Of course inspiration requires more than that God ensures a certain outcome as to what gets said. It requires that God endorses the content as well. God doesn’t endorse the content of Shakespeare’s plays. He does endorse the content of the Bible.

The difference between inspiration and non-inspiration is on the divine end. The difference between verbal, plenary inspiration and a dictation theory is over what the human role is.

For Paul to have meant the original words, it doesn’t require that he meant Timothy had the original documents, just that Timothy had been reading the original words. Even with copyist errors, that would be true. The only way it wouldn’t would be is if every single word in Timothy’s copy of the scripture had been altered.

It’s not clear to me that Jesus, Paul, and James had to have taken Jonah or Job as a real person. Even Adam I wouldn’t say of 100% certainty, although I think that’s extremely likely. Imagine a pastor using Luke Skywalker as a sermon example without mentioning the background assumption that all in the congregation would share — that there was and never will be a Luke Skywalker. That’s the usual evangelical approach to Jude’s use of apocryphal and uninspired books, e.g. about Enoch and the body of Moses. It doesn’t conflict with inerrancy. (Whatever you say about that, though, there’s no arguing from someone treating Adam as real to the conclusion that Gen 1 must involve actual 24-hour days.)

Glenn, I’m afraid I completely don’t understand your argument, then, if it’s not what I thought it was.

I see why you make this incorrect inference: “You’re insisting that if God inspires me to come up with something then it wasn’t me who came up with it. ”

Actually I haven’t insisted on this at all. That’s an inference you’re drawing for what I have said. What I have said is that if I endorsed the view of 2 Timothy that Daryl advanced, then I would have no way of choosing between a dictation view or the word-for-word inspiration theory. Now fo course, in both of those scenrios there is no injury to free will, and the author can choose whether or not to record the words as inspired/given or not. So the issue of free will just doesn’t arise in what I have said. The issue is just whether the words are given “externally” as in handed to the author int he final form, or “internally” where they arise within the author in the way I described.

I’ve said nothing with important implications one way or the other on free will or compatibilism.

I’m also unsure why you think inerrancy requires correctness of “the wording, worldview and scientific beliefs of the writers of all Scripture”. The wording, yes. The worldview and scientific beliefs of the writers, no, because not all of those affect the truth of what’s written.

Well I agree that they do not affect the truth of the message, but they do affect the literal truth.

It might be somewhat soothing for inerrantists to think that for the ancients, “ends of the earth” and “windows of heaven” were just figures of speech. They may be figures of speech to us, but they were taken quite literally at the time, and we know that they express falsehoods.

But somehow, we all recognise that the message of Scriopture is nor affected by these mistakes. It’s almost as though the infallibility of the teaching of Scripture doesn’t require inerrancy. ;)

It seems to me far too common for folk to assume that unless someone else agrees with them, that other person must simply be missing something or neglecting something. Maybe they’re not. Maybe they actually disagree with you.

Daryl, i realise that you think I am missing what 2 Timothy means badly, since you clearly have adopted an interpretation that differs from my own. I don’t have a reason to adopt yours, so I’m comfortable with you thinking mine is wrong, as long as you realise that you haven’t given me a reason to change my mind. I think that you are trying to shoehorn more into it than is required, and are thus teaching a doctrine of man in God’s name.

If God has sovereign control over every word ever written, then he has sovereign control to ensure that every word written in Alice in Wonderland is acid-induced crazy, and he has sovereign control to ensure that every word written in the Bible is exactly true.

It also goes without saying that, even under incompatibilist views of human freedom, God does have sovereign control over every word written in Scripture. He chose to instantiate this world, in which Scripture is as it is, rather than a world in which Scripture is different by even a stroke or a serif. Only by denying God’s perfect definite foreknowledge can we arrive at a view where Scripture isn’t exactly as God intended.

With that in mind, I think there’s a good argument to be made for the antecedent improbability of God’s permitting errors (as defined by, say, the Chicago Statement) in the writings which he calls his word.

