{"id":8710,"date":"2012-08-02T22:32:37","date_gmt":"2012-08-03T02:32:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/?p=8710"},"modified":"2012-08-02T22:32:37","modified_gmt":"2012-08-03T02:32:37","slug":"eric-reitan-inerrancy-is-only-a-theory-and-inerrantists-arent-evil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2012\/08\/eric-reitan-inerrancy-is-only-a-theory-and-inerrantists-arent-evil.html","title":{"rendered":"Eric Reitan: Inerrancy is Only a Theory, and Inerrantists aren’t Evil"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Eric Reitan has a post on \u201cThat Chick-fil-A Business\u201d<\/a> and it is insightful and relevant to a much broader range of issues. Here is my favorite part:<\/p>\n

[T]here\u2019s a deep disconnect between the motives of many conservative Christians and the character of their actions\u2013a disconnect created, more often than not,\u00a0by an allegiance to an untenable theory about the Bible, a theory about how\u00a0the Bible\u2019s\u00a0words are connected to divine self-disclosure, a theory\u00a0that, as I see it, cannot stand up to any serious engagement with the Bible\u2019s actual content and history.<\/p>\n

But these people aren\u2019t biblical scholars. They often don\u2019t realize they are endorsing a controversial\u00a0theory<\/em>\u00a0about the Bible when they\u00a0equate\u00a0every passage with the\u00a0Word of God. They\u2019ve never seriously considered any alternative view.\u00a0Their\u00a0failure to recognize that they could be wrong in\u00a0their\u00a0<\/em>theory about the Bible isn\u2019t the result of a pride so great they don\u2019t think they are capable of making mistakes on matters as profound as the nature of divine revelation. It\u2019s more a result of\u00a0simply failing to see that there is a controversy here.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s like when you look through a pair of sunglasses at the world, and after awhile you forget that the glasses are there coloring what you see.\u00a0It\u2019s not\u00a0overweaning pride at work. It\u2019s simply the fact that no one has pointed the glasses out to them and invited them to look at the glasses themselves.<\/p>\n

And so, unaware of the controversial character of their theory, they cannot take seriously the idea that the Bible might contain the prejudices of its human authors. Ancient Jewish culture was homophobic. And\u2013big surprise\u2013homophobic ideas come out in a few scattered passages. Is this God\u2019s eternal Word, or is it the filter of human fallibility and small-mindedness manifesting in the Bible\u2019s pages? Can we view this collection of texts\u00a0as sacred, can we lend it deep authority, let it provide the organizing narrative of our lives,\u00a0without<\/em>\u00a0treating it\u00a0as so infallible that we have to follow it even when the neighbors we are called upon to love cry out in despair, crushed by the oppressive application of a few isolated lines of text? Can we judge prophesy by its fruits, as the Bible recommends,\u00a0even in relation to the Bible itself?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The ending of the post is every bit as good:<\/p>\n

The enemy here isn\u2019t these people. It\u2019s the system of belief that has trapped them\u00a0behind walls, walls that block the ability to really hear and appreciate the lived experience of our gay and lesbian neighbors. The biblical invitation to love, to open ourselves up to what lies beyond ourselves, is thwarted by a theory about the Bible that puts so much of what is\u00a0other<\/em>\u00a0beyond the walls.<\/p>\n

What they see within the walls leads them to unwittingly support injustice, to magnify human suffering and alienation without ever seeing that this is the consequence of what they do. From behind the walls, given what they see, it looks like goodness.<\/p>\n

My\u00a0job, then\u2013and the job of those who see what I see\u2013is not to call the owners of Chick-fil-A and those who support them\u00a0evil or hateful or bad. Our job is to help them\u00a0see the walls, and then\u00a0to help hoist them up to look beyond.<\/p>\n

And\u00a0if I\u2019m wrong abou[t] this\u2013if somehow I\u2019m trapped behind walls that I don\u2019t realize are there\u2013then what I ask is that those who think this is true to\u00a0return the favor.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I wonder whether we can get some part of that turned into a poster.<\/p>\n

Click through to read the whole thing<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Eric Reitan has a post on \u201cThat Chick-fil-A Business\u201d and it is insightful and relevant to a much broader range of issues. Here is my favorite part: [T]here\u2019s a deep disconnect between the motives of many conservative Christians and the character of their actions\u2013a disconnect created, more often than not,\u00a0by an allegiance to an untenable […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":136,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,43],"tags":[1140,1174,1779,3120,4563,4745,4746,5154],"class_list":["post-8710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bible","category-inerrancy","tag-bible","tag-bigotry","tag-chick-fil-a","tag-eric-reitan","tag-hermeneutics","tag-homosexuality","tag-homosexuals","tag-inerrancy"],"yoast_head":"\nEric Reitan: Inerrancy is Only a Theory, and Inerrantists aren't Evil<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Eric Reitan has a post on "That Chick-fil-A Business" and it is insightful and relevant to a much broader range of issues. 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