Need Help: Inerrancy of Scripture

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Stumped by Muslim Apologist…re: errors found in our Catholic Bibles:

Does our Catholic Church Teaching on the Inerrancy of Scripture mean something different than how I understand it - I understood it to mean that there is ZERO Errors in the Bible.

I know language when understood properly can mean something different than it initially sounds, so does our Catholic Church mean that there isn’t ANY errors at all in the Bible?

I need clarification: if there is even 1 error is discovered in a Catholic version of the Bible than like a house of cards, our Church falls?

Or

Are errors permitted in a Catholic Bible even though our Church teaches the Inerrancy of Scripture?

How am I to understand this correctly? I want to make sure I’m completely clear so that I can explain it better.
 
There are no factual errors in Sacred Scripture.

It should be worth stating however, that things like grammatical structure, are usually seen as particular to the human writer, so grammatical errors could be possible. Also keep in mind that not everything is meant by the authors literally. If Christ is telling a parable for instance about a man selling everything he owns to buy a pearl of great price, doesn’t necessarily mean there was an actual person who did that.
 
ComeHome2Rome said:
Stumped by Muslim Apologist…re: errors found in our Catholic Bibles:

Does our Catholic Church Teaching on the Inerrancy of Scripture mean something different than how I understand it - I understood it to mean that there is ZERO Errors in the Bible.

I know language when understood properly can mean something different than it initially sounds, so does our Catholic Church mean that there isn’t ANY errors at all in the Bible?

I need clarification: if there is even 1 error is discovered in a Catholic version of the Bible than like a house of cards, our Church falls?

Or

Are errors permitted in a Catholic Bible even though our Church teaches the Inerrancy of Scripture?

How am I to understand this correctly? I want to make sure I’m completely clear so that I can explain it better.
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These essays will help:

rtforum.org/lt/index.html
 
Well, you need to understand your audience.

When Muslims speak of the “inerrancy” of the Koran they are including the idea that the Koran has not be “corrupted” by translations (it is only officially in Arabic) nor transcription types of errors.

That is NOT what the Catholic Church means at all.

Scripture is inerrant in the sense that it communicates the truths of the Faith necessary for salvation. The Church makes not claims regarding historical, scientific, etc types of accuracy. The bible is not a science book. It often communicates God’s Divine Revelation in poetic, allegorical and other types of literary devices. There are multiple senses of scripture.

Additionally, Divine Revelation is not confined to Sacred Scripture. It also includes Sacred Tradition.

I suggest you read the entire Catechism section on Divine Revelation. Part I, Chapter 2: God Comes To Meet Man, articles 1, 2, and 3.

Additionally, when older documents conflict with the Koran, Muslims will tell you the other documents are corrupted, not the Koran. The Bible is only true in so far as it agrees with the Koran. Or, for those who accept that the Bible is not corrupted, it is the interpretation that is corrupted if it does not agree with the Koran.

Basically, I doubt you will get anywhere.
 
1ke said:
That is NOT what the Catholic Church means at all.

Scripture is inerrant in the sense that it communicates the truths of the Faith necessary for salvation. The Church makes not claims regarding historical, scientific, etc types of accuracy. The bible is not a science book. It often communicates God’s Divine Revelation in poetic, allegorical and other types of literary devices. There are multiple senses of scripture.
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“For all the books which the Church receives as sacred and canonical are written wholly and entirely, with all their parts, at the dictation of the Holy Spirit; and so far is it from being possible that any error can coexist with inspiration, that inspiration not only is essentially incompatible with error, but excludes and rejects it as absolutely and necessarily as it is impossible that God Himself, the supreme Truth, can utter that which is not true. This is the ancient and unchanging faith of the Church, solemnly defined in the Councils of Florence and Trent, and finally and more expressly formulated by the [First] Council of the Vatican.” (Providentissimus Deus)
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ComeHome2Rome said:
Stumped by Muslim Apologist…re: errors found in our Catholic Bibles:

Does our Catholic Church Teaching on the Inerrancy of Scripture mean something different than how I understand it - I understood it to mean that there is ZERO Errors in the Bible.

I know language when understood properly can mean something different than it initially sounds, so does our Catholic Church mean that there isn’t ANY errors at all in the Bible?

I need clarification: if there is even 1 error is discovered in a Catholic version of the Bible than like a house of cards, our Church falls?

Or

Are errors permitted in a Catholic Bible even though our Church teaches the Inerrancy of Scripture?

