Journal: Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society
Volume: JETS 01:1 (Winter 1958)
Article: The Infallibility of Scripture and Evangelical Progress
Author: Ned B. Stonehouse

BETS 1:1 (Winter 1958) p. 9

The Infallibility of Scripture and Evangelical Progress

Ned B. Stonehouse

On the occasion of this fellowship banquet, which is appropriately more informal than our regular sessions, I have in view a rather broad and general treatment of the topic which has been announced. If my recollections are correct I have good precedents for following this course rather than endeavoring to make a scholarly contribution to the understanding of some carefully circumscribed topic.

The joining of these two phrases, “The Infallibility of Scripture” and “Evangelical Progress”, indicates that in my judgment there is a very intimate connection between the maintenance of the infallibility of Scripture and the attainment of any significant progress so far as the evangelical cause is concerned. The burden of what I have to say is indeed that the former is indispensable to the latter, that in fact the more clearly and consistently we take our stand upon the position to which this Society is committed the more assuredly and rapidly we shall make some genuine advance in the field of biblical and theological studies.

We are painfully aware indeed that this estimate is not shared by many of our contemporaries. We know that the doctrine of the infallibility of Scripture is widely regarded as an egregious error, reflecting obscurantism and inevitably leading to further obscurantism. Rather than being a liberating force it is regarded as an intolerable burden. It is sometimes said that it must result in religious and ecclesiastical paralysis. Our view of the Bible is thought to place us in bondage to a paper pope.

It will be recognised that this point of view, while hardly a novelty in our day, has been given considerable impetus and has found increasing acceptance because of the colossal impact of the teaching of Karl Barth. In view of the fact that his volume on The Doctrine of the Word of God has now become available in English and his theological position is becoming better and better known in our day, we may anticipate an increasing impact in the years ahead. Barth’s clear cut position that the Bible is itself fallible and that it may not be regarded even as containing infallible elements is presented in an attractive light because it is insisted that precisely on his view of the relationship between God and Scripture there is a recognition of “the free grace in which the Spirit of God is present and active before and above and in the Bible”.

The Barthian point of view is reflected in scores of volumes that are coming from the press in these days, one of the most recent of these being the oook of J. K. S. Reid of Glasgow on The Authority of Scripture, published by Harper in 1957. Reid maintains, for example, that “the movement...