Biblical Inspiration

I want to talk about Biblical inspiration because I’ve been on a journey that has exposed some fundamental flaws in my faith. This is a sensitive and difficult topic to discuss, but I really hope you find it to be encouraging. That’s certainly my intention, especially for those who have had their foundational beliefs challenged as they struggle to reconcile them with what they have discovered to be true in life. For me this journey has become a deeply re-defining exercise that has brought me closer to God and offered refreshing levels of clarity.

About 7 years ago I decided that it would be a good idea to know more about what the Bible actually was. At this point I had been baptized for 25 years, been actively involved in home ecclesias, and done some mission work in the Caribbean and West Africa. I knew my way around the New Testament pretty well and had a decent grasp of the Old Testament too, although I was a little foggy on some important events like the Assyrian and Babylonian exiles. I knew the Bible was the inspired word of God, so obviously knowing more would allow me to preach more effectively, give better exhortations, and become a better disciple.

But I have a problem. Because of my ADHD I have a terribly hard time reading. In less than 10 minutes I’m either fast asleep or my monkey mind is off thinking about some completely unrelated project that needs to be done. It was at this time that I discovered I could listen to podcasts – ones about Christianity, the Bible, faith, and God. Then I found I could listen to books on Audible too.

I listened widely, from Dawkins, Hitchens, and Harris on one end of the spectrum to Wright, Craig, and Habermas on the other. (I have listened to well over 1500 hours of podcasts and 80 Christian-related books to date.) It turns out that although reading is not my super power, listening is. This was my chance. Armed with bluetooth headphones and being self-employed, I could be knee-deep, wading my way through scholarship from Genesis to Revelation, history of religion to philosophy of religion, ancient cosmology to modern archaeology and the patristics to the mystics. It was a dream come true.  

But then tragedy struck.

It wasn’t one single event on one particular day, and I can’t tell you exactly where it started. All I can say is that my notion of Biblical inspiration started to crumble. And like all failing foundations, there comes a critical point where everything that once was just collapses.

What had happened to me? My once strong faith was gone. At my lowest point I even started teetering on the edge of atheism.

I started to realize it was all because I had hung my entire faith on a very narrow notion of Biblical inspiration. Barbara Brown Taylor said something to this effect in a podcast that deeply resonated with me: “When the foundations of your faith are shaken, the idols are the first to crumble.” It was as though she was saying that Biblical inspiration had become an idol to me. She was right. I had placed Biblical inspiration at the very center of my faith and it was the only thing holding the whole thing up.

I felt a little embarrassed, like the emperor with no clothes. Since childhood, I had been told the Bible is inspired and I had placed all of my trust in it without even knowing anything about how the Bible had come to us.

Over these 7 years I have been confronted with a realization that the Bible isn’t the flawless, seamless, single book that I had imagined it to be. The Bible did not just arrive fully formed from the mouth of God directly into a single book. What we have today has a long and complicated textual history, involving many authors, editors, translators, and copyists. And the result is a book that I have come to believe contains errors: errors of history, errors of internal consistency, errors of morality. Far from being the perfect book I had imagined, the Bible doesn’t always agree with itself. And if the Bible doesn’t always agree with itself, what am I supposed to agree with? Even more so, why should I believe any of it is true?

Grief, loss, death, loneliness, and wandering are all words that describe how I’ve felt over the last few years. As if that wasn’t enough, Covid hit and church attendance worldwide changed overnight.

I didn’t reach out to my community for help. I have no doubt they would have rallied around me and done all they could to support me. But this had become a deeply personal, inward journey that had to be done alone, and I don’t regret that.

The discussion of Biblical inspiration is no small topic and there is no way to cover it all here, so I’ll offer just a few essential thoughts which challenged me.

The Foundation

When the concept of Biblical inspiration that I had been raised with was challenged, my faith shattered. That understanding had been the entire foundation of my faith. But where did it come from? I couldn’t find my notion of Biblical inspiration in the Bible itself, so I went back to the Christadelphian statement of faith (BASF) to see exactly what it said. I got as far as the first paragraph:

THE FOUNDATION – That the book currently known as the Bible, consisting of the Scriptures of Moses, the prophets, and the apostles, is the only source of knowledge concerning God and His purposes at present extent or available in the earth, and that the same were wholly given by inspiration of God in the writers, and are consequently without error in all parts of them, except such as may be due to errors of transcription or translation.

