BioLogos and Inerrancy?

Faith & Science Conversation
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With the encouragement of @BradKramer, I set up this thread to discuss 2 verses and three possible categories of interpretation.

In another thread, I asserted that BioLogos categorizes Biblical texts into three different baskets. Brad took issue with my assertion. Of course, for me, I was surprised that this is a controversial idea for BioLogos supporters! I really had no idea that there are BioLogos supporters (maybe even the Majority of Them!), who accept BioLogos doctrine - - and simultaneously think the Bible has no errors.

It is logically possible … I just didn’t think it was probable!

So here’s the question:

If we can put all of the verses of the Bible into three baskets, and we named the three baskets like so:

  1. Basket of Figurative verses:

  2. Basket of Symbolic verses:

  3. Basket of Erroneous verses:

I would propose that these 2 verses would go into the last basket!

Gen 2:22: And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.

Gen 1:6: And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.

If they are not erroneous, could someone please propose how to make them symbolic or figurative? Because I’m at a loss on this one. Please note, I’m not looking for a YEC (or like-minded person) to say these are historical verses … and so do not have to be Figurative or Symbolic. That’s not the question. The question is - - how do you explain these verses as anything other than error If you reject the literal YEC position and you think humans were created by evolution.

How does Eve being made from a rib qualify for anything other than erroneous? How does God installing a firmament in the sky, to separate the heavenly ocean from the terrestrial ocean - - fall into any category other than cosmological error?

To me it is not outrageous to think BioLogos supporters would uniformly consider those 2 verses to be “in error”!

There are other verses I can mention later, depending on which direction this thread goes in …

[TITLE OF THREAD EDITED TO CALM THE MOB… for some strange reason, I have been asked to edit the thread’s title … because apparently it was making some people crazy. The original title was:
"Does BioLogos accept that the Bible contains a few errors? "]

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I do not consider any verse to be in error @gbrooks9. Not even these.

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@Swamidass

Very well, my dear sir. But could you explain how you explain those verses as something other than just erroneous? If you make a compelling case, I can change my future postings to talk about Different baskets…

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BTW, I’ve talked to @tremperlongman about this too. Perhaps he can chime in, but I do believe he takes a similar position on inerrancy as do I. I think I’ve explained this before too.

I affirm the Lausanne Covenant, which says:

We affirm the divine inspiration, truthfulness and authority of both Old and New Testament Scriptures in their entirety as the only written word of God, without error in all that it affirms, and the only infallible rule of faith and practice
The Lausanne Covenant - Lausanne Movement

I believe that the Bible is inerrant in “all that it affirms.” Of course there is a great deal of debate about what exactly Scripture affirms. I am fine with that. However, with the right interpretation (to which we aspire but may never find) I believe there is no error.

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Also, I like how @vjtorley puts it: Baker’s dozen: Thirteen questions for Dr. Hunter | Uncommon Descent Perhaps @TedDavis could fill in some details too.

In 1864, a group of young London chemists, led by a young chemist named Herbert McLeod (1841-1923) and calling themselves ‘Students of the natural and physical sciences’, put together a statement titled the Declaration of Students of the Natural and Physical Sciences, expressing their belief that “it is impossible for the Word of God, as written in the book of nature, and God’s Word written in Holy Scripture, to contradict one another, however much they may appear to differ,” and expressing their confident belief that “a time will come when the two records will be seen to agree in every particular.” The statement, which was published in 1865, attracted the signatures of 717 people (most of whom were scientists), including 86 Fellows of the Royal Society. James Joule and Adam Sedgwick were among its signatories. Other scientists, however, attacked the wording of the statement as divisive, and urged that it was high time to “let men of science mind their own business, and theologians theirs.” The most prominent critic of the Declaration was the British mathematician Augustus De Morgan, who argued in his work, A Budget of Paradoxes (section O), that scientists should not be called on to approve or disapprove, in writing, any religious doctrine or statement, and who put forward an alternative declaration of his own. What is remarkable, historically speaking, is that both documents fall afoul of what scientists now refer to as methodological naturalism. Even the alternative version put forward by de Morgan expressed a belief in the “Word of God, as correctly read in the Book of Nature,” as well as expressing “faith as to our future state.”

