Why Bart Ehrman is good for Christianity
Many conservative Christians would disagree strongly with the opening title as they see Bart Ehrman as representative of 'godless, anti-Bible higher criticism', or some other equally hysterical term. That's a shame because apart from being one of the best NT textual critics alive today, Ehrman when read intelligently acts as a catalyst to spur Christians into a more intelligent, less fundamentalist way of reading the Bible.
Greg Monette's recent blog post shows exactly how an intelligent reading of Ehrman helped him move from fundamentalist Christianity to the sort of faith that did not disintegrate on encountering a single discrepancy:
Ehrman is also correct that the New Testament contains “discrepancies” and not simply “apparent” discrepancies. Evangelicals (and I am one) often make sure they use the word “apparent” before discrepancy because what may seem like a discrepancy now, we may discover isn’t one at all. However, there are definitely more than a few discrepancies in the Gospels that will never be straightened out. For instance, who asked Jesus if the sons of Zebedee (James and John) could sit at his righthand when he entered his kingdom? Was it James and John themselves (Matthew 20:20-28) or their mother (Mark 10:35-45)? The two Gospels do not agree with one another. Was it the centurion himself who asked Jesus to heal his male servant in person as we read in Matthew’s Gospel (8:5-13)? Or did the centurion send some Jewish elders to ask Jesus as we read in Luke’s Gospel (7:1-10)? The discrepancy is clear. Ehrman is correct to point out many of the real discrepancies that exist in the Gospels. However, where Ehrman errs is where he says nothing about the possibility that real events occurred like those described in both Gospels and yet one or both of the Gospel's authors made a mistake in a few of the details, or purposely changed some of the details for reasons they thought acceptable. Yes, it may be an important detail here or there, but it doesn’t necessarily discredit the entirety of each story. Only super conservative Christians should be easy prey for scholars like Ehrman. I used to be one of these people. I’m not anymore. I have learned that there are discrepancies in the Gospels and yet they don’t discredit the overall historical reliability of the stories in question. (Emphasis mine)
Ehrman is only a problem if your view of inspiration is a rigid variant of verbal plenary inspiration which argues that God dictated every word to the writers. In this case, any discrepancy automatically reflects back on God, and produces the sort of tension which can - and does - lead to a collapse of faith. However, as Monette says:
If anyone tells you that the Bible must be 100% reliable in order for Jesus to have been raised from the dead...have a good chuckle. That’s ridiculous. That’s like saying that if a modern day journalist is slightly incorrect in their reporting of something that took place that it mustn't have actually happened. Please. We can do better than this brittle fundamentalism.
Exactly.
Yes, And for this reason I agree with what Richard Heard wrote in his "Introduction to the New Testament" already in 1950:
ReplyDelete"The progress of criticism in England, for example, has not been by violent swings of opinion but by gradual steps, in which the conception of a verbally inerrant New Testament has yielded slowly but surely to that of a collection of books, imperfect in all kinds of ways, but containing very much that is historically trustworthy and offering still a sure witness to the truth of the revelation which it contains."
"Only in the New Testament itself can we still have confidence that the essential truths proclaimed by the apostles are preserved, even if we now must add that the books of the New Testament are not free from faults and errors. The true significance of canonicity lies not in the inerrancy of scripture, but in the fact that it ‘containeth all things necessary to salvation’".
Hi Ken, I agree with your overall point. William Lane Craig makes a similar point: the interconnected web of belief has the existence of God at the centre, the resurrection very near the centre, and the inerrancy of the Bible somewhat further out. Errors in a few details would not unravel the truth claims of Christianity. However, I wouldn't link my verbal plenary understanding of inspiration to a dictation theory of inspiration. Also, I have found so consistently that alleged errors can be readily explained by careful study that I have learned to be highly skeptical of claims that there are actual errors in the Scripture accounts. What is clear is that the gospel writers often omit details that are not important to their telling of the story. These ellipses are discovered and explained by comparing the gospel accounts. The fact that Christianity has felt comfortable about leaving these obvious errors stand for 2,000 years indicates that nobody has ever felt threatened by them before. The claims of new atheists to have "found" discrepancies is a nonsense. They have been observed and resolved by Bible students since the first century.
ReplyDeleteThe 19th century Reformed scholar Charles Hodge made an astonishingly (for the time) nuanced defence of plenary inspiration, one with which I am in general agreement:
ReplyDelete""The Church doctrine denies that inspiration is confined to parts of the Bible; and affirms that it applies to all the books of the sacred canon. It denies that the sacred writers were merely partially inspired; it asserts that they were fully inspired as to all that they teach, whether of doctrine or fact.
"This of course does not imply that the sacred writers were infallible except for the special purpose for which they were employed. They were not imbued with plenary knowledge. As to all matters of science, philosophy, and history, they stood on the same level with their contemporaries. They were infallible only as teachers, and when acting as the spokesmen of God. Their inspiration no more made them astronomers than it made them agriculturists. Isaiah was infallible in his predictions, although he shared with his countrymen the views then prevalent as to the mechanism of the universe. Paul could not err in anything he taught, although he could not recollect how many persons he had baptized in Corinth.
"The sacred writers also, doubtless, differed as to insight into the truths which they taught. The Apostle Peter intimates that the prophets searched diligently into the meaning of their own predictions. When David said God had put “all things” under the feet of man, he probably little thought that “all things” meant the whole universe. (Heb. 2:8.) And Moses, when he recorded the promise that childless Abraham was to be the father “of many nations,” little thought that it meant the whole world. (Rom. 4:13).
"Nor does the Scriptural doctrine on this subject imply that the sacred writers were free from errors in conduct. Their infallibility did not arise from their holiness, nor did inspiration render them holy. Balaam was inspired, and Saul was among the prophets. David committed many crimes, although inspired to write psalms. Peter erred in conduct at Antioch; but this does not prove that he erred in teaching. The influence which preserved him from mistakes in teaching was not designed to preserve him from mistakes in conduct." [1]
It's ironic that the atheists who used to be fundamentalist Christians still take their fundamentalist view of the Bible with them, including a dictation theory of inspiration, which means that when they see Paul make a small error in 1 Cor 10:8 (23,000 dead instead of 24,000 dead ) which most likely means Paul was quoting from memory, they immediately declare the Bible worthless. At most, they've refuted the dictation theory of inspiration, and demonstrated that they still think like fundamentalists. Such shallow thinking is however all too common among ex-Christians (and ex-Christadelphians).
1. Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology (vol. 1; Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1997), 165–166.