The Divine Authenticity of Scripture: Critical Review 2

Typical, Repetitive, Baseless Assertions

We’ve already documented that it is false to assert that Kuyper, Bavinck, and Calvin did not hold to what conservative scholars would today call “the doctrine of inerrancy.” Scriptural inerrancy is not a new invention and it is not an unfair conclusion to draw given the nature, inspiration, and the truthfulness of Scripture. It is the consistent belief of Reformed thought, whether it’s the persons Calvin, Turretin, Warfield, Bavinck, Bahnsen, or Sproul, or whether it’s the terms “infallibility,” “does not err,” “errorless,” or “inerrancy.” The reality, both conceptual and historical, is generally the same in the Reformed tradition. The burden of proof is on those who assert otherwise.

Several such cases can be found in McGowan’s The Divine Authenticity of Scripture:

“Warfield was an inerrantist, while Orr and Kuyper were infallibilists.” The Divine Authenticity of Scripture, 14

“There were some who rejected this [Warfield’s] doctrine of inerrancy, despite being very close to Warfield on most other issues. As we shall see later, this was the position taken by the Scottish theologian James Orr and the Dutch theologians Abraham Kuyper and Herman Bavinck.” 87

Then, in summarizing three different views of inerrancy, McGowan points to a third position, where there…

“are evangelicals who are unhappy with the term ‘inerrancy’ but who nevertheless also reject the notion of ‘errancy’, believing that they are being presented with a false dichotomy…The strongest proponents of this position are James Orr and Herman Bavinck, although a good case can be made for saying that it is consistent with the view of Calvin.” 106

As we have documented already, none of these claims are substantiated. While Warfield’s view of inspiration and Scripture is somewhat different than Bavinck’s “organic” and “incarnational” model of Scripture, Bavinck’s view of inerrancy (though he never actually used that term) is essentially the same as Warfield’s view on inerrancy (though, he also never actually used that term). Both scholars held to the absolute truthfulness of the Scriptures and expressed that by the words “errorless” and “without error” (Warfield) and “preservation from error” (Bavinck). Calvin (“unerring standard,” “unerring rule”) and Kuyper’s view (“divinely errorless fashion”) is essentially no different.

McGowan will dedicate an entire chapter trying to counter this truth. But before doing so, he tries to undermine the necessity of inerrant autographa. But he only manages to avoid the most relevant scholarship on the subject by one of the greatest Christian philosophers of the last hundred years…