What
Is Inerrancy?
“There is no God higher
than truth.”
Mahatma Gandhi 1869-1948
What is inerrancy? It is a state of being
free from any and all error; perfect. Biblical inerrancy is the doctrine that
teaches that the Bible is free from any and all error. Most who teach this
doctrine will attach the qualifier that the Bible in all of its original manuscripts is inerrant. That qualifier is
attached because there are numerous errors in the Bible that the inerrantist would like to write off as scribal errors made
only in copies of the original manuscripts.
The problem is that there are no surviving, original manuscripts of any part of the Bible. So the assertion
that the errors appear only in the copies of the Bible is one that can never be
proven. If the originals no longer exist, then we can say almost anything we
want about them and no one can prove us wrong. Therefore, it is absurd to claim
inerrancy for the original manuscripts as a matter of fact because no one has
an original of any manuscript to confirm or refute it. The only evidence we
have of what the original manuscripts said is the copies, and the copies
contain errors. The fact that all of the known copies, while coming from
different sources, contain the same errors would indicate that the originals
were erroneous as well.
Inerrancy is not a new idea. It is
something that people simply presupposed until it was challenged. God was the
only explanation ancient man could muster to explain the mysterious forces of
nature he observed. Man had created God, and in an ironic twist, credited God
with creating man. No one objected to these views because no one had a better
explanation to offer. So, the Bible seems to have gained its initial authority
by default. There was no explicitly stated doctrine of inerrancy because no one
had cause to doubt its accuracy.
Knowledge of our universe was primitive,
to say the least. So, the primitive ideas about our universe that are contained
in the Bible went unchallenged. Comparative analysis was more difficult because
all copies of the Bible were handwritten and very rare. Most were single books
or mere fragments of books.
The invention of the printing press by
Johann Gutenberg came in the fifteenth century and began to change some things.
One of the first books printed was the famous Gutenberg Bible. Copies became more readily available, but still
the Bible remained in the hands of those who could read it, the rich and
well-educated.
Then King James commissioned an English
translation of the Bible which was completed in 1611. Common men finally had a
Bible. Over the next few centuries, as literacy rates improved, people became
more and more familiar with the Bible. The emphasis on education brought
something else as well – the scientific age.
A new, higher criticism of the Bible
began to emerge. People on all levels began to question the Bible’s accuracy in
areas of science, history, geography, etc. As a result, some religions began to
merge areas of religion and science and developed ideas like evolutionary
creationism. That idea was to concede that evolutionary principles were at
work, but to maintain that God had set them in motion.
Many others were not so willing to
compromise. They claimed that the very nature of God was at stake in the matter
of inerrancy. If God is a perfect and holy being, he cannot err in any
statement or say anything that is not true. If the Bible is God breathed, that
is, inspired, then all of its statements must be true and accurate. If they are
not then the very nature of God is compromised.
They also knew that if the Bible is
errant in matters of science or history, then it could not be completely
trustworthy in matters of redemption, heaven, hell, or any other matter. They
asserted that the Bible was inspired by God and, therefore, perfect as he is
perfect. It was to be taken literally, not figuratively, for it was the
inerrant, infallible word of God.
It became, and still is, a common teaching
among inerrantists that where the Bible and science
disagree, the Bible is always right. Where the Bible and secular historians
conflicted, the Bible was to be considered correct. Basically, anytime anyone
was not in agreement with the Bible, no matter how compelling their evidence,
they were wrong and the Bible was right. The International Council on Biblical
Inerrancy, in Article XII of the Chicago Statement made the following
affirmations and denials:
“We affirm that scripture in its entirety is inerrant, being free from
all falsehood, fraud, or deceit.
We deny that Biblical infallibility and
inerrancy are limited to spiritual
religious, or redemptive themes,
exclusive of assertions in the fields of
history and science. We further
deny that scientific hypothesis about
earth history may
properly be used to overturn the teaching of scripture
on creation and the flood.”
That statement presents a clear double
standard in the field of Biblical study. Inerrantists
deny that science may be used to overturn Biblical teachings. There are,
however, several pseudo-scientific groups who claim to have scientific evidence
that supports the Bible. If scientific methods lead to conclusions sound enough
to be considered support for the Bible, why are they not considered by these
same groups sound enough to overturn the Bible’s teachings?
