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

[Masterblaster]

Hello Otseng

You say - "Without the Bible, we would have a generic sense of God, but we would have no specific knowledge of God. It could be the gods of the Hindus, or the god of the Muslims, or the gods of the African tribes, or any myriad of gods.Also, on this forum, we use empirical evidence to support our arguments per the rules. Anything else is merely opinions and have no weight."
---
Do you not see the problem with all this. You are taking beams from the roof to prop up the walls. Just carry on regardless!
---

In your world view there are lots of Gods but you have deduced the real one,...is that it?

[alexxcJRO]

I've already argued babies are neither innocent nor guilty. You might not accept my argument, but I've already addressed this many times.

Definitions, logic and external sources which all say babies and non-human animals are innocent.
Q: Why?

I asked these to discuss the morality of these situations.

With abortions, I've already brought up the case of choosing the life of the mother or the child. There is no win-win situation in this case. So it is also with the flood.
With eating animals, from your position, you seem to also agree this is not a win-win situation. With my position, I do not believe it is wrong to kill and eat animals. They are not created in the image of God, so it is not immoral to be a carnivore.

Its textbook whataboutism sir.

I take it you mean the babies killed in wars. As I've posted before, this was standard warfare practice in the ANE. None of the cultures at that time thought this was abnormal or unusual.
Could God have ordered not to kill the babies? Perhaps. There are some possible explanations for this. One is the babies would eventually lead them astray and lead them to the Canaanite practices. Another is a demonstration of the total depravity of the Canaanites and it required their total annihilation.
Is it tragic babies are killed in wars? Yes. But it is not tragic in the sense that I don't believe the babies are going to hell when they die.
Theoretically, if the Egyptians as well put the blood over their doorposts, their first born would not have died.

1. Q: Really, it required the total annihilation of non-human animals?
The arguments are so stupid.
Q: Why this omni-perfect deity ordered the destruction and annihilation of non-human animals?

2. Sir Yahweh himself ordered this or has done it himself. The omni-perfect being. Punished the non-moral agents together with the moral agents. Clearly gave commands for the inflicting of suffering, pain and death to non-moral agents or has done the deeds himself according to the stories. Had no regard or care for those that clearly not guilty of any wrongdoing: infants, non-human animals, severely mentally impaired from birth, unborn babies.
We are not talking of limited, weak humans wars but of the supposed actions of an omni-perfect deity.

Making statements such as "You have defeated yourself without knowing it. So funny." is a personal comment.

Additional ad hom and uncivil comments you've made:
"Never have I ever seen one to avoid so much.
The desperate straw-man continues.
The concept of Yawheh is illogical and stupid.
It was you logic sir. You were finished by your own logic. So funny. "

Personal remarks are not ad hominem. One needs to avoid an argument too.

"Ad hominem (Latin for 'to the person'), short for argumentum ad hominem, refers to several types of arguments, most of which are fallacious. Typically this term refers to a rhetorical strategy where the speaker attacks the character, motive, or some other attribute of the person making an argument rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself. "
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

[Athetotheist]

[Replying to otseng in post #3539

Not really sure it can be classified as "unjust" either. Unjust implies the concept of fairness. Exactly what is fair? Is it fair for parents to have children to be killed by the flood when they knew the flood was going to happen within a few years?

"For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and knew not until the flood came, and took them all away"

I've already spent a long time talking about the flood and presented the flood model

Yes, and I've pointed out that others spent time there with you countering your argument. Of particular interest I found this:

Do you find it suspicious that these creationist arguments are almost never submitted for peer review by the consensus of experts in the field? If they were submitted for peer review but subsequently rejected, do you think it would be helpful for these creationists to publish the justifications those professional and widely respected scientific journals gave them for dismissing their papers for publication? Furthermore, even if they were provided with a justification for having their papers rejected, would that lower your confidence in the creationist belief or would you presume there was a massive conspiracy by the consensus of experts in the field to suppress all supporting evidence for creationist ideas?

Matthew 24:38-39.

That passage says nothing about babies.

It's about what the people go on doing, which would have included having babies.

How can babies be warned? If babies are "warned", can they understand it?

That's exactly the point. They couldn't have understood, so they couldn't have been warned.

As for Jesus's return, nobody knows when that will happen.

Again, it wouldn't matter since it's supposed to be the same at that time as in the days of Noah.

The difference is we don't know exactly when Jesus will return.

That makes no difference at all. It's about how people will be living when he returns, regardless of when that will supposedly be.


Are you conceding that the type of deity you're describing couldn't create the universe? If so, how is he the god of it?

Of course God created the universe.

