Bart Ehrman and Scripture's Dirty Secret: It's Not All That

From the Mailbag:

…Bart Ehrman…?

Interesting guy.

I do wish scholars like Ehrman would stop appearing on The History Channel where their well-reasoned comments on lacunae or codicology or paleography get chopped down to a six second sound-bite supporting the theory that Christ’s descendants by Mary Magdalene are living in Scotland.  But having said that, I really like his work. 

I’ve heard more evangelicals dismiss Ehrman than think about him really seriously.  

And you can’t dismiss a guy with his scholarly pedigree: distinguished work at Wheaton and Princeton, where he studied with Bruce Metzger, THE biblical codicology guy, married to the Brain-Hot Sarah Beckwith of Duke, whose work I salivate over…  Oh, yes, and his publications in the field are very well-thought of.Not Pictured: Cloven Hoof

He takes seriously the implications of some hard questions.  And he poses a major challenge or two to some of the foundations of evangelicalism.

Specifically, he criticizes the idea that scripture as it’s come down to us can transcend history.   Putting this problem very simply, the idea of a “perfect text” is a mirage, and anybody who dabbles and plays with manuscripts knows it.   They say you should never watch either sausages or laws being made: add scriptures to that list, because it will unsettle a person.  Ehrman is just saying out loud what codicologists have always known: the Bible was not faxed from heaven, and it’s no simple matter to say how that affects a text’s authority.

Ehrman’s not really out, I think, to de-convert people.  Maybe he is, but I doubt it.  

Rather, he’s interested in the premises of Christianity being accurate and true.  If they only survive because of willful blindness, then Christianity is in a pretty sorry state.  And unfortunately, the way that Western theology has shaped itself, the idea of a perfection in scripture has become its chief cornerstone.

Which is really a very pagan idea, as it slips in the intermediary of scripture for the experience of a god.

And really, I think that’s just a function of fear: the fear of not getting it right.

Sometimes it’s urged that the Bible was “perfect in the original autographs,” that is the hand-written documents the authors penned.  Two things need to be said about that: (1) how would you know? and (2) where’s that leave you now? 

My Islamic students have sometimes pointed out to me that their holy book has enormous textual stability compared to the Bible.   (I have sometimes pointed out that they cannot really know this, since the texts of the Qur’an cannot, by Islamic custom and maybe law, be studied as Christian scriptures have been.  But I’m just being ornery: evidence is good that they’re generally right.)  Mormons, whose texts emerged after the invention of the printing press, have an even better claim to textual stability.

Christian scripture’s also-ran status in the perfect-text competition needs to be digested carefully.  One of my (many) hopes in this blog is to help people of faith digest that without cheating.

It can seem to knock Christianity on its ass. 

But I don’t think it needs to.

What it does need to knock on its ass is the idea that Christian faith is, was, or ever could be, dependent on a perfect text.  

If that’s your guarantee, be afraid.  Be very afraid.

Comments

[Elizabeth/samama]

Hey Daddy_Otter. This is really interesting. I recently read about a debate between Ehrman and Craig Evans at a church in Kansas. You can watch it on youtube. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this when you have time. I'm listening to it right now, and he's going through all the discrepencies in the gospels. Yikes.

It appears that Ehrman was an evangelical fundamentalist Christian, but he is now an agnostic. He also doesn't believe the resurrection really occurred. Truthfully, he scares the hell out of me. I want to keep my faith, but...dang.

What do you think?

[Touchstone]

samama,

You might check out some of the videos at Ehrman's web site:

Bert Ehrman

This video:

For example, has a section in the middle where Ehrman gives a pretty good review of his "theological biography", from fundamentalism to unbelief, via the seminary at Princeton, etc.

Ehrman was one of the "clubs to the side of the head" for me in working through doubts, etc. back then, so your intuition is a good one -- pursue with caution. Ideas are dangerous things, etc.

-TS

[Otter]

Samama, I second TS's recommendation to go look hard at Ehrman's stuff. It's brilliant.

But I've also responded to you here.