More on Inerrancy
Joshua B joins the discussion:
I think we need to be careful about discussing inerrancy, which has an important place in magisterial texts prior to VCII, but is curiously absent from Dei Verbum. DV says that ”the books of Scripture must be acknowledged as teaching solidly, faithfully and without error that truth which God wanted put into sacred writings for the sake of salvation,” but it does not teach that the texts are inerrant in faith and morals. Furthermore, verification of error generally requires some sort of empirical fact check. This simply cannot be done in regard to the Bible. There is a Truth which is taught without error in the Scriptures, but what that is precisely is left unanswered by the Council. This does not seem to support to semi-fundamentalist understanding of inerrancy which is often put forth. For example, in 1 Sam 15:11 God tells Samuel, “I regret that I made Saul king,” but in verse 29, Samuel says to Saul “The Glory of Israel will not recant or change his mind; for he is not a mortal that he should change his mind.” In Hebrew, the words for “regret” and “change his mind” are the same word. Clearly we must be cautious in how understand inerrancy and in how we draw grand theological ideas from these complex texts.
Comments are closed.
Dei Verbum also says something which leans toward moral inerrancy:
Chapter three of Dei Verbum section 11 reads as follows:
“For holy mother Church, relying on the belief of the Apostles (see John 20:31; 2 Tim. 3:16; 2 Peter 1:19-20, 3:15-16), holds that the books of both the Old and New Testaments in their entirety, with all their parts, are sacred and canonical because written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they have God as their author and have been handed on as such to the Church herself.(1) In composing the sacred books, God chose men and while employed by Him (2) they made use of their powers and abilities, so that with Him acting in them and through them, (3) they, as true authors, consigned to writing everything and only those things which He wanted. (4)
The very last words “only those things which He wanted” and the words “with all their parts” is in my view contradicted by those who would like to make certain moral passages regarding slavery for example vanish or at least be viewed as moral error and they are not according to Dei Verbum’s wording: “only those things which He wanted.” You can argue that Dei Verbum despite the title which includes the word “dogmatic” is not infallible; but you can’t argue that Dei Verbum is allowing for moral precepts within the Bible which God did not intend to be written.
they, as true authors, consigned to writing everything and only those things which He wanted.
You know, as a teacher of literature, I sometimes question the critical reading skills of those who purport to be “conservatives” regarding the development of doctrince (and who are, actually, fundamentalists, i.e. heretics):
They consigned to WRITING (which is a time-bound, temporal activity) everything HE “wanted” at the moment of THEIR writing, but it would have been scientifically (i.e. linguistically) and physiologically IMPOSSIBLE) for them to have written down AT ANY MOMENT everything that was in the mind of God–that is, hidden from a temporal perspective, or everything that God would eventually want in the fullness of time.
Jesus revealed God is our Abba, our Dad. As such, He knows His children and He gives us laws that fulfill us as children. We are not God; His ways are not our ways. He does not wield power arbitrarily, He does so as a loving Father who knows what His children need.
Since God is the Supreme Being, everything that is, is connected to Him. Our inability to understand His commands regarding the conquering of the Promised Land does not change this.
Does it?
And, by the way, if I am wrong in what I wrote above, there would be no need for an institution like what we Catholics have–an ecclesia that “rides time like riding a river.” All we’d need would be Sacred Scripture–no interpretation, no sacred tradition, no Pentecost, no sacramental union of that ecclesia.
Are you sure you aren’t Protestant?
It is interesting to me that one faction arguing here is so intent on a particular theory of inspiration or inerrancy that they are willing to cast doubt on the moral teachings of the Church. As I pointed out, John Paul II in paragraph 80 of Veritatis splendor very specifically includes slavery in a list intrinsic evils. Consequently, because of Leviticus 25:44-46 (which says in part, “Such slaves you may own as chattels, and leave to your sons as their hereditary property, making them perpetual slaves”) John Paul II must be considered wrong. He can’t be teaching infallibly, because what he said — according to some of the interpretations here — contradicts the Bible. God tells the Hebrews they may own slaves, so slavery must have been acceptable at that particular time, which means in cannot be intrinsically evil.
