65
Ad usum privatum - for student's use only
INSPIRATION
Raymond F. Collins
Article from The New Jerome Biblical Commentary
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1 Abraham, W. J ., The Divine Inspiration of Holy Scrip­
ture (Oxford, 1981). Achtemeier, P.J., The Inspiration of Scripture:
Problems and Proposals (Phi, 1980). Alonso Schokel, L., "I nspira­
tion," Sacramentum Mundi (ed. K. Rahner, et al.; NY, 1969) 3.
145-51; The Inspired Word: Scripture in the Light of Language and
Literature (NY, 1965); "The Psychology of Inspiration," The
Bible in Its Literary Milieu (ed. V. L. Toilers and J. R. Meier; GR,
1979) 24-56. Bea, A., "Deus Auctor Sacrae Scripturae:
Herkunft und Bedeutung der Formel," Ang 20 (1943) 16-31.
Benoit, P., "Inspiration," R-T, 9-59; Inspiration and the Bible
(London, 1965). Bromiley, G. W., "Inspiration, History of the
Doctrine of," ISBE 2. 849-54. Burtchaell,J. T., Catholic Theories
of Biblical Inspiration since 1810 (Cambridge, 1969). Cassem, N.
H., "Inerrancy after 70 Years: The Transition to Saving Truth,"
ScEs 22 (1970) 189-202. Collins, R. F., Introduction to the New
Testament (GC, 1983) 317-55. Desroches, A.,Jugement pratique
et jugement speculatif chez l'ecrivain inspire (Ottawa, 1958). Gnuse,
R., The Authority of the Bible (NY, 1985). Harrington, W., Record
of Revelation: The Bible (Chicago, 1965) 20-53. Harris, R. L.,
2 OUTLINE
Vatican Council II (§ 3-7)
Early Christian and Jewish Tradition (§ 8-31)
(I) New Testament
(A) 2 Tim 3:16-17 (§ 9-16)
(B) 2 Pet 1: 19-21 (§ 17)
(II) Judaism (§ 18-22)
(III) Fathers of the Church
(A) Explanations of Inspiration (§ 25)
(B) Origen (§ 26)
(C) Augustine (§ 27)
(D) Important Formulas (§ 28-31)
(a) Condescension (§ 28)
(b) Dictation (§ 29-30)
(c) "God the Author" (§ 31)
The Prophetic Model of Inspiration (§ 32-37)
(I) Causal Instrumentality (§ 33-35)
(II) Plenary Verbal Inspiration (§ 36-37)
The Tract on Inspiration (§ 38-53)
(I) Within Roman Catholicism
(A) Impact of Textual Criticism (§ 39)
(B) Impact of Historical Criticism (§ 40-41)
Inspiration and Canonicity of the Bible: Contemporary Evangelical
Perspectives (rev. ed.; GR, 1969). Hoffman, T. A., "Inspiration,
Normativeness, Canonicity, and the Unique Sacred <::;Jiaracter
of the Bible," CBQ 44 (1982) 447-69. Lohfink, N., "Uber die
Irrtumslosigkeit und die Einheit der Schrift," SZ 174 (1964)
161-81; Eng digest in TD 13 (1965) 185-92. Loretz, 0., Das
Ende der lnspirations-Theologie (2 vols.; Stuttgart, 1974-76); The
Truth of the Bible (NY, 1968). McCarthy, D. J., "Personality,
Society, and Inspiration," TS 24 (1963) 553-76. Marshall, I. H.,
Biblical Inspiration (London, 1982). Rahner, K., Inspiration in the
Bible (2d ed.; NY, 1964). Scullion,J., The Theology of Inspiration
(TToday 10; Cork, 1970). Stanley, D. M., "The Concept of
Biblical Inspiration," ProcCTSA 13 (1958) 65-95. Synave, P.
and P. Benoit, Prophecy and Inspiration (NY, 1961) esp. 84-145.
Turner, G., "Biblical Inspiration and the Paraclete," New Black­
friars 65 (1984) 420-28. Vawter, B., Biblical Inspiration (Phi,
1972). Vogels, W., "Inspiration in a Linguistic Mode," BTB 15
(1985) 87-93. Warfield, B. B., "Inspiration," ISBE 2. 839-49.
(II) Plenary and Limited Inspiration
(A) Lessius (§ 43)
(B) Jahn and Haneberg (§ 44)
(C) Vatican I; Pope Leo XIII (§ 45)
(D) Newman (§ 46)
(E) Franzelin (§ 47)
(F) Lagrange (§ 48-49)
(III) Inerrancy Theories
(A) Among Catholics (§ 50)
(B) Among Conservative Protestants (§ 51-53)
Contemporary Approaches to Inspiration (§ 54-65)
(I) Among Protestants
(A) The Concursive Theory (§ 54-55)
(B) Consequent Behavior (§ 56)
(C) Neo-orthodoxy (§ 57)
(11) Among Roman Catholics
(A) Psychological Theories (§ 59)
(B) Social Theories (§ 60-61)
(C) Literary Approaches (§ 62-64)
(D) Ecclesial Aspects (§ 65)
Corollaries to the Doctrine of Inspiration (§ 66-72)
1023
1024 Inspiration
(I) Ecclesial Use of the Scriptures (§ 66)
(II) The Word of God (§ 67-69)
VATICAN COUNCIL II
3 "The Divine Inspiration and the Interpretation
of Sacred Scripture" was the title of chap. 3 of Vatican
II's Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation (Dei
Verbum, Nov. 18, 1965). In the text, inspiration 1s a
specific way of speaking about the unique sacred char­
acter of the Scriptures, having important implications
for the way in which the OT and NT books are to be
regarded by believers.
4 The key conciliar affirmation (3:11) is:
Those divinely revealed realities which are contained and
presented in sacred Scripture have been committed to
writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit [Spiritu
Sancto a.ffiante consignata sunt]. Holy Mother Church, relying
on the belief of the apostles, holds that the books of both OT
and NT in their entirety, with all their parts, are sacred and
canonical because, having been written under the inspira­
tion of the Holy Spirit [Spiritu Sancto inspirante conscripti] (cf.
John 20:31; 2 Tim 3:16; 2 Pet 1 :19-21; 3:15-16), they have
God as their author and have been handed on as such to the
church herself. In composing the sacred books, God chose
men and while employed by him they made use of their
powers and abilities, so with him acting in them and
through them, they, as true authors, consigned to writing
everything and only those things which He wanted. There­
fore, since everything asserted by the inspired authors or
sacred writers [quod auctores inspirati seu hagiographi asserunt]
must be held to be asserted by the Holy Spirit, it follows
that the books of Scripture must be acknowledged as
teaching firmly, faithfully, and without error that truth
which God wanted put into the sacred writings for the sake
of our salvation. Therefore, 'all Scripture is inspired by God
and useful for teaching, for reproving, for correcting, for
instruction in justice; that the man of God may be perfect,
equipped for every good work' (2 Tim 3:16-17, Gk text).
5 Clearly Vatican II intended to recapitulate
traditional teaching on inspiration. The text refers to
four NT passages often cited in the history of the
church's long discussion on inspiration, esp. 2 Tim 3:16
and 2 Pet 1:19-21. At a relatively late stage of the con­
ciliar discussion on inspiration and in response to an
intervention by Dom B. C. Butler, 2 Tim 3:16-17 was
incorporated so that there could be no mistaking how
the council fathers understood the doctrine of the inspir­
ation of the Scriptures and what they considered its
purpose to be. They intended to recapitulate the teaching
EARLY CHRISTIAN AND JEWISH TRADITION
8 (I) New Testament. What, then, does the
tradition say about inspiration? The two most important
Scripture passages are 2 Tim 3: 16-17 and 2 Pet 1:19-21.
In each, the Lat Vg uses inspirare (lit., "to breathe in"),
from which are derived not only the Eng "inspire" but
also its equivalent in most modern romance and
Germanic languages. Initially the 2 Tim passage, which
speaks of the inspiration of Scripture, would seem more
significant than the 2 Pet passage, which speaks of the
inspiration of prophecy.
9 (A) 2Tim3:16-17. "All scripture is inspired
by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for
correction, and for training in righteousness, that the
man of God may be complete, equipped for every good
[65:3-9]
(III) The Truth of the Bible (§ 70-71)
(IV) Future of Inspiration Theorizing (§ 72)
of the (NT) Scriptures themselves. In this regard,
Vatican II's statement on inspiration concurs with the
views of many evangelical Christians, �ho look to the
NT Scriptures, esp. 2 Tim 3:16-17 and 2 Pet 1:19-21,
as providing the key witnesses as to how inspiration is
to be understood and enunciated.
