Why biblical inconsistencies are irrelevant for spirituality

Philosophy Forums Religion and Spirituality
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Lately Ichthus has entertained us with his exposition of Tim Keller’s book “Reasons for God”, addressing those of us who find spiritual plurality not a problem and telling us that “not all religions can be true”. Also Shotgun has been busy with a number of threads, wanting to show us how to deal with “NCGS” who, he says, constantly “launch” inconsistencies at Christians. I think that these issues really come from the same camp, and yet they are both irrelevant.

You see, spiritual revelation is something that can take place anywhere and in any kind of situations, something which Judaism and Christianity actually both tell us. This means that religious people throughout the world are inspired by something that we cannot explain rationally, and even those who are engaged in discovering what our world and universe are composed of (or how they work) talk of inspiration that doesn’t take place during cognitive processes, but often when they have turned to something completely different. Inspiration is therefore a human experience.

Spiritual literature or scripture is written by human beings, recording spiritual experiences, circumscribing experiences, describing visions or inspirations, insights and ideas. The fact that we are talking about religious experience means that very often something “non-rational” (rather than irrational) is involved. It would be a difficult task for us to say which of these experiences is authentic and which of them are not. Shotgun believes that we can distinguish authenticity by using a presupposition of his liking, but that wouldn’t “prove” anything, since everybody has a vaguely different presupposition that each is trying to promote.

Tim Keller has a problem with the example of the elephant and the blind men, although there is no reason for that since it is only an analogy. The blind men are said to claim that their “corner” is the real description of the elephant, but it could be equally be that the blind men exchange their experiences and find that they are all right. This is in fact the advised course of action – which involves plurality. There is nothing arrogant about the analogy, but rather it gives an example of how we can add to the spiritual knowledge we have collectively.

Where the problem arises is when consistency is claimed and inconsistency stares at you from the text, or when you maintain that religion has to be exclusive and someone must drop out. You see, such claims or insistencies are what cause the problems, which are intending not only to prove that the own tradition is venerable, but that other traditions are disreputable. Often the ball is put into the courts of completely unaware people who are said to be “attacking” Christianity, but in fact it is the other way around. It is only when one blind man says, “I don’t want to feel your part of the elephant, I’m only sticking with my bit!” that we have fundamentalism on our hands.

I also feel that the analogy fits for religion and science too, if we could accept it. Both have something to say about reality as sentient beings experience it, and neither of them have the whole picture (elephant) in view (or at their hands). I feel that a misunderstanding occurs when people start assuming that the Bible is information about God, whereas it is in fact information about Humankind and their religious per- and conceptions of God, but in particular, how these conceptions are betrayed by hypocrisy. Human beings are an hypocritical race, there seems to be no doubt about that, and many traditions show us how our behaviour is the cause of our sufferings.

Any thoughts?

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Hi Bob,

Thank you for the thought provoking post.

You said:

You’re absolutely right. Most theists will argue that it is the word of God; therefore, any description of god therein is information from God, about God.

Your viewpoint eliminates this issue, as I’m sure anybody could agree that humans are fallible, that we are just trying to find our way through experience and putting into words the spiritual experiences we have. Given the age of the text, it is understandable that many people from that era would believe what they do regarding spiritual experience.