Of course, the other faction (to which I belong) points to the moral teachings of the Church and tries to use them to demonstrate that there is something wrong with the “inerrancy faction’s” theories about scripture. It seems to me, though, that the moral teachings of the Church, though not simple, are relatively easy to understand, whereas interpreting what writers over two thousand years ago meant to convey is quite difficult.
In any case, if slavery is not intrinsically evil, then I think we need to reconsider the arguments of those who were on the losing side of the American Civil War that slavery is acceptable. And for those who are concerned about modern-day slavery and human trafficking, if it was moral in the Old Testament, you will have to demonstrate why it is simply presumed wrong today.
And while you’re at it, explain why God blessed the incestuous union of Abraham and Sarah — Sarah was Abraham’s half sister — with a son (Isaac) who is the ancestor of all the Chosen People.
Digby
I think you jumped to a conclusion. The Church may indeed oppose slavery as a moral evil but not as an intrinsic evil and she can oppose it now in the modern world despite God in Leviticus 25:44 affirming chattel slavery for the Jews. But when She does so, She has to be more careful than Vatican II and John Paul II (both in a non infallible mode) ( each of whom called it “criminal” and “intrinsic evil” respectively). To use those latter terms is to correct God retroactively. It cannot be “intrinsic evil” if it was good in the context of namadic primitive times when God gave it to the Jews. He also allowed them divorce though Malachi 2:16 says that He hates divorce. God allowed things which His antecedent will would not have willed in themselves as the best thing.
Slavery was not a moral evil when God gave it to the Jews in Leviticus in that context even though it is evil now in our context.
I think part of what God wants written down is clear evidence of human fallibility and inability to correctly discern the divine will, as evidence of our need to be cautious, especially when tempted to attribute intrinsic evil to the divine will.
God Bless
But when She does so, She has to be more careful than Vatican II and John Paul II (both in a non infallible mode) ( each of whom called it “criminal” and “intrinsic evil” respectively). To use those latter terms is to correct God retroactively.
Bill,
So your interpretation of Leviticus is more trustworthy than John Paul II’s statement in Veritatis splendor? The Pope, in an encyclical, inadvertently or carelessly accused God of approving an intrinsic evil?
Slavery was not a moral evil when God gave it to the Jews in Leviticus in that context even though it is evil now in our context.
The Catechism says:
It surely doesn’t read as if slavery used to be okay in the ancient world but is immoral in the modern world. “A sin against the dignity of persons and their fundamental rights” would seem to be a sin at any time, under any circumstances.
bill,
You are sliding into moral relativism (thinking that slavery is OK in a certain social and historical context).
The Church teaches that slavery is intrinsically evil. Ditto genocide. That means evil always and everywhere, regardless of intent or circumstance, and even in Leviticus.
The Catholic approach to reading scripture is to read it with the mind of the Church, which rules out any interpretations that God could ever have commanded anything that is intrinsically evil.
God Bless
Joshua B,
Dei Verbum 11 expressly asserts that “the books of the Old and the New Testaments, whole and entire, with all their parts…have God as their author” and that the human authors “consigned to writing whatever he wanted written, and nothing more.”
Vatican II thus leaves intact the dogma that the Scriptures were “dictated” – yes, “dictated” – either from Christ’s own word of mouth or by the Holy Ghost. What you condemn as “semi-fundamentalism” is CATHOLIC DOGMA.
1 Samuel 15:29 doesn’t say that the Lord is incapable of repenting but that he will not repent from his determination to cast Saul down from the throne. It is no good for Saul to waste his time to convince the Lord to change his mind. Saul accepts this and seeks only to delay the inevitable.
