the Bible is actually saying.
In other words, I'm not saying quote: that all of this is a dead discussion for those who understand truth properly.
I'm saying that this is a discussion that we can't have at all if one side insists that there is only one way to understand truth.
That's not to say that there isn't truth. As Christians we have truth aplenty - all the truth we need. But a lot of it is contradictory. God is three and God is one. Jesus is the very man, the Second Adam; "My Lord and My God!" And there are things that are not true. God is four and two, Jesus is half man and half God.
quote: just stating parts of your opinion as fact that any fool could see if they really thought about it
I’m (humbly!) not clear where I did this…
quote: The "thrust of your post" was that there are a number of issues if only inerrantists had considered them properly we would come round to your way of thinking.
Well, of course that's my position. If I didn't believe that my position was superior to yours, I wouldn't hold it! (I’m not that postmodern!!!) I'd capitulate. And I presume that you feel the same about your position. I didn't mean it personally. But I do think that inerrantism is a perspective mired in an approach to reality and truth that’s only existed for some three hundred years, and is now passing away.
And I do also think that you underestimate the degree to which your positon presents itself as superior to other, less adequate, Christian positions. Which is fair enough. But it’s important, then, not to be irked by people who assert the contrary!
-------------------- The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty. "Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
Posts: 5433 | From: pOsTmOdErN dYsToPiA | Registered: Feb 2002
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AB
Shipmate
# 4060
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by Leprechaun: And I don't see how your comments about prophecy have anything to do with inerrancy - they just seem like an excuse to show off your huge breadth of theological reading.
Hi Lep,
Actually they were a response to the side discussion me and Fish Fish were having about prophecy and the nature of false prophets - so followed the flow of the thread.
AB
-------------------- "This is all that I've known for certain, that God is love. Even if I have been mistaken on this or that point: God is nevertheless love." - Søren Kierkegaard
Posts: 513 | From: not so sunny Warwickshire | Registered: Feb 2003
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Leprechaun
Ship's Poison Elf
# 5408
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by ...psyduck...: As a matter of fact, if I’m not misrepresenting him (the argument’s in David Kelsey’s Uses of Scripture in Recent Theology B B Warfield, a principal theorist of inerrancy and verbal inspiration, holds that these doctrines actually add nothing to the substance of the Christian faith, and that the only reason (he says!) we’re obliged to believe them is that (he says!) that’s what the Bible itself teaches.
Right. Lots to talk about here. Might have to go to bed before I've finished. Now I am usually quite liking BB Warfield, but I'm afraid I disagree with him here. I've said this before, but the issue for me is the trustworthiness of God. God's words are true, therefore I can trust those promises for my life, and more importantly eternity, and I can validly persuade others to do the same. And I think we can see even from our discussion on this thread that whether you believe inerrancy or not has the potential to change your view of God quite considerably. Am I being overly cynical to describe your (and I mean just your Psy) view as postmodern? Sorry if so, but I am describing it that way. It seems to boil down to, "the Bible works for me without being inerrant". But as I've said before, works for what? NOT as a tool to get to know God, and his plans reliably because it doesn't. So useful for what? To help you in your life? To make you feel better about yourself...what? (sorry, caricaturing, but it helps make my point! )
quote: [I said] For you to suggest, as I feel you have, that without the last level, which you add, that of an inerrant authority, the Bible just isn't being taken seriously, is unsustainable. <snip> Because I am intensely serious about taking the Bible as the Word of God, and I don't take it as such in the way that you do. Which is really the point at issue.
Agreed that this is, indeed the point. quote:
- it seems to me - have a view that truth is one thing, and that it's related to language in only one way. Therefore a text can have one completely accurate mode of relationship to the truth, independent of interpretation.
I sort of believe this. (eloquent, am i not?) Texts can obviously have more than one level of meaning, be saying more than one thing at the same time, but you SEEM to be saying, if I understand you correctly that the meaning of the text varies for us, now today. That I don't agree with, because if that is the case, it ceases to be in any way revelatory. quote: And the Bible is guaranteed to have this one truthful mode of relationship – and if the Bible is errant, the guarantee is worthless.
I don't acept the "if", but I see what you mean. I think I do indeed believe this, that there is one truthful, real relationship between the text and the truth it is presenting, because I said above, it ceases to be revelation, if not revealing truth (or truths)
quote: I say that truth is contradictory, that there's no good reason to simplify truth to a non-contradictory lowest common denominator, and that if you try to do that, you miss a great deal of what the Bible is actually saying.