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Let me throw this bit in as well.
First of all, I can agree with you very much on this subject, although I brand Ichtus and Shotgun as orthodox calvinist/protestants and not fundamentalists “per forza”.
Shotgun’s idols had postmodernism as their target and just as Plato before them, they went to battle with the idea of pointing the unsustainability of complete relativism. Look at who Shotgun criticizes: Hume, Wittgenstein, Russell, Nietzsche, and his final blow being that their views prevent even their own explorations into anything. If Hume is right then there is no possibility for science. This attempt at “reduction ad absurdum” is exactly what Plato had attempted long ago. But the issue, I think, is notthat research is impossible, but that research can never be final. Science is not religion, in fact, because it has no “revelations”. Einstein can be challenged and overturned in time (as I believe is the case with the speed of light) and systems are changed or revised to accomodate for the BECOMING of the universe. It is this change that is marginalized in orthodox circles.
God, they say, is adequately known…who judges adequacy of revelation is anyone’s guess, but more to the point is that what they want to say is that God is perfectly known. For this to be true, God is beyond all becoming and is beyond reason, in my opinion. If God is perfectly known, secondly, God is no longer God. Anything which is known perfectly stands also before us or below us. Where then do we leave his transcendence? We know God better than we know ourselves (if Freud is correct)? Third problem is that this “adequate” knowledge comes from a Book, a set of scriptures that was compiled by man. We take it on faith that it was put together through divine inspiration but after the studies history and the persecution of heretics and what the heretics believed one has to pause and wonder just how much was the Bible a product of God and how much a product of men. Even Luther, as I pointed to Shotgun, was ready to choose to exclude the book of Revelations, even if it was “divinely inspired” enough to make the canon. The Bible gives other references to the crimes of scribes…what are the books that survive but the work of scribes? It is faith that places our trust that the hand of God guided their pens.
Shotgun has a point in that these are suppositions that are essential to the Christian faith. Without their faith in revelation many Christians would be left with empty discourse…I have said this to you before. But I also recognize that not all Christians are built the same and that you represent such an example of a non-orthodox christian. There are others, most prominent of all Marcus Borg.
But enough of Shotgun.
In Ichthus case you find a close vain because Tim Keller is another presbyterian, if I am correct, like Van Til. He, like Van Til, is a proponent of orthodoxy.
Now I just wanted to touch briefly on the elephant case. Keller rails against the “imperialism” of the proponent of this argument, the arrogance of assuming an unbiased perspective. Now let me tie the two together. We can take all imperialistic perspectives out- let’s do away with the elephant. We are left with legs, tails and who knows what else. We are all blind but yet feel objects we do not understand and have never- remember we are blind- have never seen. I can live with this very realistic perspective, since it preserves God’s greatness and otherness intact without denying the religious experience of what end up being blind men. Of course, orthodox like Keller and Van Til are not appreciative of this and must know because their salvation depends on the right knowledge and creed. I have often said that Calvinism/Lutheranism are the most reasonable statements of faith, but because of this they are also poor faiths that remain above the shoulders instead of reaching down to the hearts.

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Hi d0rkyd00d,

Thanks for the reply. Yes I think it does eliminate the issue. See below for my furthering my point.

Hi Omar,

OK

Something which, I think, even science has come to understand …

This is a point that I would say shows that the elephant analogy could apply to the study of the universe as well …

Yes, I take your point, which is why the God of the OT tells Moses, “Tell them, I AM sent me”, rejecting Moses request for identification and showing that I AM is not a part of all that is “becoming”, but is fully complete and not in our sensory range.

This is very true. I believe that scripture is inspired, but the belief that it is inerrant claims that the bible is God and Jesus into the incarnate bible. It is a belief that first of all has to believe in that before it can go on to believe the content of the bible, and just shows that it is a kind of pious “one-upmanship” that goes beyond the claim that the bible is inspired.

Exactly, which is another thing that believers have to believe, before they actually get to the content.

Yes, I am in agreement with Marcus Borg on a number of issues, although I only discovered him after someone pointed him out to me – it could have even been yourself.

I appreciate what you are saying; I just think that Keller is taking on a hypothetical person whom he is calling arrogant, which is like Shotgun and his hypothetical NCGS. In fact, the whole book “Reason for God” is a bit like shadow-boxing and onlookers must just keep their distance and the whole futility will become apparent. It is when you assume that the fists are aiming at us that a fight occurs, but step back and you will find they are only hitting thin air.

Shalom

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Hi Bob,

Biblical inconsistencies are irrelevant for some people and existentially critical for others. I straddle both camps. It doesn’t bother me that the issues are so vital to some folks. I was once in that camp. Its the attacks and counter-attacks that trouble me.
:violence-pistoldouble: :violence-rambo: But at least we now have some new smilies I can use to symbolize the conflict.

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Hey Felix,

Psychological importance doesn’t speak to logical consistency or warrant.

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Right but logical consistency may not be necessary in a book like the Bible where you have multiple witnesses writing from multiple theological perspectives.

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Necessary for WHAT though Felix?

If you want to learn how to read, then, I suppose the Bible is sufficient.

If you want to read for the pleasure of reading, then it’s sufficient for that as well.

If you’d like to read a famous book just to say you’ve read it…then it’s sufficient for that as well.

