a letter to a fundamentalist
The following letter came out of a recent, difficult experience. I have adapted it here to be more generic. I post it with the thought that it could be of use to someone else.
Dear fellow believer in Christ,
After much prayerful reflection on our recent discussion, I wish to summarize what I think are the most significant differences between your perspective and mine. I urge you to consider these things carefully.
First, it all begins with the doctrine of Scripture. By this I don't mean any particular doctrine which Scripture teaches, or Scripture's teaching as a whole. I mean the doctrine about Scripture, the nature and means of God's revelation in Scripture. Scripture's own self-testimony is that it is fully from God and fully from human beings, 100% divine and 100% human: for example, biblical passages ascribe both human and divine origins to Scripture (e.g. Mark 12:36; Matt 15:4 cf. Mark 7:10); the concept of "inspiration" or Scripture being "God-breathed" in the foundational text of 2 Timothy 3:16 recalls Genesis 2:7, where God shapes natural materials and breathes into them to create that which is living and active; and the historical, cultural, and literary nature of the biblical writings attests to their human dimension. Your view, on the other hand, is essentially a docetic view of Scripture: it is fully from God but only seems to be from human beings, 100% divine but only apparently human. Yes, you claim to acknowledge the role of the human authors of Scripture, but you fail to follow through on the full implications of the fully human dimension of Scripture. Instead, you create a chain of logic based upon your own understanding of what the fully divine dimension of Scripture must entail, without taking into account these full implications of the fully human dimension of Scripture. I know you seek to exalt God in the Scriptures, but ironically your view in fact dishonours the God of Scripture: you fail to submit to the way in which God has sovereignly chosen to reveal himself in Scripture, through fully human means. I know you seek to place divine revelation above human reason, but ironically, because you do not completely acknowledge the mystery of God's fully divine, fully human revelation in Scripture, your view places your own logic above God's revelation.
Second, our disagreement involves biblical hermeneutics, that is, the approach and methods of biblical interpretation. Because of your doctrine of Scripture outlined above, and in spite of Scripture's own self-testimony, you strip the Scriptures of their historical dimension, flattening them into a purely theological and spiritual book. You ignore the particular historical, linguistic, and cultural means and contexts through which God has chosen to reveal himself in Scripture, and the historical and textual transmission and use of Scripture which God has overseen. You pull biblical statements out of one context and apply them in an undiscerning fashion to all possible contexts, or just to those contexts which you choose. I know you seek to honour God in your interpretation of Scripture, but ironically, this view dishonours the God of Scripture by failing to submit to the way in which God has sovereignly chosen to reveal himself in Scripture, through historical means. I know you seek to emphasize the theological authority of Scripture, but ironically your view actually flattens the theological dimension of Scripture, because it places the high points of God's revelation in biblical history (especially Christ himself) on the same footing as all other divine revelation in biblical history. Furthermore, because of your doctrine of Scripture outlined above, and in spite of Scripture's own self-testimony (e.g. Acts 8:31), you do not see any role for the human being—for yourself—in interpreting Scripture. You fail to acknowledge that Scripture contains "some things hard to be understood" (2 Peter 3:16), and that in this present age we can only "know in part" (1 Corinthians 13:12). Instead, you insist that your own interpretation is as Scripture itself, that your interpretation of Scripture is what "God says." I know you seek to hold to the truth of God with steadfast conviction, but ironically you are in fact at great risk of putting the interpretations and traditions of men—of yourself—in the place of God's revelation.
These two points are the foundations of our disagreement. Other areas of our discussion derive from these two points; let me outline two of these briefly.
One of these further areas of disagreement is the discernment among doctrines which are: essential to believe for salvation; essential to an orthodox Christian faith; important for the life of the Church and the believer; important for a full knowledge of the truth but not essential for salvation, orthodoxy, or Christian living; matters of personal preference; and so on. Because you have removed the historical dimension of Scripture and flattened its theological dimension, as described above, you fail to discern among these matters. Instead, you see them all as integrally related in a way that Scripture itself does not describe; you create your own chain of logic from one doctrine to another and make peripheral matters central. You claim the centrality of God's work in Christ, yet you exalt other doctrines to the same place as this, and thus strip the centrality of God's work in Christ from its power. I know you desire to hold fast to correct doctrine, but ironically you are in fact at great risk of putting the doctrines of men—of yourself—in the place of the gospel.
