The Authority of God's Word: Is the Bible the inspired and infallible Word of God?

In the next 2 posts, I will attempt to address two important questions when considering the authority of the Bible.

1. What is meant by the phrase "The Bible is the inspired and infallible Word of God?"

2. Is the Scripture alone sufficient as a source of truth and authority?


The phrase "The Bible is the inspired and infallible Word of God" literally means that Christians believe:

1. That the Bible is of such surpassing excellence as to suggest divine inspiration. [Inspired]

2. That the Bible is also incapable of failure, deception or error. [Infallible]

3. That the Bible is the express revelation of God's purpose and plan for mankind, and not simply collected writings of men. [Word of God]

Historically the Church has always believed the Scriptures to be the inspired and infallible Word of God, and thus should be considered the highest authority in Christian life. This fact can be clearly seen through the writings of many faithful men of the Church throughout history. Clement of Rome wrote in approximately 100 AD "Look carefully into the Scriptures which are the true utterances of the Holy Spirit." Justin Martyr, one of the most famous early Christian apologists wrote "We must not suppose the language proceeds from the men who are inspired but from the divine word which moves them." Irenaeus of Gaul (130-202 AD) wrote "The Scriptures are perfect inasmuch as they were uttered by the word of God and His Spirit, though we want of the knowledge of their mysteries." Origen Adamantius (182-251 AD) wrote "We cannot say of the writings of the Holy Spirit, that anything in them is useless or superfluous, even if they seem to some obscure." Augustine (354-430 AD), considered by many to be the greatest theologian of the ancient church, said "Therefore, we yield to and agree the authority of the Holy Scripture which can neither be deceived or deceive." More recently men such as Martin Luther, who wrote "For whoever despises a single word of God does not regard any as important" and John Calvin, who referred to the Scriptures as "the sure and infallible record", "the unerring standard" and "the pure word of God", have also fiercely held that the Scriptures are the perfect Word of God and as such are the highest source of Authority for any Christian.

It would be a tragic error to claim more of the Bible than it claims for itself, however it would be equally tragic to claim less that Scripture itself indicates.

Exodus 4:10-12 tells us plainly that God gave Moses the words to speak, Exodus 34:27 says "Then the LORD said to Moses, "Write down these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel." also tells us that what Moses wrote was indeed the Word of God, perfect and intact. Deuteronomy 4:2 is a clear statement of God's authority through the Scripture. "Do not add to what I command you and do not subtract from it, but keep the commands of the LORD your God that I give you." Deuteronomy 18:20 "But a prophet who presumes to speak in my name anything I have not commanded him to say, or a prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, must be put to death." describes the consequences of falsely claiming that something is the Word of God.

Each of the Prophets in the Old Testament also claim to be speaking the Words of God. In Isaiah there are about twenty claims that he was speaking the Words of the Lord, eg. Isaiah 1:10 "Hear the word of the Lord...". Jeremiah makes similar claims more than one hundred times eg. Jeremiah 1:4 "The word of the LORD came to me, saying..." Ezekiel also claims more than sixty time that he is speaking the very words of God "...This is what the Sovereign LORD says..." (Ezekiel 3:10-11) Daniel says he heard and reported directly from God "Then I heard Him speaking, and as I listened to him..." (Daniel 10:9) Each of the twelve minor prophets also plainly claim to be repeating the words of God, see Hosea 1:1, Joel 1:1, Amos 3:1, Obadiah 1:1, Jonah 1:1, Micah 1:1, Nahum 1:12, Habakkuk 2:2, Zephaniah 1:1, Haggai 1:1, Zechariah 1:1 and Malachi 1:1.

David, a man after God's own heart, wrote "Your word, O LORD, is eternal; it stands firm in the heavens." and the whole of Psalm 119 deals with David's concept of the truthfulness and purity of the Scriptures as the Word of God.

There are also many passages in the New Testament which address the infallibility and authority of Scripture as the Word of God.

2 Timothy 3:16-17 - "All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."

2 Peter 1:20-21 - "Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation. For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit."

James 1:18 - "He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created."

Since the Scripture is the Word of God we are to have as much Faith in Scripture as in God Himself. For if God can create the Universe by the power of His Words then His Words should remain true. Christian Faith rests on the Word and Truth of God's Word. The Bible surely testifies of God's honesty.

Titus 1:2 - "...a faith and knowledge resting on the hope of eternal life, which God, who does not lie, promised before the beginning of time..."

Jesus also held the Scripture to be the word of God and to be authoritive.

Matthew 5:17-20 - "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished..."

Jesus knew and said that the Scriptures predicted He would come. The Scriptures always testify of Christ and His majesty. Jesus is in the Old Testament concealed, in almost every event and cirtainly every Jewish religious observance. Jesus is in the New Testament as the Messiah revealed.

John 5:39 - "You diligently study the Scriptures because you think that by them you possess eternal life. These are the Scriptures that testify about me."