How can a god be able to create the universe and not be omnipotent, unless you mean a certain type of Deistic god?

If skeptics have a rational justification for their morality being objective, then it's not just their opinion. However, they have none as I've demonstrated earlier, so all moral statements by skeptics are just their opinion.

You still deflect to "skeptics". That doesn't address any issue I'm bringing up. And you contradict your earlier statement that everyone is instilled with objective morality by virtue of being made in God's image.


Even if all the adults had been warned, what would the warning have been? "If you don't stop sinning, I'm going to unjustly kill all your children along with you"?

The warning is there will be a judgment coming soon. And there will be a way to escape the judgment through the ark.

"For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark,
and knew not until the flood came, and took them all away"

According to your own scripture, they either weren't warned or didn't believe the warning. Either way, the warning is insufficient to save children.

You keep saying that there wasn't any way so save them, but logically they wouldn't have to be put in such danger. Instead of a flood, how about a crop failure? How about an outbreak of leprosy which affects only the guilty adults? There would be who-knows-how-many ways to get such a message across, none of which would involve wiping out innocent children.

Remember also the biblical calculation, made by the pious Bishop Ussher, placing the flood in 2348 BCE. It's estimated that the human population of Earth in 3000 BCE was approximately 14 million.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File ... _curve.svg

If a warning had been given and everyone had repented, how many of those 14 million+ people could have been carried by a 450x75x45-foot ark?


How could a perfectly just deity punish the wicked in a way which couldn't be prevented from harming the non-wicked along with them?

This is the omnipotent God argument again.

A god who let his judgement spill over onto those who didn't deserve it would be a god of criminal neglect and not perfectly just. The Omnipotent God Argument is better than the Incompetent God Argument.


Can any perfectly just god do something thoroughly unjust and then buy his way off the hook by offering some eternal reward as a bribe?

What bribe are you talking about? Where was it stated a bribe was offered by God?

The bribe of letting babies into heaven after unjustly drowning them.


They put a Judaism-friendly spin on the story.

Please cite a Jewish source that holds to the position that you're claiming.

You can't turn it on me. They hold to the position you're claiming, but do so to validate their religion, not yours.

Your worldview has to be consistent and cannot just borrow my beliefs when it is convenient. I have justifications for objective morality. Whereas you have admitted you have no justification for you having objective morality. If you want to be consistent as well, my position is the God of the Old Testament has not acted immorally. So, if you are borrowing my objective morality, then it pretty much ends the discussion.

You've already validated my morality as objective, so you can't duck out of the discussion by turning around and claiming that I have to "borrow" moral objectivity from you.

Being made in God's image instills everyone with objective morality but, at the same time, "skeptics"----and apparently non-biblical theists like myself----have no moral objectivity because we "have no justification" for it. The only consistent thing I see in your position is a consistent denial of its own inconsistency.

In written form, the Genesis account is not the oldest, but it must've been in an oral form earlier. The question though is not what is the oldest, but did a global flood occur. And as I've shown, there are many extra-Biblical accounts that attests to this.

If you're going to pick one over the others, the question is very much about which is the oldest. You can't dismiss that question just because it doesn't swing things in your direction.

[otseng]

Hello Otseng

You say - "Without the Bible, we would have a generic sense of God, but we would have no specific knowledge of God. It could be the gods of the Hindus, or the god of the Muslims, or the gods of the African tribes, or any myriad of gods.Also, on this forum, we use empirical evidence to support our arguments per the rules. Anything else is merely opinions and have no weight."
---
Do you not see the problem with all this. You are taking beams from the roof to prop up the walls. Just carry on regardless!
---

No, I do not see any problem with this. What exactly is the problem?

In your world view there are lots of Gods but you have deduced the real one,...is that it?

There are lots of claims of other gods, but only Yahweh is the true God.

[otseng]

I've already argued babies are neither innocent nor guilty. You might not accept my argument, but I've already addressed this many times.

Definitions, logic and external sources which all say babies and non-human animals are innocent.

No, logic says it's wrong. But I've covered this many times and I'll let readers assess my arguments.

1. Q: Really, it required the total annihilation of non-human animals?
The arguments are so stupid.

That has been your only response to my arguments that they are stupid, but you have not provided any substantive reasoning. Again, we're just rehashing things over and over and I'll be continuing on to the next area of debate.

Q: Why this omni-perfect deity ordered the destruction and annihilation of non-human animals?

Who's claiming God is "omni-perfect"? This is just another of the "omni" arguments that skeptics use to paint an imaginary straw man God.

Personal remarks are not ad hominem. One needs to avoid an argument too.

