Re: [asa] The Barr quote

Hi Randy,

Let me take your post one step at a time, and see what we can make of it;

Randy Isaac wrote:
> In light of all your comments, is it accurate to say the following?
>
> Barr and "any professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class
> university" believe that the authors of Genesis 1 fully believed and
> intended a message of creation in six 24-hour days. With this, the
> typical YEC agrees.

I'd tentatively suggest this is close to how YEC's would LIKE the
situation to be but I think the reality is different for at least two
reasons (already alluded to by other respondents on the thread);

(1) "world class university" is Barr's value judgment and it reflects
Barr's assessment of what constitutes credible biblical scholarship.
HOWEVER if we allow the voices of all those poor hack conservatives (and
I write that with keyboard firmly in cheek) then there is clearly
another (conservative evangelical) scholarly tradition whose adherents
follow an approach akin to that of Bernard Ramm, Gleason Archer and many
more. They would NOT agree with the claim made in the above regarding
the original author's beliefs.

(2) Barr was writing in 1984 and to assume that the views of biblical
scholars - even those at "world class" universities - has remained
static would be dangerous. Even IF Barr's comments were correct in 1984,
I'm not precisely overawed by a more than 20-year-old opinion on a field
which has been an area of major controversy and major development in the
intervening period - and on this point introducing scholars such as John
Walton, Henri Blocher and John Collins who have made significant
contributions since 1984 should warn us against too facile acceptance of
Barr's tentative ("probably") and limited ("as far as I know") and dated
(1984) position as regards the views of a particular subset of scholars
(those in OT and Hebrew at "world class universities") many of whom
would have since left the field.

In consequence I'd rephrase your above to the following - which I'm sure
you'll find to be a very disappointing rehash of Barr's original remark!
Critical differences are in caps;

<quote>
Barr TENTATIVELY ("probably, as far as I know") SUGGESTED (note past
tense!) that MOST professors of Hebrew or Old Testament at "world-class
universities" (possibly an expression of Barr's theological commitments)
AT THE TIME OF HIS WRITING TO WALTON (1984) believed (past tense!) that
the authors of Genesis 1 fully believed and intended a message of
creation in six 24-hour days. With this, the typical YEC agrees. AND
THIS WITH THE CAVEAT THAT FEW OF THESE SCHOLARS HAD GIVEN MUCH
CONSIDERATION TO THE QUESTION.
</quote>

Now, my recent remarks have made clear that I don't consider this an
entirely unreasonable judgment on Barr's part, BUT it is a judgment and
a dated one at that. As such it is, for me, a rather fragile foundation
upon which to build a case!

I might only add that the problem becomes even more compounded if one
chooses to consider that the author(s) of Genesis may have had
particular socio-political or religious agendas. Space forbids much
development of this point here, but even a cursory familiarity with
recent studies in myth and history will show that many cultures
deliberately rewrote their history in the interest of particular
socio-political or religious interests. As one small example, consider
the excising of unpopular pharaohs from Egyptian monuments. Examples
could be added ad infinitum (or, at least, ad nauseum!). On the surface
this may seem a dangerous place for evangelicals to take a theory of
scripture, but it has to be nuanced with (1) a strong sense of the
providential guidance of God; and (2) an awareness that God works all
things (even human treachery) together for good - even the enemies of
Christ must be allowed their way in order that the purposes of God come
to pass; and (3) an understanding that we have already decided to leave
behind the simplistic claim that Genesis is a form of historical
narrative (which point I add with apologies to those, such as Dick
Fischer, who would take another view).

>
> Barr & co. apparently would also believe the following with which the
> typical YEC would not agree:
> --the world was not in fact created in six 24 hour days so that the
> Bible is in error

Certainly Barr did not consider the account scientifically true. From
his 1991 Gifford Lectures on natural theology;

<quote>
"For generations people have been accustomed to say that the first
chapter of Genesis did not purport to be a scientific account of the
origins of the world, and this is an understandable apologetic response
to the fact that THE ACCOUNT IS NOT SCIENTIFICALLY TRUE." (Barr, James.
Biblical Faith and Natural Theology. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993.
p.175. emphasis added)
</quote>

> --the Genesis passage is humanly inspired but not divinely inspired

Barr held to the view that scripture is a witness to revelation rather
than revelation itself and he allowed no more inspiration for scripture
than he did for the Church. This again can be seen from his 1991 Gifford
lectures;

