What do I mean by “reliable”?

Is the Bible reliable or not? Black or white? No direct answer can be given to such a question if we have not first clarified what “reliable” means for us.

Here is a comparison: a cheese slicer is reliable when used correctly and in the context of cheese. It is rather unsuitable for other tasks. “Reliability” is therefore defined by the interaction of “tool” and “task”, as well as “correct handling”. This is also the case with the Bible.

When I say that the Bible is “reliable,” I am referring to reliable use for the intended purpose. The Bible speaks of God and the world and of us humans. It is about circumstances, relationships, experiences, origins and goals. That’s the cheese. That’s what the cheese slicer is for.

A cheese slicer, on the other hand, is less suitable for chopping wood (even if the handle is possibly made of wood), for bringing iron ore to light (even if the slicer was undoubtedly made of metal). Inauthentic use would be inefficient. Non-matching expectations also cannot be met. A cheese slicer would be just the everyday example here. However, when we have the Bible in front of us, we should also remember that we do not have a universal tool in front of us, but a book with a specific purpose. We should use the Bible “scripturally” according to our own purpose. Otherwise, we will rape them.

Verbal inspiration

By the word “verbal inspiration” is meant an understanding of the Bible that sees every word as “inspired by God.” According to this understanding, every letter is “given” by God. Verbal inspiration says: It is God’s word, word by word and letter by letter – as if it were dictated. For some, this statement applies to the basic text. Others even want to apply this view to certain translations (King James, old Luther translation). One defends this word as if it were God Himself.

Not everyone sees the Bible as dictation. This can even be justified from the Bible. Some writers of the Bible make it clear that they themselves – as human beings – react, speak, write (for example Isa 6:5 or 1Cor 7:12). Therefore it is not a mechanical reproduction, like a dictation machine, “but from God men spoke, driven by the HolySpirit” (2Pet 1,21 Elbf.). The words of men are considered to be consistent with God’s purpose. The words are still God’s words, but God has included man.

Those who define themselves as “Bible believers” (and there are quite a few of them) have to put up with the question of whether they now believe in the Bible? And what about God? Are God and the Bible the same? Or is God greater than the Bible? The word “Bible-believing” is a really strange construct against the background of the Bible itself. The Bible encourages us to “believe God.” It was never a matter of “believing in the Bible.” I myself have not been talking about “believing in the Bible” for a long time, but about “trusting” the Bible and its statements. How I trust is still not clarified with it. It takes reflection and a context for me to give this “trust” a color and identity.

However, there are other views that assume no less that God is the author of the Bible. This other consideration is about where authority lies. Reliability is where the authority lies, not in any other place. It is probably God’s Word, but it is not a dictation directly from Him. People have reproduced God’s intention, but with their own, human words. Therefore, it may contain spelling or other errors. God Himself is not questioned by this, just as little as the reliability of my trust in Him. Here we might also consider the words from the book of Proverbs: “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your understanding!” (from: Prov 3:5-8).

Let us look again at the text from the 2nd Letter of Peter. He wrote that people “spoke from God, driven by HolySpirit,” but they did so in their own words. The words carry the message, just as the paper absorbs the writing, but infallibility lies with the author, not with the human transcript.

Now we already have two terms:

• “Reliability,” a term we want to clarify for the Bible, and.
• “Authority”, from which the reliability wants to emerge.

Where does the authority of the Bible lie?

This question is not an expression of doubt, but of wanting to understand the Bible as it is meant to be understood. I do not want to impose an ideology on the Bible, nor do I want to impute any authority to it, no matter how well-intentioned. It’s a neutral question, but I ask it out of the experience that this word has definitely brought me closer to God and I experience this word as “trustworthy”. But what exactly does that mean? Am I aware of my own assumptions? Do I understand what the Bible itself says – or doesn’t say – on this subject?

So where does the authority of the Bible lie? Possible variants:

• Does it lie in the divinity, namely “flawlessness” of the words to the last letter in the basic text?
  The assumption: The word would be divine, namely God himself, or to be equated with him.
• Is it in the reality of God revealing Himself to us?
  The assumption: the Word is permeated by God’s Spirit in such a way that we come to know Him through it. The Word is not divine, but the spirit that permeates the Word is of divine origin. It is a purpose-built reliability, but not clarified for each letter. This does not diminish the value or meaning, because it is not about letters, but about God’s Spirit.
• Is the authority in the testimony of the people who wrote the Word?
  The assumption: Is it about the human stories of the living God? The testimony is real, and in this sense the stories are real and reliable.

In none of these views, which I have simply listed as a sample, is the existence of God doubted, nor is the value of the Bible as the “Word of God” doubted. Nevertheless, the views are quite different. I’m happy to leave this as a non-judgmental suggestion.

Let the text speak for itself

The idea of verbal inspiration has taught me a lot. But the same is true of modern biblical scholarship. It’s not an “either/or” comparison. I have to decide for myself what I take away as valuable information here and there. Both views also cause me difficulties. This is not so much due to the insights gained, but more to the attitude with which they are communicated. Representatives of both schools of thought have at times found themselves to be stubborn and one-sided. I probably notice it because I can be myself.

For me, it has long since ceased to be a matter of ideological trench warfare between different camps. Because the Bible first simply wants to be read. It is a book. Those who think that the book can only be interpreted through a particular lens miss out on the richness of sharing, of learning, of the larger community.

