[A paper I wrote for an independent study in philosophy my final semester at Cedarville. I defend the doctrine of biblical reliability, including inerrancy. It's long - around 8,000 words - so feel free to skip around. For the one without much philosophical training, I'd recommend skipping to the section "Scripture as Reliable." But feel free to try to make it through the somewhat dense introduction about evidentialism and the internalist/externalist debate.]
“Evidentialism and Biblical Reliability”
Blake Hereth (Cedarville University)
Blake Hereth (Cedarville University)
sbhereth@cedarville.edu
Introduction_______________
Evidentialism[1] is sometimes thought to be rather demanding, perhaps too demanding, on religious persons. Roughly, evidentialism is the thesis that one’s given doxastic attitude at a given time is epistemically justified if and only if it is supported by one’s total evidence at that time.[2] For religious persons, it follows that their religious beliefs are epistemically justified if and only if they have at least some evidence for those beliefs and no outweighing evidence, or defeaters. Kelly James Clark complains that this has the implausible implication that ordinary believers, like his grandmother, are unjustified in their religious beliefs.[3] Alvin Plantinga has pioneered what has become known as Reformed epistemology (named after the Christian Reformed tradition in which many key Reformed players, such as John Calvin, shared Plantinga’s epistemological views) in which a decidedly externalist account of something like epistemic justification (Plantinga calls it ‘warrant’) is advanced, and Plantinga does not hide the fact that his account makes it easier for many religious beliefs to enjoy something like epistemic justification[4]. For example, Plantinga contends that his Reformed epistemology (more properly: proper functionalism) is “a better picture than any of its rivals,” and that “a belief B has positive epistemic status for S if and only if that belief in S by his epistemic faculties working properly in an appropriate environment.”[5] Elsewhere, Plantinga contends that a belief produced in this way is sufficient for positive epistemic status, so we should understand the above conditions to be both necessary and sufficient for positive epistemic status (per Plantinga). This denies that positive epistemic status (or justification, as evidentialists are using it) requires evidence, and thus denies the evidentialist view of justification as I have described it. Because having evidence is not required for positive epistemic status (or justification), ordinary believers are without the added burden of having to require or believe in accordance with their evidence. Instead, all that is required is that their cognitive properties be functioning properly in an appropriate environment (and, as Plantinga would later suggest, the respective cognitive faculties must be successfully aimed at truth).
Plantinga uses his epistemology to show how religious persons and Christians in particular can enjoy warranted belief in the reliability of Scripture despite various criticisms of the doctrine. In “Two (or More) Kinds of Scripture Scholarship,” for example, Plantinga contends that historical biblical criticism “does not offer a defeater for [the Christian’s] acceptance of the great things of the gospel – nor, to the degree that those alleged results rest on epistemological assumptions he doesn’t share, of anything else he accepts on the basis of biblical teaching.”[6] Consequently, Christians “need not be disturbed by the conflict between alleged results of [historical biblical criticism] and traditional Christian belief.”[7] Others have taken Plantinga’s cue and have utilized Reformed epistemology to demonstrate how religious beliefs are capable of being warranted (or justified). Douglas Blount’s essay “The Authority of Scripture” is an excellent example of this. Blount begins his essay with a discussion of the nature of rationality, offering the following definition:
Put roughly, the notion of rationality employed below goes as follows: if it is true that a) the means by which one arrives at a particular belief are quite likely to lead to truth, and b) one has no convincing reason for giving up that belief, then it is reasonable for one to hold that belief; otherwise, it is not.[8]
What is of note is that Blount’s account of rationality identifies the locus of rationality as a reliable process – i.e., a process that is “quite likely to lead to truth.” Although Blount holds to a ‘no defeaters’ condition with (b), which surely is in line with evidentialist conceptions of justification, he nevertheless identifies (a) as a necessary condition for justified or reasonable belief, which entails that one’s evidence at any given time (i) does not uniquely determine what doxastic attitude is justified and (ii) is insufficient to justify a given doxastic attitude. So, Blount’s view of justification (a sort of process reliabilism[9]) is at odd with evidentialism by denying it straightforwardly and by denying that internalist criteria for justification are sufficient[10] (i.e., internalist criteria do not justify beliefs; if that is true, then evidentialist criteria, which are a form of internalist criteria, do not justify beliefs; therefore, evidentialist criteria, which are a form of internalist criteria, do not justify beliefs). Blount continues to apply his criteria specifically to belief in biblical inerrancy:
…we have good reasons to see Charity’s belief in the inerrancy of Scripture as the result of the Spirit’s work both within the church in general and in her in particular. Thus, assuming that the Holy Spirit has in fact worked to bring Charity to believe Scripture to be inerrant, the means by which she has come to believe this turn out to be quite likely to lead to truth. And, in that case, it also turns out to be reasonable for her to believe that the Bible is inerrant.[11]
I will not be using an externalist account of justification (or warrant) to defend the reliability of Scripture. Rather, I will be using an internalist, evidentialist account of justification. I do this for two reasons. First, it would add to the plausibility of the reliability of Scripture if it did not depend on internalist or externalist success or failure. The internalist/externalist controversy is complex and up in the air, and so any view whose success depends on such controversies is itself up in the air (at least to some degree). Here is why. Suppose you hold a libertarian view of free will in light of the Consequence Argument[12], and you assign a level of +10 to the plausibility of that view. You later discover David Lewis’s paper “Are We Free to Break the Laws?”[13] You find it equally plausible. Presumably, the level of plausibility you assign to the Consequence Argument will drop sharply. We’ll make matters simple and suppose it drops to +5, and that you give Lewis’s argument +5 as well. Suppose furthermore that you base some other view (say, your view that no one has compatibilist free will) on the plausibility of the Consequence Argument. Since your other view (i.e., that no one has compatibilist free will) is drawing its plausibility from the Consequence Argument, your other view loses plausibility when the Consequence Argument loses plausibility. There is simply not as much justification, support, or evidence to be had.
