Rome’s Battle for the Bible: Synod of Bishops revisits inerrancy compromise reached at Vatican II

The article seems calculated to annoy Roman Catholics.

Rightly and/or wrongly, many Roman Catholics,  like many Protestants andd other flavors of self-identifying Christian, are annoyed by any reminder that God has spoken to us in His written word and the incarnate Word Jesus Christ.

“To the word and to the testimony!  If they do not speak according to this, it is because they have no dawn!”

I am not a Roman Catholic, but I am very well acquainted with the best RC biblical scholarship, which is fully equal in quality to the best Protestant scholarship.  The flagship RC scholarly journal, the Catholic Biblical Quarterly, is one of the standards in the field on biblical studies, along with the ecumenical Journal of Biblical Literature and similar peer-reviewed journals.

Consider the writings of such eminent Catholic biblical scholars as the late, great Raymond Brown (arguably the best NT scholar of his time), Joseph Fitzmyer, John Meier, Luke Timothy Johnson, John Donahue, Donald Senior, William Kurz, and Frank Matera (among others) in the field of New Testament (which I know best).  And in Old Testament, there are outstanding RC scholars who are also marvelous, including Joseph Blenkinsopp, the late Roland Murphy, Norbert Lofink, and John Collins (among others).  All of them are superb, world-class scholars.  And NONE of them are anything even remotely close to being inerrantists.

Alas, the Roman Catholic Church now produces FAR more outstanding biblical scholars than TEC does.  After abstaining from involvement in modern biblical scholarship for over a century, the Catholics have made up for lost time and fully caught up with the best Protestant scholars.  The Catholic commentary series known as Sacra Pagina is one of my personal favorites.

It’s 65 years now since Pope Pius XII initiated the renaissance of RC biblical scholarship with his important WWII encyclical, Afflante Spiritu, in 1943, giving RC scholars free reign to explore the human dimension of Scripture with all the scholarly tools available.  And RC scholars accepted the challenge to enter into modern scholarship fully.  But in general, I find that they have been MUCH more pastorally responsible and theologically sensitive than most Protestant scholars.  At least in this one area of biblical scholarship, I think it’s undeniable that the Catholics have been the true praticioners of a reasonable via media approach, avoiding the pitfalls of fundamentalism on the right, and liberalism on the left.  Sadly that’s far more true of most RC scholars than most Anglican biblical scholars, although they are certainly some happy exceptions.  And +N. T. Wright and Dr. Christopher Seitz would be among the most prominent of those glorious exceptions.

David Handy+

Sarah,

There is a large group of Catholic scholars that are more liberal and desires to contemplate the “modern (German liberal) criticism” and other groups which hold to the same high view that someone like Matt+ does. So liberals like NRA+ will find many, but they tend to be more on the academic side that he’d agree with but clergy tend to grown more to the inerrentist side (I’d count the Pope as disagreeing with liberal). There is a large gambit, but unlike Protestants, Catholic liberals do have to fear discipline, so they tend to stay in bounds and write more circular arguments thane Jack Spong might.

Generally one asks who their favorite scholar is and that will begin to tell you where they fall in the spectrium.

It should be noted that most RC apologist I’ve met (or seemingly those running the RCIA classes) have no clue what their Church’s position on Scripture is truly, so often end up violating what it has been stated in effort to make a point against a Protestant argument.

Starting points to the very long and complex understand of RCC doctrine post-VC2:

CCC section giving JP 2’s understanding. (this site was more reader friendly, else the Vatican one).

The actual VC 2 document DEI VERBUM

Then an article I found while looking for the exact resources listed above:

Some even maintain that these views do not conflict with what our predecessor laid down since—so they claim—he said that the sacred writers spoke in accordance with the external—and thus deceptive—appearance of things in nature. But the Pontiff’s own words show that this is a rash and false deduction. For sound philosophy teaches that the senses can never be deceived as regards their own proper and immediate object. Therefore, from the merely external appearance of things—of which, of course, we have always to take account as Leo Xlll, following in the footsteps of St. Augustine and St. Thomas, most wisely remarks—we can never conclude that there is any error in Sacred Scripture.

My link above to the article is acting strangely, but I can get to it via the printer friendly version.

http://www.diocs.org/q&a;/printerfriendly.cfm?&question=21inerrancy

I see it, SF inserted a “;” (as it often does with an ampersand) between the q & a and the “/” to printerfriendly - manually take it out and it should work for you.

Its ironic that a non-Cathlic, Dr. George, has a better grasp of the situation, and Pope Benedict XVI comments, than his RC collegues. I would be surprised if Richard John Neuhaus is not active in the background of this debate.

Fascinating.

Hosea 6:6 (#4),

There you go again.  I am not a “liberal,” although I do enphatically reject any notion of biblical inerrancy.  I am well within the mainstream of opinion, as far as modern biblical scholarship goes, and in fact I’m well to the right of center among the 6,000 or so of us in the US with a Ph.D. in biblical studies.  (And yes, I know how haughty that sounds.  I don’t say it to “pull rank” on non-specialists in biblical studies, but to indicate that I do have qualifications to show that I know what I’m talking about).

I’m glad you provided the helpful links above, especially to the fine Vatican II document, Dei Verbum, which I think is actually one of the most important of the 16 major documents that came out of Vatican II, although the far-reaching implications of it weren’t clear at the time and it was overshadowed by other council documents (like Lumen Gentium, on the reform of the liturgy) that initially seemed more radical.  But the fact that Vatican II very definitely refused to endorse the traditional notion of biblical inerrancy is in fact one of the most revolutionary aspects of Vatican II, as the last 40 years has made clear.

The Catholic Q & A site you refer to above is an EXTREMELY conservative one that is NOT representative of the RC mainstream today.  For instance, it cites approvingly Fr. George Kelly, one of the harshest (and most ignorant) critics of my venerable hero, Fr. Raymond Brown, who was often praised by the Vatican for his devotion to Catholic doctrine, and whose works always carried an imprimatur and nihil obstat.

As for Pope Leo XIII’s famous encyclical Providentissimus Deus, which did indeed endorse the idea of biblical inerrancy, it’s worth noting the date of it, 1893.  It reflects a crucial time when the impact of modern biblical scholarship was really beginning to be felt in all its forcefulness by both Protestants and Catholics.  In particular, this was the time when the revolutionary implications of scholarly research on the Pentateuch was starting to come home to many leaders outside of academia.

That is, Julius Wellhausen’s great classic, Prolegomena to the History of Israel, had just come out in English translation in 1885 (German original in 1883).  And the same year that Leo XIII released his vehement rejection of the whole project that Wellhausen and others had pursued was also the year that America’s leading academic advocate of the Documentary Hypothesis, Charles A. Briggs, a Presbyterian OT scholar who taught at Union Seminary in Manhattan, was convicted of heresy by the General Assembly of the (northern) Presbyterian Church (May, 1893).  Over in England, Samuel Driver’s clasic Introduction to the Literature of the OT, had come out in 1891, and it had likewise stirred up intense controversy because of its frank and full acceptance of the new critical approach.  And not least, this was so controversial because S. R. Driver was a canon of Christ Church Cathedral in Oxford, as well as the even more important fact that he occupied the prestigious chair of Hebrew at Oxford that had previously been held by the great Anglo-Catholic pioneer Edward Pusey for about 40 years, and Pusey had fought tooth and nail against the modern critical approach all his life.

Similarly, for us Anglicans, the publication of Lux Mundi in 1889 (just four years before Providentissimus Desu) was a watershed.  An influential group of theological essays by a group of Anglo-Catholic scholars at Oxford, the most controversial and influential of those essays was the one by the leader of the group, Charles Gore (later made a bishop).  Gore’s essay on the Interpretation of Holy Scripture was very frank in its repudiation of biblical inerrancy and of such traditional notions as the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch.  Yet Gore was actually quite conservative theologically, and when he later became a bishop, he was often involved in fighting to defend orthodox Christianity against the encroachments of liberalism within the C of E.  I see myself as very much being in the Charles Gore tradition.  I am much closer to Gore than to Charles Briggs, his much more liberal contemporary.

David Handy+

Thanks, David, for your statement which clearly reflects the best of current biblical scholarship.  I would only add that Pope Pius XII’s encyclical was Divino Afflante Spiritu.  One of the best recent statements about biblical scholarship was the Pontifical Biblical Commission’s The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church from 1993.  I’m also very interested in Joseph A. Fitzmyer’s new book The Interpretation of Scripture: In Defense of the Historical-Critical Method which is coming out this fall with Paulist Press.  I intend to buy it in Boston at SBL.

