History and miracles

This is a sequel to two previous posts:

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2014/04/boyd-on-inerrancy.html

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2014/04/is-resurrection-more-important-than.html

I'm going to respond to some statements by Nick Peters, both in response to me and other commenters:

Also, in my apologetics endeavors, I am very careful with when I deal with Bible contradictions. I will normally address some for other Christians, but too often many atheists have this idea that "If I find one contradiction in the Bible, I can throw the whole thing out." That's a terrible way of doing history and would require we pretty much scrap all of ancient history. I ask that they just at the start treat the Bible like any other document. Of course, I hope that they would come to see its divine inspiration and Inerrancy, but I am fine with them starting where they are.Yet I do not deny for a moment that resurrection is the more important belief. If Inerrancy is false, well I have to change my view of Scripture, but not my view of who Jesus is or if Christianity is true. If the resurrection is false, my entire worldview is changed. We're not saying to reject Inerrancy. Not at all. We're saying it's not essential and the way you can know what Jesus did can also be done just by historical research. You can treat the Bible like any other historical document and still come to the conclusion that Jesus rose from the dead.If someone wants to come to Jesus and says "I'm convinced Jesus is the God-man who died and rose again, but I'm not sold that Jonah was in the belly of a big fish for the time he was" I'm not going to tell them to wait. They need to come now.

This conflates several issues that need to be distinguished:

i) We need to distinguish between defensive apologetics, and offensive apologetics or personal evangelism. 

In reference to offensive apologetics or personal evangelism, you can't make a direct appeal to the authority of Scripture since the unbeliever rejects the authority of Scripture. For the unbeliever, that's not a given. So the Christian apologist must reason for the authority of Scripture in that context. That's a conclusion rather than a starting-point.

ii) But in defensive apologetics, the Christian apologist can and should take the inspiration of Scripture for granted, since defensive apologetics isn't confined to common ground with the unbeliever, but what Christians believe. 

iii) In principle, a Christian apologist can ask or challenge the unbeliever to grant the inspiration of Scripture for the sake of argument, and explore the consequences of that postulate. 

iv) On a related note, it's necessary to distinguish between apologetic strategy or apologetic method, on the one hand, and Christian theology, on the other hand. 

Even if we think, as a matter of apologetic method or strategy, that we should bracket inspiration and simply treat the Bible like any other historical document, even if we think the inspiration of Scripture is inessential as an apologetic presupposition, it hardly follows that inspiration is essential from the standpoint of Christian theology.

v) Apropos (iv), it is essential to Biblical theism that God is a God who speaks as well as acts. A God who communicates to and through humans. Divine inspiration/revelation is no less important to the Biblical worldview than the Resurrection. Both involve core notions of God's activity in the world.

Likewise, inspiration/inerrancy is arguably indispensable to the distinction between true and false prophecy. And that's a key distinction in Biblical theology.  

A religion in which God raises Christ from the dead, but God doesn't communicate to and through humans (e.g. prophets, apostles) is not the Judeo-Christian faith. 

vi) There are "progressive Christians" who distinguish between inspiration and inerrancy. They hold some diluted view of inspiration which allows for errors in Scripture. Be that as it may, bracketing inspiration in toto, to simply treat the Bible as a historical document, whatever its merits as an apologetic method or strategy, is wholly inadequate unless we can reintroduce inspiration/revelation into Christian theology at a later stage of the apologetic argument.

vii) Merely treating the Bible as a historical document is deceptively simple. For Bible history isn't just a matter of historical events, but miraculous events. In that regard, unbelievers raise one of two objections:

a) Some unbelievers insist that methodological naturalism is essential historiography. Therefore, as a matter of principle, they preemptively discount the record of Scripture when it reports a miracle. 

b) Some unbelievers allow for historical evidence for miracles in theory. However, they maintain that the prior probability of a miracles is so vanishingly small that historical testimony for miracles can never surmount the overwhelming presumption to the contrary. A naturalistic explanation, however improbable, is always more probable than a supernaturalistic explanation. 

Therefore, simply approaching the Bible as a historical document isn't nearly as straightforward as it sounds. That's instantly complicated by these objections. So a Christian apologist who takes that tack will be immediately plunged into a debate over methodological naturalism and/or the probability of miracles. 

viii) Nick hasn't explained how he gets from the Bible as a generally reliable historical source to the Bible as inerrant/inspired.

ix) There are traditional ways of arguing for Scripture that don't just treat the Bible as a historical document. Take the classic argument from prophecy. To be sure, that has its own complications. The apologist must establish the priority and fulfillment of the prophecy. 

But that's an argument that which the Bible as divinely inspired right from the outset–without, however, begging the question. For the apologist proceeds to make a case for prophetic corroboration. 

x) The question of apologetic method/strategy is also distinct from the question of whether Christians need a fallback position, short of inerrancy and short of apostasy, to soften the landing in case they either lose faith in the inerrancy of Scripture or were never convinced in the first place. Even if we agree with that, it's a separate issue from apologetic method/strategy.

xi) Apropos (i), the threat that if I find one mistake in Scripture I will chuck the Christian faith, assumes that there's a viable alternative to the Christian worldview. Many apostates make fairly minimal adjustments to their worldview after they defect from the faith. That's because they are philosophically superficial. They continue to take many things for granted which naturalism is unable to justify. 

Rather than lowering the bar of Christian theology, we should raise the bar of atheism. There are atheists who are more candid and probing about the radically skeptical consequences of atheism (e.g. Hume, Quine, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Dennett, Rosenberg, Benatar, Paul & Patricia Churchland). It would be better to point out that if you jump ship (i.e. Christianity), there's no lifeboat waiting for you to conduct you to safe harbor. Rather, you're diving into the shark-infested waters of nihilism. Conversely, we can turn that into a presuppositional argument for Biblical theism. 

xii) If an unbeliever says he can't take Jonah's fish miracle seriously, instead of giving him a pass, we should question him on why. Does he object to that miracle because he objects to miracles in general, or is there something about that miracle in particular which he finds incredible? If so, what?

xiii) There's the specter of lowballing the unbeliever in Nick's apologetic strategy. Instead of leveling with the unbeliever about what the Christian faith commits him to, we try to get him hooked, then reveal the hidden surcharges after the fact. Is that really preferable to being upfront about the whole package deal? Otherwise, we're guilty of false advertising. 