The second reason I am utilizing evidentialism is because there are many evidentialists who hold to the reliability of Scripture. I am one of them. It is therefore relevant for us to understand how, if at all, we can justify the reliability of Scripture given our epistemological views. Of course, I do not mean to suggest (and, in fact, nothing I have said has suggested) that my account is the only plausible way for evidentialists to hold to the reliability of Scripture. In fact, I believe there are many possible ways to do this. Instead, what I will be offering is an account according to which the reliability of Scripture can be justifiably endorsed with minimal epistemic demands on the particular believer. If I am correct, this suggests that Clark, Plantinga, and Blount have overestimated the degree to which evidentialism is too demanding on religious persons, at least with respect to their belief in the reliability of Scripture. This does not entail that ordinary believers are just as easily justified (or warranted) on non-evidentialist criteria (in fact, it might be slightly easier to be justified, or warranted, given those criteria), but it does show that it is not especially difficult to be justified in affirming the reliability of Scripture on an evidentialist model, or according to evidentialist criteria.
Scripture as Reliable_______________
As I said, I propose to offer an evidentialist perspective of how a given believer can be epistemically justified in her belief that Scripture is authoritative. It seems best to begin with an understanding of just what the ‘reliability of Scripture’ amounts to. To say that Scripture is reliable is to say, roughly, that where it contains propositions, those propositions are (at least) generally true. Let’s call this the Reliability of Scripture Thesis, or RST. Formally, it would look something like the following:
RST: Some divinely authored text S is reliable if and only if it (i) contains propositions, (ii) those propositions are in fact truth claims made by S, and (iii) those propositions are (at least) generally true.
These conditions are necessary for a plausible account of scriptural reliability (or of any reliable text in general). The first condition stipulates that a reliable text must contain propositions. A book with no propositional content necessarily lacks modal properties such as being possibly true or being possibly false. Consider that non-propositions must take some other linguistic form, such as interrogative or exclamatory. But questions and exclamations, such as “Does God exist?” and “Close your door!” are neither true nor false, and it would be both counterintuitive and meaningless to suggest otherwise. Since those properties are necessary for reliability in the relevant sense, it follows that a book must contain propositional content in order to be reliable.
Condition (ii) is concerned with the type of claim being made by the contents of S. It is of both historical and current interest that certain passages of Scripture have purportedly supported some false theory or other. 1 Chronicles 16:30 states that God has fixed the Earth and made it immovable. From this, it was inferred by many religious persons that the Scriptures supported a geocentric theory. Today, it is rare in New Testament scholarship to see 1 Chronicles 16:30 used in this way. Far more attention has been given to the type of literature couching the relevant propositions, since literary type effects the plausibility of whether a literal truth claim is being made. Consequently, it is pertinent to identify not only the type of literature used, but also the type of claim being made.
The final condition is prima facie true: If something tells you the truth most of the time, then that something is reliable; otherwise, not. There are, of course, degrees of reliability. Some persons who affirm the RST believe that Scripture is reliable to a minimal degree. Others affirm a moderate degree of reliability, and still others affirm maximal reliability. I have kept the RST broad enough to show how my defense of it is not merely a defense of one or two of these positions. Rather, condition (iii) contains the caveat “at least.” Consequently, if my defense succeeds, it is possible for the RST to justify a wide range of views pertaining to exact reliability, provided that those views affirm a minimal degree of reliability. In other words, the RST has wide applicability, potentially applying to any number of views who affirm the minimal reliability of Scripture.
Testimony as Evidence_______________
Since I am assuming an evidentialist picture of justification with respect to justifying RST, and since the tenets of evidentialism require evidence for justification, I need to show what evidence there is to justify RST. Recall that it isn’t my intention to explore all the ways of justifying RST, since many of those ways demand a thorough understanding of complex issues that are beyond the cognitive reach (and free time) of many ordinary believers. Consequently, I am narrowing the evidential parameters to make matters simple and to demonstrate how RST can be justifiably believed in ordinary cases, by ordinary believers. Before I begin, however, I’d like to lay out two important assumptions I will be making throughout this paper.