6 The council fathers' desire to sum up tradi­
tional teaching on inspiration is further evidenced by
their footnoted references to Heb 1:1; 4:7; 2 Sam 23:2;
to Matthew's use of citation formulas (e.g., Matt 1:22);
and to Augustine (De genesi ad litteram 2. 9.20; Ep. 82.3)
and Aquinas (De Veritate 1.12, a.2). The footnotes also
refer to Trent and Vatican I, as well as to two major
encyclicals which had appeared in the interim between
Vatican I and II, viz., Leo XIII's Providentissimus Deus
(1893) and Pius XII's DAS (1943). Vatican II's concern
to recapitulate the tradition on inspiration becomes all
the more significant in the light of the retrogressive draft
(schema) on inspiration that had been submitted at the
outset of the council, as well as the extensive discussions
that led not only to the rejection of that schema but also
to several revisions of the text that was eventually to
become part of Dei Verbum (-+ Church Pronouncements,
72:7, 13-16).
7 Nine additional articles in Dei Verbum (7,8,
9, 14, 16, 18,20,21,24) make explicit reference to the
inspiration of the Scriptures. The conciliar text states
that the OT (3:14), the NT (4:16), the Gospels (5:18),
Paul's epistles, and other apostolic writings (5:20) are
inspired. Some conciliar passages cite inspiration as a
quality of the biblical texts (2:8; 6:21,24), whereas others
either predicate inspiration of those who were involved
in the biblical writing or refer to the texts as having been
written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit (2:9;
4:14; 5:20; cf. 2:7; 5:18). God is "the inspirer and author
of both Testaments" (4: 16); elsewhere inspiration is
specifically attributed to the Spirit (2 :7, 9; 5: 18,20).
Repeatedly, inspiration is cited as the ground for the
consideration that the Scriptures are (or contain) the
word of God (2:9; 4:14; 6:21,24). The Gospels benefit
from the charism of inspiration in a singularly pre­
eminent fashion (3:11; 5:18)
work" (RSV). (For the probable post-Pauline pseudo­
nymity of 2 Tim, -+ Pastorals, 56:6-8).
The immediate context (3: 10-1 7) encourages
1:'imothy, as the man of God and leader of the ccngrega­
tlon, to follow the example of Paul and to continue the
tradition of Pauline teaching. Timothy is reminded of
the "sa�red writings" with which he has been acquainted
from his youth. These are clearly the Jewish Scriptures
(altho�gh a definitive _Jewish canon had not yet been
established when 2 T!1:1 w�s written; -+ Canonicity,
,
66:35�. Such sacred �nt1?gs are able to instruct you for
salv�t1on throu�h fait� m Jesus Christ" (2 Tim 3:15).
Their purpose 1s salv1fic, but the key to their salvific
purpose is Christ Jesus.
[65: 10-18]
10 Apart from this reference to Christ the
author's attitude toward the sacred writings has ' been
forme� :"ithin . the Jewish tradition. The two major
Hellemst1c Jewish authors whose writings have been
preserved speak of the Jewish Scriptures as "sacred
writings" (Philo, De vita Mosis 2.292; Josephus, Ant.
10.10.4 § 210). Jewish males were trained in the Scrip­
tu�es from as early as five years of age, according to the
M1shna ('Abot 5:21). Although the reference to faith in
Christ Jesus (2 Tim 3: 15) clearly manifests a Christian
perspe�tive, th� "actualizing" exegesis implied by 2 Tim
1s consistent with the scriptural interpretation found in
the Qumran pesher and the rabbinic midrash (-+ Her­
meneutics, 71:31-34).
�1 Ver_ses 16-17 provide an explanatory reflec­
�1on on': 15, 1.e., on the utility of the sacred writings for
mstructional purposes. The author mentions the reason
why the sacred writings are valuable (v 16a) and then
specifies the u�e to which they can be put (vv 166-17).
The G� text 1s not altogether clear, as the variety of
translations shows. There are three major ambiguities:
(1) th_e meaning of pasa graphe ("all scripture"), (2) the
meamng of theopneustos ("inspired"), and (3) the gram­
matical function of theopneustos.
12 The ambiguity of pasa graphe is easily grasped
from translations ranging from "the whole Bible" (Living
Bible) to "every inspired scripture" (NEB) and a literally
accurate "all Scripture." Of itself, graphe can mean a
single written verse, an entire book, or the entire collec­
tion of the Scriptures. Pasa can be taken in an inclusive
("the whole") or in a distributive ("every") sense. Since
the NT does not use "Scripture" for a single book, that
possibility is to be excluded. Since a collection of Chris­
tian Scriptures was not yet in existence at the time when
2 Tim was written (-+ Canonicity, 66:55), the expres­
sion "all Scripture" makes reference to (only) the Jewish
Scriptures, as evidenced also by the parallel expression
"sacred writings" in v 15. Finally, since pasa graphe lacks
the definite article, it most likely means every passage of
Scripture.
13 Theopneustos (a rare word) is typically rendered
as "inspired by God," but we also find the simple "in­
spired" (NEB) and the somewhat cumbersome "God­
breathed" (NIV). Composed of theo, from theos, "God,"
and pneustos, from pneo, "to breathe," it is found once in
the NT, never in the LXX, and only four other times in
extant Gk writings. Understood in an act. sense, it
would suggest that Scripture is filled with God's breath
or spirit (=inspiring). Understood in a pass. sense, theo­
pneustos suggests that Scripture has been breathed by
God (=inspired). The vast majority of ancient and
modern commentators and translations understand this
adj. passively, so that pasa graphe theopneustos means the
Scripture which is inspired.
14 There remains the problem of the grammatical
function of theopneustos. Is it used as a predicate (RSV: "all
Scripture is inspired") or as an attribute (some ancient
versions and NEB: "every inspired Scripture")? The
grammatical problem is that the Gk verse lacks a prin­
cipal vb., so that a copulative vb. ("is") must be supplied
within the sentence. The weight of the exegetical
considerations would seem to favor understanding "in­
spired" as a predicate. Thus 2 Tim would be affirming
that every passage in the Jewish Scriptures is inspired; in
consequence whereof, these Scriptures are useful for
teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteous­
.ness. Because the Scriptures have come from God, they
can be profitably used for purposes both of instruction
and of moral exhortation.
15 Since all other known uses of theopneustos,
"inspired," appear in literature written after 2 Tim
Early Tradition 1025
(Plutarch, Vettius Valens, Pseudo-Phocylides, and Sib.
Or.), some think that "inspired" is a word coined by the
author of 2 Tim in order to highlight the divine origin
of the Scriptures (see C. Spicq, "theodidaktoi, theopneustos,"
Notes de lexicographie neotestamentaire [Gottingen, 1978] 1.
372-74). Nonetheless, the dominant opinion of scholars
is that "inspired" is a loanword from ancient Hellenistic
descriptions of the ecstatic experience of mantic
prophets.
16 Although theopneustos is not used by Philo, his
description of Moses as "a prophet of the highest qual­
ity" (De vita Mosis 2.187-91) is somewhat similar to the
experience encapsulated in theopneustos by Sib. Or. and
other Hellenistic texts. For Philo it was Moses' role as
prophet to "declare by inspiration [thespize] what cannot
be apprehended by reason." Philo distinguishes three
kinds of divine utterances: (1) The prophet serves as the
interpreter of the divine utterance. (2) The utterance
takes place in a dialogue between the prophet and God.
(3) "The speaker appears under that divine possession
[ enthousiodes] in virtue of which he is chiefly and in the
strict sense considered a prophet."
Philo regards other prophets besides Moses as in­
spired (Quis rerum 265; De vita Mosis 1.281; De mutatione
nominum 120). In this regard, he reflects views generally
held in 1st-cent. Judaism. Josephus wrote about Balaam:
"Thus did he speak by divine inspiration, as not being in
his own power [ epetheiazen ouk on en heauto to de theio
pneumatt], but moved to say what he did by the divine
spirit" (Ant. 4.6.5 § 118). Earlier, the rule of the Essene
Qumran community had urged the sectarians to act
"according as the prophets revealed by the spirit of his
holiness" (lQS 8:16; see lQpHab 2:2; CD 2:12-13).
As for the early Christians, a traditional logion
attributes to Jesus the view that David was inspired by
the Holy Spirit (Matt 22:43; Mark 12:36). The Holy
Spirit is said to have spoken through David (Acts 1:16)
or a prophet (Acts 28:25). God spoke through the
prophets (Luke 1:70) or through Moses (Mark 12:26; cf.
Matt 22:31; Luke 20:37). These texts indicate that the
early Christians shared the view common among the
Jews of their times that the prophets, of whom Moses
was a singular example, were inspired by the Holy
Spirit.
17 (B) 2 Pet 1:19-21. "We have the prophetic
word made more sure. . . . First of all you must under­
stand this, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of
one's own interpretation, because no prophecy ever
came by the impulse of man, but men moved by the
Holy Spirit spoke from God" (RSV). (For the pseudo­
nymity of 2 Pet, -+ 2 Peter, 64:2).
