Biblical Infallibility vs. Inerrancy: Meaning, Differences, and Their Relationship

Biblical inerrancy means that Scripture is without error in everything it affirms, while biblical infallibility means that Scripture is incapable of error and cannot fail to accomplish God’s purposes. In the historic Christian understanding, the Bible is both inerrant and infallible: it is without error because, having been given by God, it cannot err.

Inerrancy addresses the fact that the biblical text contains no errors in its original manuscripts. Infallibility addresses possibility: because God’s Word is incapable of error, it cannot contain genuine errors in what it affirms. Thus, inerrancy and infallibility may be distinguished, but they should not be separated.

Basic definitions

The word inerrant means that something, usually a text, is “without error.” Inerrancy means that the Scriptures do not affirm any errors. The Bible does not endorse anything untrue.

When it tells history, it tells us what actually happened. It may report on what a person said when he told a lie to someone else, but it does not endorse the lie. It is merely giving an accurate report of what the liar said.

Where it speaks to science, it does not contradict God's revelation in the natural world. In sum, the Bible is entirely truthful and has no errors at all in the original manuscripts that the prophets and Apostles actually wrote.

The word infallible-in its lexical meaning, though not necessarily in theological discussions due to Rogers and McKim-is technically a stronger word, meaning that the text is not only “without error” but “incapable of error.”

Infallibility has to do with possibilities, and it means that the Word of God is incapable of erring. Infallibility is closely related to inerrancy, yet distinct. In fact, infallibility is a much stronger term than inerrancy in many respects.

Inerrancy addresses fact; infallibility addresses possibility

The simplest distinction is that inerrancy addresses fact, whereas infallibility addresses possibility. Inerrancy says that the Bible does not contain error; infallibility says that the Bible cannot contain error.

We can produce inerrant documents and other things and yet still retain the possibility of erring. Before Ashley scored 100 percent on her math test, it was possible that she might miss one of the answers.

It is possible for a person who is capable of erring (making a mistake) to not err. He or she is fallible, yet made no error. But what about the reverse? Is it possible for someone to be infallible, yet err? Not at all.

If infallibility means being incapable of error, then it is not possible in any way, shape or form. Infallibility necessarily results in the text's being free from error; without infallibility, the production of an inerrant text is accidental. It could have otherwise had errors.

When the Lord inspired the authors of Scripture, however, He worked so as to make it impossible for them to affirm error in the completed product. We can have inerrancy without infallibility, but we cannot have infallibility without inerrancy.

The historic Christian position

The historic Christian teaching is that the Bible is both inerrant and infallible. It is without error (inerrant) because it is impossible for it to have errors (infallible).

We affirm the inerrancy and the infallibility of Scripture because we know the character of God. Today's passage, for instance, tells us that the Lord never lies. If God never lies, His Word never lies either. We can therefore trust it to be free from all error.

If God is indeed perfect, always true, always doing exactly what He promises and always doing what is right, then it is impossible for Him to err. He is not only free from error, but incapable of committing it.

Thus, if Scripture is truly inspired of God, if it is truly all that it claims to be, then it too is incapable of committing error. It is infallible and inerrant.

Inerrancy means that the Bible is entirely truthful and reliable in all that it affirms in the original manuscripts. At the risk of oversimplifying, inerrancy means that the Bible is free from error.

Because God is truthful (cf. Titus 1:2 among others), and the testimony of Scripture is that it itself is “God-breathed” (what theologians have referred to as “verbal plenary inspiration”) we can trust that what He has said, through authors inspired by the Holy Spirit, is true.

Original manuscripts and later copies

We do not today possess these manuscripts, but through the process of textual criticism, we can recover the original wording of the manuscripts with a high degree of certainty.

It should also be pointed out that the usual description of inerrant means “without error in the original autographs.” Nevertheless, transcriptional errors are described this way.

Over time typos, mistranslation, and copying mistakes have led to human error. Because of this, inerrancy concerns only original documents.

Proponents admit there are apparent errors and agree we should try and account for them when possible, but say any errors aren’t real errors-they simply fall into the category of “things our finite minds cannot explain,” are phenomenological, or are a translation error.

However, Dr. Robert Plummer, Professor of Biblical Studies at Southern Seminary, says even translation errors, confusing nuances, or printing errors that are revised over time are “not an error in the Scripture but in the translation of the Scripture.”

The many excellent translations of the Bible, Plummer says, means the Bible is accurate “insofar as it accurately conveys the wording of the underlying Greek and Hebrew text.”

In other words, as Mark Ward writes, “Only the apostles were divinely inspired; translators are not. That’s why no translation ever achieves perfection. Perfection is an unattainable ideal unless a Perfect Being is involved.”

That’s why proponents of this view say it is incorrect to identify the Bible as the root problem of a discrepancy rather than our understanding of it.

Inerrancy does not require maximal precision

Inerrancy suggests to many the idea of precision, rather than its lexical meaning of mere truth. “Precision” and “truth” overlap in meaning but are not synonymous: A certain amount of precision is often required for truth, but that amount varies from one context to another.

