I understand this. I'm surprised the number is as small as that.
You posted a lengthy article entitled "The Doctrine of Verbal
Inspiration", arguing from a number of verses (mostly in the
prophets) that the Bible claims in no uncertain terms to be
verbally inspired, and (implicitly) that anyone who claims in
any sense to follow the Bible must believe in verbal inspiration
and total inerrancy.
I replied (I have unfortunately lost my reply, as well as the
original article), and you wrote shortly afterwards:
It isn't "my doctrine" of verbal inspiration. It is a doctrine
that is widely believed, and it is, I believe, a doctrine that is
taught in the Bible. I haven't see you try to respond to my
postings entitled "The Doctrine of Verbal Inspiration." The only
one who has (that I remember) was McCaughan, and all he could do
was resort to the old all-doesn't-mean-all dodge that inerrantists
so frequently have to resort to. I intend to respond to McCaughan
as soon as I can find the time to write the detailed response that
is needed to show that he didn't really respond to anything.
> I'm aware that the Bible is rather vague about inerrancy claims. I can
> think of only a couple of scriptures that even suggest it. However, the
> inerrancy doctrine is not based on the fact that the Bible claims inerrancy
> but on the logical consequence of the claim that it was verbally inspired by
> an omniscient, omnipotent deity. If this claim is true, then it would
> logically necessitate biblical inerrancy.
Actually, it wouldn't. The deity in question might not care whether
we knew the truth, or might want us to be deceived (though neither
of these is a very useful position for a Christian to hold[1]); or
might wish to convey information by means less obvious than just saying
"Such-and such, and such-and-such, are true". Your assumption that
an omniscient and omnipotent deity could not write anything factually
false would imply that God is unable to write a novel, for instance.
[1] As a matter of fact, I don't see any convincing reason why a
benevolent God should care very much whether or not we believe
some wrong things about the trifling details of the history
of the Jewish people (you know, how long so-and-so lived, or
exactly how many people were killed in such-and-such a battle).
-- Gareth McCaughan Dept. of Pure Mathematics & Mathematical Statistics, gjm11@dpmms.cam.ac.uk Cambridge University, England.==================================================================== For help, send a message to errancy-request@infidels.org with the word "help" in the subject or body of your message. To unsubscribe from ERRANCY, send a message to errancy-request@infidels.org with the word "unsubscribe" in the subject or body of your message.