How crucial is Biblical Inerrancy to being Reformed?

Should one call themself Reformed if not holding to Biblical Inerrrancy?

  • No

  • Yes

  • Not Sure

  • Some other answer


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cubanito

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Fine Eddie, very often I don't agree with myself, so here's a different angle.

The Gospels are primarily historical books written so we may believe and know about jesus, similar to Acts. Ever tried to build a theology around Acts? Plenty have tried, go over to the charismatic side for Acts chapter 2 being implemented as straight up theology.

The letters were written as explanations, some pastoral and application centered, others like hebrews and Romans straight up theology. If you believe them ALL inspired, then where are you safest building a theology from, history or didactic?

But whatever, my Jesus Loves me enough to have kept the Gospel hidden until the right time. For to every purpose there is a time and season under Heaven. There is a time to refrain from speaking plainly, and that is waht He says He did. How would you interpret that He spoke to them in parables SO THAT they would NOT understand, so that they would NOT repent and turn to Him? This is plain Scripture. Jesus is plainly stated here to NOT want to convert the masses. Rather plain and simple, though hard to swallow. Kind of like Calvinism and election, plain and simple but hard to swallow.

JR
 
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bsd058

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Fine Eddie, very often I don't agree with myself, so here's a different angle.

The Gospels are primarily historical books written so we may believe and know about jesus, similar to Acts. Ever tried to build a theology around Acts? Plenty have tried, go over to the charismatic side for Acts chapter 2 being implemented as straight up theology.

The letters were written as explanations, some pastoral and application centered, others like hebrews and Romans straight up theology. If you believe them ALL inspired, then where are you safest building a theology from, history or didactic?

But whatever, my Jesus Loves me enough to have kept the Gospel hidden until the right time. For to every purpose there is a time and season under Heaven. There is a time to refrain from speaking plainly, and that is waht He says He did. How would you interpret that He spoke to them in parables SO THAT they would NOT understand, so that they would NOT repent and turn to Him? This is plain Scripture. Jesus is plainly stated here to NOT want to convert the masses. Rather plain and simple, though hard to swallow. Kind of like Calvinism and election, plain and simple but hard to swallow.

JR
Theology can be drawn from the Gospels. What the apostles wrote about Jesus very clearly expresses doctrine.

For instance, they all attest to his divinity and humanity...

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. (John 1:1)

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:7)

----

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” (Matthew 2:1-2)

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Bookends of Mark:

The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God...(Mark 1:1)

After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. (Mark 1:14)

And when the centurion, who stood there in front of Jesus, saw how he died, he said, “Surely this man was the Son of God!” (Mark 15:39)
----

Luke-Acts

Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. (Luke 2:11)
 
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Eddie L

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If you believe them ALL inspired, then where are you safest building a theology from, history or didactic?

We don't have to believe that Jesus is a con man to accept that theology should come from the explanations and not the historical accounts. Jesus' mission was not to out-deceive the Deceiver. That's where my view has to part with yours. :)

But whatever, my Jesus Loves me enough to have kept the Gospel hidden until the right time. For to every purpose there is a time and season under Heaven. There is a time to refrain from speaking plainly, and that is waht He says He did. How would you interpret that He spoke to them in parables SO THAT they would NOT understand, so that they would NOT repent and turn to Him? This is plain Scripture. Jesus is plainly stated here to NOT want to convert the masses. Rather plain and simple, though hard to swallow. Kind of like Calvinism and election, plain and simple but hard to swallow.

Again, I agree that the gospel was a mystery until the resurrection, but that doesn't make Jesus a con man. We don't have to view His words with suspicion. We just have to correctly understand where His words fit into the truth when the mystery is revealed.

I would agree that a person who wishes only to go by the words of Jesus in the gospels is likely to miss the big picture. I agree that the book of Acts is not a theology text. I won't agree, though, that Jesus' words, though veiled, were designed to deceive.
 
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cubanito

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Eddie, like many I believe we are actually mostly in agreement, you just do not like my choice of words. Of course theology can be drawn from the Gospels, such as you noted, just as theology can be drawn from historical books such as judges and Acts. As you point out, the Gospel (and I would argue many other things) are more difficult to draw out from the Gospels than from the letters. At no point did I mean to imply the gospels or Acts are devoid of theology, some presented quite clearly. Also, Jesus did explain His parables to His disciples privately, and there I think we have things more clearly. You just recoil at my suggestion that God is a con man, a reaction I often get from True Christians. I like putting it that way precisely because it jars the listener out of complacensy into re-examining their presumption that Jesus always spoke clearly. He most certainly did not, as it is written, He PURPOSELY hid the Gospel in the Gospels for the express purpose of NOT converting people, as Isaiah predicted He would. That bit of theology, that God at times hides Truth is clearly presented in the Gospels. The first time I read it it came as a shock to me, but as I thought about it I saw His purpose in NOT immediately bringing many into salvation. He came to be rejected and die, not to head yet another religious movement like Bhuddha, Mohammed, ect ect ect. Yet another unique facet of Christianity, and contrary to how we would do something, to win by losing.

Look, this is on of my answers as to why the idea that somehow Paul is not in line with the Gospels is absurd. This notion that Paul somehow redefined Christianity is the kind of stuff that comes when one does not have an absolute commitment to Biblical Inerrancy, plenary inspration and all those other funky terms to make clear that we actually believe what the book says and NOT what some scholarly review of some high placed seminary so and so thinks. You don't like thinking of God as the Greatest con man ever. Cool, peace be upon you and may your house live forever. I am no Tertullian, but I do share his love of paradoxical and jarring comments, loosely paraphrasing: "I believe God had a Son, because it is absurd. I believe He died and rose again because it is impossible. "
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Quoted from "I believe because it is absurd" – Was Tertullian a fideist?
De Carne Christi, a work on the Incarnation of Christ:
Natus est Dei Filius, non pudet, quia pudendum est;
et mortuus est Dei Filius, prorsus credibile est, quia ineptum est;
et sepultus resurrexit, certum est, quia impossibile.
“The Son of God was born: there is no shame, because it is shameful.
And the Son of God died: it is wholly credible, because it is unsound.
And, buried, He rose again: it is certain, because impossible.”
The part being frequently (mis)quoted is “It is certain, because it is impossible.” Even the Latin being quoted is wrong. As for the meaning, in the context where this saying appears, Tertullian is responding to the Marcionite view, an early heresy.... As for whether or not Tertullian really thought that the incarnation and life of Christ was impossible, here’s what he had to say about that, at the outset of chapter three:
Inasmuch as you suppose this was within your competence to decide, it can only have been that your idea was that to God nativity is either impossible or unseemly. I answer, that to God nothing is impossible except what is against his will. So then we have to consider whether it was his will to be born: because, if it was, he both could be and was born.

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Anyway, the point is that those of a liberal bent SOMETIMES (not always) come with a pernicious naturalistic bias. They forget that Christ predicted that after His death the Con-Forte (giver of strength, paraclete) would lead the Apostles in all Truth and enable them to do even greater works than He Himself. His words, not mine. So, we get a Paul who unpaks the entire Scripture revealing mysteries hidden from the foundation of the world because Paul is, just like me and you "The Greatest Force In The Universe" (ie, indwelt by the Holy Spirit). Please, I am not claiming infallibility for myself, but I AM claiming it for the letters found in the New Testament.

Thus, the whole approach of somehow thinking that Paul sort of shaded or restructured a new version of Christianity in my opinion comes froma naturalistic bias. The letters of all the Apostles were supernaturally influenced just as all Scripture being the breath of God, and even clearer than the Gospels. As such it is right and proper to begin our theology from the most theologically attuned writings like Romans and Hebrews. You do not go to Acts or Revelations as a start to your theology because they are not primarily didactic. That is a second reason, just as valid in my view, as the fact that Jesus was the Greatest con man ever (and I do love my Tertullian, a part time heretic like me I guess).

Anyway, this post has grown long in the tooth so I will only bring up the third reason why the letters, especially Pauls, are a better starting point for theology. The guy was anointed the Apostle to the gentiles at the very first Church council. Last time I checked, I am an uncircumcized gentile (as my kids would say, TMI,dad, TMI).

TGFITU, the Christian sometimes known as JR
 
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cubanito

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Since some like scholarly stuff, and not the random rantings of a hemiheretic claiming God is a con man, here's a pretty good examination of this "Pauline Christianity is not quite what Jesus preached" stuff:

http://www.wtsbooks.com/pdf_files/9780852347331.pdf

or for those with more interest in the attributes of Scripture, as somewhat less scholarly but really nice summary of some Reformation corolaries to "sola Scriptura"

Sufficiency of Scripture | Already Not Yet

And for those wanting more ranting from the hemiheretic:

So why do I like Tertullian so much? After all he was a lawyer and I a physician, so we are natural enemies. Well, when I was an agnostic I always had the notion that if there were a God, it would be impossible for me to fully comprehend God. I mean, if I can wrap my brain around a concept, that could not be God (the Tripitaka, Ramayana and Bhaga Gita read to me as stupid as the Koran, so I never bought into the idea I was God).

Well, along comes the Bible and the Tertullian coined word the Trinity. Wow, that blew my mind. I still can not even begin to wrap my head around "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me." Yeah, I like paradoxes. Guess that's why when presented with Einsteinian relativity I took to it like a fish to water. Why, while like everybody else, I can not understand Quantum Mechanics, I like it. It is bizarre, it is impossible, it is mathematically coherent, has survived multiple excruciating tests and made wild predictions that have come true, but beyond my comprehension. So yeah, being a CalvArminian, a post-modernist fundamentalist and reading my Bible is FUN. Loads of fun, and if somebody wants to call me a heretic, that's OK. Jesus STILL Loves me, this I know, for the Bible is perspicacious to me.

Anyway, sometime soon I am going to have to vanish from this forum again and get back to serving Mammon so as to render unto Ceaser, so just wait and I will stop plaguing y'all.

TGFITU, JR
 
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Cappadocious

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Try reading the Beatitudes as a con job whose purpose is to cause despair in the listener.

Oh what FUN being a Christian is!

JR

How Romans Road of you! ;)

Not to mention Nietzsche's slave morality.

"Dear earth,

I, in my monophysite pseudohumanity, have concocted a lovely deception. Here are all these amazing divine standards befitting my god-priests of creation; you'll never meet them! But don't worry, I'll unilaterally act upon you all to fix it. And then, once externally 'redeemed' (whatever that functionally means) by Blood Shed for Some Apparent Reason (BSSAR for short), you will all spiritually touch until your earthly deaths, after which you will all do absolutely nothing, accepting like good little sheep your inability to become gods, for all eternity.

You see, I came to show you that your existence is totally pointless. I wanted a creation and then decided to hold a cosmic Live Action Role Play within it. So, you mortals just go on and be "saved" in the corner there, I'm rather tired of playing..."
 
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Iosias

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I am a member of the PCA, which takes Biblical inerrancy seriously, as did Calvin et al. I am wondering wether people here believe can truly call themselves Reformed or a Calvinist while holding to a liberal view of the Bible, as for example, the PC-USA.

Yes, one can be Reformed and deny inerrancy.
 
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