Re: [asa] Glenn's views

Inerrancy has weak support in Scripture itself; and even if scriptures claimed themselves to be inerrant (as Revelation in effect does), why should anyone believe it? Revelation was among the most vigorously disputed books of the canon, so Christian leaders questioned its authority right from the start despite its own bold assertions.

I see the teaching of inerrancy as a result of the Protestant need for a pope after they rejected the real thing. Scriptures have the very important function among Protestants of serving as the ultimate reference for doctrine. Scriptures have this authority whether or not the given Protestants believe they are inerrant. Ultimately what gives the writings authority is whether or not they are spiritually valuable, not whether the original author got all the words right in what must have been some kind of pipeline dictation.

The fact that interpretations of scriptures have varied widely whenever Christians have consulted them indicates that there are uncertainties about doctrine that are far weightier than whether or not the manuscripts at one time were inerrant. Claiming the texts are inerrant IMO just creates another arena for doctrinal conflict.

Don

  ----- Original Message -----
  From: David Opderbeck<mailto:dopderbeck@gmail.com>
  To: David Campbell<mailto:pleuronaia@gmail.com>
  Cc: asa<mailto:asa@calvin.edu>
  Sent: Wednesday, January 17, 2007 3:36 PM
  Subject: Re: [asa] Glenn's views

  I think it's a mistake to argue for or against inerrancy based on hermeneutics. After all, you could argue against any doctrine of scripture as trustworthy and authoritative based on the fact that interpretations can reasonably differ with respect to many passages. If we affirm that scripture is trustworthy and authoritative for the faith and practice of the Church, as the Church has done throughout history, it seems to me that we must also affirm that scripture is capable of being understood and applied by/within the Church, at least to the degree necessary for the Church to carry out the mission God assigns to it. The Reformed understanding of the perpiscuity of scripture, it seems to me, captures this pretty well, while acknowledging that matters not central to salvation might be less clear.

  I prefer to think of inerrancy, as John Stott and Millard Erickson do, as a secondary affirmation to the primary affirmations that God is truthful and that scripture is God's authoritative revelation to the Church given for instruction, correction, etc. We expect scripture to be perpiscuous on central matters because of the primary affirmations about God's truthfulness and scripture's authority and purpose, not because of the secondary affirmation of inerrancy.

   
  On 1/17/07, David Campbell <pleuronaia@gmail.com<mailto:pleuronaia@gmail.com>> wrote:

> Inerrancy would be important only if the messages were always so clear that
> diverging interpretations would be an exception rather than the rule. That
> is, what good is inerrancy if you don't really know what the text means?
> The notion of total inerrancy IMO betrays too strong an emphasis on the text
> relative to the relationship.

    Inerrancy can be important if the important messages are clear, even
    if not all messages are clear. Divergent interpretations can reflect
    unclear messages or clear messages that we don't want to heed. In the
    case of unclear messages, inerrancy establishes the principle that
    agreement with Scripture as a whole should guide interpretation.
    Inerrancy many not be a sufficient principle to figure everything out,
    but it is relevant in figuring things out.

    --
    Dr. David Campbell
    425 Scientific Collections
    University of Alabama
    "I think of my happy condition, surrounded by acres of clams"

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  David W. Opderbeck
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Received on Thu Jan 18 04:41:52 2007