Rudy+

Moot (#10),

Thanks for providing that helpful link.  I wholeheartedly endorse the model of canonical criticism which your link is promoting.  The main scholar cited there is Yale’s Brevard Childs, a fundamentally orthodox Presbyterian (OK, a Barthian Neo-Orthodox sort of guy), who was one of my foremost teachers when I got my M. Div. at Yale in 1983.  He also is the mentor of Dr. Christopher Seitz, of ACI fame.  I cannot recommend the many writings of Dr. Childs too highly.  However, it should be noted that he was not anything like an inerrantist, although he was clearly well to the right of center theologically (in academia anyway).

Thanks again, Moot, for calling attention to canonical criticism, which is indeed a “fascinating” approach that treats Holy Scripture as truly a sacred and authoritative text for both the synagogue and the Church.

David Handy+

Its interesting to note on this score that the intro to the newly released ESV study bible, overseen by Grudem and Packer and many others is helpful in summing up for laymen and women the manifold inadequacies of the Documentary hypothesis and its growing disrepute among scholars. It is a dinosaur theory going the way of the dinosaurs.

As for inerrancy and Catholicism, do note that some of the scholars NRA recommends above are among the most liberal. Luke Timothy Johnson, for example, recently wrote:
http://www.commonwealmagazine.org/article.php3?id_article=1957

The task demands intellectual honesty. I have little patience with efforts to make Scripture say something other than what it says, through appeals to linguistic or cultural subtleties. The exegetical situation is straightforward: we know what the text says. But what are we to do with what the text says? We must state our grounds for standing in tension with the clear commands of Scripture, and include in those grounds some basis in Scripture itself. To avoid this task is to put ourselves in the very position that others insist we already occupy-that of liberal despisers of the tradition and of the church’s sacred writings, people who have no care for the shared symbols that define us as Christian. If we see ourselves as liberal, then we must be liberal in the name of the gospel, and not, as so often has been the case, liberal despite the gospel.

I think it important to state clearly that we do, in fact, reject the straightforward commands of Scripture, and appeal instead to another authority when we declare that same-sex unions can be holy and good. And what exactly is that authority? We appeal explicitly to the weight of our own experience and the experience thousands of others have witnessed to, which tells us that to claim our own sexual orientation is in fact to accept the way in which God has created us. By so doing, we explicitly reject as well the premises of the scriptural statements condemning homosexuality-namely, that it is a vice freely chosen, a symptom of human corruption, and disobedience to God’s created order.

I will say a further word about “experience,” a term that without careful discernment may become simply an excuse for irresponsible behavior. First, though, it is important to acknowledge that terms like “sexual orientation,” and even “heterosexual” and “homosexual” are themselves distorting oversimplifications of complex human realities. One reason for paying attention to specific human stories, in fact, is that they so often prove more complex and obscure than the categories that polarize debates and block discernment.

Thanks, Rudy+ (#12).  I’m sorry that I won’t be there in Boston myself.  We’ll have to get together some other time.

David Handy+

David
Do you really buy into JEDP?  It is my understanding that most scholars considered it
passe.

Thanks again, Moot, for calling attention to canonical criticism, which is indeed a “fascinating” approach that treats Holy Scripture as truly a sacred and authoritative text for both the synagogue and the Church.

Actually, I was just googling the term ‘canonical exegesis,’ found the link, and put it up for everyone’s benefit.  I had no other motive, and in fact I’m not sure what to think of these developments within Rome; or whether in fact they are developments.

Matt+ (#14),

I’m sorry to be so blunt, but your #14 is sorely mistaken and badly misleading in its characterization of modern scholarship. 

Two quick points of correction.  First about the Documentary Hypothesis (i.e., the famous J,E,D,P theory about the origins of the Pentateuch).  It is true that various aspects of the Documentary Hypothesis have come under increasing questioning from various directions, but it remains BY FAR the dominant model in the field.  And NO major biblical scholar defends the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch these days.  Period.  And due to the patient and detailed work of the observant, Conservative Jew, Richard Elliott Friedman, who teaches at U. Cal. in San Diego, the Documentary Hypothesis has actually been put on firmer footing than ever before.  I regard Friedman’s work as totally convincing.  See his magisterial classic, “Who Wrote the Bible?” (First edition, 1887; but be sure to read the second, further refined edition of 1897).  It’s just stunningly good.  Seldom is a major work of original scholarship also so entertaining and fun to read.  Or check out Friedman’s long article on “Torah” in the standard reference work, the (six volume!) Anchor Bible Dictionary (1992).

Second, it’s simply false to call Luke Timothy Johnson (another one of my beloved teachers at Yale Div. School, who later moved to Indiana and then to Emory in Atlanta) “one of the most liberal.”  Huh??  Yes, unfortunately Dr. Johnson has fallen for the “gay is OK” delusion (he has a lesbian daughter, which I think has clouded his normal good judgment), but on MOST issues, Johnson is very definitely on the conservative end of the spectrum, even among Catholic biblical scholars.  See for example his scathing critique of the ridiculous claims of the Jesus Seminar led by those notorious skeptics who attempt to debunk Christianity, Robert Funk and Dominic Crossan (along with Marcus Borg etc.).

Please, Matt, be more reasonable.

David Handy+

Old Soldier (#16),

Yes, I do indeed fully accept the basic SOURCE analysis of the Pentateuch that goes back to Julius Wellhausen in the 1870s and 1880s.  That does NOT mean however that I accept all Wellhausen’s associated HISTORICAL and THEOLOGICAL judgments, which are another matter entirely.  Let me again refer you, and anyone interested, to the outstanding and compelling work of the Jewish OT scholar Richard Elliott Friedman, which is superb in every way.  As noted above, see his fantastic book, “Who Wrote the Bible?”  It reads like a detective story and is very accessible.  Or check out his own translation of the Pentateuch, that uses different colors and fonts to indicate the sources behind the Pentateuch in his more recent work, “The Bible Revealed according to its Sources.”

I may have stirred up a nornet’s nest of controversy once again here.  Let me just say that I’ll be unable to respond to any critics for the next three hours, as I have a prayer meeting to lead.  And yes, that’s much more important than whatever anyone hinks about source criticism of the Bible.

I would be the first to admit and emphasize that the holy Tetragrammaton (or four letters) is YHWH, and not JEDP.  Let no one suppose I think otherwise.

David Handy+
Committed to moderate biblical scholarship.
EVEN MORE COMMITTED to orthodox Christianity and Jesus Christ.

Yes, unfortunately Dr. Johnson has fallen for the “gay is OK” delusion (he has a lesbian daughter, which I think has clouded his normal good judgment),

I continue to find statements like this troublesome.  One does not, in my perspective, reason their way out of being a Christian, or vice-versa.  IOW, the “fall” of your friend rather reveals a persistent condition of the heart.  He is promoting a thing that is inconsistent (per Scripture) with membership in the Kingdom of Heaven.  And unless he repents, he will have to be regarded as apostate.

And NO major biblical scholar defends the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch these days.  Period. 

And from the mouth of NRA (how disapointing)  to the ear of God.  Just shows what the typical seminary education in liberal schools will do for the best.  Now I am no major scholar, but I will stand with Dr. F.F.Bruce, Dr. Bruce Waltke—formost Hebrew scholar, and the Lord Jesus Christ who are clear that the first five books were written by Moses.  Good enough for me.  Dallas Theological Seminary—-ever heard of it?  (How about a four year degree in which the OT and NT are translated by the students from the original languages,) teaches that Wellhausen and co. have been totaly discredited. 

Reminds me of the old story of how the liberal scholars reported that they have proved that Moses didn’t write the Pentateuch, but rather another Hebrew who called himself Moses did!  Also, their archeology proved that the Jews listened to transistor radios, because with careful excavation, no home was found with wall plugs. 
Well what do I know, I can’t even spell in annglish.  Cheers

Hi y’all,  I will admit that the discussion is above my head.  My question is how do y’all define the term inerrant?  My understanding is that yes the Bible is inerrant, the solid rock on which our faith stands.  Otherwise, we would be free to pick and choose what part of it we think is correct and which part not, and the danger to me would then be a spiralling downward into a situation like we have in ECUSA.  I do think that one needs to interpret individual verses in light of Scripture as a whole, though, otherwise one could just as easily be led astray.  Does what I say make sense?  If not, please correct me.  Thanks.

P w/o H:  You are asking the right question. The answer among evangelicals is usually that the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy is the working definition.  Someone here probably has the link.  Or Googling will probably bring it up.

I know OT scholars who do use source criticism of the Torah, and also at least one OT scholar who doesn’t use it.  I think the latter colleagues do more in the way of literary criticism rather than reconstructing theoretical sources.  But I am very sympathetic to source criticism of the Torah.  I find it helpful when I am teaching the two creation stories of Genesis (1:1-2:4a and 2:4b-3:24).

Rudy+

How about a four year degree in which the OT and NT are translated by the students from the original languages

Yes, I did one of those. Clearly I wasted my time.