First, I will be assuming that testimony is a kind of evidence if and only if it comes from a credible source.[14] (I will say more in a moment about whether the testimony of your average individual ‘counts’ as credible.) For example, suppose I claim that my name is Blake. It’s extremely plausible to suppose that I would know my name and (in ordinary circumstances) you have no reason to think I am lying or ignorant about my real name. Furthermore, persons can have varying degrees and specialties of epistemic credentials. For example, we would be justified in believing that Alvin Plantinga is a quality epistemologist upon learning that he has published a number of acclaimed (acclaimed by other experts, that is, although not only expert epistemologists) books on epistemology and a number of articles in respectable, peer-reviewed journals. Moreover, he has been praised by other expert epistemologists as having written cutting edge epistemology. But we would not say similar things of Glenn Beck, who lacks these credentials (among others). We have no reason to believe that Beck knows much about epistemology. Thus, we would not be justified in believing that Beck is an expert epistemologist. All this to say, we are epistemically justified in believing that a given testimony is credible (counts as evidence) if and only if we have good reason to believe that the person giving the testimony has the relevant epistemic credentials. As I just mentioned, there are degrees of epistemic credentials. For example, Alvin Plantinga has a greater degree of expertise than I do when it comes to epistemology. He has far more experience, respect from other experts, and education than I do on the matter. Nevertheless, I have studied epistemology and am at least mildly competent in the field. Because Plantinga is far more credible than I am on epistemological matters, I will say he is my epistemic superior. Someone is my epistemic superior just in case she possesses a greater degree of the relevant credentials. It is reasonable for me to believe that someone is my epistemic superior just in case I have reason to believe that she possesses a greater degree of the relevant credentials. Conversely, someone is my epistemic inferior just in case she possesses fewer of the relevant credentials than I do, and it is reasonable for me to believe she is my epistemic inferior just in case I have reason to believe that she possesses fewer if the relevant credentials than I do. There are numerous possible credentials one might have, and numerous possible ways in which a given set of credentials can be relevant.
I think it is plausible to suppose that we have moderate prima facie justification for believing that people are telling the truth.[15] It’s nothing as strong as, say, our justification for belief in an external world, yet also not as weak as our justification that Darwin had a deathbed conversation. (In fact, I don’t think he did.) It is extremely plausible to suppose that people ordinarily tell us the truth, at least as they understand it. People ordinarily tell us their real names, the reality of their careers or jobs, facts about their family members, and other personal details. People reveal their religious and political views, often passionately. People are tell us what they genuinely believe about weather conditions (consider: How many times have you heard someone say, quite sincerely, that the sun was shining or that it was raining?), about movie times, about how much gas is in their car, and so on. This is not enough, of course, since sincerity is not the issue. Someone might be perfectly sincere and still have false beliefs. But we can go a step further than sincerity with the large majority of these claims. For instance, Richard Swinburne contends that the testimony of others should ordinarily be regarded as having positive epistemic status:
Other things being equal, we believe that what others tell us that they perceived probably happened. By ‘other things being equal’ I mean in the absence of positive grounds for supposing that the others have misreported or misremembered their experiences, or that things were not in fact as they seemed to those others to be. Clearly most of our beliefs about the world are based on what others claim to have perceived—beliefs about geography and history and science and everything else beyond immediate experience are thus based. We do not normally check that an informant is a reliable witness before accepting his reports.[16]
Swinburne calls this the Principle of Testimony.[17] Although he advocates this in the context of a discussion on the epistemic status of religious experience, he seems to have similar views to my own on the epistemic status of testimony in general.[18] Although he does not suggest how justified we are in believing the testimony of others (absent special considerations), he does see the testimony of others as prima facie reliable. I will go further than this and specify the degree of justification I think we have in ordinary cases. It is plausible to believe that the majority of things people talk about falls into at least one of two categories: the external world or internal mental states. Although people are not infallible when it comes to the external world or internal mental states, they are ordinarily quite accurate. People claim that they see trees, grass, celestial objects, people, homes, dust, household appliances, etc., and they ordinarily do. People also claim to be happy, sad, depressed, angry, surprised, etc., and they are usually are. This provides us with strong reason for thinking that the average person’s testimony has positive epistemic status, or is evidence, or is credible.
To sum up: Testimony is a kind of evidence if and only if it comes from a reliable source, where a reliable source is reliable if and only if (i) contains propositions, (ii) those propositions are in fact truth claims made by the source, and (iii) those propositions are (at least) generally true.
Epistemic Justification for RST_______________
I will now consider fairly simple ways for ordinary believers to be epistemically justified in affirming RST. The epistemic ‘math’ is, of course, not especially simple, but ordinary believers need not do hard-core epistemology to justifiably affirm RST. Furthermore, recall that while I am attempting to justify RST via evidentialism, I am ‘aiming high’ – that is, I will be trying to make a case for a strong understanding of Scriptural reliability. The arguments I offer, if they are successful, will justify RST since it is a more modest thesis. Here is my primary argument:
The Argument for RST
- If, at time t, I am justified in believing that a given source, X, is a set of divine testimony[19] (given my total evidence E at t), then I am also justified in believing that the members of X are instances of divine testimony at t.
- If I am justified in believing that the members of X are instances of divine testimony at t, then if the members of X include defeaters for evidence inconsistent with X, then I am justified in disbelieving any evidence inconsistent with X at t.
- Therefore, if, at time t, I am justified in believing that a given source, X, is divine testimony (given my total evidence E at t), then if the members of X include defeaters for evidence inconsistent with X, then I am justified in disbelieving any evidence inconsistent with X at t.