How am I to understand this correctly? I want to make sure I’m completely clear so that I can explain it better.
Click to expand...
What errors did they say are in the Bible? You haven’t told us what they said to you.
 
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Jehannette:
That quote sounds like if there is even 1 error, than the house of cards falls. Yikes.
 
thistle said:
What errors did they say are in the Bible? You haven’t told us what they said to you.
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There was just so much in those 3 hours, it was hard to absorb it all. Here are just two examples given:
  1. In one of the Gospels it states that during His Passion, Jesus was made to wear a SCARLET robe, but in another of the Gospels it states that during His Passion, Jesus was made to wear a PURPLE robe. Red and Purple are two completely different colors and they don’t even match so it can’t even be explained away by saying the robe was multi-colored robe.
  2. According to one Old Testament passage it states that Satan inspired David to complete a census, but in another Old Testament passage it states that God inspired David to complete a census. God and Satan can hardly be mistaken for One another, they’re complete polar opposites.
 
1ke said:
Well, you need to understand your audience.

When Muslims speak of the “inerrancy” of the Koran they are including the idea that the Koran has not be “corrupted” by translations (it is only officially in Arabic) nor transcription types of errors.
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The Muslim Apologist clearly distinguished between “translations” vs. “versions”.

While both Christians & Muslims have different language “translations” of the Bible & Qur’an respectively, Christians also have multiple “versions” of the Bible. Some “versions” have a longer chapter at the end of the Gospel of Mark, some “versions” have a shorter chapter at the end of the Gospel of Mark. Some “versions” are missing entire books of the Old Testament. While other “versions” have their Old Testament based on the original Greek, while some “versions” base the Old Testament on a newer Hebrew “version” which is missing entire sections of multiple books. And so on and so on.

“Translations” of the various “versions” of the Bible are available in multiple languages.

“Translations” of the original Qur’ran are also available in various languages; however, there are no “versions” of the Qur’an. No Qur’an has missing books or added sections. There is only one version of the Qur’an, the original.

I couldn’t care less about the Qur’an and I couldn’t care less about errors in non-Catholic “versions” of the Bible, but I am very concerned about errors found in Catholic “versions” of the Bible ***IF ***Inerrancy is correctly understood as ZERO factual errors.
 
ComeHome2Rome said:
but I am very concerned about errors found in Catholic “versions” of the Bible ***IF ***Inerrancy is correctly understood as ZERO factual errors.
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Sounds like you are not very well verssed in Catholic Scripture.

I suggest that you read the Catechism sections I referenced earlier as a start. And then start doing Catholic bible study and stop worrying about Muslims misinterpretation of Catholic doctrine and Scripture.
 
Scarlet and purple are extremely similar colors, especially in their darker hues. The authors are using the language which seems to best fit. The Greek term used for “purple” is porphyra, which is actually described as a “purple-red natural dye which is extracted from sea snails”. It is much more of a scarlet color than what we normally think when we say purple.

See the Wikipedia article on Tyrian Purple for more information: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrian_purple
 
ComeHome2Rome said:
In one of the Gospels it states that during His Passion, Jesus was made to wear a SCARLET robe, but in another of the Gospels it states that during His Passion, Jesus was made to wear a PURPLE robe. Red and Purple are two completely different colors and they don’t even match so it can’t even be explained away by saying the robe was multi-colored robe.
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You’re kidding?

This is your smoking gun?

Please.

Ask my husband what color I’m wearing and he’ll say black. Wrong, navy blue.

Scarlet and purple are not necessarily different colors. They are dark colors, they are royal colors (the whole point of putting the cloak on him).

A faded scarlet or purple can look similar. People perceive color differently, color blindness can be a factor.

Who the heck cares what color the cloak was?
 
Katholish said:
Scarlet and purple are extremely similar colors, especially in their darker hues. The authors are using the language which seems to best fit. The Greek term used for “purple” is porphyra, which is actually described as a “purple-red natural dye which is extracted from sea snails”. It is much more of a scarlet color than what we normally think when we say purple.

See the Wikipedia article on Tyrian Purple for more information: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrian_purple
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Okay. The colors may have been different historically than they are today. I can totally get on board with that. (purple 😉 )

How can we reasonably explain why our God the Holy Spirit would inspire one writer to refer to the same object as scarlet and inspired another writer to refer to the same object as purple? How can we explain reasonably why the Holy Spirit wasn’t consistent in such a basic fact? (scarlet 😉 )
 
1ke said:
You’re kidding?

This is your smoking gun?

Please.

Ask my husband what color I’m wearing and he’ll say black. Wrong, navy blue.