Yes, unfortunately Dr. Johnson has fallen for the “gay is OK” delusion (he has a lesbian daughter, which I think has clouded his normal good judgment), but on MOST issues, Johnson is very definitely on the conservative end of the spectrum

Really? “Conservative” in this whoel area is not about the conclusion one comes to so much as the authority for that conclusion. In the piece that Matt quoted Johnson displays his “conservatism”:

I think it important to state clearly that we do, in fact, reject the straightforward commands of Scripture, and appeal instead to another authority when we declare that same-sex unions can be holy and good. And what exactly is that authority? We appeal explicitly to the weight of our own experience and the experience thousands of others have witnessed to,

Now, Johnson may have “conservative” opinions but his theological method is not conservative. It is, as demonstrated by those words, quite liberal.

I found much encouragement in the rejection of more recent uses of the historical/critical method of biblical exegesis by PBXVI in his Jesus of Nazareth books.  I believe it has been a travesty, and certainly an enabler of the fall of TEC that theologians have embraced the notion that every dot or tittle of the New Testament must conform to some cultural context that we think we have gleaned about their time (typically with almost no evidence to support such things). 

Oddly enough, at times Scripture really does MEAN exactly what it SAYS even translated from Hebrew or Greek into modern English.  Sometimes I think Biblical Scholars put too much emphasis on the hunt, and not enough on the hunted, if you will.

I am encouraged that within the Roman Catholic Church the debate goes on and movements to reign in Canons, Catechism, or endorsed Practices that do not conform to Scripture but bear sanction still exist, however much they must battle to make themselves heard.  This debate and tension is critical to the life of the Church, as long as they are debating from an accepting position to and fro, not simply all staking out a claim and clouding the water for the Congregants.

Am I making any sense at all?  Long day!

KTF!...mrb

[11] New Reformation Advocate wrote:

I am not a “liberal,” although I do emphatically reject any notion of biblical inerrancy.

Yes, David, you are a Liberal.  You are an unusual species of Liberal in that you hold to orthodox theology.  But your presuppositions and methodologies are liberal, and in those are found the locus of the definition.  What causes the controversy is that you are trying to stretch the definition of ‘conservative’ far enough to cover your presuppositions.  And that is why you meet such constant and unrelenting resistance. 

carl

NRA’s response is typical…he is always quick to assert his orthodoxy while endorsing methods that and practitioners who undercut it and attempting a kind of intellectual bullying…“NO serious scholar would ever say…” to bolster his positions. In fact, he is quite liberal with regard to his understanding of the nature of scripture and its truthfulness.

“I’m sorry to be so blunt, but your #14 is sorely mistaken and badly misleading in its characterization of modern scholarship.”

Not true. It was quite accurate.

“Two quick points of correction.  First about the Documentary Hypothesis (i.e., the famous J,E,D,P theory about the origins of the Pentateuch).  It is true that various aspects of the Documentary Hypothesis have come under increasing questioning from various directions, but it remains BY FAR the dominant model in the field.”

The question of course is “which field”? If NRA means “source critics” then sure. The problem is that source criticism is increasingly eschewed as a dominant or primary methodology primarily because of the terrible deficiencies of the Documentary Hypothesis. You can read a really good destruction of JEDP, before destroying JEDP was cool, by Italian Jewish scholar Umberto Cassuto in eight lectures outlined here:
http://www.dovidgottlieb.com/comments/Documentary_Hypothesis.htm

Here is a bound version of the texts:
http://www.amazon.com/Documentary-Hypothesis-Umberto-Cassuto/dp/9657052351

“And NO major biblical scholar defends the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch these days.  Period.”

...Except for those who do like, just to name some:
Jonathan H. Sailhamer
William Sanford LaSor
Robert L. Hubbord Jr.
Frank E. Gaebelein…

and there are, of course many more.

What NRA has done is to define “scholar” as “those who agree with the documentary hypothesis”

As for this:

“it’s simply false to call Luke Timothy Johnson (another one of my beloved teachers at Yale Div. School, who later moved to Indiana and then to Emory in Atlanta) “one of the most liberal.” Huh??...”

I think Ould has taken this down fairly well above.

David Handy+

You are quite enamored by the liberal critical scholarship that you were taught in Yale Div. School and espouse it all over SFIF for nearly a year now, all the while doing vandalism to the Church Fathers usually while talking to me and everyone else in the most arrogant tone. Many on your list ARE the RC liberal, you can find more extreme, but yes you take liberal side in Biblical criticisms while applying “modern” or other adjectives and use bully techniques to insist that you’re correct. You’re one of the most liberal people on SF and while claiming “orthodoxy” and “catholicity,” I’ve found most of your argument neither.

Good day.

Well, I’m back now, and thankful for the frank feedback of several commenters above.  I’m still learning how to communicate more effectively here at SF on controversial threads like this one.  I want to express my appreciation that the tone of my critics above wasn’t as harsh or caustic as has sometimes been the case on similar threads, and I’m grateful for that.

Perhaps I can clarify one point above where I probably didn’t express myself properly, and thus caused unnecessary offense.  And that was when I roundly and dogmatically declared that no major biblical scholar supports the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch these days.  In my mind, the key word there is “major.”  That is, I meant that no MAJOR practicing biblical scholar does so anymore, in the sense that the person is a major contributor to advancing the frontiers of knowledge and is considered by his peers to be a leading scholar.  I know that still sounds arrogant, or like a circular argument, but I hope it helps to clarify what I did and didn’t mean.  I’m sorry if it still sounds condescending, as I’m sure it does.

Let me also hasten to reassert once again that it is NOT my intention to undermine anyone’s confidence in the Scriptures as truly being the Word of God written (which is something I fully affirm and teach).  And I remain committed to the supreme authority of the Bible in the life of the Christian Church.  It is indeed, as the Lambeth Quadrilateral of 1888 rightly says, “the rule and ultimate standard of faith.”

And I freely grant that I myself am very far from inerrant.  So let me correct a blatant error in one of my posts above.  Richard Elliott Friedman’s superb book, “Who Wrote the Bible?,” came out initially in 1987, not 1887, and the revised edition was published in 1997, not 1897.  I will readily admit that I make such typos all the time, as is all too evident.

I remain grateful that people here at SF who are more conservative than I am in their approach to biblical scholarship still are willing to interact with me, and not dismiss me in the same way that we’d all write off liberals like EmilyH, or Fr. Jake, or Tom from Santa Fe etc.

Finally, returning to the original focus of this thread, I’ll just point out that although carl and others above imply that I’m highly unusual in combining the acceptance of the METHODS of modern biblical scholarship with a fundamentally orthodox theology, I think there are FAR more of us who do that than people like carl suppose.  There are MANY of us who do that, and this is particularly true these days of Roman Catholic biblical scholars.  I named about a dozen of them above, and they are just the tip of a very large iceberg.

David Handy+

NRA

BTW - Pope Leo XIII is echoed since then even up to the current Pope. In fact Benedict XVI is the most evangelical guy I’ve seen in the RCC, wow, I’d never thought I’d see the day. So you’re point again is selective to what you want to hear.

L. T. Johnson is not fairly described as “among the most liberal” of biblical scholars as asserted in #14. To say this is not to be familiar with the whole body of his work nor the whole expanse of contemporary biblical scholarship.

For example, he has argued
*stridently against the endeavors of the Jesus Seminar, both methods and conclusions;
*against gospel scholarship which obsesses over sources, layers of tradition, and hypothetical communities, affirming instead the canonical form of the text;
*for the Jesus of the gospels as a model of Christian life and authentic humanity;
*for the Church’s early and unambiguous affirmation of the deity of Christ;
*for the Pauline authorship of the Pastoral Epistles (and other disputed epistles);
*for the centrality of Scripture and the Church’s creeds for Christian theology and the vitality of the Church.

His argument dismissing the witness of Scripture with respect to homosexuality is fairly described as “liberal” (and badly mistaken), but it is not the whole of his contribution.  In truth, he is hard to label.  And maybe labels like “liberal” and “conservative” are not so helpful.

33. This is what I wrote:

“As for inerrancy and Catholicism, do note that some of the scholars NRA recommends above are among the most liberal. Luke Timothy Johnson, for example, recently wrote…”

I did not say that LTJ was the MOST liberal RC scholar. I said that SOME in the group NRA named were among the most liberal with regard to the question of inerrancy. LTJ is most certainly among the most liberal biblical scholars both theologically (which is why I used the quote above) and methodologically…and I say that as one who has read his very good defense of the historical Jesus, “the Real Jesus” against the Jesus seminar.

The problem is that his defense in the Real Jesus boils down to a defense of ecclesial authority without necessarily asserting the historical validity of the biblical texts and their consequent authority…which is quite similar to NRA’s various defenses of orthodoxy…

I remain grateful that people here at SF who are more conservative than I am in their approach to biblical scholarship still are willing to interact with me, and not dismiss me in the same way that we’d all write off liberals like EmilyH, or Fr. Jake, or Tom from Santa Fe etc.