This view of inspiration – that the Bible is without error – is set up as “the Foundation” to everything that follows. And so all it takes is to find one error and all the rest will crumble, or at least for me it certainly felt that way. No wonder I nearly lost my faith!

I have come to see that my previous understanding of what inspiration meant had no dimension to it. The Bible itself is not explicitly clear on what inspiration and scripture actually mean. It appears that these gaps have been filled in somewhere along the line, and we’ve ended up with a foundational belief that doesn’t stand up to scrutiny.

There are two main Bible verses used by Christians in connection with inspiration. One verse is from 2 Timothy:

All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. (2Tim 3:16)

The other verse is from 2 Peter:

Knowing this first that no prophecy of scripture is of any private interpretation, for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. (2Pet 1:20-21)

It seems to me that we have added two unbiblical concepts to these verses. Firstly, in the foundation statement we have added to the claim that the scripture is inspired, that it is also without error (except where someone made an error in translation or made an error when copying it). The Bible never makes this claim about itself. There is no verse in the Bible that says it is without error.

Secondly, the Foundation also goes on to claim that scripture is the only source of knowledge of God and His purposes on the earth. This is not a claim that the Bible makes about itself either. God revealed himself through experiential revelation. This is where true communion between God and the patriarchs took place. God did not write to the patriarchs. Moses, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had knowledge of God and His purposes outside of written scripture. Why would we assume that such experiential revelation is unavailable to people today? Has our founding document stymied the supreme God of the universe so He can never do anything new? Have we imprisoned Him in between pages of a book? 

Ironically, the foundational clause wasn’t in the original statement of faith, but was added later in 1886. I do believe that it was an honorable attempt to capture the function of scripture in the life of the Christian and was written to address the needs of the time where people were claiming their personal revelations were equal to scripture. And it went further than many other Christian groups in acknowledging errors in translation and copying.

But with the last 150 years of archaeology, knowledge of church history, and understanding of the ancient Near East, I think it would be useful for us to acknowledge that the books of the Bible not only contain transmission and translation errors, but are also thoroughly situated within their own period of time and cultural moment. The beliefs and hopes of the people in these books come down to us filtered through their unique human experiences. For our community to remain relevant in the 21st century, I believe we need to rethink overly simplistic formulations of inspiration and get an integrated methodological upgrade.

Contradictions, Conflict, and Errors

With my previous understanding of how to read the Bible, the following passages (and many more) were irreconcilable. Reading everything as literal and historical fact caused me to run into problems all over the place. Passages like these caused my faith to unravel.

• Genesis has two accounts of creation and they don’t agree. Was Adam created before or after plants? (Gen 1:11-13, 2:5-9)

• The earliest gospel, Mark, says that the women ran from the tomb and told no-one (Mark 16:8). In Matthew’s version, the women run to tell the disciples (Matt 28:8).

• Matthew and Luke give us two different accounts of how Judas Iscariot died. Did Judas hang himself or fall headfirst? (Matt 27:5; Acts 1:18)

• The gospels also disagree about where Jesus taught his most famous sermon. Was it on a mount or on a plain? (Matt 5:1-10; Luke 6:17-23)

Then there are cases where the Bible makes claims that no Christadelphian would believe. In Genesis 1 verse 7 it says, *Thus God made the firmament and divided the waters that were under the firmament from the waters that were above the firmament, and it was so (Gen 1:7).*Verse 8 tells us the firmament was the sky. So, is there water above the sky? None of us believe that. This may have been part of ancient cosmology but I don’t know any Christadelphian who thinks that is true. 

Or, for a completely different example, Peter writes, *For if God did not spare the angels who sinned but cast them down to hell (Gk.Tartarus) and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved in judgment… (2Peter 2:4).*Christadelphians do not believe in hell, or any place called Tartarus where angels are chained. None of us believe what Peter seems to be saying. Peter is probably referring to the book of Enoch (which is not in our Bible), and the original recipients would have been fully aware of the reference. Yet we do not think the Book of Enoch is scripture and we have no such doctrine in our community.

But it gets worse. Because over and above any potential factual errors or inconsistencies, there are cases where the Bible seems just plain wrong. Not just factually wrong – morally wrong – at least as we understand morals today. Consider this example.

