Violence and Inspirational Inerrancy

From my previous post, "All Scripture is God-breathed (Part 1)," I provided a little background on the cognitive dissonance I have experienced regarding how violence is portrayed in the Hebrew Bible. Near the end of that blog post I wrote, "What has this [i.e., What is inspiration?] got to do with understanding violence as portrayed in the Hebrew Bible? Everything..." 

If we see inspiration of scripture in terms that it resulted in a book that is God's exact words written by his prophets and thus inerrant (historically, scientifically and morally), then we will have to deal with examples and descriptions of violence as historical fact. That means that Israel's God, Yahweh, commanded and/or condoned the execution of both small and large groups of people, not only those directly guilty of crimes, but those who were apparently deemed "guilty by association" (i.e., the spouses, children and slaves/servants of those who were directly guilty). 

What do you believe inspiration means? Probably most who are reading this blog are part of a Christian denomination that holds to an understanding of inspiration that is best described and explained by the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy.  At a conference sponsored by the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy (ICBI) and held in Chicago in October 1978, more than 200 evangelical leaders formulated this statement: 

http://library.dts.edu/Pages/TL/Special/ICBI_1.pdf

The following statements are taken directly from this document: 

• The authority of Scripture is a key issue for the Christian Church in this and every age. Those who profess faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior are called to show the reality of their discipleship by humbly and faithfully obeying God's written Word. To stray from Scripture in faith or conduct is disloyalty to our Master. Recognition of the total truth and trustworthiness of Holy Scripture is essential to a full grasp and adequate confession of its authority.
• Holy Scripture, being God's own Word, written by men prepared and superintended by His Spirit, is of infallible divine authority in all matters upon which it touches: it is to be believed, as God's instruction, in all that it affirms; obeyed, as God's command, in all that it requires; embraced, as God's pledge, in all that it promises.
• Being wholly and verbally God-given, Scripture is without error or fault in all its teaching, no less in what it states about God's acts in creation, about the events of world history, and about its own literary origins under God, than in its witness to God's saving grace in individual lives.
• Article X states: We affirm that inspiration, strictly speaking, applies only to the autographic text of Scripture, which in the providence of God can be ascertained from available manuscripts with great accuracy. We further affirm that copies and translations of Scripture are the Word of God to the extent that they faithfully represent the original. We deny that any essential element of the Christian faith is affected by the absence of the autographs. We further deny that this absence renders the assertion of Biblical inerrancy invalid or irrelevant.

Article X is of particular significance. We do not possess the original texts which the ICBI claims were "wholly and verbally God-given." In fact, the manuscripts we do possess, and upon which all modern committee translations are based, date many of hundreds of years after the so-called autographs were written. That seems to be logically problematic, but the ICBI claims that "the providence of God can be ascertained from available manuscripts with great accuracy...We deny that any essential element of the Christian faith is affected by the absence of the autographs." 

But, in fact, that is a pretty hard claim to prove, factually. We literally do not know when the texts that became the books of the Hebrew Bible were written, except that they were written some time prior to the manuscripts we possess. We also do not know how they were transmitted throughout the generations and what if any changes were introduced along the way.

Even if one holds to the claim that the original autographs were "wholly and verbally God-given" one must also believe that God providentially watched over, and somehow guided, every scribe who copied these texts, ensuring that the only errors they made were simple and obvious to all. For only in that way could we today determine with almost 100% precision what the "original autographs" actually said. While it is true that there is a lot of manuscript evidence for most books of the Hebrew Bible, they are not as uniform and free from revisions, as well as errors, as we have often been led to believe. 

Whatever we believe about inspiration, it is a faith decision. However, some views of inspiration are more difficult to square with the manuscript evidence as we have it today. iIn my opinion, the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, is one of those views that is the most difficult to square with the facts. Is there another way to understand inspiration that not only allows for the facts, but also helps us understand the contents of the Hebrew Bible in a way that does not contradict God's nature as revealed in the life and message of Jesus? I believe there is. 

All Scripture is God-breathed (Part 1)

I am going to write something in this post (and others to follow) that may be concerning to people who knew me mostly from some part of the first 30 years of my Christian life (1977–2007) and/or during the first 25 years I spent working in Christian ministry (1979–2004). It may not surprise you if you either do not know me or have only known me since 2004. A little background may help you understand better what follows.

In high school and throughout various university endeavours I excelled in math and science, but did not do quite as well in literature courses. I love the precision of math and science. I love laws that make sense. I love theses that were proven. In my nursing training, I so enjoyed my study of human anatomy that I took more anatomy courses than required. Why? Yes, the human body is an amazing creation, but even more so for me, it is a concrete and mostly consistent creation. You can see and even touch (yes, I studied cadavers), a radial artery or a sciatic nerve or a sphenoid sinus. I enjoy things are clear, consistent and, relatively speaking, not up for debate.