Should Evangelicals Embrace Historical Criticism?

http://thegospelcoalition.org/themelios/article/should_evangelicals_embrace_historical_criticism_the_hays-ansberry_proposal

In Defense of the Bible

http://thegospelcoalition.org/themelios/review/in_defense_of_the_bible_a_comprehensive_apologetic_for_the_authority

Reviewing Paul & the Faithfulness of God

http://thegospelcoalition.org/themelios/review/paul_and_the_faithfulness_of_god_waters

The Curious Case of Cardinal Cajetan

http://networkedblogs.com/WaFDS

Anscombe on Hume

In her essay on "Hume on Miracles," Elizabeth Anscombe offers a compact critique of Hume's celebrated attack on miracles:

A strong reason for the fame of the Essay, I should judge, is the literary skill, which is greater in the Enquiry than in the Treatise. Literary skill is independent of the soundness in argument or truthfulness in reporting. One of the most agreeable passages in Hume's chapter, for example, is that in which reports an account by Cardinal de Retz of an alleged miracle in Saragossa. 

But if one looks up the passage one has to conclude that Hume was probably relying on his memory to report it, and his memory cooked it up a bit in the interests of his argument. E.g. you would think from Hume's passage that de Retz had questioned the townspeople, whereas all he reports is what the Dean and cantors (elevated by Hume into the greater dignity of canons) told him. The comic effect, from the point of view of pious credulity, of a story of being cured by lamp oil, is taken away by making it "holy oil"; the Cardinal's own caution in committing himself as to whether the people, whom he saw at a day's journey away covering the roads on the way to Saragossa, really were going there to celebrate this miracle–which suggests that he wasn't sure it was not a leg pull on him–is transmuted into his having found that the whole company in town, by their zealous devotion, were thorough believers in the miracle. 

The accusations against Hume's arguments by his critics, which seem sound enough, can be listed quite briefly: 

1. Hume dodges about between different definitions of a miracle as (a) anything contrary to the uniform course of experience, or (ii) a transgression of a law of nature by a particular volition of the Deity or by the interposition of some invisible agent. 

2. The first definition is question begging, as may be seen from his remark: "It is a miracle, that a dead man should come to life; because that has never been observed in any age or country." 

3. Indeed Hume carries the first definition to an extreme point of absurdity: "There must therefore be a uniform experience against every miraculous event, otherwise the event would not merit that appellation." This is self-defeating, as the alleged miraculous event, having possibly happened, would be enough to call its miraculous character in question–since if it had happened, there would not be uniform experience against it; and hence its miraculous character could not be adduced as an argument against it having happened. 

4. Hume's aim is to procure (what has indeed been procured) that the miraculous character of an event shall be sufficient reason to reject the story of its having occurred without investigation of any evidence. This is a strange termination of an argument which starts with the thesis that a wise man proportions his belief to the evidence. 

5. Hume misdescribes the role of testimony in human knowledge. "The reason," he says," "why we place any credit in witnesses and historians, is not derived from any connexion, which we perceive a priori, between testimony and reality, but because we are accustomed to find a conformity between them. But when the fact attested is such a one as has seldom fallen under our observation, here is a context of two opposite experiences." 

Well, I have not merely not often, but never, experienced an earthquake; yet there is no conflict, no principle of experience which in this case gives me a "degree of assurance against the fact" that witnesses to earthquakes endeavor to establish. 

6. On the point of consistency with his own philosophy, there cold hardly be a defense. Hume is so clear that no amount of uniformity of experience can possibly be a rational ground, or evidence, let alone proof, that the like must happen in a similar case, that it really looks as if his tongue were in his cheek when he says that the occurrence of a miracle is disproved just by the fact of its being a violation of the laws of nature; that it is ruled out as an impossible event. In the very next chapter but one he repeats his constant position that, reasoning a priori, we must grant that anything may produce anything. "The falling of a pebble may, for aught we know, extinguish the sun." and yet in his chapter we get him saying "The raising of a house or ship into the air is a visible miracle. The raising of a feather, when the wind wants ever so little of force requisite for that purpose, is as real a miracle, though not so sensible with regard to us" In short for purposes of this chapter he is adopting the mechanistic determinism–the picture of nature bound fast in fate by inviolable laws–which belong not to Hume's conceptions but to those of his century–the effect of Newtonian science (?). His own view is: 

That there is nothing in any object, considered in itself, which can afford us a reason for drawing a conclusion beyond it; and That even after the observation of a frequent or constant conjunction of objects, we have no reason to draw any inference concerning any object beyond those of which we have had experience; I say, let men be once fully convinced of these two principles, and this will throw them so loose from all common systems, that they will make no difficulty of receiving any, which may appear the most extraordinary. 

The essay is brilliant propaganda…The argument for Hume's account of causality, that this is just the avoidable way we do think, is as silly if addressed to believers in miracles as the proof of God from universal consent addressed to atheists. 

G. E. M. Anscome, Faith in a Hard Ground (Imprint Academic 2008), chap. 4.

Blomberg on modern miracles

Keener has also compiled a catalog of some of the most verified miracles throughout Christian history, indicating the strict criteria that they must meet, so that he has probably eliminated many genuine miracles from consideration in so doing.  

My own experience is more limited than some, but my family and I have had firsthand, personal exposure to or involvement with several experiences for which science has no explanation but that fit Christian faith hand in glove. My aunt who passed away at the age of 88 in 1993 had a multiply-fractured ankle poorly reset in her thirties and experienced so much pain that by her late sixties she was on constant, heavy medication. One evening just before midnight, following the instructions of a preacher on a television show she as watching, she prayed for healing for her ankle and went to bed. The next morning the pain was gone, and she lived another twenty years without its recurrence and without ever taking another pain pill for that particular problem. 

As an elder in a local church, I regularly participated in prayers for healing in which we anointed people with oil according to the instructions in Jas 5:13-18. On two occasions, patients with previously diagnosed cancerous tumors went to their doctors shortly afterward, and the medical experts could find no trace of any tumors ever having existed. 

My wife, during her nurse's training at a teaching hospital one evening, watched a team of emergency personnel rush into a room in which she was trying unsucessessfully to make an elderly heart patient comfortable. The head nurse commended by wife for having come to get her, even though she had left her patient unattended in so doing, and confirmed that the patient was indeed having a heart attack. My wife replied that she had never left the room. Later the two women searched the floor, asking everyone they could if anyone resembling my wife had been on the wing, and the answer was uniformly negative. Given that she had fiery red, curly hair, there could not have been many such individuals, and even if such a look-alike had been on the floor, she would have had no reason to tell the head nurse that the patient my wife was attending in that room had suffered a heart attack. 

