In the latest issue of Modern Reformation Michael Horton writes on inerrancy. In his article he includes an extended summary of Inspiration, a short but classic statement by Archibald Hodge and B.B. Warfield, because, Horton says, “it remains, in my view, the best formulation of inerrancy just as it anticipates and challenges caricatures.”
Here’s his summary of the salient points:
- They point out that a sound doctrine of inspiration requires a specifically Christian ontology or view of reality.
- Warfield and Hodge underscore the redemptive-historical unfolding of biblical revelation, defending an organic view of inspiration over a mechanical theory.
- The Princeton theologians faced squarely the question of contradictions and errors, noting problems in great detail.
- Because it is the communication that is inspired rather than the persons themselves, we should not imagine that the authors were omniscient or infallible.
- The claim of inerrancy is that “in all their real affirmations these books are without error.”
- These theologians also denied that inerrancy was the foundation of our doctrine of Scripture, much less of the Christian faith.
It’s somewhat common in some circles to claim that “inerrancy” is a modernist invention of the Princetonians (due to their unbiblical commitment to Scottish common-sense realism), and that this is not the view of the church before this time.
For some refutations to this idea, see especially John Woodbridge’s Biblical Authority: A Critique of the Rogers/McKim Proposal.
See also:
- Robert D. Preus, “The View of the Bible Held by the Church: The Early Church through Luther,” in Inerrancy, ed. Norman Geisler
- John H. Gerstner, “The View of the Bible Held by the Church: Calvin and the Westminster Divines,” in Inerrancy, ed. Norman Geisler
- G. W. Bromiley, “The Church Fathers and Holy Scripture,” in Scripture and Truth, ed. D. A. Carson and John A. Woodbridge