Your position on sexuality and Christology are orthodox, but I have no clue why.

You have no foundation. The Divine Word you have an opinion very much like theirs and ridicule it for all the “errors,” when it comes to “catholicity,” you argue PRO-WO and completely dismiss Tradition, then you make an absurd claim “As for Pope Leo XIII’s famous encyclical Providentissimus Deus, which did indeed endorse the idea of biblical inerrancy, it’s worth noting the date of it, 1893.” Okay, you have not spent much time with Catholics, have you? The reason I say absurd is their timescale is MUCH longer than yours. It’s much like me, an American, talking to some of my family in England, sure 1776 may seem a long time for me, but when a parish celebrates it’s millennial, it puts a different perspective on things. It also is the glaring clue that you accept the liberal scholarship of the twentieth century. 

Now here is the question for you, why are you different from Fr. Jake, or Tom from Santa Fe? Honestly, if I accept your understanding of Scripture, then why should I disregard their arguments?

Once again, I think we need to define our terms.  Conservative and liberal are not necessarily the turf of certain political stances or denominations.  Is it “conservative” to think that Moses wrote the Pentateuch?  Is it “conservative” to think the world is a few thousand years old (or flat)?  Is it liberal to disagree with American Protestant evangelical Calvinist scholarship?  The problem I have with talking about Catholic theology is that there really are a great many of ultra-liberal Catholic theologians and religious who are working to turn the RCC in the USA into another TEC.  And there are a great many serious, conservative, Catholic scholars as well.  It’s easy to get in the habit of measuring scholarship by our own standards.  I know people who look at Scripture through their own lens and are completely unable to even imagine that the Fathers much less the gospel writer is not looking through the same lens.

Hosea (and others),

Well, I’ll readily concede that I’m the most determined defender of the validity and value of mainstream biblical scholarship here at SF, but I’m not nearly as unusual as you seem to think.  I’m not sure why more of my colleagues don’t join in the fray here on threads that involve the whole critical vs. traditional approaches to Scripture (or if you will, inerrantist vs. non-inerrantist approaches), except that you have to have a very thick skin and perhaps a certain measure of sado-masocism to put yourself through the kind of criticism I receive whenever I stick up for centrist scholarship.  After all, “liberal” and “conservative” are highly relative terms.  Thus, in the Diocese of VA and Southern VA I’m considered VERY conservative by the great majority of my fellow clergy.  So it all depends on your standard of reference, doesn’t it?

As for Yale, my feelings about my seminary are actually quite mixed.  I was indeed deeply influenced by Brevard Childs in OT and Luke Johnson in NT, who were two of the most conservative members of the faculty.  I was also profoundly influenced by Leander Keck and Abraham Malherbe (both world class NT scholars), who are also quite centrist figures overall.  Actually, in the early 1980s when I was there, Yale was the center of what was called “post-liberal” theology (a term coined and made popular by George Linkbeck, who taught historical theology at YDS).  Alas, Yale is certainly more one-sidedly liberal now than it was then.

And the same applies to Union-PSCE in Richmond, where I got my doctorate.  In the 1990s it was a wonderfully moderate place.  Those were the glory days for Union in VA, when Paul Achtemeier and Jack Dean Kingsbury taught NT there, and James Luther Mays and Dean McBride taught OT there.  As some SF readers will already know, when the main professional guild of biblical scholars in the US, the SBL or Society of Biblical Literature decided to issue some major handbooks as a way of celebrating the centenary of that organization (founded in 1889 I think), they tapped Dr. Achtemeier to edit the Harper’s Bible Dictionary (which is an outstanding resource), and they chose Dr. Mays to edit the twin volume, the Harper’s Bible Commentary (which is almost as good).  While I was a doctoral student at Union, the United Bible Society sent several of their top new recruits to Union to get their doctorates (i.e., those international students from developing countries who were being primed to act as the top UBS translation consultants around the world).  Thus Bible Societies considered Union to be the best mix of top scholarship with orthodox theology at the time. 

Alas, that was then.  Sadly, the school has gone downhill since the 1990s, both academically and especially spiritually.  Under the presidency of Louis Weeks, an unabashed liberal, Union-PSCE has taken a strong lurch to the left, of which I am very critical.  I thank God that I was privileged to be a student at Yale Div. School and Union-PSCE when they were at or near their best.  But I freely admit that the fact that both elite schools have since tanked spiritually is a very disturbing and sobering reality.  Their demise, however, wasn’t due to accepting the METHODS of modern biblical and theological scholarship, but to buying into the false CONCLUSIONS of many liberal scholars, which is another matter entirely.

David Handy+

David Handy,
How can you claim not to be a liberal when you deny the inerrantcy of Scripture?  You are at best self-deceived, and at worst seeking to deceive.

The trouble you experience communicating is primarily grounded in what you’re trying to communicate.  Make up your mind about what you wish to say (admit you’re a liberal revisionist) and you’ll find it much easier to say it.

David, as you know Yale, you might be interested to hear this story about Roland Bainton.  My dad dreamed that he was watching a clown dance on boards.  He became very anxious that the fellow would fall.  For some reason, he was talking to Bainton’s wife on the phone the next day and told her the dream.  She was shocked and told him that Roland had been painting, standing on a board he had stuck in the window and had fallen and hurt himself.  Odd linkage.  Bainton would have been gone before you got there.  JON might still have been there.  I considered making a retreat at Kirkridge a while back but couldn’t get it scheduled.

Hosea (#35)

Your position (NRA+) on sexuality and Christology are orthodox, but I have no clue why.

Of course you do.  If NRA+ thinks and talks like your average apostate cleric, yet reaches completely different conclusions on the REALLY big things, then what (or rather, Who) would account for the difference?

The solution to that mystery is identical to the one regarding what keeps you and I from devoting ourselves to lifetimes of flipping the bird to the Almighty. 

We can rejoice;  it doesn’t mean that we have to follow. 

Anyhow, that’s what this poor Calvinist has to say on the subject. 

Hosea (#35),

You asked me a serious and important question above, i.e., Why am I different from Fr. Jake or Tom from Santa Fe?  In essence, how can I accept liberal methods the way I do and yet come to such conservative conclusions on matters like Christology or sexual ethics?

And I’d say it’s basically for two reasons, or maybe three.

First, as Matt has rightly pointed out above, it’s because I place such a high value on the apostolic Tradition of the Church.  I really do seek to be guided by the ancient principle of Vincent of Lerins (in the 5th century AD), i.e., that the proper interpretation of Scripture from a doctrinal or moral standpoint is the his summary of the standard of orthodoxy, “what has been believed everywhere, always, and by all” (in Latin, “quod ubique, quod semper, quod ab omnibus creditum est”).  In that regard I am a loyal son of the Anglo-Catholic Diocese of Albany (which although it supports WO is NOT of the “Affirming Catholicism” sort).

Second, and this is the key thing people like carl don’t seem to get, I reach the conservative conclusions I do BECAUSE THE EVIDENCE WARRANTS IT.  I support the orthodox view of Christology and sexual ethics (etc.), because that is what the evidence compels me to believe and teach.  It’s not a matter of the pre-suppositions I bring to the table; it’s the FACTS that drive me to reach those orthodox conclusions.  And I likewise reject the notion of biblical inerrancy (which is never taught in Scripture itself, nor in the 39 Articles) BECAUSE THE FACTS DON’T SUPPORT IT.  The FACTS just don’t bear out the traditional notion that Moses wrote the bulk of the Pentateuch etc.  But they DO support the reality of the empty tomb etc.

Finally, whether it’s due to my wonderful grounding in basic discipleship at good old Wheaton College or due to some other reason, my continuing commitment to upholding Christian orthodoxy and my deep love for the Scriptures is sustained and continually renewed because I keep trying my best to submit myself to living by the Scriptures as God’s Word written.  And in the end, that’s what probably makes the difference between me and true liberals like EmilyH, or Elizabeth Keaton, or apostate bishops like Bruno, Chane, Shaw etc.

I still in the end believe and try to practice what I was taught back at Wheaton (more by example than anything), and that is this:  To under-stand the Bible properly, you must be willing to STAND UNDER it as God’s Word.  Especially the parts you don’t like or fully understand.  I still try my best to do that every day.  Perhaps in the end, that’s due primarily to the mysterious grace of God, that faithfully holds onto me, even when I’m not always faithful to him.  Thanks be to God.

