Synopsis of Misusing Scripture: What Are Evangelicals Doing with the Bible?

The editors asked for responses to the question: Is faith-based scholarship possible, legitimate, and/or ever compatible with critical scholarship?
Given their definition of the term “faith-based” and the evidence they provide, i.e., their experience with large swaths of evangelical scholarship, the editors say no and lead the readers in that direction.
Their definition of faith-based is “any attitude or argument resting overtly or covertly on assumptions or assertions derived from religious doctrine” (front matter; loc 4 Kindle). I agree that any study that begins with a point(s) of doctrine or dogma is deductive. This is not scholarship. Their argument is that evangelical scholarship—studies or research presented by evangelicals—always begins this way and is therefore circular. They are focusing especially on the doctrine of inerrancy, held by many—but not all—evangelicals, and how this affects the conclusions of their research, especially that related to higher criticism and archaeology. Their examples of evangelical scholarship are dominated by this pre-determined conclusion. But they seem to assume that research done by evangelicals that does not target certain modernist, evangelical claims, such as inerrancy, is ‘soft’ or not scholarship at all. I disagree. Any scholar, evangelical or otherwise, can do plenty of research that has nothing to do with inerrancy or other points of dogma. No scholar’s research should begin a pre-determined conclusion, whether it derives from religious doctrine or something else. Legitimacy depends on their focus, methods, evidence, and how well their conclusions are based on the evidence.
So, my short response is a qualified yes. Since one of the primary agendas of the Bible’s producers was to build faith in its receivers, should the research of scholars with faith be, for that reason, considered illegitimate? Professor Seeskin’s response that “Reverence and Objectivity [can] Go Together. There is no reason why awe and reverence cannot be combined with critical objectivity” makes sense to me. On the one hand, the editors agree with Michael Fox, who recognized that persons holding religious faith can do biblical scholarship (5, Loc 175). I hope so. For, as the editors point out, most scholars began with or still retain some sort of faith stance. Their curiosity about, reverence for, wish to understand, and/or focus upon the Bible throughout their professional lives (if not vocation in a religious sense) led them to biblical scholarship and teaching. Although many scholars chose to withdraw from faith commitments, directly related to their critical studies, others have not. Their critical studies have enhanced their appreciation of the Bible, not because it is divine, or perfect, or inerrant, but because it has become even more interesting, useful, and its continued existence as a library at the center of faith communities even more astounding.
Fox’s SBL Forum article, is further used as the basis for the arguments of Misusing, when they say that their use of “faith-based” means that unexamined axioms, such as biblical inerrancy (especially) cannot be the beginning, the basis, or the “pre-determined conclusion of a study” and still be called scholarship. Of course not!

To be fair, an assumption of ‘inerrancy’ would be extremely limiting to many kinds of study projects that may seem, at the outset, to have nothing to do with it. A close reading of biblical texts invariably leads to literary and historical contexts and sources, as well as to recognizing theological, social, and political agendas of the texts’ early producers and preservers that would contradict most definitions of ‘inerrancy.’ I believe, however, that some holders of ‘inerrancy’ recognize that it is a confession that the Holy Spirit guided all the various human authors/redactors to produce that texts as we have them, with traceable sources and so forth. Thus, their research can go forward without reference to this dogma; they compartmentalize. (And they privilege the MT over other textual families’ histories, as Misusing points out.)
Confessions cannot be studied, but only confessed. We can study how texts and families and versions of text emerged and their relationships to one another; no one can study the Holy Spirit’s involvement. Neither can a point of dogma like inerrancy be demonstrated or studied. Contradictions, texture, counterclaims, errors or misconstruals of history or of what we now call science can be examined within the texts, but not inerrancy of the soft or hard kind. It is not there.
Neither inerrancy nor, for that matter, Mosaic authorship of the Torah (or most traditional assumptions about biblical authorship) is claimed in the biblical texts. Rare is the biblical statement that written texts were authored by God (although some New Testament verses have been used to this end).
My qualified “yes” must go further in recognizing the problem of inerrancy, for how can one truly be an open to archaeological evidence (of which there is plenty); that disproves features of biblical narratives evidence that simply cannot be harmonized, but not for want of trying, as Misusing illustrates. A modernist approach to the Bible has always been subject to criticism for not allowing for the theological, social, and political purposes of its creators, writing much later than the time of the stories’ settings.
I agree that inerrancy is an odd way to approach the Bible. It is unnecessary. Why should reading the Bible be received, interpreted, and understood under a rubric of error. Inerrancy comes from a relatively recent proposal that God authored the Bible. God could not be mistaken about any detail, historical or otherwise, regardless of the limitations or agendas of the human authors. But even inerrantists recognize that humans were involved, so they retreat to “inerrant in its original autographs” to explain any contradiction or aberration. This is another invented concept, a figment of the imagination, as tracing the complicated history of the formation of the various versions and editions of the Bible demonstrates.
Regarding the emergence of the Jewish Scriptures, I prefer the word ‘produce’ over author or redact, because many people, over a long time, created and creatively handled the texts that became Scripture. They respectfully received and redacted them, their reverence for the ancient texts growing to the point they decided to freeze the process, to attempt to copy them exactly, giving already authoritative texts even more status. Communities of Jews set these texts apart, made them “sacred.” They did not make the Bible divine.
While recognizing that the editors’ stated goal is to examine conventional evangelical approach to biblical scholarship (8, Loc 299), my quibble with this well researched and clearly written book is that they downplay the progressives and the intra-evangelical dialogue too much. The editors begin by saying that evangelical scholarship exerts “enormous influence on the religious beliefs and practices, and even cultural and political perspectives of millions of evangelical Christians in the US and worldwide” (front matter). Later they rely upon and favorably quote representative scholars from the progressive wing of evangelicalism (e. g., Noll, Sparks, Hays, and Enns). Most who accept the term progressive probably do not call themselves evangelicals anymore, given the appropriation of the term in political parlance. Nonetheless, after showing that they align with the criticisms by progressives of inerrancy and other creeds in their intra-evangelical dialogue with traditionalists, the editors sideline them. They include them in their critique of inerrantist evangelicals, because they are a minority among evangelicals. But if evangelical scholarship has so much influence on millions of people, then surely these intra-evangelical disputes do matter, even if non-evangelical scholars do not care. Certainly, progressives have had tremendous influence on (often now ex-) evangelicals. Consider Peter Enns for one and the late Rachel Held Evans, who relied on Enns’ scholarship for another.
Furthermore, they disregard them because they may still personally hold to “the truth-telling nature of Scripture,” and its authority (26, 28, loc 804, 857), as well as “essential tenets of Christianity,” such as Jesus’ incarnation and resurrection. These are tenets of personal faith, and to marginalize progressive scholars because of their personal faith belies the early admission by Fox—and the editors—that criticism of poor methodology and predetermined conclusions is not meant to discount scholars of faith. If their topic was the virgin birth and their research demonstrated that a human impregnated Mary, but they circled back to the virgin birth creedal statement instead of allowing their research to stand, then this would be another example of illegitimate scholarship. But to sideline the progressive critics of inerrancy because they may hold Scripture in high regard or believe in Jesus’ resurrection is to say that the progressives’ criticisms of unhelpful –even harmful—doctrines is not important and that the scholarship of persons of any kind of faith is illegitimate, unless it conflicts with faith teachings (28, Loc 868). The works of Sparks, Hays and Enns, demonstrate that they do submit the Bible to open-minded and open-ended research, as I do.
I have taught in Christian colleges and a seminary, and I hope my teaching encourages my students’ faith in God. The Bible also is a faith-in God-building enterprise. Faith cannot stand apart from truth. Using the Bible faithfully means examining it closely and following wherever the investigations may lead.

