How can we trust the Bible if it's not inerrant?

[otseng]

From the On the Bible being inerrant thread:

How can you trust something that's written about god that contradictory, contains errors and just plain wrong at times? Is there a logical way to do so, or do you just want it to be god's word so much that you overlook these things like happens so often through the history of christianity?

The Bible can still be God's word, inspired, authoritative, and trustworthy without the need to believe in inerrancy.

For debate:
How can the Bible be considered authoritative and inspired without the need to believe in the doctrine of inerrancy?

While debating, do not simply state verses to say the Bible is inspired or trustworthy.

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Thread Milestones

• Case study of Hezekiah
• Start discussing global flood / Flood Model summary
• Recap arguments of authority of the Bible
• Start discussing Tower of Babel / Tower of Babel summary
• Start discussing archaeology / Philosophy of science / Origin of alphabet / End of discussion on archaeology
• Start discussing cosmology / Concluding cosmology
• Start discussing Shroud of Turin / Summary top TS imaging theories / Created DefendingChristianity.com and TS subforums / Shroud of Turin summary
• Start discussing Bible and resurrection
• Start discussing the Messiahship of Jesus / Messiahship of Jesus wrap up
• Start discussing Old Testament ethics
• Summary argument of atheism and morality / God basis for objective morality
• Start discussing genocide / Genocide summary argument
• Start discussing slavery / Slavery summary argument
• Start discussing homosexuality / Homosexuality summary argument
• Old Testament ethics summary argument

[TRANSPONDER]

BTW, could you check your formatting of your posts? It's hard to decipher what is being quoted and what you are adding in your posts. In your last post, it makes it seem I wrote the entire thing.

The previous one of mine wasn't to you at all. I thought that was so obvious I didn't think it necessary to quote the post I was commenting on.

Hopefully this doesn't feel like a "piling on," but I've been trying to follow the thread (specifically including your input) and your quote-response formatting is difficult to follow. A number of your posts have had mismatched [quote] and [/quote] tags, making it unclear which words are yours.

Ok. I must confess I've been struggling with the system a bit. Basic quotes (as above) seem ok, but multiple ones don't seem to work the way I want. I'll try to understand the system better.

[nobspeople]

[Replying to otseng in post #146]

Same as with any source of authority. There is no authority that is inerrant - government, teachers, professors, police, managers, doctors, politicians, preachers, or even the pope. Though authorities have weight in what they say, not everything they say will be correct. But, that doesn't mean everything they say is incorrect. So, we need to put on our thinking caps and do some research to find out the truth. It's similar with the Bible. We need to dig a bit deeper and discern what is the truth.

I would contend that, in the case of the bible, this isn't the same as 'any source of authority', justified by its expected end means (eternal life). Many may argue that's not the bible's 'end game'. But the bible is taught and read by most, not for entertainment, but as a means to understand this god-thing and get to heaven (or more likely, avoid hell).
Being as eternal life (or death) cannot be 'tested' and net legitimate results (legitimate meaning testable and verifiable by an outside source), there may be ways to 'test' and 'research', but to what end? People have been 'testing' and 'researching' the bible for centuries and still, we're left with 'what really happens after we die?'.
And yes, just because 'some things' aren't correct, doesn't mean everything is incorrect. But then, you're playing a game with 'hypothesizing' the results; guessing as it were. If one could go back in time, say, 1000 years, you'd best believe christians of those times thought they 'knew' the answers and were betting their souls, as it were, that they were right. And many of those believes, today, we'd see as wrong.
When it comes to eternal life, many (I'd say most) would be less likely to accept hypothesizing.

Having said that, it all comes down to, yet again, faith and hope. Which, for a few, may be enough. But for more (even many christians, I'd surmise), isn't enough.

[otseng]

Suppose we did throw out the Bible, how would you know what God is like? Is he omnipotent or not? Is he omniscient or not? We could rely on the testimony of people who hear directly from God who post on this forum, but would that be an acceptable source?

Well, yes - for those fortunate individuals, but no for the rest of us.

Let me jump to this which is the crux of my argument between us. Yes, I would agree with this. For those fortunate individuals, it would be the optimal situation for them to have directly communicated with God. For the rest of us, since we didn't participate in the direct communication, the best that we can get is their written testimony.

Do you have an example of God directly communicating with more than a single person?

I would say Jesus coming down to earth would be the best example of God directly communicating with a group of people.

Taken with your quote directly above this one, I really do struggle with the concept that someone would trust a book written by ‘regular people’ thousands of years ago to be the best modern explanation for any geological feature.