In mathematics and science, truth often requires considerable precision. If a student says that 6+5=10, he has not told the truth. He has committed an error. If a scientist makes a measurement varying by .0004 cm of an actual length, he may describe that as an “error,” as in the phrase “margin of error.”

Truth and precision are usually more distinct when we move outside the fields of mathematics and science. If you ask someone’s age, the person’s conventional response is to tell how old he was on his most recent birthday.

But this is, of course, imprecise. It would be more precise to tell one’s age down to the day, hour, minute, and second. However, would that convey more truth? And, if one fails to give that much precision, has he made an error? I think not, as we use the terms truth and error in ordinary language.

If someone seeks to tell his age down to the second, we usually say that he has told us more than we want to know. The question, “What is your age?” does not demand that level of precision.

Indeed, when someone gives excess information in an attempt to be more precise, he actually frustrates the process of communication, hindering rather than communicating truth. He buries his real age under a torrent of irrelevant words.

Similarly, when I stand before a class and a student asks me how large the textbook is. Say that I reply “400 pages,” but the actual length is 398. Have I committed an error, or told the truth? I think the latter, for the following reasons:

• In context, nobody expects more precision than I gave in my answer. I met all the legitimate demands of the questioner.
• “400,” in this example, actually conveyed more truth than “398” would have. “398” most likely would have left the student with the impression of some number around 300, but “400” presented the size of the book more accurately.

The relationship between “precision” and “error” is actually more complicated than many recognize. “What is an error?” sounds like a simple question with an easy-to-find answer. But “identifying an error requires some understanding of the linguistic context, and that in turn requires an understanding of the cultural context.”

A child who says in his math class that 6+5=10 may not expect the same tolerance as a person who gives a rough estimate of his age or a professor who exaggerates the size of a book by two pages.

We should always remember that Scripture is, for the most part, ordinary language rather than technical language. Certainly, it is not of the modern scientific genre.

In Scripture, God intends to speak to everybody. To do that most efficiently, he (through the human writers) engages in all the shortcuts that we commonly use among ourselves to facilitate conversation: imprecisions, metaphors, hyperbole, parables, etc.

Not all of these convey literal truth, or truth with a precision expected in specialized contexts; but they all convey truth, and in the Bible there is no reason to charge them with error.

“Sufficient precision” rather than “maximal precision”

Inerrancy, therefore, means that the Bible is true, not that it is maximally precise. To the extent that precision is necessary for truth, the Bible is sufficiently precise.

But it does not always have the amount of precision that some readers demand of it. It has a level of precision sufficient for its own purposes, not for the purposes for which some readers might employ it.

Inerrancy is compatible with unrefined grammar, non-chronological narrative, round numbers, imprecise quotations, pre-scientific phenomenalistic description, use of figures and symbols, and imprecise descriptions.

Examples include “the sun rose” and Mark 1:5, which says that everyone from Judea and Jerusalem went to hear John the Baptist.

These are merely applications of the basic meaning of inerrancy: that it asserts truth, not precision. Inerrant language is language that makes good on its own claims, not on claims that are made for it by thoughtless readers.

Biblical claims and their context

Propositional language “makes claims on its hearers.” When I say that the book is on the table, I am claiming that in fact the book is there. If you look, you will find it, precisely there.

But if I say that I am age 24, I am not claiming that I am precisely 24. I am claiming, rather, that I became 24 on my last birthday.

Moreover, if I say that there are 400 pages in a textbook, I am not claiming that there is precisely that number of pages, only that the number 400 gives a pretty reliable estimate of the size of the book.

Of course, if I worked for a publisher, and gave him an estimate of the size of the book that was two pages off, I could cost him a lot of money and myself a job. In that context, my imprecision would certainly be called an error.

However, in the illustration of the professor making an estimate before his class, it would have been inappropriate to say that he was in error. Even though I use the same language in the two situations, I am making a different claim in the first situation from the claim I make in the second.

Therefore, the amount of precision demanded and expected in one case is different from what is demanded and expected in the other. In the one case, I have made an error; in the other case not.

A “claim” in this sense can be explicit or implicit. If someone asks me to quote a Bible passage, and I say “this is inexact,” I am making an explicit claim, namely, “I will give you the gist of it, but not the exact words.”

Nevertheless, it is rare in language for someone to make his claims explicit in that way. When a person gives his age, he rarely says, “I am giving you an approximate figure.”

Rather, he simply accepts the custom of approximating one’s age by the last birthday, assuming that people will understand that custom and will not be misled into thinking that his answer is absolutely precise.

In following this custom, people understand that he is making an implicit claim. In the same way, readers must consider what kind of claim a biblical writer was making in a particular linguistic and cultural context.

Parables, figures, and ordinary language

So, in reading the Bible, it is important to know enough about the language and culture of the people to know what claims the original characters and writers were likely making.

When Jesus tells parables, he does not always say explicitly that his words are parabolic. But his audience understood what he was doing, and we should as well.

