Calvinists say that non Calvinists have a problem with the d

[SamMcNear]

I agree that

if his answer is "ignorance," he has a pretty high degree of accountability for doing something like this with such gross ignorance.

although many times I have taught passionately about something I was taught by those I trusted. Only to find out later that, those I trusted didn't know everything themselves on the issue. This happened with me on eschatology and Old Testament commandments to mention a few topics. I have learned to be more careful on how I teach. I try to teach all views fairly and honestly and if the Bible is not clear I teach what I know and tell the students to pray and decide what God is telling them to believe.

I hope and pray Eric will do the same.

[CThomas]

Steve, I really enjoyed your discussion of inerrancy above. It raised some interesting questions that I had not focused on. I had a follow-up, though, if you don't mind. You begin by noting a first possible definition of inerrancy: (1) "nerrancy might mean that the Bible does not affirm any facts that are not correct—thus it is without error." You go on to distinguish a stronger sense of inerrancy, (2) which sort of posits an abrogation of the individual author's ordinary decisionmaking processes. You question this latter view (2), noting that the Bible makes no such claim regarding its authors, and note that "[t]his would explain" various kinds of errors (grammatical, misattribution of a biblical quote, etc.) in the biblical texts.

What I was wondering, then, is do you reject inerrancy in the first sense you discuss -- i.e., simply not containing any errors, as might be true of a secular book? It seems to me that the upshot of your discussion is that you view the Bible as entirely reliable in its essential content, but view it as perhaps containing very minor errors of different sorts (e.g., the erroneous citation of the OT) attributable to the human authors. If I'm understanding you right, does this not mean that you do not strictly adhere to biblical inerrancy in the first sense either? If there are even small or insignificant errors in the documents, then I would think that one could not attribute factual inerrancy in the first sense to the Bible. And if that's right, then do you really agree with the doctrine of biblical inerrancy in any sense at all? Would it be more accurate to say that you are not a biblical inerrantist?

Maybe the Calvinism forum isn't the place for this discussion, but there are a lot of additional questions your post calls to mind on the general question of inerrancy. For my own part, I guess I've tended to accept inerrancy in your first sense (in the sense of containing no factual errors), but have generally accepted only a very weak view of the second sense (tied to the nature of inspiration of the biblical authors).

Best regards,

CThomas

[steve]

I do not know whether I would use the term "inerrantist" to describe my understanding of the Bible. On the one hand, I consider it to be inspired in every place that it claims to be inspired (and thus inerrant in such cases), and I consider the witnesses who do not claim to be inspired to be both honest and competent. Therefore, I believe them in everything they affirm, even though I believe they were capable of making grammarical errors and such, which do not in any sense call their testimony into question.

While growing up, I considered that a belief in "biblical inerrancy" was essentially synonymous with being a true Christian—and that it was the only reliable defense against falling into the trap of "liberalism." Only when I found that the Bible does not make any statements about "inerrancy" did I realize that I could actually accept the Bible on its own terms. When Paul said, "I have no commandment from the Lord," I can now believe him, rather than being obliged to think that he really was inspired and didn't even realize it (which would itself be a case of Paul being in error as to whether he was writing inspired commands from the Lord or not!). It is very freeing to let the biblical writers speak for themselves about their writings. Only then can I actually take everything that they wrote as being true!

[CThomas]

Thanks very much, Steve. I appreciate your view on this issue, and your taking the time to share it. In working through the issue myself, though, I wonder if I might trouble you with a follow-up, this time on 2 Timothy 3:16. I had two questions about your take on this verse. First, I understand the interpretive ambiguity here -- that it may be read as only stating that all God-breathed scriptures are profitable, etc., in which case it would not be making any general statements about the nature of scripture as a whole. But I wonder whether contextually it would be awkward to construe the author here as referring only to an unspecified subset of the OT scriptures (i.e., saying that those parts of scripture that are God-breathed have certain admirable qualities). Would this reading provide no guidance to Timothy about which parts of scripture were being recommended? I wonder whether it might be more natural to understand the passage in the ordinary sense of saying that all scripture is God-breathed, and that is presumably mentioned to clarify why all of it is profitable for teaching, etc.

The second question goes to the scope of the passage. Is it really true that it necessarily applies only to the OT? I understand that much of the NT wasn't written yet. But if the verse is saying that all scripture is God-breathed (putting aside the ambiguity discussed in the previous paragraph), then wouldn't that apply to all scripture, whether or not written yet? In other words, if Paul is saying that every document that is "scripture" is also God-breathed, then it would seem to follow that if a book written 20 years later turned out to be scripture, then it, too, would be God-breathed. Am I wrong in thinking that the reference to "all scripture" (assuming it should be translated as such) would refer to an open class of written materials, and encompass whatever documents ultimately turned out to be part of the canon, whether or not extant at the time of 2 Timothy?

Thanks, as always, for your help with this.

CThomas

[steve]

These are fair questions and well-stated.

I want to say, first of all, that I understand the correct translation (or at least the correct meaning) of 2 Timothy 3:16 to be exactly according to the traditional translations, meaning I believe that Paul is using the word "scripture" to mean the entire Old Testament canon. The word graphe, which can mean simply "writings" is consistently used in the New Testament to mean the Old Testament scriptures, and seems to have that meaning also in the context of 2 Timothy (e.g., 3:15). Thus, I do think that Paul is referring to the inspiration of the Old Testament canon as a whole.

