The Bible is not Spiritually Infallible

Joe Kelly shares a quote from Marti Steussy explaining why she does not consider the Bible to be spiritually infallible. Here’s part of the quote:

I also do not consider the Bible spiritually infallible, and my reasons are empirical. There has been too much mischief and flat-out evil committed in its name for me to be able to say with a straight face that the Bible provides reliable guidance to anyone who sincerely seeks it. Others might reasonably reply that the problem is not with the Bible but with the depravity of those who interpret it. I might even agree with them, except that if a Bible intended to communicate God’s message to humans is so easily corrupted by human interpretation, what sense does it make to call it infallible? As soon as we qualify infallibility with the requirement of correct interpretation, the game changes: we are not longer talking about the Bible as a simple, reliable source in which anybody can look up the right answers. Instead we are dealing with the competing authority claims of its interpreters.

Marti teaches down the street from me at Christian Theological Seminary.

Here are a couple of other posts from around the biblioblogosphere related to some issues of Biblical interpretation: Dan McClellan discusses monotheism in Deutero-Isaiah; and Doug Chaplin, having read Dale Allison’s recent book, offers a eulogy for the Jesus Seminar.