David Handy+

#37, I am aware of the Documentary Hypothesis of course and am not opposed, generally speaking.  However, I tend to approach things from the Antiochian tradition, which treats Scripture in a literal fashion, homiletically.  Certainly, there are times when the truth in a given pericope or passage is better grasped if NOT taken literally.  The Fathers, taken as a whole, were pretty saavy.I don’t say much about certain consequences of critical method ... for instance looking at the historical setting of the Book of Daniel, because so many people’s adherence to the faith these days is so tenuous, so untested.  Milk is required before meat.  I do not mean by this the presumption of the liberals of TEC who condescend to pretend they believe in Scripture when in fact they have emptied the words and replaced them with faithless, Gnostic psychologisms and mere literary criticism.  At base, we must always begin with the sacramental dimension of Holy Scripture. Christians do not do comparative anthropology of Scripture nor do we mistakenly think such an attitude would be less biased.  We begin our study as an act of worship.  In that context, we are not to play the devil’s advocate.  If a man is struggling to stay afloat and believing that Moses wrote the Pentateuch is the branch that keeps his head above water, I would not pull that away lest he drown.  It requires discernment.

Moot (#40),

I only read your last comment after I posted my last one.  I’m happy to say that I agree with you wholeheartedly, as I think the end of my #41 shows.  It’s all due to God’s grace.  His sheer, unmerited grace.

David Handy+

Mr (Rev? Fr.?) Handy,  I just wanted to ask you if you have read Cardinal Ratzinger’s Erasmus Lecture given in 1988 called Biblical Interpretation in Crisis, On the Question of the Foundation and Approaches to Exegesis Today.  I was recently assigned to read this in a course I am taking, in which we also read the 1993 Pontifical Commission statement that “Rudy+” mentions above.  Being very naive on this issue, I was somewhat disturbed by some things in the Pontifical Commission statement.  I admit that I was much happier with the Ratzinger lecture.  In it,  he suggests that since there is a hundred years of historical criticism, that the exegetes apply their method to writings in historical criticism over time.  He says that doing this would show that sometimes what they thought they had uncovered in the source was really an assumption of their own age.  But please,  find the lecture yourself and read it from your much more learned point of view.  I myself had difficulty understanding how Ratzinger gave this lecture and then wrote the preface to the 1993 Pontifical Commission statement. 
There are also some more recent thoughts of Cardinal Ratzinger/B16 on this subject in the preface to Jesus of Nazareth. 

I googled and quickly found the lecture in question at First Things:

Ratzinger lecture

Susan Peterson

monologistos (#42),

I’m glad you chimed in.  I agree with you about the need for discernment and pastoral sensitivity, which certainly gives me qualms sometimes about some of the things I have written here at SF in defense of biblical scholarship.  I definitely have no desire to undermine anyone’s faith.  Quite the contrary.  Far be it from me to pull that plank you mention from someone shipwrecked in the ocean.  But since this whole vexed dispute in the war for the soul of Anglicanism comes down in the end to upholding biblical authority, it’s essential that we be clear on what we mean by that.  Most of my time (when I’m not blogging) is spent fighting on the opposite front, against the liberal denigration of orthodoxy.

Interesting story about Roland Bainton.  Actually, he did live long enough for me to hear him speak (not long before he died).  I fondly remember him giving his annual rendition of Martin Luther’s tender view of Christmas around Christmas time (SF readers may recall that Luther wrote “Away in a Manger”).  Bainton was indeed an artist.  To this day, one of my favorite features of his books is how they are FILLED with marvelous illustrations and pictures of historical artifacts, such as the Albrecht Durer woodprints that adorn his classic biography of Luther.  Those real life illustrations sure do help stimulate my imagination and help bring the past to life.

And I appreciate the Antiochene tradition of biblical interpretation too, especially the marvelous sermons of John Chrysostom (or Theodore of Mopsuestia).

David Handy+

#41 Oh please, the “Facts” as you were taught by your liberal professors in YDS didn’t support it, yet there others who dispute the “FACTS” as they understand them and critic the methodology used. Dr. Witt’s “white hats” and “black hats” list ended the mid eighties (oddly about the time you thing institutions suddenly made this spontaneous slide downhill).

FYI -“what has been believed everywhere, always, and by all”  leads to inerrancy and no WO! “THE EVIDENCE WARRANTS IT,” but you are contradicting yourself!

Oddly, a wise teacher of mine said (read in the light of a Gordon College grad then MDiv from Gordon-Conwell), “it’s not so much the apparent contradictions in Scripture that causes so much problem but Scripture contradicts them that’s the problem>”

Your #41 is completely internally inconsistent and full of logical contradictions with appeals to modern criticism and acceptance of modern innovations with “quod ubique, quod semper, quod ab omnibus creditum est.” At least be honest that you are making your religion up as you go along and whatever your mind thinks is right than you declare it to be right and stop trying to appeal to the Church Fathers in one issue, dismiss a nineteenth century (and influential) pope a little while latter, name drop in attempt to identify with Dr Witt, or Dr Chris Sietz+ (who are members of this blog and can speak for themselves and I don’t trust you due to your behavior to speak anything but half-truths about anyone else and you often border on slander in my opinion [after you speak, borrowing another’s name, often I end up with a lower opinion of the one you used to identify to bully tactic your point - aka, if untrue, your use caused a measure of disrespect, functionally it is slander, read God’s Divine Word to what He thinks about it, although I’m not sure the “evidence” would warrant you taking those passages seriously).

Susan (#44),

Yes, I have read the Ratzinger lecture you have called our attention to, though not lately.  Raymond Brown, the pre-eminent RC biblical scholar of the 20th century, made some appreciative comments about it, while gently and respectfully pointing out that then Cardinal Ratzinger knew more about historical theology than biblical studies per se.  It’s late tonight, so I won’t say much more.  Except that I’m glad you brought up the lecture, because while Ratzinger was indeed very cautious in his approval of modern scholarly methods (not all the conclusions, of course, just the methods), he was also quite firm in his rejection of fundamentalism.

David Handy+

Well gang, this just underlines what is wrong in the churches.  The problem with the liberal seminaries like Yale, Union, etc. is not only that they are pumping false “scholarship” poison into un-instructed students, but they fail to let them know about the real scholars, experts and giants of the field.  I see this in graduates of Ivy League schools who have never heard of any of the conservative thinkers.  They have been defrauded.  So Br. Handy, you seem to be a true believer who sees the carnage in TEO due to denial of Scripture, yet do not have the solid basis in the field that supports the innerant Scripture.  Without that then each generation of believers will slip down further into heresy.  No wonder TEO is in trouble and it bodes poorly for the future of any new episcopal organization that may be formed.  The truth has been the same for all time.  Being hip and up to date doesn’t repeal the foundational truths that will stand, but just separate them from it.

Hosea (#46),

I know it must seem arbitrary and internally inconsistent to you (as to many other conservatives).  But I stand by what I said about being driven by the facts and the state of the evidence.  You are, of course, free to interpret the facts differently.

I admit that WO is a radical innovation.  But so was the abolition of slavery in the 19th century.  So was allowing Christians to engage in commercial lending (an innovation that goes back especially to Calvin in the 16th century).  So was the Just War theory of Augustine (after the Peace of Constantine and after Theodosius made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire), after the Ante-Nicene Church was pacifist.  And so on.

The Vincentian Rule does NOT mean that there have been no radical changes in the Church’s teaching over the centuries.  It doesn’t mean what has been believed “always” in so simplistic a way.  The great dogma of the Trinity is perhaps the best proof of that.  It did evolve slowly, over several centuries, as the Holy Spirit guided the Church into all truth, as the Master promised.

Let me suggest that the key here is how we understand the phenomenon called, ever since John Henry Newman’s classic work of 1845, “the development of doctrine.”  Newman proved beyond all reasonable doubt that doctrinal development (or change) has occured over the centuries.  But at the same time, not all such change is healthy or justified.  And so Newman proposed seven tests back in 1845 for determining the difference between valid and invalid doctrinal developments, i.e., how to discern the difference between those that grow organically from earlier seeds within the evolving Tradition of the Church and are thus justified, and those that are corruptions on the other hand that falsify and distort that authentic Tradition.  I think Newman was very much on the right track.

David Handy+

Susan Peterson,

I’d say the “1993 Pontifical Commission statement” is a Big Tent one and the “Ratzinger lecture” is his personal views. There is certainly a liberal contingent inside the Roman Church, especially in academia.

Most my professors favor Karl Rahner type of theology, but outside the university, I’ve found Catholics who are very different (if you want the intellectualism of the university but passion for orthodoxy, then I’d suggest finding a L’Arche house, they are they end up the magnet around here for both), so the “Pontifical Commission statement” must take in both sides of the debate. It is one of the keys that has helped unlock my understanding of official documents is that they are NOT monolithic and tend to include all those not under discipline of the Church (in bounds so reaching out, even if one’s toes are on the line).

I’m still looking for the definition of MAJOR biblical scholar.  Who decides?

Arguing that a major scholar is someone who advances the scholarship and is recognized among their peers is fairly weak.  By that standard Crossan, Spong, Borg or even any peer-reviewed and published Ph.D student is a major scholar.

