Pages 2-4: winter 1992 A CASE IN POINT Dr. Robert H. Countess One ought to be able to appl

Pages 2-4: winter 1992

                  A CASE IN POINT

                      Dr. Robert H. Countess
   
   One ought to be able to apply the ICBI definition(s) of inerrancy to any 
page or verse or phrase or word of the Scriptures and thereupon judge 
whether or not the absolutist claims about inerrancy are suitable--IF, that is, 
one proceeds from the Lindsell-phenomena approach.  (The Van Tillian pre-
suppositionalist, by definition, will not be bothered by problems with the 
phenomena!)

   The inerrancy debate, in my opinion, proceeds out of the discipline of 
Systematic Theology, a highly abstract and subjective discipline--witness the 
plethora of "systematic theologies" in Christianity!  Instead, the debate ought 
to center itself in the discipline of Exegetical Theology, especially since the 
phenomena confront the student before systematics, although I must admit 
that in the brainwashing approach, this order becomes reversed.

   I have selected 1 Corinthians 1:14-16 for a case study.  Here, Paul as-
serts with the utmost clarity whom he did and whom he did not baptize of the 
believers at Corinth. What follows is my own highly literal translation:

        I am thankful that not one of you did I baptize except Cris-
     pus and Gaius, lest anyone might say that in my name you were 
     baptized.  Now I did baptize also the Stephanas household. 
     Besides, I know not if any other I did baptize.

I chose this passage because there are no problematic variant readings in the 
manuscript traditions.  There are no difficult grammatical constructions; nor 
are there any words whose meaning-usage is in great dispute with the obvi-
ous exception of any who disagrees with me as to the historical usage of 
baptizo!

   With the path somewhat cleared, we see "the bottom line": Paul asserted 
that "I baptized none of you all there at Corinth EXCEPT for two believers, 
and their names are Crispus and Gaius."

   The problem for  the ICBI definition of                                                 
inerrancy as a technical term possessing the characteristics of being  "totally, 
wholly, etc. trustworthy, true, reliable, accurate," etc. is the word 
"except."  I would not have selected this Pauline passage had he written, "I 
baptized no one" (period!) and then had omitted the references to Crispus, 
Gaius, and Stephanas.

   On the other hand, as the facts of this matter apparently were, if he had 
written to the Corinthian church "I baptized no one," he would have erred. 
But even had he erred, I can imagine Crispus and Gaius musing in a mature 
manner as follows:

        CRISPUS: "Hey, there, Paul, you baptized us!"

        GAIUS: (Thoughtfully) "Crispus, he apparently forgot that he 
     baptized us, but it is of little consequence in light of the point 
     he's trying to make about the centrality of Christ.  This over-
     sight, this lapse of Paul's memory, doesn't make us any less 
     baptized in Christ."

        CRISPUS: "You're right, Gaius. Let's rather be glad that he 
     baptized so few people himself.  This way they can't go around 
     boasting about having been baptized at the hand of the great 
     Apostle Paul."

Now, in point of the manuscript tradition, Paul DID NOT WRITE, "I baptized 
no one" (period).  On the contrary, he wrote, "I baptized none of you 
except Crispus and Gaius."

   That is a simple assertion.  Taken at face value, it is an assertion of 
universal negation but having expressly two--and only two--exceptions: 
Crispus and Gaius. Paul then leaves off naming the exceptions and goes on to 
speak of his concern about people who would place an exaggerated emphasis 
upon having been personally baptized by him.

   It is only after the latter that his memory becomes jogged to the extent 
that he recalls his having baptized more than just Crispus and Gaius.  He 
failed to include the Stephanas household.  Paul then CORRECTS his earlier 
universal-negation-with-only-two-exceptions assertion. He adds another excep-
tion: the household of Stephanas.

   The new bottom line reveals that Paul corrected himself. In doing so, he 
revealed that humanness to which we all seem to be subject: relative accuracy 
and relative fallibility. This new twist is consistent with Berkouwer's remarks 
on the servant character of Scripture as "relatable" to phenomena of Scrip-
ture.  Paul exhibits the phenomenon of making an error in fact but then 
correcting it (cf. ICBI point XIV).

