It's a real word, apparently. You can look it up online. Wikipedia has a generic definition -- "the worship of a particular book". The Free Dictionary defines it simply as "excessive adherence to a literal interpretation of the Bible." Of course, "excessive" is not defined in this context, so it's not a helpful definition. The word is built on two other words: Bible and Idolatry. The accusation seems to be that people who believe that the Bible is inerrant are Bible worshipers. That's probably not an accurate understanding of the accusation, but that's the intent of the word. The idea is that we shouldn't hold the Bible in that high of regard. It's imperfect. Deal with it!
Interestingly, the accusation usually comes from Christendom rather than the anti-Christian world. Christians historically have indeed been "people of the Word". The claim of the Reformation was sola scriptura -- the Bible is the sole authority in matters of faith and practice. The truth, in fact, is that for most of Church history the Bible has been held as inerrant and infallible. (Why they use both terms is beyond me. I mean, if it's inerrant, it must be infallible, mustn't it? But, hey, no one asked me.) The split between the Roman Catholic Church and the Reformers was not about inerrancy, but about the Bible being the sole authority. (Roman Catholics also see the Church and Tradition as two other sources.) It wasn't until the 19th century that the question was even raised. And yet, in the last 200 years, "wise" scholars have determined that Church history has been wrong and the Church, united on this point, has been wrong and we are much smarter now to realize that it just can't be.
So what is the accusation of "bibliolatry" all about? Well, if you believe that the Bible is actually inerrant, you're placing too much trust on an unreliable book. In the '70's, Fuller Seminary (among others) shifted from "inerrant" to "infallible". (Something can be infallible in its claims while having errors in its content.) "You see," they assured us, "we believe that the Bible contains God's Word, but it is not actually God's Word and, as such, may have errors. It's just true in principle, not particulars." So here we are -- those of us who still believe that the Bible is the Word of God, inerrant -- no longer on the inside looking out. No, we're a dwindling minority. And the quickest way to shut us up is not via argument, but by ridicule. Thus the term, "bibliolatry". "You crazies ... you worship the Bible. Not us! We worship God!" But ... is it accurate? Is the accusation fair? Are we bibliolaters, even if that's hard to say?
I don't get the accusation. Oh, I suppose that there actually are folks who worship their bibles. Take, for instance, the Muslims who are offended if you sully their book. The book itself is sacred to them. Christians don't see it that way. I suppose there might be a few, but they're outliers. No, the Christian pejoratively referred to as "fundamentalist" (because that rotten Christian adheres to fundamental, biblical principles and rejects secularism) doesn't actually worship the book. So what exactly is the idea of "fundamentalist", of "inerrancy"? Well, the claim is that God breathed the Bible using human hands to write it. It filtered through their language and personalities, but God superintended the Bible to say what He intended it to say. Therefore, the Bible is God's Word written by humans. The claim, then, is not that the Bible is inerrant, but that God is inerrant. The claim is that an inerrant, infallible God saw to it that we had written down for our benefit what He intended us to know.
So my question is the counter. Is it the claim of these Christians who level the accusation of "bibliolatry" that God cannot or would not do such a thing? Is it their assertion that God was either incapable or unwilling to provide such a written record for us? And what was the failure mechanism? Did God just not conceive of the idea? Or did He fail to keep it in some satisfactory condition while Man degraded it? Did human Free Will override God's ability to maintain a reliable book? It seems to me the problem is not a problem of worshiping a book, but the apparent certainty of a God too small to bother with such a book. This God says, "Sorry, kids ... you're on your own. Good luck with that." And this is a much more educated, superior position to take than the foolish fellow who naively believes that God cares enough to see to such a writing and make sure it gets into our hands in a reliable fashion. Yeah, that's lame-brained. No, no, God has no such intent or capability.
And Paul's words echo in the background ... "Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools ..."
25 comments:
Religion provides a wonderful means for the acquisition of power. I mean wasn't it really the lust for power by man through the Church that was at the core of Luther's protest?
Those claiming to be wise are unwittingly(?) being used in the displacement of God by man in his attempts to wrest control of a huge block of power resident in the Church. The measure of man's success in the displacement of God is a matter of the extent to which he has been able to discredit the Bible. This is one reason that there are no discernible differences between the Democrat party and liberal churches with their idols: man, the environment, the government, sexual liberation, and egalitarianism; not to mention the outright gnashing of teeth toward Christianity's unmalleable God.