"Ad hominem (Latin for 'to the person'), short for argumentum ad hominem, refers to several types of arguments, most of which are fallacious. Typically this term refers to a rhetorical strategy where the speaker attacks the character, motive, or some other attribute of the person making an argument rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself. "[/i]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

The definition you provided supports that your all your comments are personal and not related to the argument.

[otseng]

For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and knew not until the flood came, and took them all away[/i]"

Knew is ginōskō.
know (196x), perceive (9x), understand (8x), miscellaneous (10x).
https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon ... jv/tr/0-1/

The question is know or understand what? At a minimum, they knew an ark was being built. Most likely it was just a subject of mocking. The very idea of some flood that needed to be saved from was ridiculous in everybody else's minds. So, they just continued on with what they've normally been doing - eating, drinking, marrying, and reveling.

I think what it refers to was nobody understood what the flood would be like. It was totally beyond anybody's guess of how catastrophic it was.

Other translations of Matt 24:39 hints also at this:

(EasyEnglish)
The people did not know what would happen. Then rain fell for a long time and all these people died in the deep water. When the Son of Man returns, it will be the same. People will not know that it is going to happen at that moment.

(FBV)
They didn't realize what was going to happen until the flood came and swept them all away. That's how the coming of the Son of man will be.

(NASB)
and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be.

(NLT)
People didn't realize what was going to happen until the flood came and swept them all away. That is the way it will be when the Son of Man comes.

Yes, and I've pointed out that others spent time there with you countering your argument. Of particular interest I found this:

Do you find it suspicious that these creationist arguments are almost never submitted for peer review by the consensus of experts in the field?

As for peer reviewed articles on the flood, I agree there aren't any. But even if there are peer reviewed articles on the flood in secular journals, would it even matter? Highly doubtful. There are many peer reviewed articles on the Shroud of Turin, and skeptics still reject the Shroud.

How can babies be warned? If babies are "warned", can they understand it?

That's exactly the point. They couldn't have understood, so they couldn't have been warned.

So it would then be the parent's responsibility since they were warned.

Again, it wouldn't matter since it's supposed to be the same at that time as in the days of Noah.

The issue is what is the same as now and back during the flood. Would it be the timing of it? No, there was a 120-year timing for the flood and there is no timing for Jesus's return.

What I believe is the same is the mocking and rejection of anything bad really going to happen to people during the day of judgment. "Jesus is not coming back, look at all these false predictions of his return. There is no judgment. There is no hell. There is no God. Even if there is a God, God will let me in because I'm a good person."

How can a god be able to create the universe and not be omnipotent, unless you mean a certain type of Deistic god?

I don't want to get into a dragged out debate over omnipotence here. I've already debated it in Is the Christian God omnipotent?

What I claim God is like is what is described in the Bible and no more. Anything beyond that is either speculation or a strawman.

You still deflect to "skeptics". That doesn't address any issue I'm bringing up.

What issue have you brought up that I haven't addressed?

And you contradict your earlier statement that everyone is instilled with objective morality by virtue of being made in God's image.

Don't see how I contradicted myself. I'm simply making a claim on my position (everyone has objective morality) and defending it. The contradiction is for anybody who don't have a justification for objective morality and then claim they do have it since I claim all people have objective morality.

You keep saying that there wasn't any way so save them, but logically they wouldn't have to be put in such danger. Instead of a flood, how about a crop failure? How about an outbreak of leprosy which affects only the guilty adults? There would be who-knows-how-many ways to get such a message across, none of which would involve wiping out innocent children.

Actually, without the flood happening, we would not be where we are today. There would be no computers or airplanes or cars or even cooking on stoves. We would never get beyond using wood to provide fuel for anything. So, strangely, it was a huge blessing to humanity to actually have a global flood.

Remember also the biblical calculation, made by the pious Bishop Ussher, placing the flood in 2348 BCE. It's estimated that the human population of Earth in 3000 BCE was approximately 14 million.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File ... _curve.svg

If a warning had been given and everyone had repented, how many of those 14 million+ people could have been carried by a 450x75x45-foot ark?

I don't believe in Ussher's dates and I don't see how that figure was calculated. But whatever number was the population is a moot point since nobody believed that there would be any impending danger.

A god who let his judgement spill over onto those who didn't deserve it would be a god of criminal neglect and not perfectly just.

We'll have to agree to disagree on this.

Can any perfectly just god do something thoroughly unjust and then buy his way off the hook by offering some eternal reward as a bribe?

What bribe are you talking about? Where was it stated a bribe was offered by God?

The bribe of letting babies into heaven after unjustly drowning them.

Where was this bribe stated?

