Peter,

I’m a fundamentalist. The reason I believe the Bible has no errors is because it says it contains no errors. It’s a presuppositional argument, but then that should come as no surprise in an apologetic context.

The logical argument you gave (God’s word > God is perfect > no error) may be used by some fundamentalists, but having moved in the circles for a while, I don’t think it’s the primary argument at all.

The dilemma’s raised by the two facts of Scripture being God’s word and man’s word are not hard to address if one is willing to consider the nuance of orthodox bibliology.

In other words, I think we can defend God’s word without needing to beat up on fundamentalist thinking. The fact is, fundamentalist thinking has been at the forefront of the defence of Scripture in the not too distant past.

Ben,

In order to the avoid the a priori, deductive argument that is based on two explicit teachings of Scripture, I would need to take an inductive look at Scripture to answer that question.

Since that would necessarily be a lengthy process, I’ll instead direct you to any of the excellent evangelical systematic theology textbooks in print.

That said, your point is taken. The doctrine doesn’t have an easy prooftext to refer to.

On the other hand, my points stand. First, the deductive argument follows. Second, there are various nuances within inerrancy (absolute inerrancy, full inerrancy, etc.) which help blend the empirical with the “rationalistic” evidence.

Jason,
No offence intended. I did try to say that there is a fundamentalism of a positive kind, which I believe. I guess my real target is the kind of rationalism (whether theistic, or atheistic) that declares beforehand what God should or should not be like, or should or should not do, a priori, by definition, and then proceeds to the evidence. A more empirical approach, I believe, is demanded by the evidence, that is, by the nature of the New Testament itself.

Hi Peter Bolt,

I have two questions arising from your post.

1. You write “[the Bible] does make the claim to be God’s word.” As Donna basically points out, it does not. And your response to her re-frames the NT phenomenon in terms of emergence and apostolic connection. Might it not be better to stop using phrases like “the Bible does make the claim to be God’s word” and replace it with something more accurate?

2. What do you do if you find the empirical evidence on some issues to be ambiguous and inconclusive? To take a specific example only for illustrative purposes, I am not entirely convinced that the pastoral epistles were written by Paul, and I am also not completely persuaded by those that claim they weren’t.

@Lionel,
Yes, but don’t you think there is a huge difference between the statements “there are at least large chunks of the Bible that claim to be the word of God” to “the Bible claims to the the word of God”?

But what is “all scripture”? Who decides what is in the canon?

Callan, the author of 2 Timothy probably had some kind of collection of Hebrew writings in view when he spoke of “all scripture”. Even if the author had something wider in view, it would not have been the protestant canon.

2Tim3:16 tells us that all scripture is inspired but the problem is it does not give us a list of books to be included.  This is not a prooftext for the bible alone or for bible infalliblity.  Furthermore, this text must be referring to OT scripture, because the NT wasn’t completed as yet.

Lionel the verses you quote also do not give us definitive lists.

This is an argument that will go round and round unless there is honesty.  The historical facts are, contrary to what Peter has said, that the canon was decreed firstly by Damascus, then the Council of Hippo and then Carthage.

We often forget that Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch’s and other writings by the Church fathers were also considered by some to be authoritative.  That is why a decree was made to ensure that documents like the Gospel of Thomas for example did not become an authoritative text.  There was obvious sorting out to be done.

Peter, I apologise if I offended anyone regarding my comment about the bible coming down from heaven.  I do believe, however, that some Christians do not consider that the bible does not give us a list of books, so therefore cannot be self-authenticating.  A lot is taken for granted and we only need to ask a few questions and look into the history of the church to gain a better understanding.

Whilst, for some it may be obvious that the scriptures are God-inspired, for others it is not so obvious.  I often wonder why Clement of Rome’s letter to the Corinthians or Ignatius’ letter to the Ephesians were not part of the canon.  When I read them they certainly read as though they are God-breathed. 

Regards
Donna

Donna,
no offense taken!

