When inerrancy kills faith

Amy, a former missionary who left the faith and became an atheist, tells her story to Jason Boyett.

I didn’t realize how deeply I had rationalized the biblical God’s evil doings until one afternoon when my 7-year-old daughter came to me with a Bible question. My husband and I had given her a youth Bible for Easter when she was 6, and she’s quite precocious; after starting in the gospel of John and losing interest, she decided that she wanted to read from the beginning. I said, “Go ahead!” not expecting her to get very far. I didn’t realize how far she’d gotten until she approached me with Deuteronomy 22:28-29.

“If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, he shall pay her father fifty shekels of silver. He must marry the young woman, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives.”

“What does this mean?” she asked me.

(Yes, my daughter understood the basic concept of sex and rape, though perhaps not in their most gory details, but all that a 7-year-old might know.)

Fortunately (or not) I had a ready answer to such questions—I had several explanations to excuse these sorts of verses, after all, was I not a Bible study leader and evangelist?

  • “This was just supposed to be a deterrent. A man would be less likely to rape a woman if he had to wed and support her.”
  • “This was just for the Jews. They had to follow more serious laws because they were God’s chosen people.”
  • “Christians don’t have to follow these civil laws.”
  • “No other men would have married a woman who was not a virgin. This was a way of making sure she’d be maintained in case she was raped and would be unlikely to marry.”

But, looking at my little daughter right then, I knew none of these was sufficient. There was only one possible answer, the simplest. I took a deep breath and said, “God said that if a man raped a woman, she had to marry him.”

“That’s horrible!” my daughter protested, and I agreed. And I still do. Wrap it however you want, excuse it however you want, but that’s what it boils down to. God made a civil law that said a woman raped was a woman wed.

How odd that it took my child to help me see that. A child sees clearly what an adult can rationalize away. And how evil would it have been of me to rationalize rape to a child?

I struggled with that the rest of the afternoon, remembering all of the places in the Bible where I had excused Elohim’s evil. Sure, you can try to rationalize these things. Of course! When you’re convinced that God is good, you must find a way to deal with these issues that we see as evil. The only answer you’re never allowed is “God is bad.” But we must allow that to be a possible answer if we’re looking for truth.

The God of the Bible calls for genocide, the murder of children and babies, condones the rape of captive women, calls for the stoning of even committed same-sex couples who engage in sexual activity together, and brutally starves thousands who don’t obey Him to His satisfaction.

Once I gave up on the idea of a good deity, the rest fell apart pretty quickly. I began reading Biblical scholars like Bart Ehrman who helped explain the strange discrepancies in the Bible. I had long wondered how Jesus was riding into Jerusalem on a colt or on two animals at the same time, or whether Jairus’ daughter was dead or not when he went to Jesus for her healing. Then it boiled down to the point that the Bible is not inerrant. I had thought it was. I had taught others that it was! However, the Bible has discrepancies and contradictions that I could no longer ignore or rationalize. And not just little ones. Take the death of Christ, for instance. Two of the gospels claim that it happened on different days! Wouldn’t the Bible get the facts of Jesus’ death correct? Isn’t this—and the resurrection—the lynch pin of Christian faith?

The book I thought existed doesn’t. The God I thought existed doesn’t.

And now I no longer labor under the contradictions that I did. And I don’t have to foist them upon my children. And I don’t have to live in fear of the things God will do to help “refine” me in this life, or what might happen to me in an afterlife—Millstone around my neck, anyone? Nope. Because that doesn’t exist either.

I wish she threw the doctrine of inerrancy out, not God. Of course the book fundamental inerrantists talk about doesn’t exist. But by no means does that mean God doesn’t exist either. What an utter tragedy, this story.

Posted by on Apr 10, 2011 | 17 comments
  • http://profiles.google.com/ben.landrum Benjamin Landrum

    The sad thing is that every time I see kids from my church going on missions trips, they say as a group that they take the Bible to be “the inerrant word of God.” I figure two or three from every group will have to go through the same thing that happened above.

  • Stephen Norris

    Interesting.

    So can I ask how this woman should have reasoned in this situation so as to not lose her faith?

    • Jay

      My question too. After leaving conservative Christianity, and studying more progressive Christianity (or whatever label you choose to apply to non-inerrantist/fundamentalist style Christianity), it seemed like an entirely different religion. Not an entirely unattractive religion, but different none the less.

      And if a different religion, why should it be assumed it should be adopted when one leaves the former, fundamentalist, “different” Christianity? Unless the two religions do in fact share the same essence?

      • http://www.arnizachariassen.com/ithinkibelieve Arni Zachariassen

        I do think the two share the same essence. So while they’re different, they are the same in crucial aspects. For me, this makes progressive Christianity a logical place to land when you give up conservative Christianity. At least, that’s what happened to me.
        Have you adopted a more progressive Christianity, Jay, or are you still undecided?

