What is the Basis of the Christian Belief?
Is it how logical the Bible is formulated or is it the grace of God?
The answer is the latter.
Yet, some make the great point that God has communicated through the Bible. The God whom we have placed our faith in is the God of scripture or declared in scripture. Thus, the Bible as a logical formulation has to mean something.
Some ask, “If His Holy book, which is set apart from all other literature, had contradictions in it, what would that say about Him? What would it say about His true uniqueness (”echad” in the Hebrew), that His Holy book would be as contradictory as a mere human’s work?”
The Bible is no mere human book but it also is not only a divine book. It is both human and divine, kind of like Jesus was, a point that Peter Enns makes in his book Inspiration and Incarnation. Thus, Jesus showed human elements about himself ( he slept, bleed, and got hungry) and divine qualities ( forgiving sins). If the Bible had contradictions should it be chalked up as human folly rather than divine folly?
Or, what if the Bible had contradictions but rather than contrary to the Bible’s authenticity it actually proves its authenticity?
For example, some think that the New Testament (NT) was fabricated by the disciples yet if it was fabricated, it would of been squeaky clean, omitting embarrassing details such as the disciples timidness, etc, etc. Yet, since it was not fabricated, it comes to us rough, rugged, and raw. The flaws recorded in the NT is an argument for its authenticity.
Can the same be true about alleged contradictions? Furthermore, if the Bible had contradictions, why could they not be divinely intentional?
For instance, what takes place in Job is contra Deuteronomy in the sense that since Job was an upright man, he should not have been cursed. But, we are ok with this conflict because we see God doing something with it. It has value. Can the same be true about other possible contradictions?
I say possible because personally I won’t have a problem with the Bible, or my faith, if the Bible had contradictions. My faith does not rest on how logical the Bible has been formulated. Logical coherency in formulating the Bible would be a human limitation just as lacking the technology needed to record all of what Jesus taught was a human limitation (John 21:25). However, logic does mean something since if it was totally thrown away, then how would I make sense of God being light and in Him no darkness (1 John 1:5)? That is a logical statement, so is the statement in Hebrew 6:18. Thus, the Bible can not be completely devoid from logic but it also can’t be devoid from human error.
In going back to the human element of the Bible, we must remind ourselves that the Bible came to us in stages, in different languages, through many people and although we see God’s hand in history preserving what we have today as the Holy Bible, we still see textual difficulties, even order issues ( different orders in various canons) that causes people to write books about them to help us explain them away.
Yet, we do not find the need to apologize for the weakness of Moses, Abraham, David, Solomon, Rahab, Paul, and the disciples, which the Bible unashamedly displays for us, but were used to produce a trustworthy Bible, even with all of its difficulties. So, why also apologize for such difficulties?
If there are claims of the Bible having contradictions, why is there a need to explain it away? If God can be revealed through imperfect people, then surely God can be revealed through an imperfect logically constructed Bible.
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Love, Faith, and Peace!
Previously I said this, “I am a full time undergrad student finishing up my last semester. I plan to go off to grad school and pursue more education on theology, Biblical studies and also a hands-on education in urban community development.?”
Since then I have graduated and have been accepted at Palmer Theological Seminary and Eastern University. I am undecided on which I would be going to although I am leaning towards a M.A. in Urban Community Development. Please pray that I receive discernment as to where God would want me at.
Using the arts, theological reflection, and knowledge of my cultural context, I seek to promote sound living, advocating for peace and justice in urban communities.
I am currently a Church Community Worker out of Mennonite Central Committee ( East Coast) designated in Philadelphia.
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And we wonder why Peter Enns was dismissed from the WTS faculty. In the words of Carl Trueman,
“One has to be very careful about using incarnational analogies for things such as the doctrine of Scripture. There is no equality of divinity and humanity in the orthodox understanding of the incarnation. They are not parallel and they are not equal because of this: the humanity brings no personhood into the incarnation. The humanity is just an abstraction until its united to the divinity. The form of the humanity in the incarnation is provided by the divinity. And when you talk about Scripture as being analogous to the incarnation, you better take that into account, or you’re going to come of what a doctrine of Scripture that is Nestorian at best and Ebionite at worst.”
The humanity is just an abstraction until its united to the divinity? Don’t quite understand that statement.
Also, Peter Enns’ incarnational paradigm is but a way to understand scripture. Furthermore, where does Peter Enns assert that Jesus’ humanity is equal to divinity? From my perspective, wouldn’t the inequality of the humanity of Christ to His divinity be a way of understanding the less than perfect formulation of God’s word?
I think what Trueman is saying is that the humanity and divinity of Christ are not separate equals. In the person of Christ, it’s the divinity which brings meaning to the humanity. But in Enns’ model and those who subscribe to it, the two natures of Christ are equal but separate, that’s not the way to understand the hypostatic union. I may be understanding Trueman wrong on this, perhaps I will ask him.
I don’t know what you mean by your last question. It seems to be begging the question, or at least presupposing that God’s Word is “less than perfect.” Further, I’m just not seeing Enns’ incarnational analogy working with Scripture; again it presupposes a dual nature and I just don’t see that supported by the witness of Scripture itself. I highly recommend the following for reading, it’s WTS response to Enns and is very insightful: http://www.wts.edu/about/beliefs/statements/theological_discussion_documen.html
You honestly think that Peter Enns sees the humanity and divinity of Christ as separate entities but equal?
