Re: Flood and miracles

Brian D Harper (bharper@postbox.acs.ohio-state.edu)
Wed, 25 Feb 1998 15:48:34 -0500

At 10:10 AM 2/25/98 -0500, Jim wrote:
>Message text written by Lloyd Eby:
>
><<I remember, from my Mennonite ancestors, a kind of compulsive Biblicism
>--
>but selective, of course, because the Bible contains internal
>contradictions, so you must pick and choose what you are going to attend
>to and what y9ou are going to ignore if you want to hold to any notion of
>Biblical inerrancy.>>
>
> I recommend Bloesch's "Holy Scripture" to you for a modern definition and
>defense of inerrency.
>

I'm not familiar with this book or with modern definitions
of inerrancy (BTW, is it considered an errrancy if you
misppell inerrent? ;-) ) but I'm very familiar with the
practice of using inerrancy as a chopping block of orthodoxy.

In many Southern Baptist churches one had better answer the
question "Do you believe the Bible is inerrant?" with an
immediate yes. If you hesitate, you're under suspicion.
If you ask what inerrant means or if you ask for the scriptural
basis of the doctrine of inerrancy then you're a heretic.
[BTW, if you try to find the word inerrant in the Bible you'll
also be out of luck, in addition to being suspicious and
heretical].

Brian Harper
Associate Professor
Applied Mechanics
The Ohio State University

"It is not certain that all is uncertain,
to the glory of skepticism." -- Pascal