The first premise is largely conceptual. If I am justified in believing Q, where Q is a set with members q1, q2, and q3, then I am also justified in believing q1, q2, and q3. There are at least three two strong reasons for believing this is true. First, in this case, Q = q+q+q. That is, there is a conceptual relation between a set and its members. The number “5,” for example, might be considered a set with members “3+2,” “4+1,” “1+1+1+1+1,” and so on. Thus, to say that believing that “5” is justified is the same thing as to say believing that “3+2” is justified. Since if Q=q1+q2+q3, if Q is justified, then q1+q2+q3 is justified.
Second, given the conceptual relation, there is also an ordinary entailment relation: If I justifiably believe that p, and p entails q, then I am justified in believing q. Relatedly, suppose it were the case that I denied that one or more members of a set were unjustified. If that were true, it seems I would be denying that the set (which is a whole) is justified. For example, the following propositions are justified (for me):
There are no grapes bigger than cars
All human persons are human persons
Barack Obama was president of the United States in 2009
Glenn Beck is emotional
However, suppose I added the following proposition:
All red things are uncolored things
If I created a conjunctive set of the five aforementioned propositions, it would be false that the set was epistemically justified since at least one member of the set (namely, that “All red things are uncolored things”) is unjustified. Third, and finally, consider that when we ask whether a particular set is justified, we are asking whether it is reasonable to believe that all of its members are true, or justifiably regarded as true. It would be false to say this if we realized that one of the members was false, or justifiably regarded as false.
The second premise in the argument requires a somewhat elaborated defense. The argument is lengthy, but my purpose is to make each inference explicit since there are a number of details to follow. Since this argument is a defense of premise (2) in The Argument for RST, I will give this argument a simple name:
The Argument for Premise Two of RST
- If, at time t, I am justified in believing that X is a source of divine testimony, then I am justified in believing (at time t) that what X says is true or probably true, and I am also justified in believing that X is the maximal epistemic superior.
- At time t, I am justified in believing that X is a source of divine testimony.
- Therefore, I am justified in believing (at time t) that what X says is true or probably true, and I am also justified in believing that X is the maximal epistemic superior.
- If I am justified in believing (at time t) that what X says is true or probably true, then I am justified in believing that the contents of X are logically consistent.
- Therefore, I am justified in believing that the contents of X are logically consistent.
- If X claims that X is the one and only God, then I am justified in believing that the claim “X is the one and only God” is true or probably true.
- X claims that X is the one and only God.
- Therefore, I am justified in believing that the claim “X is the one and only God” is true or probably true.
- If X claims that there is yet-to-be-encountered evidence inconsistent with X’s being the maximal epistemic superior and/or evidence inconsistent with X’s claims is false, then I am justified in believing that the claim “the yet-to-be-encountered evidence inconsistent with X’s being the maximal epistemic superior and/or evidence inconsistent with X’s claims is false” is true or probably true.
- X claims that there is yet-to-be-encountered evidence inconsistent with X’s being the maximal epistemic superior and/or evidence inconsistent with X’s claims is false.
- Therefore, I am justified in believing that the claim “the yet-to-be-encountered evidence inconsistent with X’s being the maximal epistemic superior and/or evidence inconsistent with X’s claims is false” is true or probably true.
The first premise is somewhat imprecise. By ‘divine being,’ I do not have in mind just any divine being, but rather a divine being that (at least) bears resemblance to the crucial epistemic aspects of the classical Christian conception of God – i.e., omniscience. To say that the divine being is omniscient is to say, minimally, that she knows all truths and believes no falsehoods.[20] I realize there is some controversy regarding whether God knows future contingents regarding human choices. I will assume that God does, in fact, have knowledge of those contingents. But one need not assume this in order to endorse the view that God does, on orthodox accounts, have an overwhelmingly outweighing number of true beliefs to false ones, and that is more than sufficient to justify the view that, if we know that God claims that p, then it is true or probably true that p. Since there can be no greater knowledge than knowing all truths and believing no falsehoods, it is conceptually (and thus necessarily) true that God is the maximal epistemic superior. Another possible justification for this premise is this: Even if God did not know every truth, or even if God believed some false things, it’s still very likely the case that God knows more than anyone else. So, from a comparative stance, God is the maximal[21] epistemic superior since God knows more than anyone else.
Premise (2) can be defended in several ways. I will choose one of the easiest. Suppose I am in church and I have good reason to believe that my pastor knows far more about the Bible than I do. Perhaps I have been told this by a reliable source, such as my parents, or have read elsewhere about my pastor’s knowledge of the Bible, or perhaps I can simply tell that he knows more about the Bible than I do. After all, he knows more about its origin, its contents, and he seems to know plenty more facts that I do. At this point, I am justified in believing that my pastor’s words are indeed true, or at least very likely true. Suppose I hear from the pastor, as many believers hear from their pastors, that something very much like RST is true. Perhaps the pastor affirms that Scripture is maximally reliable (such as inerrancy), or maybe the pastor affirms some weaker understanding of Scripture’s reliability (such as suggesting that Scripture is accurate only on matters of salvation). Given my pastor’s testimony, I am now epistemically justified in believing that Scripture is reliable. But let’s go even further than this. Suppose my pastor claims that God is omniscient and explains all omniscience entails. Suppose furthermore that my pastor claims that an omniscient God authored the Scriptures with the intent to reveal truths. If this occurs, then I am justified in believing that the Scriptures are true or probably true. And it’s plausible to think this happens a great deal in the average church: Clergy are ordinarily better informed than the majority of the laity, and the laity often recognize this. Consequently, the average layperson’s evidence is such that she is justified in believing that the propositions in Scripture are true or probably true.