"Did human Free Will override God's ability to maintain a reliable book?"
Human free will seems to have overridden God's ability to maintain a perfect Creation. God can't be bothered to prevent rape, genocide, famine and disease... but He will exert His infinite power to prevent men from writing down something wrong?
We call you Bibliolaters because you ascribe attributes that are God's alone -- Perfection, Authority -- to a sequence of words on a page, rendered in human language, interpreted by human minds. The Bible isn't God.
I think the charge will be leveled at people who elevate their interpretation of Scripture over physical evidence. For example, being a flat earther because you think the Bible tells you to believe in a flat earth. You deify your interpretation of the text because you think that you are according God more sovereignty or something because he can do impossible contradictory things. It becomes a badge of honor to interpret the text based on the need to appear pious and humble rather than actually accept what the text says.
Anonymous,
I'm admittedly confused about your comments. It appears as if you're saying, "Yes, human Free Will overrode God's ability to maintain a reliable book in the same way that human Free Will overrode God's ability to maintain a perfect Creation." Is that your position? (It begs the question, of course, as to whether or not God intended to "maintain a perfect Creation". The question of the power of human Free Will is about will, isn't it? The question is "Did God intend to produce a reliable book?" and "Did God intend to maintain a perfect creation?" Or, to put it another way, did human Free Will in both cases override God's Divine Will?)
I'm also confused by the other claim. If, for instance, Perfection is an attribute of God's alone, didn't you ascribe it to His Creation as well? That is, if a Perfect Being produces something, will it be Perfect or imperfect?
Beyond that, ascribing Authority to God alone creates a bit of a problem, doesn't it? Assuming agreement that it is God's alone, we no longer have any authority here except the direct Authority of God ... which seems to vary by individual. So much for agreement or unity, right?
But the final remark was perhaps the most confusing. Is there someone around you that has made the claim in some form that "The Bible is God"? That would indeed be genuine Bibliolatry, but I know of no such person -- even in Islam or other religions. So the claim that God breathed (the biblical claim) the message and superintended the message isn't a claim that the message is God. The claim is that the message came from God and that God, being inerrant, cannot produce an erroneous message. That's not ascribing Divinity to the Bible, so I'm trying to figure out your position.
It's interesting to me, Dan, that the Bible has never been assaulted in Church History like it has in the past 200 years. There were questions about "Is this 'Bible' or is it not?" but never "Is the Bible God's Word?" Now, a couple of thousand years later, "enlightened" folks have figured out what no one from the time of the writing on has been able to figure out. I suspect, like you, that it's a smokescreen, not a genuine question of authenticity. "We want to do what we want when we want and the Bible won't let us ... so let's eliminate the Bible."
" 'We' call you Bibliolaters..."
The use of a pronoun in such a pronouncement deserves an antecedent, don't we think?
Yes, I was curious myself about the juxtaposition of "Anonymous" and "we". Who is "we"?
Wintery: "You deify your interpretation of the text because you think that you are according God more sovereignty or something because he can do impossible contradictory things."
Ah, now that's a different thing entirely, isn't it? Holding to the Bible as inerrant and holding to my own interpretation as inerrant are two different things.
Wintery: "being a flat earther because you think the Bible tells you to believe in a flat earth."
Yeah ... well, I'd just call it foolishness, not "bibliolatry".
But I think you have a key there on the difference between an inerrant Bible and the arrogance of an inerrant interpretation.
I think, also, that the original view is often missed. The claim has been that the texts are inerrant in their original form. Textual criticism tells us that we likely have something more than 95% of the original, but that means that there might be in some 5% someplace a copy error or two ... which doesn't nullify the original claim.
Wintery
Wouldn't another example similar to "flat earth" be the conclusion, after examining scripture on homosexuality, that the Bible condones it.
"The claim is that the message came from God and that God, being inerrant, cannot produce an erroneous message."
God didn't produce the message. He produced *people* who produced the message. And the people God produces are quite demonstrably capable of error. They are quite prone to transmitting God's message with mistakes, misunderstandings, and/or gaps.
A pastor at a church I once attended talked about how he prepared sermons, praying for the Holy Spirit to inspire him and give him the words to say. He wasn't inerrant. The original authors of the Bible were no different.
"Gaius, whose hospitality I and the whole church here enjoy, sends you his greetings. Erastus, who is the city's director of public works, and our brother Quartus send you their greetings." (Romans 16:23.) This is not the God of all Creation transmitting an inerrant message. This is a man writing a letter. The act of calling that man's thoughts God's thoughts is the bibliolatry.
Anonoymous: "The act of calling that man's thoughts God's thoughts is the bibliolatry."
So when the Bible says "All Scripture is breathed out by God", that would be bibliolatry. And any suggestion that God would be either willing or able to superintend the works of certain spokespersons to provide accurate, inerrant texts to transmit His message would be bibliolatry.
I'm asking, though, about the bottom line. Is it that God is not capable or is it that God is not willing? Is it, indeed, that the "the people God produces" who "are quite demonstrably capable of error" override God's ability to transmit accurately the information He intended?
"I'm asking, though, about the bottom line. Is it that God is not capable or is it that God is not willing? Is it, indeed, that the "the people God produces" who "are quite demonstrably capable of error" override God's ability to transmit accurately the information He intended?"
God is *capable*. God's also *capable* of curing everyone in the world of cancer. But he doesn't.
Same with the Bible. God *could*, presumably, have inerrantly superintended everything. But he didn't.
Just like he didn't prevent the original manuscripts from being lost and destroyed. He didn't prevent scribes from making mistakes and deliberate changes to the texts, only revealed hundreds or thousands of years later thanks to modern textual criticism. God didn't safeguard the preaching of priests and pastors who preached to the majority of Christians who were *illiterate* throughout most of human history -- utterly dependent on other humans to transmit the Bible's words to them. And God doesn't prevent people from reaching different conclusions about the words that are there -- hence the thousands of differing Christian denominations, many of which are certain they alone grasp God's inerrant truth.
God's able. But he obviously hasn't been willing.
Anonymous: "God's able. But he obviously hasn't been willing."
Excellent! Straightforward, clear, unambiguous answer. That's nice. Thanks.
You say, "He obviously hasn't been willing." On what do you base that? I mean, for centuries to all who examined the question it has been obvious to them that He was willing and even succeeded. Even today well-educated biblical scholars still conclude that He was both willing and successful. To you the opposite is "obvious". I'm just wondering on what you base that presumption.
(If anything I just wrote here sounds sarcastic or insulting, please rest assured that not one single thing was intended as either.)
On what to I base the presumption? I listed many of those reasons in my last comment. If God were interested in superintending an inerrant text, that fact that the originals are gone and that errors infiltrated the copies implies either that God is incompetent at achieving his purposes, or that establishing an inerrant text was never his intention. I conclude the latter.
The latter explanation also fits the text better. I'm sure you're well-familiar with all the classics -- contradictions between Kings and Chronicles; Jesus saying David ate temple bread in the time of the high priest Abiathar; whether Jesus commanded or forbade his disciples to take a staff on their journeys; etc. In order to uphold inerrancy, you need to develop libraries' worth of elaborate theories to explain away how these texts that *appear* to be mistakes are *really* totally inerrant.
Such defenses of the mistakes in the text remind me of the conspiracy theorists who produce volumes devoted to how, despite all the evidence, insist that the moon landing was actually on a sound stage; or that the earth is 6000 years old; or that the Holocaust never happened.
Instead, I find that the best fit to the evidence is simply this: the texts aren't perfect or consistent. Explanation complete. No volumes of conspiracy-theory intellectual contortion are required. That's what I mean by "obvious."
...but what's not obvious, I expect, is that I don't think this means the Bible is worthless. Just because books contain mistakes, misunderstandings or gaps doesn't make them useless. We learn from and rely on books all our lives without the expectation that they're magically perfect somehow. And the Bible's no different. It doesn't have to be inerrant to be a sincere testament from a people wrestling with God and Gospel. It doesn't have to be inerrant for it to be telling the truth about, say, the Resurrection. It just means we can't *know* that with propositional certainty.
Maybe Bibliolatry is a front for a worship of Certainty.
Okay, there are a couple of gaps here that I'd like to close.