Verse 11 says God repents of making Saul king. Verse 29 says God will not repent from casting Saul down. There is absolutely no inconsistency. Nice try though.
The greater theological problem of how “God” could “repent” – which has nothing to do with the literal meaning of this text – is easily solved. God remains the same, but his activity changes because of differences in circumstances and conditions. When Scripture says God repents of creating man (Gn 6:6) or repents of making Saul king, it means that the decisions of man and Saul have precipitated a change in the divine activity toward them. Yet because God remains free, almighty and sovereign, the change is attributed in anthropomorphic language and categories.
David Nickol,
I’d have to check wikipedia, but I’m pretty sure Veritatis Splendor was written AFTER the coming of Jesus Christ. Is that significant? Let’s ask Veritatis Splendor:
“This is what is at stake: the reality of Christ’s redemption. Christ has redeemed us! This means that he has given us the possibility of realizing the entire truth of our being; he has set our freedom free from the domination of concupiscence” (VS 103).
God’s commands in the Old Testament must be understood in the context of what the pope here calls “the domination of concupiscence.” Before the redemption of Christ, God dealt with man in a way that was consistent with the fact that man did not have “the possibility of realizing the entire truth of his being.”
You are stripping Pope John Paul II and the Second Vatican Council of their context in the dispensation of Christian redemption.
David,
The Trent catechism supported slavery implicitly in its comments on the 7th and 10th commandments where it forbade stealing another man’s slave or coveting another man’s slave because they were his “property”.
Catechisms are to some extent creatures of their time and only when they quote the infallible documents of the extraordinary magisterium, are they themselves instruments of the infallible. As to John Paul II, what makes you think he ever read Leviticus 25:44? No Pope I ever heard about has been well known for mastering the Old Testament the way Augustine, Jerome and Aquinas did. And if he did read that part of Leviticus, we have reason to believe in section 40 of Evangelium Vitae that he saw aspects of the Law as really coming from humans and not God. That perhaps is why he saw nothing problematic with Brown being on the PBC.
Chris,
Quite simply you place the Living Magisterium above the obvious sense of a moral scripture. The Bible has chronological, scientific and scribal errors…not moral errors. Popes can interpret but not delete scripture and they can interpret within the parameters of preserving what is handed to them according to Dei Verbum. You are implicitly saying they can delete what is handed to them and that such deletion is interpreting. No…it’s deleting. Deuteronomy 4:2
“In your observance of the commandments of the LORD, your God, which I enjoin upon you, you shall not add to what I command you nor subtract from it.”
Dei Verbum Chapter 2 next to last paragraph:
“This teaching office is not above the word of God, but serves it, teaching only… what has been handed on…, listening to it devoutly, guarding it scrupulously and explaining it faithfully in accord with a divine commission and with the help of the Holy Spirit, it draws from this one deposit of faith everything which it presents for belief as divinely revealed.”
Now the Pope does not have to hand on much of the 700+ laws from the OT that is now surpassed…but he cannot condemn implicitly what God commanded then and John Paul II did that in section 80 by using “intrinsic evil” rather than another description since intrinsic evil is not given by God in any age as a grant.
Chris Sullivan and Kyle,
“With regard to intrinsically evil acts,” John Paul II expressly says, “it is lawful to tolerate a lesser moral evil in order to avoid a greater evil” (Veritatis Splendor 80).
Tolerating evil is very different than committing evil, Carl. You have defended the committing of intrinsically evil acts, not merely their tolerlation.
The “I enjoin”, “I command” here is not God commanding but the sacred author having Moses command (the sacred author writing many centuries after Moses).
The fundamental error here is ascribing to the divine command that which the text itself clearly ascribes to human command.
Very fallible and culturally conditioned human command.
