Enns – Inspiration and Incarnation

I recently read completely Inspiration and Incarnation by Peter Enns. (I had previously read parts of it.) This book was the catalyst in Enns’ departure from Westminster Seminary at the behest of the board, although he apparently had the support of the faculty. (You can probably Google it and find the information if you are interested.)

Many others, including D. A. Carson and John Frame, have reviewed it, so I have no desire to do that here. (BTW, if anyone knows where Carson’s review is, please let me know. The links I have found are broken.)

However, let me offer a few brief thoughts on this book that has caused some angst among evangelicals.

Enns does a good job of bringing out some points. He argues that the OT accommodated itself to its readers in certain ways (which no one I know of denies) and gives numerous illustrations. He writes in an easy to read style that makes things fairly simple (which is the great danger … It is intelligible.) He is loaded up with information and documentation. At first glance, without strong theological underpinnings, Enns makes sense. And he makes a good case for humility in our conclusions.

But here’s the rub for me: I think Enns is writing from a very simplistic and limited view of the theological doctrine of inspiration as revelation from God. IMO, Enns essentially denies any meaningful doctrine of inerrancy in bibliology. (I realize I am making some pretty direct statements about a recognized scholar in OT, but I find it hard to draw any other conclusion. How does a robust historical doctrine of bibliology allow for the conclusions that Enns draws?)

He seems to assume that since ANE texts reveal a similarity to the OT, that somehow has implications for the inspiration of the OT that move away from the historic doctrine of inspiration. I disagree. There’s no reason why similarity has a negative impact on the inerrancy or accuracy of the OT. As many have pointed out, the historicity of the worldwide flood should cause us to expect flood accounts in other ancient peoples stories. Why that means that the biblical account is somehow mythical or inaccurate is not clear, nor is it well-founded. In fact, only if the flood was a true world-wide destruction should we expect other accounts. If the flood was merely local, there is less of a reason for parallel accounts since those unaffected by the flood would have little reason to tell the story. Other examples could be cited.

Enns leans heavily on second temple hermeneutics (which is essentially the way that people interpreted the Bible between the restoration of Israel from Babylon in the fifth century B. C. and the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70) to argue that the NT writers used the OT in some ways that seem pretty weird to us but were perfectly normal for the first century readers. IMO, he hasn’t made a convincing argument that his conclusions are necessary or even accurate. This section he loads up with illustrations, but doesn’t seem to coherently draw his conclusions from those illustrations. I think this stems from a view of inspiration that is too limited given the biblical data on the subject.

So overall, while I found Enns interesting, I didn’t find him compelling nor particularly credible in some of these matters.

Why did I read Enns? Because as a student with some interest in the OT (and particularly in the early second temple era … Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Zechariah, Haggai, Malachi), this is an idea that is getting some traction outside of its normal liberal habitat. It is working its way into evangelicalism (as evidenced by coming from someone who taught at Westminster for years).

Should you read Enns? No, I think there are better things to do with your time … like read the phone book or count the hairs on your head.

Scholarship, Faith, and the BAR

A man in my church recently gave me some back issues of the Biblical Archaeology Review, which can be found online here. The March/April 2007 issue contains an article entitled "Losing Faith: How Scholarship Affects Scholars" (pp. 50-57).

This interview was participated in by the well-known Bart Erhman, James F. Strange ("a leading archaeologist and Baptist minister"), Lawrence H. Schiffman ("a prominent Dead Sea Scroll scholar and Orthodox Jew"),, and William G. Dever ("one of America's best-known and most widely quoted archaeologists, who had been an evangelical preacher, then lost his faith, then became a Reform Jew, and now says he's a non-believer").

The interview was interesting at parts, and boring at others. But there were some notable exchanges (and an unsurprising unanimous rejection of inerrancy (p. 52)).

Ehrman blames his turning on the problem of theodicy, where he concluded "Finally, because I became dissatisfied with all the conventional answers [though there is no hint of what these answers were nor why he rejected them], I decided that I couldn't believe in a God who was in any way intervening in this world, given the state of things. So that's why I ended up losing my faith."