A few years ago before my mother moved out of the house she had lived in for over fifty years and into a retirement community, she was starting to go out her back door and walk to the alley behind her garage one cold winter's day, to put out garbage for the trash collector. Unlike any experience she had ever had in her life, and although she was entirely alone in her house, she heard an audible voice telling her, "Take your cane." Startled, but assuming it was God, she grabbed her cane. Just before closing the backdoor behind her, she heard the voice again say, "Now take your cell phone." Again, nothing like this had ever happened to her before, nor has it happened since. As she was walking on the sidewalk through the backyard, she realized that there was a think layer of ice she hadn't seen from the house, and the cane became quite important to keep her from falling. After emptying the trash, she realized that she was poised precariously between larger sections of snow and ice, so that she didn't want to try to navigate the walk even with the cane. So she used her phone to call for help and was able to get back to the house with assistance. My mother acknowledged that she would have been quite frightened otherwise,  having recently had knee surgery, if she had tried to get back on her own, and she felt sure there was a good chance she would have fallen. 

Once a friend and former student contacted me, told me she had dreamed that I had a particular affliction, and accurately described a recently injury I had experienced.  

I could add even more astonishing examples, but I have not sought their permission to tell their stories. Several, I know, would not want attention drawn to themselves.  

Craig Blomberg, Can We Still Believe the Bible? (Brazos Press 2014), chap. 6. 

Dog-eat-dog world

There are lots of dystopian movies and TV shows. And current subgenre is the zombie flick. But many dystopian movies and TV shows don't feature zombies. Examples include Gibson's Max Max series, Jericho, The Book of Eli, and Revolution.

Some dystopian films have a political agenda. During the Cold War, you had movies promoting unilateral nuclear disarmament (On the Beach; The Day After). Others have an environmentalist agenda (Soylent Green; The Day After Tomorrow). 

In these films, with the destruction of civil authority, human society reverts to barbarity. You have roving rape gangs. Cannibals. Brutal, dictatorial city-states. 

Some survivalists promote the gold standard, on the theory that in the event of gov't collapse, gold will become the fallback currency. But in a post-apocalyptic scenario, many things will be far more valuable than gold, viz. guns, bullets, batteries, gasoline, medicine, flashlights, lighters, pocket knives, chainsaws, solar chargers, drinking water, canned goods, women of childbearing age.

One question we might ask is what are some of the more realistic causes of a post-apocalyptic world? Likewise, what would be the greatest threats in a post-apocalyptic world? 

One looming concern is whether, in the not-so-distant future, pandemics will return because the overuse of antibiotics (and antivirals) led to resistant strains. A post-antibiotic world which reverts to a pre-antibiotic world. Antibiotics are also essential in surgery to stave off infection. 

Another possibility is that when scientists clone fossilized organic matter, that will accidentally release an ancient pathogen for which modern-day humans have no resistance.

Like theories about how the vastly outnumbered Conquistadors were able defeat Mesoamerican warrior cultures. Was it due to their exposure to European diseases? 

Suppose most of the human race was wiped out by one of these pandemics, leaving scattered survivors. What would pose the greatest threat to survivors? In movies and TV shows, it's usually desperate fellow humans. 

But here's a neglected threat: dogs. Of course, a percentage of dogs would starve to death because they can't escape the house or fenced yard after their owners die. But other dogs would be on the loose. Without owners, they'd form packs and revert to their wolfish instincts. Big dogs would eat little dogs (as well as cats). Tough dogs would kill sweet dogs. Bad news for Golden Retrievers. 

You'd end up with roving packs of pit bulls, Dobermans, German Shepherds, Malinois, Tosas, Presas, Rottweilers, Irish Wolfhounds, &c. And humans would be on the menu. 

Handguns and rifles might be inadequate, since you might be unable to get off enough shots to drop a vicious dog pack. You'd need a submachine gun. 

Raining on Bart Ehrman’s Easter parade

http://www.worldmag.com/2014/04/raining_on_bart_ehrman_s_easter_parade

The temptation of Christ

The high Calvinist doctrine of God's sovereignty including evil as part of God's plan, purpose, and determining power blatantly contradicts Scripture passages…[God] never tempts anyone (James 1:13). To be sure, Calvinists have clever but unconvincing explanations of these and numerous other passages of Scripture. R. Olson, Against Calvinism, 98-99. 

Let's compare Jas 1:13 to another passage:

Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil (Mt 4:1). 

In this passage, Satan is the actual tempter. Yet his role is instrumental. Jesus is led by the Spirit of God in order to undergo temptation. So, indirectly, God is behind the temptation, as a part of his "plan and purpose." 

The historicity of Jonah

Donald J. Wiseman and T. Desmond Alexander both wrote good articles on Jonah, which are currently available for free.

Go here:

http://www.tyndale.cam.ac.uk/index.php?page=frame&add=http://www.tyndalehouse.com/TynBul/Library/00_TyndaleBulletin_ByDate.htm

Click on 1979 and 1985 respectively.

Scroll down and download their articles.

The Messiah of Mott Street

Edward G. Robinson was a popular character actor who played a number of memorable roles. He was a Jewish emigre from Romania. Years ago I read his autobiography. It was a bit of a let-down. Oftentimes, an actor's real life is less interesting than his fictional onscreen lives. 

During the Prohibition era, Robinson became famous playing gangsters. Most notably Little Caesar. He later had a role in the film noire classic Double Indemnity. He had great role in the Bogie and Becall classic, Key Largo, and another great role as the wily gambler in The Cincinnate Kid, which had a wonderful ensemble cast, including Karl Malden, Steve McQueen, and Joan Blondell. Sci-fi buffs remember him from his swan song performance in Soylent Green.  

As a kid, I remember watching him in the little remembered made-for-TV film The Old Man Who Cried Wolf, in which he played an aging shop-keeper who witnessed the murder of his best friend. He reports it to the police, but they dismiss him as a crazy old man. His son has the same reaction. Everyone assumes it's the paranoid delusions of a old man who's losing his mind. 

Unfortunately, many of the elderly are treated like patients in a mental ward. No one takes them seriously. He conducts his own investigation, which makes himself a target. When he, too, is murdered, his son belatedly realizes that his dad was not imagining things. 

I also remember him from a classic episode of Night Gallery: "The Messiah of Mott Street". He plays a dying Jew (Abraham Goldman). He's not ready to die because he's caring for his 9-year-old grandson. He's behind on the rent and a social worker is threatening to take his grandson away.

But he's an observant Jew, and he's pinning his hopes on the Messiah coming to his aid. Of course, the adults dismiss this as wishful thinking. Possibly delirium, due to his deteriorating condition. But his grandson believes him. It's Christmas Eve, and his grandson goes outside, searching for the Messiah on the snowy streets and sidewalks. Inside, a spectral figure overshadows Goldman. Is it the angel of death? 

Goldman is miraculously healed, and a check arrives in the mail. The Messiah did come after all, but the adults didn't recognize him, except for Goldman and his grandson. 