When I am in NYC, I am really in NYC. I might have gotten there any thousand ways, but the fact I’m there doesn’t mean that I either built a teleporter or I wandered into one by accident.

Inerrancy looks at the end result, and verbal plenary inspiration looks at how it applies to the words. How that wound up happening doesn’t necessarily involve words popping into the author’s head while the author thinks it’s his own words. (It might, but it doesn’t necessarily entail that: I’ll call this (1).

It could be that (2) the author is picking words which God approves and allows before hand via foreknowledge; (3) God orchestrates events so that the author is influenced by his surroundings–God working all things together for good–and those surroundings resulting in the right words; (4) there’s infinite possible worlds that God selected the world where the text was how he wanted it. Heck it could be (5) all previous 4 together.

It still results in God superintending the words he wants written (verbal plenary inspiration) without using the vehicle of direct dictation.

A few links to add to the pile for the sake of the search engine:

William Lane Craig with a Middle Knowledge view of Inerrancy
Video of D.A. Carson
B.B. Warfield
Roger Nicole on Calvin’s Belief of Inerrancy
J P Moreland on the Rationality of Inerrancy

I would argue that Exodus 20 (and the parallel passage in Deuteronomy) Make a good case as well, talking about the 6 say creation as the basis for the sabbath day.

But you’re right, I was writing and erasing and re-writing…and missed that one.

…although…I think that the NT treatment of Adam and Eve as real people and the cause of the fall of the human race, make a good case that the NT assumes the reality of a 6 day creation, you’re right, I don’t think the NT explicitly says so.

I do think Genesis 1 and Exodus are plain enough, but that’s not the issue here.

After teaching Biblical lit for six years I have come to see that we have to try to understand the literature from the perspective of the author and the original hearers. Imposing questions that the Scriptures were not intended to answer can lead to some silly concepts.

R Hampton, who said we couldn’t use reason to understand creation? No one on this blog.

Who said creation is an authoritative word of God? No one here, I hope.

And as for your 3 “experts”…let’s just say that they leave a lot to be desired.
Go to Paul in Romans 1 and you’ll see that creation is sufficient…to condemn you.

Besides all that, where does Scripture ever call creation an authoritative word of God?

Matt,

your bit about Timothy and the Holy Scriptures? Sorry, but that dog won’t hunt. It’s a bit like you saying “Plato said” and me saying “Clearly Matt spoke personally with Plato…”

Jeremy,

I agree, that inerrancy doesn’t get you everywhere, but I think you are presenting a pretty surface view of inerrancy. For instance, Jonah ,Adam and Job. You say that an inerrantist could conclude that they are just stories, not real. Except that Jesus and Paul and James took them as real. My point is that the view that the other people in and writers of Scripture have of certain passage, also must be included in the discussion.
When Paul says “For it was Eve who was decieved and not Adam” means, I think pretty plainly, that he’s writing as if they are real people. When Jesus talks about Jonah as a real guy, it means he’s a real guy (why would the man of Nineveh stand up and condemn this generation if they only repented in a made up story about a made up guy and a fish?)…and when Ezekiel and James talk about Job as a real guy…he’s a real guy.
I think that’s most often what gets missed. While inerrancy doesn’t magically fix everything, it does a lot more than I think you are willing to give it credit for.

(The arguments against 6 day creation also typically ignore NT passages which treat it as fact.)

Glenn,

I think you’re missing God-breathed pretty badly. Is Scripture just a message? Or is it the written record of the message?
When Jesus opened the Scriptures to teach, did he open an idea or the inspired words that God chose to use to transmit the message.
At the least I think you’re misusing the word “Scripture” to get past this.

If God were dictating, the writer would not have to use sources for information. He would not have to think the issues through and develop arguments. He would not write in his own style and use his own vocabulary. He would not choose what points to emphazise. The only human agency involved would be as a sort of secretary or reporter for God—taking down his dictated “letter” or transcribing his “speech”, so to speak.