God Bless
Carl,
Why not give the quotation in full?:
With regard to intrinsically evil acts, and in reference to contraceptive practices whereby the conjugal act is intentionally rendered infertile, Pope Paul VI teaches: “Though it is true that sometimes it is lawful to tolerate a lesser moral evil in order to avoid a greater evil or in order to promote a greater good, it is never lawful, even for the gravest reasons, to do evil that good may come of it (cf. Rom 3:8) — in other words, to intend directly something which of its very nature contradicts the moral order, and which must therefore be judged unworthy of man, even though the intention is to protect or promote the welfare of an individual, of a family or of society in general”.”
The quotation you give says exactly the opposite of what you want it to say. It says that, while it is sometimes permissible to choose a lesser evil to avoid a greater one, this is never the case with regard to intrinsic evils.
Regarding that passage from Leviticus allowing slavery, I wonder if we can assume that this type of law can be considered necessarily identical to a divinely sanctioned moral principle. I recall what Jesus said about divorce–an issue already brought up above–that the law allowed it because people were hard-headed (or words to that effect). The problem of God sanctioning an “intrinsic evil” goes away if we do not interpret the passage as God sanctioning it by this law.
But even if we do interpret the passage in the latter sense, the text remains a time-bound context-specific assertion of what the human author/s in their time and situation believed to be a God-given moral principle. That is the datum we have to work with.
As I understand the current Catholic teaching on the Bible, believing that the passage is divinely inspired means that God put it there to teach me something–to be understood in the context of the whole Bible and especially the words and deeds of our Lord Jesus Christ, and in accordance with the interpretive tradition of the Church; it does not mean that I am simply to take what the human author/s said at face value–no interpretation needed–in the manner of some Protestants who view the Bible as “Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth.”
Kyle,
My position is that God TOLERATED the evil of commanding the genocide of the seven nations in order to prevent the greater evil of Israel giving itself to the abominable practices of these nations.
On the human side, Israel TOLERATED the evil of killing children in order to prevent the greater evil of disobeying God.
I believe these statements are consistent with everything I have previously written on the subject.
Bill Bannon,
I’m confused. Are you saying that it was okay to covet and/or steal another man’s slave? You are confusing an acknowledgment of slavery for support of slavery.
In the Church’s language “infallible” refers to the immutability of doctrinal formulae. All of the Magisterium’s teaching is free from error as a result of the Church’s indefectibility.
My position is that God TOLERATED the evil of commanding the genocide . . . .
On the human side, Israel TOLERATED the evil of killing children in order to prevent the greater evil of disobeying God.
Carl,
No, you are saying God COMMITTED the evil of commanding genocide and Israel COMMITTED the evil of carrying it out. the principle of toleration is not something you apply to your own actions. It is applied to the actions of others.
See here for a good summary. It says, in part,
Carl
Read Noonan’s “The Church That Can and Cannot Change”….historical reality Catholicism rather than the abridged apologetics Catholicism of the net which converts are more influenced by. The majority of Catholic theologians til 18OO at least supported several just titles for slavery even while the anti slavery papal bulls were extant. No Pope silenced the opinions of the theologians about those exceptions. That was the problem. That is why you had the Jesuits e.g. holding about 500 slaves in the US into the 19th century according to a Bishop of that time who was trying to convince the Vatican that those assets..those slaves… belonged rather to his diocese rather than to the Jesuits because when the Jesuits were suppressed, they reverted for awhile to being diocesan clergy…ergo the slaves should revert to the diocese. And that was after most of the anti slavery bulls. Noonan recounts the incident in detail but it shows that the 19th century Vatican saw nothing untoward in the slavery itself if the exceptions of the theologians could be supported.
One unfortunate exception is even recounted by Aquinas in the Supplement to the ST in the section on marriage of a slave Question 52 article4: “children follow the mother in freedom and bondage….The canons are in agreement with this (cap. Liberi, 32, qu. iv, in gloss.: cap. Inducens, De natis ex libero ventre) as also the law of Moses (Exodus 21).” In short, the old canon law which existed from Aquinas til the 20th century for the most part seems to have supported slavery in the case of a child born to a slave mother.
