As a Christian who does not hold to inerrancy, I
come across a fair amount of negativity from fellow believers concerning my
theological convictions. Some have even gone so far as to label me a heretic,
or deny that I am indeed a fellow brother in Christ. However, despite some of
the fierce attacks wielded towards my beliefs, I do, in fact, many times see
where my fellow Christian interlocutor is coming from; and no more so than when
they bring forward the present charge: if you are a non-inerrantist then you,
by definition, find some error in the bible; therefore you discard what you find to be falsehood in scripture.
By doing so you are putting yourself “over” scripture, and therefore God
himself. Hence, you are raising your autonomous authority above God’s!
Now, let me admit that I do in fact understand what
the inerrantist’s concern is here; and it is, indeed, a very serious
accusation—one that should not be taken trivially. Who has the right to raise their
authority above that of God? Is God one such that his truth is contingent on
the whims of fallen humanity? Surely such a position would be the epitome of a
sin against our creator!
Yet I maintain that to submit such a charge is only
a wild mischaracterization on the part of the inerrantist.
First, the inerrantist seems to be forgetting a
crucial aspect of the non-inerrantist position: we don’t believe the bible is authored by God in any direct sense. That
is to say, we don’t believe that the human authors were only puppets or
instrumental mediums that perfectly transmitted the “word” of God. This is,
obviously, what constitutes the very rejection of inerrancy. So, since we don’t
view the bible as authored by God then the whole charge losses tenability. How
are we putting ourselves above God if God didn’t author the text to begin with?
It would surely be foolish to think our authority supersedes God’s; yet if the
bible is not inerrant then no such thought need cross our minds.
Second, I claim that even if the bible were inerrant, the above argument would
still constitute a non-sequitur. The reason for this is that no one can avoid
putting themselves “over” the text. Written mediums are of the very nature that
the reader must exercise his authority over the text in order to interpret and decipher
it; and the bible being a written medium necessitates that we do the same
regarding it. So even if the bible were inerrant, God would have known that the
transmission of his message was being filtered through a channel that
necessitates using our own judgment.
However, this isn’t exactly what the inerranist is
getting at. It’s not the act of interpreting that troubles him; rather, it’s
the act of deciding, using our own arbitrary authority, which parts are valid
and which parts contain falsehood.
This point is well received, but I still believe the
inerrantist is accusing the non-inerrantist of something he himself cannot
escape. While it might seem as if only the non-inerrantist is utilizing his
arbitrary judgment –by deciding what he will or won’t accept in scripture as
valid—I maintain that the inerrantists (and everyone for that matter) do the
same. For a judgment is both positive
and negative—that is to say, the inerrantist is still utilizing his own
arbitrary judgment by affirming the whole of scripture—especially since the
determination of what constitutes scripture is itself a judgment--as valid. It
is not only the one who denies aspects of scripture that is putting his
authority in place to judge said scripture. For the proposition “scripture is
wholly true” is still a conclusion reached through an individual’s logical
inference; and as such it constitutes a judgment predicated on the authority of
what the inerrantist views as valid or reasonable.
Thus, it seems that, inerrantist or not, we are in
the same boat here and the argument above loses weight unless the inerrantist
is prepared to predicate it of himself. We were all meant to judge scripture;
without the judgment of scripture there would, consequently, be no scripture.
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