And I, not being one who holds to the theory of a literal and verbally inspired (i.e. dictated) view of scripture, have no argument with that.
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To those who hold not the theory of a literal and verbally inspired view of scripture,I invite them to repent it and listen to the advice of Gleason Archer in his Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties !!
After explaining that witnesses in a court of law lose all credibility once they have been caught lying, he applied this principle to the Bible.
(The same is true of Holy Scripture. If the statements it contains concerning matters of history and science can be proven by extrabiblical records, by ancient documents uncovered through archaeological digs, or by the established facts of modern science to be contrary to the truth, then there is grave doubt as to it trustworthiness in matters of religion. In other words, if
the biblical record can be proved fallible in areas of fact that can be verified, then it is hardly to be trusted in areas where it cannot be tested. As a witness for God, the Bible would be discredited as untrustworthy. What solid truth it may contain would be left as a matter of mere conjecture, subject to the intuition or canons of likelihood of each individual. An attitude of sentimental attachment to traditional religion may incline one person to accept nearly all the substantive teachings of Scripture as probably true. But someone else with equal justification may pick and chose whatever teachings in the Bible happen to appeal to him and lay equal claim to legitimacy.
One opinion is as good as another. All things are possible, but nothing is certain if indeed the Bible contains mistakes or errors of any kind (Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties pp. 23-24, ).
it seems a bit idiotic to me to call a book "the word of God" if the words in that book are not the words of God but only the words of fallible men who were given "ideas" to record in their own words. Anyone with any kind of background in writing should know that this is a ridiculous premise.
Actually the Bible teaches that "the word of God" came to man through a process of verbal inspiration
It teaches that God put his words into the mouths of the Old Testament prophets and at times ordered them to write "his words" that had been revealed to them
In Isaiah 51:16, the prophet had Yahweh saying to him, "I have put my words in your mouth." The same claim was made in Jeremiah 1:9, "Then Yahweh put forth his hand, and touched my mouth, and Yahweh said to me, Behold I have put my words into your mouth." Jeremiah had opened his book with the claim that the "word of Yahweh came to [him], saying..." (1:4), and thereafter he frequently claimed that what he was saying were the "words of Yahweh."
so obviously he was not claiming that Yahweh had given him just the "ideas" that he was preaching but that Yahweh had given him the very words that he spoke.
(Ezek. 6:1; 7:1; 12:1; 13:1; 15:1; 16:1; 17:1; 18:1; etc., etc., etc.). Hosea claimed that the "word of Yahweh" had come to him (1:1), and so did Joel (1:1), and so did Jonah (1:1), and so did Micah (1:1), etc., etc., etc
Exodus 24:3 Moses came and told the people
all the words of Yahweh and all the ordinances; and all the people answered with one voice, and said, "All the words that Yahweh has spoken we will do.4 And
Moses wrote down all the words of Yahweh.
the people understood that they had heard him read not the "ideas" of Yahweh but
the WORDS of Yahweh.
Jeremiah, whose claim that Yahweh touched his mouth and put his words into the prophet's mouth we have already noticed, later claimed that he wrote down the words that Yahweh had spoken to him: "The word that came to Jeremiah from Yahweh: Thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel: ‘Write in a book all the words that I have spoken to you’ (30:1-2).
Matthew 10:16 "See, I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. 17 Beware of them, for they will hand you over to councils and flog you in their synagogues; 18 and you will be dragged before governors and kings because of me, as a testimony to them and the Gentiles. 19 When they hand you over, do not worry about how you are to speak or what you are to say;
for what you are to say will be given to you at that time; 20 for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.
2 Peter 1:19
First of all you must understand this, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation, 21 because
no prophecy ever came by human will, but men and women moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.
but if God gave only the "ideas" to prophets, rather than putting his words into their mouths as Isaiah and Jeremiah claimed, then the prophecy would be very much something that had come "by human will." He concluded by saying that men and women "moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God." Can anyone imagine how it would be at all possible that someone who was "moved by the Holy Spirit" to "speak from God" could say something that wasn't true? If that should happen, then it would necessarily follow that the Holy Spirit had "moved" this person to say something that was inaccurate.
It is very evident that both the Old Testament and New Testament taught that those whom God or the Holy Spirit inspired were guided on a verbal basis in what they said and wrote. In other words, their very words were the words of God and not their own.
The doctrine of verbal inspiration is the only effective description of the process of guidance that the Bible claims that God used in guiding his inspired ones into "all truth." This doctrine is the exact reason why so many Bible believers also believe in biblical inerrancy. This belief is a logical consequence of the doctrine of verbal inspiration.
(Traditional Biblical Inerrancy P:2)
part of a day (as opposed to night) ,reckoned as a day and a night)