Sorry, isn't this what I am saying? It seems to be it is the "errantists" who say "these are contradictory therefore one is not true." I have been arguing for accepting things as true because God says them, even when the appear to be contradictory.
quote: That's not to say that there isn't truth. As Christians we have truth aplenty - all the truth we need. But a lot of it is contradictory. God is three and God is one. Jesus is the very man, the Second Adam; "My Lord and My God!" And there are things that are not true. God is four and two, Jesus is half man and half God.
Again, this is exactly what I have been arguing for against those who say "The Bible must be tainted by our human-ness and therefore partly not true". It seems contradictory that God can speak through the words of people. But he does. Again, I think what you are saying actually acts as more of an argument for inerrancy than against...does it not?
quote: just stating parts of your opinion as fact that any fool could see if they really thought about it
I’m (humbly!) not clear where I did this…
It was to this particular gem I was referring: quote: Truth isn't like that, Never was. Wasn't in the Bible. It's time to trust God and move on.
quote: But I do think that inerrantism is a perspective mired in an approach to reality and truth that’s only existed for some three hundred years, and is now passing away.
Your whole approach Psyduck rests on the assumption that postmodern non Christian thinkers have something useful to add to our Christian debate about truth. I happen to disagree with that. To me, simply because a particular approach has been held by most people, and now isn't, is no argument to say whether it is right or wrong. So our society has largely moved to a postmodern approach to truth. So what? I find it particularly difficult to stomach (and I don't know if this is you) when people who are keen to tell me that church "tradition" doesn't teach inerrancy are keen to throw the last c 300 years of Reformed "tradition" od scripture interpretation out the window because they find the johnny come lately postmodernism a bit more palatable. It may be that the enlightment people had it right. quote: And I do also think that you underestimate the degree to which your positon presents itself as superior to other, less adequate, Christian positions. Which is fair enough. But it’s important, then, not to be irked by people who assert the contrary!
To be fair, all positions on this board, by their nature do this, else there would be no debate. My irk is with the assumption that I have never read or thought about any of these things before. Which I have. At length. That's what gets my goat.
-------------------- He hath loved us, He hath loved us, because he would love
Posts: 3097 | From: England - far from home... | Registered: Jan 2004
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Psyduck
Ship's vacant look
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Posted
OK. quote: Now I am usually quite liking BB Warfield, but I'm afraid I disagree with him here. I've said this before, but the issue for me is the trustworthiness of God
Let me get you absolutely straight on this. You say that you are an inerrantist because it is only if the Bible is inerrant that you can trust God? That sounds awfully like saying that an inerrancy position can't trust God without guarantees, specifically the guarantee that the Bible is inerrant. Now I know that accepting the Bible is inerrant is itself an act of faith. But what you seem to me to be calling for is faith in the Bible, in the first instance, not faith in God. You seem to me to be saying that you can't believe in God until you have first believed in the Bible. And I have often heard inerrantists say similar things.
The counter-argument is simple. Faith is faith in God. In all the Christian tradition, and in the Bible itself, faith is presented as trust in God not on the basis of authority but of a personal venturing on the truth of a relationship with God. Only in certain Roman Catholic and certain Protestant ways of looking at it, so far as I know, is faith presented as acceding to certain propositional truths taught on authority. I still maintain that inerrancy is rooted in the Enlightenment, but its spiritual ancestor seems to me to be a certain strand - and by no means the whole - of unreformed Roman Catholicism. You believe this because an Authority tells you that it's True&trade:.
New Testament faith is a response to Christ, and a response to Christ as the one who reveals God.
quote: Am I being overly cynical to describe your (and I mean just your Psy) view as postmodern?
If you want, but my postmodernism only goes so far. I'm a Christian first, and if you wanted a pigeon-hole, you'd probably put me somewhere between neo-orthodox and 'radical orthodox'(if the latter isn't just Anglican™). Postmodern thought - and much more importantly the post-modern social and cultural environment - gives me the space to accept without pressure or tension what the Church has always taught (including Paul on grace, which is why I'm a Presbyterian!)
quote: It seems to boil down to, "the Bible works for me without being inerrant".
I'd say that that's the mainstream Christian position, not particularly postmodern. I'd also say that it's God's position. I'm not laid-back about this. (And of course I accept that we differ here.)
quote: But as I've said before, works for what? NOT as a tool to get to know God, and his plans reliably because it doesn't. So useful for what? To help you in your life? To make you feel better about yourself...what? (sorry, caricaturing, but it helps make my point!
