Inerrancy - a deeply unbiblical and idolatrous concept

How true?

Nowadays there probably aren't that many Christians who really believe the bible is true in every detail. However, somewhat paradoxically, if you challenge them on this, they (well, lots of 'em) will circle the wagons and declare that it is indeed completely "God's Word", and that if it disagrees with the findings of science, history, common sense, reason, and even what people would ordinarily judge to be "true", then so much the worse for the competition.


But this is a tricky position for the (theistic) Christian. There is nothing in the recorded (or attributed) words of Jesus that can really support such an extreme bibliolatry, and - worse - if people take that view, then they are left unable to properly understand what is written in the bible, and the beliefs and culture of the people over the 800 years or so during which it was cobbled together. The process of compilation is part of the message, and part of the fun and value of the thing, for Christ's sake! Why turn it into some primitive oracle, and rob it of its humanity?

As a Christian Atheist, it's pretty obvious that I cannot hold to an inerrantist position - but even when I was a theist, the suggestion was absurd. In order to make it "inerrant", one had to dream up the most ridiculous convoluted nonsenses, that then dehumanised the authors, wrenched the stories and worldviews from their historical contexts, and made the "God" of the bible a buffoon. Indeed, biblical inerrancy was (in my view - and it continues to be my view) a very deep and troublesome form of blasphemy.

Let's look at it another way. If there are contradictions in the bible, outright errors, fictions, fables, fantasies and fudges - does that decrease its value? I would suggest not. I would instead suggest that the bible gives us a very clear view that religion should really have nothing whatever to do with truth claims (or even gods), but about community. A shared narrative that gives us a toolkit for describing the problems that life throws at us wee humans.

So, if you're sitting in a church, listening to some priest or pastor rabbitting on about the amazing bible, you can remind yourself that he or she is missing something really important. Perhaps the most important thing of all. But you won't be thanked for pointing it out.

Secular Bible Scholarship

Debunking Christianity is one of my favourite blogs, run by the incomparable John Loftus. John has posted a call from himself, Hector Avalos, Jim Linville and Ken Pulliam for the establishment of a group to apply biblical scholarship from an explicitly non-religious perspective.

Yes, yes, I know the CJCA is trying to not rock the boat, but replace it plank-by-plank, while keeping it afloat (possibly a doomed enterprise, but who's to say it's not a fun experiment?), but this has got to be a good thing. Many Christian Atheists have come to their positions because they have studied the bible in considerable detail, and Christianity ultimately supports Atheism in the final analysis.

Of course, a corollary of what I'm saying is that Atheistic Judaism and Atheistic Islam etc. are perfectly valid positions to take, and people are developing atheistic compatibility layers for these religions too (possibly most advanced in Judaism - a fantastic model to follow in many respects). Atheistic Christianity is not exclusive - our atheism joins us to our colleagues in many other camps and disciplines. Keep it up, folks! Similar groupings for study of the Torah and Koran, anyone?