When people talk about the inerrancy of the Bible, where do they really believe that truth resides?
I think I have observed a couple of different approaches in the people I have known:
1. truth resides in the events that happened and the Bible as an accurate record of that.
2. truth resides in the words as they are held in the texts (that is the manuscripts) and the translations we have
3. truth resides in our hearts as we read the words and their meaning is opened up to our minds
Isn't the idea of inerrancy pure craziness. Imagine reducing the Truth to this... only someone who didn't really believe it in their heart would need to.
I do believe that truth exists. It must - with my intellectual logic I can see that there must be truth, how history actually did happen before it was subjected to endless perspectives. With my emotional logic I feel certain that there is a truth and that it is more complicated than the reductionist point of view that says its all about science. It can't be, it must be aesthetic as well, and economic, and rhythmic, conceptual and concrete and.... alive. Dynamic.
People being interested in inerrancy seems to be about building walls of defense - but it's silly to build a wall around a forest. A forest should grow and recede, it should be made up of many different trees. Trees flourishing as they grow upward to the light. Sometimes a tree will die and fall and as it decays it will become a home for all sorts of little creatures and its nutrients will feed the soil.
And there is a caretaker of the forest. A man who lives there. He likes all kinds of greens and greys. He is good, and sometimes you can't see him for the trees.
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Kate. Thank you. I've been thinking about just this this week. And it's clearer now. Much clearer. And I'm so thankful. For you. For truth. For the good caretaker.
ReplyDeleteKate, this is beautiful!
ReplyDelete(& the pictures are amazing!)
I am thinking that maybe Truth is expressed as ideas, & as a person (even, maybe even more so, a body of persons)(ie in the whole complex of their expressions, words, actions, sighs, looks, laughs, & attitudes) & stories are a good way to "handle" both (at the same time even). There's a parallel in the fact that when you "get the idea", the idea gets you. And when you get to know a person, the person knows you.
Paul