In Defense of the Bible’s Truth and Trustworthiness as Articulated in the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy

Introduction

            In John 18:38, Pontius Pilate uttered the famous question that has puzzled philosophers and non-philosophers throughout the ages, “What is Truth?” It is a question that everyone must wrestle with at some point in their life. Why is “truth” so elusive? What is it about “truth” that causes everyone to define it differently? You could walk onto any college campus in the world, step into any philosophy or anthropology class and hear the instructor discussing the concept of “big T” truth vs. “little t” truth. “Little t” truths are much easier to define because they are the truths that are dealt with in everyday life and they relate to truths that may be true in some cultures but false in others, such as, in America we drive on the right side of the road and to do otherwise could be tragic, whereas in other parts of the world the opposite is true. Additionally, the diversity of language comes into play with the use of “right.” Right could mean the opposite of left or it could mean correct or proper, so the statement, “in America we drive on the right side of the road” could be restated as “in America we drive on the correct side of the road,” to which those in England, for example, would vehemently disagree (their steering wheel is also on the wrong side of the car).

“Big T” truths, on the other hand, deal with universal type truths, truths that true regardless of what context one finds himself. These questions are: Does God exist? How can we know? What is he or she like? Or is there purpose for my life? Assuming that a God exists, the big questions are: can humans know who this God is, what he is like, and how must one live to be accepted by God? Each one of these questions deal with the nature of revelation because in order for humans to know anything about an entity that fits the definition of what it would mean to be God, then God would have to reveal who he is to humans. The Bible makes these types of claims for itself. 2 Timothy 3:16-17 claims that the Scripture, (graphe, the written Old Testament in this context) is theopneustos, “breathed out by God,” and that it is profitable or advantageous for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, indicating that it is trustworthy and true, so that the man of God may live by it. Further scriptural evidence will be given under the biblical witness for the doctrine section, but first it is necessary to define the doctrine of inerrancy.

Defining Inerrancy

            The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy is the result of a three-day conference convened by the International Council of Biblical Inerrancy in October 1978. It is both a response against liberalism and its attacks against biblical authority and a call for believers to embrace the biblical doctrines of inspiration and inerrancy. The 268 participants[1] issued a Preface, A Short Statement, Articles of Affirmation and Denial, and an Exposition. The Short Statement reads,

1. God, who is Himself Truth and speaks truth only, has inspired Holy Scripture in order thereby to reveal Himself to lost mankind through Jesus Christ as Creator and Lord, Redeemer and Judge. Holy Scripture is God’s witness to Himself.

2. 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.

3. The Holy Spirit, Scripture’s divine Author, both authenticates it to us by His inward witness and opens our minds to understand its meaning.

4. 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.

5. The authority of Scripture is inescapably impaired if this total divine inerrancy is in any way limited or disregarded, or made relative to a view of truth contrary to the Bible’s own; and such lapses bring serious loss to both the individual and the Church.[2]

 

The statement itself has received much criticism over the past forty years, but not all the criticism is warranted. It has often been accused of holding to a wooden literal interpretation of the Bible, but as Boone shows, “it is a misunderstanding of inerrancy to think that it commits one to ‘letterism or wooden literalism.’”[3]  The framers never intended the statement to receive creedal status. It is clearly stated in the Preface that “we acknowledge the limitations of a document prepared in a brief, intensive conference and do not propose that this Statement be given creedal weight.”[4] Additionally, the statement was presented in a spirit of humility and love, as evidenced by the statement, “We gladly acknowledge that many who deny the inerrancy of Scripture do not display the consequences of this denial in the rest of their belief and behavior, and we are conscious that we who confess this doctrine often deny it in life by failing to bring our thoughts and deeds, our traditions and habits, into true subjection to the divine Word.”[5] Both of these statements are important because the two primary objections are that (1) it is overwhelmingly an American position and that it does not accurately represent the global position and (2) it has been used as a litmus test of who is or is not a Christian. In light of the statements in the Preface, these objections are either misunderstood or grossly misapplied.

Statement 4 of the Short Statement is where the concept of inerrancy is introduced, logically follows statements 1-3, which address inspiration, infallibility and divine authority. Inerrancy simply means without error; therefore, biblical inerrancy would necessarily mean that the Bible is without error. This may seem to be an oversimplification of the doctrine, but the concept is rather straightforward. If the Bible is the word of God, with all that that entails, and God cannot lie or err, then the Bible cannot lie or err, therefore the Bible is inerrant. John Wooodbridge, a signer of the Chicago Statement, states that, “by biblical inerrancy, I mean in shorthand the doctrine that the Bible is infallible for faith and practice as well as for matters of history and science.”[6] Vern Poythress, another signer of the Chicago Statement, declares that, “the doctrine of inerrancy, in summary form, says that God consistently speaks truth, that error is opposite of truth, and that therefore what God speaks has no errors. It also maintains that the Bible is the Word of God – it is what God speaks.”[7]

Wayne Grudem provides the definition that inerrancy “means that Scripture in the original manuscripts does not affirm anything that is contrary to fact.”[8] Finally, Norman Geisler provides the analogy that a table must have three legs to stand. He articulates inerrancy as the third leg upon which the Christian faith must stand. The first two are inspiration, “which deals with the origin of the Bible” and infallibility, which “speaks to the authority and enduring nature of the Bible.”[9] He defines inerrancy as “simply mean[ing] that the Bible is without error. It is a belief in the ‘total truthfulness and reliability of God’s words.’”[10] A personal definition of the doctrine of inerrancy would be: the belief that the Bible is trustworthy and true solely on the basis of God’s character meaning that God has chosen to reveal himself to fallen man through the words of Scripture, which he has breathed out and inspired men to write the words he intended them to write, therefore the written word of God is without err because God cannot lie or err.

