Your description of the "two possible positions" omits the crucial point that
believing the Bible to be God-inspired & truthful does NOT imply that one must
believe it all to be historically accurate narrative. There are other kinds of true
statements - e.g., much of the Psalms. The assumption that Genesis can be true only
if it is an historically & scientifically accurate chronicle of past events is a source
of incredible amounts of misunderstanding, acrimony, & wasted time.
> This verse-picking tendency is somewhat encouraged by the particular
> presentation of the biblical text: the text is partitioned in verses
> that are numbered. This can uncounsciously lead one to think that each
> numbered packet of words is an isolated statement. This is absolutely
> not so. I did not have time to seach it out but I remember reading in
> Proverbs a verse where a statement is made in the affirmative and a few
> verses later the same words are repeated...but in the negative! A
> mistake? A typo? No. It's just a statement about the amazing complexity
> of life.
Proverbs 26:4 & 5. Yes, this illustrates the fact that one cannot read
verses in isolation. But it also warns against naive attempts at "harmonization"
of apparently discordant biblical statements - the sort of thing often done with
the gospels, Genesis 1 & 2, etc.
> One example of the "isolated statement" syndrome is a comment from one
> of you based on Psalm 104 about God being thanked for providing prey to
> the predator. Since the subject of our discussion was the death-sin
> link, I was being asked the reason for the psalmist's word of thanks to
> God. Thanks for allowing the predator to kill something? The Bible does
> not give in to sin...but it does take it into account. But it does not
> do it through accomodation and compromise. Throughout the Bible, there
> are numerous examples of God "taking into account" man's fallen nature.
> Some examples? What about God overlooking polygamy in the days of the
> patriarchs? Was He for polygamy then? No. What about God saying to
> slaves to love and serve their masters? Was He for slavery? No. What
> about God asking the Israelites to eliminate by the sword certains
> nations. God was for people killing people? God wanted the
> Inquisition? No and No. Indeed you need the whole picture to get a
> proper understanding of the Person of God and His plan for mankind and
> for yourself. The Bible was never intended to be published in
> loose-leaf form.
Psalm 104 doesn't "thank" God for providing prey to the predator, but praises
God for doing so. & while Isaiah 11:6-9 suggests that this sort of relationship will
eventually end, that is an eschatological statement. It is not a statement about
the way things are to be now, like passages in the New Testament which indicate that
polygamy is to be done away with. Christians can still sing Psalm 104 today in praise
of God, but we read about polygamy in the Old Testament only as history or saga.
> The Bible is a much more cohesive piece of litterature than most dare
> admit even though it contains sixty-six books written by over 30
> writers. A bit of scrutiny shows how well the first three chapters of
> Genesis link solidly with the very last book, Revelations. Both books
> were written about 2500 years apart.
& no one in his/her right mind reads the Book of Revelation as a straight
account of future history.
> One notable, but not unusual fact is that nobody commented on the second
> half of my last paragraph which made a statement on one's understanding
> of the Bible by saying: <<It just depends on how intently one listens
> to the Holy Spirit who interprets Scripture. Man's little spirit acting
> alone does not do too well in that area.>> You are all intelligent
> people. But to understand the Bible you need more than human
> intelligence alone.
Probably because no one disagreed with your statement as far as it goes. But
it doesn't go far enough. The Spirit who gives Christians understanding of Scripture
is the Spirit of Christ, & one has a genuinely Spirit-led understanding of Scripture
only when it is interpreted in relation to Christ. Having a "global view" of Scripture
is important but that by itself is not enough. Some people have had global views in
which the whole thing is a massive secret code or a timetable for calculating the end
of the world. Jehovah's Witnesses can claim to have a global view of the Bible but
it is profoundly wrong.
George L. Murphy
gmurphy@raex.com
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/