[Contents] [About the Participants] [Opening Statement by John Rankin] [Opening Statement by Robert Price][Dialog] [Questions from the Audience] [Closing Statements] [Return to Mars Hill Forum]

	Is the Bible Coherent?
	Closing Statements
	John Rankin: Bob said earlier that he talked about the Old Testament as being a nationalistic document of one particular nation in one time in history. And let me respond to that with a question. What other religious origin text in history, or secular understanding, transcends its own nationalism or its own tribalism and cares for the well being of everyone? What is so powerful about Genesis is that it starts with the claim that we are all made in God's image, and Adam and Even are our parents, we are all cousins. No matter what our racial or tribalistic histories may be in the meantime. And therefore it is one nation as a remnant that God entrusts to bring forth a Messiah who does what? Invites us all back in to that unity. So the nationalism of the Old Testament is in service to the unity of all humankind. This is not true rooted in pagan, religious origin texts. And therefore I will simply conclude by saying that since God is our judge, and since I'm a free man made in his image, then the satisfaction I have is the opportunity to argue, to evidence, and to be accountable to the Biblical ethics I've shared with you tonight. What better ethics are there to live by than the power to give? To give to others so that they receive and give back and we have trust, or take before you're violated. Those are the two choices, one is Biblical, one is pagan. The power to live in the light. The power to live in the light is to be open, honest, and accountable. The power to live in the darkness is occultic religion. It's the thief, it's the liar, it's the adulterer. The power of informed choice, God gives us freedom, versus the pagan deities that force us into fatalism based on astrology. The power to love hard questions, which Bob and I have both celebrated tonight, versus the power of ignorance. But again, pagan religion shuts off certain questions. And what I love about Biblical religion is that it opens it all up. The believers are allowed to be skeptical in challenging God, in search of the truth, that's an honest skepticism. The power to love enemies, which is what Jesus has done for us on the cross, how we should treat all those who disagree with us. And the power to forgive. What is so powerful about eternal life is that it's a community of people who have been forgiven, who forgive each other. And to me, indeed, that's the community I want to live in now and on the other side of this mortal body. Thank you. Bob Price: Well said, and I affirm the vision there, I think we can find it in Christianity, and Buddhism, and perhaps some others, but I feel that one does encounter, in the New Testament, what I call kind of a gratuitous moral vision, that is one that would not be rationally required by the view of the world. You could just come up with social Darwinism if you wanted to, by just looking at the world. But there's on top of that a kind of a vision one is not forced to accept. But that takes one higher, that does transcend nature, the self-giving ethic of the cross that I find to be challenging and inviting and the great image for that is Jesus calling the disciples, just on the spot beside the Sea of Galilee at the tax collection booth. They don't have to get up and follow him, they're not threatened with being damned if they don't, but here is destiny calling to a higher path and why not take it? And so I find that a refreshing breeze that I find in the New Testament, in Christianity. However, that is not the only voice in the Bible, it seems to me, hence the incoherence, but as Kay-suh-mahn [phonetic] said, even within the New Testament canon, we must test the spirits. It doesn't in any way threaten the integrity of that gospel vision for life; that the Bible is not absolutely coherent with all the ends tied up and with a unified ideology or theology. And the reason that it's important to stress the loose ends as well as what is the beckoning voice of the gospel is just to stress that it is a matter of loving the hard questions, as John says well. And to emphasize that we mustn't oversimplify, and that the exegesis, the interpretation of the Bible that concludes there are contradictions and then tries to make sense of them is itself a result of a love for the Bible and a determination to take it literally. The JEPD thing, for example. I once asked a Pentecostal Bible professor who I had great respect for and still do, what do you think of that hypothesis? And he said, well, I know we're not supposed to like it, but it sure would make sense of some of those difficulties in Exodus. When did God first reveal his name to Moses, there are two different answers to that. And when I say with these old-time, higher critics, well, you see, we can answer that. We all see there's a puzzle there, but if there's a source theory here, that Genesis is scotch-taped together from four earlier narratives that don't agree with each other, hey, there's the answer! It's not an attempt to attack or assault the Bible, it's an attempt to solve the problems of the Bible. The one who looks at it minutely in detail, prying apart the strata of the text is a lover of the Bible who would never bother with such efforts if he or she didn't love the Bible. And it's just as much a way of taking the Bible seriously as those who feel compelled to unify all of it in the outline of systematic theology. Everybody sees there are problems, and what I say is, coherence is in the eye of the beholder. It's a question of what strikes you as a reasonable way of dealing with those obvious differences. You come up with your own way. RETURN TO CONTENTS PAGE

		[Contents] [About the Participants] [Opening Statement by John Rankin] [Opening Statement by Robert Price][Dialog] [Questions from the Audience] [Closing Statements] [Return to Mars Hill Forum]