Lydia: "At one point (about 23 minutes in), my name comes up in Dr. Licona's presentation, with a bit of snark about my not being an inerrantist--as, indeed, I am not and have made no secret of not being."
So what's Lydia's concern with Licona, Keener, etc.?
I don't know Lydia personally but I've followed her blog for some time. My understanding of the issue (which could be completely wrong) is that Licona is basically far too free & easy with throwing around the concept of "they're allowed to change the facts since that was the way they wrote" about the gospels. Lydia, as she says, is not an inerrantist but that does not mean she's okay with Mike Lacona spouting off about the gospels being purposefully yet permissively deceitful. Honestly, when Geisler first started criticizing Lacona, I was more sympathetic to Lacona's point of view. But, the more Lacona goes on, the less I sympathize and the less I wish to grant his theories any credence. Lydia, I hope I didn't misrepresent you and please correct anything I have wrong.
Yeah, Licona doesn't want to call it "deceitful," because he has this heavy genre claim that makes the Gospels like movies that have invisibly changed some facts. That's why I have taken his claims about the surrounding culture, etc., so seriously and rebutted them in such detail. If there were such a genre and the Gospels were "in" it, of course it would greatly alter our ability to gain historical information with confidence from the Gospels. It's therefore fortunate that the literary device theorists do not come anywhere close to satisfying the burden of proof for the claim. To be fair to Geisler, I think he saw a lot of this pretty clearly at the beginning, and he didn't even focus as narrowly on the "raising of the saints" passage as people thought that he did.
I don't have any reason at this point to believe that the Gospel authors ever *deliberately* changed a fact, though (in my view) they may have occasionally made a good-faith error. As I've argued elsewhere, this is actually a much *higher* view of Gospel reliability (and is in that sense closer to the inerrantist view) than the idea that they deliberately changed facts.
It has been kind of interesting to see that the old-school inerrantists and I have a pretty good understanding of each other and that they are quite willing to promote my work. I've been extremely honest with them right from the beginning, and I think they appreciate that straightforwardness. Based upon various things that Mike Licona and his friend Kurt Jaros have said, I think this surprises them and (I would venture to say) bothers them. They had assumed, I think, that I would be rejected by their own camp for obvious reasons and avoided in horror by the traditional inerrantist camp because I say outright that I am not an inerrantist, and they are quite surprised that the latter is not happening. Phil Fernandes, a very old-school inerrantist, recently did a long interview with me on these subjects that may be of interest.
Lydia can speak for herself, but I think her general position is that it's preferable to have witnesses who recount events to the best of their recollection, even if they might be mistaken in minor details, to someone who deliberately misrepresents what really happened, and where there's no way to detect the theological embellishments because that's the only record you have–there's nothing to compare it with.
It's amazing to me that anyone would think that a prior commitment to inerrancy is the only possible "beef" one could have with these literary device views.
There are two different ways to see why this is not so. First of all, there is the question of what is at stake. As Steve says, my position is that from an epistemic point of view good faith errors on the part of honest witnesses are far less damaging to reliability than deliberate changes. In a court of law, a witness who made a minor good-faith error and admitted it would be a far more trustworthy witness overall than one who shrugged his shoulders and said, "Yeah, I changed that to make a better story." The latter would not be infallible anyway, so he might *also* make ordinary errors, so you have just introduced an *additional* source of unreliability. But also, the invisible changing of stories is not subject to control except his own subjective idea of what will make a better story or advance his agenda, whereas we have a better idea of how often well-informed, habitually honest witnesses make minor good-faith errors.
Second, it is a sheer matter of evidence and truth. I have *examined the evidence*, and I think there is *no good reason to believe* that the Gospel authors *did* make these types of changes. It is kind of astonishing to me that no one thinks one could examine the evidence for these literary device claims and just find it wanting and think it important to make that known. Can we have only a priori objections? What about the sheer question of whether it's *true* that the Gospel authors engaged in such changes? I have argued at length that the evidence even for the *existence* of such literary devices in the surrounding culture is wanting, that the additional evidence that the Gospel authors did so is wanting, and that there is counterevidence that they would not have deliberately made such changes. The rejection of harmonization in many cases is itself far more strained than traditional harmonizations themselves. (For example, the extreme negative evaluation of two Temple cleansings is unwarranted--a point in which I agree with D. A. Carson, Craig Blomberg, and St. Augustine.)
Lydia: "At one point (about 23 minutes in), my name comes up in Dr. Licona's presentation, with a bit of snark about my not being an inerrantist--as, indeed, I am not and have made no secret of not being."
