One of the areas of theological reflection that I have been thinking about lately is the interface between what we think the Bible is and what it says it is. Evangelicals have come up with very clear formulations of what they think the Bible should be, or rather, what an inspired, authoritative book should look like. Inerrancy debates are looming up all over the place, and part of the debate is exactly about one’s presupposition of the nature of Scripture. Although “inerrancy battles” are mostly fought within evangelicalism, I have come to realize more and more that the assumptions that often fuel the epistemological, pre-suppositional and theological fire of these discussions are not privy to fundamentalists and a certain cross-section of evangelicals. The same question-begging assumptions come from the academia, and the presently raging debates are bringing these to light in more nuanced ways.

James Kugel in his How to Read the Bible: A Guide to Scripture Then and Now concludes his chapter on the Decalogue (Ten Commandments) with what scholars see as the incompatibility of the human elements they find in a text that is taken to be divine. After showing why scholars think that the command not to make any images was inserted at later period (which does not imply that it did not exist early on), he writes the following:

[The Decalogue’s] very form now appears to most scholars to assimilate them to the covenant stipulations found in old Hittite and other ancient Near Eastern treaties. This fact itself raises disturbing questions about the divine origin of these laws. For why should God, in this crucial act of binding the people of Israel to Himself, have chosen to rely on an utterly human set of conventions instead of going about things in some very different, divine sort of way? (p. 259, my emphasis)

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G. K. Beale’s book The Erosion of Inerrancy in Evangelicalism: Responding to New Challenges to Biblical Authority is a response to what he believes is a challenge to biblical authority that has arisen recently in evangelicalism. The book contains a response to Peter Enns’ book Inspiration and Incarnation, a defense for the single authorship of Isaiah, and a discussion of Old Testament cosmology as opposed to its modern scientific understanding.

It was somewhat frustrating to read the first part of the book because I had already read Beale’s articles (and rejoinders) along with Enns’ responses. What you get in the first few chapters is basically this exchange (Enns’ responses are summarized) with some modifications. I do not understand why Beale chose this format having the benefit of Enns’ responses. His critique is extensive and Enns’ original responses are short (as responses should be) so, at the end, you do not get a balanced exchange (plus most people will probably not bother to read Enns’ articles although Beale encourages us to do so). I do not mean to imply that Beale isn’t asking good questions or doesn’t have some valid points (this back-and-forth is what should be happening). What I did not appreciate was the format and the fact that Beale seems to put Enns in the worst possible light. This part of the book will satisfy those who didn’t like Enns’ book and irritate those who did.

The chapter on Isaiah’s authorship basically repeats traditional arguments and, from what I could see, does not advance the discussion. This will probably be of interest to people who would like to have a summary of the arguments for the single authorship of Isaiah and why Beale believes they are important. In the end, he concludes that a different view can not be said to hold a high view of Scripture.

Perhaps, the best chapter in the entire book in my opinion is chapter 6 entitled “‘Can Old Testament Cosmology be Reconciled with Modern Scientific Cosmology? Part 1.” Read more »

Sparks, Kenton L. God’s Words in Human Words: An Evangelical Appropriation of Critical Biblical Scholarship. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Academy, 2008.

There are some books that have the ability to drastically shape your worldview. This is one of them, at least for me. I found the book to be quite a challenging read and made me think about things I had never thought of before.

This book sort of reminded me of my experience reading Peter Enns’ book “Inspiration and Incarnation.” Whereas Enns focused primarily on the Old Testament, the scope of this book is a lot broader, and I felt that the author wrote as much as he wanted to get his points across without worrying about making it easier for a general audience. To me, that’s one of the strengths of the book. I liked Enns’ book quite a bit and, after all the controversy surrounding it, I have come to the conclusion that one of Enns’ book’s primary weaknesses is that it should have probably been double its size. Although Enns wrote the book for lay people at a popular level, it is quite apparent that many evangelicals are not ready for this type of book (given all the objections against it). You not only have to be nuanced when writing about the nature of Scripture, you also need to spend the time building your case from the ground up. You need to interact with other people and attempt to answer more questions than you ask even if they are tentative or preliminary. And I think Sparks’ book does a better job in that sense.
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Allert, Craig D. A High View of Scripture? The Authority of the Bible and the Formation of the New Testament Canon. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Academy, 2007.

This book is about the formation of the New Testament canon. The author does a great job describing the Evangelical movement to set the context of the debates about the authority, inspiration, canonicity and inerrancy of the bible. He basically talks about how the bible came to be formed and looks at the merits of three different theories: 1) the NT was a spontaneous occurrence, 2) the NT was formed in the second century and 3) the NT was formed in the fourth century (p. 41). The differences in these theories can be attributed to the way historical evidence is interpreted (p. 87). The rest of the book analyzes these three theories and concludes that, while we can talk about Scriptures being recognized as authoritative in the first and second centuries, it is anachronistic to talk about a canon in this period. Even in the fourth century, despite the list of Athanasius in the West and Carthage in the East, there was still a lot of fluidity. Read more »