Is it sufficient for basing an entire philosophy / theology on?

That’s the question.

Some folks have based their psychological assurance on a great many irrational and frankly stupid things…is the Bible just another stupid book, or is it sufficient for accurately relaying God’s revelation to man?

(That’s a rhetorical question meant to focus the discussion.)

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Hi Shotgun,

I think that you have here hit onto your whole dilemma! The question is whether you have problems whilst doing what you want to do with the bible, not whether there is a problem as such. I see no problem as such, because we can appreciate the bible as a spiritually inspired scripture without taking it literally or saying that it is logically consistent in all things, and clearly, for many it is regarded in this context as a source of divine wisdom and a basis for their lives.

It is only when you want to base “an entire philosophy” upon it that this enterprise falters, because people simply find inconsistencies (and don’t “launch” them) in places that show up literalism as problematic. In fact, the more we know through archaeology, the more we come to appreciate that a great deal of the stories and symbols in the bible are in fact common to many cultures, including the Egyptian, Assyrian and Babylonian cultures, and even some of the Greek philosophies. The bible just isn’t as unique as you are trying to make it, but it does show that its wisdom is to be found to have been revered in many places.

Shalom

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I’ve already said it too many times, but just for emphasis, there is no method of inquiry known to man that provides complete knowing. It doesn’t make any difference if we’re talking religion, science, or philosophy. The idea of any system of thought complete in itself may be the holy grail, but so far, we haven’t found it. Inconsistencies and paradoxes are part of any system of thought.

But this in no way negates spirituality. It does do damage to religion when that thin line between apprehending what is a spiritual experience and the religious explanation are confused - which is often.

The bible is full of wisdom along side all of it’s inconsistencies. No amount of apologetics is going to sweep away those inconsistencies, any more than the wisdom and spiritual insight presented there can be obscured.

The desire for certainty is also futility. It requires a closed system, and the efforts to “prove” a closed system fails. Nothing we know of the universe is “fixed”, and yet time and time again, we find those who want the universe to stand still, to become fixed and all things known. The questions that can be asked are almost infinite, but none make any difference. The spiritual experience just happens, and the words mean nothing.

There are too many who willfully or in ignorance attempt to set up an idol to worship and focus on everything but the experience itself. A spiritual experience just is, but of course, now I’m not being very religious… :unamused:

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I’m in agreement with the general direction of this thread.

The only contradiction that matters is the contradiction that matters to the person holding the belief.

Or to follow the analogy of the thread:
The only part of the elephant that you have felt that is wrong, is the part of the elephant that you don’t like touching.

Ultimately, I believe people are too concerned with religion as an absolute.
Religion tells us more about the person holding the belief than it tells us about anything in the religion.

If I meet someone believing in Calvinism, I am unfortunately going to shy a bit away from their company as they are likely more judging and unrelenting (holding grudges) than people I will enjoy the company of.
Either that, or they will be a very sad person with really low self esteem.

If I meet someone believing in Catholicism, I am likely to not mind hanging around with them; I won’t be able to relate on politics, people, sex, and “the way things are”, but that’s OK; to each their own.
Or they may be highly manic or depressive, in which case, I may not wish to be around them.

If I meet someone that is into Buddhism, Quaker, or LDS, well hell…they can come on in and stay for dinner. I love me some yuppy and hippy religious people.
Or they may be waaaay out there and kind of creep me out.

I was just about to start a thread similar to this that focuses on my perspective: religion is like art.
It’s not really so much about what the art is like, as what the art expresses that counts.

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…necessary for the Bible to be accepted as the sacred text of the Christian church.

If there is an apparent inconsistency say between two verses, why would we necessarily presume we know how to resolve the conflict? Why not just admit that we don’t know?

Historical research has demonstrated that so much is unknown about Jesus, his times, the development of the early church. The more we learn, the more we realize how much is unknown and how much may never be known.

What was it about the early church counsel’s epistemology that led them to believe that they could resolve the metaphysical questions conclusively and then expect everyone to accept their conclusions unconditionally or be excommunicated from the church? I mean look at Christology. They decided on things like whether Christ had a soul or if God the Father occupied his body without a soul. How could they possibly know the answer to these questions? They go way beyond what Jesus taught in simple homilies and parables.