Please explain…you, explain…not what others are saying but you…from your own interaction with the book…explain how Enns Model of understanding God’s word separates Christ’s humanity from His divinity.
Also, thats the problem right there, Enns was not writing a book on the nature of Christ but on making sense of the OT and getting Evangelicals to interact in a more productive way with modern scholarship.
It is people like Truman that makes Enn’s book important.
In terms of the Bible being less than perfect, why would that even matter in the first place? What is the basis of the Christian belief, the logical formulation of God’s word or God’s grace?
Well to begin, I actually never said Enns’ Model for understanding God’s word separates Christ’s humanity from His divinity. I simply offered a quote from Trueman that speaks of the dangers of Incarnational analogies, and he says that is a danger. I wasn’t responding to Enns himself, as much as Trueman’s comment on where incarnational analogies take us, especially as it might be applied to Enns (why don’t you like Trueman’s quote, where is he woefully misguided?). That’s a serious question, I’d love to know. To be honest, I haven’t read Enns’ book, it’s not worth buying (especially when I have Warfield at my fingertips) and friends who have personal relations with the man (all who said the book isn’t worth buying). But Enns’ thoughts aren’t unique, they mirror the great Warfield vs Charles Briggs debate in which Warfield won out. He’s beating a dead horse. All you need to do is go pick up Warfield’s Revelation and Inspiration, and you have all the polemic you need in defense of the Scriptures. Enns questions the infallibility of Scripture, and as a confessing Reformed Christian you don’t do that. He focuses too much on the humanity of Scripture,a and that’s dangerous.
As to our question, “What is the basis of Christian belief, the logical formulation of God’s word or God’s grace?” I don’t know that you can separate the two. God’s actions, his “grace” means nothing without the explanatory Word. The Person and Work of Christ means nothing unless God himself defines the Person and work. I think Horton deals with this wonderfully in his book Covenant and Eschatology…I think that’s the one. Without the accompaniment of the Divine Word, Divine action is…what?
Grace.
Oh as to your first question about what Trueman means by abstraction, I’ve been thinking about this. It’s not as if there was so human out there that the Second Person of the Trinity joined himself to in the hypostatic union. The humanity of Christ does not exist independently on its own, for Christ is fully divine, and yet it can’t be abstracted from Christ’s divinity. There is only one Christ, as all the creeds of Christendom affirm, the humanity and the divinity cannot be separated. I bet that was as clear as mud?
Also, do you think Enns’ book has dangerous Christological consequences?
Grace.
As much as I want to continue this discussion, I can’t, for the mere fact that you have not read peter Enns’ book. I advice you to read his book.
WOW! That’s it. Thanks for your help. I’m sorry but I have far too many other books on my list of reading to bother with Enns’ right now. As I trust the faculty of WTS (at least Trueman, Gaffin, and Lillbeck) I see no reason why one must “personally experience” the book to actually talk about it; especially since it’s all been done before (Ecclesiastes 1:9). I mean if you are going to be taken seriously on any of your thoughts on Enns’ and incarnational analogies can’t I just say, go read Warfield, Hodge, Kline, Letham, or Vos? It’s so silly to think one can’t talk about book unless one has read the book, especially in this blogging day. But oh well, to each his own. Enns has overstepped the boundaries of confessional reformed theology, and WTS did the right thing in cleaning the seminary out of him and his faithful followers. Go to Princeton if you want an education where Enns is accepted.
Grace.
It is what it is. Sorry. BTW,I have read B.B. Warfield and Hodge, have not read Kline or Letham but have read Vos. I have also read Cornelius Van Til’s The Doctrine of scripture from the, In Defense of the Faith series, Vol. 1. Again, read Enns’ book if you want to be taken seriously and so you can stop making irrelevant comments like asserting that Enns book is nothing new especially in light of Enns’ following words in the book, “The aim of this book is not novelty but synthesis.”(p.9).
Good readings brother.
Well I’m glad your reading list is so dynamic
You cannot get much better than Vos or Van Til (I love my Dutch!). The problem is, whether or not I read Enns’ book, it’s clear and obvious that he is being unorthodox. Now, if the prerequisite to say anything about anyone is that you must have read their books, then by that line of reasoning we can’t say much about many people. In fact, if I might ask, have you read Osteens books? I noted a post earlier where you refused to call him dangerous…but according to your line of reasoning, if you wish to be consistent, you can’t really say that unless you have read his books. See what I am getting at? It’s useless to say one has to read someone’s book to speak of that person, which is what you are doing by refusing a conversation on Enns’ shoddy theory of incarnation and inspiration. But to each his own!
Grace.
BTW, hope I don’t sound like a complete ass in these comments, that’s not the intention. I just really do want to talk about incarnational analogies and why Trueman is so wrong. But that can be hard to relay via blogs.
Grace.
Where did I assert that the prerequisite to say anything about anyone is that one must first read their books?
cruz…I’m floored!