Biblical Writers: Infallible or Inerrant?

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Thank you for the discussion.

I think the Creation story is allegory and the Hebrew word used for day can also mean ‘passage of time’. This would seem to make sense as the earth and the Sun were not created on ‘day 1’.
 
Those two statements don’t go together. I guess I don’t understand what you mean by without historical or scientific error.
Varying forms of speech is not an error, figurative language among others is admitted. Not everything has to be taken in the literal historical sense. Nevertheless, there are passages where scholars think the Bible has an error that cannot be explained as figurative language, or that such an explanation would be ad hoc.
 
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Varying forms of speech is not an error, figurative language among others is admitted. Not everything has to be taken in the literal historical sense. Nevertheless, there are passages where scholars think the Bible has an error that cannot be explained as figurative language, or that such an explanation would be ad hoc.
This seems like splitting hairs to me. So we agree that the bible is not necessarily historically or scientifically accurate? I think that is probably the important point.
 
The whole Scripture is given for the sake of salvation,
If God can create the heavens and the earth, then he also has the power of final edit. I just trust that the Bible I read today, is the Bible that God intends me to read.

Even if some all powerful Roman Emperor wanted to corrupt the Bible for his own use, he would have to fight against God, so no contest.
 
Even if some all powerful Roman Emperor wanted to corrupt the Bible for his own use, he would have to fight against God, so no contest.
No all-powerful Roman Emperor ever tried that, but it is exactly what the all-powerful Emperor of China is doing now. The Bitter Winter blog reported a few months ago:

The regime has banned the sales of the Bible online since March last year, removing it from shelves in brick-and-mortar stores even earlier. The Bible is also being re-edited and annotated by including chapters from Confucian, Taoist, and Buddhist classics, as part of the government’s work plan to promote Christianity with Chinese characteristics through “thought reform.”

 
This is about the Christ poem written in Philippians 2:5-11 from Wikipedia. It was written in translational Greek where St. Paul translated the poem original written in Aramaic dated around the 40s AD. It’s significant because it gives evidence that the author believed Jesus existed in heaven before his physical incarnation, but:
“this does not necessarily mean that he was believed to be equal to God the Father prior to his death and resurrection. This largely depends on how the Greek word harpagmon is translated in verse 6 (‘Something to be grasped after / exploited’)…”
(Bold mine)

The word harpagmon is key to understand this poem. So as I’m preaching to the choir and will expect a certain answer, can we have good reason to believe the author actually thought Jesus was equal to the Father? Ehrman can be quite controversial, but does he have any good evidence for believing his interpretation is true?:
”If ’harpagmon’ is rendered as ’something to be exploited,’ as it is in many Christian Bible translations, then the implication is that Christ was already equal to God prior to his incarnation. But Bart Ehrman and others have argued that the correct translation is in fact ’something to be grasped after,’ implying that Jesus was not equal to God before his resurrection. Outside of this passage, ’harpagmon’ and related words were almost always used to refer to something that a person doesn’t yet possess but tries to acquire.[8]

It is widely agreed by interpreters, however, that the Christ poem depicts Jesus as equal to God after his resurrection. This is because the last two stanzas quote Isaiah 45:22–23 (‘Every knee shall bow, every tongue confess’), which in the original context clearly refers to God the Father.[8]
(Bold mine)
 
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Rather, it’s “[t]he books of Scripture must be acknowledged as teaching solidly, faithfully and without error that truth which God wanted put into sacred writings for the sake of salvation.”
Yes, this is what Vatican II says, and people try to interpret it in the limited way (that only that which was for the sake of salvation was taught solidly, faithfully, and without error, even though there is no “only”), but in the citation in the above definition we get a rather wide acceptance of Biblical inerrancy. For instance, Divino Afflante Spiritu recalls, “When, subsequently, some Catholic writers, in spite of this solemn definition of Catholic doctrine, by which such divine authority is claimed for the “entire books with all their parts” as to secure freedom from any error whatsoever, ventured to restrict the truth of Sacred Scripture solely to matters of faith and morals, and to regard other matters, whether in the domain of physical science or history, as “obiter dicta” and - as they contended - in no wise connected with faith, Our Predecessor of immortal memory, Leo XIII in the Encyclical Letter Providentissimus Deus , published on November 18 in the year 1893, justly and rightly condemned these errors and safe-guarded the studies of the Divine Books by most wise precepts and rules.”

People are very skeptical of the Bible, and sometimes it may be the only historical witness to something that we know of. But we very well may then gain more historical knowledge and then see that the Bible was correct all along. We learn new things about history quite a lot, and it by no means would be the first time the Bible is confirmed in its history when doubted.
 
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I’m actually taking an online class about scripture right now, I’ll get back to you.
 
From Dr. William Marshner: in verse 6 of Philippians 2: “Who, though he was in the form of God,” is really interesting because in the original Greek, the word “form” (morphe) means “inner form” or “substantial nature”. This is different from our modern idea of form as “in the shape of”. This would show Christ was truly God in His nature before (and after) His Incarnation.

The rest of the verse: “did not regard equality with God something to be grasped [harpagmon]” is another intriguing line. From my NABRE translation, this might mean that Jesus had “aspects of divinity that he was willing to give up in order to serve in human form”. Another beautiful understanding of the Word.

I think it’s a little confusing position to imply that Jesus was not equal to God before His resurrection given the understanding of morphe (even if harpagmon meant “something that a person doesn’t yet possess” in other parts of the Bible). I’m not sure if Ehrman touches on the word morphe in his book but does anyone have thoughts?

I’m just now learning about this, it might seem a little nit-picky but I find it fascinating. I pulled part of this from Dr. Marshner’s series on the Early Councils (Part 1). I highly recommend his talks, he has great information.
 
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