So, since you are interested in epistemology, I would ask you, each time we take an article of the faith that goes beyond what we know scientifically, by what method was that article of faith arrived at? So for example, in the Athanasian creed where it says concerning Christ:

“Who although he be [is] God and Man, yet he is not two, but one Christ;
One, not by conversion of the Godhead into flesh, but by taking assumption of the Manhood into God;
One altogether, not by confusion of Substance [Essence], but by unity of Person.
For as the reasonable soul and flesh is one man, so God and Man is one Christ…”

…how were those facts arrived at and how can we verify that they are true?

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Hi TheStumps,

Now that is one thought that I like. It reminds me a little of Alan Watts saying that human beings are an expression of God who is playing hide and seek in his creation but pops up in in people ever now and again. I think that religion, or in this case the Bible, has in fact very often been effectively treated like Art, and I believe that it is quite legitimate.

Shalom

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Interesting.

I’m about to write a post on why Karl Barth is wishing he had paid up on his fire insurance right about now.

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The only quibble I have with this notion is the practical one; if one asserts that the text is less important than the inspiration one draws from it, then a few problems arise. Suddenly instead of being untrue, all religions can be equally true. And if it’s the epiphany, the insight we get from the study of it, then why not study Lord of the Rings instead? I’m vastly oversimplifying this and somewhat reducing it to absurdity, but I think you can glean my point. There’s a point where inconsistency begins to look like “untruth,” or at least that the work in question is simply a work of fiction. At that point it gets a bit strange to attempt to derive rituals are deduce practices that will lead one to God from it.

But don’t take me entirely wrong- I’m no longer a Bible Literalist. In the past I viewed inconsistencies as serious theological holes, dangerous flaws in the bedrock ideas of Christianity. But my study of the Pentateuch has made me realize it’s written not for the modern, logical mind used to a modern, linear narrative but rather for the audience of the times. Those contradictions wouldn’t have been considered unusual to them. Even things like cause and effect and linear time are things that aren’t always a given in the storytelling of the day.

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Agreed, although perhaps for different reasons that yours.

I don’t think anyone would disagree with what you wrote about spiritual revelation, but it’s a deal that simply doesn’t go anywhere except within a group of people who self-identify as having had one that’s sufficiently similar to the others. Where it came from, how it arose, what’s similar that makes it the Christian versus the Muslim one is more about psychology to a non-theist like me and, no doubt, more like divine intervention to the reveal-ees. I don’t view us as feeling different parts of the same elephant, I view it as two different elephants. The one I’m feeling is identifiable by genus and species; theirs can be anything because its fantastical…maybe its pink and it flies through the clouds. What I find insurmountable in the staunch theistic assertions is that they’re fundamentally anti-intellectual. Because it seems to me that forming the ideas of a religious belief should involve what the intellect is actually about, which is rationality and logic. From the get-go. That means it’s simply wrong IMO to force an intellect to grapple with that which it knows is irrational. The dead rising, the virgin birth. And I’m even pretty much okay with these in terms of what an intellect would’ve been expected to deal with successfully in, say, 50 CE. But 2,000 years later? How do they do it without getting red-faced at least some of the time, I wonder.

It appears that Tim Keller’s blind men are also deaf-mutes. And perhaps anti-social ones at that, lol.

It’s known in my neck of the doctrinal woods as classic dualism. And there are, within non-theistic, so-called ‘religio-philisophical’ doctrines, detailed explanations of this that are thousands of years old, as well.

Perhaps the problem is the incessant grasping at determining ‘the whole picture’ in the first place, at least without the balancing effect of living in the present, and of practicing to better develop one’s ability to directly experience reality. (e.g., through meditation)

Also, I don’t think it’s as simple as science and religion both having something to say about reality. Science, meaning the methods of inquiry and data analysis based upon mathematics and physics, makes the effort to be as objective as possible. Its strength lies in being fundamentally free of anthropocentrism. Meaning, purpose, the ‘why’, aren’t the point. And science isn’t troubled or in conflict with religion. It’s the other way around, because modern science forced theistic religious institutions to leave behind the comfort of relying upon textual literalism as their basis in order to survive. It’s why Judeo-Christian doctrines have turned into a mish-mash and why fundamentalist Islam can only thrive when its adherents live in social structures that resemble the 4th century more than the 21st. The creator, judge and redeemer of the universe implies a personal god, yet science has revealed to us a completely indifferent universe. That’s why atheism and nihilism can be more rationally justified than a supernatural deity these days. The possibility clearly exists that nihility is at the center of it all and there’s no place for gods, Nietzsche’s third stage of history.

