How is the Bible true?

Each week in OT501 - Pentateuch, we are asked to post about 5 paragraphs in response to a question from the prof. So far, I've found these pretty engaging, and will publish the question and my answer here from time to time as class rolls on.

As a preface to this post there was a little joke in the readings that made a great point on the difference between Modernism and Post-modernism. To understand the post that follows, I'll repeat the joke here:

"Consider the joke told by Walter Truett Anderson (as reported by J. Richard Middleton and Brian J. Walsh:

...three umpires are having a beer after a baseball game. One says, "There's balls and there's strikes, and I call 'em the way they are." Another responds, "There's balls and there's strikes, and I call 'em the way I see 'em." The third says, "There's balls and there's strikes, but they ain't neither' until I calls 'em."

Middleton and Walsh comment:

"So what is reality? [Or, in terms of this online discussion, what is true?] Are there balls and strikes objectively out there in the world as the first ump implies? Most baseball fans and hometown commentators insist that there are, though some might side with the second ump in his more honest appraisal of his own subjectivity. Many postmodern thinkers, however, wonder whether the third ump just might have the most honest position of the three. How do we know, after all, if there is anything "real" beyond our judgments?"

They comment further:

"The first ump is a naïve realist, believing that human knowing is a matter of seeking direct correspondence between the external world and epistemological judgments. The second ump knows that access to the external world is always mediated by the perspective of the knower. He might be called a perspectival realist (or perhaps a critical realist), since he recognizes that the way he sees the world invariably affects his epistemological judgments. The third ump pushes this perspectivalism to its extreme. His perspective is all there is, or at least all that matters. The radical perspectivalism epitomizes the postmodern shift."



Post from Week 2 of OT501:

Q: How is Bible true (case-in-point, Genesis 1-11)?

A: The umpire joke in this week's readings was a great little way to understand the move from a Modernist (objective) view of truth to a Postmodernist (subjective) view. As our culture moves further and further away from the Positivist Modernism of the Enlightenment, it seems that the arguments of traditional fundamentalist apologetics are losing steam, while storytelling is gaining much ground. Even doctrinal statements which state that the Scriptures are inerrant in their original languages are difficult to maintain in the current culture, which seems to routinely reject objective, definitive truth claims just on their face. Claiming that the Bible is true in the same way that a science or mathematics textbook is true is now rejected out of hand as uninformed and simplistic.

So, the question of HOW the Bible is true is a very important one for our current day. If we stay away from the notion that truth is discernible at an atomic level, as granular as Greek syllables or Hebrew vowel markings, and able to be summarized up from there to broad doctrines, then I think we can actually have a fruitful discussion about truth with our Postmodern culture. To stand squarely on the idea of truth residing at the level of specific word choices made by the inspired authors of Scripture, is to deliberately disengage from dialogue with our present postmodern culture. We render ourselves obsolete, and surrender our right to make truth claims, when we insist on objective truth existing at a granular level in the Bible.

And the sad thing is... we don't have to do that to be "faithful" to Scripture, or to hold it in high esteem. There is plenty of truth to go around! For instance, the narrative of Gen. 1-11 communicates truth on several fronts:

1) the character of God (merciful, relational, just),
2) the nature of humankind (fallen, but still bearers of God's image),
3) the consequences of our sin to us and to creation,
4) God's desire (and actions) for our (and creation's) redemption.

I also believe the Pentateuch specifically can be trusted to contain faithful transmission of ancient oral traditions passed down from earliest times, until such point as literacy was sufficiently pervasive to allow faithful preservation of those traditions via the written word. And just like we pass down to our children through faithful repetition the most treasured of our "family stories", the Pentateuch does the same for the treasured stories of God's family: Creation, the Flood, the Patriarchs, Moses, the Exodus, the Promised Land. Just because they are many generations removed from us today doesn't mean they aren't true family stories that tell us who we are, and how we fit into God's purposes.

These stories are effective, in much the same way as Jesus' parables are effective, at telling others about who God is, who we are, and why we're here. Modernism and objective truth can't make us feel like family. Treasured stories, faithfully preserved and told, can.