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  • #31
    Originally posted by Starlight View Post
    Yup, same.

    Go for it. Feel free to use it in whole or in part without attribution, however you see fit.
    I thankee good sir. Attribution is a must - I do try to instil a bit of scholarship type approach to studies.
    1Cor 15:34 Come to your senses as you ought and stop sinning; for I say to your shame, there are some who know not God.
    .
    ⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛
    Scripture before Tradition:
    but that won't prevent others from
    taking it upon themselves to deprive you
    of the right to call yourself Christian.

    ⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛

    Comment


    • #32
      Originally posted by tabibito View Post
      I thankee good sir. Attribution is a must - I do try to instil a bit of scholarship type approach to studies.
      Sounds fun, I had a bible study group I led for several years and I tended to opt for about 3-4 pages of scholarly stuff each time. Some fun and interesting discussions. Makes me wish I was still a Christian just for the fun of the talking about theology... haven't done much of that in years.
      "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
      "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
      "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

      Comment


      • #33
        Originally posted by Adrift View Post
        Hmm. I don't think I've heard that definition of infallible. ...
        Wikipedia --
        Not to be confused with Biblical inerrancy.

        Biblical infallibility is the belief that what the Bible says regarding matters of faith and Christian practice is wholly useful and true. It is the "belief that the Bible is completely trustworthy as a guide to salvation and the life of faith and will not fail to accomplish its purpose. Some equate 'inerrancy' and 'infallibility'; others do not."
        ...


        Don Stewart --
        The Word Infallible Means Trustworthy

        When referring to Scripture, the term infallible is usually used to mean reliable and trustworthy. It refers to something that is without any type of defect whatsoever. Those who trust its infallible teachings will never be lead astray.
        Inerrancy Means There Are No Errors Whatsoever

        The term inerrancy is more recent. While some Christians used inerrancy and infallible interchangeably they are normally used in slightly different ways. Inerrancy contends that the Bible does not have any errors of fact or any statements that contradict. Infallibility deals more with ones personal knowledge of the Lord while inerrancy is more concerned with the details of Scripture. Infallibility is the broader term. For example, one who believes in inerrancy will also believe in infallibility. The reverse, however, is not necessarily true.

        There are those who argue that the Bible can contains errors of fact while still accomplishing its purpose - to bring humanity into a relationship with God. They see no problem trusting the Bible as the final standard of authority on all matters of faith and practice though it may contain some errors. However, others think the idea of an infallible but not inerrant Bible is something that is nonsensical.


        Roger Olson has an excellent article directly on the topic. It really doesn't lend itself to excerpting.

        Agreed.



        I think it's still very important. But we've had this discussion before.
        I tend to agree with Olson, who prefers "infallible" (but not in the sense you use it) and Witherington, who IIRC regards Scripture as inspired, authoritative, and trustworthy, but avoids the term "inerrant." But I do think some of the flippant objections to inerrancy by some here in this thread are off-base.
        Geislerminian Antinomian Kenotic Charispneumaticostal Gender Mutualist-Egalitarian.

        Beige Federalist.

        Nationalist Christian.

        "Everybody is somebody's heretic."

        Social Justice is usually the opposite of actual justice.

        Proud member of the this space left blank community.

        Would-be Grand Vizier of the Padishah Maxi-Super-Ultra-Hyper-Mega-MAGA King Trumpius Rex.

        Justice for Ashli Babbitt!

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        Comment


        • #34
          Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post
          There are some scholars out there who do not hold to inerrancy who are probably more conservative than some who do hold to inerrancy. Glenn Peoples is an excellent example of one such person. He has a high view of the text and is conservative on most doctrines, but does not identify as inerrantist. Some who hold to similar positions may identify as inerrantists but qualify the term "inerrancy" so much that it is relatively meaningless.
          IIRC the noted conservative theologian Augustus Hopkins Strong rejected inerrancy

          I'm always still in trouble again

          "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
          "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
          "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

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          • #35
            Originally posted by Adrift View Post
            And yet, a very liberal Christian might say that they believe that the Bible is without error in what it teaches. I think Biblical inerrancy goes a bit beyond that though. Biblical inerrancy is the idea that, if one takes into consideration things like literary style, figures of speech (including metaphor and phenomenology), cultural expressions, and fluidity in grammar, and recitation, the Bible's divinely inspired authors were without error in everything they wrote, including doctrine, morality, history, cosmology, geography, and the like.
            This reads as a long-winded way of saying the same thing AP did. You haven't eliminated the liberal Christian's belief here simply because you've provided such a huge caveat. You've just outlined the door they're already using.
            I'm not here anymore.