In giving up atheism for Christianity, I know one of the concepts that attracted me, and helped solidify my newly found faith, had to do with the inspiration of the Bible as it shared with me based on passages like 2 Timothy 3:16–17, Hebrews 4:12–13, etc. The Bible is God's inspired word. God's revelation is complete and inerrant in every way. What it says, it means and what it means always has been and always will be truth. If anyone ever points out any errors or inconsistencies in any biblical book or between biblical books, the problem is not the text, it is the human interpreters who have either sincerely misunderstood the scriptures or are purposely misrepresenting the scriptures. For about three decades, I camped on that concept, strengthened my foundational understandings of that teaching and both privately and publicly defended the Bible as the inspired, and thus completely inerrant, and final, word of God.

Yet, there were certain things that the Bible said that I could not defend under that banner. So, for the most part, I ignored those parts of scripture in my teaching and personal reading and study. I just hoped that no one would ask me to preach or teach from those parts of the Bible or ask me personally questions about what I believed those passages meant. Yet, in spite of all my efforts to hide away, there were times when I was called to defend my understanding of inspiration in light of what others saw as historical and/or moral inconsistencies or outright contradictions. My response was usually some kind of pat answer that I had read, written by some conservative Christian scholar, but which I really either did not understand or did not actually believe.

Then, in 2005, I put myself in a situation where I knew I was going to have to deal, one way or another, with the growing cognitive dissonance I was experiencing. I opted to continue my "biblical" education by attending a secular university, where I took courses in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Archaeology and the Bible, Greek, Roman and Near Eastern Religion, Ancient Ethnicities, etc. If I had attended one of the local conservative Christian seminaries, I know I would have 'agreed' with most of what I was taught and would have my personal convictions confirmed, but I would not have been forced to deal with my cognitive dissonance. Even after I received my BA in Classics, I began digging deeper into courses at the university and then applied for the MA in Religious Studies program, with a focus on Hebrew Bible and ancient Judaism. And I am so grateful that I made those choices.

Gradually my cognitive dissonance, related to the Bible, is being resolved - not easily or comfortably and not without intellectual and emotional struggle. You see, I no longer define the inspiration of the Bible as inerrant and thus without inconsistency and/or contradiction. I no longer have to defend the Bible, nor God, because I now believe he knew exactly what he was doing in allowing the Bible to be written the way it was and to come to us the way it did. I can read it for what it is, not for what I wanted or needed it to be.

What has this got to do with understanding violence as portrayed in the Hebrew Bible? Everything - which I will try to explain in future posts. However, if you have read this far, I wanted to give you fair warning. I want to be open and vulnerable in sharing my thoughts with you. If you hold to the idea that inspiration of scripture means that every word is historically accurate and morally consistent, then if you choose to read future posts, you will encounter some ideas you will not agree with - it will be a rough road ahead.  However, if you persevere, you might just find some answers to the cognitive dissonance you are experiencing when it comes to the portrayal of violence, commanded and condoned by Israel's God. And even if you do not, you will at least understand better how others, like me, have resolved this issue (and others).

I will end this post with some words of encouragement taken directly from Peter Enn's book, The Bible Tells Me So: Why Defending Scripture Has Made Us Unable to Read It, pp. 236–244:

• The Bible is God's Word.
• The Bible is not, never has been, and never will be the center of the Christian faith.
• The Bible is not a weapon.
• An unsettled faith is a maturing faith.
• Let go of fear.
• Branch out.
• Take a page or two out of Judaism.
• Don't expect more from the Bible than you would of Jesus.
• If we let the Bible be the Bible, on its own terms - on God's terms - we will see this in-fleshing God at work.
• If we come to the Bible and read it this way, in true humility, rather than defending our version of it, we will find God as he wants to be found.

Myth, Propaganda or Reality? (Part 2)

From Part 1: "Thus, I could no longer hide behind "God's ways are unfathomable" or "It will all makes sense in eternity" or worse (from my perspective) yet, "Those people deserved to wiped off the face of the world."

So...I decided that there must be another way to understand all this. There must be an explanation of why these accounts are rampant through the Hebrew Bible."

Part 2...

If these accounts of violence, commanded and/or condoned by God, are, in any respect, historical accounts of real events, then the next thing I had to do, but did not want to do, was to humanize these events. By that I mean that these were real people--fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, children or neighbours. Whether idolatrous or not, whether extremely sinful by biblical standards or not so much, what if these were my parents, my spouse, my children, my kin, my friends and neighbours?

Let me put it this way. There isn't much in the Gospels about the childhood of Jesus, but there is one scene that abhors us all. It is where Herod, in order to protect his position of power, having heard that a king was born in Bethlehem, commands the slaughter of all of Bethlehem's children who are two years old and under. We have no record of this particular slaughter outside of the Gospels, however, historians indicate that it would not be beyond Herod to have done something like this. Add to that fact is the reality that Bethlehem was a small village in a tiny and politically insignificant nation. As horrific as it is, this would not have made front page news. But if we take that act of violence as reasonably accurate, we're horrified! And so we should be!

Yet, according to the Hebrew Bible, God had the conquering Israelites, wipe out entire villages--men, women, children and even the animals. How can that be justified? Even if we buy into the idea that it was punishment for ongoing idolatry and unrepentant and extreme sin, what about the children? What about the women who were pregnant and without power in their patriarchal societies, often treated much more as possessions or slaves than as free individuals who could make their own choices? And what about the slaves/servants who had not opportunity to express, let alone live out, their own choices in life? Were the children and other innocents simply guilty by association? Was the evil so rampant that even the innocents were infected with the virus and the only choice was to wipe all those contaminated with idolatry and its associated evils from the face of the earth?

