Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Bryant J. Williams III" <bjwvmw AT com-pair.net>]

Dear Yigal,

[Yigal]
The academic/scientific approach does not accept any authority just on faith,
and considers everything open to questioning - including whether any sort of
deity is behind the composition of the Bible in the first place. You know
that, we know that, and there is no use in repetedly re-hashing it.

[Bryant]
You must remember that all people use "faith" in everything they do, think, or
say. Do not make the mistake that "faith is without knowledge." Quite the
contrary. Faith always includes knowledge. Without faith knowledge makes no
sense. Without knowledge faith is irrational. Faith and knowledge go hand in
hand. The one cannot exist without the other.

Frequently, academic circles of the liberal side make a dichotomy between 
faith
and reason (knowledge). This type of dichotomy is a false one. Everyone uses
faith. It is the question of the accuracy/creditability of the knowledge 
behind
that faith that is the problem. I accept the text as written unless the 
context:
literary genre, grammar, historical markers, rhetorical devices: hyperbole,
metaphor, understatement, overstatement, chiasm, acrostics, puns, etc., tell 
me
otherwise. If there is a problem, as in the problem of the text between 
Jeremiah
52 and II Kings 25 on another thread, then that requires that any decision 
will
always be tentative until more information becomes available that can decide 
the
issue one way or the other; if that is even possible. That is being
intellectually honest. I do not use phrases such as, "most scholars,"
"scholars," etc., because frequently that is basically implying/stating, "You
are not a scholar if you do not accept this reasoning or fact." That is
intellectually dishonest. Everyone is a scholar. The question then becomes the
degree of competency. In fact, this last question cannot be spoken about on 
this
list because it would be ill-mannered to do so. The person's own writings will
make it evident without comment being necessary.

Rev. Bryant J. Williams III



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