            Comment


            • #36
              Originally posted by TheWall View Post
              So from what I gathered infallibility means trustowrthy. The bible is trustworthy.
              Originally posted by TheWall View Post
              So am I understanding the issue?
              Understand that all of the defense still only goes to 'teaches', however it's being worded. Strict inerrantists are insisting on 'says'. Infallibility, as its commonly used, is a way to say 'teaches' is good enough.

              You can't defend 'says'. Most people (afaict), AP included, aren't even trying to. People like Geisler, et.al., are insisting on 'says'. That's what all the fuss is about.
              I'm not here anymore.

              Comment


              • #37
                Originally posted by Carrikature View Post
                This reads as a long-winded way of saying the same thing AP did. You haven't eliminated the liberal Christian's belief here simply because you've provided such a huge caveat. You've just outlined the door they're already using.
                You might think that, but it's not really the case. The distinction I'm making is that the actual original autographs themselves are without error, not simply in what they teach, but as you point out with Geisler and company, in what they actually say. To say that what the Bible teaches is without error is an extremely loose definition by most inerrantist standards. Someone like John Shelby Spong could say that what the Bible "teaches" is without error, yet he doesn't agree with most of what scripture itself has to say on a great many things. And no, I haven't really provided such a huge caveat. The things I mention are the sort of things most people would need to recognize when attempting to understand a foreign ancient writing. Heck, I needed to understand most of those "caveats" when I was studying 19th century English Romanticism in college.
                Last edited by Adrift; 04-09-2017, 02:54 PM.

                Comment


                • #38
                  Originally posted by Adrift View Post
                  You might think that, but it's not really the case. The distinction I'm making is that the actual original autographs themselves are without error, not simply in what they teach, but as you point out with Geisler and company, in what they actually say. To say that what the Bible teaches is without error is an extremely loose definition by most inerrantist standards. Someone like John Shelby Spong could say that what the Bible "teaches" is without error, yet he doesn't agree with most of what scripture itself has to say on a great many things. And no, I haven't really provided such a huge caveat. The things I mention are the sort of things most people would need to recognize when attempting to understand a foreign ancient writing. Heck, I needed to understand most of those "caveats" when I was studying 19th century English Romanticism in college.
                  I could grant that the original documents were without error in both 'say' and 'teach', but we don't have those.

                  I'm not saying the things you mention aren't normal when it comes to foreign and/or ancient writing. However, they are inherently subjective in nature, which leaves open all the room for interpretation and disagreement. The liberal and conservative Christian approach here is the same. The difference is what they consider metaphor (for example) or not. The Licona vs Geisler dispute is a perfect example of that.
                  I'm not here anymore.

                  Comment


                  • #39
                    Originally posted by Carrikature View Post
                    I could grant that the original documents were without error in both 'say' and 'teach', but we don't have those.

                    I'm not saying the things you mention aren't normal when it comes to foreign and/or ancient writing. However, they are inherently subjective in nature, which leaves open all the room for interpretation and disagreement. The liberal and conservative Christian approach here is the same. The difference is what they consider metaphor (for example) or not. The Licona vs Geisler dispute is a perfect example of that.
                    These methods are only subjective to a degree. We can, for instance, state with some objectivity that a book is in a certain literary style. We can state with some objectivity when certain figures of speech are expressed. We can state with some objectivity what ideas or concepts might make sense to agrarian societies in the ancient near East that might not make so much sense to people living in the 21st century West. Good historians don't just throw their arms up in the air and say "Oh, it's all so subjective, we can never know a thing about what the Bible's author's really meant!" No, instead NT scholars, and a great many lay Christians have made it a lifelong pursuit to figure out what the authors intended, and in so many ways we've been progressing towards that end, especially as archaeology, and even the social sciences have been able to paint a broader picture for us. Even in areas where scholars don't have 100% unanimous confidence, they still have a greater confidence in certain interpretations than others, and we can get pretty close to what the original autographs said.