It seems that the verbal plenary view could be described in terms of God inspiring scripture, in such a way, that the text is exactly the way it would have been if he had dictated it (although he did not dictate it).

Not necessarily, because the process involved human beings speaking (or writing) as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. The personality of the writers shows through. Some are better writers than others, for instance.

God so superintended the process of the writing, however, that every word is completely satisfactory to express what he desired to reveal. None of the words (and nothing of the meaning those words express) is wrong or untrue.

It is hard to see whether the denial of dictation really amounts to much.

It doesn’t make the words any less “God-breathed”, if that’s what you’re getting at. Or any less “perfect.”

I see no reason why a person could not hold that inspiration extends to the teaching or message of the text while normal providence applies to the exact words used.

The teaching or message of the text is inspired, but the teaching and meaning is expressed in words. Wrong words would express false meaning, so inspiration must extend to words as well in order for the teaching and meaning to be true. There might have been different words the author could have used that would also have expressed the teaching and meaning, and had the author thought of them, perhaps the Holy Spirit would have approved them. But that’s neither here nor there, really. What we can be assured of is that the words that are there are approved by the Holy Spirit.

Daryl cites 1 Tim 3:16, “All Scripture is inspired by God” and suggests that this means that the exact words of the autographs are inspired by God. However, this follows only if one assumes that the word “scripture” in this passage refers to the exact words of the autographs.

“Breathed out by God” refers to the process by which scripture came. That “breathed out” process resulted in what the authors wrote down—or the autographs.

1. I wonder what the difference is between God inspiring me so that I write the exact words he wants me to write and God dictating to me the exact word he wants me to write?

It seems that the verbal plenary view could be described in terms of God inspiring scripture, in such a way, that the text is exactly the way it would have been if he had dictated it (although he did not dictate it).

It is hard to see whether the denial of dictation really amounts to much.

2. Many of those who have commented mention God’s sovereignty and note that God’s sovereignty extends to every word a person says. It is true that God’s sovereignty extends to every word a person says but I do not think that appealing to this helps here. After all, God’s sovereignty functions in this way for every piece of writing that exists. For example, Hitler’s Mein Kampf, Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Homer’s Odyssey were all composed under God’s sovereignty, so that, in the sense of his sovereign will these writers wrote exactly what God wanted them to, in exactly the words he wanted them to use. However, no one would suggest that these words are inspired in the sense that these authors speak for God.

This clearly shows that inspiration requires more than just sovereign guidance. I see no reason why a person could not hold that inspiration extends to the teaching or message of the text while normal providence applies to the exact words used. On this model the author’s literary style and exact words would be no more inspired than Shakespeare’s but what he or she teaches with these words would be.

3. Daryl cites 1 Tim 3:16, “All Scripture is inspired by God” and suggests that this means that the exact words of the autographs are inspired by God. However, this follows only if one assumes that the word “scripture” in this passage refers to the exact words of the autographs.

This assumption is false. If the word “scripture” in 1 Tim 3:16 is referring to the exact words of the autograph then it must have the same meaning when Paul refers to the same scriptures in 1:Tim 3:15 where he states “from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.” This would mean that Paul is stating that Timothy has been reading the exact words of the autographs from infancy but, Timothy clearly had not read the original autographs of the Old Testament, he had read translations that existed in his time which are verbally errant. It was these verbally errant scriptures that Paul said were inspired.

You say, “If one can not harmonize the truth as discovered by Science and the truth as told by the Bible, then one fails to understand God on God’s terms.” I disagree. Harmonization is not necessary, just possible harmonization. It might be that the most likely exegesis conflicts with the most likely determination of science, so both can’t be right. But both are merely likely. Taken together, the combination is highly unlikely. That means something less likely has got to be true in at least one of the two fields of inquiry, either the more likely exegesis or the more likely scientific conclusion. But one can remain agnostic about which without undermining God’s revelation. There are a lot of things in scripture that aren’t 100% clear. Adding one more because the most likely result of science conflicts with the most likely exegesis of scripture does not end the inquiry. It just means we don’t have 100% certain answers.

