A person does not have to be a Christian very long before they encounter the view that the Bible is ridden with error. From college campuses to the Discovery Channel, we live in a modern world where Christians are constantly assaulted on every side by such assertions. Many walk away wrestling with tough questions, clouded by an inability to find immediate answers, while some walk away from the faith itself.[1] Therefore, I feel that the answer to this question is essential for every Christian’s understanding. We, as Christians, must know and understand why our answer is a confident, “No!”
The Vocabulary of Inerrancy. Plummer begins by stating the fact that before the Enlightenment of the 18th century, essentially all persons who claimed the name of Christian accepted that the Bible was completely truthful in all matters that it asserted. But with the elevation of human reason (which is at least understandable given the condition of the Church at the time), more people became skeptical of “previously sacrosanct texts.” Plummer writes, “People started to judge revelation (that is, the Bible) on the basis of their own human reason, rejecting and criticizing various portions, based on what seemed reasonable or probable to them…Of course, the historic witness of the church to the complete truthfulness of Scripture has continued in spite of challenges, but the critics of it also have continued until this day.”
Before proceeding further, Plummer clarifies some terms that have developed during the centuries of debate over the topic:
· Inerrant/Inerrancy. This means that the Bible is completely truthful in all things that the biblical authors assert – whether in geographic, chronological, or theological details. Every word of Scripture were divinely guarded from all error. Plummer finds help from Grudem, “The inerrancy of Scripture means that Scripture in the original manuscripts does not affirm anything that is contrary to fact.”
· Infallible/Infallibility. To claim the Scriptures are infallible is to assert that they are error-free in matters of theology or faith. The word is weaker in connotation and does not include within it the claim that the Bible is free from all error (intentional or unintentional, theological or nontheological).
· Inspired/Inspiration. See my post on Question 3: Who Wrote the Bible – Humans or God?
· For the sake of brevity, I am leaving out Plummer’s definitions of Neo-Orthodoxy and Trustworthy/True/Authoritative. If you have an interest in these, please email me.
Scripture’s Claims About Itself. I personally love the fact that Plummer includes this section. Being a presuppositionalist, I firmly believe that the argument is not merely about facts, but about one’s interpretation of the facts. We must be careful not to commit the errors aforementioned concerning the Enlightenment. The Scriptures are not inerrant primarily because we have searched them and found no error in them (e.g. logical contradiction or whatever), but primarily because they themselves claim their own truthfulness and inerrancy.[2] Here are some passages that attest to this fact (I will cite only 2 for brevity):
· Numbers 23:19. “God is not a man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?” Plummer comments, “If God is completely truthful and the Bible is God’s communication to humanity (Heb 1:1-3), then it follows that the Bible, as God’s Word, is completely truthful.”
· Psalm 12:6. “And the words of the Lord are flawless, like silver refined in a furnace of clay, purified seven times.” Plummer: “Psalms and Proverbs are filled with repeated praises of the perfections of God’s Word (esp. Ps 19 and 119).”
Qualifications of Inerrancy. Plummer writes, “The doctrine of inerrancy must be properly explained and qualified to prevent misunderstanding. A number of important qualifications are listed below”:
· Inerrancy applies only to the autographs (original copies of Scripture).[3] In other words, a person cannot come to us with a KJV Bible, point out a numerical error and say, “See, the Bible has errors!” There are also copying errors in every Hebrew and Greek manuscript of the Bible. However, our Lord, in His providence, has supplied us with such a vast number of Greek and Hebrew manuscripts and their careful transmission, we are able to reconstruct, with extreme accuracy, the original wording of the Old and New Testaments. There will be more on this next week when we answer the question, “Were the ancient manuscripts of the Bible transmitted accurately?
· Inerrancy respects the authorial intent of the passage and the literary conventions under which the author wrote. Plummer comments, If the author intended an assertion literally, we should understand it so…” and likewise figuratively. We must also respect the level of precision intended. For example: When someone asks us what time it is and we say, “Five after,” is it exactly five minutes after? Or, is it four minutes after and we simply round up? Even if we do round up, no one would say we were in error.
· We must not impose chronological accuracy/order where it is not intended (this is my summary of what Plummer is saying on this point). The best place this is found is in the Gospel of John. John is piecing together events from Christ’s life to get his intended point across. The Apostle is not giving a chronological account of Jesus’ life.