The dissenters from the 1864 Declaration of Students of the Natural and Physical Sciences carried the day, and by 1872, the Declaration was all but forgotten.

The Declaration read as follows:

We, the undersigned Students of the Natural Sciences, desire to express our sincere regret, that researches into scientific truth are perverted by some in our own times into occasion for casting doubt upon the Truth and Authenticity of the Holy Scriptures. We conceive that it is impossible for the Word of God, as written in the book of nature, and God’s Word written in Holy Scripture, to contradict one another, however much they may appear to differ. We are not forgetful that Physical Science is not complete, but is only in a condition of progress, and that at present our finite reason enables us only to see as through a glass darkly, and we confidently believe, that a time will come when the two records will be seen to agree in every particular. We cannot but deplore that Natural Science should be looked upon with suspicion by many who do not make a study of it, merely on account of the unadvised manner in which some are placing it in opposition to Holy Writ. We believe that it is the duty of every Scientific Student to investigate nature simply for the purpose of elucidating truth, and that if he finds that some of his results appear to be in contradiction to the Written Word, or rather to his own interpretations of it, which may be erroneous, he should not presumptuously affirm that his own conclusions must be right, and the statements of Scripture wrong; rather, leave the two side by side till it shall please God to allow us to see the manner in which they may be reconciled; and, instead of insisting upon the seeming differences between Science and the Scriptures, it would be as well to rest in faith upon the points in which they agree.

It strikes me that a creationist could conscientiously sign this Declaration, affirming a belief in the special creation of man, while at the same time acknowledging that the scientific evidence appears to contradict this view at the present time, but trusting nevertheless that at some future time, a resolution of this conflict of evidence will be found. To my mind, that sounds like a fine, manly position for a special creationist to take. I wonder what Dr. Hunter thinks of it. And what do readers think?

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@Swamidass

You may be a man without an explanation… you are obviously not without great faith.
I wonder how many BioLogos supporters affirm the Lausanne Covenant ?!

The Lausanne Covenant certainly varies quite a bit from the great bulk of the discussion on these boards. When we dispute the nature of the firmament … we don’t argue that it must be something meaningful. We argue that the firmament was an ancient idea that was wrong.

But I digress… just how many BioLogos supporters adhere to the the Lausanne Covenant?

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So regarding the firmament. I do believe that passage is referring to ancient cosmology to accomodate the ancient reader. In this, the Bible is not affirm ancient cosmology but affirming different truths in a “langage” the ancient Hebrew would understand. So the Bible is not affirming an error here, just accommodating an error in the original reader’s mind.

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You are going to make a distinction between Affirming … and Accommodating?

I never would have expected that kind of a distinction from you…

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I suppose I am surprising in many ways. Yes, I do make a distinction between affirming and accommodating, as many people do. Isn’t the whole point of accommodation to recognize the the Bible says somethings to be easier to understand in cultural context, but without specifically make a statement for or against the cultural meaning itself?

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I’m down with the Lausanne Covenant. Though I don’t know how incredibly meaningful it is to say that the Bible is inerrant in all the it affirms, and then admit that “what it affirms” is open to lots of interpretive freedom and nobody can positively identify with 100% accuracy all that the Bible affirms.

