Rvaughn wrote:Dave Roberts wrote:...the Chicago Statement on Inerrancy (1978)...
I haven't read through it, but quickly read "A Short Statement" at the beginning, with which I can readily agree.
A SHORT STATEMENT
1. God, who is Himself Truth and speaks truth only, has inspired Holy Scripture in order thereby to reveal Himself to lost mankind through Jesus Christ as Creator and Lord, Redeemer and Judge. Holy Scripture is God's witness to Himself.
2. Holy Scripture, being God's own Word, written by men prepared and superintended by His Spirit, is of infallible divine authority in all matters upon which it touches: it is to be believed, as God's instruction, in all that it affirms; obeyed, as God's command, in all that it requires; embraced, as God's pledge, in all that it promises.
3. The Holy Spirit, Scripture's divine Author, both authenticates it to us by His inward witness and opens our minds to understand its meaning.
4. Being wholly and verbally God-given, Scripture is without error or fault in all its teaching, no less in what it states about God's acts in creation, about the events of world history, and about its own literary origins under God, than in its witness to God's saving grace in individual lives.
5. The authority of Scripture is inescapably impaired if this total divine inerrancy is in any way limited or disregarded, or made relative to a view of truth contrary to the Bible's own; and such lapses bring serious loss to both the individual and the Church.
My Take [taking "Holy Scripture" to mean, here, the 66-book Protestant canon]1. While not disagreeing with this, I don't think that is the
only reason God has inspired holy scripture (which I can't bring myself to capitalize here as it feels idolatrous), nor do I think
holy scripture is God's only witness to Himself. "Nature in open volume stands", and on top of that God intervenes directly and speaks in the mind's ear. At least that has been my experience.
2. Too much human hermeneutics stands in the way of affirming this except in the most evanescent theoretical sense.
3. Amen.
4. Runs up against the times God appears to me to be inspiring the writing of fiction or of myth, the times when the authors are clearly speaking from their own experience and thoughts either to God (e.g. the Psalmist, quite often) or to his audience (e.g. Paul), and I don't see where the Bible as a whole ever speaks to its own canonical limits or describes its own "literary origins" in an overall sense. Certain books and passages say something about
their literary origins, but not the Bible as a whole.
5. That sort of authority is not something I give a book. I might (indeed, I hope I would) if I were convinced of its underpinnings, but the fact that I am not so convinced is what I just got done stating...
Some further idea of my take on Scripture may perhaps be gleaned from a reading (rereading perhaps, for some of you) of my "
My Burning Bush" sermon.