I am currently reading "Apocalypse: On the Psychology of Fundamentalism
in America" by Charles B. Strozier (Boston: Beacon Press, 1994). I
thought I'd share a small excerpt that relates DIRECTLY to the subject of
this newsgroup (which, if I recall correctly, is errancy/ inerrancy).
pp 185-187 "The notion of inerrancy took concrete shape in the 1870s.=20
Charles Hodge, in his <italic>Systematic Theology</italic>, argued that
all of scripture, every book and every word in every book, was divinely
inspired, based on his reading of Jeremiah 1:9.... Hodge himself could
easily allow for errors in biblical texts ("No sane man would deny that
the Parthenon was built of marble, even if here and there a speck of
sandstone should be detected in its structure"), but his son, A.A. Hodge,
and colleague, Benjamin Warfield, pussed his ideas to new heights of
certainty. In an 1881 article, the two argued that "all the affirmations
of Scripture of all kinds whether of spiritual doctrine or duty, or of
physical or historical fact, or of psychological or philosophical
principle, are without any error." and Warfield wrote: "A proved error
in Scripture contradicts not only our doctrine, but the Scripture claims
and, therefore, its inspiration in making those claims." In the theory
of inerrancy, in other words, literalism became dogma.
"However, one key problem in the theory that threatened to undermine the
new theology needed to be solved. Careful research, especially by German
scholars, was continually unearthing contradictions in the texts of the
Bible. Since Charles Hodge stopped short of an absolute theory of
inerrancy, he could airily dismiss such apparent errors as sandstone
specks in the marble, but once his son and colleague had turned his idea
of literalism into dogma, the issue of mistakes in the biblical texts
could not be avoided. So they came up with the convnient idea of
"original autographs," or the notion that the only truly inerrant texts
were the first ones written. Since then, with all the copying and
translations, errors have inevitably crept in. It was a convenient
theory, since the original texts have long since been lost, but it also
created further problems of its own for which there was no easy or
logical solution. What an inerrant beliver has to accept in reading the
Bible is that it is a surviving text that is simultaneously seriously
flawed and yet perfect. Earnest Sandeen rightly sniffs with distain at
such a "scholastic" argument. It is worth noting, however, that
psychologically inerrancy at its core has a mystical grounding: The
perfect text can only be imagined, not seen; must be believed, not read;
worshipped, but never directly encountered. Perhaps any literalism,
whether Christian or Marxist, requires such an intellectual and spiritual
adjustment. Biblical literalism makes mystics of the whole
fundamentalist movement."
=09
So, a little history and a few things to think about and discuss for you
all.
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James E. Faubel =20
jef@europa.com =20
=20
"Welcome to the planet Earth, where=20
belief masquerades as knowledge."
--> This way to the Unasked Questions
<<-- That way to the Unquestioned Answers
anonymous =20
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