3-4 responds 1

Grace Asquith

Posted Date:

March 25, 2020 7:01 PM

Status:

Published

After reading Erickson’s and Feinberg’s sections on “inerrancy,” what is your position and argument on the inerrancy of the Bible? Do you believe this doctrine to be important for the contemporary church? Why?

 

My Position and Argument on Inerrancy of The Bible

            From a young age, I have always believed that the Bible is the authority of God and what is said in the scriptures is not wrong, although questionable, and often needs much interpretation such as in systemic theology. I believe when God created the heaven and the earth it was perfect, and as we see in scriptures where God says, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the earth.” [1]

 I do not believe that the Bible contains errors. I do think that what people consider error might be what they do not understand, agree with, or want to accept, yet God’s word is true. The scripture tells us, “All your words are true; all your righteous laws are eternal,” (Psalm 119:160). [2]  Thus, we see the Bible is the authority, it is ethics in its purest form, it is love, it is peace, it is moral. For example, the world cannot run without a government. If it tries, the world would be in chaos. Simultaneously, we need the authority of the Bible that we may follow the teachings of Jesus and thus cannot see the Bible as being error. I also think that systematic theology is a great way to understand the truth of the Bible because it helps us through the guidance of the Holy Spirit to understand what we read. Systematic theology is like hermeneutical to the scriptures, which is necessary for scripture interpretation and for explaining truths. Walter A. Elwell states, “It has been far more common to define inerrancy as "without error," but a number of reasons argue for relating inerrancy to truth and falsity. To use "error" is to negate a negative idea. Truth, moreover, is a property of sentences, not words.” [3]  I also think that there are scriptures that have lots of questions, for example, the book of Job, which has been a topic of discussion in my former Pentecostal as a child and undoubtedly other churches as well. One of the main discussions was that Job did not complain in all his suffering and neither did he regret life, yet the scripture says, “After this, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth. He said, “May the day of my birth perish, and the night that said, ‘A boy is conceived!’ That day may it turn to darkness; may God above not care about it; may no light shine on it,” (Job 3:1-3). [4]

When we look at Job’s response to his almost never-ending suffering, it is humanly possible for him to become frustrated. And although Job uttered those words, he was careful not to utter them in anger, which would have caused him to sin, whereas the scripture says, “Be angry and do not sin, do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil,” (Ephesians 4:26-27). [5]   It is Scriptures like these that appear to be an error but can be explicit through systematic theology to a greater understanding. I am grateful that by the Grace of God, and the guidance of the Holy Spirit, I have gained CQ knowledge of the Bible and therefore does not think of the Bible is a falsifiable Bible authority, but inerrancy with an understanding to the clues of the truth. More importantly, I believe the Bible is infallible, but what may appear to be fallible may be literary criticisms, such as structural criticism and reader-response criticism, as well as due to misunderstanding.

As said, Structural criticism attempts to investigate the relationship between the surface structure of the writing and the deeper implicit structures that belong to literature as such. These implicit structures are the formal literary possibilities with which the author must work.

Reader-response criticism regards the locus of meaning not as the text, but the reader. The reader creates the meaning, rather than finding it there. Consequently, attention is concentrated on the reader rather than the text. [6]

Do you believe this doctrine to be important for the contemporary church? Why?

I do believe this doctrine is important for contemporary today as a base yet teaching them the clues that can give them a better understanding of why the scripture says what it says, and that is systematic theology. Today people use many different Bible versions, trying to arrive at a clearer understanding, picking up clues to the truth of scriptures. It is not to say what we think but to dissect the clues and details of the bible to bring about truth, not different theology, or a different doctrine, but the same true word using systemic theology, to help the contemporary understand a deeper sense of the word.

 

This document contains words:884

 

Bibliography 

Elwell, Walter A. Evangelical Dictionary of Theology. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House Company, 2009.

Erickson, Millard J. Christian Theology. Third Edition. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books A division of Baker Publishing Group, 2015.

 

[1]  Unless otherwise noted, all biblical passages are in The New International Version, (Zondervan Publishing, Grand Rapids, MI: 2011).

[2]  Ibid.,

[3]  Walter A. Elwell (2017). (p. 157). Evangelical Dictionary of Theology. Baker Book House. Retrieved from https://app.wordsearchbible.com.

[4]  Ibid.,

[5]  Ibid.,

[6]  Millard J. Erickson (2015). (p. 93). Christian Theology. Baker Academic. Retrieved from https://app.wordsearchbible.com.