Michael Bird critiques Greg Beale’s formulation of inerrancy. Bird’s most important points, I think, are about the phenomena and genres of scripture. Beale and others who insist on a rationalistic definition of inerrancy cannot handle phenomena and genre issues without a priori strong-arming and unsustainable mental gymnastics — at least not without in practice violating the very notion of inerrancy they supposedly hold. (Check out Beale’s excellent commentary on Revelation and try to explain how his amillennial view — which seems sensible to me — and explain to me how its use of apocalyptic as a genre differs from Pete Enns’ reference to ancient near eastern literature that parallels the OT).
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One reply on “Bird on Beale on Inerrancy”
Beale’s Revelation commentary is excellent and exhaustive. It, along with George Eldon Ladd’s writing, saved my aching head from the propaganda of pre-tribulation pre-millennialism I was force fed at “that university.”