As I read Misusing Scripture’s introduction, I wonder whether it makes sense to add anything else to such a long list of reactions, blogs, book chapters and even books on misusing Scripture. What I can contribute is a lense from my own corner of the world, Argentina. Latin American scholarship is still in the making, so to speak. Most of us have been trained in the North-Atlantic world, where our particular contexts and perspectives were, for a long time, colorful anecdotes but not part of academic scholarship. This translates into a slow process of integrating our different perspectives into our scholarship, as we grow more confident in our own right to speak with our own voice. Furthermore, our theological schools often had, at least until de beginning of this century, scholars from their respective “mother churches” as part of their faculties. Most Latin American countries do not include Divinity schools in their State universities, leaving theology, therefore, to the private realm of the churches.

Our struggles in Latin America are particularly related to counter colonization, patriarchy, racism, and classism. Today, we also face the consequences of economic and ecological disasters produced mainly by decisions made by others in other parts of the globe.

One of the main issues derived from misuse of the Scriptures is that of a rigid and artificial model of family life, allegedly instituted by God Himself (sic) at the creation of the world as the only valid family model forever. I contend that it is a misuse of Scripture because it forgets that there are several family models in the Bible (see Tom Hanks, La diversidad ¡50! de familias en la Biblia (Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires: Epifanía, 2016) besides the nuclear, binary, heterosexual, patriarcal family model espoused by its proponents (furthermore, these Scripture misusers misread gender theories, labelling them an ideology). Consequences of this misuse go from denying women sexual and reproductive rights to preaching the indisoluble character of marriage, even under violent circumstances.

I contend that they also misread Scripture by deriving from this only family model total denial of female sexual and reproductive rights; “male and female he created them” ends up being the ground for prohibition—only for the female—of premarital sexual relations, prohibition of contraceptives, prohibition of abortion, and blaming the mother for single parenthood. While female sexual and reproductive rights in Ancient Israel might have been denied to most women (at least, those under a patriarchal figure), it is debatable that they be derived from Genesis 1! There is, also, a “hermeneutical leap”, disregarding differences in social and historical conditions that put women in dangerous situations for the sake of fixed and idealized “family” and “motherhood” models (see particularly Susanne Scholz’s examples of essentializing women in the USA). Sadly, I have to attest to the fact that not only Evangelicals are guilty of misuse of Scripture when it comes to gender (see, e.g., “Male and Female He Created Them”: Towards A Path of Dialogue on The Question of Gender Theory in Education, by the Congregation For Catholic Education, Vatican City, 2019, https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/ccatheduc/documents/rc…). Perhaps many of us do not deem the Bible inerrant; yet, we all hold beliefs we are not ready to re-examine in the light of contemporary events or academic consensuses. This is of course no justification for misuse of Scripture by evangelicals.

Mercedes L. García Bachmann, PhD

Institute for Pastoral Contextual Studies, United Evangelical Lutheran Church (Argentina-Uruguay), Adjunct Distinguished Faculty, Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago (USA).