   The ICBI proponents cannot, I judge, treat this particular phenomenon in 
1 Corinthians 1:14-16 without resorting to some sort of detour around their 
absolutist, technical definition of inerrancy.  I have personally confronted 
several inerrancists with this passage and have universally (!) found them to 
employ a most interesting circumlocution: that inerrancy does not require (1) 
omniscience, nor (2) complete precision, nor (3) entire harmonizability.  In a 
letter to me on this passage, Dr. Gleason Archer insisted that Paul be allowed 
"the liberty of expression" that we allow to each other!  (Of course, I am 
willing to do just that, but with that concession I also allow others to be in 
error at times and to have to correct themselves.)

   Archer concluded his defense of Paul (rather the ICBI's defense of their 
inerrancy theory):

        He imparts this information in an informal manner, to be sure, 
     but by the time he has finished this item he has given all of the 
     information, and done so with accuracy.

I suggest that an analogy to this "detour-defense" might be a math student 
who gives incomplete information on a test, while the teacher, when marking 
the incorrect response with red ink, allows the student to redo the work and 
hand it in later and has--using Archer's words-- "done so with accuracy." 
In such an analogy I see both the math teacher and Archer exhibiting grace 
toward an erroneous student and an apostle; in Archer's case, grace takes a 
back seat to cover up.

   Archer recently authored a book treating alleged errors in the Bible. What 
I wish to note is that on the passage in question, this defender of a total 
inerrancy appears to be content with something less than total (cf. ICBI 
articles III, VI, XII, XIV). Archer avoids the precise grammar of Paul's 
universal-negative-with-only-two-exceptions by means of transforming it into a 
universal positive statement to which other positive additions can be made 
later, and, which additions, would not point out Pauline fallibility.

   The grammar of the text does not, however, allow for such a gracious 
detouring. One inescapably must conclude that in verse 14 Paul erred when 
he wrote that he had baptized no one but Crispus and Gaius. In verse 16, 
Paul corrected himself by the addition of the Stephanas household. I must 
insist that we readers are not aware of the error of verse 14 until we read of
Paul's correction of that error in verse 16.  Without the correction, we 
probably would have never become aware of the error.

   What is called for by the ICBI and all would-be inerrancists is candor to 
admit that the phenomenon of Pauline self-correction CANNOT comport with 
the abstractly theological articles that Chicago's summit produced.  It is my 
contention that the ICBI articles were produced NOT in conjunction with the 
phenomena of exegesis but, on the contrary, against the reality of the 
phenomena of exegesis.  As there has been a Realpolitik, there now needs to 
be in evangelical circles a "Realexegese."

                         THE PROBLEM OF 
                     THE ELUSIVE AUTOGRAPHA 

   The ICBI does have going for it something that cannot be overcome by 
any critic: non-existent Scripture originals affirmed to be inerrant. The 
inherent safety of this position is that no critic can possibly examine for 
errors that which no longer exists.  But a simple application of logical infer-
ence, however, can lead one to conclude that a manuscript tradition with so 
many errors/problems at least seems to point out that the autographs proba-
bly partook of the same humanness--unless one insists on the presupposition 
of immediate dictational inerrancy as with the Koran.

   Even inerrancists themselves admit (with a few hardcore hold-outs) that 
the present manuscripts possess real errors of sorts. Thus, in the final 
analysis, ICBI abandons the phenomena approach when the subject of the 
originals comes up and jumps to the presuppositional approach (shades of Van 
Til), BECAUSE THE PHENOMENA APPROACH JUST WILL NOT  WORK.  Hence,
I assert, we see two radically different methods at work: (1) the phenomena 
method with its powerful apologetical persuasiveness over multitudes of peo-
ple, and (2)  the presuppositional method when (1) cannot be employed.