When you go out to war against your enemies, and the LORDyour God delivers them into your hand, and you take them captive, and you see among the captives a beautiful woman, and desire her and would take her for your wife, then you shall bring her home to your house, and she shall shave her head and trim her nails. She shall put off the clothes of her captivity, remain in your house, and mourn her father and her mother a full month; after that you may go into her and be her husband, and she shall be your wife. And it shall be, if you have no delight in her, then you shall set her free, but you certainly shall not sell her for money; you shall not treat her brutally, because you have humbled her. (Deut 21:10-14)

And consider this example.

If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and who, when they have chastened him, will not heed them, then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city, to the gate of his city. And they shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’ Then all the men of his city shall stone him to death with stones; so you shall put away the evil from among you, and all Israel shall hear and fear. (Deut 21:18-21)

These are neither transcription nor translation errors and yet not one of us would morally subscribe to them. The idea that you could take a prisoner of war captive to be your wife is horrific – today we would consider it a war crime. And none of us would even dream for a moment of stoning our own children, however disobedient they became. These are cases where these books in our Bible reflect their own cultural moments, and not the higher calling of Christian love. 

In the past, I often read these passages with a subconscious filter anyway, using my own special form of interpretation, which was basically just ignoring them. When I came across a passage that represented something either morally reprehensible or obviously unscientific, I tended to gloss over it and move on to talk about something else which may have a useful lesson. I would say to myself, “Well, that’s the Old Testament; obviously, we don’t follow that now.” But remember, the Foundation states that the Bible is without error and the only way to know God. The scripture is God’s word, and yet I was explaining away these inspired scriptures just to get out of actually having to deal with the obvious difficulties they presented.

Our Cultural Context

The Bible comes to us in the 21st century fully loaded with the culture of its time. That’s okay, so long as we recognize it. It’s now our sacred act, our turn to participate and struggle honestly with the text, knowing that God let his children write the story, and recognizing that sometimes we moderns don’t have access to the same information or social and cultural code as the original intended recipients.

We also need to acknowledge that when we read scripture we bring our own culture, biases, and interpretative principles to the text. Just as the Bible is culturally situated, so are we. It’s not possible to be completely neutral in our interpretation and ‘just read the Bible’. So when the BASF claims inspiration, we simply cannot ignore the fact that when we interpret the inspired text and we bring into that reading our limited knowledge, opinions, and experiences. Our interpretations may very well be changing the authorial intent of the original text. This becomes most obvious when genre, and the use of theological comparisons, are ignored and replaced with literal, flat readings that become the only accepted way of interpretation.

Now we might resist the idea that we reinterpret the Bible. But there are many places where the way we approach the Bible as Christadelphians conflicts with the most straightforward reading. For example, the Bible talks about demons a lot, especially in the New Testament.

When he saw Jesus from afar, he ran and worshiped him. And he cried out with a loud voice and said, “What have I to do with you, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I implore you by God that you do not torment me. For he said to him, “Come out of the man, unclean spirit!” (Mark 5:6-10)

Here Jesus acknowledges unclean spirits and speaks directly to them. But we say they are just mental illnesses. If we took the Bible literally, we would believe in demons and spirits. But we don’t. And we have good reasons for that conclusion. But we should note that is something we are bringing to the text to interpret it, rather than just reading what the text says.

Here is another example.

Let your women keep silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak; but they are to be submissive, as the law also says. And if they want to learn something, let them ask their own husbands at home; for it is shameful for women to speak in church. (1Cor 14:34-35)

I have never been in an ecclesia where this is taken as written, i.e. where women remain totally silent and are not permitted to speak at all.

I hope it has become clear that I’m not here to discredit the Bible, its books, or authors. I have absolutely no problem with the claim that God revealed himself to men or women who were then inspired to write. But I do have a problem with the way we shut down conversations that challenge Christadelphian doctrine and fellowship practice by asking the peculiar question, Do you even believe the Bible is the inspired word of God?

I want us to recognize that what the community claims in the Foundation and what we do in practice are not the same thing. It seems to me that, if we interpret the Foundation literally, we have made claims about the Bible that it doesn’t make about itself – and then we sneak our interpretation in the back door like some theological sleight of hand. Interpretation is an essential and unavoidable element of reading scripture, or any book, especially one written in another language, at another time, in another culture. So while the Foundation makes no mention of it, we should acknowledge that we understand and already adopt principles of interpretation.