        • Jay

          To this point I have not been able to adopt a more progressive Christian faith, though as I noted, I do not find it unattractive. A rigid doctrine of inerrancy led me to doubt, then reject the tenets of conservative evangelicalism, and I have not found compelling reasons to believe in that part of the religion it might share with progressive Christianity. Though I do attend a more progressive evangelical church (largely for family reasons), with a progressive evangelical pastor who has become a good friend. And obviously keep up with progressive Christian bloggers… :^)

    • http://www.arnizachariassen.com/ithinkibelieve Arni Zachariassen

      Here’s how I go about it: The centre around which my faith revolves is Jesus. It’s because of Jesus that I believe that God is a good God, because he, I believe, showed himself be good in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. So if anyone says that God isn’t good, Jesus contradicts that.
      That includes the Bible. It’s reasonably easy to reject those passages in the Bible that portray God as being evil as simply being wrong and something like human projections serving a political or polemical goal.
      But obviously, this is only possible if you’re not committed to the inerrancy of Scripture.

      This throws up a number of questions of course. Why believe the Bible in some instances and not in others? That requires a longer blog post. But initially, I would say that this move seems to me to be squarely in keeping with the logic of the Christian faith. We don’t believe in the Bible. We believe in Jesus and he is the all-determining central reality.

  • Pgroach

    How would throwing out inerrancy help in this situation? She reasoned from believing in a bad deity to then believing the Bible is errant. To focus on in/errancy is a red-herring.

    • http://www.arnizachariassen.com/ithinkibelieve Arni Zachariassen

      I don’t think so. It was because she thought that the Bible was inerrant that she felt she had to conclude that God was bad. Had she not thought the Bible to be inerrant, chances are she might not have found the OT passages that describe God as bad to be quite as disturbing.

      • Pgroach

        “Once I gave up on the idea of a good deity, the rest fell apart pretty quickly. I began reading Biblical scholars like Bart Ehrman who helped explain the strange discrepancies in the Bible. I had long wondered how Jesus was riding into Jerusalem on a colt or on two animals at the same time, or whether Jairus’ daughter was dead or not when he went to Jesus for her healing. Then it boiled down to the point that the Bible is not inerrant.”

        Maybe I am misunderstanding her, but she says that a) Once I gave up on a good deity, b) the rest fell apart, c) then it boiled down to the Bible isn’t errant. You are reading it c-b-a. Maybe for good reason, but none that I can find in the post.

        Even if your example made the case you want to establish, it is too reductionistic to simply say that “inerrancy killed her faith.”

        • http://www.arnizachariassen.com/ithinkibelieve Arni Zachariassen

          Why did she give up the idea of a good deity? Because her holding to inerrancy required it of her, or at least made her likely to do it. God wrote the Bible, after all, and the Bible says evil things.
          Whatever the case, it would have been much easier for her to give up her inerrancy, simply chalk offensive passages in the OT to less than admirable human beings and get on with being a Christian with slightly modified views about the Bible. No need to give up the entire faith because of such a minor matter as inerrancy.

  • Stephen Norris

    Interesting.

    So what happens when Jesus says something we don’t like, if he’s the centre of our faith in the way you suggest e.g. on divorce, or the last judgment, or even let’s say on love your enemies. Let’s say I live in a part of the world where eye for an eye – strict justice – is the cultural norm, and I find what Jesus says to be deeply offensive and to unravel the entire basis of a given legal system. Why shouldn’t I just reject what he says there or any other given instance?

    My point is that it is sad for that poor woman to have lost her faith over that issue and it is also sad that she and you think rejecting innerrancy would have prevented it. You write enmeshed in your own cultural system of personal preferences and they dominate what you like and don’t like. I realise you say it would take a longer blog post to explain why you accept it in some instances and not others. The reality is that where this happens you a) embed yourself in sectarianism because your reasons for not accepting a certain bit may not not be my reasons and why should I agree with you and vice-versa and who decides anyway(church? which church? indviduals? which individuals?) and b) you undermine the Christ of your faith who said ‘the Scripture cannot be broken’. Except, obviously, it can.

    We don’t believe in the Bible – we believe in Jesus.

    Which Jesus? The Jesus of the Bible? The Jesus of certain parts of the Bible? The Jesus of certain parts of the Gospels or all the Gospels or the Jesus of certain parts of his Torah-shaped worldview or certain parts of this Torah-shaped person?

    • http://www.arnizachariassen.com/ithinkibelieve Arni Zachariassen

      You’re welcome to chalk my opinion in this regard up to personal preference influence by cultural systems, but I think there’s more to it. I don’t think my believing in Jesus (of the Bible) requires me uncritically accept everything that the Bible says as being true and commendable. You seem to think it does. We’ll just have to disagree about that. But I’d really appreciate you taking me a bit seriously. Obviously, you’re just visiting a blog, you don’t know me and so I don’t mean enough to you for you to invest your resources into what I’m saying. But I’d really like for you to extend the courtesy of not writing off my thoughts like that. While I’m aware that regarding the OT accounts of divine violence, for example, as morally reprehensible is something that accords well with what Western society might be likely to say, I really do try to be theologically coherent and honest about this. I really can’t make any sense of the God I see revealed in Jesus if I too have to take some of the OT accounts of who he is and what he does as factual. And since Jesus is the core of my faith, I feel the only option here is to reject the factuality of the OT accounts. Again, I do this because I love Jesus, not because I’m shaped by culture.
      You might be interested in a post I wrote about divine violence in the OT specifically last year: http://www.arnizachariassen.com/ithinkibelieve/?p=1133 Do share your thoughts.