This leads to another area of disagreement: the way in which Christians relate both to those who hold to the essential/important doctrines and to those who do not. This is a very large topic, but let me highlight a couple of key points. Because of your view of Scripture and biblical interpretation, as described above, you take the various statements in Scripture regarding "separation" out of their immediate contexts and apply them absolutely in all contexts, or even just the contexts you choose. Statements such as those in Romans 16:17, Ephesians 5:11, 2 Corinthians 6:17, and 1 Timothy 6:5, are describing the fellowship of Christians as they gather together for corporate worship, prayer, instruction in the Word, and so on. In this setting the fellowship of believers cannot have moral or doctrinal impurity in its midst. These passages do not relate to other settings to which you apply them, such as business or academic contexts. Beyond this, other passages are more relevant in defining our interaction with the ideas of those with whom we disagree, even ideas which we feel are unbiblical. We are, for example, to "[cast down] imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and [bring] into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ" (2 Cor 10:5). This "taking thoughts captive" necessitates, not withdrawal from such ideas and critiquing these ideas from a distance, but direct engagement with such ideas and direct interaction with those who hold these ideas.
Scripture in fact encourages us to seek truth where it may be found, and in particular we are encouraged to learn from all servants of God who submit to the Lordship of Christ, and to be slow in pronouncing judgment upon them: "For all things are yours; Whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours; And ye are Christ’s; and Christ is God’s. Let a man so account of us, as of the ministers of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God. Moreover it is required in stewards, that a man be found faithful. But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you, or of man’s judgment: yea, I judge not mine own self. For I know nothing by myself; yet am I not hereby justified: but he that judgeth me is the Lord. Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God." (1 Cor 3:21-4:5).
Fellow believer in Christ, I fear that you are in danger of glorifying a God of your own making and a Bible of your own invention, rather than the one true God revealed in holy and inspired Scripture. I fear that you are in danger of promoting an unbiblical disunity among Christians who are rightly centred on the saving gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ as revealed in Scripture and witnessed by God's people through history. I urge you in the Lord to humble yourself before the Lord, to repent of your sin of pride, and to cast yourself on the abundant mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ. I will do the same, and perhaps we will then find some common ground.
Michael Pahl
Dear fellow believer in Christ,
After much prayerful reflection on our recent discussion, I wish to summarize what I think are the most significant differences between your perspective and mine. I urge you to consider these things carefully.
First, it all begins with the doctrine of Scripture. By this I don't mean any particular doctrine which Scripture teaches, or Scripture's teaching as a whole. I mean the doctrine about Scripture, the nature and means of God's revelation in Scripture. Scripture's own self-testimony is that it is fully from God and fully from human beings, 100% divine and 100% human: for example, biblical passages ascribe both human and divine origins to Scripture (e.g. Mark 12:36; Matt 15:4 cf. Mark 7:10); the concept of "inspiration" or Scripture being "God-breathed" in the foundational text of 2 Timothy 3:16 recalls Genesis 2:7, where God shapes natural materials and breathes into them to create that which is living and active; and the historical, cultural, and literary nature of the biblical writings attests to their human dimension. Your view, on the other hand, is essentially a docetic view of Scripture: it is fully from God but only seems to be from human beings, 100% divine but only apparently human. Yes, you claim to acknowledge the role of the human authors of Scripture, but you fail to follow through on the full implications of the fully human dimension of Scripture. Instead, you create a chain of logic based upon your own understanding of what the fully divine dimension of Scripture must entail, without taking into account these full implications of the fully human dimension of Scripture. I know you seek to exalt God in the Scriptures, but ironically your view in fact dishonours the God of Scripture: you fail to submit to the way in which God has sovereignly chosen to reveal himself in Scripture, through fully human means. I know you seek to place divine revelation above human reason, but ironically, because you do not completely acknowledge the mystery of God's fully divine, fully human revelation in Scripture, your view places your own logic above God's revelation.
Second, our disagreement involves biblical hermeneutics, that is, the approach and methods of biblical interpretation. Because of your doctrine of Scripture outlined above, and in spite of Scripture's own self-testimony, you strip the Scriptures of their historical dimension, flattening them into a purely theological and spiritual book. You ignore the particular historical, linguistic, and cultural means and contexts through which God has chosen to reveal himself in Scripture, and the historical and textual transmission and use of Scripture which God has overseen. You pull biblical statements out of one context and apply them in an undiscerning fashion to all possible contexts, or just to those contexts which you choose. I know you seek to honour God in your interpretation of Scripture, but ironically, this view dishonours the God of Scripture by failing to submit to the way in which God has sovereignly chosen to reveal himself in Scripture, through historical means. I know you seek to emphasize the theological authority of Scripture, but ironically your view actually flattens the theological dimension of Scripture, because it places the high points of God's revelation in biblical history (especially Christ himself) on the same footing as all other divine revelation in biblical history. Furthermore, because of your doctrine of Scripture outlined above, and in spite of Scripture's own self-testimony (e.g. Acts 8:31), you do not see any role for the human being—for yourself—in interpreting Scripture. You fail to acknowledge that Scripture contains "some things hard to be understood" (2 Peter 3:16), and that in this present age we can only "know in part" (1 Corinthians 13:12). Instead, you insist that your own interpretation is as Scripture itself, that your interpretation of Scripture is what "God says." I know you seek to hold to the truth of God with steadfast conviction, but ironically you are in fact at great risk of putting the interpretations and traditions of men—of yourself—in the place of God's revelation.
