Theological Straight-Jackets

I'm currently taking a summer intensive course entitled "The Gospels." This has included an historical overview of the political, social and economic survey of the Mediterranean world around the time of Christ. It has also included analysis and review of extra-biblical Gospels.

And I have been eating it up!!!!

My professor, Dr. Craig Evans, a New Testament scholar, speaks on tangent regularly about what he terms "theological straight-jackets." Simply put, theological ideas that lead to "mistaken expectations of the nature and function of Scripture" (31)

One such idea that he raises (with much discussion and controversy in class) is the idea of inerrancy. Here's what he writes in his book, Fabricating Jesus (pages 29, 31):

Peter and the rest of the apostles proclaimed the resurrection of Jesus. (See Acts 2:22-24) For them this was the good news, this was conclusive evidence that God was at work in the ministry and person of Jesus of Nazareth. Peter didn't stand up and proclaim, "Men of Israel, I have good news; the Bible is verbally inspired and therefore inerrant and, moreover, the Gospels can be harmonized."... It was the reality of the resurrection and its impact on those who heard and responded to it in faith that propelled the new movement forward, not "mistake-free" Scripture... [People] need to be told that in the first ten to fifteen years of the existence of the church, not one book of the New Testament was in existence. Nevertheless, the church grew fast and furious, without benefit of a New Testament or the Gospels (inerrant or otherwise).

I repeat: The truth of the Christian message hinges not on the inerrancy of Scripture or on our ability to harmonize the four Gospels but on the resurrection of Jesus. And the historical reliability of the Gospels does not hinge on the inerrancy of Scripture or on proof that no mistake of any kind can be detected in them.

This has sure been thought-provoking for me.