I guess that’s okay as a general thesis, but it’s awfully watered down, and perhaps closer to pagan mytholigies than you’re aware (or maybe you are, I don’t know). Watered down to the extent, even, that any engineer worth his/her salt would suggest that a major, MAJOR redesign is in the cards.

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The religious fundamentalist, Bob, is going to tell you that all your argument shows is that scriptural inconsistencies are only irrelevant for those people who are wrong. I.E., let’s take the Hindus. They’re wrong. So any spiritual revelation they actually get is going to be some dimly-felt goobledegook that MIGHT be from God, but even if it is, it’s all screwed up by the bad dogma they interpret it by. This is a very cynical version of about what you’d say happens to all of us, I suppose. So really, who cares if the Hindu Bible says somebody turned into a bird, but they didn’t actually turn into a bird? It’s irrelevant, as you say. If thinking somebody turned into a bird helps them get into a state of inner well-being, then that’s about the best you can hope for. I mean, they’re only Hindus, after all.
But the Zoroastrians, see, they’re actually right. So, for them, it’s super important if the Zoroastrian Bible means ‘10 days’ when it says 10 days, or if means ‘a really long time’ or something else altogether. If one prophet says Zoroaster is living among us, and another prophet says that Zoroaster hasn’t been here yet but will be soon, they better be reconciled, because at least one of them is definitely a false prophet, and we all know what Ahriman does to false prophets in the underworld.
What I’m getting at is, it all depends on how seriously you take your faith. If you’re a Jew because your parents were Jews, but other than that you don’t really give a crap about Yom Kippur or whatever, you’re just how for spiritual warm-fuzzies and spinning the dredel is how you choose to go about it, then sure, who cares about the finer points? BUT, if you actually discover a particular faith through dedication and research, and you’re super convinced that it’s actually true and not just a means to an end, then you might actually get hung up over the minutea of your holy book.
I mean, you read books. You used to be into this Meister Eckhardt guy, yes? Wouldn’t you like to know what he actually said and actually meant by stuff, and if you read something he said that seemed to contradict something else he said, wouldn’t you want to make sense of it? See? So you find inconsistencies in your holy books important, just like a Christian does with the Bible.

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Hi Phaedrus,

The Epiphany doesn’t come with a drum-roll announcing its appearance and bow. The Epiphany is a revelation of truth and has a message for us – besides, do we all get to see the Epiphany or do we mostly read about it?

Perhaps you don’t get the same kind of inspiration from LOTR as you do from the Bible. I don’t, and I am aware that JRR Tolkien was against using his work as an analogy of the world. However, there are definitely symbols and occurrences in LOTR that remind me of issues in our society and time.

I do not really understand why people are worried that “all religions can be equally true”, since it should be liberating to find inspiration wherever you find it. Inspiration that is helpful in your life should be grasped and not shunned because it isn’t the right brand.

I understand you, but do you apply presuppositions, or do you just let the Bible speak for itself? Do you immediately use an exegesis, or do you first of all try to understand what is being said? Do you apply the words immediately to you present day situation (like an oracle) or do you reflect or meditate, or pray on or over the words you have read? The words of the Bible, especially the Gospels, are memories, not a report. They are memories that mean something to people. This has led them to developing rituals in the interest of inducing those memories into their everyday spiritual lives.

One thing that seems apparent is that believers who read the Bible have knelt and prayed in silence, that they have kept themselves humble and unassuming and that they have tried to act on what they have read. This suffices. There is no need to then go on and complicate the issue by announcing that the Bible is literally true, that everything written about really happened and that anyone who doubts that is in for trouble. To me, this second part is as much lack of faith as the first part is a show of faith.

I’m glad to hear that. You have to also think about the use of such stories, which were first of all passed on orally, in that time. It wasn’t a means to record history, but to pass on experiences that furthered people in a holistic manner. They made people whole and gave them a deeper understanding of life or meaning for their lives. They also helped overcome the mistakes we all make by talking about them, even making fun of them, so that all listeners will understand without being the one being ridiculed. Jonah for example, is someone who you can really laugh at – but isn’t there a Jonah in us all?