These two points are the foundations of our disagreement. Other areas of our discussion derive from these two points; let me outline two of these briefly.
One of these further areas of disagreement is the discernment among doctrines which are: essential to believe for salvation; essential to an orthodox Christian faith; important for the life of the Church and the believer; important for a full knowledge of the truth but not essential for salvation, orthodoxy, or Christian living; matters of personal preference; and so on. Because you have removed the historical dimension of Scripture and flattened its theological dimension, as described above, you fail to discern among these matters. Instead, you see them all as integrally related in a way that Scripture itself does not describe; you create your own chain of logic from one doctrine to another and make peripheral matters central. You claim the centrality of God's work in Christ, yet you exalt other doctrines to the same place as this, and thus strip the centrality of God's work in Christ from its power. I know you desire to hold fast to correct doctrine, but ironically you are in fact at great risk of putting the doctrines of men—of yourself—in the place of the gospel.
This leads to another area of disagreement: the way in which Christians relate both to those who hold to the essential/important doctrines and to those who do not. This is a very large topic, but let me highlight a couple of key points. Because of your view of Scripture and biblical interpretation, as described above, you take the various statements in Scripture regarding "separation" out of their immediate contexts and apply them absolutely in all contexts, or even just the contexts you choose. Statements such as those in Romans 16:17, Ephesians 5:11, 2 Corinthians 6:17, and 1 Timothy 6:5, are describing the fellowship of Christians as they gather together for corporate worship, prayer, instruction in the Word, and so on. In this setting the fellowship of believers cannot have moral or doctrinal impurity in its midst. These passages do not relate to other settings to which you apply them, such as business or academic contexts. Beyond this, other passages are more relevant in defining our interaction with the ideas of those with whom we disagree, even ideas which we feel are unbiblical. We are, for example, to "[cast down] imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and [bring] into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ" (2 Cor 10:5). This "taking thoughts captive" necessitates, not withdrawal from such ideas and critiquing these ideas from a distance, but direct engagement with such ideas and direct interaction with those who hold these ideas.
Scripture in fact encourages us to seek truth where it may be found, and in particular we are encouraged to learn from all servants of God who submit to the Lordship of Christ, and to be slow in pronouncing judgment upon them: "For all things are yours; Whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours; And ye are Christ’s; and Christ is God’s. Let a man so account of us, as of the ministers of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God. Moreover it is required in stewards, that a man be found faithful. But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you, or of man’s judgment: yea, I judge not mine own self. For I know nothing by myself; yet am I not hereby justified: but he that judgeth me is the Lord. Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God." (1 Cor 3:21-4:5).
Fellow believer in Christ, I fear that you are in danger of glorifying a God of your own making and a Bible of your own invention, rather than the one true God revealed in holy and inspired Scripture. I fear that you are in danger of promoting an unbiblical disunity among Christians who are rightly centred on the saving gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ as revealed in Scripture and witnessed by God's people through history. I urge you in the Lord to humble yourself before the Lord, to repent of your sin of pride, and to cast yourself on the abundant mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ. I will do the same, and perhaps we will then find some common ground.
Michael Pahl
Labels: evangelicals and evangelicalism, scripture
posted by Michael Pahl at
7/20/2006
10 Comments:
Could the New Testament be full of mistakes about what Jesus said and did, as it was written by fallible humans?
By
Steven Carr, at 11:28 PM
A lovely and extremely helpful peice, Mike. And I like the way you never forget the fact that these conservative brothers and sisters have good motives, and are eager to glorify God.
By
Chris Tilling, at 4:19 AM
Steven, let me first answer within a framework with which you might agree, i.e. looking at Scripture as a merely human collection of writings. Of course, anything written by human beings can itself contain error--I'm sure my own blog testifies to that. But that doesn't mean that any particular item written by a particular human being must contain error: human beings do make true assertions. Also, any judgment of truth or error is relative to the intention of the author or speaker, being attentive to both the locutionary and illocutionary aspects of speech--the explicit, implicit, indirect, and performative nature of speech. To charge someone who is being intentionally ironic with making a false statement is inappropriate, as is accusing a science textbook of inaccurate theology, and so on. Furthermore, any judgment of truth or error is relative to the form of speech involved--issues of style, metaphor, genre, and so on. We expect the truth of a novel to be of a different kind than the truth of a newspaper report, or even the truth of a historical novel to be different than that of a history textbook, and so on.