This presumably plays on the traditional motif that only the faithful, or children, have eyes to perceive the ways of God. 

The story combines Christian themes (Christmas) with Jewish themes (the Messiah). It's a touching drama, in a sentimental way. And it's anchored by Robinson's performance. 

Rod Serling wrote the teleplay. Like Robinson, Serling was nominally Jewish. 

This is how we'd like stories to end, but in real life they rarely end that way. Some Jews have given up waiting for the Messiah. They lost hope. Ironically, they are waiting for a Messiah who never comes because he already came. They are too late for his first advent, but too early for his second advent. Like missing connections at the airport because you expect your passenger to arrive on the wrong flight. He came and went before you arrived. 

This Easter, and every Easter, we celebrate the Messiah who did come, and who is coming again. Coming for his people. And he can come again because he's a living Messiah. The Risen Son of God Incarnate. 

The Monsters On Maple Street

Let's spend a little more time on the parallel between MacArthurites and secular debunkers. As I've documented in the past, MacArthurites resort identical arguments. I'll give back-to-back examples at the end of this post. Unfortunately, the MacArthurites are matching the atheists move for move.

Before discussing that, let's back up a step. In my experience, MacArthurites are so transfixed by errors and abuses in the charismatic movement that that fills their view screen. They are oblivious to the danger which they themselves are fostering in their overreaction to the charismatic movement.  

Their attitude reminds me of the classic Twilight Zone episode ("The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street") in which alien invaders successfully deflect attention from the real threat by making neighbors turn on each other in a self-destructive witch hunt. 

Secular debunkers deploy these arguments to discredit miracles in general. MacArthurites ape the same arguments to discredit postapostolic charismatic miracles in particular. The obvious problem is arbitrarily restricting the force of their arguments to all and only postapostolic charismatic miracles. They act as if their arguments, like smart bombs, will only target just those reported miracles which happen to conflict with cessationism, why allowing biblical miracles, and the subset of postapostolic miracles consistent with cessationism, to escape unscathed. 

Unfortunately, MacArthurites are conditioning Christians who've imbibed their brand of cessationism to commit apostasy if they ever encounter atheists who use the very same arguments to discredit biblical miracles. Imagine teenagers who attend Grace Community Church (or students to attend the Master's College or Master's Seminary). Teenagers (or students) who've dutifully mastered the objections to modern charismatic miracles offered by MacArthurites like Fred Butler, Ed Dingess, Lyndon Unger, et al. 

Imagine, when surfing the web, they are suddenly exposed to atheists who use the identical arguments to discredit biblical miracles? Not only have MacArthurites left them defenseless against this line of attack, MacArthurites have predisposed them to lose their faith on contact the moment they encounter direct, parallel arguments against the miracles of Scripture. The proverbial accident waiting to happen. Instant apostates: just add water. 

MacArthurites are giving atheists a huge opening to begin picking off Christians. Of course, that's not their intention. But when they are warned, they angrily denounce the warning. Obviously, MacArthurites aren't equipping Christians on how to field this challenge, for they don't even acknowledge the problem they've nurtured. The MacArthurite is safe so long as he remains in his freeze-dried condition, sealed in a waterproof container. 

Mind you, MacArthurites who turn to someone like Mennoknight for intellectual leadership are going to be pretty impervious to arguments one way or the other. Keener's two-volume monograph on miracles is no match for Unger's muppet show. Who wants to slog through Keener when you can watch Unger don a propeller-cap and make animal balloons. Adult preschool for readers who've been held back 12 grades. 

My concern is for smart young MacArthurites whose one-sided indoctrination leaves them vulnerable. It's a lot easier to protect something from breakage than to wait until it breaks, then try to fix it. That's often too late. The damage is irreparable. If you wait until kids raised on MacArthurite cessation lose their faith when they discover atheistic counterparts, you waited too long. 

Now, perhaps a MacArthurite would respond by saying, "Well, the same arguments don't apply to Biblical miracles because Biblical testimony is special." Indeed, I've read MacArthurites who do respond in that vein. Problem is, that reflects a failure on their part to understand cessationism, even though that's their own position. 

In cessationism, the Bible doesn't start out special. That's the conclusion of a multi-staged argument. In cessationism, the Bible is in the same initial position as the Koran, the Book of Mormon, Swedenborg's Arcana Cœlestia, &c. In cessationism, Isaiah starts out in the same position as Oral Roberts. 

At this preliminary stage of the cessationist case, the Bible is simply one of several rival revelatory claimants. Out of the starting gate, it has no lead over the competition

In the cessationist argument, what makes the Bible special is the argument from miracles. Apostles and prophets preform miracles which validate their divine commission. "Sign-gifts."

However, there's a complication. The source of this information comes from the Bible itself. The Bible attributes miracles to OT prophets and NT apostles. But unless the Bible is special, it is viciously circular to cite reported miracles in Scripture to furnish miraculous confirmation for the reporters. At this preliminary stage of the cessationist argument, we have yet to establish that Biblical testimony is special.  

At this preliminary stage, the argument from miracles must, in turn, fall back on the general reliability of testimonial evidence. But unfortunately, the cessationist must impugn the general reliability of testimonial evidence to discredit any and all reported miracles which conflict with cessationism. They have to say testimonial evidence is only trustworthy when it just so happens to coincide with reported miracles consistent with cessationism. Whenever it bears witness to miracles inconsistent with cessationism, it suddenly becomes totally unreliable. MacArthurites need to explain how their procedure isn't an egregious case of special pleading. 

MacArthurites attack charismatics for compromising the sufficiency of Scripture, and some charismatics are guilty, but MacArthurites are so mesmerized by the dangers of the charismatic movement that they can't take their eyes off that long enough to reflect on the internal tensions in their own position. In cessationism, Scripture is insufficient. In cessationism, Scripture does not stand on its own. Rather, Scripture occupies the second floor, which rests on the first floor of miraculous attestation, which rests on the foundation of testimonial evidence. 

i) Now, there are alternative ways of defending Scripture. In principle, you could mount a presuppositional argument for Scripture. However, the presuppositional authority of Scripture is inconsistent with cessationism. Although a presuppositional argument could incorporate some of the same elements (e.g. argument from miracles, testimonial evidence), they will be rearranged. For instance, the argument from miracles lacks the foundational role in presuppositionalism that it occupies in cessationism. 

An argument for the presuppositional authority of Scripture would discuss how biblical creation and providence are necessary to underwrite memory and sense knowledge, as well as the possibility of miracles. It begins with Biblical theism, as a precondition for testimony and miracles. God is the metaphysical starting-point, but at the level of epistemology, one can reason from miracles to God.

a) The order of being: God>miracles

b) The order of knowing: miracles>God 

ii) In principle, you could also appeal to postapostolic Christian miracles to furnish collaborative evidence. But that poses a dilemma for cessationism, since it must reject the general reliability of testimony (see above). 

