Dr Paul Allen

"The Bible is the Word of God, which errs." From the advent of neo-orthodox theology in the early twentieth century, this assertion has become a mantra among those who want to have a high view of Scripture while avoiding the academic liability of asserting biblical infallibility and inerrancy. But this statement represents the classic case of having one's cake and eating it too. It is the quintessential oxymoron. Let us look again at this untenable theological formula. If we eliminate the first part, "The Bible is," we get "The Word of God, which errs." If we parse it further and scratch out "the Word of" and "which," we reach the bottom line: "God errs." The idea that God errs in any way, in any place, or in any endeavor is repugnant to the mind as well as the soul. Here, biblical criticism reaches the nadir of biblical vandalism. How could any sentient creature conceive of a formula that speaks of the Word of

Jewish and Christian scribes took inordinate care in copying the Bible from one generation to the next. For a variety of reasons, we can have great confidence that our present Bibles have considerable fidelity to the original writings. [1] Hands down, the Bible is the most carefully preserved book from the ancient world. And yet throughout the history of biblical transmission , there have been some intentional and unintentional changes in the text. Some people think this undermines its reliability, but that is not necessarily the case. While there were certain scribes with doctrinal agendas, the vast majority considered it their duty to copy the scriptures faithfully. And they did so. Typically, when variants are found across different manuscripts, textual scholars can reconstruct the correct reading with a high degree of probability. According to professor Dan Wallace , one of the leading textual critics in the world, there has not been a single manuscript discovery that has pr