It is consumerist society (and the English…beginning with the Quakers) that helped end slavery since Home Depot and Macy’s need millions of free people who have a wage to spend. Wageless slaves are not an advantage to capitalism although low paid workers in China are for awhile. At the time of Leviticus, no consumerist super large entities existed to demand millions of wage earners.
I agree with Carl. Joshua B., in his desire to make the Scriptures politically correct, is dangerously headed towards the heresy of determinism.
Carl
On infallibility, you are off course. I have 16 years of Catholic education…8 with priests and brothers… but follow Ott not me. Here is Ludwig Ott in the Intro to his Fundamentals of the Catholic Faith last paragraph of section 8…notice that mistakes can happen in the ordinary magisterium of the Popes:
” With regard to the doctrinal teaching of the Church it must be well noted that not all the assertions of the Teaching Authority of the Church on questions of Faith and morals are infallible and consequently irrevocable. Only those are infallible which emanate from General Councils representing the whole episcopate, and the Papal Decisions Ex Cathedra (cf. D 1839). The ordinary and usual form of the Papal teaching activity is not infallible. Further, the decisions of the Roman Congregations (Holy Office, Bible Commission) are not infallible. Nevertheless normally they are to be accepted with an inner assent which is based on the high supernatural authority of the Holy See (assensus internus supernaturalis, assensus religiosus). The so-called “silentium obsequiosum.” that is “reverent silence,” does not generally suffice. By way of exception, the obligation of inner agreement may cease if a competent expert, after a renewed scientific investigation of all grounds, arrives at the positive conviction that the decision rests on an error.”
“Vatican II thus leaves intact the dogma that the Scriptures were “dictated” – yes, “dictated” – either from Christ’s own word of mouth or by the Holy Ghost. What you condemn as “semi-fundamentalism” is CATHOLIC DOGMA.”
Carl,
I think you’re misinterpreting Vatican II. The Church has never held to a dictation theory of inspiration as the Islamic community does. The human authors were not mere mindless instruments who had words dictated to them. They used their own ideas, words, literary styles, cultural influences to express an idea that was somehow “breathed” by God. But that exact process is a mystery to us and to express it as mere dictation does violence to the text.
Nathan O’Halloran, SJ,
The Council of Trent didn’t say that the human authors were “mindless instruments,” but it did say that their words were “dictated either by Christ’s own word of mouth or by the Holy Ghost” (tamquam vel oretenus a Christo, vel a Spiritu Sancto dictatas). The word “dictated” belongs to the heritage of Catholic dogma.
Vatican II confirmed this by affirming the Holy Spirit’s inspiration of the books of Scripure as “whole and entire, with all their parts” (DV 11) and that “they have God as their author” (DV 11) and the sacred writers “consigned to writing whatever he wanted and no more” (DV 11)
It is precisely because the human authors were not “mindless instruments” that “the interpreter of sacred Scriptures, if he is to ascertain what God has wished to communicate to us, should carefully search out the meaning which the sacred writers really had in mind, which is that meaning which God had thought well to manifest through the meaning of their words” (DV 12)
One cannot prescind from the literal sense (i.e. “the meaning which the sacred writers really had in mind”) in order to reconcile a Scriptural passage with one’s tenuous philosophical or theological presuppositions about the consequences of “God is love” or “God is truth.” On the contrary, one must correct one’s suppositions in order to conform with Scripture.
We can’t just say “God is truth” and then force Scripture to say whatever we want it to say. And we certainly cannot justify such an arbitrary and fundamentalist approach to Scripture based on the doctrines of Vatican II.
In order to hold that God did not command genocide, we have to abandon “the customary and characteristic patterns of perception, speech and narrative which prevailed at the age of the sacred writer, and to the conventions which the people of his time followed in their dealings with one another” (DV 12) and simply cling to our prejudices about God not being able to command genocide.