Let's now sample some parallel arguments by atheists and MacArthurites:

If God existed, there'd be no need to prove it

Something as significant in the universe as God could hardly be overlooked.  The ultimate creator of the universe and a being with infinite knowledge, power, and love would not escape our attention, particularly since humans have devoted such staggering amounts of energy to the question for so many centuries.   Perhaps more importantly, a being such as God, if he chose, could certainly make his existence manifest to us.  Creating a state of affairs where his existence would be obvious, justified, or reasonable to us, or at least more obvious to more of us than it is currently, would be a trivial matter for an all-powerful being. So since our efforts have not yielded what we would expect to find if there were a God, then the most plausible explanation is that there is no God.

http://www.iep.utm.edu/atheism/#SH4f

 

If continuationism were true, there'd be no need to prove it

Dan Phillips January 23, 2014 at 10:43 am #Once again: it doesn’t matter how strong Storms’ arguments are. It’s TOO LATE to establish the “continuationist” position by argument. If the position were true, there would be no argument.

http://www.dennyburk.com/friendly-fire-tom-schreiner-and-sam-storms-debate-cessationism/#comment-130232

Atheists on ETs

These are just some of the reasons why we cannot trust extraordinary reports from that time without excellent evidence, which we do not have in the case of the physical resurrection of Jesus. What about alien bodies recovered from a crashed flying saucer in Roswell, New Mexico? Many people sincerely believe that legend today, yet this is the modern age, with ample evidence against it in print that is easily accessible to anyone, and this legend began only thirty years after the event. 

http://infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/resurrection/lecture.html

In Matthew, the women “suddenly” see Jesus. He says the disciples will see him in Galilee, and it does not sound as if he will be walking. In Luke, he disappears before the eyes of the disciples he met on the road to Emmaus. In John, he appears out of nowhere in a house whose doors have been shut against the Jews.
All of this is suggestive of hallucinations. There is one other point that should be made, which comes from Robert Sheaffer, who has writ- ten many magazine articles and one book on UFO reports. He has also written a book on the origins of Christianity called The Making of the Messiah. It gets off track in relying heavily on anti-Christian polemic from the second century and later (does Sheaffer imagine such works can be treated as contemporary debunkings?), but his comments on the similarity between UFO reports and the resurrection appearances are worth listening to. 

C. Hallquist, UFOs, Ghosts, and a Rising God: Debunking the Resurrection of Jesus, 109.

MacArthurites on ETs

Fred Butler @Fred_Butler1hPls explain how the hysterical claims of UFO activity in this video http://bit.ly/1g2LvoY  differ frm those regarding modern miracles. 

I had twittered out a link to a documentary trailer on UFOs in which wide-eyed enthusiasts passionately testify to the overwhelming evidence that extraterrestrial vehicles dominate our skies. How can thousands of eye-witnesses be wrong? Well, of course they can’t be; the evidence is just too powerful. 

I merely noted that the eye-witnesses to UFO activity are just as confident and absolute certain that UFOs exist (because they saw them) as Pentecostal/charismatics are certain modern day miracles happen (because they saw them). Watch that video. Switch the word “UFO” with “miracle” or “healing” and the testimonies are so similar it’s uncanny. 

http://hipandthigh.wordpress.com/2013/12/09/ufo-continuationism/

Atheists on amputees

So what should happen if we pray to God to restore amputated limbs? Clearly, if God is real, limbs should regenerate through prayer. In reality, they do not. 

Why not? Because God is imaginary. Notice that there is zero ambiguity in this situation. There is only one way for a limb to regenerate through prayer: God must exist and God must answer prayers. What we find is that whenever we create a unambiguous situation like this and look at the results of prayer, prayer never works. God never "answers prayers" if there is no possibility of coincidence 

http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/important.htm

MacArthurites on amputees

When people were healed, it was an undeniable, extraordinary work of the Spirit healing an individual (Acts 4:16). Something the “Amazing” Randi could not deny. Think Iraqi war veterans getting their limbs back completely whole or the late Christopher Reeves having his spinal cord injury reversed. 

https://hipandthigh.wordpress.com/2013/08/16/hunting-benny-hinn/

It is nice to hear about a person having her hip pain taken away and his flu-like symptoms disappearing, but those miraculous healings, even if they are occasionally supernatural healings (and I am not saying they aren’t) are no where near the kind of supernatural healings recorded in the Bible. I want to see people with the gift of healing going into burn wards, veteran’s hospitals with soldiers who have lost limbs, and hospitals that specialize with spinal cord injuries.  

 http://hipandthigh.wordpress.com/2013/10/24/my-concerns-with-bloggers-concerned-about-strange-fire/

[ Ed Dingess] Name one that is biblical. To claim that false healings and miracles and gibberish are the works of the Holy Spirit is a dangerous practice. That is MacArthur's point. Produce one person that has been healed of congenial blindness, one amputee who's limb has grown back, one legitimate resurrection...just one. Show me someone who speaks in the tongues Luke describes in Acts 2...just one.  

http://thegospelcoalition.org/book-reviews/review/strange_fire#comment-1100570585 

Atheists on cancer

Also, he [God] could say, "Folks, I'm going to do you a favor: make you immune to cancer," where from that day on no cancers are observed in anyone. It would put the oncologists out of business, but it would please everyone else, but more importantly: it would provide excellent evidence that God exists.  

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/theodore_drange/drange-interview.html

Someone tells us that God loves us as a father loves his children. We are reassured. But then we see a child dying of inoperable cancer of the throat. His earthly father is driven frantic in his efforts to help, but his Heavenly Father reveals no obvious sign of concern. Some qualification is made -- God's love is "not a merely human love" or it is "an inscrutable love," perhaps -- and we realise that such sufferings are quite compatible with the truth of the assertion that "God loves us as a father (but, of course, ...)." We are reassured again. But then perhaps we ask: what is this assurance of God's (appropriately qualified) love worth, what is this apparent guarantee really a guarantee against? Just what would have to happen not merely (morally and wrongly) to tempt but also (logically and rightly) to entitle us to say "God does not love us" or even "God does not exist"? I therefore put to the succeeding symposiasts the simple central questions, "What would have to occur or to have occurred to constitute for you a disproof of the love of, or of the existence of, God?"  

