Boro Nut

When? Where? Which foundry would that be? Look forward to your reply. Can't stop. Must keep my nose to the grindiron as they say.

Boro Nut

ExChristian8

In this arena of assessing the possibilities of an unwrtitten scenario that could harmonize two seemingly different Biblical statements, when do we instead, grant the possibility of one of the authors giving incorrect information? Is it never possible to assume that an author was wrong? This seems to be the only option that an apologist would never permit. Skeptics do not share the same double standard. Skeptics admit that there are passages that do harmonize with one another. Why were the preceeding proposed harmonizations any more probable than a Biblical author being wrong?

Doug Shaver

Fine. Show me an example that proves your point. The example would follow this model.

The XYZ Foundation funds the construction of, say, a public library. The XYZ foundation was established by Joe Megabucks, but he is now deceased. A newspaper story announcing the grand opening says the library was paid for by Joe Megabucks but does not mention the foundation.

The claim I attributed to you was not that I could not doubt but that I had no reason for doubt. I'll take that as a confirmation.

Those harmonies aren't in the Bible. You're having to put them there with all your ad-hoc speculations about how the writers must have really meant B when they wrote A.

Net2004

the money no longer belonged to him :And he threw the pieces of silver into the temple sanctuary and departed; and he went away and hanged himself.

Boro Nut

Actually I remember something very like this quite recently. Some bloke applied for a loan at the bank in return for setting up the bank manager's wife for a divorce case. Having done the deed he felt really guilty, told the bank manager to stick his loan up his arse, went home, and stuck his head in the gas oven.

Later, on hearing his putrifying body had been discovered, the bank manager took out the loan and bought a car, recovered the body, and threw it in the boot.

After an exhaustive inquest, being an honest christian, the coroner duly recorded a verdict of death by RTA.

Boro Nut

Steven Avery

All analogies will have points of agreement and points of difference. The basic outlines of an 'agency' position have all been given above.

Actually again and again I see that the complete picture only arises when all the Bible sources are viewed as a unit. The cases of what you call ad-hoc speculation are few and fascinating, most harmonies are simply integration. In an apologetic/skeptic environment, the amount of time of focus however will be disproportionately on those harmonies with more pizazz.

Shalom,
Steven Avery
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Messianic_Apologetic

Steven Avery

The apologists who see these supposed errors are those who come from a non-inerrancy or weak inerrancy (e.g. "scribal error") position. If one doesn't see these supposed errors then one is by definition an inerrantist. All we are really doing here is refining categories of viewpoint.

Often skeptics do have a double standard and a vested interest. Something in them deeply wants there to be "errors" in the Bible as a way to distance themselves from any concern about its having any true authority.

I'm not sure how you are seeking to apply a probability analysis here. Post facto probability analysis can be fraught with conceptual difficulties.

Shalom,
Steven Avery
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Messianic_Apologetic

Steven Avery

Hi Net... the problem here is that in our common day-to-day stuff, people throwing away money in guilt is a rare occurance. Normally it is simply given away, under a variety of circumstances. In those cases it is often referred to as from the originating source.

Possibly the best discussion of this is Eric Lyons.
http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/569
Who Bought the Potter’s Field?
“Qui facit per alium, facit per se”
(“he who acts through another is deemed in law to do it himself”).

And I realize that some inerrantists come up with involved alternate scenarios (it would be interesting to do a review) however my sense is that Eric's discussion is solid and strong. Though he is what I call a "weak inerrantist" often I find his articles insightful.

Shalom,
Steven Avery

Apikorus

As usual, Steven's source is weak and tendentiously harmonizing, with little in the way of insight or analysis. It works backwards from the presumption that the biblical text, despite being written by different authors with different viewpoints, memories, and storytelling skills, must be globally coherent, and agree with interlocking detail.

The analogy between Pilate and Judas is weak. A political figure such as Pilate had many underlings, so it is reasonable to interpret a statement such as John 19:1, Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged [him], as meaning that Pilate ordered him scourged. However, it is quite another matter when Acts 1:18 says, "Now this man [Judas] purchased a field with the reward of iniquity". Jesus' disciples (as the story goes) were not powerful political figures who could delegate matters to underlings. Indeed, they are generally portrayed as powerless. So when the story says that one of the disciples did something, it would be strange to take this other than at face value. The author of the apologetics piece presumably does not believe that Mat 26:14 really means that Judas delegated someone to go before the chief priests -- Judas did this by himself.

TomboyMom

The main thing about inerrancy arguments is that they are all special pleading. I would love to lock a biblical, koranic and mormon inerrantists in a room and come back 24 hours later. If the biblical text were taken from the koran, the biblical inerrantists would call it a contradiction. If the koranic text were taken from the book of Mormon, the muslic would call it a contradiction. They're all wrong.