In the Hebrew Bible we can read that the prophets taught the Israelites that people are not guilty by association. The one who sins is the one who will die. The father shall not suffer for the guilt of the son, nor the son for the guilt of the father. If you have not read Ezekiel 18 lately (the whole chapter), then I would encourage you to do so now.

"A child shall not suffer for the iniquity of a parent, nor a parent suffer for the iniquity of a child; the righteousness of the righteous shall be his own, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be his own." (Ezekiel 18:20)

God does not delight in the death of even the wicked. If the wicked turn from their ways, they shall be considered righteous. If a child sees the wickedness of his/her parents and takes a different path, he/she will not die. Now, this is more the heart and actions of the God whom Jesus came to make known. Yet, this seems inconsistent with the God who commanded the annihilation of whole communities of people, especially those who were "guilty" by association and had little control over their own lives -- i.e., children, slaves, women, the poor, etc.

So, are there other ways to understand the violence as portrayed in the Hebrew Bible? My explanations and justifications of the past have not worked for me, but have created obvious cognitive dissonance to the point that I still am having trouble reading these accounts...and there are so many. While I do not need every question raised by my reading of the Hebrew Bible satisfactorily answered, to me (and, I think to many people, Christian or not), this is a big one. My journey is ongoing and will soon consider alternative explanations for why the Hebrew Bible portrays Yahweh commanding and/or condoning violence. But first I want to remind myself and any of my fellow "travellers" of some historical and literary contexts that, I believe, must be taken into account.

Myth, Propaganda or Reality? (Part 1)

As I continue to examine the issue of violence as portrayed in the Hebrew Bible, one thing that I've had to do is decide whether these are completely mythical accounts (no historical basis), exaggerated propaganda (possible historical basis) or relatively accurate accounts of historical events. What I decide here impacts how seriously I take the means of death inflicted and the loss of lives described.

For the first two-thirds of my Christian life, I have taken these accounts at face value. In other words, I understood them to be relatively accurate accounts of historical events. And that is why I had so much trouble reading the Old Testament. In spite of being in the paid ministry, I seldom used these accounts in my teaching and preaching. I hoped that no one would come to me with questions about how the God, whom we call our Father, could command and condone the mass slaughtering of whole communities, sometimes with the goal of putting an end to an entire ethnic group or nation. Interestingly enough, the members of the churches I served over thirty-five years, seldom questioned these violent accounts. In the last third of my Christian life I have striven to deal with my cognitive dissonance.* I have found other long-time Christians have taken the same approach that I did: the-ignore-it-and-it-will-go-away approach. Because, if one accepts these accounts as essentially historical, some kind of explanation and justification is required.

Whether we spoke about our dissonance or kept it to ourselves we had to find ways, even in our own heads, to justify God's actions. Early in my biblical education I was taught that these were examples of God's judgment "in time" (as distinct from his judgment at the end of time). In other words, I was taught (and I accepted) the explanation that these peoples were so incredibly sinful (usually blamed on their idolatry) that they deserved capital punishment. Whether specifically referenced in the biblical accounts or not, the assumption made was that God obviously had given them many opportunities to repent and had they repented he would have spared them--just as he did when he had Jonah preach to the people of Nineveh.

In one sense, for sure, God is God and we are not. How can we possibly understand God's ways? God doesn't owe humanity any kind of explanation. He doesn't have to justify himself. I get all that, but I don not agree with it and here is why. The NT claims that through Jesus, God is demonstrating that he is about grace, forgiveness and thus having relationships with human individuals and communities. Paul and Peter both wrote of God's patience with humanity and his desire that all are come to a knowledge of truth and experience the eternal salvation which he offers--at great price to himself--through the gospel. Those qualities of God do not fit with a God who would say, "I do not have to explain or justify myself to humanity. I can do what I want, when I want, to whomever I want." Our heavenly Father is love. Thus, I could no longer hide behind "God's ways are unfathomable" or "It will all makes sense in eternity" or worse (to me) yet, "Those people deserved to wiped off the face of the world."

So...I decided that there must be another way to understand all this. There must be an explanation of why these accounts are rampant through the Hebrew Bible. Myth, Propaganda or Reality? Part 2 is coming soon...

____________
*"In the field of psychology, cognitive dissonance is the mental discomfort (psychological stress) experienced by a person who simultaneously holds two or more contradictory beliefs, ideas, or values. The occurrence of cognitive dissonance is a consequence of a person performing an action that contradicts personal beliefs, ideals, and values; and also occurs when confronted with new information that contradicts said beliefs, ideals, and values.^[1][2]

In A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance (1957), Leon Festinger proposed that human beings strive for internal psychological consistency in order to mentally function in the real world. A person who experiences internal inconsistency tends to become psychologically uncomfortable, and is motivated to reduce the cognitive dissonance." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance)