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The Presence of God Qualifying Interpretation
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about inspiration, God gives the human authors inspiring thoughts. But they then mix
those thoughts with their own, and come out with a product that shows God's influence to
varying, unpredictable degrees. In neoorthodoxy, the words of Scripture are a witness to
Christ and to God in Christ. But only indirectly, in the moment of a divine encounter, do
they somehow become the word of God.
And what God (or god) are we talking about? The rise of process theology and
open theism has made us more aware of the fact that questions about the character of God
must be confronted. And if our conceptions of God differ, our assumptions about the
meanings that he generates may also differ. Thus any hope for a scholarly consensus
about the meaning of a particularly text would appear to vanish.
We need also to be aware of the question of the historical veracity of Scripture.
Evangelicals rightly care about maintaining the claim for the reality of the events about
which Scripture testifies. It is of the essence of Christianity that certain events, like the
crucifixion and resurrection of Christ, happened as real events in time and space (1 Cor
15:1-20; in contrast to Bultmann's idea of mythological expression of existential truths, and
some postmodernists' exclusive attention to "story"). One would then like to keep the
discussion of historical veracity open for a wide inspection. The events themselves really
happened, rather than being generated merely as religious feelings among people with the
right kind of subjective faith. Hence, the Bible, as a testimony to the events, must be open
in some sense to inspection by those who do not yet believe.
Failure of the argument from historical objectivity
Despite the attractions of these arguments, I do not think they hold water. Consider
first the concern for the historical reality of the events. The events are indeed real. But it
does not follow that events fraught with stupendous religious significance are equally
accessible to all human beings, regardless of the religious condition of those human beings.
The Bible itself informs us that, ever since the fall of Adam, humanity has been in a state of
rebellion against God. Only through God overcoming human resistance do people come to
him: "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him" (John 6:44).
In particular, if an unbeliever does not acknowledge that the Bible is the word of
God, he does not give its testimony the proper weight, the weight that it deserves in virtue
of the trustworthiness of its Author. Hence, believers and unbelievers will inevitably differ
in their reasoning about the historicity of various events.
Yes, an unbeliever could come to admit that parts of the New Testament are
generally reliable. He could then come to admit that the testimony concerning the
resurrection of Christ carries serious weight. After considering some of the alternative
explanations, he could decide that the resurrection is probable. That in turn might lead to a
serious consideration of the religious claims of Jesus and of the New Testament. In this
sense, the evidence is there for anyone who would care to examine it. And the evidence
can be instrumental in leading to religious faith.
But unbelievers also have many ways of escaping through assumptions about
history and assumptions about the supernatural. If they really want to , they dismiss the
Bible out of hand. There is not going to be consensus about how to evaluate the testimony.
Moreover, even those who may be more sympathetic toward an overall historical
reliability in the New Testament are not treating the evidence fairly. General reliability is