Yes, I can sympathize with that.

So if the evidence points you to a global flood as wholly unlikely, you’d consider the Bible to be untrustworthy?

Note, I'm only speaking for me personally and not for others. But, it would make the Bible less trustworthy for me if there was not a global flood. But if there was good evidence for a global flood, it would make the Bible more trustworthy for me.

The flood is not a core doctrine of the Bible, but I do believe it to be pretty important. So, if it's false, it would weaken the authority, but not make it completely unauthoritative. However, if a core doctrine like Jesus not resurrecting or not even existing was proven true, it would make the entire Bible unauthoritative.

Tell you what – as a very simple exercise, please rank the following three sources in decreasing value for likeliness in being ‘trustworthy and accurate’ for providing an explanation of geologic strata, and provide reasons for your ranking:

Rather than doing a quiz on rating sources, what would be more important is the actual data. We'll get into this later.

(1) the Gospel is made up. Based on a real person, perhaps, but made up material overlaid. The contradictions (I argue) demonstrate that.

Do you mean made up by the authors? Or in the copying process was altered as it went along to fit what the scribes would like you to believe?

If you mean the authors, how much of it is fictional? We have four authors of the gospels that are similar in their core doctrines. Yes, I agree the details can be different, but the main messages of the four are consistent.

(b) There are clues as to the people who did this. Matthew (the most apparently Jewish of the evangelists) shows (in misread prophecy) that he doesn't understand the OT but even had to read it in Greek. That indicates a Greek Christian, and that even without the Jew -hate.

The Septuagint was what was primarily used by all the Jews at that time, not the Hebrew text. So, it was not just Matthew that read it in Greek.

(c) it is evident that their views then are from Paul - the dismissal of the Law, the verbal attacks on Pharisees and Sadducees.

Paul did not quite dismiss the Law.

Rom 3:31 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.

1Ti 1:8 - But we know that the law [is] good, if a man use it lawfully;

2Ti 3:16-17 All scripture [is] given by inspiration of God, and [is] profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: 17 That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.

I would contend that, in the case of the bible, this isn't the same as 'any source of authority', justified by its expected end means (eternal life). Many may argue that's not the bible's 'end game'. But the bible is taught and read by most, not for entertainment, but as a means to understand this god-thing and get to heaven (or more likely, avoid hell).

At the risk of proposing another heresy, I don't believe the primary message Jesus preached was to get people saved so they can enter the celestial heaven after they die. Yes, it's important, who wants to go to hell? But, it was not Jesus's primary message.

[nobspeople]

[Replying to otseng in post #153]

At the risk of proposing another heresy, I don't believe the primary message Jesus preached was to get people saved so they can enter the celestial heaven after they die. Yes, it's important, who wants to go to hell? But, it was not Jesus's primary message.

There's more to the bible than simply 'jesus' and his story.
But that's an important point of discussion elsewhere.
That aside, even the story of jesus isn't told exactly without omissions or errors, either. So no testing that's independently verifiable can be done to believe the bible. One has to take it on faith that it can be believed if it has errors. This is because it DOES have errors. And it can't be the word of god and accurate if it has errors as god's perfect (many believe).

So, how can we trust the Bible if it's not inerrant?
Only by faith and want. No other way.

[TRANSPONDER]

Suppose we did throw out the Bible, how would you know what God is like? Is he omnipotent or not? Is he omniscient or not? We could rely on the testimony of people who hear directly from God who post on this forum, but would that be an acceptable source?

Well, yes - for those fortunate individuals, but no for the rest of us.

Let me jump to this which is the crux of my argument between us. Yes, I would agree with this. For those fortunate individuals, it would be the optimal situation for them to have directly communicated with God. For the rest of us, since we didn't participate in the direct communication, the best that we can get is their written testimony.

Do you have an example of God directly communicating with more than a single person?

I would say Jesus coming down to earth would be the best example of God directly communicating with a group of people.

Taken with your quote directly above this one, I really do struggle with the concept that someone would trust a book written by ‘regular people’ thousands of years ago to be the best modern explanation for any geological feature.

Yes, I can sympathize with that.

So if the evidence points you to a global flood as wholly unlikely, you’d consider the Bible to be untrustworthy?

Note, I'm only speaking for me personally and not for others. But, it would make the Bible less trustworthy for me if there was not a global flood. But if there was good evidence for a global flood, it would make the Bible more trustworthy for me.

The flood is not a core doctrine of the Bible, but I do believe it to be pretty important. So, if it's false, it would weaken the authority, but not make it completely unauthoritative. However, if a core doctrine like Jesus not resurrecting or not even existing was proven true, it would make the entire Bible unauthoritative.

