Phil's recent (terrific) posts on BioLogos tangentially raise the issue of inerrancy once again. Many lodge the charge that some or all of the contributors at BioLogos either weaken or deny inerrancy, either openly or tacitly.
As surely as Christopher Hitchens does, as surely as Richard Dawkins does, as surely as Paris Hilton (or Perez Hilton, for that matter) does, as surely as the Pope does, as surely as Lindsey Lohan does.
Everyone is an inerrantist.
The only question is where we locate inerrancy.
The glandolatrous hedonist locates inerrancy in his senses; the Papist (and the, er, Pape-er himself) locates it in the teaching office of The Church™.
What of the BioLogos types? One might argue that they locate inerrancy in the scientistic fad du jour, the fad of uniformitarian macroevolutionism with a light dusting of God-talk on the top.
About that. Is Science a person, a monolith, a thing that speaks or writes? Or is it (as the word is popularly used) actually a particular philosophy? Are there other competing philosophies? Is there only one school of thought?
Are facts self-interpreting? How long has the current fad held the day? How long did previous fads dominate? Did previous generations say they were probably wrong and would likely be undone by the next generation — or did they all lay out their positions in just as absolute and self-assured terms as the current lot is doing?
Yet with all that, let us grant for the sake of argument that the BioLogos types really are sincere in their insistence that they'll go wherever the evidence drives them. Then we must make three observations:
- Given their eagerness to throw out the plain reading of Scripture in Genesis 1-3, they obviously do not locate inerrancy in the text of Scripture.
- Given their eagerness to throw out the plain reading of Scripture in Genesis 1-3, they obviously are in fact provisionally locating inerrancy in today's scientistic consensus, over against Scripture. (That is to say: given that there is a push and shove between the majority view created on the assumption that Scripture is untrue on the one hand, and Scripture itself on the other, they are siding with the former against the latter. It is Scripture that must yield, to them.)
- Given their eagerness to throw out the plain reading of Scripture in Genesis 1-3, they obviously locate inerrancy in their own personal reason, their own ability to sort things out, their own (if you will) autonomous knowledge of good and evil.
Creation is a classic He-said/they-said. Listen:
- We begin our thinking with the premise that God the eyewitness cannot err in His revelation of what happened, or ...
- We begin our thinking with the premise that man the non-eyewitness cannot err in his reconstruction of what happened.
It's just a matter of where he locates the final authority.