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/antony_flew/theologyandfalsification.html

MacArthurites on cancer

All of that to say, if contiuationists are correct that signs and wonders are a part of the normal Christian experience and they are happening with regularity among God’s people, then there should be gifted individuals who should do extraordinary signs and wonders with their laying on of hands.  Their ministry should be public — I would suggest a children’s cancer hospital or special ministries department at a local church.  And their ministry should be witnessed by believers and unbelievers alike and those signs and wonders should be both undeniable and verifiable.  

http://hipandthigh.wordpress.com/2013/07/08/the-continuationists-signs-and-wonders-problem/

Continuationists would easily smash the cessationist position if any one of the thousands of people who claim to have the spiritual gift of healing would simply clean out a cancer ward on camera with verification by medical staff (and Jesus did this repeatedly – Matthew 4:24, 8:16; Luke 4:40), but the fact that nobody ever tries to attempt this is suggestive.  

http://mennoknight.wordpress.com/2013/03/27/cessationism-and-continuationism-and-strange-fire-oh-my-part-1/

Atheists on biased sources

We have many of Caesar's enemies, including Cicero, a contemporary of the event, reporting the crossing of the Rubicon, whereas we have no hostile or even neutral records of the resurrection until over a hundred years after the event, which is fifty years after the Christians' own claims had been widely spread around.  

http://infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/resurrection/lecture.html

MacArthurites on biased sources

I would even add, verified by unbelievers who knew the person before he or she was healed and now know of the person’s healing. 

http://hipandthigh.wordpress.com/2013/10/29/the-resurrection-schtick/

Atheists on secondhand testimony

[Lessing] Miracles, which I see with my own eyes, and which I have the opportunity to verify for myself, are one thing; miracles, of which I know only from history that others say they have seen them and verified them, are another. 
I live in the eighteenth century, in which miracles no longer happen.
The problem is that reports of fulfilled prophecies are not fulfilled prophecies; that reports of miracles are not miracles. 

MacArthurites on secondhand testimony

I too have read many accounts of modern miracles. I find them to be mostly hearsay and apocryphal. 

http://hipandthigh.wordpress.com/2013/07/28/why-wont-faith-healers-heal-amputees/

[Ed Dingess] You will reply that you personally don't know of any faith healers to whom we can turn for healing. Have you ever witnessed an indisputable, certified genuine miracle? One for which there were no natural explanations?

Atheists on Third-World testimony

[Hume] It forms a strong presumption against all supernatural and miraculous relations, that they are observed chiefly to abound among ignorant and barbarous nations; or if a civilized people has ever given admission to any of them, that people will be found to have received them from ignorant and barbarous ancestors, who transmitted them with that inviolable sanction and authority, which always attend received opinions. When we peruse the first histories of all nations, we are apt to imagine ourselves transported into some new world; where the whole frame of nature is disjointed, and every element performs its operations in a different manner, from what it does at present. Battles, revolutions, pestilence, famine and death, are never the effect of those natural causes, which we experience. Prodigies, omens, oracles, judgements, quite obscure the few natural events, that are intermingled with them. But as the former grow thinner every page, in proportion as we advance nearer the enlightened ages, we soon learn, that there is nothing mysterious or supernatural in the case, but that all proceeds from the usual propensity of mankind towards the marvellous, and that, though this inclination may at intervals receive a check from sense and learning, it can never be thoroughly extirpated from human nature.    It is strange, a judicious reader is apt to say, upon the perusal of these wonderful historians, that such prodigious events never happen in our days.   The advantages are so great, of starting an imposture among an ignorant people, that, even though the delusion should be too gross to impose on the generality of them (which, though seldom, is sometimes the case) it has a much better chance for succeeding in remote countries, than if the first scene had been laid in a city renowned for arts and knowledge. The most ignorant and barbarous of these barbarians carry the report abroad. None of their countrymen have a large correspondence, or sufficient credit and authority to contradict and beat down the delusion. 

MacArthurites on Third-World testimony

Dan Phillips ‏@BibChr 21h 
EVERY time someone challenges this, the story starts, "I knew/heard about someone who was in the Philippines/Mexico/Uganda once, and..." 

Fred Butler
Oh sure, some third world kid somewhere dipped in the river and was healed of her cholera, so you can't deny the continuation of the gifts. 

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2013/11/hiding-behind-girl.html?showComment=1383851428186#c1838578720377491666

Of course, far away examples in distant lands in the backwaters of the jungle are usually provided, but if miracles and healings are prevalent among God's people, then they should happen here where they can be witnessed firsthand…Again, anecdotal stories are provided from Nepal or India… 

http://thecripplegate.com/authentic-fire-review-chapter-4/#comment-1417530754

Hays’ argument is really an argument from silence. What I mean by that is that Hays’ argument appeals to claims of miracles far, far away, in a distant land in order to defend his position. 

http://reformedreasons.blogspot.com/2013/10/responding-to-hays-responding-to-butler.html

The Deadliest Catch

For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth (Mt 12:40).

As we approach Easter, it's appropriate to revisit the miracle of Jonah.

i) Some critics classify Jonah as a fictional book because of the miraculous elements, especially his survival inside the fish. From a Christian standpoint that's an illicit reason to reject the historicity of Jonah.

ii) Another approach is to classify Jonah as a fictional satire. That's the tack taken by David Marcus in From Balaam to Jonah: Anti-Prophetic Satire in the Hebrew Bible (Scholars Press 1995). 

In Scripture, although sinners are often targets of prophetic satire, sometimes prophets are on the receiving end of satirical barbs. Balaam is a case in point. 

In his analysis, a text is a satire if (a) it has an object that it attacks, either directly or indirectly, and (b) it contains an overwhelming abundance of satirical features, including "a mixture of unbelievable elements (absurdities, fantastic situations, grotesqueries, distortions), ironies, ridicule, parody, and rhetorical feature. On that view, Jonah is analogous to Gulliver's Travels or Don Quixote. 

And up to a point, Jonah certainly fills the bill. If there was some overriding reason to conclude that Jonah can't be historical, then this would be a respectable alternative. There's nothing inherently wrong with a canonical book that's satirical fiction. 

iii) That said, this is not a strong argument for classifying Jonah as fictitious. Even if it is satirical, satire is not a fictional genre. Satire is neutral in that respect. A satire can be fiction or nonfiction. Satirists routinely lampoon real people, real events, real institutions, real customs. 

iv) In addition, scholars don't agree on the satirical character of Jonah. According to one Jewish commentator (Uriel Simon, in the JPS series), Jonah reflects "compassionate irony" rather than "satirical irony. This is a pathos-amplifying sort of humor, "one which looks down on the hero and painfully exposes his failures, but it is forgiving: It sets the hero in his proper place without humiliating him and restores him to his dignity without abasing him" (xxii). The fundamental seriousness of the fugitive prophet and his utter fidelity to himself are meant to arouse the reader's sympathy rather than derision: Jonah is a genuinely pathetic figure in his hopeless struggle with his God (xxi); a desperate fugitive, who is at once bold and stubborn, upright and ludicrous, (xxi).  

