Why William Lane Craig cannot be trusted

William Lane Craig [04]

In case you are not familiar with him, William Lane Craig [01] is an individual who works as a Jesus shill for Biola University [02], an institution of questionable academic integrity that requires all its staff to accept an intellectually untenable doctrinal statement [03].

This is a text, full of unproven claims, which I don't feel like reproducing here, since it can easily be found on the Internet. However, this paragraph is crucial in demonstrating the intellectually problematic position of Biola University and all who work there, since they have no option but to accept the statement (emphasis added by me):

The Bible, consisting of all the books of the Old and New Testaments, is the Word of God, a supernaturally given revelation from God Himself, concerning Himself, His being, nature, character, will and purposes; and concerning man, his nature, need, duty and destiny. The Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are without error or misstatement in their moral and spiritual teaching and record of historical facts. They are without error or defect of any kind.

It shall be clear to most people that universities who require their professors to accept and defend intellectually untenable and scientifically disproved nonsense are not a priori particularly trustworthy and should therefore be approached with well-earned caution and suspicion.

Likewise, professors who are required to uphold and defend the indisputable correctness of a deeply flawed document such as the Bible, can be reserved no other welcome than that of the snake-oil salesperson, since these people will -at some point- have no other choice but to lie.

Since I claim to be evidence-based, I'd better put my money where my mouth is and come up with some evidence that the Bible is indeed a flawed document. Consider these two statements from the New Testament:

And Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ. (Matthew 1:16) [05]
And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli, (Luke 3:23) [06]

According to Matthew, Jacob is Joseph's father. According to Luke, it's Heli. This means that the gospels don't agree on who Jesus' grandfather was. This also means that the Bible contradicts itself. We do not even need outside proof to disprove the inerrancy of the Bible.

This, in turn, is incompatible with Biola's claim that:

The Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are without error or misstatement in their moral and spiritual teaching and record of historical facts. They are without error or defect of any kind.

In other words, a professor at Biola can indeed be put in a situation where s/he will have to choose between her/his career at Biola and telling the truth. I realise that -although undeniable- this one example is meagre evidence, but then, this post is about William Lane Craig, not about the inerrancy of the Bible. I will have plenty of fun showing what a painfully flawed book this is in future articles.

We cannot look in William Lane Craig's head and decide whether or not he is a pathological liar, but we can look at the Biola University Doctrinal Statement and the Bible and conclude that William Lane Craig will, at some point, necessarily be a liar. It's not a matter of choice. It's a matter of contractual obligations. 

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References
[01] William Lane Craig, Talbot School of Theology at Biola University, retrieved 23 February 2012
[02] Biola University, home page, retrieved 23 February 2012
[03] Biola University, Doctrinal Statement, retrieved 23 February 2012
[04] William Lane Craig, Wikipedia, retrieved 24 February 2012
[05] Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 1, verse 16, King James Bible
[06] Gospel of Luke, Chapter 3, verse 23, King James Bible


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Last updated on 24 February 2012