The next premise, (3), contends that my justification for the truth or probable truth of the contents of X entails that I am justified in affirming that the contents of X are logically consistent. This is true since no propositions of the form p and ~p are true, and therefore anything that is true (or probably true) does not have (or probably does not have) propositions of the form p and ~p. Thus, at time t, I am justified in believing that the contents of X are logically consistent.
Premises (6) and (7) are also fairly simply justified. (6) is true given what we have already established about X. Since I am justified in believing that the contents of X are true (or probably true), then if X’s contents include the claim that its author is the one and only God, then I am justified in believing that X’s author is the one and only God, and (7) merely affirms the antecedent. Justification for (7) can run along the same lines as before: Perhaps a clergyman or clergywoman informs me of this fact. As my epistemic superior or as an epistemic authority on the matter (so far as I am aware, at least), I would be justified in believing that the author of Scripture is the one and only God. But at this point, I need not become justified in this way. Since I am already justified in believing that the contents of X are true, I would be justified in believing X’s claim to have its origin in the one and only God because X itself is reliable. This should seem straightforward: If I am justified in believing what a bishop says because I know that he is reliable, then I am justified in believing what Scripture says if I know that it is reliable. There is no unacceptable circularity here; I have not used Scripture to justify itself. Rather, I have justified Scripture on other grounds and have used its subsequent reliable status to justifiably believe its claims. Not only is this straightforward and non-circular, it is also a common way of gaining justified beliefs. We regularly have good reason, as I argued earlier, to believe that people know their names, are aware of their internal states, etc. On that basis, we gain justified beliefs about their names, internal states, etc., by hearing those people testify about their names, internal states, etc.
The next premises, (9) and (10), are somewhat complex, and I will spend the remainder of my time here before continuing to objections. Since I am already epistemically justified in affirming the contents of X as true (or probably true), then if X claims that there is yet-to-be-encountered (by me, that is) evidence to the effect that I have prima facie defeaters for either X being the maximal epistemic superior or a particular claim (or set of claims) of X’s being true, but X claims those prima facie defeaters are unsuccessful, then I am justified in believing that the prima facie defeaters are unsuccessful. Consider the following example, called The Hawking Example:
I am invited to a seminar on astrophysics, where I have the opportunity to hear a number of highly respected astrophysicists. Among them is Stephen Hawking. Not being an astrophysicist, Hawking is the expert here. In fact, I have reason to believe he has more true beliefs about astrophysics than anyone else. He begins his lecture on the topic of black holes, and I (surprisingly) understand all of his claims. Toward the end of Hawking’s lecture, he decides to take the time to respond to another astrophysicist who has challenged his views on black holes, but he neglects to give the astrophysicist’s name. Just as Hawking begins to explain the other astrophysicist’s claims, he is told that he is out of time and that he must conclude. He concludes by saying, “Suffice it to say, the other astrophysicist is wrong and I am right.” He then thanks everyone for attending and leaves.
In this situation, am I justified in believing that Hawking not only is justified in his original claims (since I am justified in believing that he is an epistemic authority on black holes), but I am also justified in believing that Hawking has defeaters for the objections from the other astrophysicist. Admittedly, I do not know what the defeaters are, but I am nevertheless justified in believing that Hawking possesses those defeaters insofar as Hawking’s testimony is of highest epistemic rank and he claims to have defeaters. This is where difficult questions arise. After all, if Hawking does not give us the objections or his responses to them, then how can we know whether or not he is right? And suppose we come to encounter the objections to Hawking’s view. How, then, are we to continue to be justified in siding with Hawking? We might appeal to Hawking’s superior credentials (after all, we are already justified in believing that Hawking is the foremost expert on these matters), but then are we begging the larger question as to whether Hawking actually is the maximal epistemic superior on these matters?
I think there are plausible answers to be made. First, it is false to suggest that the question being asked is whether Hawking is the maximal epistemic superior on the issues. What is instead being asked is whether he is correct regarding particular issues. Even if he is wrong about a claim or even a set of claims, that does not itself entail that he is not the maximal epistemic superior around. Recall that being a maximal epistemic superior in this case means that one has a greater number of true beliefs than anyone else. That leaves room for false beliefs. Thus, Hawking can remain the maximal epistemic superior and nonetheless have false beliefs. Switching back to our discussion of RST, the believer who wishes to affirm only the minimal degree of reliability for Scripture (which is consistent with RST) can utilize this response. She can admit that Scripture is wrong in some places, that some of its claims are defeasible, and nonetheless maintain that Scripture is generally reliable, that its source (God) is the maximal epistemic superior, and that Scripture contains more true claims on the issues it addresses than other testimonies. But for those who want to affirm RST and affirm that Scripture is, necessarily[22], entirely without error (or entirely reliable, or inerrant), the possibility of defeaters must be excluded. This brings me to the second consideration, which I will explain by a modified Hawking example.
