In 1977 Christians theologians and pastors in America gathered together over the issue of what they thought to be the erosion of inerrancy within the Christian Church. They issued a statement in 1978 which was signed by 300 scholars. It consisted of 19 Statements of Affirmation and Denial in a creed-like fashion with a  fuller statement issued in 1982. They can be read for example here.

Some have said that this is a North American issue: In 1977 also,   the Nottingham Evangelical Anglican Congress, assured themselves that such a battle for the Bible in the Unites States would not arise in the UK (observed by Ranauld Macaulay in the forward to "The Great evangelical Disaster" see below). N T Wright, a British theologian cleary does not want to subsequently  commit himself to the term but claims "I don't think I've ever said I an not an inerrantist". Nevertheless it is clear that it has become an issue with the western church generally and of course in the UK.

A full list of signatories to the Statement can be found here, but people who stand out the me personally include D A Carson, Wayne Grudem, R C Sproul, Norman Geisler, John M Frame, James Packer and Francis Schaeffer.

FRANCES SCHAEFFER- Warning

In 1984 in his last book " The Great Evangelical Disaster", Francis Schaeffer, written while in the throes of terminal cancer warned of the failure of the evangelical world. He wrote (p37) "Here is the great evangelical disaster... the failure...to stand for truth as truth. There is only one word for this- namely accommodation: the evangelical church has accommodated to the world spirit of the age. First there has been accommodation on Scripture, so that many...hold a weakened view of the Bible and no longer affirm the truth of all the Bible teaches...many evangelicals are now accepting the higher critical methods in the study of the Bible"

So do you think this is an issue in the church today?

 

 This article, written by Leon Morris, is particularity relevant https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/churchman/081-01_022.pdf

. Here is the opening paragraph that identifies the issue

"MODERN biblical scholarship has proved itself so insipid and
unstimulating. We are confronted with the paradox of a way
of studying the word of God out of which no word of God ever seems to
come, with an imposing modem knowledge of the Bible which seems
quite incapable of saying anything biblical or thinking biblically." In
these words J. V. Langmead Casserley expresses concisely the basic
objection to the usual critical approach.  This is not a criticism which
deals with peripheral matters. It goes to the heart of the matter.
For this critical approach not only does not yield us a word from God:
it cannot yield us a word from God. It rests on the presupposition
that the Christian must abandon his views of inspiration when he
interprets the Bible in order to make quite sure that his method is
historically and critically respectable. The critic insists on being so
"objective" that an unbeliever must respect his scholarship even if
he cannot agree with his conclusions"

 

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This article will look at the the view of Tom Kennar with particular reference to his position on the authority of the bible. He is taken as a representative of a particular viewpoint and such a view is prevalent today even amoung those that teach us.

Tom Kennar  is an outspoken and charming rector from St Faith's Church Havant. He has his own blog and has his sermons publish on YouTube. He has recently commented upon the potential split in the church of England because of the evangelical movements attitude towards same sex blessings ( ie they are at fault).  In summary he believes that the Bible is to be no longer to be considered the Word of God and thus in particular many traditional views regarding relationships between the sexes and marriage should be re-evaluated. We may cover that issue separately.

Schism in the Church?

I agree with him that the core issue is the view that different Christians hold about the authority of the bible. However I differ with his conclusions.

This YouTube video (opens in new window) where he contrasts his view that the bible is a "vitally important collection of scriptures, inspired by God... useful for teaching and instruction but ultimately point toward the true Word of God which is Jesus" with " those who believe the bible to be the word of God and be treated as authoritative straight off the page in all matters". These, according to him are the cause of the schism.

Please take some time to watch his video. It is 11 minutes long. Usefully, you can find (some of ) the text  his sermon summarized here.  Here are some quotations:

1. "It is clear that I have touched a raw nerve among a certain section of the wider church who cling persistently to the idea that the Bible is the sovereign, immutable, inerrant Word of God."
2. "If we no longer consider the Bible to be the Word of God, this means radically re-evaluating our views about male headship of churches and the family – and that’s a challenge to some people."
3. "The saddest part of the debate for me is that lack of historical knowledge among my detractors. They do not seem to realize, for example, that the status of Scripture has been a real and live debate in the Christian church throughout its history.  The early church councils and synods wrestled with it, constantly – including centuries-long debates about which books should be considered ‘in’ or ‘out’ of the Bible.  Those debates have continued right through the church’s history – and even today, different version of the Bible, with different books included or excluded, are published by different sections of the church. "
4. With regard to same-sex unions, my detractors are ignorant of something called ‘adelphopoesis’ – or ‘brothering’.  That was a formal liturgical ceremony in which two people of the same sex could be legally and formally joined together as ‘brothers’ (nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more).  It was a common ceremony up until the Reformation, and shows that historically, the church was rather more tolerant of same-sex unions than many, today, suppose. 
5. Doing theology seriously, you see, requires us to live in the grey world of mystery.  As I’ve often stated, our tiny brains are simply not up to fully comprehending the mystery and majesty of God.  Any of us, at any time, might consider that we’ve reached firm and unassailable knowledge about God.  We may be utterly certain that we are right about, for example, the authority of the Bible.  Or we might imagine that we have completely comprehended God’s opinion about same-sex unions, or the divinity of Christ, or the efficacy of prayer.  But serious students of God, who’ve read the history of the church, and thought hard about the theological questions of the ages, soon come to the conclusion that all our supposed knowledge is provisional.  At any moment, the Holy Spirit is likely to shake us out of our certainty, rattle our complacency, and knock down the ivory towers of certainty that we love to battle over. 

