Frequent Asked Questions on Biblical Inspiration and Inerrancy

Many people wonder why God doesn't just make everything clear and obvious, for example by providing writing across the sky that could clearly be nothing other than supernatural.

This is a natural question, but it assumes that God wants to provide us with a clear and simple path to pursue. It appears that God actually aims to allow us to learn and to make decisions through trial and error, rather than ;simply laying everything out for us. That leaves us freedom of choice, and it also involves developing character.

I suspect this is because God wants us to be creative individuals, rather than cookie-cutter characters produced by divine psychological pressure.

Related Links:

• Why Doesn't God Speak Directly?
  Essay built from the concepts of Hebrews 1:1-4 examining why God doesn't make it easier for us.

The best way to learn how inspiration functions is to observe it in action. That means that we can learn a great deal about visions by reading the stories of visions and the reports of visions by the prophets. We can learn about inspiration of historical material by looking at and comparing them as they actually occur in scripture.

Related Links:

• Information or Conversation
  What is your primary purpose in looking at scripture? Are you looking for data, or do you want to commune with God?
• A Tale of Three Prophets
  Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel as examples of how God uses different people in different circumstances.

One of my main points in opposing the doctrine of Biblical inerrancy is that we need to spend less, not more time discussing supposed errors and contradictions in the Bible, and more time trying to understand the Bible on its own terms. I have occasionally pointed out proposed errors, but I do so in two circumstances only: only: 1) to aid in understanding the text as we have it, and 2) to illustrate with errors that have proposed solutions, or those that I believe are so trivial that they illustrate the unimportance of most issues in this debate effectively.

I believe that the doctrine of Biblical inerrancy tends to force us to focus on the trivialities of the text and keeps us away from communion with God, from hearing the direct inspiration that God has for us.

No. I believe that the Bible is the result of God interacting with people, and that it has been providentially protected by God. This means that errors and contradictions are there because God permitted. God could have exercised more intense control over the process, but he did not.

I would note two types of error especially. First, there are those cases of inadvertent written error. An example would be the ages of certain kings in the records of Kings and Chronicles. These may be copyists' errors (one proposed solution) but I don't believe they are of concern whether they occurred in the royal records of Judah and Israel, were the fault of the compiler of Kings or Chronicles, or were committed by an early copyist. They simply have no impact on the meaning of the book. Second, there are intentional statements that we regard as errors in the modern world. An example would be the listing of bats as birds in Leviticus 11:19. (The categories used here are simply different than ours.)

I believe that God speaks to people in the cultural and historical setting in which he finds them. Jesus didn't use divine knowledge in order to spice up his parables with aircraft, for example. But I go further. I believe he speaks using the cosmology and historical knowledge of the time wherever that improves communication to the original audience. In this case we may regard something as a historical or scientific error, but correction of that error would harm communication to the original audience.

No, not at all. What I mean is that the Bible is a valuable piece of literature even if not regarded as inerrant. The value of the Bible does not lie in being without error, but in conveying God's message. In addition, the Bible contains great literature, which should be of valuable even if one didn't regard it as divinely inspired.

In practice, I find that I interpret most passages in the same way as other interpreters who do believe in inerrancy (provided it is the inerrancy specified in the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy). I have actually been asked just what is the difference in my view by some who have compared notes on many controversial passages. I see my understanding of Biblical inerrancy not as a solution to "problems"-most of which I find very enlightening when studied-but rather an attitude. My attitude toward scripture is to listen to God speaking to a human audience. Grace regards the needs of the human audience more than a need to assert the divine attribute of infallibility. In other words, God speaks in a way in which we can hear right now even if some later generation might regard that message as flawed because of some new discovery. And you can be certain that if the Lord doesn't return first, our current understanding of science will move so much that the way we see scripture today will seem naïve and unscientific. God was gracious to speak in a way that the ancients could understand, and he's gracious to help us understand that message now through the power of the Spirit.

Yes, I do. I believe that God has worked in inspiring the writers, in the collection and copying of the work, and continues to work in the process of translation. As a result I believe the Bible conveys God's message in the way that he wants it conveyed.

