Bob Thune 2004-03-19
From Summa Bergania
From : David Bergan
Sent : Friday, March 19, 2004 11:16 AM
To : Bob Thune, Jr
Subject : Inspiration, inerrancy, and trust
Hi Pastor Bob,
Well, I see the point you are trying to make, but unfortunately, I'm not yet convinced. Here's why.
- I want you to notice that your very proof against the skeptic (following Lewis) relies on a foundation you claim you can't accept. You say that "it is not possible for Jesus to be a "good religious teacher" since the main theme of His message was that He was the Son of God." Later, you say that "Jesus fulfilled all the Messiah prophesies of the Old Testament." But on what are you basing these assertions? On Scripture. And if Scripture is not inspired by God, then it is not trustworthy, and therefore gives you no basis to state what the main theme of Jesus' message was. After all, it might not have been the main theme of His message; it might be what His error-prone disciples THOUGHT he meant.
The choice you give me is either A) believe Scripture is inerrant, in which case you have a solid foundation for your case, or B) believe Scripture is error-prone, in which case you have to doubt your whole worldview.
Yes I agree that the choice is that either the text is inerrant or it's error-prone - but I disagree with your conclusion that I have to doubt everything I read in error-prone texts. The world would be in pretty pickle if it did. Some examples:
- The local newspaper is far from inspired and inerrant, yet when they report that there was a fire in a home yesterday evening, I do not doubt that. Sure some of the particulars may be wrong, or perhaps they are even mere guesses, but that does not cause me to distrust my newspaper or doubt the fact that there was a fire.
- When I want to know somebody's phone number I look it up in the phone book... another text that is not inspired or inerrant, yet I trust it to provide me with accurate information.
- The prescription label on the antibiotics I took this morning is not inspired, yet I trust that there is indeed Augmentin in the bottle and not poison.
- The owner's manual of my car is not inspired, but when I had to find the fuse box to replace a fuse, I opened it and trusted it... and found the fuse box.
How about history:
I do not doubt that Alexander the Great conquered the Persians. Nor do I doubt that Diogenes walked through his town with a latern in broad daylight searching for an honest man. I believe that Hannibal crossed the Alps with elephants to invade Rome. I believe that Caesar invaded Gaul first and later crossed the Rubicon to battle Pompey. I believe that Socrates was put to death on charges of corrupting the youth. I believe that Archimedes was put to death in his den when the Romans took Syracuse. I believe all of these things and not one of them come to me from a divinely inspired text. Everything I listed occured before Christ. If I hold you to the choice you gave me, then you must doubt all of this and everything else you read that is not inspired. You can't trust your phone book, your maps, your health insurance policy, your grocery list, your letters from your mother or your wife, your newspaper, or even your own writing.
I assume, therefore, that it is clear that textual inerrancy isn't necessary for trust.
Or think about it this way: I can climb onto the roof of my house with a less-than-perfect ladder. I can make it through the night with a less-than-perfect supper. I can make it to Omaha with a rickety '88 Pontiac Bonneville (which is surely not the perfect car).
I trust my brother Michael. If I were drowning in a lake, he would jump in to save me. When he writes me about an upcoming test in his class at school, I do not assume that he is lying. Yet, Michael is not inerrant. He is not perfect. He has said a few things that were untrue in his life, but that doesn't make me assume that everything he says is a lie. Trust does not require perfection.
In the same vein, I believe the accounts of Jesus just as I believe the accounts of Archimedes, Alexander, Caesar, and all those others. I believe that Caesar said "I came, I saw, I conquered," and "The die is cast," and "You too, my son? [referring to Brutus]." I believe these sayings, written down by historians that were corrupt Roman senators without even an ounce of inspiration. I believe these sayings, but I do not find any plan for redemption in them. Similarly, I believe that Jesus said the things attributed to Him on the Sermon of the Mount. (If Matthew wrote them himself, as you suggested, I find it unlikely that he wouldn't have taken the credit for his own sermon.) And while Caesar's sayings sparkle with wit, Christ's sayings shine with redemption. I trust that both said most of what was attributed to them, but I dwell longer on the sayings attributed to Jesus because the message is greater.
Addressing Boyd...
I will admit that the Gospel of John gives me the most difficulty of the four. And I admit that I have trouble understanding how the Trinity works. (For example, if Jesus IS God, then why did He pray to God? To pray assumes that you are praying to some entity other than yourself. But if Jesus was God, then He was the entity that He was praying to... Also, how could God's Will [crucifixion] be different from Jesus's Will [let this cup pass], if Jesus was God?)
However, I cannot agree with Dr. Tom Boyd that the only evidence of Jesus's divinity was in the Gospel of John. We have a virgin birth in both Matthew and Luke. We have a resurrection in all four, plus Acts, plus some of the epistles. We have Matthew carefully detailing all of the prophesies that Jesus fulfilled to be the Messiah. We have Jesus claiming to be the Messiah and the Son of Man throughout the synoptic Gospels, although He usually tells people not to tell others when they call Him by those names. And we have sayings where Jesus speaks of the Second Coming, and where He speaks of sitting at the right hand of the Father. He gives several parables about the Kingdom of God, eternal life, and treasures in Heaven. And in Matthew 21:33 we find a parable that makes a pretty clear analogy of God sending first prophets and then His own Son. Dr. Boyd might be right that in John is the only true "I am" claim of Jesus being God. But tossing that aside we still have Jesus and His disciples claiming Him to be the "Son of Man," "Messiah," "Son of God," "the foundation of our salvation," "soon to be sitting at the right hand of the Father," and "the annointed one." He also claims to forgive sins (which upsets the Pharisees), and declares His feet worthy of special perfumes at the expense of feeding the poor. Roll all those together and it is still very clear that Jesus thought of Himself as extra-ordinary... in a way that none of the other sages I mentioned in the last email thought of themselves.
And in other issues, I hope you don't run home and rename your child, but C.S. Lewis didn't believe in the inerrancy of Scripture, either. It's interesting that you chose that name for your son and I always wanted to name my first son Jack... so maybe we aren't all that different in the end. ;) Anyway, since I addressed your position that I must believe the Bible to be inerrant to be trusted, it's your turn to answer my questions. I'll copy them below to save you the trouble of going back and finding them.
First question: What if one text claims the inspiration of another? For example, I don't remember that the book of Ruth ever claims to be inspired by God itself - it is a story about faithful people and their relationship under God. God is certainly mentioned, but the author doesn't say that he is writing the story from God's inspiration. However, 2 Timothy, a separate text with a separate author, claims that Ruth is inspired even though the book of Ruth doesn't claim that itself.
Second question: When you say "From there, we might ask: what sort of God is revealed in this document?" is that to mean that this is a subjective or objective question? Does each person have to decide for themselves whether or not the God revealed by a specific text is acceptable, or is there some absolute universal standard? When a cult member comes to me with a book written by a meglomaniac that claims divine inspiration, do I have any right to say that his text is unacceptable for all people? Or am I limited to saying that it is only unacceptable for me, yet still divinely inspired for him?
Have a great day. And if I don't get back to email, a good weekend, too. I have a wedding to attend in St. Paul on Saturday.
Yours,
David
--David Bergan
"I wish I had never been born," she said. "What are we born for?"
"For infinite happiness," said the Spirit. "You can step out into it at any moment..."
-CS Lewis (The Great Divorce)
