Bible Difficulties Read Online Free PDF Page A

distinction between the historical-scientific and the doctrinal-theological passages of the Old Testament is completely unknown either to the later Old Testament authors or to the apostolic writers of the New Testament in their treatment of the Hebrew Scriptures.
    Most decisive against this division into historical-scientific and doctrinal-theological categories is the clear endorsement by our Lord Jesus Himself of even those passages in the Old Testament that speak of supernatural events most commonly rejected by rationalistic critics in our day. As we have already seen, Christ accepted as literally true (1) the historicity of Adam (Matt. 19:5), (2) the rescue of Noah and his family from the Flood by means of the ark (Matt. 24:38-39), (3) the literal accuracy of Moses'
    interview with God at the burning bush (Matt. 22:32), (4) the feeding of Moses'
    congregation by manna from heaven (John 6:49), (5) the historicity of Jonah's deliverance after three days in the belly of the whale (Matt. 12:40), and (6) the repentance of the pagan population of Nineveh in response to Jonah's preaching (Matt. 12:41).
    Nothing could be clearer than that our divine Savior believed in the literal truthfulness of the entire Old Testament record, whether those accounts dealt with doctrinal matters, matters of science, or history. He who refuses to go along with the Lord in this judgment stands guilty of asserting that God can err (since Jesus is God as well as Man) and that the sovereign Creator (John 1:1-3) stands in need of instruction and correction by the finite wisdom of man. It is for this reason that we cannot possibly concede that the errancy of Scripture is reconcilable with true Evangelicalism or the historic Christian faith.
    Third, the advocates of partial inerrancy (whether of the confessedly neoorthodox camp or the revisionist evangelical persuasion) fatally undermine the tenability of their theoretical position by their actual practice in the matter of teaching from the Bible. That is to say, when they preach to a congregation or teach at a Bible conference, they forsake their commitment to partial inerrancy altogether--at least insofar as they proclaim the authoritative message of Scripture itself. Whenever a preacher declares a truth from the Bible and calls on his audience to believe and act on that teaching, he thereby presupposes the total inerrancy of Scripture. In other words, he who affirms that a statement is true because the Bible affirms it, can do so with integrity only if he takes the position that whatever the Bible teaches is necessarily true. Otherwise he must always append to his proclamation of the biblical message the following additional corroboration: "In this particular case, we are warranted in believing what the Bible says-
    -even though it may occasionally be mistaken in matters of history or science--because it does not appear to contravene the findings of modern scientific or historical knowledge."
    From the logical standpoint, therefore, it is a requirement of honesty that anyone who does not hold to the principle that whatever the Bible affirms is true simply because it 13

    affirms it, may not preach in such a way as to imply that no further corroboration is needed for its statements to be believed.
    It is a matter of basic self-contradiction for a partial-inerrantist to hold that in matters of history and science the Bible may err and yet for him to expound any text from the Scripture as having authority in its own right. While he may perhaps preserve a greater measure of integrity if the text he is preaching happens to be purely doctrinal or theological, nevertheless he is false to his own position when he fails to justify his treating the text as inherently authoritative. Nearly all the cardinal doctrines of Scripture come in a historical framework, and very frequently in a supernatural setting. It is less than candid for a Christian spokesman to assure his audience that any such doctrinal affirmation