I must explain why I referred to these
groups as pseudo-scientific. Science is a process in which all of the available
evidence about a particular subject is pieced together and carefully
considered. Then, a hypothesis, an educated guess, is formed based on the
available evidence. There may be more than one interpretation of the evidence
leading to more than one hypothesis. Each hypothesis is tested, when possible,
and checked against known facts and accepted theories for discrepancies. If an
experiment cannot be performed to support or refute the hypothesis, (and in
some cases even if experiments support the theory) it remains theory and is checked
against new evidence as it is found. That process is science.
What some people are doing is taking a
conclusion drawn from the Bible (an earth that is only 10,000 years old for
example) and looking for and presenting only evidence that appears to support
the conclusion that they began with. That is not science and it is dishonest to
call it science.
Because of that double standard, a
dogmatic view of an inerrant Bible remains today, even as we enter the space
age. Popular preachers like Jerry Falwell make the
same claims for an inerrant Bible today. Falwell has
said:
“It is absolutely infallible, without error in all matters pertaining
to faith and practice, as in
areas such as geography, science,
history, etc.”
It is clear that these men consider the
Bible inerrant on all matters it touches, but what constitutes an error? And
what if an error is found in one book and not in the others? Alexander Carson
addressed that in 1830.
“If the scriptures contained one rule of poetry and oratory, that
rule must be a legitimate one, or
the Bible is a forgery. And if it tells
one historical untruth it must
forfeit its pretensions in everything,
seeing its pretensions
extend to everything in the book. The inspired
writers may have been ignorant of
natural philosophy, as the most
ignorant of British peasants,
without affecting their inspiration. But
verily, if they have delivered a
philosophical dogma, it must either
be true or the scriptures as a
whole are false.”
It seems that Mr. Carson understood that
there is no such thing as partial inerrancy. It is either “legitimate” or it is
a “forgery.” It is either “true” or “the
scriptures as a whole are false.” Charles Ryrie expounded on that as follows:
“Remember, it takes only one error to make an errant Bible. It
may be a “small” error, an inconsequential
one, an historical one,
or a doctrinal one, but if there
is one, then we do not have an
inerrant Bible.”
Ryrie’s’ realization that only one error
could negate the doctrine of inerrancy led him to stretch his definition of
inerrancy by saying:
“The Bible tells the truth, but that the truth can and does include
approximations, free quotations,
language of appearances, and
different accounts of the same
event as long as those do not contradict.”
I’ll give Mr. Ryrie this – that is the
most creative attempt I have discovered to reconcile the Bible’s errors with
the doctrine of inerrancy, but it doesn’t hold water and here’s why.
Approximations are only acceptable as truth if the exact number is not known.
God is described in the Bible as being omniscient, that is, all knowing. If you
know the exact number, as an omniscient God would be expected to, and you give
any other number, whether rounded or approximate, you have been less than
perfectly truthful.
Perhaps you could use language of
appearances and remain truthful, but only if the language does not mislead the
reader as to the true nature of what he apparently sees. In Genesis, for
example, one could suggest that God was using language of appearances when he
said that the sun and moon were “two great lights,” as opposed to the lesser
light of the stars. Because they are closer to the earth they do in fact appear greater. But to say that they
are greater is misleading the readers as to the true nature of what they are
observing. The sun is, in fact, an average star. It is closer, not greater,
than the other stars. Certainly even ancient man could be counted on to
understand the difference between near and far. And the moon is not a light at
all. It is simply a reflector of the sun’s light and minute in comparison to
the stars. Surely when ancient men saw the sun’s light reflected off the water
they knew there was not a light in the water. The concept of light reflection
was not beyond their grasp. There is simply no reason to use language which
misleads the reader when the correct view could have been presented and
understood.
The singular difference between saying
that the sun is closer and saying that the sun is greater is that the first is
correct and the latter is an error in the Bible.
CLOTHED
IN INERRANCY I WHAT IS
INERRANCY?
FACING
THE TRUTH I BIBLICAL
CONTRADICTIONS I BIBLE
BASED MORALITY
EXCUSES USED TO EXPLAIN
ERRORS I CAN
GOD EXIST? I ATHEIST
IN A FOXHOLE
ATHEISM I THE
EMPEROR HAS NO CLOTHES I DOES THEIR BELIEF AFFECT ME?