First, the standard claim is that the Bible is inerrant in its original form. This might raise the question, "So, what do we have now?" Scholars tell me that we currently are at about 99% certainty of the texts we have. Therefore, if someone can point out 1% error, it makes no difference to the original claim. Further, none of the significant passages are in question. So I'm back to a Bible with 99% certainty.
Second, if we label the Bible as merely "a sincere testament from a people wrestling with God and Gospel", what do we have? We have no authoritative source. We have no definition. We have no reliable documentation. We have no ground upon which to stand. You choose, as an example, to stand on "the truth about, say, the Resurrection", but you do so merely as a matter of opinion, don't you? You can't cite an authoritative source for it. It came from a couple of guys expressing their opinions about God and the Gospel. So, while you assure me that "I don't think this means the Bible is worthless" (and I take you at your word), it seems to me that it's just a matter of opinion at this point. You believe in the Resurrection and that's fine for you and Pastor John Shuck thinks it's a crock and that's fine for him and no one has any reason to argue otherwise since the Bible is not authoritative. What do you do now?
There is one other issue here. My original premise is that those of us who believe that the Bible is God's Word, not merely some writings of men, do so with the belief that God did it. The accusation is that this is bibliolatry -- a worship of the Bible. So I'm still at a loss. Even if we're wrong (and you're right and there is no authoritative source), I still don't see how we can be called Bible worshipers when we are worshiping God by respecting what we believe He had written. Can you explain that? If my wife writes a love note and I appreciate the note because it is from my wife, I'm not loving the note. I'm loving my wife. I don't see how respecting what God wrote is equated with worshiping what God wrote.
Regarding the "original manuscripts" claim to inerrancy, I agree that what we have is 99% close to those. In fact, that's an important part of why I think the original manuscripts weren't inerrant. I find it more plausible that the original authors included mistakes and inconsistencies, rather than believing all mistakes and inconsistencies are copyist errors.
"Second, if we label the Bible as merely 'a sincere testament from a people wrestling with God and Gospel', what do we have? We have no authoritative source. We have no definition. We have no reliable documentation."
That's right.
"We have no ground upon which to stand."
That's wrong.
Is God real or not? Is his Spirit active in the world or not? Do you have a real, personal relationship with Jesus or not?
The answers to those questions are not dependent on whether they can be authoritatively proven. Many things in life (and most important things, like faith and hope and love) are true without having reliable documentation to show they are true.
The ground upon which you and I stand is Christ Himself, not the words written about Christ.
If your wife writes a love note (or has, say, a florist write it on her behalf) and it includes a mistake, that doesn't undermine your love. You still stand on the solid ground of your actual, real relationship.
Maybe you're insecure that you have a real, actual relationship apart from the words on paper saying you have one? If that's the case, I'm sorry. (And that's trying to be sincere, not snarky.)
"The accusation is that this is bibliolatry -- a worship of the Bible. So I'm still at a loss."
Maybe I can approach it a different way. We know that people can worship just about any created thing. So suppose there were a cult that did worship a book -- not the physical artifact of the book, but the text, the content. How would you expect that cult to behave? What attributes would they ascribe to the text? What attributes would they ascribe to those who wrote the text? If they were faced with errors or diverging copies of their text, what would they do?
I just can't think of anything an actual bibliolater would do that Biblical inerrantists in my experience don't do.
Anonymous: "The ground upon which you and I stand is Christ Himself, not the words written about Christ."
That's high sounding and all, but in what sense is it practical? Does Christ speak to you? If so, is He a bass, a baritone, or a tenor? (You understand the question.) When Christ does speak to you (we both understand that you're not getting a voice here, but a "sense", a "feeling", a "leading", or some such) and He speaks to me and He says opposing things, who's right? (It's not remotely possible that we're both right.) Since it is only this non-existent "voice" upon which we are relying, what's the point of sharing the Gospel, preaching the "Word", defending the "faith", or making any truth claims beyond "That's what I believe"? If I say, "Jesus never rose from the dead", on what grounds could you possibly mount a disagreement since the source documents are not reliable or God-breathed? You can't tell me, "Well, the Bible says ..." because it's merely the opinion of those guys. I like stuff written by some men, but I would never base my argument on what they said. They're just as fallible as I am. What can you base your argument on?