The immediate context (1:12-21) guarantees Chris­
tian hope. Having reflected on the transfiguration (vv
12-18), the author cites "the prophetic word" (ton
prophetikon logon, i.e., the entire Law, Prophets, and
Writings -the three divisions of the Hebrew Scriptures;
-+ Canonicity, 66:22) as a firm foundation for hope
insofar as God has confirmed its truth, and its message
was in the process of being realized. The author's
thoughts on false prophets (2: 1-3) are introduced by the
caveat of 1:20-21: it is not permitted to interpret the
prophetic dicta contained in the Scripture (pasa propheteia
graphes) according to one's subjective whim. The reason
is that prophecy comes from the Holy Spirit.
18 (II) Judaism. The inspiration of prophets is
one thing; the inspiration of the Scriptures (i.e., written
works) another. That the writings which contain the
words of the prophets were inspired is never explicitly
said in theJewish Scriptures, even though they constantly
affirm that the Holy Spirit was deeply involved in the
I 026 Inspiration
activity and proclamation of the prophets (2 Sam 23:2;
Hos 1:1; Joel 3:1-2, etc.).
19 Philo echoed the traditional belief of Judaism:
"A prophet has no utterance of his own, but all his
utterance came from elsewhere, the echoes of another's
voice. The wicked may never be the interpreter of God,
so that no worthless person is 'God-inspired' [enthousia].
in the proper sense" (Quis rerum 259; cf. De praemiis 55).
Like the author of 2 Pet, Philo distinguishes the true and
inspired prophet from the false prophet. He ascribes the
gift of prophecy to Moses, Noah, Isaac, and Jacob, but
above all to Moses, who is "everywhere celebrated as a
prophet" (Quis rerum 262).
20 In Philo's opinion, the words of Moses and the
patriarchs were inspired, and all things in the sacred
books (hosa en tais hierais bibliois) are oracles delivered
through Moses. Accordingly, the Torah or law tradi­
tionally ascribed to Moses contains inspired prophecy.
The Babylonian Talmud goes further in speaking of the
Torah as "divinely revealed." Indeed, the rabbis taught
that the legislation of Num 15:31, "Because he has
despised the word of theLord, and has broken his com­
mandment, that person shall be utterly cut off," applies
to the one "who maintains that the Torah is not from
heaven" (b. Sanh. 99a).
21 Clearly the doctrine of prophetic inspiration
lies at the root of the Jewish doctrine of the inspiration
of the Scriptures. The entire Teniik (i.e., the Torah, the
Prophets, and the Writings; -+ Canonicity, 66:22) was
considered inspired since all three units were derived
from prophetic utterance. That both the Torah, which
has come from Moses, the prophet par excellence (cf.
Deut 15: 18), and the prophetic books result from pro­
phetic utterance almost goes without saying. Occasional
passages suggest that even the utterance of sages should
be interpreted along the lines of inspired prophetic
utterance (Isa 11:2; Exod 15:20-21; 2 Chr 15:1-5).
22 It is on the basis of this Jewish tradition that
the author of 2 Pet affirms that ton prophetikon logon is
made more sure- "the prophetic word" of Hellenistic
Jewish usage, where it indicates the entire Teniik. These
Scriptures stand fast because they have begun to be
realized in Jesus Christ. Thus early Christianity shared
with Jewish tradition the notion that the Gewish) Scrip­
tures were inspired, as attested by the virtual inter­
changeability of "it is written" (Acts 13:33) and "he
[=God] says" (13:34,35).
23 (Ill) Fathers of the Church. The witness
of the NT was such that the early Fathers took the
inspiration of the Scriptures as almost self-evident,
echoing traditional language in their descriptions.
During the 2d and 3d cents., however, "the Scriptures"
(hai graphat) came to be used also of the authoritative
Christian writings that would eventually be incorporated
into the canon. This extension of the term used for
Jewish writings indicated a divine source. In the school
of Alexandria, Clement (ca. 150-215) wrote about the
"sacred writings" (hiera grammata) and the "holy books"
(hagiai bibliot), affirming that the Scriptures were the
work of "divine authors" (theion graphon). Clement's
pupil, Origen (ca. 185-254), wrote about the "sacred
books" (hierai biblioi) derived "from inspiration" (ex
epipnoias). Contemporaneously, in Antioch, Theophilus
was writing about the "holy Scriptures" (hai hagiai
graphaz) and citing their authors as "bearers of the spirit"
(pneumatophorot).
24 Such patristic views underscored the authority
of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures. Clement of Alex­
andria, e.g., wrote of the possibility of citing innumer­
able texts of the Scriptures of which "not a dot would
pass away" (Matt 5:18), because they have been spoken
[65:19-26]
by the mouth of the Lord, the Holy Spirit, "who uttered
them" (Isa 1 :20; Protrepticus 9.82.1). While acknowledg­
ing that the Scriptures do not provide answers to all our
questions, lrenaeus ofLyons (ca. 130-200) noted that the
Scriptures are perfect because they have been given by
the word of'God and the Spirit (Adv. Haer. 2.28.2).
Among the Cappadocian Fathers, Gregory ofNazianzus
(329-389) wanted attention paid to even the shortest
scriptural texts since they are attributable to the exact
care of the Spirit (Oratio 2.105; PG 35. 504).
25 (A) Explanations of Inspiration. Quite
another matter was the way in which the Fathers
understood inspiration. Some earlier Fathers considered
it the result of an ecstatic phenomenon. Theophilus
compared the prophets with the sibyls, for they "were
possessed by a holy Spirit [pneumatophoroi pneumatos
hagiou] and became prophets [kai prophetai genomenot] and
were inspired and instructed by God himself [hyp' autou
tou theou empneusthentes kai sophisthentes]" (Ad Autolycum
2.9; PG 6. 1064). Justin Martyr (ca. 100-165) wrote:
"When you listen to the prophecies, spoken as in the per­
son [of someone], do not think that they were spoken by
the inspired prophets of their own accord, but by the
Word of God who prompts them" (Apo/. 1.36). Justin, in
fact, rarely cites the name of an individual prophet (but
see Dial. 118, naming Nathan, Ezekiel, and Isaiah). The
prediction of future events was a gift to prophets (Apo/.
1.31; Dial. 7), and inspiration was almost a matter of
divine dictation. Somewhat similar views were held by
Athenagoras, the 2d-cent. Christian apologist. Capital­
izing on the Gk root pneu- (pnein, "to blow"; pneuma,
"spirit") and anticipating the scholastic doctrine of
instrumental causality in the discussion on inspiration,
he wrote about the teachings "of Moses or of Isaiah and
Jeremiah and the rest of the prophets who in the ecstasy
of their thoughts, as the divine Spirit moved them,
uttered what they had been inspired to say, the Spirit
making use of them as a flautist might blow into a flute"
(Legatio 9; PG 6. 905-8).
26 (B) Origen. In the East, Origen, one of the
first Christian writers to take up the notion of inspira­
tion at length, demonstrated a bias against the view that
an ecstatic experience was at the origin of prophecy and
of scriptural inspiration. His major work, On First
Principles (Peri Archon; De principiis), contained a chapter
entitled "Inspiration of Divine Scripture." He wrote of
the testimonies "drawn from the Scriptures, which we
believe to be divine, both from what is called the Old
Testament and also from the New" (4.1; PG 11. 341).
Referring to "divine writings" and the "divine character"
of the Scriptures, Origen thought it impossible to accept
many scriptural statements "as spoken by a man" (4.22;
PG 11. 391). "One who approaches the prophetic words
with care and attention . . . will be convinced by his own
feelings that the words which are believed by us to be
from God are not the compositions of men" (4.6; PG 11.
353). The Holy Spirit "illuminated" (to photizonti pneu­
mati) the inspired writer (4.14; PG 11. 372) with an
action directed to the human mind, will, and memory
(Contra Ce/sum 7.3-4; PG 11. 1424-25). Nevertheless,
for Origen the biblical prophets "voluntarily �nd con­
sciously collaborated with the word that came to them"
(Hom. in Ezech., frag. 6.11; PG 13. 709), and the evan­
gelists were able to express their own opinions. Indeed,
he distinguished between the word of revelation and the
commentary on that word which comes from the human
author of the Scriptures. This distinction led Origen to
admit the possibility of error on the part of an OT
prophet or a NT author.
Origen's greatest contribution probably lay in the
emphasis that he placed on the inspiration of the text
[65:27-31]
itself as distinct from the previous stress on the inspira­
tion of the prophets. This shift to emphasizing that the
text itself was the word of God was due, at least in part,
to Origen's struggle with the remnants of Montanism,
which overemphasized Spirit-led prophets.Origen also
admitted various levels or degrees of inspiration, a posi­
tion later held by the Antiochene theologian Theodore
of Mopsuestia (ca. 350-428), but not generally espoused
by the Eastern Fathers.