      • Stephen Norris

        My most sincere and genuine apologies if for any minute you thought I was not taking you seriously. I was. I have looked around your blog a bit and you seem like an intelligent guy, but that is not an intelligent position to hold and I think surely some more reflection will show you that. If you don’t take all the OT as factual do you take all the Gospels as factual? If so, why? If not, how do you decide because the Jesus you are left with will depend on which bits you take factually.

        Seriosuly now – if Jesus is the centre of your faith I just want to know which Jesus. The anti-semitic Jesus of the sectarian Johannine community, a la John 8; the Jesus who seems to believe in a literal Adam and Eve (given the refernce to Abel in Matthew 23); the Jesus who tells us to sell all we have and give to the poor, or who tells us about the last judgment and the Father who cast a soul into hell … or whatever. My point is that you are saying you don’t have to take some of the OT accounts as factual because you believe in Jesus – but where does your belief in Jesus come from? I presume: the Bible? If so, how do you decide which bits about Jesus to take literally. Was he really born of a virgin? Did he walk on water? My point here is not that you cannot do whatever you want with the Bible and believe whatever you want to – of course you can – but you will, when you do this, of course simply be like the famous quip someone made about the Quest for the Historical Jesus scholars who looked down a long well and simply saw their own reflection. The Jesus you place at the centre of your faith will, necessarily, be a Jesus of your own making. This is taking your position seriously. If you can show me how you can adopt your position and not have a Jesus of your own making then I would like to know how.

        • http://www.arnizachariassen.com/ithinkibelieve Arni Zachariassen

          I get what you’re saying. And I proceed here with fear and trembling. I try to be as honest as I can with myself about exactly the point you’re raising. But something coincidentally according with our wishes and desires does not mean it is based on them. I must admit that I like God a lot more now that I have a reasonably coherent way of theologically making sense of disturbing OT accounts of his behaviour. But I don’t think I have simply made up a God that I can like. Whatever the case, it’s not a serious critique. Maybe I’m doing this because I’m hopelessly modern, maybe not. That doesn’t in any way determine whether what I say is true or not. If the criterion of truthfulness is that we don’t enjoy holding a proposition as true then we’re all in a lot of trouble. I don’t know about you, but I like Jesus and my liking him has a lot to do with why I’m a Christian.

          You are right, there are a lot of interpretations of who Jesus was and is, but the ones you mention aren’t relevant here. There are two things at the foundation of my reasoning here:
          1. I believe that Jesus was God’s self-revelation. What was revealed only partially before, in the law, the prophets, the history of Israel, was revealed fully in him. I think this a foundational belief in Christianity. That means, I think, that Jesus must be said to be the determinative hermeneutical starting point and principle when looking at everything else, including the Bible. Christocentric interpretations of the OT aren’t anything new – Jesus himself indulged in those.
          2. Whoever Jesus was – whether he was born of a virgin or walked on water, or not – at the centre of everything he did, said and was, lies self-sacrificial love. I don’t think there can be any doubt about that. If we accept that Jesus is God’s full self-revelation, then God, in his essence, must be said to be self-sacrificial love. Love that would rather suffer and die than resort to violence. Love demonstrated on the cross. Again, this is hardly a radical reinterpretation of Christianity, but a thoroughly orthodox, Biblical belief.
          Taking these two points seriously means I simply cannot accept any account of God that portrays him as what can fairly be described as evil. For example, wanting raped women to marry their rapists. Or ordering the “unilateral taking of lives”, to borrow John Piper’s phrase, of both men, women and children. Can you see Jesus proclaiming this from the cross? I can’t. I simply can’t. And so I reject the notion that God decreed these things.

  • Stephen Norris

    p.s. Meant to add: I think there are perfectly sensible ways of understanding the original Deuteronomic injunction which are perfectly in keeping with Christian faith – see the commentaries by Chris Wright and Gordon McConville, for instance.

    SN

  • http://quantumnonlinearity.blogspot.com/ Timothy V Reeves

    Some of my own experience tends to support the general point being made here.

  • http://www.sketchsepahi.com SketchSepahi

    The only problem is that the Bible’s say-so is the only reason to believe in God in the first place, so if the Bible is not inerrantly reliable, then there is no reason to believe in God.

    I had the same experience as a child. My mother believed in God but when I started reading the Bible and told her about what was in it, she refused to believe in for instance demons even though they’re plainly in the Bible. I was appalled by the inconsistency. Why believe in one thing and disbelieve another if the source is the same?

    No, it doesn’t mean God doesn’t exist. It just means that the belief in God’s existence is built upon rationalisation, faulty reasoning, doublethink, and gullibility.

    You could say the Bible is reliable in regards to God’s existence even though it’s completely unreliable regarding everything else, but then you would have to provide independent argument of why we can reliably assert God’s existence. But then if you could provide such argument, then the Bible is redundant as evidence.