                    The liberal and conservative Christian approach is really not at all the same. A liberal Christian doesn't necessarily care whether something is metaphor or not. They can look at something like Genesis and say, "Eh, it's not a metaphor. It really does refer to an earth created 6K years ago within literal 24 hour days, and it's completely wrong, but that's okay, the central message that it's teaching, that creation is good, and that humanity is special is true."

                    The Licona vs Geisler dispute is not a very good example of something like this. Despite their differences, as far as I know, Licona is still considered (and would likely consider himself) very much conservative. Nick can probably say more about that than I though.
                    Last edited by Adrift; 04-09-2017, 07:23 PM.

                    Comment


                    • #40
                      I think any talk of "literary styles" is misleading. Everyone thinks you should pay attention to the intended literary style of any piece of biblical writing or whether something is intended as a figure of speech vs literally.

                      I would personally view the terms as being:
                      "Infallible" - anything the original autographs of the bible say on topics of theology or morality is true, but there might be historical errors in terms of the details of battles or number of dead etc.
                      "Inerrant" - infallible + also zero historical errors.

                      As a liberal Christian I never believed in either of these, and would have always said there were some fairly obvious examples of the bible getting it wrong and OT prophets from competing schools of thought disagreeing with each other over theological ideas etc. The common JEPD explanation for who wrote the various bits of the OT, discussed well in Friedman's Who wrote the [OT] bible? explains how the OT was gradually put together over the centuries by the assimilation of a number of competing views and traditions. Obviously the Jews continued their traditions of rabbinic disgreements into the NT era with groups like the Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes etc disagreeing over theology, and the Jewish Talmuds record the competing views of various rabbi theologians. In the NT we see the same sort of assimilation of competing views and multiple strands of thought in the early Christian tradition (in which we know from Galatians etc that there were severe disagreements at times) with the letters of Paul versus those of James and Peter, with the gospel of John versus the gospel of Matthew etc. Combining a group of divergent viewpoints and writers together into a single volume and then declaring it inerrant/infallible never struck me as a particularly sane thing to do.
                      "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                      "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                      "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                      Comment


                      • #41
                        Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                        But you then need to take a leap and claim that the Bible is the word of God... the bible contains some sentences that are claims by various prophets that God was speaking to them and thus are words from God and if those claims happen to be accurate then those sentences would be infallible and inerrant according to your logic, but that is a far cry from the bible itself being the infallible and inerrant word of God. According to one passage in the bible, it is Jesus that is the word of God.
                        Here is your Bible challenge, find one false statement which is not a matter of disagreement in interpretation, not an issue of translation and not an issue of the making of copies since the original writing of it. Just one.
                        . . . the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; . . . -- Romans 1:16 KJV

                        . . . that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures: . . . -- 1 Corinthians 15:3-4 KJV

                        Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God: . . . -- 1 John 5:1 KJV

                        Comment


                        • #42
                          Originally posted by 37818 View Post
                          Here is your Bible challenge, find one false statement which is not a matter of disagreement in interpretation, not an issue of translation and not an issue of the making of copies since the original writing of it. Just one.
                          Your challenge appears to be "find a passage that I can't make up fake and creative explanations about to show that it's 'really' when 'properly understood' Totally Not False Like It Looks". Since you can, of course, make up fake and creative explanations about any passage, what's the point?

                          After a quick google for lists of errors and browsing the results, I think this list of errors is one of the better ones that shows some simple contradictions. It's far from complete of course, but shows some of the more obvious and simple contradictions. A lot of them result from the fact that Chronicles vs Samuel/Kings cover the same historical timeline but give different accounts.

                          A few of my own personal favorite errors / problems (not mentioned in the linked list above) are:
                          1. The story of Jacob's breeding of speckled cattle through having the cattle breed in speckled shade (Gen 30). From a modern scientific perspective this beautifully depicts the common historical Lamarckian ideas of evolution, and how things were often understood prior to modern discoveries of genetics and DNA. Breed cattle in front of speckled shade, get speckled cattle, what could be more obvious... except that of course we now know that's not how it works.

                          2. The story of Saul/David/Jonathan in Samuel and Kings is interesting because the writer has pasted together awkwardly about 3 different historical accounts of the events and not properly edited them to flow. So the accounts contradict on issues like: when Saul and David first meet, and how; On when Goliath was killed and in which battle; etc.

