In his book The Bible Made Impossible, Christian Smith identifies a problem with the use of the Bible as a source of doctrine. He calls that problem pervasive interpretive pluralism, and as you can guess, the term refers to the fact that Christians hold many contradictory positions which they believe are consistent with Scripture. As […]
hermeneutics
Does inerrancy apply to the human authors of the Bible?
This morning I posted a tweet on inerrancy which prompted a reply from the philosopher Paul Franks. I thought it was an interesting Twitter exchange and worth repeating here. After compiling our tweets, I’m a bit surprised at how long it is too. I have not bothered to flag or correct the typos that appear in […]
If you reject evolution, should you accept a flat earth?
Yesterday, I posted the following tweet: “I’ll agree that ‘evolution is only a theory’ if you’ll agree that it is the only theory which offers a viable account of biological diversity.” The tweet received the following response from (what I assume was) a young earth creationist: “Whether the earth is flat or not makes no […]
Would Jesus want you to stay married to a psychopath?
This morning, I tweeted the following survey: Clinical psychopaths are manipulative anti-social narcissists who are incapable of experiencing love or empathy. The condition is untreatable. If you came to believe your friend was married to a non-violent psychopath, would you support your friend divorcing that individual? — Tentative Apologist (@RandalRauser) July 27, 2018 As of […]
If the Bible is a map for how to get to heaven, it isn’t a very good one
We’re all familiar with the fire evacuation maps on the inside of a hotel room door. In a brief, succinct, and luminously clear manner, the map provides directions for evacuating the building in case of fire. Growing up, I was taught to think of the Bible as like God’s hotel fire evacuation map for the […]
Jesus, the God of Genocide, and William Barclay
William Barclay (d. 1978) is a lot like C.S. Lewis in one key respect: he was a British scholar widely read and trusted by North American evangelicals who nonetheless frequently expressed some relatively radical opinions that sailed under the radar of those same evangelicals. I was reminded of this again the other day when in […]
The Complementarian Dilemma
Egalitarianism is the view that all offices of church ministry and leadership should be open to both genders. By contrast, complementarianism insists that some offices of ministry and leadership should be restricted to males. I am an egalitarian and yesterday I posted this tweet expressing my concern that complementarianism is not just wrong, but potentially […]
Who is the Fool? How Christians misread the Bible to attack atheists
This article is an excerpt from my 2015 book Is the Atheist My Neighbor? Rethinking Christian Attitudes Toward Atheism. It’s a book that J.L. Schellenberg, one of the leading atheist philosophers of religion, recommended as “brief and lively but remarkably full and acute” and “impressively fair”. You can decide whether this brief excerpt lives up to […]
1 Samuel 15 and Paul Copan’s Middling Compromise
This week “Unbelievable” featured Part 2 of an exchange between Paul Copan and Greg Boyd on Boyd’s new book The Crucifixion of the Warrior God. In Part 2, Justin Brierley and his two guests focus in on particular biblical texts to see how each position deals with the text in question. The first major text under discussion is 1 […]
God and the Weather Revisited
Ten days ago I posted an article titled “‘I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth…’ Could God be punishing Texas?” Since then I rewrote and expanded the article and this morning it was posted at Strange Notions as “Does God Punish People Through Natural Weather Events?“
Because Jesus would build a wall, that’s why!
The base of the Statue of Liberty includes this famous poem by Emma Lazarus: “Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me: I lift my lamp beside the golden door.” Well-intentioned, perhaps. But is it really […]
“I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth…” Could God be punishing Texas?
13 So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. […] 17 I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath […]
If this is God’s Word, why isn’t it easier to understand?
That’s the question. You can read my latest article at confusedaboutgrace.com here.
The Birth of a Nation: A Powerful but Flawed Film
Things started out promising for Nate Parker’s 2016 film The Birth of a Nation. The film tells the story of Nat Turner, a slave preacher who led a fated slave rebellion in 1831. The movie took the 2016 Sundance Film Festival by storm, winning critical and popular praise along with a stunning $17.5 million payout from […]