Christianity is Re-Interpretation

In this we follow the founding of Christianity. Christianity itself is a re-interpretation of the scripture. Let that sink in for a moment.

Both Paul and Jesus re-interpreted scripture from its original meaning. Paul says in Galatians, For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation. (Gal 6:15)

This is in direct conflict with what God commanded Abraham:

This is My covenant which you shall keep, between Me and you and your descendants after you: Every male child among you shall be circumcised; and you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between Me and you. (Gen 17:10-11)

This has to be the biggest turn around in the history of Judaism! God says you shall keep a commandment, and Paul says it doesn’t matter. So which is it? Paul was re-interpreting the significance of circumcision, arguing that relationship with God comes through new creation, not the cutting of flesh. Yet, as much as Paul is rooted in the Old Testament and in Judaism, he is directly contradicting that original command. 

In Matthew 5:21-48, in his inaugural address, Jesus re-interprets six different Old Testament laws, You have heard it said… But I tell you… These are all cases where Jesus tells us explicitly that his teaching is different from the Old Testament. He does the same with the Sabbath. Under the Law you could be stoned for breaking the Sabbath, but Jesus says that man was not made for the Sabbath but Sabbath was made for man.

When Jesus says, I did not come to destroy the Law but to fulfill it, he is presenting himself as one with authority to reinterpret the Law and give light to its true meaning.

As Christadelphians, we may have been taught to think of the Bible as something fixed, unchanging, and good for all time, but it is clear from the text that is not the case. Interpretation is not just expected, it’s also necessary. Both Paul and Jesus re-interpreted what God commanded in inspired scripture as did the Rabbis before and after them. They were not doing this to find fault or to contradict the text but, rather, to help navigate the unique circumstances of their own time.

Living with an Errant Bible

Many Christadelphians will be challenged by the idea that the Bible might contain errors. I was too. It absolutely rocked my faith, because I thought faith could only be built upon the Bible being infallible. But what if that isn’t true? How does faith work now? 

What if I believed in a Bible that was errant and fallible and Jesus still rose from the dead? How does that change things? Is it possible to have a fallible Bible and a living Lord? I think my answer to that question exposed what I had really worshiped. Since realizing that the inerrancy-of-scripture approach to faith in God isn’t particularly helpful – it is one which has led those with strong personalities to wield authority within communities and has contributed to people like me nearly falling away – I’ve come to gain a deeper appreciation of John Wesley’s (1703-1791) approach to faith. The Wesleyan Quadrilateral proposes that the core of our Christian faith is Revealed in Scripture, Illuminated by tradition, Brought to life in personal experience, and Confirmed by reason. All four of these function together and serve to keep each other in check.    

Sadly, somewhere along the line I had learned a religion of belief, not a religion of transformation. I had culturally adopted the relatively modern Protestant ideology of inerrancy without due consideration, and elevated it over and above my theologically rich 3500 year old Judeo-Christain heritage – all for the sake of perceived security and authority. The library of books we call the Bible are culturally bound and have had human hands all over them, and yet I treated the Bible as if it was God himself. The Bible is not God. God is worthy of worship, but the Bible isn’t.

I have grown to appreciate that I am part of an ancient and diverse Biblical tradition that must handle the scriptures humbly and with the respect they deserve. Interpretation of scripture is a sacred obligation that we are all called to participate in, just like our Jewish and early church fathers did before us. They may have gotten it wrong every now and again – and we will too – but with each new day, let us strive to build on this beautiful divine mystery that is sometimes messy but still a living, breathing, generative tradition.

I’m still on my journey but the grief and loss have gone. Ironically I have returned to the very thing which sent me on my journey in the first place. But this time I’m free. Scripture has become more alive to me than it ever was before, because I can now let the Bible be itself. I no longer feel the need to make it behave like it fell out of the sky. I now understand that not all contradictions are errors; sometimes, they’re even intentional because the author is saying something more than just plain facts. By letting go of my fundamentalist ideology, I’ve learned to read the Bible with open hands. God was never just in a book anyway, He was everywhere all along. 

Earth’s crammed with heaven,

And every common bush afire with God;

But only he who sees, takes off his shoes…

(Elizabeth Barrett Browning)