Tell you what – as a very simple exercise, please rank the following three sources in decreasing value for likeliness in being ‘trustworthy and accurate’ for providing an explanation of geologic strata, and provide reasons for your ranking:

Rather than doing a quiz on rating sources, what would be more important is the actual data. We'll get into this later.

(1) the Gospel is made up. Based on a real person, perhaps, but made up material overlaid. The contradictions (I argue) demonstrate that.

Do you mean made up by the authors? Or in the copying process was altered as it went along to fit what the scribes would like you to believe?

If you mean the authors, how much of it is fictional? We have four authors of the gospels that are similar in their core doctrines. Yes, I agree the details can be different, but the main messages of the four are consistent.

(b) There are clues as to the people who did this. Matthew (the most apparently Jewish of the evangelists) shows (in misread prophecy) that he doesn't understand the OT but even had to read it in Greek. That indicates a Greek Christian, and that even without the Jew -hate.

The Septuagint was what was primarily used by all the Jews at that time, not the Hebrew text. So, it was not just Matthew that read it in Greek.

(c) it is evident that their views then are from Paul - the dismissal of the Law, the verbal attacks on Pharisees and Sadducees.

Paul did not quite dismiss the Law.

Rom 3:31 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.

1Ti 1:8 - But we know that the law [is] good, if a man use it lawfully;

2Ti 3:16-17 All scripture [is] given by inspiration of God, and [is] profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: 17 That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.

I would contend that, in the case of the bible, this isn't the same as 'any source of authority', justified by its expected end means (eternal life). Many may argue that's not the bible's 'end game'. But the bible is taught and read by most, not for entertainment, but as a means to understand this god-thing and get to heaven (or more likely, avoid hell).

At the risk of proposing another heresy, I don't believe the primary message Jesus preached was to get people saved so they can enter the celestial heaven after they die. Yes, it's important, who wants to go to hell? But, it was not Jesus's primary message.

Just to reply to my own bits (It always feels impolite to clip ) Made up (gospel material). Yes, invented by the authors. That is why the stories contradict - because they made it up. Of course, there is the basic story common to all four, and then a common text for the synoptics, but where they go off on their own, they are inventing.

Of course the four are consistent in the core doctrine - they are Christians, so why wouldn't they? But even there, you can see evolution of the Jesus figure from the spirit - driven meat puppet of Mark to the God with a Jesus - mask on in John. But the core - doctrine can lead to the contradictions. The need of Jesus to be God from Birth, not just from the baptism (as well as fulfilling the OT prophecy) led to the invention of the two contradictory nativities, though (of course they have a common 'core doctrine': Jesus was born with the spirit of God and was born in Bethlehem, as prophesied.

Can you show that the Septuagint was used by Jews? Show me for instance how many of the Qumran OT scrolls are in Greek or even Aramaic? (1) The Jews, from what I understand, were not at all happy about translating their Torah into Greek. However, even if that's so, the point about Matthew is still the same; he read in two donkeys because he did not understand what the OT passage was actually saying. He mistook 'young woman' for 'virgin because he did not understand the meaning of the OT, whether in Hebrew, aramaic or Greek.

If you read Romans, it is clear what Paul is arguing - the Law is a requirement for Jews. It is not a requirement for Gentiles. It is a burden for Jews as it just gives them more to sin about. Gentiles are free of that. Becoming God's people is through Righteousness, not the Law. The Law cannot save, only Jesus can save. All this is perfectly clear in Romans. Mind, in later letters, he seems to argue that Jesus can even make Jews free of the Law, but that's something else. But the end point is that the Gospel arguments about good deeds counting more than ritual cleanliness and Sabbath observance is absolutely in line with Pauline preaching. Now, it also looks like Paul was in conflict with the Jews about converting Gentiles without regard to Jewish Law - not even the Noahide ones. Acts 21 21 shows that the writer (I am sure Luke writing a biographical novel based on Paul's letters) was aware of this. I also think this was Paul in conflict with Jesus' own followers, who were still observant Jews. If so it of course means that Jesus did not teach his own followers or anyone else to sideline Jewish Law. If so, it follows that none of the gospels (other than a basic story) is what Jesus taught but is what the Christian writers invented, using common text or just their own invented material. That's my argument and I think there are clues that support it. It explains the contradictions, it explains the nonsense. It explains everything.