Ehrman later comments that the implausibility of the resurrection had a "damaging impact on my faith."

Strange says "My faith is based on my own experience--a good old Protestant principle [one with which I am not familiar] ... I love the existentialist philosophers. I love to read them, not because they're giving me any testable facts. It's because it's like reading a really good poet. It does something to you that propositional truth never does."

Strange comments on the suffering of people saying that "Suffering tends to disconfirm the hypothesis [of a loving God that intervenes upon the earth]." (To him I would recommend the recent four message series presented by John Piper at Wheaton College.)

Dever, whose father was a "fire-breathing fundamentalist" was himself an ordained minister at age 17 who went to divinity school at Harvard. There he read George Ernest Wright's God Who Acts, who says "In Biblical faith, everything depends upon whether the original events actually happened." [Editorial note: There is something admirable in an unbeliever who at least recognizes that very fact, as opposed to these professing believers who think they can be a Christian with a "Christ" who didn't actually do what the biblical record says he did.] Dever freely admits that his scholarship destroyed his faith while working as an archaeologist in Israel (p. 54). He says, "That's when I converted to Judaism. [Laughs] I did it precisely because you don't have to be religious to be a Jew. And I'm perfectly comfortable where I am."

Now, I say all this, not to comment individually and refute their statements, which could be ably addressed. I say this rather to make a few short comments.

First, all these men allowed their experience to dictate their approach to God. They all, in essence, assert that "Because God did not act like I thought or think he should, I chose not to believe what God said about himself." However, we must realize that experience follows our exegesis and understanding of Scripture. It must not determine it. We must never allow our experience to dictate our understanding of God through his word. We must instead allow our understanding of God through his word to dictate our experience in God's created world.

Second, these men believe that true scholarship lead them away from the God who is the fountain of knowledge. Such an assertion is absurd on its face. It would be as if understanding that 2+2=4 convinces us that mathematics is a faulty and untrustworthy discipline.

The truth is that true scholarship always leads us to God, not away from him. And true scholarship recognizes the weaknesses of the fallen mind. These men seem not to recognize the truth of Ephesians 4:17-19 which asserts that the unbelievers mind is darkened, ignorant, and hardened against the truth. That is a darkness that only the Holy Spirit can overcome. God reminds us that he "who said, "Light shall shine out of darkness," is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ."

Faith is the the supernatural gift of God that comes from the light that reveals the true glory of Christ. These men have simply never seen it. Perhaps having tasted of the power of God and of the age to come, they have fallen away, as a dog returning to his vomit.

Third, these men, perhaps because of their rejection of inerrancy, fail to recognize the reason because the current state of affairs. The ultimate issue in evil in the world is the sinfulness of humanity. If you reject human sinfulness, then you do wonder why the world is broken, seemingly beyond repair. If you accept human sinfulness, but reject the crucified and risen Messiah, then you find the hopelessness of despair which comes when you realize there is no true remedy. The best you can hope for is to "try harder to do better." Atonement is found in things that bring no true hope.

Fourth, the hope of these men, as with all men whether the most educated and studied, or the least educated and knowledgeable is that the hope of life lies with God alone. One reason I am a Calvinist in my soteriology is because of situations like this. We cannot argue these men "into the kingdom." We are but vessels of weakness, used by God to proclaim forth his glory in the gospel. But ultimately God must open the eyes and bring regeneration and saving faith. And when that happens, true scholarship can take place.

I say again as I have often said, if I believed that I had to convince people to come to Christ for salvation I would put down my Bible, and never preach again. I have not the power of mind or eloquence of speech to convince even the most gullible to come to faith in Christ. Were not the sovereign power of God at work in preaching, my voice would be but a clanging cacophony of noise. Only the Spirit of God, working unilaterally and sovereignly in the hearts of sinful man, can take the preached word and bring spiritual life to the hearer.