27 (C) Augustine. Among the Western
Fathers, Augustine (354-430) dealt extensively with the
significance of the Scriptures, esp. in The Harmony of the
Gospels and On Christian Doctrine. He stressed that mean­
ing of the Scriptures which the author intended: "Our
aim should be nothing else than to ascertain what is the
mind and intention of the person who speaks" (Harmony
2.12; PL 34. 1092; cf. Christ. Doct. 1.36; PL 34. 34). By
and large, Augustine held that the Scriptures were dic­
tated to human authors by the Holy Spirit: "the author
(through whom the Holy Spirit brought Holy Scripture
into being)," and the Spirit of God "who produced these
words through him" (Christ. Doct. 3.27; PL 34. 80). He
accorded a large role to the human authors, who "use all
those forms of expression which grammarians call by
the Greek name tropes" (figures of speech; Christ. Doct.
3.29; PL 34. 80). The evangelist may introduce a topic
without expanding upon it at length or make some addi­
tions of his own "not indeed in the subject-matter itself,
but in the words by which it is expressed." "He may not
be entirely successful ...in calling to mind and reciting
anew with the most literal accuracy the very words
which he heard on the occasion" (Harmony 2.12; PL 34.
109 1).
28 (D) Important Formulas. While the
Fathers of both East and West generally affirmed the in­
spiration of the Scriptures and yet tried to deal
realistically with the problems of interpretation, three
expressive formulas emerged from their writings that
would dominate much later discussion, viz., condescen­
sion, dictation, and "God the author of the Scriptures."
(a) CONDESCENSION. Having a forerunner in
Origen's "accommodation" (symperihora), the notion of
"condescension" (synkatabasis), stemming from John
Chrysostom (ca. 347-407), had the most enduring value
in the discussion of inspiration (Vawter, Biblical 40). It
continues to be cited in ecclesiastical documents, e.g.,
DAS (EB 559; RSS p. 98) and Vatican II's Dei Verbum
(3:13). The latter cites Chrysostom on Gen 3:8 (Homily
17.1; PG 53. 134) proclaiming the condescension of
divine wisdom "that we may learn the gentle kindness of
God, which words cannot express, and how far He has
gone in adapting His language with thoughtful concern
for our weak human nature." It sees this as analogous to
the incarnation of the Word of God, an analogy fre­
quently used in explaining inspiration and intimated by
Chrysostom himself (Homily 15.3 on John 1: 18; PG 59.
100). Chrysostom often used divine "condescension" to
talk about the Scriptures being written by human
authors, who occasionally expressed their thoughts in
metaphor and hyperbole or in such a way as to gain a
favorable reception from their readers (captatio benevo­
lentiae). See R.C.Hill, Compass Theology Review 14 ( 1980)
34-38.
29 (b) DICTATION. That the Scriptures were
"dictated" (Lat vb. dictare) is found in such Western
Fathers as Augustine (e.g., En. in Ps. 62.1; PL 36. 748)
and Jerome (Paul's Rom was dictated by the Holy Spirit;
Epist. 120.1O; PL 22.997).Even in the 16th-cent.Refor­
mation disputes, dictation of the Scriptures by the Holy
Spirit served to describe inspiration for both sides. For
Catholics, in 1546 Trent clearly "perceived that this
Fathers of the Church 1027
truth and rule are contained in the written books and un­
written traditions which have come down to us, having
been received by the apostles from the mouth of Christ
himself, or from the apostles by the dictation of the Holy
Spirit [Spiritu Sancto dictante], and have been transmitted
as it were from hand to hand" (OS 150 1)-a passage
cited verbatim in 1870 by Vatican I (Dei Filius; DS 3006).
30 In the same vein, "the Reformers took over
unquestionably and unreservedly the statement on the
inspiration, and indeed the verbal inspiration, of the
Bible, as it is explicitly and implicitly contained in those
Pauline passages which we have taken as our basis, even
including the formula that God is the author of the
Bible, and occasionally making use of the idea of dictation
through the Biblical writers" (emphasis added; K.Barth,
Church Dogmatics 1.2.520). With regard to how far the
Bible is the word of God, Barth finds in the Reformers
"that God or the Holy Ghost is its autor primarius; that its
content is 'given' to the prophets and apostles ...; that
it is mandata, inspirata, dictata, etc., by divine 'impulse: ...
[that] in the composition of their writings the prophets
and apostles acted as amanuenses ...or as librarii ...or as
actuarit' ( 1.2.523).
John Calvin ( 1509- 1564) frequently used "dictation"
to describe the divine authorship of the Scriptures and
"scribes" to describe the role of the human authors.
Whatever Daniel "uttered was dictated by the Holy
Spirit" and the NT authors were "certain and authentic
amanuenses of the Holy Spirit" (Institutes 4.8.9). Isaiah
and Moses were "instruments of the Spirit of God" who
offered nothing on their own" (24th Sermon on 2 Tim;
Corpus Reformatorum 54. 285-86). Nonetheless, when
Calvin spoke of the Scriptures as having been "dictated"
and of "scribes," for him dictation was not mere
stenography.He admits, e.g., that the scriptural authors
were affected by the obscurity of the times (Institutes
2.1 1.6) and that even Paul did not cite the Scriptures
without error.
31 (c) "Goo THE AUTHOR." Used by a Reformer
like Calvin, this terminology is well attested in Catholic
church statements of faith and doctrine, e.g., in the 13th
cent. to the Waldensians (OS 790) and to the emperor
Michael Palaeologus (OS 854), in Trent, Vatican I and II
(OS 150 1, 3006; Dei Verbum 3:1 1). The first official
church usage was in a profession of faith for future
bishops in the so-called Ancient Statutes of the Church
(AD 450-500): "There is one and the same author and
God of the New and Old Testament, that is, of the Law
and Prophets and Apostles" (OS 325). The formula
seemingly derived from 5th-cent.African controversies
with the Manicheans, polemically countering dualism.
Thus Augustine wrote of "venerating God as the author
of both Testaments" (Contra Adimantum 16.3; PL 42.
157). Similarly, Ambrose, showing the correlation
between OT and NT, wrote about the one author of
knowledge (Exp. in Ps. 118 8; PL 15. 1320). These
polemical origins are recalled in the 15th-cent.Decree for
the jacobites, which explicitly links God as author with
inspiration. The Roman church "professes one and the
same God as the author of the Old and New Testa­
ment ... since the saints of both Testaments have
spoken with the inspiration of the same Holy Spirit ....
It anathematizes the madness of the Manicheans, who
have established two first principles, one of the visible
and another of the invisible; and they have said there is
one God of the New Testament, another God of the Old
Testament" (OS 1334).
The "author" formula indicates that God is the
ultimate source of both Testaments but does not neces­
sarily ascribe literary authorship to him. Lat auctor has a
much broader range of meaning than Eng "author,"
1028 Inspiration
describing one who produces something, whether a
building, a bridge,or a literary work. In the ecclesiastical
tradition about God's authorship of Scripture, auctor has
the more generic meaning of producer or source,e.g., in
THE PROPHETIC MODEL OF INSPIRATION
32 From the time of NT writing till the Reforma­
tion and Trent, a prophetic model of inspiration was
dominant, and the inspiration of the Scriptures was con­
sidered analogous to (and dependent on) the inspiration
of the prophets. This approach is found in the Jewish
philosopher Maimonides (1135-1204), in Aquinas
(1225-1274), as well as in the 16th-cent. Reformers. W.
Whitaker(1548-1595),a Calvinist divine at Cambridge,
wrote: "We confess that God has not spoken of himself,
but by others. Yet this does not diminish the authority
of Scripture. For God inspired the prophets with what
they said, and made use of their mouths, tongues, and
hands: the Scripture, therefore, is even immediately the
voice of God. The prophets and apostles were only the
organs of God."
33 (I) Causal Instrumentality. Aquinas con­
sidered inspiration to be "something imperfect within
the genus of prophecy." The scholastics used the
categories of Aristotelian philosophy in attempting to
understand inspiration, esp. the category of causality
and its four types: efficient, material, formal, and final
causality. Within the category of efficient causality, one
may distinguish between a principal efficient cause (God
or the Spirit) and an instrumental efficient cause (human
author). In scriptural composition a distinct but con­
joined role is attributable to God and to the human
writers,just as in sawing lumber a distinct but conjoined
role is assignable to the carpenter (principal efficient
cause) and the saw (instrumental efficient cause).
34 Although most scholastics before him con­
sidered prophecy a habitus, i.e., an almost permanent gift
conferring a new nature on the prophet, Aquinas held
that prophecy is a motio, a gift given by God to a prophet
on a temporary basis for a specific function. This gift
pertains to the human cognitive factors, not placing the
prophet in immediate contact with the reality of God
(the speculum aeternitatis) but providing divine enlighten­
ment through "likenesses" (Summa II 2 q.173,1). Prophecy
is not bound to a specific manner of acquiring knowl­
edge; rather, it is a matter of judging that some
knowledge is the word of God. It is a gratia gratis data,
i.e., a gift given to the prophet not for the sake of his
personal sanctification but for the sake of the community.