I know this not mainstream (I have only seen one authority that even got near it - though I heard that Seminary students know it but keep it secret... conspiracy! ) but it is also not rocket science if you do it. It becomes obvious, but who does the comparisons? How many people quoting Matthew on the Law not passing away even know that Luke has the same (Sermon material) passage saying it differently?

I came here hoping that people would listen. I couldn't understand why the antagonists on my former board wrangled about what 'fulfilling' actually meant, but even after I pointed out that John does not know of the transfiguration, it seemed to fall on deaf ears. Well, I'm not spouting a spiel and you - all have to believe it, but a method you can check yourself, and see. It takes a bit of effort but it isn't hard.

(1) mind you, I did find out that Matthew's 'babes and sucklings' quote seemed to match the OT passage as it was in the Qumran version rather than the OT in my Bible, based on the Mazoretic text.

[Tcg]

Ok. I must confess I've been struggling with the system a bit. Basic quotes (as above) seem ok, but multiple ones don't seem to work the way I want. I'll try to understand the system better.

This tutorial may help especially with nested quotes:

viewtopic.php?p=5747#p5747


Tcg

[Diagoras]

Let me jump to this which is the crux of my argument between us. Yes, I would agree with this. For those fortunate individuals, it would be the optimal situation for them to have directly communicated with God. For the rest of us, since we didn't participate in the direct communication, the best that we can get is their written testimony.

Do you have an example of God directly communicating with more than a single person?

I would say Jesus coming down to earth would be the best example of God directly communicating with a group of people.

Apologies - I'm not clear on whether you're meaning a past event or a future one. If this is something like John 6:38-40 ("For I have come down from heaven..."), then the value of this claim (written testimony) is relatively low. Of course, if you're meaning a future event - possibly playing out similarly to my Douglas Adams example - then I'm in agreement. But Jesus has had two thousand years to perform this 'best way' of communicating God's will to multiple people, so the question becomes, why rely on a sub-optimal communication method (the Bible) for that length of time?

Note, I'm only speaking for me personally and not for others. But, it would make the Bible less trustworthy for me if there was not a global flood. But if there was good evidence for a global flood, it would make the Bible more trustworthy for me.

Noted, thanks.

Tell you what – as a very simple exercise, please rank the following three sources in decreasing value for likeliness in being ‘trustworthy and accurate’ for providing an explanation of geologic strata, and provide reasons for your ranking:

Rather than doing a quiz on rating sources, what would be more important is the actual data. We'll get into this later.

I was hoping to avoid a lot of time spent rehashing old arguments. Would you be willing to instead rank three sources if they were simply ‘an 18th-Century geology textbook, the Bible and a very recent geology textbook’?

As how we determine the trustworthiness of such sources may differ greatly, I suggest the ranking exercise is a useful first step toward my better understanding of what you mean by ‘good evidence for a global flood’. If we can agree on what are ‘good sources’ before we move onto ‘good data’, then we might save ourselves time and trouble.

[otseng]

So, how can we trust the Bible if it's not inerrant?
Only by faith and want. No other way.

There will always be an element of faith, but it doesn't need to be blind faith.

As for the "errors", there are several possibilities to account for this.

One reason is we have on the wrong glasses. We read it from a modern Greek perspective, not a Jewish perspective. It's like you reading a Chinese book and saying it's all wrong. You have to dig a little deeper to understand the culture, audience, and mentality of the Chinese and not judge based on western modern culture. Also, just because our glasses makes things look skewed doesn't necessarily mean the Bible is skewed. Our modern assumptions of precision and accuracy did not exist in the minds of the authors. So, each account doesn't need to match up in all the details. It is anachronistic to place on them a modern standard that they did not and could not have. Now, it's entirely possible to read the Bible with our modern glasses on and to understand the core message. But to impose modern assumptions to demonstrate the Bible is wrong is anachronistic.

Another factor is our culture has a major impact in our interpretation of the Bible and makes things look skewed. An example of this is our modern debate on homosexuality. Actually, the Bible doesn't say much about this. And Jesus didn't say anything about it. Yet, given all the hoopla over it, you would think this is some major doctrine of the Bible. Another example is accepting Jesus as your savior by raising your hand, walking down the aisle, and accepting him in your heart. Who knows how many times this is done in the US each Sunday? Yet, this is not even in the Bible.

[nobspeople]

So, how can we trust the Bible if it's not inerrant?
Only by faith and want. No other way.

There will always be an element of faith, but it doesn't need to be blind faith.

As for the "errors", there are several possibilities to account for this.