The same could be said for the label, CENTRIST.  Unless the parameters are defined, the center is non-locatable, except to the person using the label.

.  But so was the abolition of slavery in the 19th century.

Dream on! No it was NOT!! You really are a liberal aren’t you! It does not take too long to see how something is practices and one who has a high respect for Scripture, instead of twisting it (much like modern so-called “centrist scholars” do today) consider it abhorrent [would you like me to hold your hand and walk you through the Scriptures on why it would be wrong as it was practiced or would you like to confess you were trying to throw up a ruse to “win” your point [oddly proving mine that you’re making up your religion as you go along]).

Let me suggest that the key here is how we understand the phenomenon called, ever since John Henry Newman’s classic work of 1845

No thank you.

I took your arguments about St Augustine to PhD (union card) in Church History and received a long lecture about how you had committed great vandalism and were reading your own ideas into St Augustine, when I send you were PhD in NT, I got an ad hominem cross discipline jab at how NT scholars only have 27 books so have nothing new to say (then it got worst). I have actually read a bit of Newman and would say that I disagree that you “think Newman was very much on the right track” because I see gulf of differences between what he writes and what you write, which goes back to my point that you often call on sources to add credence to your position but those citation do not support you.

I find you about as Anglo-Catholic as Elizabeth Keeton, who also claims the same. No you have departed from Tradition! In fact I have more in common with Carl, whom I have gotten into good debate as he’s a Calvinist, yet oddly we are not much closer to each other in Scripture/Tradition debates than you and I ever have been. I sorry to inform you but what you learned in your education is far from Orthodoxy (big “O” but they seem to like +Newman and certainly fight to preserve “T” Tradition) and to your thinking, as a real honest to goodness confirmed Anglo-Catholic and one who went through Catholic school while they prepared for confirmation, you really are self-deceived if you think you are anywhere close to the Apostolic Tradition of the Church).

#51 AMEN!

Fr. Handy-
While I myself have a criteria which leaves the issue in no doubt,  I would be interested sometime in seeing how you apply Newman’s criteria for the development of dogma to the WO question.  I think, thought, that that would not be considered within the scope of this thread. 

You say that Cardinal Ratzinger/B16 was quite firm in his rejection of fundamentalism.  But what is fundamentalism?  Is it a way of reading scripture which does not acknowledge that different books of it are different types of writing which therefore have to be understood using different criteria?  I don’t think anyone here is advocating that.  Is it a way of thinking which would try to use scripture to determine facts about the order of nature, such as how long it took for the physical universe to come to be, or the movements of the sun and planets?  I don’t think anyone here is advocating that either.

But what about this sort of issue?  Do you consider it fundamentalistic to believe that Jesus said the things the evangelists say He said,  allowing for differences in their memories?  Or do you think we have to believe that the evangelist put such and such words in Jesus’ mouth because of a dispute that was going on in his community many years later?  (Even when we have no independent evidence of what might have been going on in his community.)  For instance,  one book I read recently stated as flat out fact that the risen Jesus did not say ‘Make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit’-no this reflected the practice in Matthew’s community 70 years later.  But even if we knew independently about the practice of the early Christian community (maybe the Didache or Epistle of Clement?)  how would we know that they weren’t doing this because Jesus said to do it?  Is it fundamentalism to take as one’s first assumption that if the gospels say “Jesus said” , that He did?  Is it fundamentalism to reject premises which say “Jesus couldn’t have said thus and so because He wouldn’t/couldn’t have known X,” for instance?  I also think that if surrounding pagan cultures and religions had similar stories to those in the bible,(like those myths which are supposed to have influenced the genesis story)  it is because the pagans had hints of the truth, not because the pagan stories are the origins of the biblical ones.  Even if we suppose a biblical author had heard such pagan stories,  what he put in scripture would be the elements of the story which reflected the truth, and not the others.  That is where I am at on these questions.  I realize you could always say, well God directed the evangelists which elements of their early Christian community life to put in Jesus’s mouth so it is still Scripture, but I don’t like the idea of Scripture saying “Jesus said”  if He didn’t, not even close.  Why would God do that to us? 

That is my naive take on this issue.  I know real fundamentalists would find it far from fundamental enough.  But I guess you will find it far from sophisticated enough. 
Susan Peterson

The question which comes to my mind, reading this interesting discussion while you are all sleeping on it, is whether the new Anglican Church will be exclusively based on scriptural inerrancy or whether believers will be allowed to disagree so long as they subscribe to the ancient Creeds and acknowledge the primacy of Scripture in the life of the Church (nothing clearly contrary to Scripture).  If the former is to be the case, I sadly conclude that the experiment may fail.

Fr. Handy, I respectfully submit that your acknowledgment that WO is a “radical innovation” calls at the very least for full respect for those who disagree with it and cautious implementation, waiting for full implementation until such time as the Church Universal is in agreement.  This is another big stumbling block in our way.

Eulogos, NRA tends, like most liberals, to lump all those who hold to the inerrantist position pejoratively into the “fundamentalist” camp. Of course in doing so he sets men like JI Packer, RC Sproul, Wayne Grudem and others alongside Jimmy Swaggart…

Your questions are dead on. You will find, if he answers you honestly, that creedally “orthodox” NRA does not believe in the historicity of the Patriarch accounts, the crossing of the Red Sea, the Exodus, the giving of the Law on Sinai, the water from the Rock or the Manna from heaven, the crossing of the Jordan or the Conquest.

And he believes the writers of the Gospels contradict themselves and each other constantly and do not present historically accurate accounts, especially John, got many many things wrong and essentially made up the words of the historical Jesus…

And yet, he believes in the resurrection, the virgin birth and the creedal assertions of the Church…and he tries to lump all of these things together under orthodoxy.

Katherine (#55),

Thank you for your calm, irenic, respectful post.  I fully agree with you on both points. 

1.  Yes, I think it’s absolutely essential that the new orthodox province allows freedom of opinion on the issue of biblical inerrancy, for as this thread shows, there are some die-hard inerrantists in our midst.  But the fact remains that the MAJORITY of orthodox clergy are not inerrantists, just like the majority of the faculty at both Trinity in Ambridge and Nashotah House aren’t inerrantists.  I may seem like the oddball on this thread, but that’s simply not the case at all.

2.  Yes, I would agree that WO is a very serious obstacle indeed to orthodox Anglican unity.  But I do believe it’s manageable.  Look at how Nigeria (which opposes WO) manages to get along well with Uganda, Kenya, and Rwanda (which all support WO).  That astute commenter, jamesw, argued on the most recent thread about WO here at SF that the new province needed to carve out two separate convocations, leaving space for those who adamantly oppose WO (as the C of E is refusing to do).  That is, we may have to create a pro-WO convocation and an anti-WO convocation within the new province.  That could well be true.  It would be challenging, surely, but it’s doable.

Thanks for injecting a serene, diplomatic note into a contentious thread.

David Handy+

Wow, NRA, have you done a survey of all orthodox Anglican clerics in the USA?...amazing that you have this encompassing knowledge…

For those who like me are not biblical scholars and are wondering what all the shouting is about, here is the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy.  I note two things it says in its Preface:  “We gladly acknowledge that many who deny the inerrancy of Scripture do not display the consequences of this denial in the rest of their belief and behavior,” and also, “We acknowledge the limitations of a document prepared in a brief, intensive conference and do not propose that this Statement be given creedal weight.”

And here is the related Chicago Statement on Biblical Hermeneutics, coming four years later from the same sources.

I suppose after I have read and studied these I may have a position on them.  Offhand, and without the study and reflection clearly called for, it seems to me that we could do well to tone down some of the rhetoric here.  It seems unlikely to me that those who do not fully accept the evangelical definition of inerrancy are therefore people who think the whole Bible is a fairy tale.

Katherine,
I’m sorry you seem to have a problem with the discussion o this board but there has been no harsh rhetoric. You do not seem to have been privy to recent discussions on this board with NRA. What most have noted and what I detail in 56 is not pejorative in the least.

For a constructive analysis of the Bible and the need for epistemological certainty, I recommend a recent publication by William J. Abraham, an evangelical Methodist teaching at the divinity school at Southern Methodist University, <i>Canon and Criterion<i>.

Dear Matt+ a/o David Ould+

I would be interested in reading either of your thoughts on the article.  Specifically, does this qualify as a development, and if so, what is that development?

When I read it and do a word substitution in my head (e.g., “Lutheran”, for “Roman Catholic”), it seems close to what I believe about inerrancy;  However, my gut is telling me that the article may be either under-emphasizing something, or deliberately leaving out key pieces of information.

Susan/eulogos (#54),

You raise some important questions, which I’d be happy to try to answer in detail, but that’s hard to do on a thread like this, where only relatively short comments are possible, and it’s hard to build up a consistent argument, because so many people can jump in and interrupt the flow of the argument with other questions and comments etc.  So let me invite you to send me a private email or PM using the SF personal account system.