Suppose we are justified in believing that Stephen Hawking not only knows more truths than anyone else about astrophysics, but also that he knows all the truths of astrophysics. If we are justified in believing these things, then we are also justified in believing than there is no higher epistemic authority (regarding astrophysical truths; I will call this a ‘truth-peer’) than Stephen Hawking. Independently of all this, we are also justified in believing the following disjunction and the following conditionals: Either Stephen Hawking has an epistemic truth-peer or he does not. If Stephen Hawking has an epistemic truth-peer, then that epistemic truth-peer knows all the truths of astrophysics, in which case he necessarily agrees with Hawking, and we have no defeaters for Hawking’s testimony about black holes. If Stephen Hawking does not have an epistemic truth-peer, then we are justified in believing Hawking’s testimony over anyone who disagrees with him. This argument, I think, provides a prima facie defense of how we can justifiably dismiss epistemically weaker testimonies. Because of this, I believe the first two questions have plausible answers. The implications for RST in this respect are as follows: The defender of RST can justifiably maintain the scriptural witness against counterevidence if the source of the scriptural witness has maximal epistemic credentials.
But what about the third question? Is it not the case that we are begging the question of Hawking’s stronger epistemic credentials? It is possible, I suppose, to have differing intuitions on this matter. (In fact, I sometimes find myself with differing intuitions on this matter.) On the one hand, it seems true that I have reason to question whether Hawking’s testimony does have stronger epistemic credentials. After all, his views have been challenged, and reasons have been offered to the conclusion that he is incorrect. Vague as it may be, it seems I do have reasons to believe that Hawking does not know all the truths about astrophysics. On the other hand, if I am already justified in believing that Hawking’s credentials are epistemically superior to all others (at least in matters of astrophysics), and Hawking offers defeaters for all the counterevidence (even if those defeaters are purely in testimonial form), it seems I have better reason to suppose that Hawking has got matters right since the only clear evidence I have regards the levels of credibility to their testimony. Hawking’s credentials were as strong as logically possible, since my evidence indicated that he knows all truths. Someone with less impressive credentials challenges Hawking’s credentials, and Hawking responds that they are incorrect. At this point, since we are not aware of the particular evidence(s) in question, the epistemically justified attitude seems to be that we believe Hawking. After all, the weight of the testimonies is all we have to go on, and that supports Hawking.
Perhaps this is clearer if we consider RST more directly. At time t, we are justified in believing that some testimony T has its origins in a divine (omniscient) being D. We are told by D at t that the relation between T and D will be challenged in the future, but that the challenges are ultimately unsuccessful. At t, then, we have divine testimony defeating the future challenges to the relation between T and D. This evidence, even in the forms of defeaters (which are forms of evidence), is the strongest epistemically conceivable. There is no type of evidence we are more justified in believing than evidence that we justifiably believe has its origin in a being that knows all true things (and believes no false things). Most importantly for present concerns, if we justifiably believe at t that T has its origins in D, and if T informs us at t that there will be counterevidence about the relation between T and D (in this case, counterevidence that T does not have its origins in D), then we have ‘forward-looking’ defeaters for the counterevidence. When we come to possess that counterevidence, we can therefore justifiably adopt (or, rather, maintain) an attitude of disbelief toward that counterevidence and justifiably continue in our belief about the relation between T and D. If all this is correct, then RST plus some strong form of scriptural reliability (like inerrancy) can be indefeasibly justified.
Objections_______________
I will now consider two objections to the argument I presented before I conclude. Aside from the possible objections I have already dealt with, these objections represents the strongest objections to the view I presented here.
The Contradictions Objection
I have been speaking about the Bible in a very abstract sense, as a “source of divine testimony” and such. But many individuals believe that once we seriously look at the Bible’s contents, we cannot justifiably believe those contents since they are logically incompatible. Perhaps there are such contradictions. I am unconvinced of their presence, but it would be epistemically unjustified to affirm inerrancy if the Bible contained inconsistent propositions. Of course, this is consistent with RST, since RST (being weakly formulated) contends only that the Bible is generally reliable. Something can be generally reliable and nevertheless be sometimes unreliable. But since I am attempting to justify RST plus some strong form of scriptural reliability (like inerrancy), I will offer more than this response.
Objections about the truth of this or that verse or passage are contingent and many times call for case-by-case treatment. Because I am interested in establishing a broad theory of becoming and maintaining justification for affirming scriptural reliability, especially in light of counterevidence (like logical incompatibilities), I will consider a broad way in which concerns regarding contradiction can be handled.
Consider the more abstract possibility of logical contradiction in a text, or between two or more texts. Suppose that there is good reason to think that X has inconsistent truth claims. If this is so, then it would appear that X violates the Law of Contradiction and is thus necessarily false. Clearly, this is worrisome for the thesis. There are at least four options for a response: (1) reject the thesis on these grounds, (2) reject the Law of Contradiction, (3) contend that one of the truth claims is not divine testimony, (4) contend that the evidence for logical inconsistency is contrary to divine testimony and thus unreasonable to believe (i.e., contend that there is no logical inconsistency, despite appearances). I shall address only (2) and (4), since the others commit us to the rejection of the thesis.
The first response is to reject the Law of Contradiction. In short, the Law says that there are no true propositions of the form p and not-p. Since X contains propositions of the form p and not-p, X has necessarily false contents. But since we have divine testimony backing up our view of Scripture’s contents, we might see divine testimony as more plausible to uphold than the Law of Contradiction. I suppose this move might be made, but it is a significant sacrifice, one I would prefer not making.