What’s perhaps even worse, in order to cling to this prejudice, we must contradict St. Paul (Acts 13:19), St. Augustine (Exposition on Psalm 80, 5), St. Thomas Aquinas (Sum. Theol. I-II, 105, 3, ad. 4), and God knows who else.
First, thanks to all who have to taken the time to read and comment and thanks to Kyle to inserting me into the conversation. Unfortunately, I don’t currently have the computer time necessary to adequately respond to the many insightful, engaging, and challenging comments. Therefore, I offer this rather long-winded addition to what I have previously said. (This will be cross-posted at the 3 locations where the convo is taking place)
A further explanation of some of my thoughts on inspiration and inerrancy: I believe the entirety of the Bible was inspired by God. The text(s) which we now call the Bible can be considered inspired because the inspired communities (of Jews and Christians) recognized them as such. (Thus scriptural inspiration is dialogical.) In accordance with its divine authority the Scripture contains Truth with a capital T. However, I think it is dangerous to speak of “inerrancy” because error can be understood in any number of ways, many of which ought not be applied to the Bible. For example, our post-enlightenment scientific and empirical understanding of the world conceives of error primarily as factual error whereas the sacred authors would not have had either that understanding of error nor that empirical outlook on historicity. Accordingly, their literary genres don’t fit neatly into ours. The Gospels would not pass for adequate biographies today, and Samuel would not pass for an acceptable historical textbook. Trying to judge them as such does violence to the text. Thus, I think the Fathers of VCII were quite wise to avoid the word “inerrancy” and to instead speak of “ that truth which God wanted put into sacred writings for the sake of salvation.”
I also want to reaffirm what I said/meant about approaching Scripture with humility. The Bible is not a monologue. If God had wanted to reveal “that truth which is necessary for salvation” with utmost clarity and precision, then the Bible probably would not consist primarily of narratives, poetry, and letters. Rather, it might read more like a medieval scholastic treatise. If Scripture could be reduced to simple precepts, then it wouldn’t need to be read. We could just read…the “Catechism of the Bible” instead. The complexity of the Bible reflects the transcendence of the person, both of human persons and of the divine persons, which cannot be contained in simple precepts. The Bible, as revelatory of both God and man, is necessarily complex, and being that it represents the inspired work of innumerable human authors, editors, and redactors, we should expect that complexity to open up a wide range of valuable interpretations, which, in my opinion, is part of what makes it a living text capable of speaking to us today, rather than a mere dead letter. As the Pontifical Biblical Commission puts it, “One of the characteristics of the Bible is precisely the absence of a sense of systematization and the presence, on the contrary, of things held in dynamic tension. The Bible is a repository of many ways of interpreting the same events and reflecting upon the same problems. In itself it urges us to avoid excessive simplification and narrowness of spirit.” (Interpretation of the Bible in the Church, III.A.2) We have four Gospels -not one- and multiple creation stories. The dynamic tension contained therein opens up the “personal” and the transcendent so that neither God nor man can be conceived to have been fully contained in the text. Additionally, this dynamic tension, it seems to me, is precisely where the Bible delivers its most powerful moral influence. Morality, holiness, virtue – these do not come from mere blind obedience, as Pope Benedict has repeatedly taught. Faith complements and is complemented by reason. They need each other. Accordingly, it seems that these tensions within scripture ought to move us to humility before the text and remind of the transcendent and sacred character of the text. A friend who is an OT scholar once explained to me, “The diversity within Scripture makes us better people by engaging our critical imagination and therefore developing our capacity for empathy.”
We ought to have the humility to recognize that God and man are both bigger than we can imagine. We do know a bit about God through Scripture and Tradition, but even the doctors of the Church are always quick to complement the positive assertion with negative theology. Thus, upon his Eucharistic vision Aquinas called his writings straw, and Bonaventure believed that in the mind’s journey to God the intellect must eventually give way to the relationship, to love.
