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
• Start discussing philosophy / Summary argument on philosophy
• Start discussing creation of universe / Summary argument universe was created

[earl]

Atheotheist states ,clever medieval artists.

Osteng replied,If that is true then it should be easy to provide who they were and how they created the TS.

Atheotheist responded,also a weak argument.
Is it really?

Response to Clever .medieval , and artists.
What observation do you have to state cleverness was used to create the TS ?Why is a clever person required?

medieval ?,If science don't know how the image on the shroud was created then how can one say the creation of the image has ,had no affect on the shroud dating or irregularities?Is not this half of an assumption based on half of a conclusion?Not only a date but a how plus the two interacting if any with each other if discovered must be scientifically answered to be in the category of humanly possible at this time.
So is it currently 'humanly' impossible at this time ?

Artists,?How do you know there more than one artist?Did an artist (s) create the TS as you say or was there any artists involved?
How do you know these unpublished things?

[Athetotheist]

Atheotheist states ,clever medieval artists.

Osteng replied,If that is true then it should be easy to provide who they were and how they created the TS.

Atheotheist responded,also a weak argument.
Is it really?

Response to Clever .medieval , and artists.
What observation do you have to state cleverness was used to create the TS ?Why is a clever person required?

medieval ?,If science don't know how the image on the shroud was created then how can one say the creation of the image has ,had no affect on the shroud dating or irregularities?Is not this half of an assumption based on half of a conclusion?Not only a date but a how plus the two interacting if any with each other if discovered must be scientifically answered to be in the category of humanly possible at this time.
So is it currently 'humanly' impossible at this time ?

Artists,?How do you know there more than one artist?Did an artist (s) create the TS as you say or was there any artists involved?
How do you know these unpublished things?

https://talesoftimesforgotten.com/2020/ ... ly-a-hoax/

(I recommend skipping the lengthy section on the Mandylion and proceeding to the more direct points.)

[earl]

From post #1968
Athetotheist,
"But just because it hasn't been exactly replicated doesn't mean that it can't be ."Your words.
In your link I find unreliable statements from it's author
One is Bishop Henri who went to great lengths to track down a person who claimed author of this shroud and was given the recipe for the shroud image by it's creator but the creator's name never mentioned.Why go down a rabbit hole?Because no name was given it becomes unreliable source.
Note ,it states "how it was done" .The link stated the TS was painted. Was it? Paint should be easy to detect.What does TS reports say ?
Another is the unreliable statement of what grave clothes are used in Jesus's burial.
If it interests me ,Ill pick it apart at a later time.

[Athetotheist]

From post #1968
Athetotheist,
"But just because it hasn't been exactly replicated doesn't mean that it can't be ."Your words.
In your link I find unreliable statements from it's author
One is Bishop Henri who went to great lengths to track down a person who claimed author of this shroud and was given the recipe for the shroud image by it's creator but the creator's name never mentioned.Why go down a rabbit hole?Because no name was given it becomes unreliable source.
Note ,it states "how it was done" .The link stated the TS was painted. Was it? Paint should be easy to detect.What does TS reports say ?
Another is the unreliable statement of what grave clothes are used in Jesus's burial.
If it interests me ,Ill pick it apart at a later time.

I don't give equal weight to all the arguments, but I do believe that the point about the burial wrappings is significant.

I also think it legitimate to ask if Jesus would be taller from the back than he was from the front.

[otseng]

One does not follow from the other, as shown by your points 3 and 4 in the post.

I present these points as independent arguments. I'm not saying any follows another.

If the shroud sample is not representative of the original shroud material and is a medieval repair or contaminated (the primary argument against the C-14 dating results), then no method of dating would produce a 1st century result. This isn't the fault of C-14 dating, but of sampling.

Not claiming that either. All I'm claiming is the 1988 C-14 dating result is invalid. Do you agree with this claim?

Additional C-14 in coal deposits is thought to arise from production of C-14 by other processes such as radioactive decay (especially of Ur/Th) or bio or fungal activity. If this is the case, then it is similar to the marine reservoir effect, the bomb effect, etc. and has to be corrected for and better understood. It is no way suggests that coal deposits are less then 40,000 years old. Ditto for deep time ... C-14 is only good to about 50,000 years so has nothing at all to do with deep time involving millions and billions of years.

Don't disagree with this either. There are possible explanations for a wrong C-14 dating of coal. And as I've demonstrated, there is an explanation for a medieval dating of the TS.

[otseng]

You're taking what Paul is talking about up through verse 16 and applying it to verses 17 onward instead. In vv.17-22 he's admonishing them for misconduct. The practice held by all the churches which he mentions in v. 16 is what comes before that----and that's the practice about hair length.

I'm taking the entire chapter in context. What you're doing is simply cherry picking verses to build up your own theology, which really has no support from any other scripture, in mainstream interpretation, or even hermeneutic support.

Paul got his theology from the OT. Where in the OT does it say all males must have short hair?

If it doesn't, then Paul didn't get his theology from the "OT"----or else had given it up.

You did not answer my question.

If you do want to go down the scriptural route, you'll need to present verses from the OT to argue about hair length since the OT was the only thing written prior to the resurrection.

Without inerrancy, what's left to hold the Christian narrative together?

This is what I've been arguing for in this entire thread. In every topic I've went through, I've spent considerable time presenting evidence to support the veracity of claims in the Bible.