The second response one could make is that despite the evidence supporting the reality of X having inconsistent truth claims, that evidence is defeated by divine testimony, and is thus unreasonable to believe. Granted, it might seem, perhaps even quite strongly, that there is a contradiction, but this is incorrect. It might be argued against this that this might entail rejecting the Law of Contradiction, but I fail to see why. One need not contend that contradictions are even possibly epistemically justified in order to save one’s boat. Instead, divine testimony can stop the buck short by defeating the evidence which supports seeing the claim(s) as logically incoherent. By consequence, there would be no need to deny the Law of Contradiction, since we would be unjustified to suppose that any contradiction exists. Furthermore, as I have shown in premise (7), if I am already justified in believing that the contents of X are true or probably true, then it follows that I am epistemically justified in believing that none of the contents of X are false. If that is true, then I am epistemically justified in believing that the contents of X are logically consistent since, if they were not, at least one of the claims would be false.
The Changeless Interpretation Objection
It might be argued that my defense of maintaining inerrancy has the following implausible implication: If someone is epistemically justified in maintaining inerrancy in the way I have sketched, that person would be unjustified in changing her interpretation of even a single passage of Scripture. The reason for this is because if I am justified in believing a given interpretation N of a passage or verse at t, and if have divine defeaters for counterevidence to what Scripture says (which at t I take to be N), then I am unjustified in believing ~N. Indeed, it is epistemically impossible for me to justifiably believe ~N.
Like the first objection, this objection is not troubling for the believer who affirms a weaker version of RST, for the epistemic commitment there is only to the general reliability of Scripture. Perhaps, for example, I am indefeasibly epistemically justified in affirming the core tenets of orthodox Christian theism – the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Atonement, the Virgin Birth, and so on. But if it is the case that not all of Scripture directly relates to these core tenets, there is nothing about the way in which I am justified demanding that I keep my interpretations of other passages the same. But for the believer who desires to affirm something like inerrancy, this solution is not available. Instead, the believer will have to avoid this criticism on other grounds.
Suppose I am indefeasibly justified in affirming the inerrancy of Scripture in the relevant way, and that my interpretation of a given verse or passage is such that I come to see that passage differently than I had before. It is true that, if I see my interpretation N of a verse or passage as being the same thing as what Scripture itself says, then I would be epistemically unjustified in denying N. But in the case where I do not see my former interpretation, N, as what Scripture itself says, but rather see some other interpretation, Q, as what Scripture itself says, then I can be and am epistemically justified in affirming Q. Therefore, my account does not rule out the possibility of a change of interpretation of a verse or passage in Scripture.
Conclusion_______________
I have argued here that an evidentialist model of epistemic justification can justify the Reliability of Scripture Thesis, which posits that Scripture is generally reliable. Contrary to what Plantinga and Clark seem to believe, it is not especially demanding on ordinary believers that they be justified in believing RST according to evidentialist standards. But in fact all that is required is that believers come to have justification for the proposition that Scripture is reliable; or, in the strongest of cases, that it is inerrant. This justification can be found in an argument for scriptural reliability. An example of this might be an a priori argument beginning with the premise that an omniscient, omnipotent, and omnibenevolent God would know the truth and know how to reveal it, be able to reveal the truth, and would desire to reveal the truth to Her children in an accurate manner. Strong reliability, such as inerrancy, might be defended on similar a priori grounds. Another possible way for an ordinary believer to become justified in believing that Scripture is reliable or inerrant is by testimony. A clergyperson whom is clearly an epistemic authority on the matter might claim that Scripture is reliable or inerrant, in which case an ordinary believer would be epistemically justified in believing that Scripture is reliable or inerrant.
I have also argued that belief in RST, even in the strong form of inerrancy, can be justifiably maintained in light of counterevidence. This can be done if someone is epistemically justified in affirming that Scripture contains forward-looking defeaters. But even this is not necessary. I am inclined to believe that someone is justified in believing that there are forward-looking defeaters of the relevant sort once that someone is justified in believing that an omniscient being (who, by definition, knows all truths and believes no falsehoods) authored Scripture, and therefore knows about any and all counterevidence that will be encountered by both Her and us. I believe there is more to say on these matters, and I certainly do not believe that this is the only way evidentialists can justify RST. It is just one way; a simple way for ordinary believers. And the simplicity is compounded by the fact that it is consistent with evidentialism to suppose that the ordinary believer need not consciously make each and every one of the inferences I made in the argument. The fact that she or he is justified in believing premise (5) is sufficient, in my estimation, to justify the other premises.
Finally, I claimed that if a strong sense of reliability for RST is epistemically justified, then so are weaker senses. Thus, if inerrancy is justified (i.e., if the view that there are only truths in Scripture is justified), then so are weaker views of reliability for RST. This is true, since if Scripture is 100% reliable, it is also 70% reliable (for example).
[1] See Richard Feldman and Earl Conee, Evidentialism: Essays in Epistemology (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 2004, for an extended defense of evidentialism.
[2] I am following Feldman and Conee in this regard. Although they claim not to be offering an analysis, they propose the following as “the kind of notion of justification that we take to be characteristically epistemic”:
EJ Doxastic attitude D toward proposition p is epistemically justified for S at t if and only if having D toward p fits the evidence S has at t.
See Feldman and Conee’s essay “Evidentialism” in ibid, p.83. All of this is exactly what I have in mind.