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I had not heard of the Lausanne covenant before it came up in this forum, but if the part that Dr. Swamidass quotes above is representative of the whole, then I would support it without reservation, and specifically admire its chosen wording: …“in all that it affirms.” While I understand Christy’s reservation that this leaves a door wide open for all sorts of potential mischief, it seems to me nevertheless that there is no escaping that qualification. I.e. To think such qualification unnecessary is to pretend along with YECs among others that it is possible to “get the message straight up” with zero interpretation. Most (all?) Biologos supporters probably --rightly in my view-- reject that notion. And in any case, it is more than just a “decoding of a message”. The phrase “what Scriptures affirm” I think invites a reader to be more than just a successful decoder. The reader is called to deeper understanding of what is being taught and even to obedience. I.e. --to be more than just “hearers only”. In other words, even being a successful decoder is not enough.

Regarding George’s original challenges; even if Dr. Swamidass shows a more mature and staid reticence about taking George’s bait, I’ll brashly dive in with my layman’s attempt --and then learn from any corrections that may come my way. [I have learned to appreciate your similar practices, George.]

I propose that what Scriptures “are affirming” in the case of Adam’s rib is that women are not independent from men. It is obvious that men are not independent of women since we are all depend on our mothers for birth. So perhaps this was a bit of a corrective (as if such a thing were needed in that patriarchal society) to affirm that men are needed in this whole process too. And indeed we see Paul later using these passages to affirm our mutual interdependence (I Cor. 11:11) --which was probably a radical thing for him to be promoting in the still highly patriarchal culture of his own day. So I think, George, that we are probably safe in thinking that the rib story affirms that none of us (in this case with respect to gender) is independent.

Regarding the firmament that separates the waters above from those below, I propose that this is part of the larger narrative of God bringing order to chaos (represented by unchecked waters in the ancient Hebrew view). So just as the waters below are later separated to make space for land, so the waters have their vertical separation too. It rains in due seasons-- which obviously must come from waters above, and that water runs in rivers to the sea (the waters below) because it has to drain somewhere. So the Hebrew is admiring God’s order in all these things. Water, dangerous as the stuff is, has its necessary and now contained places.

All of this the believer can affirm is 100% true. Only those hostile skeptics (and their creationist counterparts who swallowed the same bait) want everything spelled out in scientific terms, then becoming muddled and confused about so much additional anachronistic baggage they think Scriptures ought to affirm. Then they can use this confusion to dismiss the bible, or alternately to desperately insist that it must in reality affirm some sort of “true” and still quite missing science if we could just defeat the huge evolutionary conspiracy today. It is a tragic example of taking one solution and turning it into two problems.

In faith we can assert there will be no problems with what Scriptures affirm. Let’s insert a fourth basket into your set and call it an historical basket. So far those three baskets would be sufficient for all your examples and your ‘Erroneous verses’ basket is still empty. But you said you have more … what’s next?

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I affirm that I affirm the Lausanne Covenant in all that it affirms.

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I don’t think it leaves the door open for mischief, so much as that the line is in there mostly for the benefit of all the people who really need to have inerrancy in there somewhere to sleep well at night. Compromise is important when you are trying to unite a culturally and generationally diverse group, and I think that line is an example of compromise between the folks who think it is essential to mention inerrancy in any discussion of Scripture’s authority and the folks who have reservations about the way the concept of inerrancy has been applied in the past. I think it is more an example of diplomacy than doctrine, that’s all. It worked, because I am not a fan of inerrancy, but I can live with Lausanne.

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I too fully support Joshua’s stance, not only in principle, but in the experience of maybe 50 years study of the Bible.

Merv’s suggestions for the two “erroneous” passages are good - and because they’re not the only possible ones, by that very token indicate that is is very foolish for a modern person to think they know so much about a far off culture that they can confidently say, “Well, they got that wrong.”

John Walton, on the Eve passage, points out some significant indicators that it indicates a visionary experience of Adam’s, in which God reveals the interdependence of the sexes. You only spot the possibility by forgetting that, though to us “deep sleep” suggests a general anaesthetic, that is entirely anachronistic. Deep sleep is used of visionary experiences not infrequently in both Testaments, and even elsewhere in Genesis (in the case of Abraham).