In the meantime, let me make a general response to indicate the general direction of how I’d answer your very natural and appropriate questions.  And since you’re not a hardcore Protestant, like some of my critics above, I think you should be able to grasp what I’m getting at more easily than they would.

I think the key here is to recognize that one of the chief results of modern biblical scholarship has been to demonstrate beyond any reasonable doubt that MOST of the Bible has passed through a gradual process of evolving into its final, canonical form.  That is, the letters of Paul are highly unusual in that they were written by one man at one time, and that we have them in substantially the same form that he wrote them.  But the vast majority of the biblical writings are COMMUNAL products, and the fruit of discerning, Spirit-led reflection on the information and traditions available to the biblical writers.  The divine inspiration of the Holy Scriptures doesn’t cease to be real, just because it is now seen to be more diffused over time, and shared among a wide variety of contributors to the final sacred text.

Now granted, God COULD presumably have inspired the biblical writers to write what they did from scratch, in much the way that some medieval Christian art delightfully pictures a dove sitting on the shoulder of a scribe and dictating what to say.  But the evidence is now OVERWHELMING that it didn’t in fact work that way.  The whole process of inspiration was FAR MORE COMPLEX than that.  And in a word, it was more INDIRECT than such a simplistic and individualistic view of inspiration assumes.

Thus, thanks to the tremendous advances in our knowledge of Ancient Near Eastern culture over the last 150 years, as archaeologists have unearthed and carefully deciphered many thousands of clay tablets allowing us to see what ancient Babylonian, Assyrian, and Canaanite mythology was really like, and helped us to gain a much clearer picture of what ideas were available to the ancient biblical writers, we now know for a certainty what pre-Enlightenment interpreters never had the data to know, or even suspect.  So yes, now we can make much better sense of the Genesis 1 account of creation, since we have access to the Babylonian creation myth called Enuma Elish, and likewise with regard to the flood story in Genesis 6-9, and its delightful Mesopotamian equivalent, the Gilgamesh Epic.  We can see the obvious similarities between the so-called Covenant Code in Exodus 21-23 and the older Code of Hammurabi.  We can see the obvious similarities between Prov. 22-24 and the Egyptian equivalent, the Instruction of Amenemope.  Or we can now understand why when Solomon built the first Temple in Jerusalem, he used pagan Phoenician blueprints.  Similarly, research on the gospels has proved that Matthew and Luke used Mark as a source, along with the almost certain use of Q, the postulated sayings source.  They were working within, and reshaping, a living, evolving tradition, under the providential guidance of the Holy Spirit.

But my point is this: it’s actually very, very rare for the biblical writers to create their writings ex nihilo, as it were, out of nothing.  They almost always relied on the information humanly available to them, and then modified it under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.  But they weren’t working from a blank slate, as both Protestants and Catholics supposed in the 16th century.

And to return to the initial topic of this thread, that’s why I think that although Roman Catholics (and Anglo-Catholics like Pusey too) fiercely resisted modern biblical criticism when it first arose, the great irony is that the way that modern scholarship has compelled us to rethink the close relationship between Holy Scripture and Holy Tradition is in fact much more compatible with a Catholic theological orientation than a Protestant, sola scriptura one.  That’s why I think it was no accident that it was the Anglo-Catholic wing of the C of E that accepted modern biblical scholarship before the low church, Evangelical wing did (see my earlier post that refers to Charles Gore and the Oxford scholars who produced that landmark collection of essay, Lux Mundi, in 1889).

In other words, I think it should be easier for us more catholic types to reconceive of the divine inspiration of the Bible along the gradual, diffused lines that I’m suggesting.  Namely, Holy Scripture stands WITHIN Holy Tradition, as its supreme and normative part.  But Holy Scripture and Holy Tradition are only different in DEGREE of inspiration, not in KIND.  Or so I firmly believe.

David Handy+

Matt+, you are correct that I do not usually follow these intense theological debates very closely.  I was startled, however, to see one conservative Anglican clergyman saying that another doesn’t believe much of the Scriptural testimony.  Perhaps I need not to pay attention to these arguments after all.

David Handy,
Would the above be your rather long way of saying that you don’t believe in the creation of Man from the dust, nor the Global Flood?

I suggest that you should spend more time reading the Bible and not About it.  If you really want to get to know someone you spend time with them, not their ‘so-called’ friends.

Moot,

Please pardon my interjecting into a question for either Matt+ or David+ (which I too would enjoy a commentary) but I do think I know what is missing from this article. A understanding of Catholic polity.

I don’t see anything new here except that Liberals has made enough noise that it demands some attention so the Pope has gathered his bishops and cardinals to think through such things. I think we Protestants think papal infallibility is different from what is practice (at least in this era, the secular popes do give us plenty of ammunition for our charge but it was defined in VC1 [you never hear of VC1 but they did actually do some things]).

The last two instances I am aware are Pope Pius IX’s 1854 definition of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of Mary, and Pope Pius XII’s 1950 definition of the dogma of the Assumption of Mary [which ironically is why I can not ever become RC but I could go EO]. In each case the pope did not invent anything but made a ex cathedra ruling on theological ideas that already existed and debated, now in RCC there is no longer debate on those topics.

So what I read into this article is a measure of Protestant confusion about RC polity, which does work very different and usually a lot more restrain than we tend to think. I think we look at VC2 to being the norm, but VC2 would be more like if the US called a third Constitutional Convention and passes a whole bunch of amendments verses the path of how all the 27 other amendments (including the Bill of Rights) were past then an outsider thinking the convention was the normative process.

I admit that WO is a radical innovation.  But so was the abolition of slavery in the 19th century.

No. Why do people continually state this as though it were clear fact?

Council of London, 1102.
27. Let no one presume for the future to enter into that nefarious business by which they were accustomed hitherto to sell men like brute animals in England.

Pope Eugene IV in 1435 wrote to Bishop Ferdinand of Lanzarote in his Bull, Sicut Dudum:
...They have deprived the natives of their property or turned it to their own use, and have subjected some of the inhabitants of said islands to perpetual slavery, sold them to other persons and committed other various illicit and evil deeds against them… We order and command all and each of the faithful of each sex that, within the space of fifteen days of the publication of these letters in the place where they live, that they restore to their earlier liberty all and each person of either sex who were once residents of said Canary Islands…who have been made subject to slavery. These people are to be totally and perpetually free and are to be let go without the exaction or reception of any money..

There are plenty of other sources, including some which are much earlier, going back to the patristic period showing a continual (if not as forceful or effective as it should have been) opposition to slavery within the Christian Church. These just happen to be the ones I thought of. The radical innovation was the acceptance of slavery by some purported members of the church in the 16th and 17th centuries.

Katherine, it should also be noted that NRA does not in fact believe in the primacy of scripture as you suggest above…he believes in the primacy of the Church.

As for the development of inerrancy after the chicago statement, you might check out this book:
http://www.amazon.com/Inerrancy-Norman-L-Geisler/dp/0310392810/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1226495819&sr=8-1

which includes essays by Dr. Packer, RC Sproul and other original signatories of the Chicago Statement

NRA does not in fact believe in the primacy of scripture as you suggest above…he believes in the primacy of the Church.

It should be noted a “primacy of the Church,” which is changing an he gets to define.

My debate buddy, Carl, showed more respect for Tradition than NRA+ with his post on the other thread, by taking a sextant reading back in the past to one who finished well then asking questions about how to understand passages based on that reading (Tradition here would be as EO cleric Father Georges Florovsky said, “Scripture rightly understood” and not as infallible second source of revelation). Rev. John Piper’s books tend to be filled with sexton readings back to many faithful people and their understanding of a passage. Both examples are very different from what I read from NRA+ and are actually much closer to other faithful RC scholar in the approach (in the making sure there is a purity of understanding be looking to the faithful who have gone before not other ways which would spark much discussion).

So to be fair, this “primacy of the Church” is not the same as one from the Orthodox, but more a contemporary primacy of an organization that we (those with union cards) get to vote on what we think is best and unrestrained by text of Scripture or the Church of the past. So I’d say it’s more like primacy of a general convention.

[41] New Reformation Advocate wrote:

I reach the conservative conclusions I do BECAUSE THE EVIDENCE WARRANTS IT.  I support the orthodox view of Christology and sexual ethics (etc.), because that is what the evidence compels me to believe and teach.

David,

I asked you once whether you believed in the Resurrection because of:
1. The testimony of Scripture.
2. The Testimony of the church.
3. The testimony of scholarship.

It seems you have firmly declared for scholarship.  So then will you change your mind on the basis of scholarship?  If enemies of the church present to you a compelling case against orthodoxy, will you then repudiate your faith and join them on the barricades?  If not, why not?  Having believed for the sake of the evidence, then you must also logically agree that you might disbelieve for the sake of new evidence.  After all, you must simply follow what the evidence compels you to believe and teach.