Useful for God to speak through. That the Bible is a tool sc. in our hands for us to get to know God and his plans is an astounding formulation, to my mind. That we have tools for the manipulation of God... But I think that that's what inerrancy really is saying. God never says anything that's different to what he says in the Bible. What he says in the Bible means one inerrant thing. Therefore in the Bible you've got God. I think that's what's implied in saying that the Bible is the revelation of God. Now, say all of those things about Jesus Christ, and I'd agree. Because God is never object, always subject, in his revelation. And as Karl Barth says, Jesus Christ reveals God as Mystery. The idea that the Bible is a 'tool in our hands' is absolutely alien to me. The Bible is a meeting-place, where our narcissistic subjectivity is laid low before God in his glory, his grace and his love and forgiveness. And I think that that's what Scripture says about itself. "Meet God here." Not "This is an Infallible Book."
quote: quote: --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- it seems to me - have a view that truth is one thing, and that it's related to language in only one way. Therefore a text can have one completely accurate mode of relationship to the truth, independent of interpretation.
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I sort of believe this. (eloquent, am i not?) Texts can obviously have more than one level of meaning, be saying more than one thing at the same time, but you SEEM to be saying, if I understand you correctly that the meaning of the text varies for us, now today. That I don't agree with, because if that is the case, it ceases to be in any way revelatory.
I'm saying that the text, as encounter with God, says what God wants it to today. I think that that's a basic condition of the Bible as the locus of revelation (place where revelation happens.) "When Scripture is read and preached, the congregation wait, not for the wrds of the Minister, but for the word of Christ, who is the Word of God."
quote: It seems to be it is the "errantists" who say "these are contradictory therefore one is not true." I have been arguing for accepting things as true because God says them, even when the appear to be contradictory.
What I note is "appear to be contradictory". It seems to me that you're saying that the contradictions aren't, can't be, there. Because there can only be one inerrant truth in the Bible. I'm saying that truth emerges out of the contradictions of the Bible when God speaks it in Christ. Notions of inerrancy actually blind us to the way the Bible works. That, by the way, was my point about prophecy.
To re-order the nexct bit a bit (please bear with me - no sleight of hand) quote: It seems contradictory that God can speak through the words of people. But he does.
Absolutely.
quote: Again, I think what you are saying actually acts as more of an argument for inerrancy than against...does it not?
No. How human speech becomes the speech of God is a mystery, not th esubject of formal guarantees provided by a doctrine of inerrancy. quote: Again, this is exactly what I have been arguing for against those who say "The Bible must be tainted by our human-ness and therefore partly not true".
I'd never dream of putting it like that. You're thinking of Enlightenment liberalsm, which shares its basic approach to truth with inerrantist approaches. Both of these dissolve together in the 'postmodern condition'.
quote: Your whole approach Psyduck rests on the assumption that postmodern non Christian thinkers have something useful to add to our Christian debate about truth. I happen to disagree with that. To me, simply because a particular approach has been held by most people, and now isn't, is no argument to say whether it is right or wrong. So our society has largely moved to a postmodern approach to truth. So what? I find it particularly difficult to stomach (and I don't know if this is you) when people who are keen to tell me that church "tradition" doesn't teach inerrancy are keen to throw the last c 300 years of Reformed "tradition" od scripture interpretation out the window because they find the johnny come lately postmodernism a bit more palatable. It may be that the enlightment people had it right.
I really think you should read, say, Schweitzer's "Quest for the Historical Jesus" before you strat being too effusive in your praise of the Enlightenement and all that flowed from it! To reiterate, for me, postmodernity makes it possible to return to the authentic modes of Christian understanding by listening to the Bible for what it's actually saying, for its many voices, and for its many-stranded truthful speaking about God. It doesn't embody the truth, miraculously or magically. It tells the truth. I think that that's what's at the heart of Christian understandings of inspiration, authority, canonicity. Not "Is this document a slice of Biblical truth/" "Is this a bit of the inerrant Bible?" but "Does this tell a truth that we have to hear, are constrained to trust?" quote: My irk is with the assumption that I have never read or thought about any of these things before. Which I have. At length. That's what gets my goat.
I can't for the life of me see where I've said this. All I've said is that I'm as convinced that your view is, uultimately, Christianly untenable as you are convinced mine is. I don't want to get your goat. Your goat is safe. But I do think that you have committed yourself to a view that ultimately (and actually considerably sooner than ultimately) doesn't make sense. That's by no means a comment on your intelligence or the scope of your reading. And I presume you feel exactly the same about me and my position. Otherwise why are we having this 'conversation'?
