How to Get Inerrancy Wrong, A Series

Introduction 

I am firmly convinced of the inerrancy of Scripture. 

I also realize that’s a very bold statement to make, especially in a world where uncertainty is promoted with so much certainty. 

A genuine belief in Scriptural inerrancy is a fine line to walk. It is so fine that from both sides it can appear to be a denial of the (literal) truth of Scripture. 

Whether it’s believing in a flood that wasn’t global but functionally worldwide or believing in a literal creation week that didn’t occur 6,000 years ago, I will be accused by both believers and unbelievers of being compromised and inconsistent. 

However, I would argue that my critics are the ones who are compromised and inconsistent. Because when I say that I believe that Scripture is true, the corespondent element for the truth of it isn’t dependent on what can be proven scientifically or confirmed historically. 

My belief is entirely dependent upon the God who made and sustains all things and not on the things that he has made (Psalm 20:7-8).

Now some will assume that means that I don’t believe that there are things that the Bible says that can be scientifically proven or historically confirmed, but that’s not what I’m saying at all. What I’m saying is that the truth of God’s self-revelation isn’t dependent upon anything else to confirm it (Hebrews 6:13). Rather, what it means is that apart from God having made revelation, we would have no foundation for knowledge.

The Intersection of Narrative and Fact

Voltaire is alleged to have said, “History is the lie commonly agreed upon.” 

Philosopher Alex Rosenberg noted in an essay at Salon a few years ago that, “Narrative history is not just an almanac or a chronology of what happened in the past. It is explanation of what happened in terms of the motives and the perspectives of the human agents whose choices, decisions, and actions made those events happen.” He went on to note, “that history, the kind most readers of nonfiction consume, is almost always wrong.”

In his essay, Rosenberg belittles narrative history, stating that it, “[fails] to identify the real causal forces that drive events, that they obstruct efforts to really understand our past, and that they serve as harmful tools of the worse angels of our nature.”

Rosenberg assumes that we can get at such causes apart from the narratives, that there can be no objective sense for the truth of the matter. But that assumes that we are locked into the system, that there is no one outside the system who can feed information in. This is not to say that the writers or narrative history, like what we find in Scripture, can’t be operating from a biased perspective. Rather, it’s a recognition that there is a bias. As I have noted elsewhere, “the writer [of history] is often reporting what is important or relevant to them.”

Those who take the Bible seriously, more importantly those who name the name of Christ, have a responsibility to the God we claim to believe in to properly represent the text. If we are to stand by the fact that the Bible is historical and is reliably reporting history—whether or not one believes that Scripture is either inspired or inerrant—then we have a responsibility to speak truthfully, and to understand the Bible as the historical source that it is, not as we might like it to be.

This includes the recognition that, as containing historic narrative, the biblical texts will reflect a certain bias on the part of the author with regard to how they choose to tell the story. Such a recognition, some might argue, undermines a belief in inspiration and subsequently inerrancy. My response would be that if one believes that, then they have a deficient belief in those doctrines anyway. But I digress…

The Lies Apologists Tell

Undoubtedly one of the greatest harms to the faith is brought about by men and women who believe that they are defending the truth of Scripture by either inventing outright falsehood or unintentionally repeating falsehood. 

Undoubtedly, of someone were to what to invest the time to read over the contents of this blog, they might find something that I said or wrote early on that was said in ignorance and try to use that as evidence against me. I have never claimed to be perfect, and have long stated that this blog is a journey that I’ve invited people to come along on. As I’ve learned and grown, I have shared this. And the point of a journey is that you don’t end up where you started.

Along the way, I’ve discovered that sometimes I gave far too much credence to certain voices. Part of this realization came from study, and some it came from interaction. All of it came together in a desire to be consistent with my faith, and the means by which that faith is conveyed and maintained.

This means that I have had to interact with enemies of the faith. One of those enemies is Ben, the Amateur Exegete.

I would like to think that our interactions have been friendly, as one can see here, but sometimes they’ve been downright ugly. 

The truth is that I see a lot of myself in Ben, and I find him to be mostly thoughtful as he isn’t afraid to correct people on his side of the fence when they get things wrong, see here. And, believe it or not, I appreciate his exposing of bad apologetics, such as this recent one.

Why this recent post is so appreciated is that it brings to light so much of what I have said about the necessity of understanding the Bible as a historical document, especially in regard to how it presents a historical account. In it, Ben interacts with a post by someone he describes as a “faux Bible scholar” by the name of Robert Clifton Robinson.

Robinson, describes himself as an author, philosopher, and apologist. Reading his material, one cannot help but find him to be a fundamentalist of the ultra variety, who clearly believes that for the Bible to be true, that everything must have a scientific justification or confirmation. Judging by how he handles biblical texts, Robinson is a biblical concordist. His twitter feed is…interesting…often devolving quickly into personal attacks and misrepresentation.

Ben, in his post, seems to catch Robinson apparently indulging in plagiarism in a 2019 post from his blog. And, if Robinson were writing a fully fledged academic paper, I agree, based upon the evidence that Ben presents, that Robinson would technically be guilty of such, but that’s not what Robinson was writing. It was a 609 word blog post, 90 of which were a quote from the Book of Joshua.

Looking at Robinson’s publishing schedule, he seems to post at least two blog posts per week, some are longer than the example that Ben points to, and seem to be fairly well sourced. So, Ben’s criticism of Robinson—to be completely fair—seems unfair given the context of Robinson’s post is that it written almost in a conversational tone rather than with a deliberately academic tone. Perhaps it was written quickly while Robinson was getting his oil changed as it’s not directly aimed at anyone, but is written very generally. The fact that it appears under the heading of “essays”, doesn’t really prove anything. In my amateur opinion of the Amateur Exegete, it’s nitpicking at its finest.

My issue with Clifton though, isn’t in any alleged co-opting of sources. It’s in his handling of the text of Joshua and his handling of sources.

For Part 2