Bible Inerrant?

[redblue22]

Do you believe the bible is inerrant? Why?

 

[Tom Mix]

I believe the the King James version of the Bible is perfect in the fact that there is enough information in it to obtain eternal salvation.

I also believe that those people who try and point out mistranlations are in general trying to change the meaning to make it match their point of view.

 

[Swan7]

I believe the the King James version of the Bible is perfect in the fact that there is enough information in it to obtain eternal salvation.

I also believe that those people who try and point out mistranlations are in general trying to change the meaning to make it match their point of view.

This is very true, it's actually the reason I came back to living out a Christian life. I found that reading the other versions left me with many more questions than answers and my faith started to wilt.

 

[radhead]

I think it's absurd to suggest that the "path to salvation" lies in a book. If that's the reason that people read the Bible they will be lost for their entire lives. The Christ is inside us, and we don't need a book to find the Christ.

 

[Cearbhall]

I also believe that those people who try and point out mistranlations are in general trying to change the meaning to make it match their point of view.

More often, they're the ones pointing out how other people did that. A mistranslation is a mistranslation.

 

[High Fidelity]

Do you believe the bible is inerrant? Why?

Yes. Because to believe otherwise calls the entire credibility of it in to question.

Take the irony of peoples' disbelief in creation, yet belief in the resurrection. Both extraordinary accounts, both from the same source. Few believe the former while most believe the latter.

To question the inerrancy of Scripture is to question the authority of God, in my opinion.

 

[High Fidelity]

More often, they're the ones pointing out how other people did that. A mistranslation is a mistranslation.

Indeed and it's often the case where the KJV is argued as inerrant when the KJV itself is wrongly used as the basis of accuracy; not the original texts.

 

[radhead]

Yes. Because to believe otherwise calls the entire credibility of it in to question.

Take the irony of peoples' disbelief in creation, yet belief in the resurrection. Both extraordinary accounts, both from the same source. Few believe the former while most believe the latter.

To question the inerrancy of Scripture is to question the authority of God, in my opinion.

So, then it would not be about the errancy of the Bible. But rather the interpretation.

A fundamentalist equates inerrancy with a belief than anything not labeled explicitly as a "parable" must be a factual event.

 

[High Fidelity]

So, then it would not be about the errancy of the Bible. But rather the interpretation.

A fundamentalist equates inerrancy with a belief than anything not labeled explicitly as a "parable" must be a factual event.

Right. As it should be.

 

[Steve Petersen]

OK, so we are talking about the inerrancy of the Bible, but which Bible? Translations based on which texts?

Most inerrantists will eventually default to the argument that the original manuscripts are inerrant. That is a pretty safe position because we don't have those manuscripts to analyze.

Additionally, within the Christian world today, there are different sacred canons. They don't all agree on which books are part of the canon.

 

[ks777]

As someone who majored in theology and history, there are at least historical errors, others are harder to prove.
The writers often mingle historical fact together with fictional stories. At the time of writing, this was not uncommon unlike today’s society where we need everything to be precise, historical and scientific in order for it to warrant any value.

 

[Cearbhall]

A fundamentalist equates inerrancy with a belief than anything not labeled explicitly as a "parable" must be a factual event.

I agree with this definition. However, speaking about Christians in general, I would argue that there are different types of truth. For example, Christians who acknowledge evolution are not saying that Genesis isn't true in any sense. They still appreciate and agree with the theological truths that the authors of Genesis were trying to communicate about God.

As someone who majored in theology and history, there are at least historical errors, others are harder to prove.
The writers often mingle historical fact together with fictional stories. At the time of writing, this was not uncommon unlike today’s society where we need everything to be precise, historical and scientific in order for it to warrant any value.

Exactly. Those who seek to use it as a history or science textbook aren't looking at the book in its cultural context.

 

[High Fidelity]

I agree with this definition. However, speaking about Christians in general, I would argue that there are different types of truth. For example, Christians who acknowledge evolution are not saying that Genesis isn't true in any sense. They still appreciate and agree with the theological truths that the authors of Genesis were trying to communicate about God.

Yes. It's seen by many as who and why. Not who, why, when and how.

I subscribe to the latter, but while I still consider the former to undermine the authority of Scripture, I don't believe there's a total disregard for the contents of the account in every sense to those that affirm evolution.

 

[radhead]

As someone who majored in theology and history, there are at least historical errors, others are harder to prove.
The writers often mingle historical fact together with fictional stories. At the time of writing, this was not uncommon unlike today’s society where we need everything to be precise, historical and scientific in order for it to warrant any value.