One reason is we have on the wrong glasses. We read it from a modern Greek perspective, not a Jewish perspective. It's like you reading a Chinese book and saying it's all wrong. You have to dig a little deeper to understand the culture, audience, and mentality of the Chinese and not judge based on western modern culture. Also, just because our glasses makes things look skewed doesn't necessarily mean the Bible is skewed. Our modern assumptions of precision and accuracy did not exist in the minds of the authors. So, each account doesn't need to match up in all the details. It is anachronistic to place on them a modern standard that they did not and could not have. Now, it's entirely possible to read the Bible with our modern glasses on and to understand the core message. But to impose modern assumptions to demonstrate the Bible is wrong is anachronistic.

Another factor is our culture has a major impact in our interpretation of the Bible and makes things look skewed. An example of this is our modern debate on homosexuality. Actually, the Bible doesn't say much about this. And Jesus didn't say anything about it. Yet, given all the hoopla over it, you would think this is some major doctrine of the Bible. Another example is accepting Jesus as your savior by raising your hand, walking down the aisle, and accepting him in your heart. Who knows how many times this is done in the US each Sunday? Yet, this is not even in the Bible.

For some biblical things, yes blind faith is necessary. Absolutely necessary. Aside from that, faith is faith, be it blind or 'sighted' or purple or whatever new term christianity wants to apply to the word itself. That's why christianity perpetuates throughout history and to modern times: no fact, no proof, simple faith.

That said, there are many reasons we could reach into the sky and grasp to make excuses for errors in the bible - many, many, many of them have found their ways into this thread. The fact remains, if the bible is the word of god, it shouldn't have errors. If it does, it's either not the word of god or god isn't perfect.
But it does. So that means god's not perfect or it's not the word of god.
Christians don't want god to be imperfect, therefore, the bible isn't the word of god.

Now that that difficulty is out of the way, we must address the elephant in the thread:
Can the bible be trusted if it has errors.
Trusted for what, is the question.
Trusted to be a means of a roadmap to live morally? Somewhat, sure.
Trusted to be a means of a better life? Meh... maybe.
Trusted to be a means to eternal life? Maybe, but no more than any other, similarly phrased religious work.
Trusted to be the absolute, stand alone, truth? Nope, not if it has errors, omission, duplicate and or missing info, causes confusion or even requires more study of the time it which it was written.

So, how can we trust the Bible if it's not inerrant? Only by faith, which, sometimes, includes blind faith.

[Mithrae]

Problems undermining the perceived main purpose/s of the bible - These are the issues which are really serious, to my mind. Is the bible meant to teach us to love one another? It endorses and in cases actively commands genocide, slavery, eternal torture and the like, in numerous different sections! Is the bible meant to promote a relationship with God? Fixation on an intermediary object as a means of communication actively impedes any kind of 'relationship' with a deity supposedly able and eager to communicate with his followers directly.

I would agree with the thrust of your argument. The strongest arugments against my case would be fundamental flaws in the core teachings and doctrines of the Bible.

Besides the existence of God and importance of Israel there don't seem to be any core teachings and doctrines throughout the bible as a whole, just believers' various ideas about what its 'true purpose' is... the main ones of which (the latter being one you named as its main purpose) do seem to be fundamentally flawed.

It's also worth noting that as a religion Christianity not only doesn't need biblical inerrancy or biblical authority; strictly speaking it doesn't even need a resurrection or a heaven or even a God. Presumably most Christians get plenty of value out of their church community, the cultural trappings of literature, music etc., the moral framework and existential values to be found in their stories...

Lol... yes, I'd even agree with this, with the caveat that this would be cultural Christianity (which arguably is probably the dominant expression of Christianity).

But, this is not what I'm arguing for. I'm arguing for Christianity that takes the Bible as authoritative in their lives.

Seems to me that judging by the name, Christianity would be something centered on either Christ or on Christians. Basically no-one follows Jesus' example and teachings to forsake all they have, give their possessions to the poor, stop working for money to work for God instead and trust in Him for their daily bread... so that pretty much leaves Christian communities themselves as the defining characteristic of the religion. Most Christians throughout history have either not had access to the bible in the own language or been unable to read even if they did (or both), so Biblicism is a fairly peculiar approach adopted by only some Christian communities, mostly in the centuries since the Reformation as an attempt to return to the sort of romanticized ideals found in the bible stories.

If it turned out that the stories of the resurrection and miraculous early church were among the points of biblical errancy - that Christianity was a religious movement not so different from others - would you still be arguing that the bible should be considered 'authoritative' then? Why?

If not, then it would seem that its supposed 'authority' rests on the assumption that many of its most fantastic and unprovable stories are actually true, which is obviously not a position based on reason.