   I suggest that we see here at least the problem of inconsistency if not the 
problem of integrity.  Integrity can be saved only, I believe, if the inerran-
cist confesses at the outset that he is going to use two different methods of 
persuasion, that the implications of the two are at variance, and that if he 
cannot persuade by means of empirical data, he will then  ask the "per- 
suadee" to assume the veracity of that which he initially said he would 
demonstrate empirically. (I do not know an inerrancist who will do this!)

   As a critic of the ICBI position, I do well not to criticize the autographs, 
at least not beyond being willing to make a mild inference or two about them, 
for why should I engage in laborious effort to justify or attack that which all 
parties agree does not exist?  Critics do well, I suggest, to limit themselves 
solely to the present manuscript tradition.

                    THE CIRCULAR REASONING OF 
                           INERRANCISTS

   The evidentialists in evangelical apologetics enjoy attacking the "wretched 
presuppositionalists" (John Warwick Montgomery's term) for their circular 
reasoning.  For an evidentialist to be accused of the latter is tantamount to 
being accused of being a communist.  However, I have observed the following 
line of reasoning amongst the ICBI folks:

        Our present Bibles have errors of sorts. From these Bibles or 
     manuscript tradition, we have deduced and/or inferred what we 
     now call inerrancy.  Inerrancy applies to the whole of the Bible 
     because Bible and God's Word are synonyms.  However, this 
     total, entire, and complete inerrancy applies in its fullest sense 
     ONLY to that corpus of writings called "autographa." Unfortunate-
     ly, the latter long ago perished, and we are not able to examine 
     them empirically to measure our theory against them.  BUT we are still justified 
     in extrapolating from current errant Bibles back to our (allegedly) inerrant autographs.

I truly believe that I have presented a fair synopsis of ICBI reasoning.

   Critics of ICBI are not all slow to point out that there is no way to 
demonstrate that the extrapolation is justifiable or infallible or inerrant itself. 
Theological extrapolations are no less precarious than astronomical or biologi-
cal or geographical extrapolations.  The ICBI line of circular reasoning is an 
example of what I have  called "inferential theology" (Journal of Psychology 
and Theology, Summer 1977, pp. 220ff).  It is not that I fault religionists for 
engaging in inferential theological activity; such activity is unavoidable. What 
I do find fault with is the dogmatism that frequently surrounds such infer-
ring. Dogmatism is unwarranted by the nature of the so-called "problem of 
induction." Rather, some measure of pious agnosticism is in order.

   ICBI thus assumes at the outset that the autographs are inerrant. Then 
ICBI extrapolates back to the autographs from a present day errant Bible 
text and thereupon declares quite dogmatically that this method is justifiable 
because faith requires an inerrant source of recorded revelation. (To me, this 
line of circularity is reminiscent of the papal infallibility argument that re-
quires an infallible interpreter to convey an infallible Scripture. Certainly, 
the logic of both positions has a tantalizing aspect, lacking, however, in 
compelling logical persuasiveness.)

   Of signal interest is the evangelical admissions  that God can and does 
work through Bibles generally regarded to have failings and errors in text. 
Why cannot these evangelicals take the further step that God might even be 
able to have worked from originals with failings and errors of sorts? These 
evangelicals--with errant Bibles in hand--continue to preach, teach, evangel-
ize, and missionize. Why could God not have worked similarly from fallible 
autographs (non-absolute documents)?  This may seem to be only a rhetorical 
question, but its logic impresses at least me.                                

   (Dr. Countess's address is 120 Sagewood Circle, Toney, AL 35773.)   


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      COMPLETE ARTICLE AVAILABLE 

   "A Case in Point" was excerpted from a longer paper that Dr. Countess 
presented on March 18, 1983, to the Society of Biblical Literature in Atlanta. 
The longer paper discussed and quoted several of the articles in "The Chica-
go Statement on Inerrancy." 

   The entire paper is available upon request.  Please include a self-ad-
dressed, stamped business envelope. To receive both this paper and a copy 
of Dr. Archer's letter, please affix 52› postage.


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