That's clearly a more sympathetic portrayal. However, these differing approaches aren't necessarily antithetical. Jonah could be a tragic figure in his own mind. Someone who takes himself too seriously. There can be a contrast between his heroic self-image and God making a fool out of Jonah. How he sees himself, and how the reader sees him, from the narrator's viewpoint, can be two very different perspectives. 

v) Moreover, although Jonah has satirical elements, it isn't pervasively satirical.  

vi) Also, a modern reader needs to keep in check what he deems to be unbelievable elements (absurdities, fantastic situations), in contrast to what an ancient Jewish reader would deem to be unbelievable. Jonah wasn't written to or for a secular-minded audience. 

vii) Another problem with classifying the book as fictional is that Scripture views Jonah as a real person, a real prophet (2 Kgs 14:25). Moreover, his ministry in 2 Kings dovetails with the setting of the book of Jonah. There is, of course, such a thing as historical fiction. But we have to be careful not to anachronistically project modern examples of that genre back into the OT.  

viii) Some moderate to conservative scholars defend the miracle on naturalistic grounds, by citing alleged parallels in modern times. I myself find that dubious. I'm no expert, but I doubt a human could naturally survive for more than a few minutes inside the stomach of a marine creature. That's not an oxygen-rich environment. I assume he's quickly asphyxiate. Moreover, soaking in a vat of gastric acid is not conducive to survival.

This is a case where a natural explanation is less credible than a supernatural explanation.

That said, there are marine creatures large enough to swallow a man whole. That much is naturally possible. 

ix) I also think a stronger case can be made for the historical interpretation than conservative interpreters generally do. Both proponents and opponents of the miracle typically make the mistake of isolating the miracle from its larger context. But taken in context, this miracle is embedded in a number of realistic features. By "realistic," I mean theologically and psychologically realistic features. 

Of course, if you suffer from an a priori antipathy to miracles, this argument won't have any traction, but I'm not addressing people who suffer from that attitude. 

1 Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying, 2 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it, for their evil has come up before me.” 3 But Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish. So he paid the fare and went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish, away from the presence of the Lord.
4 But the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship threatened to break up. 5 Then the mariners were afraid, and each cried out to his god. And they hurled the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten it for them. But Jonah had gone down into the inner part of the ship and had lain down and was fast asleep. 6 So the captain came and said to him, “What do you mean, you sleeper? Arise, call out to your god! Perhaps the god will give a thought to us, that we may not perish.”
7 And they said to one another, “Come, let us cast lots, that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah.

i) It's realistic that pagan sailors would blame the squall on the displeasure of a god. Pagans ascribe natural forces to the gods. Pagans view natural disasters as punitive events. Indeed, that's not confined to paganism. 

ii) Moreover, this isn't just a primitive outlook. I sometimes catch episodes of The Deadliest Catch, when it airs on TV. Modern captains and their crew can be superstitious. When they have a run of bad luck, they resort to superstitious rituals.

iii) Moreover, the idea that God really sent the squall is consistent with Biblical theism.  

iv) It's realistic that pagan sailors resort to sortilege to finger the culprit. The pagan world was rife with divination. Casting lots was a popular form of pagan divination. 

v) Furthermore, the idea that God providentially loaded the dice is consistent with Biblical theism. 

 8 Then they said to him, “Tell us on whose account this evil has come upon us. What is your occupation? And where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you?” 9 And he said to them, “I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.” 10 Then the men were exceedingly afraid and said to him, “What is this that you have done!” For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them.
11 Then they said to him, “What shall we do to you, that the sea may quiet down for us?” For the sea grew more and more tempestuous. 12 He said to them, “Pick me up and hurl me into the sea; then the sea will quiet down for you, for I know it is because of me that this great tempest has come upon you.” 13 Nevertheless, the men rowed hard to get back to dry land, but they could not, for the sea grew more and more tempestuous against them. 14 Therefore they called out to the Lord, “O Lord, let us not perish for this man's life, and lay not on us innocent blood, for you, O Lord, have done as it pleased you.” 15 So they picked up Jonah and hurled him into the sea, and the sea ceased from its raging. 16 Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows.

The sailors are in a bind. On the one hand, they'd normally have no compunction about giving a passenger who endangered them the heave-ho. He's to blame for their woe. By getting Jonah off their backs, they get God off their backs. 

On the other hand, the situation is complicated by the fact that the culprit is a prophet. They already angered his God by giving the fugitive prophet safe passage. Sure, they didn't know the all the details, but in their experience, the gods aren't very discriminating. 

Can they kill a prophet with impunity? Or is he sacrosanct? What if killing the prophet would further enrage his God, thereby sealing their doom? That's their inhibition. 

It's a dilemma. Either way, they are mortally imperiled. 

17 And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.

Having thrown him overboard, what's the expected outcome? If nature was allowed to take its course, in all likelihood he'd drown. 

But in that event, Jonah would successfully evade God's command. Indeed, although volunteering to be thrown overboard might seem altruistic, by sacrificing himself to save the sailors, a more cynical interpretation is that this is Jonah's final way of evading God's command. Suicide is his opt-out clause. On that view, this isn't Jonah's confession of guilt and submission to punishment, but another ruse evade God's command. He's provoking the sailors to kill him, because a dead prophet can't preach to the Ninevites.   

Pious commentators impute pious motives to Jonah, but that overlooks the fact that Jonah is on the run from God. He gives new meaning to a reluctant prophet. 

We don't expect God to let Jonah to defeat his plan for Jonah. The next logical step in the course of events is for God to miraculously preserve the life of his wayward prophet, so that Jonah will be forced to continue and complete his appointed mission. 

The miracle of the fish is not an isolated event, but part of a logical sequences of events. The narrative is realistic, both within the Jewish worldview of the narrator as well as the pagan worldview of the sailors.  

Interpreting NDEs

http://reflectionsbyken.wordpress.com/2014/04/15/how-to-think-about-near-death-experiences/

From Luther to Hitler?

http://phc.edu/UserFiles/File/_Other%20Projects/Global%20Journal/06_03_Poewe.pdf

Is the Resurrection more important than inerrancy?

Nick
Which do you think is more important? The resurrection or inerrancy?
The scholars Geisler has gone after do uphold inerrancy. They just don't agree with his interpretation.
I think Geisler's position will end up creating more Ehrmans.

(For those who don't know, I believe Nick Peters is the son-in-law of Mike Licona.)

