Importance of Innerrancy to Moderate Christians

But this is not what happens. The bias itself determines what the scholar finds. I tried to find a particular admitted case of this but it's not online or I don't know how to look it up. It's not scholarship, it's an illusion of scholarship that is really guided by prejudice.

I'm not talking about scholarship, I'm talking about people led by the Holy Spirit. That is how the authenticity of inspiration of the Biblical writings was originally determined. Scholarship has nothing to say about the criteria of inspiration. Not particularly useful facts, and not when there is a dullwitted rejection of spiritual criteria in favor of irrelevant intellectual criteria based on prejudice against the supernatural. No worry. You'll never convince true believers but you'll always have an audience of unbelievers.And for the umpteenth time, Galileo was opposed by a corrupt Roman church enamored of Aristotle's pagan cosmology, not the Bible. Well, at least at the very end of time.

And that "corrupt Roman Chuch" had a lot to do with the canon we use today. Doesn't that least give you pause? That corropt Roman Church was also the keeper of the orthodoxy for quite a long time and they did base their objections to Galileo on scripture, as much as you are wont to deny it.http://home1.gte.net/deleyd/religion/galileo/

The canon was determined before the Roman church got the power it had later, and is not associated with the Roman church. Protestants later changed a few things, mostly rejecting the Apocrypha, but in general regard the early centuries as simply Christian, before the Roman church veered so deeply into apostasy the Protestant Reformation became necessary. Their interpretation of scripture was corrupted by Aristotle through Aquinas. I don't remember Galileo's and your link doesn't spell it out, but his interpretation was no doubt closer to the Protestant view.

You have, I think, been asked to show a specific case where the spiritual criteria would be used and how it would change the conclusions of a particular analysis. You have not, that I can recall, been able to do so. You are, again, making stuff up.

Well, not in the sense you're saying this to Faith. Although the gnostic sets were early and numerous, the "orthodox" church, which Faith would not consider corrupt or Roman, had its canon pretty much set by at least the mid-2nd century. You can Google the Muratorian Fragment and see a list made in AD 161. The list of Scripture quotes used by earlier writers like Justin, Polycarp, Ignatius, Barnabas, and Clement make it clear that the Muratorian Fragment was not a controversial list, and it is little different from the "official" list decided on in the late 4th century.In my opinion "the corrupt Roman church" would be, in the context y'all are using it right now, a reference to the councils of the 4th century and later. They had very little to do with the canon except to make it "official." The canon had varied very, very little over the previous two centuries.

I am not a moderate Christian. By American standards, I am a very radical Christian, having joined a community of over 200 very radical Christians who live together and share their possessions. However, I do not believe in the inerrancy of the Bible.The center of my faith is God and his Son, Jesus Christ, not the Bible. I do not worship the Bible, but we hold the writings of the Bible--along with others that belong to the line of our people back to Abraham--to have been preserved by God for our guidance and edification. We do not see that this requires inerrancy, any more than we require inerrancy is our more spiritual teachers today.According to Jesus Christ, the accuracy and reliability of a Christian teacher is to be determined by the fruit he produces, not by a Biblical examination.

Right, it's not based solely on a 2000+ year old text. It's based on the power of God.

Sorry for answering your question repeatedly, but you asked them repeatedly earlier in the thread.The power of God makes for the strength of belief. I was moved by the idea that this man Jesus lived with 12 men for over three years, then after he died they were willing to give their lives for him. Along with some other things that were happening in my life at the time, that thought intrigued me enough for me to begin to believe that he might really have been the Son of God. Actually believing and admitting that belief brought an awareness of God and a transformation of life that was absolutely miraculous to me.24 years of continuing in that faith and experiencing its results has made that faith deep and abiding.None of that requires inerrancy, nor do I bother trying to remove faults from the text of the Bible. There was no need to "legitimize" that faulty text, though, because it contains life-changing stories without needing to be inerrant.

Ah, here's where I see the problem that's confusing you. If all we have is a book promising a heaven that may or may not exist, then inerrancy could really be an issue.We don't. Salvation is not just a promise of eternal life in bliss. Salvation is deliverance from "sin." It is the ability to live as we believe is right and good and to live in fellowship with God, rather than living as our lusts and desires drive us to live.If the message of the Bible can produce such a salvation, then the power of that message is visible, and you don't need inerrancy to guarantee the promise. Instead, you have a real, transforming power that guarantees the promise. The Scriptures do not teach that the inerrant Bible is the guarantee of our inheritance, but it teaches that we have received the Holy Spirit as a guarantee. This should be a real, tangible, ongoing experience. (You'd think that if God came to live in you, it would be noticeable, wouldn't you?)Jesus used the Scriptures to back up his message, but in the end he said that the love of his disciples for one another and their incredible unity would be what would cause people to believe (Jn 13:34,35 and 17:20-23), not the Bible or its inerrancy or lack of it.

I don't know to what extent acceptance of supernatural hypothese would change the observation but there is also the problem of anachronisms that demonstrates books were written long after the time they were attributed to. That is a fairly straight forward critical historical analysis of a text.The most recent example I've encountered is not prophecy but demonstrates that the David Goliath material was written in the time of Josiah most likely because the Philistines were described as wearing Greek style armor that was current in the time of Josiah and not the style of armor known to be used in the time of David.The historical critical scholars are pointing right at the texts and archeology and known history. It's not anti-surpenatural bias is is informed examination of the texts in their historical settings using as much known data for the time and place as archeology and history have collected.Your charge of bias is a projection.lfen

Truthlover,Your position makes sense to me. This seems to me the best way to base a faith in one's religion which is to say that it is found meaningful in one's life rather than it has been proven in a logical scientific way.To me this seems like real faith whereas literalism seems like a fear that if it's all not literally true then one would lose the benefits of one's faith.lfen

To address the issue of modern scholarship, almost everything you gave as reasons for the Gospel and the Book of the Revelation to have different authors was set forth by Dionysius the Great of Alexandria in the 3rd century (see this entry in the Catholic encyclopedia). I can't find the place where I read it, but I remember that his arguments about the precision of the Greek in John's Gospel versus the vulgarity of the Greek in the Revelation were very compelling.I agree that modern scholarship tends to be better, but this is really modern scholarship agreeing with quite ancient scholarship.

I agree wholeheartedly.

Phat DID indeed heave up a softball. Im playing Devils advocate on much of this exchange....my beliefs have changed over the years, but I think that people have to realize why I have a case, if in fact I do have one! Because in many, if not most areas of endevour, facts are facts. When building a bridge, calculus is undeniably calculus! Knowledge of how deep to sink the support structures is never in question. Similarly, in an operating room, medical science relies on the latest in suturing techniques, blood clotting, and anesthesiology. The Bible can be examined as a text written by humans over a large period of time. You correctly say that Thats fine and dandy, but lets philosophically question the original source of the wisdom to begin with. Its not just as if some old sage on a mountaintop gets struck by lightening and utters profound sayings to anyone bold enough to climb up to him. Now what does that mean? Is it wrong for me to use a scriptural quote to explain the message, the intention, or the wisdom (or lack of same) contained in the Bible? Indeed. If one is predisposed to believe in a Holy Spirit and in the ability of that Spirit to speak through humans---at certain times--one would give weight to the source that the author (whoever the author was) followed. In other words, either1) The author simply made this statement up to be politically correct and to manipulate a certain audience
or
2) The author felt in all honesty and by all integrity that what he was writing was in fact inspired by God as the author understood God.The authors view of God has a lot to do with the reasoning behind the words that they say.Words are not true or false in and of themselves. The source becomes important.Edited by Phat, : various grammatical sins