· Inerrancy allows for partial reporting, paraphrasing, and summarizing. Watch the news and you will see reporters doing this all of the time. All of reported history is biased in some way – that is, it has an agenda and reports accordingly. It is simply impossible to report all of history at any given moment.
· Inerrancy allows for phenomenological language (that is, the description of phenomena as they are observed and experienced). For example, we do not charge the biblical author with error when speaking of the sun rising (Ps 19:6) any more than we would the meteorologist on channel four when he speaks of the time of tomorrow’s sunrise. In other words, we all know that the sun itself does not rise, but we do not say someone is in error for saying “sunrise.”
· Inerrancy allows for the reporting of speech without the endorsement of the truthfulness of that speech (or the implication that everything else said by that person is truthful – e.g. Ps 14:1).
· Inerrancy does not mean that the Bible provides definitive or exhaustive information on every topic. Plummer writes, “No author in the Bible, for example, attempts a classification of mollusks or lessons in subatomic physics. The Bible tangentially touches on these subjects in asserting that God is the creator of all things, marine and subatomic, but one must not press the Scriptures to say more than they offer.
· Inerrancy is not invalidated by colloquial or nonstandard grammar or spelling. This is an academic way of saying that just because a person may not be as learned as another does not mean that person is not as honest. And when honest people communicate, we would be well served to listen, even if their grammar is bad. There are a few statements in Scripture that are ungrammatical (according to current standards of proper grammar at that time) but still inerrant because they are completely true.
Recommendations for Dealing with Difficult Texts.
· Be sure that you are interacting with real texts. Plummer asserts, “Do not allow another person’s uninformed skepticism to poison your own intellect.” I usually like to ask for a specific reference when someone tells me that the Scriptures are filled with errors. Christians should not be disturbed by arbitrary arguments – especially ones that stem from ignorant conjecture.
· Approach the text in trust, not as a skeptic. We should be diligent to investigate the truthfulness of Christianity. Christianity has nothing to fear. See my post on "What to do with Doubt".
· Pray about a difficult text. Plummer writes, “God is a loving Father who cares for His children.” The Puritans used to call difficult texts “Scripture knots.” Prayer is a great way to untie them!
· Keep in mind the qualifications of inerrancy when dealing with a difficult text (See above). Don’t demand that ancient writers conform to your expected standards.
· Seek counsel when dealing with difficult texts. That is what the Body of Christ is for. Read good books and commentaries. Talk to good Christian friends and pastors.
· Be willing to set a text aside for further consideration rather than force harmonization. Plummer quotes Augustine: “I have learned to yield this respect and honor only to the canonical books of Scripture: of these alone do I most firmly believe that the authors were completely free from error. And if in these writings I am perplexed by anything which appears to me opposed to truth, I do not hesitate to suppose that either the [manuscript] is faulty, or the translator has not caught the meaning of what was said, or I myself have failed to understand it.”
Questions for Reflection. 1) Has anyone ever presented you with an alleged error in the Bible as an argument as to why it is not true? What was your response? 2) Is there a puzzling text that you are dealing with now? What methods are you employing to “untie” such a Scripture knot?
Due to the importance (and size) of this study, not to mention the trying week I am experiencing, we will forgo our study of specific Biblical texts. Lord willing, we will resume next week! Have a great day!
[1] I’d like to clarify this statement. I do not believe a believer can fall away from a genuine faith in Christ. However, I have personally encountered and conversed with those who (from a human perspective) have walked away from Christianity – and this because they could not reconcile what they thought to be errors in the Bible.
[2] I understand this may be a bit tricky; but it is true nonetheless. A person does not understand and then proceed to belief. Rather, a person must believe and then proceed to understand (Augustine). We believe that the Scriptures are inerrant (b/c they say so), and then we can further understand them and their inerrancy. But a person who believes that they are errant, will not be able (without belief/faith) to search them and then find reason to believe because he has found no error. An unbeliever may perceive error in the Scriptures even though they are innocent of such claims. The problem is with the person’s understanding, not with the Scriptures.
[3] For a greater explanation of this statement see the Chicago Statement of Biblical Inerrancy: Article X.
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