Anonymous: "I just can't think of anything an actual bibliolater would do that Biblical inerrantists in my experience don't do."
In the debate over illegal immigration, there are those who believe that a nation can and should defend its borders and there are those that believe that people of other races shouldn't be here. Both are in favor of the recent Arizona law that enforces immigration law. Both look the same. They are not the same. In the debate over abortion, some evil-minded white males want to keep women in their place and some people want to defend life. Their actions look the same. They are not the same. In the debate about Scripture there are those who might worship the message and those who worship the God of the message and, therefore, value the message on the basis of the author. They are not the same. Similar actions, widely divergent motivations. So in what sense is it rational to accuse someone of "bibliolatry" when their motivation is to worship the God of the message and not the message?
"When Christ does speak to you... and He speaks to me and He says opposing things, who's right?"
You are correct that this is a quandary. You're incorrect that inerrancy would somehow solve it. Shall I list all the wildly divergent Christian denominations that include inerrancy amongst their articles of faith?
No, we can't prove we're right. Then why share the Gospel, preach the Word, spread the faith? Well, presumably, these *are* true, regardless of whether we can prove them. Presumably, God is real, so when we spread the faith, He changes lives for the better. Presumably, where the Holy Spirit works, the fruits of the Spirit increase. That isn't reason enough?
"In the debate over illegal immigration, there are those who believe that a nation can and should defend its borders and there are those that believe that people of other races shouldn't be here. Both are in favor of the recent Arizona law that enforces immigration law. Both look the same. They are not the same."
I do understand the difference. I've been subjected to it before. I was very frustrated, once upon a time, to be accused of homophobia when I was really only interested in defending the traditional Biblical sexual ethic.
So with that experience, yes, I understand how it is frustrating to be accused of bibliolatry when that isn't your motivation. That kind of mislabeling creates an obstacle to engagement.
That said -- "by their fruits you will know them." When people can't distinguish the behavior of a patriot from that of a racist, the patriot should examine what he's doing with his beliefs. And I seriously can't distinguish the behavior of an inerrantist from that of a bibliolator.
Anonymous: "Shall I list all the wildly divergent Christian denominations that include inerrancy amongst their articles of faith?"
Two difficulties here. First, the problem of divergent Christian denominations (and I would contest "wildly" when used in context of "Christian" unless we're willing to concede that anyone who claims the term is a valid "Christian") is not one of an inerrant Bible, but of errant interpretation. Second, the advantage that these divergent denominations have that you do not is that they have a basis on which to diverge. One can say, "It says here that ..." and the other can say, "But this passage says ..." and there is common authority with a differing interpretation. Without that common authority, one can say, "Christ told me it's this ..." and no one at all has the authority or backing to suggest they're wrong. End of discussion.
Anonymous: "Why share the Gospel, preach the Word, spread the faith? Well, presumably, these *are* true, regardless of whether we can prove them."
But ... didn't you just claim that the Word is not "true"? It's just the opinions of some guys that holds no more sway than my own.
Anonymous: "... I was really only interested in defending the traditional Biblical sexual ethic."
This just begs the question. Why? Of what value is "defending the traditional Biblical sexual ethic" if the Bible is simply the opinion of some guys trying to work through these things? It has no authority. What makes "the traditional Biblical sexual ethic" any more right than any other sexual ethic?
The other thing I thought when I read that was this: If you have been subjected to such false accusations, why would you perpetrate the same?
By the way (to no one in particular), I was looking at that David and Abiathar thing and I couldn't figure out what the problem was. The account in 1 Sam. 21 says that David went to a town where Ahimelech was priest. 1 Sam 22 says that Saul ordered the deaths of all the priests in Nob ... "eighty-five persons who wore the linen ephod." One (the only one) who escaped was Abiathar. Ergo, Abiathar was there and was one of the "high priests" (of which there was generally more than one). When Abiathar escaped, he joined up with David (with the ephod -- the possession of the high priest) and was not deposed until Solomon's day. In what sense does this contradict Jesus's statement that David ate the showbread " in the time of Abiathar the high priest"? I mean, this isn't complicated stuff. What's the contradiction?
This is a great discussion, and though I side with the "God breathed" crowd, I find that Anon is seemingly disagreeing in an agreeable manner. That's a good thing. I hope I don't screw that up.