Daryl, I do think you need an actual Adam and Eve to get the intent of the Genesis narrative right. Whatever else is true about Gen 1-11, I think it’s out of touch with the genre of literature to think the actual people narrated in those chapters are, say, mere symbols of general truths about humanity. But I’m insisting that inerrancy isn’t going to get you that by itself.

I disagree about sin nature being explainable without Adam and Eve as an actual couple, though. Sin nature could just as easily be explained by Peter van Inwagen’s suggestion of an entire generation of human beings who fell at once. On the theological question, less rides on Adam and Eve being two people than you claim. But Paul seems to take them as two. The parallel between the one first Adam and the one second Adam does seem to me to require an actual individual Adam. So I don’t think inerrantists can easily dismiss historical Adam and Eve if they take into account the whole Bible. But they would have to say more than just inerrancy to get it absolutely clear from just the Genesis narratives.

You’re right about my stance on the flood. I don’t think it’s the best interpretation of the narrative, and I certainly don’t think the local flood fits well with what other scriptures say about the flood outside of Genesis, but you could maintain the truth of the narrative in Genesis with a local flood, so it’s not inerrancy of Genesis alone (and maybe not even just inerrancy of the entire Bible, but I’d have to look more closely at the texts). You need other plausible exegetical and hermeneutical principles to guarantee the global flood.

Glenn, I think you just reject compatibilism about divine sovereignty and human freedom. If so, then there’s no further place to go. You’re insisting that if God inspires me to come up with something then it wasn’t me who came up with it. This flies in the face of too many scriptural statements for me to accept it. The scriptures make some pretty clear statements that God stands behind everything that happens at least in some sense, and yet it takes those who are the immediate causes to be immediately responsible for what they do, e.g. the king of Assyria in Isaiah 10, David in conducting the census that God incites him to do (by means of Satan’s incitement, given the other account of it), Judas’ betrayal of Jesus (by means also of Satan’s entering him), and numerous other places. The prophets regularly give speeches that are presented as God’s word to the point where if they get something wrong they’re deemed false prophets, and yet it’s clear that the language of individual prophets is unique to their own style and so on. How can it be guaranteed never to be false if God isn’t careful about the details of how they creatively arrive at their prophecy? Your view just doesn’t fit with how the Bible describes God’s means of communicating through human beings.

I think your statement of the dictation view is wrong, though. The key there is that the person is not engaging in any creative activity. The words just appear as if from someone else.

I’m also unsure why you think inerrancy requires correctness of “the wording, worldview and scientific beliefs of the writers of all Scripture”. The wording, yes. The worldview and scientific beliefs of the writers, no, because not all of those affect the truth of what’s written. If Obadiah happened to think the sun is smaller than the earth, how could that possibly affect the truth of what he wrote? If the author of Hebrews had read some Greek philosophy and had become convinced of ancient Greek atomism, and there are no such things as what the ancient Greeks took to be atoms, how could that possibly affect the truth of the book of Hebrews?

As tot he question of what was God-breathed, my answer is that the message is God breathed. And yes of course God means what he says. The message is what he says.

If Scripture being God-breathed doesn’t mean the words of Scripture, then what exactly was God-breathed?
I’d also suggest that God’s character lends itself to that understanding. God always says what He means and if Scripture isn’t God’s Words then what is it?

I’m adding nothing, I’m just repeating God.

R Hampton, soooo creation is God’s authoritative Word? Not hardly.

This is where the precise definition of inerrancy and the respect one gives the revelatory truth of God’s Creation can be tested. If one can not harmonize the truth as discovered by Science and the truth as told by the Bible, then one fails to understand God on God’s terms.