The essence of liberalism is self-referential truth. The liberal imagines that all truth claims ultimately originate with man, and are not valid until man has given assent.  This is the claim of modern scholarship - “God hasn’t spoken until we say He has spoken.”  It is a profoundly liberal claim.

carl

Matt and Hosea,

You are free, of course, to dispute the authenticity of my claim to uphold the supremacy and primacy of the Scriptures in the life of the Church.  I recognize that some Protestant-minded Anglicans inevitably will do so.  But my rejection of the doctrine of sola scriptura does NOT imply that I give primacy to the Church.  Far from it.  Rather, by canonizing certain writings, the Catholic Church itself has set the Scriptures up as the supreme authority on earth for settling theological disputes.  It is the final court of appeal.  And ultimately, the authorized interpreters of the biblical witness, the successors of the apostles, are SERVANTS and STEWARDS of the Word of God, and not masters over it. 

In other words, the supremacy of the Holy Scriptures is a Roman Catholic and Anglo-Catholic doctrine too, as well as a Protestant one.  Anyone who reads the main Fathers, especially in the golden age from Nicea to Chalcedon (AD 325-451), quickly sees how devoutly and earnestly they approach the Scriptures, and the great care they devote to its interpretation, even if they do so in a highly creative and often allegorical way that often seems strange to us today.

So let me simply reassert here, as I have often done in the past, that I fully accept, firmly believe, and publicly teach that the Bible is indeed the Word of God (and doesn’t merely contain that divine Word, ala Karl Barth etc.), and that it contains all things necessary to know for salvation, which is what we Anglicans have always and rightly stressed.  And I further affirm without reservation that the Holy Scriptures are, as the Lambeth Quadrilateral says, “the rule and ultimate standard of faith.” 

What I deny is the usual evangelical corollary that is deduced from the fact of the divine inspiration of the Bible, i.e., in the classic words of the Westminster Confession of Faith of 1646, that the Scriptures are “the only infallible rule of faith and practice.”  I also deny the Protestant notion of “sola scriptura.”  Those familiar beliefs in biblical infallibility (or inerrancy) and sola scriptura go well BEYOND the teaching of the Bible about itself, in a way that may seem perfectly natural, but that the actual inductive study of the Sacred Text does not warrant and in fact rules out.

Far be it from me to undermine people’s confidence in the Scriptures as being truly the Word of God.  I’ve devoted my life to teaching and preaching the Word, and to defending its authority, properly understood.  My point, however, is that we need to be defending the truth of the authentic gospel and the biblical witness as the main source of divine revelation for us, and not defending a HUMAN tradition about the nature of that authority (inerrancy) that in fact has no real biblical basis or justification.  And in that sense, I’m quite evangelical really.

David Handy+

<blockquote>But my rejection of the doctrine of sola scriptura does NOT imply that I give primacy to the Church.  Far from it.  Rather, by canonizing certain writings, the Catholic Church itself has set the Scriptures up as the supreme authority on earth for settling theological disputes. <blockquote>BINGO! A statement that I can agree, The Church Universal did recognize the supreme authority of the Scriptures and what you have been touting is very different from the Apostolic Tradition.

However, you do great violence to the accepted Church Fathers in your claims. Yet I understand that I’ve hit a brick wall and you will read back into them whatever you please, irrespective of any accepted methodology because you desire to be unbound by any restraint, much like the liberal academics of today, who think they must come up with something “new” to be relevant.

Apologies all for the missing “/” in blockquote.

I want to note that when debating one David Handy+ thinks is on the evangelical side, he claims catholicity, but if one of the more catholic side debates him, he claims “I’m quite evangelical really.”

So odd, a cafeteria approach to try to cut-n-paste whatever side he thinks will enable him to go unchecked as if these things are acceptable doctrines in Anglicanism. I’ve not read any claims towards Charismatic side yet, don’t forget them so they fell left out.

NRA. ‘

You wrote above that you accept scripture as the Word of God on the basis of the Church’s declaration of that fact which means that the Church holds the underlying authority and the authority of scripture is contingent upon and dependent upon the prior authority of the Church.

3 questions:

1. What if the Church were to rule, universally and uniformally that homosexual blessings were in keeping with the scriptural mandate?

2. What if the Church, all three branches, were to agree that the doctrine of the Incarnation or Resurrection is factually inaccurate.

3. What do you do when the teaching of the Church officially contradicts the findings of mainstream scholarship?

you wrote:
“So let me simply reassert here, as I have often done in the past, that I fully accept, firmly believe, and publicly teach that the Bible is indeed the Word of God.”

Yes, you just reject the historicity of:
1. the Patriarch accounts
2. The exodus account
3. the parting of the Red Sea
4. The giving of the law on Sinai
5. the crossing of the Jordan
6. the fall of Jerico
7. the Conquest of Canaan.

I could go on…so accepting the “authority of scripture” does not mean, for you, accepting what the scriptures reveal…

I take it that for most here advocating “inerrantism” that cashes out to Sola Scriptura?
To interject a peaceful note here, David, I do remember Bainton’s Christmas sermons which use Martin Luther’s standard Christmas sermons which make colorful suggestions like “There’s no donkey in the Gospels” regarding Mary and Joseph’s journey to Bethlehem.  In fact, that was added by Medievalists who liked the symmetry of Jesus coming in on a donkey and going out on donkey (Palm Sunday).  And I recall him saying, “The miracle was not that God can do this for God can do anything.  The miracle was that Mary believed.”  And the summary: “We say there was no room in the inn but of course there was.  There was all the room in the inn but nobody would give any up.  You say, ‘I would have loved the baby Jesus’ but that’s because you know who He grew up to be! If you think you are better than those who refused, then go and make room for your neighbor!” (I’m paraphrasing these quotes from old memory.)I also miss Bainton’s Christmas cards which he hand pressed from replicas of Duhrer’s carvings.  It is noteworthy that Bainton’s children’s book, Faith of Our Fathers, mentions Anglicanism somewhere as muddle-headed, if I recall correctly. Yale Div. is an interesting place albeit not an appropriate place to get seminary formation for priesthood, IMHO, with or without Berkeley.

David, in fact, for a while, Bainton was doing his own woodcarvings to make Christmas cards.  Such a talented man.  I have a fond memory of popping popcorn in a basket over the fire at his beach cabin.  If only I could remember that I have an appointment across ton in six minutes!

What about “contradictions in the Scriptures”?: the two genesis accounts, the two different genealogies of Jesus, the different chronological order of visitations of Jesus (he went to Galilee then Nazareth versus vice versa).

Is Biblical inerrancy a litmus test? Can one say that all scripture is “God-breathed” but not “inerrant” and still be an evangelical Christian in good standing?

Robroy,
The two ‘different accounts’ are nothing more than ‘high overview’ followed by ‘human centered view’.  The two genealogies, I take to be ‘legal father’ and ‘actual mother’ lines (though I’m not nearly as comfortable with that as I am the ‘High Overview/Human Details’ understanding of Genesis). 

I’m not aware of the ‘itinerary’ issue.  Books, Chapters, and verses if you would please….

It is always helpful to revisit the Articles of Religion.  Article VI: “Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation:  so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the Faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation.”  Article VIII:  “The Nicene Creed, and that which is commonly called the Apostles’ Creed, ought thoroughly to be received and believed:  for they may be proved by most certain warrants of Holy Scripture.”  Wise articles, both.

Therefore, this discussion is very interesting, as is the one nearby on Inerrancy as defined by evangelicals in the twentieth century.  Acceptance of this statement of inerrancy is not required of Anglicans, although of course they may accept it and may continue merrily to debate it.

Indeed,
The trouble is getting folks like David Handy to ‘fess up’ to what they believe can be proved from scripture - as they don’t seem to accept it as the basis from which to discuss matters.

It might be helpful to read the teaching document of the Pontifical Biblical Commission published in 1994 by the President of the Commission Joseph Ratzinger. The document presents the Catholic view of Bible interpretation and can be found here.

We must frankly accept that certain hermeneutical theories are inadequate for interpreting Scripture. For example, Bultmann’s existentialist interpretation tends to enclose the Christian message within the constraints of a particular philosophy. Moreover, by virtue of the presuppositions insisted upon in this hermeneutic, the religious message of the Bible is for the most part emptied of its objective reality (by means of an excessive “demythologization”) and tends to be reduced to an anthropological message only. Philosophy becomes the norm of interpretation, rather than an instrument for understanding the central object of all interpretation: the person of Jesus Christ and the saving events accomplished in human history. An authentic interpretation of Scripture, then, involves in the first place a welcoming of the meaning that is given in the events and, in a supreme way, in the person of Jesus Christ.