COMMENTS AND DISCUSSION

1. Clearly his comment has struck a raw nerver for those who have a different view on biblical authority. He has had a number of comments on his YouTube video BUT THEY HAVE NOW BEEN TURNED OFF!!. He hold that those who oppose him believe that the bible is "authoritative, straight off the page the word of God in all matters" When he refers to straight off the page I am not quite sure what he means. For example when Jesus said in John 10:9-16 "I am the door..." Are those who hold a different view to consider Jesus as an actual physical door or as he said earlier in that chapter a physical gate? He has built a 'straw man' position for the opposing view so it cam be dismissed as extreme asnd unreasonable.

Alternatively he considers (reasonable) people like him think that the bible is inspired by God (and I think that those who oppose him think that also!), useful for teaching but point towards the true Word of God which is Jesus. However he pushes this idea further and asserts that only when Jesus speaks do we take it that God has spoken. Therefore we only need to take heed of the 'red letters' of the New Testament and we can go differently where the red letters are have been silent. The rest of the content of the Bible is useful but not authoritative. This fails completely because Jesus had much to say about  the failure of the traditions to uphold "what is written ... and teaching as doctrines the precepts of men" (eg Mark 7:6) referring to the earlier scriptures. In Matthew 19 speaks about Genesis "...He who made them... made the male and female.. a man shall leave... and be joined to his wife... and the two shall become one" Jesus later speaks of eunuchs by birth but not of those who desire is of the same sex. (Note that we are not dealing directly with the same sex attraction issue here). There is much more to be said on this subject.

He claims ignorance for those who has opposing views in terms of 'nod, nod, wink wink' in relation to 'brothering'. To be fair I was ignorant of this but his conclusion is based upon some disputed research. A rebuttal can be found here. In any case this is a blind alley.

I am not convinced that 'doing theology' leads us to a grey world. Yes, we cannot comprehend all there is to know about God. If the standard of certainty and truth is omniscience then yes we fail to know. We cannot know things absolutely like God can. However we claim that God knows everything and he has spoken. He has spoken in our terms. He has disclosed Himself so that we can substantially understand. Our understanding will vary as our experience will vary but we can know God's truth and we can have knowledge. We can get closer and closer to knowledge of God's truth- we may never get to having arrived at full understanding but we can get closer. Tom is saying because we cannot fully know, everything is dark shadow. I an saying that although we cannot know things absolutely, we can know enough to base our lives on them. We can claim that  God is there and He has spoken. God accommodates himself and speaks in our terms. He has given words we can think about, He has invaded history and has spoken. We can understand substantially.

 

 

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The perhaps most fundamental  aspect of our Christian faith is the place of the Bible as an authority. It makes claims (or propositions) that certain events occurred. It contains teaching for us to adhere to. It claims to have been written over a long period of time by many different 'inspired' authors to have content relating to the beginning of all as far as we are concerned and to the future end. Within it, it claims that God has spoken in history and contains the actual words of God in many cases. It describes the many failings of man and a particular people.  It also claims spectacular events or miracles that defy the 'natural order' of things. The incarnation, of God being born, teaching face to face, being rejected and crucified and of rising to break the barrier of death. To break out from just one group of people to be offered to the whole world of people and together with God Himself through the Holy Spirit to lead us into an new way of being.

That's a wonderful claim but can we trust all that?

After all the content was written variably thousands of years ago. Surely in the intervening centuries we have learnt many things and have a greater understanding of the makeup of the physical world and of mankind? Can we accept the assertions of the bible as truth?  I suppose the central issues is perhaps the role of reason is all of this. Whereas one would reason out the world within and subject to the authority of the bible, the growth of the Enlightenment and Modernism placed reason in the seat of power leading to it application within Christianity as liberal theology. This became prevalent particularly in Germany and exported to America as theologians moved. Christian teaching became interpreted by way of modern knowledge and science. Religious experience became irrational and it took a wild leap of faith to participate. 

However rationality was not all it promised to be and post modernity asserts that there is no truth, and so called 'historical' records cannot verified.

All of this had an affect upon how the content of the bible has been studied, and the approach of theologians.

CASE 1: Limited Authority
Tom Kennar has a Jesus only view towards biblical authority and has a post modern concept of truth. He is outspoken on this issue. Read more on this page here. 

Case 2 : Biblical Inerrancy

It is has been argued that the the doctrine of inerrancy was invented in the 19th century in Princeton. However it is to be noted that doctrines arise when there is a need: the rise of liberal theology was the spur for the clarification, in the same way the earlier creeds were created.  The notion of biblical truthfulness was assumed throughout the history of the church. Jesus himself quoted scripture whcih implied its words were trustworthy.  Read an article here about the Statement of Biblical Inerrancy.

Case 3 : KJV (KIng James Version) only

Some of the claimants for the King James version as being the only acceptable version of the Bible assert that other versions are tainted by liberal Protestant or Roman Catholic agendas and more modern translations are tainted. 

A local example is the Providence Baptist Church, Northampton who say "We use the King James Authorised version of the Bible as we believe it is the most accurate English translation that presently exists,"

 

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