The Biblical Witness for the Doctrine

            The claim has been made that the Bible is without err because it is the revealed Word of God, thus, the argument is that God cannot err or lie and the Bible is his revealed Word, therefore, the Bible cannot err or lie. From where does the concept that God cannot err, or lie come? Scripture tells us that “God is not a man, that he should lie or a son of man, that he should change his mind” (Num. 23:19), that he is “perfect in knowledge” (Job 37:16), that he “never lies” (Titus 1:2), and, in fact, it is impossible for him to lie (Heb. 6:18). If he is perfect in knowledge, then he cannot make an error in anything, therefore, he has exhaustive knowledge. The doctrine of the inerrancy of the Bible is directly related to the doctrine of God because it relies on the character of the one revealing or breathing out the words of the Scriptures. If God did lie, not only would it would be in direct contradiction to the above passages, but based on other passages of Scripture, God would be hypocrite. God admonishes the people through the prophet Zechariah to “not devise evil in your hearts against one another, and love no false oath, for all these things I hate.” “Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord” (Prov. 12:22) and “all liars” will find themselves in the lake of fire (Rev. 21:8). And finally, Jesus calls the Jews the children of the devil in John 8:44, “You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” Therefore, if God lies or is even able to lie, then he would be the greatest liar of all time because he claims to be always truthful. Now that the character of God has been established as it relates to him speaking truth, it is now time to examine what the Bible says regarding it being God’s word.

There are about thirty-eight hundred instances where the Bible declares, “God said,” or “Thus says the Lord.”[11] An oft-repeated phrase in the book of Jeremiah is “the word of the Lord came to me” or “the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord,” in fact, these two variations are stated twelve times in chapters 32-35 alone. Right from the beginning of the Bible, God speaks (Gen. 1:3) and continues to speak throughout the entire Scriptures even until the very end, where the God-man, Jesus Christ, declares that he is coming soon (Rev. 22:20). It is important to acknowledge that there is a great distinction between how God speaks in the Old Testament and how he speaks in the New Testament. In the New Testament, Jesus, the Son of God, is on earth communicating to his disciples and others. Hebrews 1:1-2 states that “long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world,” so how God speaks in the NT is by Christ, although there are a few instances of God (the Father) speaking, most notably, at the baptism of Jesus and on the Mount of Transfiguration.

The Old Testament period, which includes the time in the first century A.D. when the New Testament was being written, as evidenced by Paul’s statement in Second Timothy 3:16 that “all Scripture is God-breathed” and Peter’s statement that “no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:20-21). In the Old Testament, there are statements such as, “God spoke all these words, saying” (Exodus 20:1), and repeated instances of God speaking through the prophets (1 Kings 14:18; 16:12, 34; Zech. 7:7, 12). The psalmist declares that “by the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host” (Ps. 33:6). The psalmist, also declares that the “words of the Lord are pure words” (Ps. 12:6) and the proverb states that “every word of God proves true” (Pro. 30:5). Lastly, Jesus proclaims, while communicating with his Father, that “your word is truth,” not just stating that they are true, but that they are objective, authoritative truth.

To conclude this section, it is important to take a step back into the New Testament. During the temptation in the wilderness, Jesus quotes Deuteronomy 8:3 to demonstrate that man does not ultimately find his sustenance for life from food, “but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Matt. 4:4), once again reemphasizing that all Scripture is God-breathed. Additionally, there is a demonstration of how the human authors will be able to record what has been spoken to them in John 14:26 and 16:13 with the promise of the Holy Spirit who will bring to their remembrance what was spoken to them. Peter also reminds the believers to “remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles” (2 Peter 3:2). Finally, the New Testament authors provide some indications that they understood that they were writing Scripture. Peter calls Paul’s writings Scripture, even if they difficult to understand (2 Peter 3:16). Paul, in 1 Timothy 5:18 states that “the Scripture says, ‘You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain’ (Deut. 25:4) and, ‘The laborer deserves his wages’” (Luke 10:7), thus equating the words of Jesus in Luke with the words of Moses in the Law. The scriptural evidence for the character of the written word is overwhelming and that it can be trusted as true and without err.

Why it is important?