Coming from an entirely different viewpoint, nothing in science would preclude the possibility that Eve was miraculously formed, in literal fashion, from Adam. The fact that we can’t see why that makes any logical sense might be an indicator that we don’t understand the setting, not that our science shows it in error.

Me, I’d go closer to Walton’s view - but that’s not the main issue, which is the hubris of pretending to an omniscient judgement on Scripture.

Regarding the firmament, I won’t rehash my arguments for believing the firmament to indicate primarily the spatial separation of the waters, not the thing that separates them. That’s an argument about interpretation, but even were the verse demonstrably an accommodation to Hebrew “ancient science”, it would not affect its truth. Again, Joshua is absolutely right on that.

Imagine, for example, that (to please me!) the writer of Genesis had wanted clearly to stress the separation of heaven and earth, and had written something like “God created the empty space under the sky.” A modern could sniffily say that the space isn’t empty, being full of air - but since the concept of air as a material substance was absent from ANE culture, until the Greeks demonstrated it centuries later, what would be the point of it? Air was conceived as a space - wind, breath (and spirit) were conceived as something quite different, not (as we conceive them) as air in motion.

Paradoxically, it would be uncontroversial if Genesis had said that “outer space is empty”, because we think in terms of material vacuum, usually forgetting all the ions, energy, fields and probably dark matter that makes “vacuum” as dated and misleading concept as “aether” is now.

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I’m interesting in this Thread (thanks for posting it George) because of my 1) fundamentalist (albeit Anabaptist) roots and 2) later spiritual/intellectual journey. That being said, I’m puzzled by the Thread’s Heading: “Does BioLogos accept that the Bible contains a few errors.”

The BioLogos belief statement simply affirms the following: We believe the Bible is the inspired and authoritative word of God. By the Holy Spirit it is the “living and active” means through which God speaks to the church today, bearing witness to God’s Son, Jesus, as the divine Logos, or Word of God. - See more at: About BioLogos | Science and Faith Working Hand in Hand - BioLogos Therefore, within the parameters of this Statement the various “official Voices of BioLogos” hold a variety to views about how the statement plays out? So as George states in his opening post isn’t the Thread merely a place for BioLogos ‘supporters’ to state their views (kind of like a sandbox where we play respectfully) rather than trying to definitely state anything about what BioLogos accepts?

I’m planning to post on this thread’s topic and the questions George poses but wanted to get this off my mind because I was confused by the Thread’s heading.

Larry Schmidt

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So, in my humble assessment, BioLogos does not take an official position one way or another and has struggled to find a diplomatic position on these issues. Their belief statement is good (in that I largely agree with it) but I personally feel reference to the hard diplomatic and theological work of others (in for example the Lausanne Covenant) would greatly clarify things. BioLogos is not the first to navigate the thorny bramble of theological disagreements surrounding inerrancy and infallibility.

We would do well to use the language and history of those that have come before and negotiated “treaties” between the different factions on this issue already. This is exactly what the Lausanne Covenant is, a treaty between Christians from 150 countries and almost every denomination from 1974. I would hope the next version of the belief statement quotes its statement on inerrancy verbatim. It will clarify things greatly for a lot of conservative audiences.

So @larry, the post is a consequence of BioLogos’s unfortunate effort to “reinvent the wheel” on this very difficult topic. We should try and stay out of the theological fights as much as possible (especially avoidable ones like inerrancy), because our mission is to “invite the church and the world to see the harmony between science and biblical faith as we present an evolutionary understanding of God’s creation.”