This does not mean that inspiration took the same form in every book of the Old Testament as in every other book of the Old Testament. Solomon's writings seem to arise from his God-given wisdom, whereas the writings of Moses seem to have been the transcript of his face-to-face encounters with God, and the prophets received their revelations by various means, including dreams, visions, oracles, etc. (see Numbers 12:6-8). I believe that 2 Timothy 3:16 only affirms that every part of the Old Testament, in its own way, arises from God's communication with chosen human instruments. The degree to which this communication rendered them inerrant in their writing of the revelations is left unanswered. However, the question of inerrancy need not cast doubts upon the value of these writings for the purposes of teaching, reproof, correction and instruction in righteousness.

Moving now to the question of whether Paul wished to make a claim for New testament writings as well, I must profess ignorance. It seems clear, from the immediate context (v.15), that Paul's intention in verse 16 was to say something about the Old Testament scriptures in which Timothy had been schooled from his youth. Whether Paul thought of his own writings as scripture or not, we may never know (though Peter seems to have recognized Paul's writings as such). The statement in 2 Timothy 3:16 is made by Paul, not by Peter, however, and must be understood from Paul's frame of reference. We know that Paul regarded some of his instructions to be the very "commandments of the Lord," whereas, other of his comments were said to reflect only his mature opinion. It would certainly be possible to think of certain elements of a letter to contain divine commandments without claiming that the whole letter bears that status.

There was a time when I would have said, "It doesn't matter what the limits of Paul's understanding of the matter might have been, because he was inspired by the Holy Spirit, who certainly knew about the coming New Testament canon and about the inspired status of Paul's writings. Therefore, 2 Timothy 3:16, in being itself inspired scripture, would be intended by the Holy Spirit to include the future scriptures of the New Testament as well." But this argument begs the question. It assumes about Paul's writings the very thing that we are seeking to investigate—i.e., whether Paul's writing were "inspired" in a sense similar to the prophetic writings of the Old Testament.

The point of your second paragraph may be correct, if extrapolation is consistent with Paul's intent. It is not obvious to me that Paul is anticipating the New testament writings as a new class of scripture to be canonized in the same manner as the Old Testament about which he speaks. This does not mean that I am opposed to the New Testament canon. It only means that I am not sure that Paul anticipated this fourth-century development clearly enough to have intended to include it in his statement in 2 Timothy 3:16.

[CThomas]

Thank you once again. Very persuasive analysis, as usual.

CThomas

[SamMcNear]

Ok here is a full transcript of the movie AMAZING Grace -The History & Theology of Calvinism if you want to read it. It's found in this PDF starting on page 110 http://www.theapologeticsgroup.com/expo ... yGuide.pdf. I'm reading it now and i'm sure I will have questions after I read it!

[Sean]

I'm glad you pointed this out. I've just read through a good lot of it but have more to go. It seems to be filled with the usual arguments. Once again we have faith = works. Nothing like disregarding the bible (Romans 4) for the sake of theology. It saddens me greatly. Anyway, I'm still reading.

In short, the leaders at the Synod of Dort, like Luther, Calvin and Augustine, taught that
salvation is accomplished by the almighty power of the Triune God. The Father chooses
– or elects – people to be saved; the Son redeems them through His cross; and the Holy
Spirit makes Christ’s death effective by bringing the elect to faith and repentance,
thereby causing them willingly to believe the Gospel. The entire process is the work of
God and is by and through grace alone. Thus God’s grace and not man’s “good work”
determines who will be saved.

Let me get this straight. The Holy Spirit causes people to willingly believe. And the entire process is the "work of God".
The entire statement is nonsense. It's completely illogical. If the Holy Spirit is the cause of faith, then how can it be said that man is believing? And if man cannot believe on his own until the Holy Spirit causes it, then how can it be said to be man's will? This act would be totally against man's will!

The Apostle Paul declared that there is no room in the Gospel for boasting. (Eph. 2:9)
Arminianism, at its root, allows for it. Thankfully more and more Bible-believing
Christians today are coming to understand the doctrines of sovereign free grace and are
now making their boasts in the Lord.

Hmmm.

Rom 3:27 Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? Of works? No, but by the law of faith.
Rom 3:28 Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith apart from the deeds of the law.

Rom 4:4 Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt.
Rom 4:5 But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness,
Rom 4:6 just as David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from works:
Rom 4:7 "BLESSED ARE THOSE WHOSE LAWLESS DEEDS ARE FORGIVEN, AND WHOSE SINS ARE COVERED;
Rom 4:8 BLESSED IS THE MAN TO WHOM THE LORD SHALL NOT IMPUTE SIN."


So who is really boasting here? Is it the Arminian? Or the Calvinist, who declares:

Dr. Kenneth Talbot – The doctrine of Calvinism has never been defeated because you
can’t defeat the Scripture. Calvin’s teaching is the true teaching of Christ, Paul, as they
are presented in the Scripture. Thus it is impossible to defeat this teaching. You might
defeat hyper-Calvinism, a perversion of Calvinism, but you cannot defeat Calvin’s
theology because it is the true exposition of Scripture.

Calvinism = scripture. It's not an interpretation or theology, it is the scripture. If you threw out your bible and only read Calvinism you would still be reading the bible, the very word of God. I'm a bit surprised they say that.

[darinhouston]

Let me get this straight. The Holy Spirit causes people to willingly believe. And the entire process is the "work of God".
The entire statement is nonsense. It's completely illogical.

Of course, Sean, they would say this was evidence of an unregenerate man who they believe can't accept the doctrines of grace as they are foolishness to the unregenerate.

[Sean]

I want to say thanks to Sam for posting the link to the Amazing Grace transcript. I found the DVD on ebay for $10.95 so I think I'm going to get it. It would be nice to have this in video format to share with others. Doesn't matter if it's with a Calvinist or someone who has never heard of the subject this video could be a good resource.

I found some other issues reading through the transcript that I may post later.