Jesus authenticated the New Testament Scriptures as inspired by God before they were even written.

John 14:26 - "But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you."

Belief in the divine inspiration and infallibility of Scripture simply means that God used men to write the Bible. He overruled their particular imperfections, and did not allow any human faults or imperfection to enter the Scriptures which were written.

This does not imply mechanical dictation. God did not audibly dictate the scriptures as a business executive might dictate a letter for a secretary. God used the human intelligence, literary style and personal feelings of each author of Scripture. He did not remove them. He did not force material through an unwilling writer but prepared the writer for the task. God's light of truth is not distorted by the coloured glass of the writer's humanity. God designed the writer's humanity to colour His truth in a very precise and perfect way. God did not need to search all of humanity untill He found Paul so we could have the Pauline Epistles, God created Paul and conditioned him for exactly that purpose.

This does not imply that the modern translations are inspired or infallible. Only the original manuscripts were inspired. Whereever humans are involved there will be errors. No book has ever been reproduced, especially by hand which has not incurred some error. It is unreasonable to hold the Author responcible for this in an ordiany book, so we should not hold God responcible for this with the Bible. As far back as Augustine, there was distinction made between the original manuscripts and copies in regards to accuracy. "If, in one of these books, I stumble accross something which seems opposed to the truth, I have no hesitation in saying that either my copy is faulty or the translator has not fully grasped what was said, or else I myself have not fully understood." In spite of this God's message in the Scriptures is very close to its original form in the modern translations. This is why it is important to use multiple translations for Biblical study, and why the study of the original-language, root-words is helpful.

This especially does not mean any single, modern translation is inspired. People who passionately advocate only one translation as being the inspired and preserved Word of God in accordance with Matthew 5:18 are usually "King James Only" people. In effect, people who believe this position claim that Christians who do not speak or understand English, espeially middle or Old Elglish, have no access to the authoritive Scriptures. In order to hold the inerrancy of scripture, it it not required or defensible to believe that only one modern translation is inspired.

This does not eliminate the human element of the Scriptures. Each of the authors of Scripture has their own distinct, if at times subtle, characteristics. The vocabulary, form, phrasing and the way they say things indicate their humanity and personalities. The wirters of the Scriptures were not intended to write about everything, Paul possibly believed the world was flat, he cirtainly would not have understood higher order calculus, or Einsteinian Physics. He was not called to write about these things so it does not matter what he thought about them. The important thing is that he did not introduce any error into the things he was called to write and any Scriptures he wrote were divinely inspired and thus contain no fault.

This does not eliminate figurative language. Literal inspriation of Scripture means the literature was inspired, the words were inspired, not that all the words are intended to be literally understood as opposed to figuratively. It is just as destructive to Biblical truth to interpret a figurative passage as being literal, as it is to interpret a literal passage as being figurative. If I said "My nose is running while I am running around the oval" everyone would understand the difference in the meanings of the word running. The language of the Bible should be offered this same coutesey.

This does not require exact duplication in parallel passages. In the gospels there are apparent discrepancies. These however should be treated with patience and caution and most likely arise from our incomplete understanding. For instance Mr X recieved a phone call to say his wife had been injured at home and was being rushed to hospital. On his way to meet her he recieves another phone call to inform him that his wife has been in a car accident and is being rushed to hospital. Which is correct? When he arrives at the hospital, Mr X is informed by the doctor that his wife had fallen off a chair at home, and was being driven to the hospital when she was involved in a car accident, and was then rushed to the hospital. When we are confronted with a discrepancy in the Gospel accounts of Jesus, it is most likely that they simply are relaying different aspects of the events of His life and in fact are both true. This should not surprise us as each of the Gospels had different human authors.

Divine Inspiration means that the Bible is accurate in all that it says an it will not deceive its readers theologically, historically, chronologically, geographically or scientifically. Of course the Bible is not a textbook on science, or history, or geography. The Bible is not even a textbook on theology. However, whatever the Bible says about any of these things is correct and no one will ever be deceived or led into error by believing what the Bible says.

According to Scripture, Jesus and the Church Fathers, the Bible is either totally inerrant and is reliable in all things or else it is not reliable at all and may be decietful at any point. Who is to say then, where the Bible is truthful and where is it not? The modern answer is that "the Holy Spirit will guide us" but this leads to nothing more than relativism, pluralism and mysticism. This answer denys the authority of Scripture and means the human mind is the final test which truth must pass through. This leads to an entirely different from of Christianity to Biblical Christianity which claims the Word of God and the contained Gospel of Christ is Truth. This issue will be addressed in my next post.

Further reading:

Biblical Authority: The Critical Issue for the Body of Christ by James T. Draper & Kenneth Keathley

The Authority of God's Word: Is the Scripture alone sufficient as a source of truth and authority? and Where did the Bible come from? by the Modern Day Magi

Looking for Jesus is Genesis: I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, by T A Blankenship at Fire and Hammer.