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I’m coming into this conversation late… Sorry. I’ll just affirm that Josh well states the understanding of Scripture of the Lausanne Conference. Also the idea that the Bible is true in all that it teaches/affirms/addresses/touches upon is also the language of the Chicago Statement of Inerrancy that has been the banner statement of American evangelicals since the late 1970’s (see Articles 9 and 11). Of course, this does move the discussion to the question what exactly the text teaches, etc. Let’s remember that the doctrine of perspicuity of Scripture only relates to the matters central to our salvation as described in the Westminster Confession of Faith:

All things in Scripture are not alike plain in themselves, nor alike clear unto all: yet those things which are necessary to be known, believed, and observed for salvation, are so clearly propounded, and opened in some place of Scripture or other, that not only the learned, but the unlearned, in a due use of the ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them.

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I resonate with Mervin’s post and appreciate his suggestion of adding a fourth historical category to George’s three baskets. Of course this means we put every verse in the Bible into the historical category and as someone trying to reflect biblical theology isn’t that the point?

George provocatively places Genesis 2:22 & 1:6 into the Erroneous Basket. This is how I suggest viewing his questions since the Creation Narratives (and indeed much, perhaps all, of Genesis 1-11) can be viewed as true myth the Hebrews used in dialogue with their ANE neighbours as they developed their self-understanding as a nation.

There are implications of this view in how the New Testament treats references to these Genesis passages (Jesus recorded sayings, Paul and the other NT authors). Here I have been helped, influenced by NT Wright’s work on the self-understanding of Jesus. In short, Jesus had a growing sense of his vocation to do for Israel what only Yahweh could do (as apposed to a Docetic type view of Jesus, during his time on earth, knowing he was the One who spoke the universe into existence). My apologies if in my attempt to summarize Dr. Wright I have done his view a disservice.

Larry Schmidt

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@Larry

Hmmmm… I suppose it is provocative… because of the very nature of the question. But I really did try to choose the least provocative verses … and went to the heart of the BioLogos goal - - teaching that Genesis is not historically factual.

Now notice that there is a difference between something

A) not being historically factual

vs.

B) being in error.

So, rather than argue about some contradiction between Deuteronomy and Exodus… or between Ezra and Nehemmia, or between Kings and Chronicles [because there are lots of contradictions in these parallel writings!], I focused on 2 Biblical texts that touch on the YEC reality vs. the BioLogos proposals.

After several threads on these two issues:

  1. Did males originate from dust and females from a human rib? Or did they emerge through evolution?

  2. Isn’t it obvious that Genesis’ description of the Firmament is erroneous …

I actually got several BioLogos supporters to insist these were not factually erroneous.

@Eddie

Don’t you think think this is way more dramatic than whether or not Prof. Collins says how he thinks God guided evollution?

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I have some quibbles with your baskets. We have one basket that is essentially evaluating on the basis of truth value and two that are evaluating on meaning (?). And symbolism is a subset of figurative language. What is the point of putting verses into baskets in the first place? When I am studying a passage to try to figure out what it means and how I apply its meaning to my beliefs and behavior, I never sort verses into baskets. It is my impression that people who do are motivated by some sort of sense that only the verses in basket X matter or need to be taken seriously, and the verses in basket Y can be ignored or disqualified.

But, all the verses contribute to the overall communicative intent of the passage in question, whether they include figurative language, or bare objective facts, or stories, or symbols, or guesses, or estimations, or examples, or parables, or exaggerations, or legends, or whatever. The question you need to ask is not usually “Is this verse fact or fiction?” or “Is this verse true or false?” “Or is this verse correct or an error?” “Or is this verse literal or figurative”. The question you need to ask is “What clues does this verse give us as to the overall communicative intent of the author?” No verses get chucked in the “irrelevant” basket. .

Meaning is rarely 100% compositional. (Where if you add up all the individual meaning bits, you get some sort of sum meaning. That’s why robots make poor translators.) There is a whole important level of pragmatics and discourse functions that we process mostly subconsciously to figure out why the speaker is saying what they are saying and how we are expected to respond to what has been communicated. We need biblical scholarship to help inform us when we should not trust our own subconscious processing because it will be significantly different from the original audience, to help to spell out the subconscious processing that would have been going on in the original context.

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