Friday, June 06, 2014

Christian priorities


What I tell my students every year is that it is imperative that they pursue truth rather than protect their presuppositions. And they need to have a doctrinal taxonomy that distinguishes core beliefs from peripheral beliefs. When they place more peripheral doctrines such as inerrancy and verbal inspiration at the core, then when belief in these doctrines start to erode, it creates a domino effect: One falls down, they all fall down. It strikes me that something like this may be what happened to Bart Ehrman. His testimony in Misquoting Jesus discussed inerrancy as the prime mover in his studies. But when a glib comment from one of his conservative professors at Princeton was scribbled on a term paper, to the effect that perhaps the Bible is not inerrant, Ehrman’s faith began to crumble. One domino crashed into another until eventually he became ‘a fairly happy agnostic.’ I may be wrong about Ehrman’s own spiritual journey, but I have known too many students who have gone in that direction. The irony is that those who frontload their critical investigation of the text of the Bible with bibliological presuppositions often speak of a ‘slippery slope’ on which all theological convictions are tied to inerrancy. Their view is that if inerrancy goes, everything else begins to erode. I would say that if inerrancy is elevated to the status of a prime doctrine, that’s when one gets on a slippery slope. But if a student views doctrines as concentric circles, with the cardinal doctrines occupying the center, then if the more peripheral doctrines are challenged, this does not have an effect on the core. 

http://evangelicaltextualcriticism.blogspot.com/2006/03/interview-with-dan-wallace.html

This argument seems to be increasingly popular among some scholars and apologists (e.g. Dan Wallace, Craig Blomberg, William Lane Craig, Mike Licona, Michael Patton). On this view, a dogmatic commitment to inerrancy is a "slippery slope" or "house of cards." Once you begin to question inerrancy, that has the "domino effect."

To this I'd say a few things:

i) Although we shouldn't make the Christian faith more demanding than God demands, by the same token, we shouldn't make the Christian faith less demanding than God demands. Indeed, we don't have the authority to tell people what biblical teachings they are free to jettison. 

ii) Some professing Christians lose their faith because they had very crude notions of what inerrancy requires. Their false expectations were dashed. But there are nuanced models of inerrancy, viz.

Darrell Bock, “Precision and Accuracy: Making Distinctions in the Cultural Context That Give Us Pause in Pitting the Gospels against Each Other,” in Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith? A Critical Appraisal of Modern and Postmodern Approaches to Scripture, ed. James K. Hoffmeier and Dennis R. Magary (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012) 367-381.




iii) As scholars like Warfield have documented, verbal inspiration is the Bible's own doctrine of inspiration. That's not one among several theories of inspiration. That's not a "peripheral" doctrine. That's the "core" of divine communication. 

iv) Finally, suppose, for the sake of argument, that Scripture is not inerrant. Suppose, when I die and go to heaven, I find out that I was wrong about inerrancy. Does that mean I was wrong to defend inerrancy in the here and now?

Although it's best to be right for the right reasons, it's better to be wrong for the right reasons than right for the wrong reasons. Let's take two examples:

a) Suppose I have a teenage daughter who's diagnosed with cancer. Unfortunately, it's a cancer with a 20% survival rate. Suppose I don't have her treated, because the odds are against her. Conversely, suppose I have her undergo treatment, but she dies anyway. 

Which was the right thing to do? Well, if I have her undergo treatment, then, in a sense I was wrong, because the treatment was futile. Put another way, if I don't have her undergo treatment, there's a sense in which I was right, because even if she had undergone treatment, she was doomed.

But, of course, even though she only had a 1 out of 5 chance of survival, it was my parental duty to try to save her life. I didn't know ahead of time if therapy would be successful or unsuccessful. But there was so much to gain if it succeeded, and so little to lose if it failed.

If I deny her treatment, I'm factually right, but morally wrong. If I order treatment, I'm factually wrong but morally right. 

We'd be justified in condemning a parent who denied her treatment, even if it might have proven futile.I didn't have the benefit of hindsight.

b) Let's take another example. Suppose I have a bedridden mother who lives with me. I have a nurse's aid visit everyday to change her or bathe her. 

Suppose a category-5 hurricane is making a beeline for our neighborhood. It isn't feasible to evacuate my mother in her frail condition. I can stay behind, but I'd be risking my own life in the process. Or I can leave her behind and come back after the hurricane has passed over. It's possible that the hurricane will weaken or swerve before it makes landfall, but if I wait until the last minute to decide what to do, it will be too late to escape because the evacuation routes will be gridlocked. I'd be overtaken by the hurricane.

Suppose I stay behind. As it turns out, the hurricane swerved. My mother was never in danger. It was unnecessary for me to stay by her side.

Suppose I leave her behind. As it turns out, it was safe to leave her alone, then return a few hours later. 

If I say behind, there's a sense in which I was wrong, since she was never actually threatened by the hurricane. 

But, of course, it's my filial duty to stay behind, even if that means we both die. If I leave her behind, and no harm comes to her, we both got lucky. But that hardly excuses me for deserting her in a crisis. 

If I leave her behind, I'm factually right, but morally wrong. If I stay behind, I'm factually wrong, but morally right.

Suppose, for the sake of argument, that some Christians have too much faith in Scripture. Suppose their excessive faith is misplaced. 

Even if (ex hypothesi), they were wrong, they were wrong for the right reason. Their motives were God-honoring.

Even if (ex hypothesi), those who reject inerrancy turn out to be right, they were right for the wrong reason.  Their motives were God-dishonoring. 

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