Then why have you said things like this?....

They are not related, unless one assumes the Bible is inerrant, which I do not hold to.

("Motivations for belief", post #31)

This thread does not assume inerrancy to be true. I'm arguing in this thread the Bible can still be considered to be trustworthy and authoritative without inerrancy.

If that's true, then it should be easy to provide who they were and how they created the TS.

Also a weak argument. Do we know specifically who carved the statues of Easter Island and moved them into place? No. Does that mean it was humanly impossible? No.

We're not talking about Easter island statues here, we are talking about the TS. I will be presenting additional evidence it is the actual burial cloth of Jesus. Please present evidence it was created by clever medieval artists instead of just asserting it.

But cloth angle-to-body is exactly the problem with there being no images of the sides of the head, where the cloth would naturally have fallen.

Another problem with the hair is that it frames the face as if the individual were standing upright rather than falling away from the face onto the surface beneath a body lying supine.

We can discuss this more when I present the theory of how the image formed.

[otseng]

https://talesoftimesforgotten.com/2020/ ... ly-a-hoax/

(I recommend skipping the lengthy section on the Mandylion and proceeding to the more direct points.)

Please state what you are claiming instead of simply providing a link. I as well can just provide a bunch of links for everyone to read, but it would not be a constructive debate.

[Athetotheist]

[Replying to otseng in post #1987

Please state what you are claiming instead of simply providing a link. I as well can just provide a bunch of links for everyone to read, but it would not be a constructive debate.

Here are my main take-aways:

The cloth is said to bear miraculous images attesting to Jesus's resurrection, yet with all the accounts of miraculous events recorded in Christian texts like Acts, there is no known mention of the shroud before the 14th century.

I don't think it mere coincidence that the noticeably enlongated features of the image [face, arms, fingers] match the Gothic art style of the period to which the cloth has been dated (one forearm is actually longer than the other).

And perhaps most significant....

Why would miraculously produced images of Jesus depict him as being seven centimeters taller from the back than he was from the front? (The front image measures 1.95 meters in length while the back image measures 2.02 meters.)

[Athetotheist]

[Replying to otseng in post #1986

You're taking what Paul is talking about up through verse 16 and applying it to verses 17 onward instead. In vv.17-22 he's admonishing them for misconduct. The practice held by all the churches which he mentions in v. 16 is what comes before that----and that's the practice about hair length.

I'm taking the entire chapter in context. What you're doing is simply cherry picking verses to build up your own theology, which really has no support from any other scripture, in mainstream interpretation, or even hermeneutic support.

You seem to be taking the entire chapter in context except Paul's directive about hair length----but there it is on the page and it can't be ignored or watered down. If it has no other support in scripture, that's Paul's issue and not mine.

If you do want to go down the scriptural route, you'll need to present verses from the OT to argue about hair length since the OT was the only thing written prior to the resurrection.

Again, Paul is the one pronouncing the edict and so he would have to back it up from scripture, not I. (Given the way Jesus himself deviated from scripture, it isn't surprising that one of his followers would see fit to do likewise.)

This thread does not assume inerrancy to be true. I'm arguing in this thread the Bible can still be considered to be trustworthy and authoritative without inerrancy.

Then you're inadvertently arguing that the text of any religion can be considered trustworthy and authoritative without inerrancy.

We're not talking about Easter island statues here, we are talking about the TS.

We're talking about humans in past ages having done something even when we don't know how they did it.

I will be presenting additional evidence it is the actual burial cloth of Jesus. Please present evidence it was created by clever medieval artists instead of just asserting it.

That additional evidence will have to provide better explanations for the problems with the images which have already been noted.

[DrNoGods]

[Replying to otseng in post #1991]

I present these points as independent arguments. I'm not saying any follows another.

I was responding to this:

But, if this single evidence can be used as a trump card against all the other evidence for the shroud's authenticity, then it can likewise be claimed that coal deposits are less than 40,000 years old and all theories that involve deep time (evolution, geologic processes) are conclusively false.

It suggests that if one accepts the C-14 results for the shroud then it follows that it can be claimed that coal deposits are <40,000 years old, and theories involving deep time are conclusively false. My point was that this is not the case, especially if one accepts that the medieval C-14 results are not due to errors in those dating measurements, but rather in the sample not being representative of uncontaminated, original shroud material.

Not claiming that either. All I'm claiming is the 1988 C-14 dating result is invalid. Do you agree with this claim?

I agree that the dating result may be invalid IF the supplied sample was not original shroud material, and/or was contaminated. If neither of these conditions are met, I'd side with a preponderance of the evidence pointing to the C-14 results being in the correct ballpark (ie. sufficient to distinguish a medieval date from a 1st century date).

There are possible explanations for a wrong C-14 dating of coal.

Right ... so it can't be claimed that coal deposits are less than 40,000 years old based solely on C-14 results on coal samples. I agree that the C-14 shroud results would be invalid if the sample was not representative of the original material, or was contaminated in some way that could produce wrong C-14 results.

On another point made in post #1984 (item 2), if the requirement to accept a medieval date requires knowledge of who did the work, and exactly how they did it, could not the same be said for the claim of a 1st century date? It seems we have no answers for either of these points for the earlier date either. What if it were a fake done, say, in the 2nd century?