Scarlet and purple are not necessarily different colors. They are dark colors, they are royal colors (the whole point of putting the cloak on him).

A faded scarlet or purple can look similar. People perceive color differently, color blindness can be a factor.

Who the heck cares what color the cloak was?
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This isn’t “my” smoking gun. This is one example of multiple errors in the Bible pointed out by a Muslim Apologist. I’ve only included two of the errors here. I’m missing your reaction to the other. If both of those to errors can be reasonably be explained away, then I’ll post some of the additional ones.

However, even if this difference of color were the only error (and it couldn’t be explained away), then according to the Papal Encyclical someone quoted above and is linked here: vatican.va/holy_father/leo_xiii/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_18111893_providentissimus-deus_en.html it’s a HUGE deal!

I’m going to continue researching this as I trust that our Catholic Church has the answer and a reasonable one. I’m confident that I just simply don’t know what it is yet 😃
 
Some word choice and style choice is up to the human authors. DOn’t forget that one of the biggest differences between the way that Muslims believe the Koran was delivered and a Catholic notion of inspiration is that we do not hold that the Bible was literally dictated world-for-word in exact form and that the human authors were merely copying what they had been given. Think of it more as a collaborative effort. Both God and the human authors are true authors.

Providentissimus Deus is the most elaborate and authoritative explanation of innerrancy. That should hold most of the answers for you.
 
ComeHome2Rome said:
This isn’t “my” smoking gun. This is one example of multiple errors in the Bible pointed out by a Muslim Apologist. I’ve only included two of the errors here. I’m missing your reaction to the other. If both of those to errors can be reasonably be explained away, then I’ll post some of the additional ones.

However, even if this difference of color were the only error (and it couldn’t be explained away), then according to the Papal Encyclical someone quoted above and is linked here: vatican.va/holy_father/leo_xiii/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_18111893_providentissimus-deus_en.html it’s a HUGE deal!

I’m going to continue researching this as I trust that our Catholic Church has the answer and a reasonable one. I’m confident that I just simply don’t know what it is yet 😃
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If you are truely sincere in finding an answer, and not doing this for the sake of debating on the internet, I strongly advise that you forget trying to research this issue on line. Your findings are too easily mis-interpreted, especially for one who is untrained in theology and philosophy.
I suggest that you research the availability of a priest of either the Jesuit or Dominican religious orders. That you can do on the internet, or just call the office of your local Diocese. Most priests in both of these orders have Doctorate degrees in Theology and are thoroughly familiar with Islam as well as Christianity.
If your intent is to debate a Moslem apologist, forget about it. That is just an excercise in futility-which you will lose. They are trained in justification by debate and you aren’t.
 
ComeHome2Rome said:
This isn’t “my” smoking gun. This is one example of multiple errors in the Bible pointed out by a Muslim Apologist. I’ve only included two of the errors here. I’m missing your reaction to the other. If both of those to errors can be reasonably be explained away, then I’ll post some of the additional ones.

However, even if this difference of color were the only error (and it couldn’t be explained away), then according to the Papal Encyclical someone quoted above and is linked here: vatican.va/holy_father/leo_xiii/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_18111893_providentissimus-deus_en.html it’s a HUGE deal!

I’m going to continue researching this as I trust that our Catholic Church has the answer and a reasonable one. I’m confident that I just simply don’t know what it is yet 😃
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Read this about alleged contradictions in the Bible:

bringyou.to/apologetics/bible.htm#INDEX
 
Just throwing this out there for the scarlet/purple thing. In the ancient west, colors weren’t even remotely close to being as well defined as they are today. The ancient Greeks and later the Romans, for instance, would often use the same WORD to refer to colors as distinct as red, purple, and pink; or for green and yellow.

Obviously this wouldn’t have been the most important potential contradiction, but it seems like an odd one to stand out.
 
ComeHome2Rome said:
This isn’t “my” smoking gun. This is one example of multiple errors in the Bible pointed out by a Muslim Apologist. I’ve only included two of the errors here. I’m missing your reaction to the other. If both of those to errors can be reasonably be explained away, then I’ll post some of the additional ones.
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Your problem is not with the supposed errors, but with a lack of understading of Scripture. Did you read the section of the Catechism I posted yet? You (and your Muslim debator) do not understand inerrancy of Scripture.
ComeHome2Rome said:
However, even if this difference of color were the only error
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It isn’t an error at ALL. That is the point you are missing.

I also suggest Dei Verbum in addition to reading the Catechism section I posted.
 
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