Thanks for challenging and engaging conversation. Pax.
Bill Bannon,
Sacred Scripture cannot have “scientific errors” because it doesn’t (and actually can’t) entertain questions of science. You have to say something about science in order to err on the subject. Scripture errs on matters of science as much as I have erred on the 2104 presidential election: not one wit.
Scripture also cannot have “scribal errors” because of how “Scripture” is defined. If a scribe lived previous to the completion of the text, their contributions would be considered inspired and therefore true. If they lived subsequent, their contributions would be considered “deformities” that do not belong to Scripture and that textual criticism exists to correct.
Unlike the previous two examples, reason itself doesn’t prevent Scripture from having errors of chronology. Indeed, I know of a bunch of mind bogglers, some of which I can explain, some of which I cannot. Since I believe that Sacred Scripture is, as the Church teaches, “without error,” I refuse to admit any error whatever.
Before you try to convince me that Vatican II really only taught that Scripture is without error in matters pertaining to salvation, please read the text:
Cum ergo omne id, quod auctores inspirati seu hagiographi asserunt, retineri debeat assertum a Spiritu Sancto, inde Scripturae libri veritatem, quam Deus nostrae salutis causa Litteris Sacris consignari voluit, firmiter, fideliter et sine errore docere profitendi sunt.
It is clear that 1) everything (omne quod) asserted by the sacred writers is equally asserted by the Holy Spirit, 2) the truth taught by Scripture is “firm, faithful and without error,” and 3) the clause “nostrae salutis causa” does not modify “veritatem” or “sine errore” but “Deus,” i.e. “for the sake of our salvation” does not describe the type of truth contained in Scripture, but God’s “motive” or “purpose” (causa) in preserving Scripture entirely free from error (omne quod…veritatem…sine errore).
I admit that it is sheerly on faith that I believe that Scripture does not contain chronological errors. There are many difficulties of this sort in Scripture, which if you present them to me, I will have to say, “I can’t explain it, but I believe there is an explanation.”
David Nickol,
I answered this objection on another thread. Here I will only say that you don’t have the right to put words in my mouth or dictate to me what I really mean.
You get to be you. I get to be me.
The reason God does not “commit” the evil of commanding genocide is because his intention is the avoidance of the greater evil. Genocide, as a lesser evil, is therefore merely tolerated. He committed the avoidance of greater evil.
I concur with Carl that God indeed ordered the killings of the tribes and God notes, if anyone would read Wisdom 12, that this was the end result of first appealing to those tribes with patience over a long period of time and v.10 “punishing them bit by bit that they might have space for repentance.” He gives the concomitant purpose of protecting the Jews from corruption in Deuteronomy 20. But to leave out the reason from Wisdom 12 is to paint God as surprising the tribes in their sins with the harshest punishment immediately. Protestantism does not have Wisdom 12 so they are left with that latter impression. We should know better.
In Ezekiel 18:4 God tells you who owns all souls. He kills Onan clearly in Genesis as He does kill Herod Agrippa in Acts 12. In the dooms He chose to do the same thing through the Jews as His instrument and restricted the dooms to only the named tribes and in Deut.20, He gives the rules for warfare outside of that case.
As for God killing children, He could have a salvific reason even in that case in 2 Kings wherein God clearly kills children when they insult Eliseus:
2Ki 2:24 And he turned around, and when he saw them, he cursed them in the name of the LORD. And two she-bears came out of the woods and tore forty-two of the boys.
Now God could have been saving these 42 boys from further injustice as they grew or not…but He alone controls the bears of this world if He so chooses.
Literally 50 years of too sweet homilies as the only kind of homily coming from most Catholic pulpits has ill prepared people to accept what Paul called the “whole counsel of God”…from which Paul notes: he did not shrink.