I have often been accused of worshipping the Bible over God, when, as suggested here, adhering to the teachings of the Bible is indeed a means of perpetrating a "proper" worship of Him. Without the Bible, I can't even know who God is or if He even exists. I may believe there is a god which is above everything, but that it would be "God" would be the result of incredible chance.
I don't think Anon would find too many scholars (traditional/conservative/objective/non-Jesus-seminar) that would put forth that there are any "errors" that a worth mention in what passes for "our best" manuscript examples. That is, what can be said to be errors are mostly on par with contemporary typos, bad punctuation (so to speak), spelling, misusing articles ("is" instead of "are" and such), but nothing that disrupts the common understanding of God's Will, or the message that is sent through the various authors, whoever they may be. Also, there are plenty of sites where one can see discussions and explanations for what are often termed "mistakes" or "contradictions" that don't require any of the conspiratorial level mental gymnastics Anon suggests is necessary to resolve them.
I haven't studied the differences between all the various Christian denominations, but largely differences are a matter of minor Biblical points not essential for any Christian (baptizing infants vs. waiting for adulthood vs. baptizing at all for example) and/or matters of polity and organizational things. (In the last 40 years or so we've seen a growth in "progressive" Christian churches which begins to get into whether they are actually "Christian" at all any more.)
Lastly, I have a hard time believing that God would have any trouble getting His message out during a time when He had more direct contact with mankind, either face-to-face as with Moses, any of the many prophets, none of whom transmitted any of God's words "wrong", or those who were handpicked by Christ to go forth into the world, or those who were struck blind by Him after He ascended into Heaven. How can any of these people have recorded any of it "wrong" and not been immediately corrected by God? Why would He make direct contact to correct the errors of His chosen, but allow the recording of His actions, words and mandates be done sloppily? This means that the originals CAN'T have had errors because to think so isn't logical considering His direct contact. Any alleged errors would HAVE to have occurred during copying of the originals, and that possibility has been addressed.
"One can say, "It says here that ..." and the other can say, "But this passage says ..." and there is common authority with a differing interpretation."
Why isn't it settled, then? All such denominations refer to a common authority. That common authority should make it clear who's right and who's wrong, correct?
...unless the common authority has no such power to do so. Figuring out who's right and who's wrong -- even *with respect to* the common authority -- ultimately just ends up being each person's own judgment call in the end, and nobody can claim anything authoritative.
Therefore, I still don't see how an inerrant Bible telling two people opposing things, and a Holy Spirit telling two people opposing things, are different. Each person must still rely on their own discernment. Each situation is still subject to irreconcilable disagreement and schism.
"But ... didn't you just claim that the Word is not "true"?"
1. I was echoing your own phrasing to make it clear what point I was addressing.
2. Jesus is the Word, and He is worthy of being preached.
3. I believe in the truth of many parts of the Bible, just not all of it. Yes, I made the decisions about which parts. But I don't see that as a problem; I see it as no different than an inerrantist making their own human decisions about whether to interpret a text as metaphor, poetry, hyperbole, or as part of a different dispensation, so as to consider it applicable to Christians or not. Interpretation is formalized picking-and-choosing.
...Last -- why did I defend the traditional Biblical sexual ethic? Well, at the time, I was an inerrantist myself. For most of my life I believed in the verbal plenary inspiration of the original manuscripts of Scripture.
And therein is why I feel comfortable calling you a Bibliolater. I believe *I* used to be a Bibliolater. I did not *intend* to be one; but apart from my assertion that I wasn't, nobody would have been able to tell the difference. I suppose I hope the accusation of bibliolatry has some power to rattle you or a reader out of that self-imposed echo chamber I used to inhabit.
...the last word is yours.
Anonymous, my "last word" is really only a question since I have become convinced that I have a reliable Bible breathed by God to human authors and you have become convinced it's not so. You were once an inerrantist. You've operated under the "anonymous" name, but can you at least tell me what it was that caused you to eventually change that position?
How does one like "Anonymous" get saved if the Bible is not completely true. How can one pick and choose what is correct? Lord help me if I'm left on my own to choose correctly. Sorry Anonymous...
Simple, starflyer. You're saved by whatever you feel like is correct ...
Are you so weak that you require something to tell you? Wimp!
(end sarcasm)
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