They put a Judaism-friendly spin on the story.

Please cite a Jewish source that holds to the position that you're claiming.

You can't turn it on me. They hold to the position you're claiming, but do so to validate their religion, not yours.

My position is the Israelites invaded Canaan because God commanded them to do so. The Canaanites were sinners and were judged by God through their conquest.

Yes, the Jews agree with this. So it's not spinning on my part. If you disagree, then aren't you the one spinning the narrative?

You've already validated my morality as objective, so you can't duck out of the discussion by turning around and claiming that I have to "borrow" moral objectivity from you.

Of course you're borrowing the justification for objective morality from me. I've asked you to provide a justification for objective morality and all you've stated is:

Suffice it to say that I don't pretend to fully understand the nature of the Ultimate Source of Existence.

viewtopic.php?p=1138507#p1138507

Being made in God's image instills everyone with objective morality but, at the same time, "skeptics"----and apparently non-biblical theists like myself----have no moral objectivity because we "have no justification" for it. The only consistent thing I see in your position is a consistent denial of its own inconsistency.

There's nothing inconsistent with my position or arguments. I've never stated that skeptics have no moral objectivity. What I have stated is skeptics have no justification for objective morality.

In written form, the Genesis account is not the oldest, but it must've been in an oral form earlier. The question though is not what is the oldest, but did a global flood occur. And as I've shown, there are many extra-Biblical accounts that attests to this.

If you're going to pick one over the others, the question is very much about which is the oldest. You can't dismiss that question just because it doesn't swing things in your direction.

Even if I grant there are older stories (whether orally or written), it does not disprove the flood actually occurred. Rather, the totality of all the flood accounts around the world is best explained by a global flood actually occurring.

[Masterblaster]

Hello otseng

You say - "There are lots of claims of other gods, but only Yahweh is the true God"

Yahweh is the God of Judaism.
Yahweh is the God of the Old Testament.
Yahweh is the God of Jesus.

Yahweh is not the God of Christianity.
Yahweh is not the God of the New Testament.
Is Yahweh your God otseng?

Why do I say these things.
The Christian God is a Trinity, Yahweh is not.
square that circle for me ,otseng, for starters.

I can give you pages of OT and NT quotes to describe both these entities, and they are fundamentally different, not even generics of each other. I am interested in your explanation/,ideas about this, so please do not run away from your own words otseng.

[otseng]

I can give you pages of OT and NT quotes to describe both these entities, and they are fundamentally different, not even generics of each other. I am interested in your explanation/,ideas about this, so please do not run away from your own words otseng.

None of this is relevant to this topic.

Also, you did not answer my question - No, I do not see any problem with this. What exactly is the problem?

[Mae von H]

[Replying to Diogenes in post #6]

„This question poses a dilemma for the "Bible based" Christian. If one believes the Bible is the "Word of God" or at least is inspired by God, does it not have to be perfect?“

No, it does not have to be perfect anymore than the men who spoke the words from God (including a donkey) have to then be perfect. It has to be true, not perfect.

„Yet if the Christian admits the Bible is written by men who only thought they were inspired by God, then indeed it loses its authority.“ Actually, it was not the authors who thought the pieces were inspired, by and large. The readers, not the writers, thought them inspired. The OT and NT test whether a person is delivering a word from God is the recipients, not the speaker.

„I do not see a way out of this dilemma, for the believer.“ The way out is to do the teachings of Jesus and then that one will know the truth. That is the way out. The scriptures useful for correction, teaching and training in doing right. Use it for anything else and there are difficulties.

„Unless I am mistaken, the classic Jewish belief is that the Torah is from God, but it must be interpreted by an ongoing oral tradition. This leaves much "wiggle room" and thus the axiom that there is a different, though correct, interpretation of the Torah for every Jew.“ That is not the Christian view of scripture but I can see why the Jews might like that „wiggle room.“

[Masterblaster]

Hello otseng
You say - "What exactly is the problem?"

We are talking about Bible inerrancy ( I think)
There are two different Gods in the same book. There are two different religions in the same book. The scripture ties used by the NT writers to the OT are flimsy and out of context, in the main. These two books are like a hot air balloon , a basket and a balloon tied together by very spurious connections.

What exactly is the problem?

You are in the middle of this, otseng, trying to defend these Gods of yours with Bible scripture that told you about them in the first place.

How can that work? Pick a God! Does the Pope believe in Yahweh? I cannot remember hearing him say the word. Are you sure you have the correct deity?

After deep analysis of your position on this thread, otseng, it appears to me that you are unwittingly, impaling poor old Yahweh, with the pseudo-theological arrows of Pauline nonsense.