The claim for God’s authority is already there as far back as Paul’s letters were written. ‘He is the apostle of Jesus Christ, therefore ...’ Perhaps an illustration of the strength of Paul’s claim can be 1 Cor 14:37 ‘If anyone thinks that he is a prophet, or spiritual, he should acknowledge that the things I am writing to you are a command of the Lord’.

The recognition of this authority is also there at the time —when the churches received the apostolic letters. Even at the time the churches received Paul’s writings as authoritative; note 2 Peter 3:16 which puts Paul’s writings amongst ‘the other Scriptures’.

To use the Gospels and Acts to trace this back further, Jesus carefully prepared a select group of men to be his witnesses (and then later added Paul to it), in order to have the foundational role of testifying to what they had seen and heard, before AND after Jesus’ resurrection (see for example Acts 10:41). And yes, he promised to equip them with his Holy Spirit, that is, the presence of God in their lives would help them perform this important foundational task. They are the ones who bring the authorised testimony that is released upon the world by the risen Christ, that is, the ‘word of God’.

As to the list of books etc, see my comments above. The emergence of the canon requires a historical discussion and, once again, despite views to the contrary (such as those you have pointed out) there was no decision or decree that created some state of affairs that was not there beforehand; there was simply a recognition of the texts that had always been accepted or not (although admittedly the borders of the list were blurry).

Peter
My argument here is not whether the bible is the Word of God or whether the apostles had an authoritative voice.  Simply, the bible cannot and does not self-authenticate.

Notice that Paul does not authenticate his writings as scripture, but Peter.  Paul did not think he was writing an inspired scripture but a series of letters to the churches. 

The reference you use in 1 Cor only suggests that he is speaking on behalf of the Lord.  That in itself does not make something scripture.  We all, from time to time speak for the Lord.

The problem with saying that Jesus used his apostles to bring forth the Word (in written form) is that a very small percentage of them wrote the NT.  So if the apostolic argument is the litmus test, then a good deal of the NT would not be part of the canon.  I am in no way suggesting that the apostles did not have authority and I personally believe all public revelation ceased at the death of the last apostle.  I hope you see my point.

Whilst I don’t want to harp on what I have said previously regarding when the official canon was ratified, the fact remains that these councils sought to settle some disputes that were around at the time.  Even if I give you the point that the canon was already generally accepted before these councils, it still proves that men, not the bible claim them to be scripture - albeit with the help of the Holy Spirit.  If a definitive statement was not made, then we could still be debating the validity of the Gospel of Thomas or any of the other spurious books that were floating around at the time.  Imagine, if the church did not make a definitive statement about whether gentiles should be circumcised or not at the council of Jerusalem, some poor fellows would be putting off indefinitely their faith in Christ!

Regards
Donna

Donna,
There are several indications of an intersubjective experience (that is a subjective experience shared by many) of a conviction that these words of men are the words of God, and this is evident already in the NT age (1 Thess 1:5, 2:13), and mentioned by Jesus in his ‘my sheep hear my voice’ (Jn 10:3, etc). In my very limited research into the question, this relationship to ‘a book’ is something apparently NOT shared by other groups with ‘sacred books’.

Paul’s claims are authoritative, not just speaking for the Lord in some general sense. Check out the next verse (1 Cor 14:38) ‘If anyone does not recognize this, he is not recognized’. (!)

There is no problem saying that councils settled disputes, that is true. In regard to the canon, this means they recognised what had already been received by the churches from the beginning—and so rejected other writings or claims as having NOT been received from the beginning. Notice Bp Serapion’s wording, for example: ‘... we carefully reject, knowing that no such writings have ever been handed down to us’.

As for lists, there are several outside what the councils stated, as you no doubt realise. These were compiled because alternative theories were on offer (such as Marcion). There is the Muratorian fragment (mid 2nd c), Codex Claromontanus (late 3rd), and Eusebius of Caesarea (early 4th). These three show that about 20 of the NT books were unquestioned from 2nd century.

