The duality of Scripture
by Taylor Martin, Reporter
When considering the humanity and divinity of Christ we have no problem accepting both natures as co-existing. Not only is this an accepted fact by the majority of modern Christians, it is viewed as almost a necessity for Christ to be completely human and completely divine in order to save us from our sins. I think we can use this view of Christology to better understand scripture.
So often it seems that Christianity pushes the divine inspiration of scripture to the point that it is almost necessary to view scripture as the infallible, foolproof word of God. And yet, as many believe, scripture isn't perfect; there are actually a number of seemingly obvious errors within the Bible. Often this fallibility of scripture can lead Christians to feeling exposed and vulnerable. "If one thing isn't right within the Word, how can we be sure that there aren't other errors?" I counter that just as we take hope in the fact that Christ had dual natures, we can also claim that scripture contains dual natures.
We often try to downplay the fact that the books of the Bible were written by human hands, and I think that is doing a disservice to God's providence. Not only can we take hope in the fact that God left such an important task up to humankind to figure out, but we can also see the great triumph of the insights that we are capable of as humans. Time and time again God has chosen to work through humankind. Sometimes it backfires (when we fail), but at other times it really speaks volumes to the capability of humankind when we rely upon the Father and use the gifts that he has blessed us with to glorify him and his kingdom.
Finally by understanding the humanity of scripture we are able to perceive the biases with which the authors often write so that we can apply the truth more wholeheartedly to our world today. Many worldviews held by the writers of the Bible contain things that we disagree with today (e.g. slavery), and so by acknowledging the humanity of the writers we are able to see their shortcomings and hopefully engage our world in a better discussion of love and grace.
For these reasons I think we should embrace the humanity of scripture: it frees us from having to defend every last detail of scripture; it opens the door to allow us to see a beautiful example of God's working within our world; and it permits us to better understand the Bible and therefore interpret it better.