<quote>
More certainly, we can say, the dogmatic locus of the doctrine of
scripture is that it should be part of the doctrine of the Church. It
belongs there, along with the other resources that the Church uses and
upon which it depends, like the doctrines of the nature of the Church,
the ministry, the creeds, the sacraments and so on. This is so because,
if we are to ask what the Bible ‘properly’ is, as distinct from
‘transferred’ terms like ‘the Word of God’, we would have to say, as I
wrote long ago, not revelation coming from God to humanity but the
Church’s (properly: Israel’s and, later, the Church’s) response to and
interpretation of that revelation. That is what it directly and
univocally is, and it is on these terms that we can approach it and
enter into it exegetically. But its response and interpretation contain
structures which derive from, and depend on, natural theology and other
kinds of ‘natural’ knowledge.
Thus the terms like ‘holy’, ‘inspired’, and even ‘infallible’, often
used of the scripture in traditional Protestantism, are viable and
usable in so far as these terms have meanings analogous to those of the
holiness, inspiration, infallibility, and so on of the Church as a [198]
whole. The Bible has as much infallibility as the Church has (in
Protestant terms, not too much). It is inspired in much the same way, as
the Church is inspired by the presence of the Spirit within it.-
(Barr, James. Biblical Faith and Natural Theology. Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1993. p.197-98.)
</quote?

Such is, in brief, Barr's view and I think two important points might be
made in respects of it;

(1) It stands in most definite denial of a verbal plenary inspiration of
scripture - which would be the theory of choice amongst fundamentalists,
and perhaps amongst conservative evangelicals. The later would nuance
such a theory in regards of Genesis by allowing that God could inspire
word-for-word an account which was other than historical narrative. But
essentially Barr is consciously rejecting the verbal plenary approach
and so standing in contrast to fundamentalist and conservative
evangelical views (he would have classed both as "fundamentalist")

(2) Amongst those other scholars (the "& co." of your query) who
rejected the verbal plenary approach there were different possible
options as to the degree and kind of inspiration (if any!) which lay
behind the Genesis narrative. Indeed, it is perhaps not too much to say
that attempting to find a doctrine of scripture which adequately nuanced
the balance of human and divine elements (if, indeed, there were taken
to be any divine elements!) was always a very great difficulty for
liberal and neo-orthodox scholars and the issue was consequently not
given to one single solution.

> --the message that God created the world in six 24 hour days is not God
> telling us what actually happened

 From Barr's perspective this is most certainly correct. Indeed, from
what I've written above, even IF the YEC view of origins was correct,
Barr's theory of scripture would perhaps still not allow him to say that
Genesis account is a case of "God telling us" anything at all (but I
think I just introduced an unnecessary pedantry!)

> --Genesis was written in 5th or 6th century BC by Hebrew scribes

Barr may have believed this - it would at least be consistent with the
sort of "world class" scholarship in which Barr considered himself to be
engaged. I have, however, never encountered any specific remark by Barr
on the subject.

As an aside, despite my ignorance of Barr's position I would wager to
suppose that few if any YEC's would wish to quote Barr with approval on
the matter - whatever his view might be. Did somebody mention selective
quotation?

>
>
> If so, we have a curious situation:
>
> the interpretation of a 6 24hour day creation is correlated with a view
> that the Bible (or at least Genesis) is of recent (relatively) human
> inspiration and origin, not God's message of truth to us.
>
> the view that Genesis has an indeterminate (either long or no message of
> chronology) is correlated with a view that the Bible is of divine
> inspiration and origin, with Genesis written earlier, taken from God's
> theological message to a Mesopotamian audience.
>
> That's quite the opposite of what is normally claimed. Scientific
> evidence of an old earth would be consistent with both of the above
> views (heads I win, tails you lose) but the YEC position would pick and
> choose from each one.
>

I've had to mull over this a bit to try and get the gist of your point.
I _think_ you're suggesting that the foregoing discussion leads to one
of two possible situations;

First, the contrast which seems to arise in respects of the conservative
evangelical vs. liberal/fundamentalist approach;

EITHER

(1) Genesis is a human (non-inspired) account of a young creation

OR

(2) Genesis is a divinely inspired account of an old creation

As opposed to, second, the contrast most people would imagine exists;

EITHER

(1a) Genesis is a human (non-inspired) account of an old creation

OR

(2b) Genesis is a divinely inspired account of a young creation.

The gist of your point seems to be that people argue about the 1a/2a
option whereas the actual debate should be over the 1/2 option?

Let me know if I have this latter bit right and I'll give you my
considered response as soon as possible. But so as you won't die
wondering (smile) I'll give my knee-jerk reaction; it seems to be an
interesting re-framing of the debate, but perhaps too dichotomous given
the very great variety of theories of inspiration which have been
proposed particularly on the liberal side. If we put the myriad of
liberal views aside, however, such a reframing may have interesting
implications for the debate between YEC vs conservative evangelical
exegetes of Genesis.

Anyway, get back to me and we'll kick it around some more.

Kindest Regards,
Murray Hogg
Pastor, East Camberwell Baptist Church, Victoria, Australia
Post-Grad Student (MTh), Australian College of Theology

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Received on Mon May 19 01:37:31 2008