When I read the Bible, I assume that the text makes sense. What sense, I can try to understand. After all, the reliability of the Bible cannot be that everything would be “literally” true, because then the focus is on the carrier of the message (the letter), not on the message itself (the Spirit. Cf. 2 Cor. 3:6). The text is meaningful not because of the letter, but because of the message, the spirit and the life contained in it (John 6:63).

When I read Scripture, I first give the text – and thus the author – space to tell the story. When I read, I want to listen. Of course, no human reads without bias, but I can take care to take the text seriously.

When I read “Israel”, I assume that Israel is meant. Should it be otherwise, then I have to see it justified in the context. “Feeding of the 5000”? Then I listen first, and don’t get tangled up in “this is a miracle” or “there are no miracles.” The feeding of the 5000 is not a teaching about miracles. The story has a very different goal. I do not doubt the story, asking first and foremost what exactly is witnessed. It was undoubtedly important to satiate people, but that was not the goal. Jesus was not and is not in the business of miracles, gastronomy or logistics.

Sometimes you have to question your own ingrained thoughts while reading. Not so that something is defined as “right” or “wrong”, but so that one can again encounter the text in an unbiased way, “open-ended”, so to speak. Be curious. Be open to learning new things.

For example, when the first verses of the Bible say: “In [einem] the beginning God created the heavens and the earth …” (Gen 1:1), the text establishes a connection between the One God and the surrounding reality. They are directly related to each other. It is about God and the world, namely the world in which we live. These opening verses tell us that this God created the world around us. It is about creating a link between God and us. It is not a statement about “creation” versus “evolution”, not a scientific statement about “right” or “wrong”. Neither Moses nor any of the prophets, neither Jesus nor any of the apostles, asks us to “believe in creation and be against evolution.” If we get involved in such trench warfare, we abruptly find ourselves on a sideshow. The Bible text speaks of something else.

Whatever the Bible has to say, we must first simply read it.

Notes of the Bible

The Bible is not black and white. God’s word or man’s word? That’s not the point at all. It is about the way in which the Bible is God’s Word. There are enough references to this in the Bible itself. If we take the Bible seriously, we will begin to differentiate. Here are some examples:

• Human words in the Bible
  Some words are “in the Bible,” but they are clearly “words of men.” For example, Acts 17:23 speaks of an inscription on an idol altar. They are part of the Bible, but not necessarily statements from God Himself.
• It depends on each letter
  At the same time, we can see that here and there Bible texts were read “ultra-literally” by Bible writers. For example, Galatians 3:16 emphasizes the difference between singular and plural. The theme is not “literalness”, but it is a narrative form that exists in Judaism to this day, and from which we can interrogate the text, with the aim of learning. Not rigidity, but liveliness is the goal, for which a text is used as an example. It is about interpretation and interpretation.
• Personal perspective
  Sometimes it is also about a personal perception of a Bible writer. It is completely correct from his perspective, but fundamentally wrong from a scientific perspective. Thus Luke reports of a ship’s voyage “that land was approaching them”(Acts 27:27). This is how the shipmen had perceived it. It is a perception, but not physics. Much of the Bible is described from the perspective of perception. In a completely different context, Paul once made a clear distinction between the words of Jesus (1Cor 7:10) and his own assessment (1Cor 7:12).
• Visual language
  The Bible is full of figurative language. When Paul promises the shipmen on his last voyage “none of you will have a Hair of the Mainit will be lost” (Acts 27:34), it is clear that this does not mean a chance of success for the hairdresser, but that they should all be “completely saved”, even if a few hairs were to disappear unawares into the floods in the process. Because imagery is never about the image, but about what is to be expressed with it. A clear distinction must always be made between image and statement. Ultra-literally is sometimes ultra-awkward.

If we understand these and other points, then we learn to understand the text better while reading, we grasp a common thread, recognize that a story is being told, a concern is being explained. Indeed, literalness alone is no guarantee of better understanding – on the contrary! Blind literalism misses the language and the context. The Bible is written in a language, with words and examples from an everyday life that took place 2000-3500 years ago. Is it God’s word? Yes, but it is also man’s word, namely God’s statements in a form we can understand, spoken and written by men. We should fade that in, not fade it out.

In the next post on the subject, we will take a closer look at some biblical passages that are cited as justification for verbal inspiration.

Deepening

• Was this post helpful? Why (not)?
• Reading tip: Siegfried Zimmer, “Does Biblical Scholarship Harm the Faith?” Clarification of a Conflict.
  ISBN 978-3-525-57306-8. Also available as e-book: ISBN 978-3-647-57306-9.
• Modern biblical scholarship is also infamous as “biblical critical.” How is this viewed in your community? Is this justified in detail? Is there a thunderstorm against “the liberals”? Or do you look down on the “fundies”?
• There are certainly critical voices on modern biblical scholarship, such as those of the theologian Eta Linnemann.
• Opposite to the Bible faith, there can be a science faith. Are these the two alternatives we have? Or does the Bible itself speak of something else? What is actually the object of our faith?
• Historical-critical theology originated in Germany. However, biblical scholarship also exists in other countries. Differentiation: Many people have scientifically studied the Bible with different results. Do you know other points of view?