-------------------- The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty. "Lle rhyfedd i falchedd fod/Yw teiau ar y tywod." (Ieuan Brydydd Hir)
Posts: 5433 | From: pOsTmOdErN dYsToPiA | Registered: Feb 2002
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Leprechaun
Ship's Poison Elf
# 5408
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Posted
quote: Originally posted by ...psyduck...: But what you seem to me to be calling for is faith in the Bible, in the first instance, not faith in God.
But this springs from my view of the Bible. It is a nonsense to say "I think Mr X is trustworthy, but the things he says aren't true". If the things someone says are not true and cannot be relied on, then they are not trustworthy.
quote: The counter-argument is simple. Faith is faith in God. In all the Christian tradition, and in the Bible itself, faith is presented as trust in God not on the basis of authority but of a personal venturing on the truth of a relationship with God. New Testament faith is a response to Christ, and a response to Christ as the one who reveals God.
Absolutely. But I think you overlook one important strand of what faith is in the Bible - a response to a promise, a trust in a word. Thus faith IS a response to Christ who reveals God, but it is no mistake that Christ himself is described as a word, that all of God's promises are "yes" in him. So I don't deny that faith is a response to the living truth, Christ. But he is presented to us in the form of propositional truth (which is itself described as living).
quote: That we have tools for the manipulation of God... But I think that that's what inerrancy really is saying. God never says anything that's different to what he says in the Bible. What he says in the Bible means one inerrant thing.
Yes. But how is this manipulating God? It is merely banking on his character... quote: Therefore in the Bible you've got God.
No. I don't think I have ever said this. I've noted you said before that you think this is the logical outcome of the ineraantist position. I don't think it is. Rather, my position is that God has reliably told us all we need to know about himself, and how to live in relationship with him in the Bible. I have no doubt there is far more knowledge out there, in fact some parts of the Bible make it clear that there is, like John 20 for example. quote: Now, say all of those things about Jesus Christ, and I'd agree. Because God is never object, always subject, in his revelation. And as Karl Barth says, Jesus Christ reveals God as Mystery. The idea that the Bible is a 'tool in our hands' is absolutely alien to me. The Bible is a meeting-place, where our narcissistic subjectivity is laid low before God in his glory, his grace and his love and forgiveness. And I think that that's what Scripture says about itself. "Meet God here." Not "This is an Infallible Book."
I qouted all of this bit because there were a number of things I wanted to raise. Its my view that the whole of Scripture is a witness to and revelation of Christ. Therefore, to say, Christ reveals God but the Bible does not, to me is a nonsense. How does God reveal Christ to us? Through the written truth of the Bible (mainly, although I don't deny he does so in other ways too)I agree with you on the "meet God here" thing. But I just don't agree that we can meet God effectively if some of the revelation of things God has said and done are not true, or wrongly attributed to Him. And again, I think that's been clear from the discussion on this thread - we do have different views of God precisely because of what we make of this doctrine.
quote: Notions of inerrancy actually blind us to the way the Bible works. That, by the way, was my point about prophecy.
No, inerrancy provides part of a way through the "seeming contradictions" to establish the truth. None of what you said about prophecy is in any way contradictory to an inerrantist position, unless it is some sort of straw man you are setting up that says "inerrantists believe that prophecy can only be fulfilled once" I don't believe that. I don't know a single inerrantist that does. But it does say that all prophecy in the Bible will be fulfilled. But I don't think that is a point of disagreement.
I am not being effusive about the Enlightenment as such, and in fact to a certain extent I agree with you about postmdernity in some senses being helpful to us in bringing us to experience the Bible rather than just examine it. But it seems to me that an uncritical acceptance of a postmodern method actually presumes that God cannot communicate truth through texts at all, and that I have an issue with. And if you are committed to a truly postmodern mindset it shouldn't bother you that my view doesn't make sense, as long as it works for me. With my pseudo modernist views, I think it is me who has more of an axe to grind!
I think your talk of "formal guarantees" is trying to overclinicalise the view. For me, it is not an attempt to scrabble about to find a text I can trust. Rather inerrancy for me IS trusting God, because it is taking him at his word. This does not deny the scholarship, rigorous study etc that should go into hearing the many voices of Scripture. It is merely to say that the God who ultimately speaks through Scripture stands by what he says. This is far from a formal guarantee for me, it is my reason to keep trusting no matter what.
Posts: 3097 | From: England - far from home... | Registered: Jan 2004
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