But having said all this, to get back to the original post, there is no need to have an ‘a priori’ view that the Scriptures MUST BE self-authenticating etc. The discussion needs to begin historically (not theologically or ecclesiastically), namely, where do we need to go to find the primary sources for the early christian movement, and, more importantly, for the person that began it all, a crucified man who (so the story goes) rose from the dead.  The empirical quest for evidence (rather than rationalistic decisions beforehand) drives us back to these writings and, based in eyewitness testimony, they are therefore (historically) authoritative. And, lo and behold, they proclaim ‘the word of God’, namely, that Jesus Christ died and rose again for a lost world.

Hi Lionel,
Thanks for your reply. But there is still the problem of determining what was in the canon. And whose canon? Have you read the apocrypha? Parts of that claim to be the word of God. What is your position on it? Something similar to the 39 articles? Do you read it for example of life and instruction of manners? Matters are somewhat more complex, and those who ask genuine questions are so often hit with proof texts and waving slogans that it can be exasperating at times. (Please note that I am not accusing you of doing this )

Lionel, the quest you speak of is hardly proceeding with rigor if you label “the Bible does make the claim to be God’s word” as an important piece of empirical data. If you think that it is a helpful phrase that summarises conclusions that you have come to after negotiating through various complex arguments, then fine, but let’s not short-circuit the whole process that draws you to that conclusion by simply calling it data.

I hope that this does not sound harsh in tone, and I am not meaning to be argumentative. But I don’t think that conservative evangelicals do themselves any favours by ignoring the complexity of the situation. As you at least acknowledged five comments above, there IS a “significant difference” between the two claims that were being made.

Hi Rob,

No harshness or argumentativeness inferred (nor intended)! I think these are good questions, but I reckon the specific details of the canon are too complex (and time consuming) for me to fruitfully discuss in this forum.

I do agree that we sometimes have to acknowledge the complexity of the canonical situation. But not always. In this case, in the context of Peter’s post, the phrase “the Bible claims to be God’s word” works quite well. Why is that? Because in this case, the idea of the Bible being God’s word is not being used to close down the discussion, but to open it up. Whether or not you’re dealing implicitly with the Bible as a whole or explicitly with those many parts of the Bible that do claim to be God’s word (or which claim that other parts of the Bible are God’s word), the quest is ultimately the same: to work out what the claim “this is God’s word” actually means in its context, without assuming you know what the answer is.

I think that the canonical question is a good question, but not always relevant to the task at hand.

Hi Peter,
Thanks for your response. I broadly agree with the way you have explained things here. In particular, I welcome the acknowledgment that (as understood in the context in which you wrote) there are associated probabilities, that not everything is black and white, and that there is a “great deal of messiness”. I feel that I have been arguing this case to friends for a number of years, but that I have been getting little traction. Perhaps because some of my tentative conclusions about how one navigates that “messiness” is too radical.

I have a number of observations.

i) Your comment seems to advocate that the Word of God is to be seen (initially at least) as the apostolic proclamation about Jesus, and that the written texts take the function primarily as witness to Jesus or to that proclamation.

ii) If we are to let go of our rationalist mindset, then we cannot insist, a priori, that all parts of the Bible cohere or are consistent. (In fact, at present I don’t think the thesis that all the scriptures cohere can be sustained empirically, but that is just my judgment.)

iii) This, in turn, opens up a wide spectrum of interpretive possibilities. Which texts do we privelege? (And let’s face it, we all privelege some texts over others; we might as well be honest about it.) How do we relate with those who take a different perspective?

iv) Related to this, it seems to me that if Paul or the author of Matthew were to take a contemporary evangelical course in Biblical exegesis (at least, as it was modelled to me by my time at CBS), they may well fail the exam. This is how I read the empirical evidence. Consequently one should explore more creative and flexible approaches to intepreting scripture (the OT at least).