However, this argument functions in the context of Christian theology. It is commonly held that the process of bringing someone into faith in Jesus Christ is a matter of first convincing him that the Bible is true, and then using the Bible to convince him of the specific doctrines of the Christian faith. I would suggest instead that experience is first in the sharing of the good news. We first share the testimony of our experience, and when and if the sharing of our experience brings a desire for similar experience, then we share the theological expression of that experience.

Our present method in the west is based on the strong cultural position of the Bible in which many people who are not active in church life or who don't call themselves Christians still hold some sort of reverence for the Bible. This allows us to start with the Bible. The lack of success of modern Christianity with populations that lack this Biblical background I believe results from replacing a living experience of God with a set of doctrinal postulates, most of which only make sense in the context of a personal experience with God. In other words, I see this doctrinal approach as having a form of godliness, but denying its power (2 Timothy 3:5).

I believe I am accepting the Bible just as it is, and that the inerrancy approach imposes meaning on the Bible that is not there. I do not approach the Bible as I do because I lack the faith to believe God could inspire scriptures in any way he wants. I approach it that way because that is the Bible that we have.

There is no such thing as "taking the Bible as it is" despite the many people who claim to do that. Their claim is simply empty. There is no such thing as "taking the Bible" apart from an interpretive framework. I believe that such a framework can be consistent with what the Bible is, or it can be completely imposed from outside, but it always requires justification. No passage of scripture was addressed to me, personally, in a specific set of my circumstances. Thus every application requires me to interpret some Biblical passage in such a way as to discover God's guidance for me.

I believe this is possible. I don't believe it's easy. I believe the responsible thing to do is for each of us to admit that we are following our best understanding, but that it is our understanding.

Inspiration refers to the process of God presenting his message to us, and inspired writings are those that are infused with God's message. There can be considerable disagreement about the process by which this takes place.

When something is canonical, it has been recognized as authoritative by a particular community. A writing may be inspired but not canonical. One hopes, as a member of the community that the writing is never canonical if it is not inspired!

Related Links:

• Inspiration and Canon
  Part of my blog series on inspriation, discussing the relationship of inspiration and canonicity.

There are a variety of tests for inspiration given in the Bible. See the links below for my disucssions of some of these.

Related Links:

• Divine Wisdom and Discernment
• In the Divine Council and Conclave
• Testing Prophets - Godliness
• Testing Prophets
• Community and Inspiration

Inspiration is a very controversial topic. I will discuss the various views in the essays listed below and lay out my own view on what it is.

While inspiration may be an individual question, the recognition of inspired writing is generally done by some sort of community.

Related Links:

• The Heart of Inspiration
• Community and Inspiration
• Inspiration, Inerrancy, and Authority
  My longest and most definitive essay on this topic.

I'm creating this question to serve as a point to list essays on Biblical criticism, and how I use it and relate it to inspiration. The relationship of Biblical criticism to inspiration can be very complex.

The short answer is that I believe they can be compatible, though many of the excesses of Biblical criticism certainly would challenge a Christian view of inspiration.

Related Links:

• What is Biblical Criticism?
  Pamphlet introducing the basic concepts of Biblical critcism.
• Biblical Criticism Overview - I
  Beginning of a more advanced introduction to Biblical criticism than the pamphlet, What is Biblical Criticism?

There are those who view all of scripture as the work of a single author, and thus they believe they can combine texts from any book of scripture and derive valid applications. The view of divine-human cooperation in the production of scripture means that individual writers have an actual impact, not just on the form, but on the content of scripture. Thus as we study we need to pay particular attention to all aspects of the context.

Related Links:

• Applying Divine-Human Scriptures
• Understanding Context
  A look at the various elements of context that might apply to applying any particular passage of scripture.

The New Testament was written in Greek, while the Old Testament was written largely in Hebrew with a few chapters in Aramaic. Thus New Testament quotations are actually from translations, either made by the author himself, or take from the LXX or some other translation of the Hebrew text into Greek. It's not surprising that there are some differences.

In addition there are some differences in the underlying text--some manuscripts read differently than others. Some Bible translations try to accommodate the translation between the two testaments, but others simply translate as is and let interpreters deal with the difference.

See the linked articles for some examples.

Related Links:

• The Locus of Biblical Inspiration
  Discusses where inspiration works using a quotation from the Hebrew scriptures in the book of Hebrews.

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