Shalom

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Hi Ingenium,

… or believe those witnesses that say that they have had a revelation. I agree completely, but that is where religion comes from. There has to be someone who says they have come to understand something and other who listen and believe it. In the long term, someone writes it down – usually someone far removed from the first person. It is then a question whether the scripture (as it then becomes) is authentic enough to capture an audience. I don’t need to discuss whether everybody can identify with it, just whether I can identify with it.

I agree, and if we think about it, psychology originally meant “study of the soul”, and Christians are very interested in the soul … (or so they say). I don’t believe that there is a great deal of difference, taking into account that you are (I believe) more a philosophical Buddhist than a religious one. People who have a similar approach to Christianity as you do to Buddhism would probably agree with you.

Careful, don’t lose your grounding! There are definitely such people, but let us leave them out of the discussion. You can’t identify your elephant by genus and species because, if you remember, you are blind. Even a comparison of the leg of the elephant with a tree or the trunk of the elephant with a snake is problematic (especially if you start talking about tree trunks).

What you are saying is that theistic assertions are not rational but rather based upon emotions and feelings. What you forget, but which is something upon which I depend upon regularly, is that human-beings are not just capable of cognition, but they have an emotional intelligence that assists them in coping with life when cognition fails. This is also an area of life which has importance even when my ability to perceive is intact. This is also the area of archetypes and symbols which gives us comfort and security when we cannot know we are secure. It is too easy to just say I want pure intellect, but then you would have to make sure you are secure and you couldn’t “rest assured”, but would need proof for everything.

My thesis is that the whole of religion is built on both emotion and intellect, but that you have to differentiate when what side of us is being spoken to. There are numerous examples where the intellect isn’t being spoken to, but that doesn’t mean that what is being said isn’t important for our well-being. I agree that we shouldn’t cling to illusions, but we need to differentiate when a symbol is a symbol, and not an illusion. We must differentiate between the meal and the menu or the moon and the finger pointing to it. In this case, it has nothing to do with people “then” believing something that we ridicule today.

Agreed …

Agreed …

I agree, and I have continually pointed this out with reference to the way Jesus behaves according to the Gospels.

But we are agreed, I hope, that the objectiveness of science also has its limits …?

The problem here is that, without laws, the whole universe would crash together and even atoms couldn’t keep up their motion. The same can be said about human-beings, we need some kind of order, whatever it may look like. The developed religionist is able to sense the “Tao” and move with the flow (curiously without intellectual strivings), which I believe is where we are going. Just as we can aim an arrow without working out the trajectory on a piece of paper, so we can “understand” life by intuition and inspiration.

Shalom

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Hi Uccisore,

So the Hindus are “wrong” at the start and all they have produced is “gobbledegook”? Is there no approach to try and discern whether the Hindus do actually have something for the rest of the world? There are Professors and even Christians who would say they do, if we were able to approach it with an open mind. You see, this is an example of Shotguns “presupposition”, which is more highly revered than the content.

Agreed, but then you can go about practising what you believe and developing your brand of authentic spirituality. The way I read Jesus is that he emphatically encourages such behaviour. But what he doesn’t emphatically encourage is to go about telling people that they are wrong. The “Realm of God and His righteousness” are not sought by debate and philosophising, nor by anxiously defending scripture against claims of inconsistencies, but by being confident that “your heavenly Father knows what you have need of”.

I would indeed follow such an inconsistency up, but it wouldn’t break me up to find that the Meister had contradicted himself, but instead I would say that nobody is perfect and perhaps it is me who is missing the point. I wouldn’t regard someone who had pointed out such an inconsistency or contradiction as someone who “launches” contradictions like missiles. I would not blatantly claim that there is no contradiction and that scripture is faultless. Such an attitude reveals the insecurity that Shotgun, representative of others, actually has.

It is this insecurity that is behind all kinds of fundamentalism, including those who promote the inerrancy of science. It is something which I can understand, but it is completely irrelevant to spiritual life – in fact it is damaging for those people who end up infatuated with the idea of a book that fell from heaven.

Shalom