If it ain’t consistent then Satan is using you. As Jesus shows us you need to understnd your bible to combat him.

Ross Daws
If I consider that Michelangelo was inspired when he painted the Sistine Chapel, must I therefore conclude that the ceiling is exactly as God intended it?

if it was truly the holy spirit that inspired and guided him for a specific purpose then i guess you could conclude that

Sometimes the argument of inspiration is used to negate the human factor in scripture, but I find that a difficult argument to accept, as though scripture being inspired means that it is no longer subject to the other influences and attributes which are normally encountered in human endeavours. If this is true, then it seems only true of the inspiration of the bible - not other examples of inspired human work throughout the centuries, which leaves us with a type of special inspiration at work in the scriptures, as opposed to an ordinary inspiration at work elsewhere. And to my mind, we’re back at square one, where we argue that the bible is special because we already believe that the bible is special.

Don’t get me wrong here, I believe that the bible is inspired. I just think that it’s flawed logic to go from a) the bible is inspired, to b) therefore human involvement in the bible is moot. I think our experience of inspiration today and down through the centuries should warn us of the fallacy of giving too much clout to what inspiration can account for. I find it easier to work with the notion that God has been trustworthy to people since before he was a boy, and that the bible reflects numerous inspired authors or communities relating their experiences of his faithfulness and character as best they can; and that strikes me as something useful (for teaching, rebuking, correcting, training…).

Oh btw, I am totally against gender-inclusive bibles. I would prefer that all readers were forced to engage with the fact that the scriptures were written in times and cultures where one would address a letter ‘Brothers’ and not ‘Brothers and Sisters’ because I hope that the reader would then have those times and cultures in mind when they read, for example, ‘women should not speak in church.’

Hello by the way. I recognise some names here from philbaker days, but I can’t remember what my username was there. Jasenotjason maybe?

I think that assuming to know God in totum is an arrogance that as imperfect humans we can’t afford. likewise, while what God breathed may have been perfect truth, what humans passed on and eventually wrote down, probably wasn’t.

Thomas Paine wrote:
For my own part, my belief in the perfection of the Deity will not permit me to believe that a book so manifestly obscure, disorderly, and contradictory can be His work

That might be a little harsh, but the core of the idea to me is valid.