That's a good question, but a question that takes off in many different directions.

i) Let's begin with a bit of background. In the past, Norman Geisler went after Robert Gundry for denying the historicity of the nativity accounts in the Gospels, and Murray J. Harris for his view of the glorified body.

In fairness to Geisler, this was during the heyday of redaction criticism. As a new academic fad, redaction criticism was overused. Also, it wasn't just Geisler. John Warwick Montgomery was also an opponent of redaction criticism–or at least the way it was being deployed by scholars like Gundry and Grant Osborne.

ii) That said, redaction criticism can be used to defend the inerrancy of Scripture. For instance, it's useful in harmonizing the Gospels. Craig Blomberg skillfully deploys redaction criticism to defend the inerrancy of the Gospels. So both proponents and opponents can take the issue to mistaken extremes. 

iii) Murray J. Harris may well have had an inadequate view of the glorified body. It's been while since I've read him. However, a number of NT scholars and Christian apologists infer from what Paul says about the "spiritual body" as well as how the Risen Christ appears and disappears in Luke and John, that the glorified body can materialize or dematerialize at will. 

I don't think that's the best explanation, and I think it creates problems for a physical resurrection. However, it's not a liberal denial of the resurrection. It's not that Harris et al. think a physical resurrection is too miraculous or supernatural to be credible. Rather, he's basing his position on what he thinks the NT describes or implies about the nature of the glorified body. 

iv) Is the resurrection more important than inerrancy? Before we can answer that, we have to ask what makes the resurrection important. There are different ways of answering that question:

v) For instance, you might say the resurrection is important because belief in the resurrection is essential to saving faith. And you might say that makes it more important thatninerrancy if belief in inerrancy is inessential to saving faith.

However, that proves too much. For instance, one might say belief in justification is inessential to saving faith. Yet even if that's the case, justification is necessary to salvation. Only the justified will be saved. 

vi) Events are ontologically independent of the historical record, if any. Some incidents are recorded events, but most events go unreported. The occurrence of an event doesn't (causally) depend on a subsequent record of the event. It happened whether or not it's recorded. 

In that sense, the Resurrection is not contingent on an inerrant record of the Resurrection. In principle, it's not contingent on having any record of the Resurrection.

Again, though, that tends to prove too much. God planned the Resurrection with a view to recording that event for the benefit of posterity. In the plan of God, the Resurrection is coordinated with the record of the Resurrection. The Father wouldn't raise Jesus from the dead if he had no intention of publicizing the Resurrection. A Resurrection that no one remembered or knew about wouldn't serve God's purpose for the Resurrection.

vii) Some Biblical events are more intrinsically important than others. If the Exodus never happened, that would falsify Judaism. But if the census of Quirinius never happened, that would not falsify Christianity. In that respect, Bible history has some flexibility. 

viii) The theological significance of an event like the Resurrection may not be evident apart from an authoritative interpretation of the event. NT writers are interpreters as well as reporters. The importance of the Resurrection is bound up with the significance of the Resurrection. And that implicates inerrancy.

ix) Geisler tends to blur the distinction between inerrancy and historicity. But these are often distinct issues. 

x) Yet inerrancy and historicity are sometimes intertwined. It's a hermeneutical issue as well as a factual issue. It depends on your theory of meaning. If authorial intent is an essential component of meaning, then whether or not a Bible narrator intended to report a real-world event is directly germane to the historicity (or not) of the account. To that extent, historicity can't be neatly separated from inerrancy.

xi) Inerrancy is important in part because it goes straight to our source of information. We lack direct knowledge of many things stated in Scripture. Not just past events, but future events, or undetectable events like the afterlife. Absent inerrancy, we don't know which Biblical statements are true or false. 

xii) But there is, if anything, a deeper issue. There's a cause/effect relationship between inspiration and inerrancy. Just as the Resurrection is a divine event, the process of revelation and/or inspiration is a divine event. Just as the Resurrection bears witness to God's activity in the world, so does inspiration or revelation. 

Take prophecy. Prophecy involves three presuppositions: (a) God knows the future; (b) God controls the future; (c) God sometimes discloses the future. 

If, however, you consider prophecies to be fallible, then that reflects back on the nature and existence of God. Likewise, if you think some or all Biblical "prophecies" are really vaticinia ex eventu, then that likewise reflects back on the nature and existence of God. 

Perhaps God is finite in knowledge and power. Perhaps God is the Creator of a closed-system. He doesn't break in.  Perhaps God doesn't exist.

Denying the inspiration of Scripture can have far-reaching theological consequences. 

Inspiration and revelation presuppose the existence of a God who's active in the world. Who communicates to and through humans (as well as angels). If we deny inspiration, then God isn't active in the world in that respect. Is God's silence an indication that he's uninvolved? Is God's silence an indication that there is no God to communicate with us in the first place? So inerrancy can indeed be as important as the Resurrection. 

xiii) Likewise, denying inerrancy nearly erases the distinction between true and false prophecy. Yet Scripture is deeply invested in that distinction. 

xiv) As a Calvinist, I admit that my views on inspiration are influenced by my views on predestination and providence. God is intimately involved in everything that happens. Once again, take prophecy. God is in a position to predict the future because he makes it happen. He has a plan, and he executes his plan. Directly or indirectly, he causes what he predicts. 

xv) Some Christian apologists think we need a back-up plan in case inerrancy fails. A safety-net to break the fall in case a Christian loses faith in the inerrancy of Scripture. We need to stake out a middle ground between inerrancy and apostasy. 

Their contingency plan is to view the Bible as an uninspired historical record. A historical record needn't be inerrant to be informative or reliable. 

For some professing Christians, this is more than just a fallback position. This is their actual position. They approach Scripture simply as historians. They have no doctrine of inspiration or revelation. 

There's a sense in which that might be better than apostasy. At least for them. But even if that's the case, what's better for some individuals isn't necessarily a good policy for the church. At best, it just means that is preferable to the dire alternative of all-out apostasy.

xvi) At the same time, there's a deceptive security in this profession of faith. When you deny inspiration or revelation, and simply approach the Bible as a set of historical documents (some of which are less historical than others), that's a secularizing outlook. At best, Scripture is a historical witness to what God does rather than what God says. A God who is somehow active in (or behind) certain redemptive events, but inactive in communicating to and through certain individuals. But is that dichotomy plausible? 

xvii) I don't think creating more Bart Ehrmans is necessarily a bad thing. Separating light from darkness (Jn 3:19-21) can purify the church. To the extent, however, that inerrancy is a make-or-break issue, we need to make reasonably sure that truth is what is driving some folks away from the faith. I think scholars like Bock, Blomberg, and Poythress are much better models than Geisler when it comes to general harmonistic strategies.