ReplyDeleteSo what's Lydia's concern with Licona, Keener, etc.?
I don't know Lydia personally but I've followed her blog for some time. My understanding of the issue (which could be completely wrong) is that Licona is basically far too free & easy with throwing around the concept of "they're allowed to change the facts since that was the way they wrote" about the gospels. Lydia, as she says, is not an inerrantist but that does not mean she's okay with Mike Lacona spouting off about the gospels being purposefully yet permissively deceitful. Honestly, when Geisler first started criticizing Lacona, I was more sympathetic to Lacona's point of view. But, the more Lacona goes on, the less I sympathize and the less I wish to grant his theories any credence. Lydia, I hope I didn't misrepresent you and please correct anything I have wrong.
ReplyDeleteYeah, Licona doesn't want to call it "deceitful," because he has this heavy genre claim that makes the Gospels like movies that have invisibly changed some facts. That's why I have taken his claims about the surrounding culture, etc., so seriously and rebutted them in such detail. If there were such a genre and the Gospels were "in" it, of course it would greatly alter our ability to gain historical information with confidence from the Gospels. It's therefore fortunate that the literary device theorists do not come anywhere close to satisfying the burden of proof for the claim. To be fair to Geisler, I think he saw a lot of this pretty clearly at the beginning, and he didn't even focus as narrowly on the "raising of the saints" passage as people thought that he did.
DeleteI don't have any reason at this point to believe that the Gospel authors ever *deliberately* changed a fact, though (in my view) they may have occasionally made a good-faith error. As I've argued elsewhere, this is actually a much *higher* view of Gospel reliability (and is in that sense closer to the inerrantist view) than the idea that they deliberately changed facts.
It has been kind of interesting to see that the old-school inerrantists and I have a pretty good understanding of each other and that they are quite willing to promote my work. I've been extremely honest with them right from the beginning, and I think they appreciate that straightforwardness. Based upon various things that Mike Licona and his friend Kurt Jaros have said, I think this surprises them and (I would venture to say) bothers them. They had assumed, I think, that I would be rejected by their own camp for obvious reasons and avoided in horror by the traditional inerrantist camp because I say outright that I am not an inerrantist, and they are quite surprised that the latter is not happening. Phil Fernandes, a very old-school inerrantist, recently did a long interview with me on these subjects that may be of interest.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GMfDeOY-4M&feature=share
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hrek9fQnx1w
If Lydia doesn't agree with biblical inerrancy then why does it bother her if John changed the time of the cleansing of the Temple?
ReplyDeleteLydia can speak for herself, but I think her general position is that it's preferable to have witnesses who recount events to the best of their recollection, even if they might be mistaken in minor details, to someone who deliberately misrepresents what really happened, and where there's no way to detect the theological embellishments because that's the only record you have–there's nothing to compare it with.
DeleteYup, Steve has it right.
DeleteIt's amazing to me that anyone would think that a prior commitment to inerrancy is the only possible "beef" one could have with these literary device views.
There are two different ways to see why this is not so. First of all, there is the question of what is at stake. As Steve says, my position is that from an epistemic point of view good faith errors on the part of honest witnesses are far less damaging to reliability than deliberate changes. In a court of law, a witness who made a minor good-faith error and admitted it would be a far more trustworthy witness overall than one who shrugged his shoulders and said, "Yeah, I changed that to make a better story." The latter would not be infallible anyway, so he might *also* make ordinary errors, so you have just introduced an *additional* source of unreliability. But also, the invisible changing of stories is not subject to control except his own subjective idea of what will make a better story or advance his agenda, whereas we have a better idea of how often well-informed, habitually honest witnesses make minor good-faith errors.
Second, it is a sheer matter of evidence and truth. I have *examined the evidence*, and I think there is *no good reason to believe* that the Gospel authors *did* make these types of changes. It is kind of astonishing to me that no one thinks one could examine the evidence for these literary device claims and just find it wanting and think it important to make that known. Can we have only a priori objections? What about the sheer question of whether it's *true* that the Gospel authors engaged in such changes? I have argued at length that the evidence even for the *existence* of such literary devices in the surrounding culture is wanting, that the additional evidence that the Gospel authors did so is wanting, and that there is counterevidence that they would not have deliberately made such changes. The rejection of harmonization in many cases is itself far more strained than traditional harmonizations themselves. (For example, the extreme negative evaluation of two Temple cleansings is unwarranted--a point in which I agree with D. A. Carson, Craig Blomberg, and St. Augustine.)