In my view, the Gospels evince an intention to create and sustain faith in Jesus as Messiah, Lord, and Son of God, they provide a theological interpretation of Jesus' life and teachings to achieve this purpose, they evince an intention to support this theological interpretation and faith-building purpose through historically reliable narrative, and they use an ancient historical-biographical sort of genre to do all this. As far as can be discerned, they fulfill these intentions rather well through that genre--they are trustworthy in these respects. The same sort of perspective can be applied to the other New Testament writings, though of course they are writing in a different genre with different specific purposes, and must be evaluated in light of those things.
But, if one holds to the inspiration of Scripture, as I do for various reasons, then there is another angle to all this. On this, let me quote something I wrote in an earlier post: "I believe the loving and faithful God ensures the trustworthiness of his revelatory acts in accordance with the purposes and means of those acts, and I believe Scripture to be a revelatory act of God given for salvific purposes and through human means." In this sense, Scripture is trustworthy and true.
This answer is unlikely to satisfy you, I'm sure. But that's the way I understand these sorts of issues at this point, in my own fallible way... :-)
By
Michael Pahl, at 9:56 AM
Hey Michael,
Well written... I don't think I would have been able to expend the energy into such a debate!
By
Tyler F. Williams, at 10:23 AM
Excellent letter. I have fumbled through this sort of exchange myself. The most frustrating part is that the ones I've bothered wrestling with are folks I genuinely like and appreciate their heart, just not the way they deal with scripture. Thanks for a great letter.
By
One of Freedom, at 8:06 PM
So what errors are there in the New Testament? Are you a 27-book inerrantist?
By
Steven Carr, at 2:44 AM
Steven, I'm not sure what you mean by a "27-book inerrantist." I believe that my prior description covers all 27 books of the New Testament canon, and I am comfortable using the term "inerrancy" in describing my position. However, I suspect that "27-book interrantist" is some kind of "insider code" for some pre-defined type of person, and I don't know what that might be.
I'm not sure what you might count as an "error" in the New Testament. Mark certainly has several grammatical irregularities, as does Revelation and even Paul. The Gospels do not give the exact words of Jesus, as a simple comparison among the Gospels shows; in fact, John in particular is likely taking traditional sayings and teachings of Jesus and providing interpretation and exposition in Jesus' name. The Gospels don't provide a precise chronology of events, as a simple comparison among their orders of events demonstrates. Acts likewise is relatively unconcerned with verbatim speeches and precise chronology. It's possible that some of the New Testament letters were not directly written by those to whom they are ascribed; within the scope of the research I've done in some detail, I would see the Pastoral Epistles as problematic in this regard. Some cosmological perspectives are at least simplistic compared with modern scientific knowledge, such as Paul's description of "bodies" in 1 Corinthians 15. And different authors and writings in the New Testament provide different theological perspectives on certain matters.
These are the sorts of things that are often called "errors" in this kind of discussion. However, to do so is to miss the point: it misses the shared purpose of the New Testament writings, to create and sustain faith in Jesus as Messiah, Lord, Son of God, and Saviour; and it misses the nature of inspiration in recognizing the fully human nature and historical conditioning of these writings, employing ancient genres and modes of thinking and expression. Furthermore, these matters fit within my prior description of the truth and trustworthiness of Scripture.
Steven, I suspect that your question is more of an "honour challenge" than a quest for understanding. So in that spirit, let me return the favour: What truth is there in the New Testament?
By
Michael Pahl, at 2:04 PM
What truth is there?
Well, there is 1 Corinthians 13 and Ephesians 4:31-32.
And you are correct that the NT was written to get people to believe certain things, rather than give facts (or a 'precise chronology' in your terms)
By
Steven Carr, at 2:35 PM
Steven, you've misread my statements if that is the dichotomy you come up with (between "getting people to believe certain things" and "giving facts"). Still, thanks for the discussion: it has allowed me to expand on some unclear or incomplete statements of my own, and to continue working through my own perspective on these sorts of things. But perhaps I have some more work to do at least in expressing my perspectives more clearly.
By
Michael Pahl, at 2:55 PM
Hi 'honorary Dr. Pahl'
Looking forward to seeing you in the fall. I just want to say that I appreciate your letter and that I'm sure I'll pull something from it in some conversation somewhere. PS I'm getting married soon and I'll be back in class as a married student. See you in Class.
Christopher
By
ChristopherandNatalie, at 1:14 AM
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