Thursday, August 14, 2014

Scot McKnight's Review of "Five Views of Biblical Inerrancy," Part 4 - Kevin Vanhoozer




There is little doubt that the inerrancy of the Bible is a current and often contentious topic among evangelicals. Five Views on Biblical Inerrancy represents a timely contribution by showcasing the spectrum of evangelical positions on inerrancy, facilitating understanding of these perspectives, particularly where and why they diverge.

Each essay in Five Views on Biblical Inerrancy considers:

  • the present context and the viability and relevance for the contemporary evangelical Christian witness;
  • whether and to what extent Scripture teaches its own inerrancy;
  • the position’s assumed/implied understandings of the nature of Scripture, God, and truth; and
  • three difficult biblical texts, one that concerns intra-canonical contradictions, one that raises questions of theological plurality, and one that concerns historicity.

Five Views on Biblical Inerrancy serves not only as a single-volume resource for surveying the current debate, but also as a catalyst both for understanding and advancing the conversation further. Contributors include Al Mohler, Kevin Vanhoozer, Michael Bird, Peter Enns, and John Franke.
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Scott McKnight begins a discussion of Inerrancy to which I will add
occasional emendation, notes, links, and resources. - R.E. Slater, August 4, 2014


Well-Versed Inerrancy
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2014/08/13/well-versed-inerrancy/

by Scot McKnight
Aug 13, 2014

Kevin Vanhoozer
In a book where the biggest terms are the last two, Five Views of Biblical Inerrancy, the problem is the word “biblical.” If this adjective means “inerrancy of the Bible” we haven’t much of a problem. But even this raises a problem I have with the book: a biblical view of inerrancy ought to be about the Bible’s view of inerrancy but this book — all five views — are much more theological and philosophical and historical studies of inerrancy instead of a serious attempt to show from the Bible what the Bible says about the topic of “inerrancy.”

The criticism applies less to Kevin Vanhoozer’s fine chapter, “Augustinian Inerrancy: Literary Meaning, Literal Truth, and Literature Interpretation in the Economy of Biblical Discourse,” than to the other essays. Still, we are a long way from a truly biblical approach, because that approach leads at least in part to Matthew’s or Paul’s midrashic, allegorical exegeses that at times have nothing to do with the author’s intent. 

Vanhoozer’s remains very theoretical and the categories are more or less set up before we get to the test cases but his section “God and Truth” is an exceptional example of a more biblically-framed approach to inerrancy. His approach is Augustinian, but the more important expression is that he’s about a “well-versed” inerrancy, one that is well versed in hermeneutics enough to know the following:

God’s authoritative Word is wholly true and trustworthy in everything
it claims about what was, what is, and what will be (202).

Or,

… the authors speak the truth in all things they affirm (when they make affirmations),
and will eventually be seen to have spoken truly (when right readers read rightly) (207).

Yes, hermeneutics is at the core of this issue, but determining what is “affirmed” is more than a little challenge.

So both semantics and poetics are at work in reading Scripture. So the quest is the “speech act content” not just the content. That is, find the literal sense to know truth and falsehood of the Bible.

I’ll say it again: The problem for inerrancy is the Bible itself so we need far more attention on what the Bible says about truth and how it speaks before we can have anything approaching a “biblical” inerrancy.

On the problem passages, I have one big comment: Inerrantists tip-toe and tap-dance around the fall of Jericho’s walls and end up denying the overwhelming conclusions of the archaeologists. Pete Enns is right to challenge dust-in-the-eyes proposals of resolution to these sorts of problems. So, what we really need is an inerrantist to explain their view of inerrancy if the account of Joshua 6 really does not correspond to the archaeological evidence. Vanhoozer shifts to “extreme caution” about the archaeological evidence. But then he provides, at least in my view, a way out: he asks what the author means to do with the text of Joshua 6. God is faithful to his word by granting the Israelites the Land. Jericho 6 communicates that promise of God. But does this just shift the content from the historical to the theological? Is this dodging or offering an alternative reading that can accommodate a non-historical reading of Joshua 6?