35 The prophetic theory of inspiration, with the
frequently concomitant notion of dictation, continued to
influence Christians throughout the Middle Ages, the
Reformation, and Counter-Reformation and is held by
THE TRACT ON INSPIRATION
38 (I) Within Roman Catho licism. The
patristic era popularized certain formulas for articulating
scriptural inspiration(-> 28-31 above); the scholastic era
developed prophetic models of inspiration through
philosophical notions of causal instrumentality(-> 33-34
above); the Reformers and Counter-Reformers shared
much of this heritage,and their successors independently
[65:32-38)
the profession of faith for Mich:el �ala_eologos, Lat
auctor is rendered by Gk archegos, begmnmg, founder,
originator."(-> Canonicity, 66:89.)
many contemporary Christians, esp. the more conser­
vative. It admits of some variation,according to the way
in which the relationship between the prophet and God
is understood. Alonso Schokel (Inspired Word 58-73)
distinguishes three possibilities: the speaker is (1) the
instrument through whom God speaks,(2) a person to
whom God dictates, or (3) a messenger of God who
plays a part in phrasing the message. The second
possibility has been the most dominant and has given
rise to what is known as plenary (verbal) inspiration.
36 (II) Plenary Verbal Inspiration. Melchior
Cano, the 16th-cent. Dominican systematic theologian,
explained: "Everything great or small has been edited by
the sacred authors at the dictation of the Holy Spirit
[Spiritu Sancto dictante esse edita]" (De locis theologicis 2.17).
Not far removed is the Reformed Formula Consensus
Helvetica(1675), which held that not only the words but
also the very letters of the Scriptures were inspired. The
theory of plenary verbal inspiration has significant con­
sequences in the practical order. (1) Every Scripture is
the word of God. (2) Since God is not false, every word
in Scripture must be true. (3) The truth of the Bible is
ultimately propositional. (4) The unity of the Bible bars
any real contradictions among the biblical texts. (5) At
least for some conservative Protestants, the Bible does
not simply contain or bear witness to revelation; rather,
the Bible itself is revelation.
37 Critique: A serious reading of OT and NT raises
cogent objections against a naYve or simplistic theory of
plenary verbal inspiration: (1) The theory makes the
dubious assumption that the message which the proph­
ets received from God came in the form of a verbal
message. Was this usually or ever the case? Certainly the
prophets sometimes conveyed the divine message by
means of a nonverbal prophetic gesture rather than by
means of a verbal oracle. (2) Are not the events of salva­
tion history revelatory? Are not the exodus-event and
the Jesus-event primary forms of God's communication
with his people? (3) The biblical texts themselves clearly
suggest that normal human writing processes were at
work in the production of the Scriptures. Ezra cited Per­
sian archives (Ezra 7:11-26). There are self-corrections
(1 Cor 1:16; John 4:2). Luke surveyed the accounts
written about Jesus and took information from eye­
witnesses and ministers of the word (Luke 1: 1-2). Such
objections have led most contemporary critical scholars
to abandon the theory of plenary verbal inspiration.
�orked out its in:i�licati?ns in terms of plenary inspira­
�1on of every detail m Scnpt�re(-> 35-36 above). Finally,
m 19th-cent. Roman Catholic theology a systematic tract
on biblical inspiration made its appearance under the im­
petus of issues raised by textual criticism and by the
historical-critical method, which was a by-product of ad­
vances in the historical and physical sciences.
[65:39-45]
39 (A) Impact of Textual Criticism . The
18th and 19th cents. saw a great increase in the number
of texts and versions of the Bible available for study, as
well as a maturing skill in comparing the authority of
divergent readings. This proved fatal to the simplistic
understanding of (plenary) verbal inspiration. In the
absence of the autograph of any biblical work, and with
the existence of thousands of textual differences, which
is the inspired text? Abandoned by most was the idea
that the LXX was inspired-an idea commonly held in
early Christianity and occasionally thereafter (to this day
in some Eastern churches). The mistranslations and
other variants in the LXX compared to the MT make it
impossible to affirm that either always represents
precisely the inspired OT text. Fortunately, the
hypothesis of the inspiration of the Vg did not enjoy
much popularity, although it was espoused by a few
Catholic theologians after Trent. The textus receptus of
the Gk NT also ceased to be regarded as the surest guide
to the original, inspired text (--+ Texts, 68: 160-61, 168).
40 (B) Impact of Historical Criticism. The
advent of higher criticism (--+ OT Criticism, 69:6; NT
Criticism, 70:5) made scholars aware that not only the
Pentateuch but also the Synoptic Gospels were com­
posed by drawing on previous documents or sources,
and not simply by dictation. The impact has been varied:
a hardening of the position on verbal inspiration within
Protestant orthodoxy; practical abandon of the theory of
inspiration by liberal Protestants; and the modification
of traditional formulations of inspiration by many
Roman Catholics. The historical-critical method of
scriptural exposition was the child of the Enlightenment,
where methodical skepticism was generally character­
istic of the scientific revolution. The 17th-cent. "Galileo
affair" was an early landmark in the confrontation
between scientific truth and the apparent "truth" of the
Scriptures, which implied that the sun moved around
the earth. Increased data about the origins of the earth
and of the human race led to incompatibility between
scientific knowledge and a nai"ve, literal reading of the
creation narratives (Gen 1:2-2:25).
41 In defense of tradition, Roman Catholic eccle­
siastical authority responded in somewhat negative
fashion. Even the mildly progressive Providentissimus
Deus (1893) of Leo XIII reacted strongly to the diffi­
culties posed by advances in the natural and historical
sciences:
We have to contend against those who, making an evil use
of physical science, minutely scrutinize the sacred books in
order to detect the writers in a mistake, and to take occasion
to vilify its contents....To the professor of sacred Scrip­
ture a knowledge of natural science will be of very great
assistance in detecting such attacks on the sacred books, and
in refuting them. There can never, indeed, be any real
discrepancy between the theologian and the physicist, as
long as each confines himself within his own lines, and both
are careful, as St. Augustine warns us 'not to make rash
assertions....' The Catholic interpreter ... should show
that these facts of natural science which investigators affirm
to be now quite certain are not contrary to the Scripture
rightly explained... .The principles laid down will apply to
cognate sciences, and especially to history.... It follows
that those who maintain that an error is possible in any
genuine passage of the sacred writings either pervert the
Catholic notion of inspiration or make God the author of
such error .... Let them loyally hold that God, the Creator
and Ruler of all things, is also the Author of the Scriptures­
and that, therefore, nothing can be proved either by physical
science or archaeology which can really contradict the
Scriptures. (-+ Church Pronouncements, 72: 17.)
42 (II) Plenary and Limited Inspiration.
Prior to his remarks on the perverse use of scientific dis-
The Tract on Inspiration 1029
coveries to attack the credibility of the Scriptures, Leo
XIII cited the problems caused by some proponents of
"higher criticism." He also affirmed the inspiration of the
totality of the Scriptures. "It is absolutely wrong and
forbidden to narrow inspiration to certain parts only of
Holy Scripture or to admit that the sacred writer has
erred." This affirmation of plenary scriptural inspiration
was to counteract certain Catholic attempts to maintain
both a doctrine of biblical inspiration (because it was
traditional) and the principle of scientific knowledge
(because it was rational to do so) by limiting biblical
inspiration in some way or other.
43 (A) Lessius. Roman Catholic reactions
against simplistically viewing scriptural inspiration as
stenographic dictation had taken place earlier. The theo­
logical faculty of Louvain had censured liberalizing
propositions of the Jesuit L. Lessius (1554-1623), e.g.:
(1) For something to be Holy Scripture, its individual
words need not be inspired by the Holy Spirit. (2) The
individual truths and statements need not be immediately
inspired in the writer by the Holy Spirit. (3) If a book
(e.g., 2 Mace) were to be written through purely human
endeavor without the assistance of the Holy Spirit, who
would later certify that there was nothing false therein,
the book would become Holy Scripture. Lessius wrote
to the archbishop of Malines pertinent to (2):
It is enough that the sacred writer be divinely drawn to
write down what he sees, hears, or knows otherwise, that
he enjoy the infallible assistance of the Holy Spirit to
prevent him from mistakes even in matters he knows on the
word of others, or from his own experience, or by his own
natural reasoning. It is this assistance that gives Scripture its
infallible truth.
In the 19th cent. this negative assistance theory of inspira­
tion would reappear: the Holy Spirit acts upon a human
author in such a way as to preserve him from error.
Close to (3) were some 19th-cent.authors with their sub­
sequent approval theory of inspiration. The point of (1) is
similar to the theory of content inspiration (as distinct from
verbal inspiration), which also appeared in 19th-cent.
expositions on inspiration.
44 (B) Jahn and Hane berg. J. Jahn, an
Austrian Premonstratensian, published 2 vols. (1802,
1804) in which he held that inspiration was simply "the
divine assistance for avoiding errors" - the negative
assistance theory. In the mid-1800s the Benedictine
bishop of Speyer, D. B. Haneberg, proposed that,
whereas sometimes inspiration was antecedent to the
composition of the scriptural works, and sometimes
inspiration consisted of a concomitant influence upon a
human author preserving him from error, it sometimes
happened that inspiration took the form of the church's
approval of the work at the time of its canonization - the
subsequent approval theory.
45 (C) Vatican I; Pope Leo XIII. Each of
these approaches was expressly disapproved by Vatican
I: "These [OT and NT books] the church holds to be
sacred and canonical, not because, having been carefully
composed by mere human industry, they were after­
wards approved by her authority, nor merely because
they contain revelation without errors, but because,
having been written by the inspiration of the Holy
Spirit, they have God for their author and have been
delivered as such to the church herself" (OS 3006). The
conciliar teaching led Haneberg to revise radically the
4th ed. (1876) of his Versuch einer Geschichte der biblischen
Offenbarung. This teaching was taken over verbatim by
Providentissimus Deus (EB 125; RSS p. 24). Leo XIII also
took issue with "those who, in order to rid themselves
1030 Inspiration
of these difficulties, do not hesitate to concede that
divine inspiration regards the things of faith and morals
and nothing beyond" (EB 124; RSS p. 24). Two books
espousing such a view appeared in the interim between
Vatican I (1870) and Leo's encyclical (1893). In 1872 A.
Rohling published Natur und Ojfenbarung, restricting
inspiration to matters of faith and morals. In 1880 F.
Lenormant published Les origines de l'histoire d'apres la
Bible, limiting inspiration to supernatural teachings.
46 (D) Newman. The writings of J. H.
Newman (1801-1890) have been thought to limit in­
spiration according to content because of his repeated
references to the "passing remarks" (obiter dicta) found in
the Scriptures. In his Anglican period Newman had
written:
In what way inspiration is compatible with that personal
agency on the part of its instruments, which the composi­
tion ofthe Bible evidences, we know not; but if anything is
certain, it is this-that, though the Bible is inspired, and
therefore, in one sense, written by God, yet very large por­
tions of it, if not by far the greater part of it, are written in
as free and unconstrained a manner, and (apparently) with
as little consciousness of a supernatural dictation or
restraint, on the part of His earthly instruments, as ifhe had
no share in the work. (Tract 85; Lectures on the Scripture Proofs
of the Doctrine of the Church 30)
As late as 1884, almost 40 years after he became a Roman
Catholic and five years after he was named a cardinal,
Newman averred that the Word was morally separable
from the words of the human authors, because the Word
consists of those portions of the Bible that treat of faith
and morals.
In 1861 Newman observed: "The plenary inspiration
of Scripture is peculiarly a Protestant question; not a
Catholic" (C. S. Dessain, ed., The Letters and Diaries of
John Henry Newman [London, 1969] 19. 488). Yet scrip­
tural inspiration continued to fascinate Newman the
Catholic. While holding to the inspiration of the written
word (the Verbum Scriptum), Newman wrote:
The formula ofinspiration runs thus: the Bible is the Word
of God such, by virtue of its being throughout written, or
dictated, or impregnated, or directed by the Spirit ofTruth,
or at least in parts written, in parts dictated, in parts im­
pregnated, in parts directed, and throughout preserved from
formal error, at least substantial, by the Spirit of Truth. CT­
Holmes, ed., The Theological Papers ofJohn Henry Newman on
Biblical Inspiration and on Infallibility [Oxford, 1979) 81)
He noted that inspiration was "a gift attached to the Ver­
bum Scriptum" (ibid., 70) and that "a great variety of
teaching is both conceivable, and admissible on the sub­
ject of the divine inspiration of Holy Scripture" (68), and
again that "inspiration proper ...admits degrees" (74).
47 (E) Franzelin. Some have thought that
Newman's ideas on inspiration were rejected by Provi­
dentissimus Deus; yet they were close to the ecclesiastically
approved ideas of]. B. Franzelin (1816-1886), a peritus
of Vatican I. In De Divina Traditione et Scriptura (1870)
Franzelin expounded his key idea of God as author
through a theory of instrumental causality that distin­
guished between scriptural content and truth (the res et
sententia, or formal content) and scriptural formulation (the
res, or words of Scripture).
Biblical inspiration seems to consist essentially in a freely
bestowed charism of enlightenment and stimulus, whereby
the mind ofthe inspired men would propose to write down
those truths which God wished to communicate to his
Church through Scripture, and their will would be drawn
to commit all these truths, and these alone, to writing; and
the men thus raised to be instrumental causes at the disposi­
tion of God, the principal cause, would carry through this
[65:46-50]
d1vme proposal with infallible truthfulness. We thus
distinguish between inspiration, which extends to the truths
and "formal word," and assistance, which must extend
further, even to the expressions and "material words."
48 (F) Lagrange. Although Franzelin's views
enjoyed the implicit endorsement of Vatican I and Provi­
dentissimus Deus, their importance in Catholic scholarship
diminished in the 1890s, alongside the rising popularity
of the views of M.-J. Lagrange (1855-1938). Lagrange
believed that Franzelin's exposition of scriptural inspira­
tion suffered from both a methodological and a historical
deficiency. Methodologically, it separated the Bible into
two parts, one divine and one human, creating the
almost inextricable difficulty of distinguishing between
the core content and the relatively unimportant details of
its expression. Historically, studies of the Florentine,
Tridentine, and Vatican councils led Lagrange to
endorse the logical and theological priority of inspira­
tion over against the notion of divine authorship.
Lagrange's own theory of verbal inspiration was heavily
dependent upon the Thomistic model of prophetic
inspiration. As an "intellectual enlightenment" (illuminatio
iudicii), inspiration was a divine gift enabling the biblical
author to choose certain ideas (no matter their immediate
source), to understand and judge them, and form them
into a literary unit.Thus the Scriptures were totally the
work of God and totally the work of the human author.
God was the principal efficient cause; the human author
the instrumental efficient cause.
49 Official Roman Catholic reaction to Modernism
in the early 1900s (--+ Church Pronouncements, 72:5)
cast a shadow over Lagrange's theory of inspiration.The
modernists had compared biblical inspiration to the
"inspiration" of gifted poets and orators, and some found
a suspicious resemblance in that to Lagrange's emphasis
on the human element in biblical composition. Nonethe­
less, his fundamental ideas would be resurrected and
clarified in the work of P. Benoit (--+ 59 below) of the
Dominican Biblical School atJerusalem, which Lagrange
had founded. It remains to Lagrange's credit to have
emphasized that an understanding of inspiration must
begin with the written text itself Notions of divine author­
ship, scriptural authority, inerrancy, and canonicity are
but corollaries of this primary datum of all inspiration
study, which accordingly must proceed a posteriori
rather than a priori.
50 (Ill) Inerrancy Theories. There are some,
nevertheless, who continue to work with the doctrine of
biblical inerrancy as the primary datum or focus.
(A) Among Catholics. The theological
tract on inspiration was placed within the treatise on
theological authorities (De locis theologicis), and so there
was emphasis on the results rather than on the nature of
inspiration. The inerrant "truth" of the Bible was
deemed all-i_mportant insofar as the Bible is a principal
and normative source for theological endeavor. This
approach still dominated in the preparatory schema De
Revelatione presented to Vatican II for deliberation, but
quickly rejected. As has been seen (--+ 4 above; Chµrch
Pronouncements, 72:14), Vatican II gave only a sentence
to "the books of Scripture .. . teaching firmly, faithfully,
and without e�r ?r that truth which God wanted put into
the sacred wntmgs for the sake of our salvation," as a
result of inspiration. Since then, inerrant scriptural
"truth" has not received primary emphasis in Roman
Catholic circles, a change resulting from a more
adequate understanding of the nature of the Scriptures
(not primarily a source for doctrine) as well as from con­
ciliar directive (--+ 70-71 below).
[65:51-59]
51 (B) Among Con servative Protestant s.
"Both evangelicals and fundamentalists insist on the 'in­
errancy of Scripture' as being the most basic of all their
fundamentals" (M. Marty, in The Evangelicals [ed. D. and
J. Woodbridge; Nash, 1975] 180). The role of the human
authors is completely overshadowed by the idea of
divine power.
Inerrancy fo llows from divine authority, period. For
whatever God utters is without error. And the Bible is the
Word of God. Therefore, the Bible is without error. But if
this is so, then the inerrancy of the Bible cannot be lost by
simply adding the human dimension. As long as it is God's
Word, then it is thereby inerrant, whether or not it is also
the words of men. (N. L. Geisler, "Inerrancy and Free Will,"
EvQ 57 [1985] 350-51)
"The scripture cannot be broken" Oohn 10:36) is cited as
a scriptural warrant for the doctrine of inerrancy, since,
if a single error is to be found in the Scriptures, the
authority of the whole is undermined.
52 Enlightened fundamentalists, however, are
not impervious to the discrepancies in biblical mss. (-+
39 above) or in parallel narratives of the OT and the
Gospels as detected by historical criticism (-+ 40 above).
In a seminal article ("Inspiration," Presbyterian Review 2
[1881] 225-60) A. A. Hodge and B. B. Warfield
formulated three criteria that must be met before some-
CONTEMPORARY APPROACHES TO INSPIRATION
54 (I) Among Protestants.
(A) The Concursive Theory. B. B.
Warfield (The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible [Lon­
don, 1951]) and J. I. Packer (Fundamentalism and the Word
of God [London, 1958]) are articulate spokesmen. Packer
used "concursive action" to denote the role of the Spirit
in the composition of the Bible. Just as the process of
cause/effect and the doctrine of creation/providence are
different ways of speaking about the existence of the
physical universe, so inspiration and human composi­
tion are different ways of speaking about the existence
of the Scriptures. They are theological and human
understandings of the same material phenomenon; they
do not exist on the same plane. Just as creation/provi­
dence is a theological statement that the cosmos derives
its origin from God, so inspiration is a theological state­
ment that the Scriptures derive their origin from God.
The doctrine no more provides Christian believers with
an explanation of how inspiration occurred than does the
doctrine of creation/providence provide an explanation
of how creation took place.
55 I. H. Marshall explains concursive action:
On a human level we can describe its [the Bible's] composi­
tion in terms of the various oral and literary processes that
lay behind it - the collection of information from witnesses,
the use of written sources, the writing up and editing of
such information, the composition of spontaneous letters,
the committing to writing of prophetic messages, the
collecting of the various documents together, and so on. At
the same time, however, on the divine level we can assert
that the Spirit, who moved on the face of the waters at
Creation (Gen 1 :2), was active in the whole process so that
the Bible can be regarded as both the words of men and the
Word of God. This activity of the Spirit can be described as
"concursive" with the human activities through which the
Bible was written. (Biblical Inspiration 42)
56 (B) Consequent Behavior. Conservative
Protestant scholarship has produced most of the recent
literature on inspiration; liberal Protestants often
Contemporary Approaches 1031
thing can be considered an error such as to destroy the
inerrancy-inspiration of the Scriptures. The error must
(1) occur in the "original autograph" of the biblical text;
(2) involve the true meaning and intention of the text,
"definitely and certainly ascertained"; and (3) render that
true meaning "directly and necessarily inconsistent"
with some "certainly known" fact of history or science.
But these criteria deprive biblical inerrancy of rational
verification, for (1) pertains to a text that is no longer
extant.
53 In 1978 the International Council on Biblical
Inerrancy produced the Chicago Statement, affirming
the total truth and trustworthiness of Scripture, which
should always be interpreted as infallible and inerrant.
God's "penmen" were not limited to the knowledge
available at their time. Although inconsistencies, irregu­
larities, and discrepancies must be dealt with, Scripture
remains inerrant "in the sense of making its claims and
achieving that measure of focused truth at which its
authors aimed." A more popular conservative-funda­
mentalist position maintains that inerrancy is a quality of
the biblical texts such as they exist in edited or translated
forms (and not only of autographs). Various harmoniza­
tions and metaphorical readings can maintain verbal
merrancy.
effectively deny inspiration by silence. A unique con­
tribution has been made by W. J. Abraham (Divine
Inspiration), an evangelical who takes his cue from a
meaning of the English word "inspire" rather than from
the Scriptures themselves or inerrancy. An excellent
teacher can so inspire students that they are led to con­
sequent behavior (including, perhaps, the writing of a
text). Analogously, God, through his revelatory and
saving activity, so inspired the biblical authors that they
were led to consequent behavior, specifically the writing
of biblical books.
57 (C) Neo-orthodoxy. The views on inspir­
ation of K. Barth (1886-1968) have been followed by
many mainline Protestant thinkers. Barth accords a
unique place to the Bible insofar as it witnesses to God's
act of revelation in Jesus Christ, who is primarily the
Word of God. Inspiration is not a quality of the scrip­
tural text itself, but an aff1rmation of a divine ability to
use the Scripture to communicate revelation to human
beings, either individually or in groups.
58 (II) Among Roman Catholics. A realism
marks recent Catholic writing on inspiration. Integral to
Vatican II's understanding of the biblical texts was an
appreciation of their human quality and the processes by
which they were produced. These texts, which are the
"word of God," are human words. Various exegetical
methodologies only serve to highlight the humanity of
the Scriptures. With that humanity as a starting point,
recent Catholic theories on inspiration focus on one of
four aspects.
59 (A) Psychological Theories. The influen­
tial P. Benoit has distinguished scriptural inspiration
(which lead the authors to produce texts) from dramatic­
historical inspiration (which took place in the events of
salvation history) and prophetic-apostolic inspiration
(which took place in the oral proclamation of these
events). Using Thomistic categories (some of which
were abandoned in his later writings) and heir to the
1032 Inspiration
legacy of Lagrange (---+ 48 above), Benoit makes the
human psyche the locus of inspiration. Logically sub­
sequent to revelation to which it is related, inspiration is
an impulse to write and produce a book. It bears upon
the author's judging what matters are to be included,
how they are to be formulated and arranged. Through­
out the entire process God is active as the originating
cause of the scriptural work. (Benoit's emphasis is essen­
tially on the individual biblical authors.)
60 (B) Social Theories. Form criticism (---+
OT Criticism, 69:38; NT Criticism, 70:42) has demon­
strated that, to a large extent, biblical books cannot
simply be considered the literary production of isolated
individuals, as modern books are. The individual writers
were members of faith communities which had more
than a passing influence on the formation of the biblical
literature itself. That is the heart of the varied social
theories of inspiration, which recapture an earlier view
of the author as the functionary of a community, draw­
ing on its traditions and writing to edify it. J. Barr, a
critic of fundamentalism, states:
If there is inspiration at all, then it must extend over the
entire process of production that has led to the final text.
Inspiration therefore must attach not to a small number of
exceptional persons ... it must extend over a larger number
of anonymous persons ... it must be considered to belong
more to the community as a whole. (Holy Scripture: Canon,
Authority, Criticism [Phi,1983])
Within Roman Catholic circles, social theories of inspir­
ation have principally been associated with the names of
J. L. McKenzie (CBQ 24 [1962] 115-24), D. J.
McCarthy (---+ 1 above), and K. Rahner (esp. Inspiration).
61 A form-critical approach emphasizes the
interdependence between a biblical author and his com­
munity, and the more radical form critics would reduce
the "author" to virtually an anonymous scribe. This has
led to the practical abandonment of the psychological
theories of inspiration. If the biblical literature is the
complex expression of community faith, inspiration is
much more complex than divine influence upon an
individual author. This disconcerting way of looking at
biblical composition virtually silenced discussions of
inspiration by biblical scholars and theologians within
the mainline churches. Fortunately, the emergence of
redaction criticism (---+ Hermeneutics, 71:28; NT
Criticism, 70:80) has redressed some of the inadequacies
of an (exclusively) form-critical approach. The writer
who produced the final biblical book, even though
influenced by and drawing upon predecessors and the
community, was an author and a theologian in the
proper sense.
62 (C) Literary Approaches. Some recent
approaches to biblical study, viz., literary and structural
approaches (---+ Hermeneutics, 71:55-70), stress the
reality of the text itself, thus opening the way for a text­
centered form of theorizing about inspiration. Although
a text enjoys a certain semantic autonomy, two essential
human activities are related to a text: writing (and
rewriting) and reading (almost a form of mental
rewriting). The doctrine of inspiration affirms that the
Holy Spirit is responsible for the biblical text as text, i.e.,
with regard to both these human dimensions. As for
writing, the Spirit is active in the long process whereby
a biblical text has been produced within a faith com­
munity (i.e., including formulation of traditions, partial
texts, early drafts, and rewriting). As for reading,
inspiration is predicated of the biblical text precisely
[65:60-65]
because there is a faith community who, under the
influence of the Spirit, will read and identify with this
biblical text. To this extent, a literary theory of inspira­
tion echoes the active meaning of the theopneustos of
2 Tim 3:16 (---+ 13 above) and accentuates dimensions of
inspiration highlighted by Calvin and Barth.
63 Other dimensions of textuality are important
for a full understanding of inspiration, e.g., the three
basic functions of language: to inform, to express, and to
impress. The Bible may inform its readers by imparting
knowledge and communicating truth, but that is only
one of its functions. It also expresses something of the
dynamic reality of God and affects or impresses the
recipient(s) of the language communication in a variety
of ways. The inspiring Spirit would be involved in the
totality of these language functions. Indeed, the greatest
contribution of the literary approaches to an under­
standing of inspiration may be their emphasis on the total
reality of the text.
64 Another dimension of textuality to which
literary analysis draws attention is the fact that text is "a
production of significance" (R. Barthes). Frequently
texts derive part of their meaning from the larger textual
unit to which they belong. An individual saying of Jesus
is part of a Gospel, which is part of the NT, which is part
of the Bible. This reality resonates with the traditional
doctrine that predicates inspiration of "the books of both
OT and NT in their entirety, with all their parts"
(Vatican II;---+ 4 above). The Bible as a whole is inspired,
and so by implication the parts are inspired. The tradi­
tion does not state that because the individual sentences
(=texts) of the Bible are inspired, the Bible is considered
to be inspired. (Concentration on the inspiration of an
isolated text can produce a type of fundamentalism.)
This holistic understanding of textuality has no small
bearing on an adequate understanding of the notion of
biblical truth. Inerrancy should be related to the total
biblical view of a topic.
Many factors highlighted by recent literary analysis
support G. Turner's notion that the doctrine of inspira­
tion qualifies the Bible as "paracletic literature." He
explains ("Biblical Inspiration" 427): "The Bible as
paraclete is an advocate in the sense that it is a witness
to Jesus Christ. It is often used as a sort of counsellor;
certainly it is a helper, consoler and comforter."
65 (D) Ecclesial Aspects. Other theories of
inspiration focus upon the relationship between the
Scriptures and the church, since inspiration is a "charism
of the written communication of the word of God as a
constitutive element of the church" (Collins, Introduction
345). 1:he ecclesial-theological theories of inspiration are
�10t _w1�hout analogy to the consequent theories of
1nsp1rat10n (---+ 43-44 above). Rahner has written:
Since scripture is something derivative, it must be under­
stood from the essential nature of the church,which is the
�schatological
_ and irreversible permanence of Jesus Christ
m h1s�ory.... Then he [God] is the inspirer and the author
of scripture,although the inspiration of scripture is "only"
a moment within God's primordial authorship of the church.
(Foundations of Christian Faith [NY,1978] 371,375)
Rahn�r's perspective places God's authorship of S�crip­
ture 1n the context of a broader and more accurate
underst��d�ng of "authorship," but his approach has
?ee� cr!tic1zed by many proponents of composition
1nsp1rat10n as . focusing too exclusively on Jesus, to
whom the Scriptures bear witness.
[65:66-72]
COROLLARIES TO THE DOCTRINE OF INSPIRATION
66 (I) Ecclesial Use ofthe Scriptures. A first
corollary to or consequence of the inspiration of the
Scriptures by the Holy Spirit is that they have authority
for Christians and the church. This was recognized
historically by the formulation of the biblical canon, i.e.,
the collection that the church would consider a rule (--+
Canonicity, 66:5-11). Biblical authority is also reflected
in the use of the Scriptures in the church's liturgical
worship, as a source and norm for theological endeavors,
and for the personal piety and spiritual growth of
individual Christians.
67 (II) The Word ofGod. A second important
corollary is that the Scriptures are the word of God. This
traditional formula, apparently simple, is extremely
complex and polyvalent. Some Protestant evangelicals
affirm an almost physical identity between the Scriptures
and words actually spoken by God, rejecting as inade­
quate the view that the Scriptures attest to the word of
God. Other Christians can affirm that the Bible is the
word of God while maintaining that God has never
communicated in words (even internal words; see R. E.
Brown, The Critical Meaning of the Bible [NY, 1981]
1-44). Some Protestant theologians affirm that the word
of God is a dynamic reality; accordingly, Jesus is pre­
eminently the Word of God (so Barth). The Scriptures
are truly the word of God when they become alive in
proclamation and preaching (so Bultmann).
68 Cardinal C. Martini has helpfully distinguished
various senses of the expression "word of God." Basic­
ally (esp. as a trinitarian concept) it suggests divine
communicability. Thus it can refer to (1) the events of
salvific history because Heb dabar means "word, event,
reality"; (2) the spoken message of divine emissaries, esp.
of the prophets and Jesus; (3) the person of Jesus who is
the Word of God (esp. John 1:1); (4) Christian preach­
ing; (5) God's general message to human beings; (6) the
Bible. (See La Paro/a di Dio alle Origini della Chiesa [Rome,
1980] 56-58.)
69 Though canonized by long usage, "word of
God" should not be used of the Scriptures without
further hermeneutical reflection. True, it highlights the
divine origins of the biblical communication and ex­
presses its reality and force. !"l"�verthel��s, th� "wo_rd of
God" in the Jewish and Christian traditions is radically
different from the divine oracles of ancient Hellenistic
and Near Eastern religions -it is intended not simply to
impart truth but to encourage, console, challenge, etc.
Since the words contained in the Scriptures are, in the
only written reality they possess, human word_s, "wor_d
of God" is necessarily analogous language. A distance is
to be maintained conceptually between the scriptural
expression and the self-communication o� God �n i_ tself,
even in the case of the prophets. Theologically it is less
confusing to state that the Scriptures witness to the word
of God.
70 (III) The Truth of the Bible. Although
some conservative Protestant theories of inspiration
make the truth of the Bible (its inerrancy or infallibility)
the nub of biblical inspiration (--+ 51 above), I. H.
Marshall, an evangelical, has noted some pertinent issues:
1. First, the Bible uses language in a great variety of
ways.... 2. Then there is the fact that the �uestion of truth
may be answered in different ways a_t different le�els of
understanding.... 3. An understanding of the Bible as
"truth from God" may also lead to a failure to appreciate
Corollaries to the Doctrine 1033
passages where God is not speaking to man.... 4. A further
question about biblical truth may be-"true for whom?"
He concludes "that the concept of 'truth' is a complex
one, and that it is not easy to apply it to every part of
the Bible" (Biblical Inspiration 54-5 7).
The concentration on inerrancy tends to reduce
theological discussion about inspiration to a concept that
was first introduced into the theological discussion in
the 19th cent. The term "inerrancy" has never appeared
in a conciliar text (although found in papal encyclicals
and the original, rejected schema ofVatican II on revela­
tion). At Vatican II Cardinal Koenig pointed out errors
in the biblical books, which "are deficient in accuracy as
regards both historical and scientific matters" (Commen­
tary on the Documents of Vatican II [ed. H. Vorgrirnler;
NY, 1969] 3. 205). Indeed, the Scriptures themselves
never claim to be inerrant. Finally, serious philosophical
reflection on the nature of biblical "truth" and "error"
must take into full consideration literary form and the
level and function of language.
71 Yet there is much to be gained from a positive
reflection on the truth of the Bible, which is ultimately
salvific truth. Christians of various backgrounds should
be able to approve and accept the language ofVatican II
about Scripture's teaching without error that truth
which God wanted put into the sacred writings for the
sake of our salvation (--+ 4 above; Church Pronounce­
ments, 72:14)-a compromise between those who
wanted to affirm the truth of the Scriptures without
further qualification and those of kerygmatic orientation
who envisioned the entire reality of the Scriptures
within the context of salvation history. The kerygmatic
perspective had already been espoused by the PBC
"Instruction on the Historical Truth of the Gospels" (--+
Church Pronouncements, 72:35): "It is apparent that the
doctrine and life of Jesus were not simply reported for
the sole purpose of being remembered, but were
'preached.'..." As for "truth" in the biblical sense, "The
'truth' (emeth) of God is primarily bound up with his
faithfulness" (Loretz, Truth 83-84). From this perspec­
tive the antithesis is not simple error, but deception or
infidelity. The truth of the Scriptures lies not so much in
that its passages are without error, but in that through
them God manifests his fidelity to his people, bringing
them into loving union with himself.
72 (IV) Future oflnspiration Theorizing. Is
it still legitimate to theorize about the inspiration of the
Scriptures? Loretz has written Das Ende der Inspirations­
theologie. Even more radically, the Protestant brother­
exegetes A. T. and R. P. C. Hanson have declared: "The
ancient doctrine of the inspiration and inerrancy of the
Bible not only is impossible for intelligent people today,
but represents a deviation in Christian doctrine,
whatever salutary uses may have been made of it in the
past by the Holy Spirit, who often turns human errors
to good ends" (Reasonable Belief: A Survey of the Christian
Faith [Oxford, 1980] 42).
. .
Even if we dismiss this as overreaction, Cardinal C.
Martini (Paro/a 42) has correctly noted that a co1:1plete
treatise on inspiration is still lacking (and very desirable)
in the church. Any adequate treatment of inspiration
should begin with the real�ty of the Scr_iptures _ them­
selves. Since the understanding of the Scriptures is very
much "in process," an understanding of inspiration must
necessarily be "in process" as well.