What I hope to explore in this post is not whether the Bible is truly "dictated by God" but whether it actually claims to be. I will be discussing a particular concept in order to set up the question: Does Paul claim (in 2 Timothy 3:16) that the Bible is inerrant?
In his second recorded letter to Timothy, Bishop of the Christian Church in Ephesus, Paul writes the following passage:
"All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness." - 2 Timothy 3:16 (NASB)For purposes of transparency and for the reader to be able to read the text on his/her own, here is what the verse says in the original Greek:
"πᾶσα γραφὴ θεόπνευστος καὶ ὠφέλιμος πρὸς διδασκαλίαν, πρὸς ἐλεγμόν, πρὸς ἐπανόρθωσιν, πρὸς παιδείαν τὴν ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ"I would like to break each word down and render a translation from the Greek to the English:
- πᾶσα (pas) - All, every one of such a thing
- γραφὴ (graphyin) - Any written thing [where we get the English words "graph" or "graphic" from]
- θεόπνευστος (theopneustos) - from two words theos (meaning "god" or "divinity") and pnuema (meaning "breath" or, loosely, "spirit")*
- καὶ (kahee) - and, also, indeed, even, but [Greek conjunction]
- ὠφέλιμος (ophelimos) - profitable
- πρὸς (pros) - to the advantage of
- διδασκαλίαν (didaokalian) - teaching or instruction [where we get the English word "didactic" from)
- ἐλεγμόν (elegmon) - reproach
- ἐπανόρθωσιν (epanorthosis) - correction, return to a state of uprightness
- παιδείαν (paideian) - the training and education of children
- τὴν (hon) - the, these [Greek article]
- ἐν (en) - in [Greek preposition]
- δικαιοσύνῃ (dikaiosune) - rightness
"All writings are influenced [blown by god] and profitable in advantage of teaching, reproach, correction and training the youth in rightness."
I'm certain that there are those that will disagree with my translation of this passage, this is one of the largest problems with translating anything from the Greek language into English: it's nearly impossible to come away from a Greek translation and say "this is precisely what it says," as there are any number of ways to translate/interpret any number of words within a text. In light of this rendering of Paul's encouraging words to Timothy, I would like to make a number of points that, I feel, go very often unsaid when studying the writings of Paul:
- This writing of Paul to Timothy is a letter, written from one very experienced and well-trained teacher to another relatively inexperienced teacher. In the most modern analog to this kind of letter, we might think of Paul's epistles as "memorandums" or, in political terms, "policy statements".
- Scholars know that Paul had extensive, two-way, correspondence with all bishops and pastors that he established in Anatolia, Thrace and Greece. In these letters - most of whom only Paul's end was kept for posterity due to its subsequent canonization - any number of problems, questions, concerns, requests for clarification and reports of church activity were transferred to Paul and Paul sent his responses to either the pastor/bishop in a private letter (as in Timothy) or to the church-at-large (as in his letter to "the Ephesians"). We should always be conscious that there is a whole narrative happening around these letters that we have limited-to-no information regarding.
- What we do know about the context of this letter is that there was a considerable row between Jewish Christians and Greek Christians over the following "church policies": circumcision, keeping the kosher laws, keeping, teaching and application of the Hebrew scriptures (for more information see Galatians 2:12, Galatians 6:13, Acts 21:15-26, Titus 1:10, 1 Corinthians 7:18, Romans 3:27-28 vs. James 2:17, 26, etc.). This controversy, as evidenced by Paul's extensive discussion of circumcision and "the law" to churches in traditionally non-Jewish cities (like Rome, Corinth, etc.). We know that "men from James" (brother of Jesus and leader of the Jerusalem church, most of which were Jews) went to a number of Greek churches to encourage them to adopt the Jewish traditions that Jesus himself observed (i.e. circumcision, the law and the Hebrew scriptures).
- What can be interpreted from this "policy statement" by Paul to Timothy, in my reading, is this: amid the controversy of what to do with all of the Jewish traditions still observed by the Jerusalem church and the Apostles, Timothy (a very young half-Jewish, half-Greek bishop of a large cosmopolitan church in traditionally Greek city) asks Paul how he should settle this highly charged question for his own congregation.
- Paul's response "splits the baby" with regard to the Hebrew scriptures. He does not encourage Timothy to do as the Jerusalem church and the Jewish-Christian congregations did: which is make the Hebrew scriptures a centerpiece of the Jewish-Christian experience. He tells Timothy that these writings are "blown on by God" (an idea which was well understood by anyone exposed to Greek religious and philosophical culture as "inspired" or "blown upon by the gods") and, as such, they are useful for teaching Christians how to be righteous before God and Christ.
- What is noteworthy here is that Paul does not say that the scriptures are directly dictated by God and, thus, "inerrant". There is a phrase in Greek that would have directly conveyed this idea. Here it is in the original Greek: "υπαγορεύεται από τον Θεό και δεν σφάλμα [upagopeuetai apo hos theos kai den ophalma]." Paul does not say this. Instead he, essentially, creates a whole new vocabulary word with an ambiguous meaning.
- The last point that should be made is possibly the "touchiest" of all. In the twenty-first century, we are very comfortable using the words "the Bible", "the Word" or "scripture". It is very important, when making claims about the "the Bible", that we understand the following: what we call "the Bible" is a compilation of various different texts, penned (if not actually authored) by a number of different writers, written across centuries of history, in at least two entirely different languages. Modern American readers read the Bible as one contiguous book, in one language as though it was penned by one person sometime in history and chosen by a god-ordained authority/apostle. The books of the Bible were selected in 393 AD at the Synod of Hippo, and chosen by this council of bishops to represent "sacred scripture." In the time of Paul and Jesus, "scripture" only referred to the Hebrew Tanakh (or the "Old Testament"). None of the Gospel narratives or apostolic letters were considered by any first-century Christian to be "canon."
- In light of this, it is important to understand that if we insist that "the Bible" is "inerrant" we have to answer these questions: Which version of the Bible is inerrant? What texts are included in this version? Are all of the texts "inerrant" or just a select few? If Paul is saying that scripture is "without error", do we take that to mean only the "Old Testament" like he said? Or do we apply that error-less-ness to the decisions made by the Synod of Hippo almost four hundred years later?
Perhaps the even more important question is this: does it need to be "error free" in order to be "profitable for teaching, reproach, correction and education of the youth in righteousness"?
I certainly look forward to everyone's comments and criticisms on the subject and hope to hear from you all soon.
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