A straight-forward reading of the Bible will cause the reader to conclude that the Bible is self-attesting. It has no higher authority to appeal to in order to prove its truthfulness and authority. Just as God has no other higher being to swear by, his written word is the highest authority as to its accuracy and truthfulness. To some, that may sound like circular reasoning, but is it really? To what can something appeal to when it is the highest authority? Once again, it comes back to the character of the text or the person making the claim. Is the Bible appealing to itself to substantiate its claim to ultimate authority? Yes, but it does so, based on the character of God. Boone states that, “Inerrancy is rooted in the doctrine of the divine inspiration of Scripture. God is the reason that the biblical authors were protected from error, and God has a better knowledge of text than even they did.”[12] The question is what happens when people start to chip away at the doctrine of the Bible as it pertains to its truth and trustworthiness? It has been frequently stated that when one entertains the idea that there are errors in the Bible, then the whole Bible becomes questionable. Augustine expresses this idea, “For if once you admit into such a high sanctuary of authority one false statement…there will not be left a single sentence of those books which, if appearing to any one difficult in practice or hard to believe, may not by the same fatal rule be explained away.”[13] However, there are many that claim that the slippery slope argument is simply a non- sequitur as it pertains to this issue, but there certainly appears to be some validity to the slippery slope argument in practice. There are examples of men, such as Bart Ehrman, who began to question inerrancy and has now moved to agnosticism, at best.

It is undeniable that there is a serious fragmentation of what it means to be evangelical. G. K. Beale states that, “there is an erosion of the traditional evangelical notion of what it means for the Bible to be true, as formulated in the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy. This slow process of weakening the traditional, biblical view of the Bible’s truth is nothing less than the erosion of the very identity of evangelicalism.”[14] This raises the question of how the debate over inerrancy effects the believer in the pews, since this is mostly a debate within academia. A large majority of those in the pews hold to the doctrine of inerrancy, even though they may not be able to articulate the doctrine if asked, but what happens when young men graduate from the seminaries, enter the pulpit, and start preaching that the Bible simply cannot be trusted in certain areas?

Conclusion

            The goal of this paper was to show that the doctrine of inerrancy is a biblical doctrine. The Bible is both true and trustworthy in all it intends to communicate. The doctrine of inerrancy, however, should not be held in isolation or above all the other doctrines articulated in the Scriptures. When considered with the authority of Scripture, the infallibility, the clarity, the sufficiency, and the inspiration of the Scriptures, the doctrine of inerrancy is an essential doctrine within the overarching doctrine of the Scriptures. Regarding the Chicago Statement, there are two questions that need to be answered: (1) is it an accurate description of the doctrine as it is articulated in Scripture, and (2) is it useful in the life and practice of the church? I believe that both questions can be answered with a resounding yes. Problems arise when people try to make the Chicago statement and the doctrine of inerrancy say more than they are intended or attempt to say. Ultimately, when the inerrancy of the Bible is discussed, attacked, or affirmed, the underlying assertions deal with the character of God, rather than the character of the Bible. Therefore, Christians must declare with the Apostle Paul, in Romans 3:4 to “let God be true though everyone were a liar, as it is written, ‘That you may be justified in your words and prevail when you are judged.’”

[1] Nichols, Stephen. “The Chicago Statement” 5 Minutes in Church History. Sept. 17, 2014. 5minutesinchurchhistory.com. Accessed on Feb. 20, 2018.

[2] bible-reseacher.com (accessed Feb. 15, 2018)

[3] Boone, Mark J. 2016. “Ancient-Future Hermeneutics: Postmodernism, Biblical Inerrancy, and the Rule of Faith.” Criswell Theological Review 14, no. 1: 35-52. ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials, EBSCOhost(accessed Jan. 22, 2018). 39

[4] bible-reseacher.com (accessed Feb. 15, 2018)

[5] Ibid.

[6] Kostenberger, Andreas J. and Robert W. Yarbrough. Understanding the Times: New Testament Studies in the 21^st Century: Essays in honor of D. A. Carson on the Occasion of His 65^th Birthday. Wheaton: Crossway. 2011. p. 107.

[7] Poythress, Vern S. “Inerrancy and the Trinity: New Testament Perspectives – John 17:6-8 As a Window into Divine Communication in Language.” Presbyterion. 43, No. 1. ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials, EBSCOhost (accessed Jan. 22, 2018).  21.

[8] Grudem, Wayne. Systematic Theology. Grand Rapids: Zondervan. 1994.

[9] Farnell, F. David and Norman L. Geisler. Vital Issues in the Inerrancy Debate. Eugene: Wipf and Stock Publishers. 2015. Ebook. Loc 626 of 16358.

[10] Ibid.

[11] https://bible.org/seriespage/4-bible-written-word-god (accessed on Feb. 20, 2018)

[12] Boone, Mark J., “Ancient-Future Hermeneutics: Postmodernism, Biblical Inerrancy, and the Rule of Faith.” Criswell Theological Review. Vol. 14. No. 1. 2016. 45.

[13] Moorhead, Jonathan, “Inerrancy and Church History: Is Inerrancy a Modern Invention?” Master’s Seminary Journal. Vol. 27. No. 1. 2016. 80.

[14] Beale, G. K. The Erosion of Inerrancy in Evangelicalism: Responding to New Challenges to Biblical Authority. Wheaton, Il: Crossway Books, 2008. 221.