His approach to these difficulties is to discern the larger rhetorical intent of the author as a generalization whose truth outdoes the historical tension. Vanhoozer rightfully wonders this: since Jesus never distanced himself from the God of the Old Testament, maybe we should use his version of God. Well, isn’t this about what Jesus affirms more than what he doesn’t deny? Is affirmation of Israel’s God an affirmation of everything found in the OT?

Jesus, Vanhoozer says, reads the Bible with an over arching salvation historical drama driving his vision. The herem instructions then are about God clearing space for his own dwelling in the Land. I am unconvinced of this over arching narratival solution: the problem is the actual propositions of the text about what God wants for his people — the tension between Deut 20:16-17 and Jesus’ eschewing of the same in Matthew 5:44. By permitting that act to be God’s way in that time one finds tension with God’s way in Jesus’ time. (Right?)


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Addendum by R.E. Slater

From the onset of discussing the subject of inerrancy it has been mine own conclusion, along with many others like Peter Enns, that inerrancy as a philosophical proposition placed upon the biblical text has been unhelpful. That it adds additional religious (Christian) layers to the discussion of the biblical text and by doing so speaks more from the reader's more culturally-defined (and not Spirit-defined) preferences and prejudices.

Scot touches upon the real issue here in that the reading of the biblical text must also be done with an eye to what the author of that text (or its oral legendary component) is trying to communicate. Now it might be assumed through biblical archaeological work - coupled with anthropological research - that the study of ancient cultures might portray a credible idea or two about what may have been going on many thousands of years ago. But it might also be credibly assumed that we may have no idea whatsoever as to what was in the mind of the author, or the intent of the legend being communicated, down through its generations of song, psalm, hymn, and poem.

As such, theology can get itself in a real bind when pretending to "compare verse with verse" to itself without consulting the ancient customs and cultures of the biblical text. Moreover, it can also do a great disservice to its discipline when not also considering the intentions of the ancient society when transmitting its oral histories of God and His revelation to one another. This is what is meant when saying that a fuller biblical hermeneutic must not only be contextual, grammatical, and linguistical, BUT ALSO anthropological. It is not enough to consider ancient society's philosophies and ideologies of their day, but also its receptive readership and what they may have wanted from God by communicating their specific ideas of Him through oral legends and ballads, testimonies and narratives.

Thus the anthropological component is crucial to the biblical text both then, as it is now, in our day. As readers of God's Word we must ask ourselves "just how do we come to its ancient script to read of God?" Do we come with an intent to re-enforce what we believe about God and thus come to the ancient text by way of our own preferences and prejudices? Or do we come to its text willing to unlearn what we think we know in order to reconsider other possible avenues of spiritual discovery and revelation?

And so, not only must a proper hermeneutic include an anthropological orientation to the past and to our own times - including ourselves - but it must  also be contemporary, relevant, dynamic and open. Why? Because a closed faith coupled with a closed Bible simply leads to dogmatism and undue critical judgment and not to a true biblical doctrine. Rather, this approach is not loving but critical of everyone and everything. But an open faith and an open Bible may lead to a gracious God who is doing mighty works against the evils of our day - even within our own lives!

Interpreting the Bible then is a complex set of tasks and not so simply read as first thought. But then again, it must be read and studied. It takes capable teachers of its many stories and narratives - and it takes a wisdom not of man but of God Himself. Hence, to layer one more "philosophical or theological" idea upon its text like the spurious doctrine of "inerrancy" is unhelpful. It can lead to Christian ideas that are not biblical but fallible, harmful, unhelpful, both to ourselves as to our friends and family, church and nation.

Let us be wise then to "unbind" the shackles we would unadvisedly place upon the Bible when pretending we are speaking up for the One who needs no Speech except His own through our still, small voices, offering crucified lives of dedication to the atoning Savior claimed and known with eyes and hearts not of this world. Amen.

R.E. Slater
August 14, 2014
edited August 18, 2014
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