                          3. "No one is righteous, not even one". This is an interesting theological conundrum. Paul cites in Romans 3 a series of 6 OT quotes purporting to show that "no one" is righteous. However if you look up the OT references for those you find in all 6 passages that the original author is not in fact claiming that nobody in the world is righteous and all 6 passages actually claim specific people or groups are righteous. Also, numerous other passages in the bible state that certain people or groups are righteous... e.g. "Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation" etc.
                          Last edited by Starlight; 04-11-2017, 05:30 PM.
                          "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                          "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                          "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                          Comment


                          • #43
                            1. The story of Jacob's breeding of speckled cattle through having the cattle breed in speckled shade (Gen 30). From a modern scientific perspective this beautifully depicts the common historical Lamarckian ideas of evolution, and how things were often understood prior to modern discoveries of genetics and DNA. Breed cattle in front of speckled shade, get speckled cattle, what could be more obvious... except that of course we now know that's not how it works.
                            True enough - but if we are to believe the accounts, the offspring were produced according to whether the procedure had been followed or not. Given that the procedure could not have produced such a result, there arises the need to account for the results. You have quite thoroughly eliminated any possibility that a "natural" explanation is viable.

                            3. "No one is righteous, not even one". This is an interesting theological conundrum.
                            Nope. It is simply a matter of certain parties misrepresenting what their cherry picked (I think that's the term) citations, Paul's included, are about. Once again you have adequately addressed the issue.

                            As for point 2 ... I haven't encountered that one before, so I can't answer to it. However, given that errors do assuredly exist, it would be no surprise to find that you are right on this one too. The inerrant story doesn't hold water. The closest that the Bible comes to being "inerrant" or "infallible" is "self correcting." Even then, not all issues are corrected, but I haven't found an uncorrected error of doctrine to date. (not discounting the possibility that someone will present such a thing in future - stressing ... to date.)
                            Last edited by tabibito; 04-11-2017, 10:19 PM.
                            1Cor 15:34 Come to your senses as you ought and stop sinning; for I say to your shame, there are some who know not God.
                            .
                            ⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛
                            Scripture before Tradition:
                            but that won't prevent others from
                            taking it upon themselves to deprive you
                            of the right to call yourself Christian.

                            ⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛

                            Comment


                            • #44
                              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                              After a quick google for lists of errors and browsing the results, I think this list of errors is one of the better ones that shows some simple contradictions.
                              As for that link: I agree - it is one of the better ones.

                              Point 1 On the face of it, this might reasonably be considered a contradiction. "Die" is kind of a mercurial concept Biblically, but terming this a contradiction (for the sake of argument at least) can be allowed.
                              Point 2 is not a contradiction, the claim is based on the solid foundation of a failure in reading comprehension
                              Point 3 is based in part on some unfortunate translations, and in part on failure in reading comprehension.
                              Point 4 ... really? God tells Jacob that his name shall be Israel and later calls him Jacob? The LXX has the change of name appointed for the future. "And God said unto him, Thy name is Jacob: thy name shall not be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name: and he called his name Israel." (the blue sections are not in the LXX) Flawed translation to English? Flawed transmission of the Hebrew texts as used for the English translation? Even without those, the complaint would be no more than nit-picking.

                              Withal though, there is enough in that link to demonstrate that the Bible is not wholly accurate - with regard to historical accounts at least. It should be more than enough to convince a dispassionate reader that the stories of the Bible being inerrant are no more than fairy tales ... or to put it in Biblical terms "profane and old wives' fables", or "fables that turn from the truth."
                              1Cor 15:34 Come to your senses as you ought and stop sinning; for I say to your shame, there are some who know not God.
                              .
                              ⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛
                              Scripture before Tradition:
                              but that won't prevent others from
                              taking it upon themselves to deprive you
                              of the right to call yourself Christian.

                              ⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛

                              Comment


                              • #45
                                Originally posted by tabibito View Post
                                Nope. It is simply a matter of certain parties misrepresenting what their cherry picked (I think that's the term) citations, Paul's included, are about. Once again you have adequately addressed the issue.
                                Well I actually don't think this is a contradiction so much as I think it's an instance of modern evangelical theology being severely wrong in its reading of Paul. I don't think Paul is trying to teach that God's required standards of righteousness cannot be met by humans, I think that's a severe misreading of Paul, that Paul would have objected to vehemently, and which places Paul into contradiction with the context of his own proof-texts and with many other biblical passages.
                                "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                                "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                                "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                                Comment

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