Yes. I wish that more Christians would study history. The writers of the Bible were obviously aware of writer's tricks and so-called "history" which they understood was always written by the winners. Which is why I can't take seriously any story that says that God is on one side (or nation) in any fight or battle, and doesn't want both sides to get along. Blessed are the peacemakers.

 

[Ubuntu]

I believe that the Bible is like Jesus – fully human and fully divine at the same time. The men who wrote the Bible were certainly not inerrant, yet their words were nevertheless inspired. We're told that we can trust the Word of God, and I believe that this is true:

"The Lord’s words are absolutely reliable. They are as untainted as silver purified in a furnace on the ground, where it is thoroughly refined." Psalms 12:6

The Bible is written by sinful and faulty humans in a human language, and as such it has imperfections and flaws. Still, the great mystery is how the Bible at the same time is the Word of God, how it is the embodiment of truth. This union between the divine and the human as seen in the Bible, is something that I don't believe we can fully comprehend.

To sum it up, is the Bible inerrant? No! Is it infallibly true? Yes!

 

[radhead]

We're told that we can trust the Word of God, and I believe that this is true:

"The Lord’s words are absolutely reliable. They are as untainted as silver purified in a furnace on the ground, where it is thoroughly refined." Psalms 12:6

You can't use a quote from an ancient Psalm to prove something written later. To me, the psalmist was saying the God's word is something that is written on the heart, and which cannot be written down on paper. God does not write with paper and ink, but through the spirit which does not have words as we know them.

If there were no language, how would people communicate God's law? And how do we know that something is God's law today?

 

[Ubuntu]

You can't use a quote from an ancient Psalm to prove something written later. To me, the psalmist was saying the God's word is something that is written on the heart, and which cannot be written down on paper. God does not write with paper and ink, but through the spirit which does not have words as we know them.

If there were no language, how would people communicate God's law? And how do we know that something is God's law today?

It's up to ourselves whether or not we want to believe the Bible. Faith is something that comes when we realize that the word of God is trustworthy and reliable, that he addresses each and every one of us personally through the Holy Scriptures. We might have many valid questions about how to understand the Word of God, but in my experience the only thing that ultimately helps is to study the Bible for ourselves with an open mind. Many people will tell us what they think of the Bible, but ultimately we have to find out for ourselves whether or not the Bible is the Word of God.

But yes, I do believe that there are laws in the Bible which are eternal. The law of love is an expression of God's own character, and God never changes. We're told that, “the word of the Lord endures forever”, (1 Peter 1:25) and that “your word, LORD, is eternal”. (Psalms 119:89.) “All your words are true; all your righteous laws are eternal.” (Psalms 119:160.)

While writing this the following song played... I thought it was appropriate to share it:

 

[JackRT]

The King James Version of the New Testament was based upon a Greek text (the Textus Receptus) that was marred by mistakes, containing the accumulated errors of fourteen centuries of manuscript copying.It was essentially the Greek text of the New Testament as edited by Beza, 1589, who closely followed that published by Erasmus, 1516-1535, which was based upon a few medieval manuscripts. The earliest and best of the eight manuscripts which Erasmus consulted was from the tenth century, and yet he made the least use of it because it differed most from the commonly received text; Beza had access to two manuscripts of great value, dating from the fifth and sixth centuries, but he made very little use of them because they differed from the text published by Erasmus. We now possess many more ancient manuscripts (about 9000 compared to just 10) of the New Testament, and thanks to another 400 years of biblical scholarship, are far better equipped to seek to recover the original wording of the Greek text.

 

[Isaacsname]

I think that only Jesus Christ would know the objective truth of the book

 

[CCHIPSS]

I believe the bible was written just as God wanted it to be written.

That means if there are mistakes (not saying there is), then God willed that mistake to be in the bible for his greater purpose.

For example the empty tomb narrative was different on the 4 Gospels. There can only be 1 true description. So which one is it?

The answer is it doesn't matter. God wanted these differences to be there to prove a bigger point: The Gospel writers didn't copy and paste each other's works. Each did their own research, talked to the witnesses by themselves, recalled their own stories in their head and wrote their own versions.

Why it doesn't matter? Because the main point is the tomb was empty and was discovered by women. Then they ran to the Apostles to tell them what happened. The other minor details (angel, or a man in white robe, or no one was there?) doesn't affect the main point.