[3] Clark, Kelly James. Return to Reason: A Critique of Enlightenment Evidentialism and a Defense of Reason and Belief in God (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdman’s), 1998, pp.157-158.
[4] See his Warranted Christian Belief (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 2000. Admittedly, Plantinga and Clark are critiquing ‘Enlightenment evidentialism,’ or ‘classical evidentialism,’ which stipulates that a given doxastic attitude toward some proposition is justified if and only if the individual with the respective doxastic attitude has an argument (presumably a good argument) supporting that doxastic attitude. Evidentialists like Feldman, Conee, and me are inclined to see this requirement as unnecessary, although it is a way to justify a given doxastic attitude regarding some proposition. But Plantinga nevertheless believes that Christian belief can be ‘warranted’ in ways far simpler than most will think, as he states numerous times in Warranted Christian Belief.
[6] Plantinga, Alvin. “Two (or More) Kinds of Scripture Scholarship,” in his Warranted Christian Belief (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 2000, p.375. It is important to note that Plantinga’s talk of “epistemological assumptions” is a wide net that captures various other possible criticisms to the reliability of Scripture. So, Plantinga has more than historical biblical criticism as a possible defeater for Christian belief in the reliability of Scripture.
[7] Plantinga, Alvin. Ibid.
[8] Blount, Douglas. “The Authority of Scripture” in Michael J. Murray (ed.) Reason for the Hope Within (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans), p.400.
[9] See Alvin Goldman’s Epistemology and Cognition (Harvard, MA: Harvard University Press), 1988, for a more developed defense of process reliabilism.
[10] And by asserting that the criteria held by his unqualified variety of process reliabilism are sufficient. This entails that if a given person S believes p without evidence, S is epistemically justified in believing p just as long as the means S used to arrive at p are reliable and S has no defeaters for p. But this has the following implication: S might have arrived at p without noticing it, or without understanding why she has that belief. For example, I might arrive at the belief that unicorns exist because my cognitive faculties are reliably connected to the world; yet, when I find myself with the belief that unicorns exist, I have no idea why I believe as I do. In this case, I have no evidence that unicorns exist; none whatsoever. Yet, according to Blount, it would be reasonable (or justified) for me to believe that unicorns exist. Not only is this a denial of the evidentialist thesis; it also shows that a particular epistemic ‘burden’ (i.e., having evidence) is not necessary for justified beliefs, and thus not necessary for the justified beliefs of ordinary believers.
[11] Blount, Douglas. “The Authority of Scripture” in ibid, p.413. Although I do not cite it, Blount’s example spells out that Charity has no defeaters.
[12] The Consequence Argument is, of course, the infamous argument by Peter van Inwagen to demonstrate the logical incompatibility of free will and determinism. It can be found in: Van Inwagen, Peter. An Essay on Free Will (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 1986.
[13] Lewis, David. “Are We Free to Break the Laws?” in Gary Watson (ed.) Free Will: Oxford Readings in Philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 2003, pp.122-129. As a helpful note, Lewis’s essay was intended to be a response to van Inwagen’s Consequence Argument, proposing a way to defeat the Consequence Argument.
[14] It would be unjustified for us to believe a given testimony if we were justified in believing that the testimony was unreliable. A basic consequence of this is that: If someone S makes some testimony d regarding some proposition p, if I am justified in believing that d is unreliable, then I am justified in believing that d does not justify (i.e., is not evidence for) p.
[15] I don’t see that this assumption is essential for the success of my thesis here, but it’s an assumption, and an important assumption, nonetheless.
[16] Swinburne, Richard. The Existence of God, second edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 2004, p.322.
[17] “The other component is the principle that (in the absence of special considerations) the experiences of others are (probably) as they report them. This latter principle I will call the Principle of Testimony,” in ibid, p.322. See also Richard Swinburne’s Epistemic Justification (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp.123-127, for Swinburne’s further thoughts on the Principle of Testimony.
[18] In fact, Swinburne offers a different principle for religious experience: namely, the Principle of Credulity. See his Existence of God, pp.303-315.
[19] I understand “instances” of divine testimony to amount to the following: For every testimony T, if T has its source or origin in a divine being, then T is an instance of divine testimony.
[20] This is controversial in orthodox Christian theism, at least in part because there is substantial debate about whether there are future ‘truths’ to be known. For more on this literature, see William Hasker’s “A Philosophical Perspective” in Clark H. Pinnock (ed.) The Openness of God: A Biblical Challenge to the Traditional Understanding of God (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press), 1994, pp.126-154; God, Time, and Knowledge (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press), 1998. See also the contributions by Gregory A. Boyd, David Hunt, William Lane Craig, and Paul Helm in Divine Foreknowledge: Four Views (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press), 2001.
[21] Although ‘maximal’ might be a poor word choice. Perhaps ‘overall epistemic superior’ would be a better revision. The argument can then be changed without modifying anything of substance. But I don’t think ‘maximal’ is a poor word choice. It might be poor if by ‘maximal’ I mean ‘greatest conceivable,’ but ‘maximal’ need not take that meaning. It might simply mean ‘greatest in existence.’
[22] That is, it is necessarily true in virtue of coming from an omniscient being of the relevant sort, since it is logically impossible for an omniscient being to have false beliefs.
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