Carl,
You write:
The reason God does not “commit” the evil of commanding genocide is because his intention is the avoidance of the greater evil. Genocide, as the lesser evil, is therefore merely tolerated. He committed the avoidance of greater evil.
There are a number of mistakes here. First, one commits an act, not an intention. Your conclusion that God committed an avoidance fails to acknowledge that God (assuming he actually ordered genocide) committed an act for the sake of an avoidance. He committed the act so that the avoidance would come about. God is therefore not merely tolerating; he is committing and ordering others to commit. Your first sentence is also wrong. Just because someone intends an end or result doesn’t mean that he doesn’t also intend the means that produce that end or result. And just because the intended end is good doesn’t mean that the intended means are also good.
Carl
By overstating infallibility’s reach or LG 25′s religious submission’s reach in this case in Vatican II, you are left protecting the absurd within the Bible and that is not the Bible’s fault.
Even Augustine within his “Harmony of the Gospels” (Chapter 12/sections 27&28) had to admit that scripture has trivial mistakes which are beside the point. He admitted it in the discrepancy of one gospel having John say he was not worthy to loose the sandals of Christ (Mk.1:7) and another gospel (Mt.3:11) has John saying he is not worthy to carry the sandals of Christ. Augustine said such trivial mistakes mean nothing….then it depends what reasonable men consider trivial.
When Christ sends the 12 out on a mission, there is the identical problem ( see Mark 6:7 onward/Matthew 10:10 onward/Luke 10:4 onward).
Mark has Christ instruct them to take a walking stick and one tunic and sandals.
Matthew has Christ instruct them to not take a walking stick.
Luke’s Christ does not mention a walking stick at all whatsoever.
What did Christ say of the three? Augustine says such surface problems are not germane.
Kyle,
An intention is always directed to an act, which is by definition the commission of an intention. Just as voting for John McCain was necessitated by my intention to directly oppose the election of Barack Obama, commanding genocide was necessitated by God’s intention to fulfill his covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob by giving the land of Canaan to their descendents. I tolerated voting for John McCain in a similar way that God tolerated commanding genocide. In both cases, the lesser evil had to be “performed” in order to avoid a greater evil. In both cases, what is “committed” (i.e. the intended act) is not the lesser evil, but the prevention of a greater evil. To put it positively, in issuing the Deuteronomic commands (genocide inclusive), God was COMMITTING an act of faithfulness to his covenant (cf. Dt 4:31-40).
God did not command genocide in a vacuum. He doesn’t enjoy or approve of genocide. He is not bloodthirsty. He TOLERATED it in order to fulfill his covenant and give the Israelites possession of the land promised to their fathers.
Bill Bannon,
You’ve grievously misrepresented St. Augustine, who in discussing textual variations, explicitly says, “we ought not to suppose that any one of the writers is giving an unreliable account” (Harmony of the Gospels, II, 12, 28). He never uses the word mistake or error. Quite the opposite: “For as we are not at liberty either to suppose or to say that any one of the evangelists has stated what is false, so it will be apparent that any other writer is as little chargeable with untruth, with whom, in the process of recalling anything for narration, it has fared only in a way similar to that in which it is shown to have fared with those evangelists.” Never does St. Augustine tolerate the notion that Scripture contains a mistake or error of any kind, however “trivial” (another word noticably absent from the text). Augustine never said that there were “trivial mistakes” or that if such mistakes existed that they would mean nothing.
Where Mark’s Gospel is chronological, Matthew’s Gospel is systematic, oscillating between the deeds and the words of Christ. Where Mark 6 gives a sequence of specific events (rejection at Nazareth => mission of 12 => death of John the Baptist), Matthew 10 is a collection of ‘cherry-picked’ teachings given to the twelve. Given this stark difference in literary styles, it is unreasonable to conclude that a contradiction exists in what actually happened. It is not at all unlikely that at one point Christ told the apostles not to take a staff and another time he told them to take a staff perhaps as a symbol of entrusting them with greater authority.