A parable does not claim historical accuracy, but it claims to set forth a significant truth by means of a likely nonhistorical narrative.

Similarly, metaphors, hyperbole, symbols, and phenomenal descriptions should be interpreted according to their intended function. Their nontechnical or figurative character does not make them false.

Inerrant language makes good on its claims. When we say that the Bible is inerrant, we mean that the Bible makes good on its claims.

Two major theological uses of “infallibility”

The terms are not used identically by all theologians. Some scholars see infallibility as a less restrictive term than “inerrancy” in discussing the reliability of the Bible.

Some theologians affirm the infallibility of Scripture but not the inerrancy of it, “intending thereby to indicate that the Bible can be relied on as an authority in matters of faith and practice while recognizing the possibility of scientific and historical errors.”

In this approach, infallibility means that the Bible cannot fail as a guide for faith and practice, even if it may contain errors in minor matters of history or science.

The word “infallible” means “will not fail” or “trustworthy.” So to say Scripture is infallible signifies its full trustworthiness “as a guide that is not deceived and does not deceive.”

Infallibility does not mean the Bible cannot contain errors-but rather that it cannot fail. Beth Felker Jones says the concept of infallibility means that the Word of God “will do what God intends for it to do” for his expressed purpose.

Thus, this view posits the Bible can and should be trusted as unfailing “in all matters that pertain to Christian faith and practice,” but it should not be considered without error regarding minor matters of history or science.

Other theologians use “infallibility” in the stronger traditional sense. On this understanding, infallibility specifically implies inerrancy: if the Bible is incapable of error, it cannot contain errors in history, science, faith, practice, or any other matter it truly affirms.

Some people have recently used the term infallibility even though they believe the Bible does contain errors, so we need to be on guard against the possible misuse of the word.

Historically, however, Christians have said Scripture is infallible because they have believed that God's Word is incapable of erring and thus contains no errors.

The inerrantist view

In contrast, the inerrantist view goes further, holding that Scripture is free from error of any kind-or as defined in the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, “free from all falsehood, fraud, or deceit.”

The inerrantist view thus makes a strong claim about the truth and reliability of the Bible-that it, the original autographs-not copies-is without error in all matters it addresses, including history and science.

Inerrantists believe Jesus held this view and point to the following passages:

• “For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.” (Matt 5:18; see also Luke 16:17)
• “Scripture cannot be broken.” (John 10:35)
• “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.” (2 Tim 3:16)

If God is perfect and cannot err, and if he inspired Scripture, and if what God breathes retains his perfect character, then Scripture, according to this view, cannot err either.

Dr. Plummer adds that Christians who believe in inerrancy say the biblical writers themselves claim biblical writings to be uniquely authoritative and true-and that the Word itself affirms this in Numbers 23:19:

“God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?”

Biblical inspiration and divine truthfulness

In their book Across the Spectrum: Understanding Issues in Evangelical Theology, Gregory Boyd and Paul Eddy discuss the inerrancy of Scripture and explore one of the core distinctions of evangelical theology: “the conviction that the Bible is the inspired Word of God” (2 Tim 3:16-17).

And closely related to biblical inspiration is the long-held evangelical claim that the Bible is the final authority on faith and practice.

Those who affirm biblical infallibility and inerrancy connect these doctrines to divine inspiration. The prophetic word does not originate merely in human will, and Scripture is not simply a collection of fallible human reflections.

Those who adhere to the stronger view point to 2 Peter 1:19-21 as evidence that the Bible itself claims infallibility:

“And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention has to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation.

For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.”

God is infallible-there is no error in him. Therefore, the Word he “breathed out” (2 Tim 3:16-17) is infallible too.

We affirm the inerrancy and the infallibility of Scripture because we know the character of God. Today's passage, for instance, tells us that the Lord never lies. If God never lies, His Word never lies either.

Apparent discrepancies and difficult passages

Despite the claim that the Bible is the final authority on faith and practice, disagreement exists among evangelicals concerning certain differences in Scripture-like why the fourth Gospel’s record of Jesus’ activities while on earth differs so much from the other three and why resurrection details in the Gospel accounts don’t match down to the last jot and tittle.

For some, these differences are enough to land respected theologians on one side or the other of the Bible-is-historically-accurate fence.

Inerrantists admit there are apparent errors and agree we should try and account for them when possible, but say any errors aren’t real errors-they simply fall into the category of “things our finite minds cannot explain,” are phenomenological, or are a translation error.

The inerrantist position does not claim that every reader will immediately understand every passage or resolve every apparent discrepancy. It claims that the difficulty lies in the limits of human understanding, the nature of translation, the transmission of copies, or a mistaken interpretation rather than in an actual error in the original text.

Historical development of the debate

The inerrantist view goes back to the inception of the Church and was held until the Enlightenment in the 1600s, when Christians began to question whether the Bible was completely truthful.

For example, early Church fathers like Clement of Rome (AD 300-100), Justin Martyr (AD 100-165), Tertullian (AD 160-226), and Augustine (AD 354-430) championed this view-that the Bible is inerrant in historical and scientific matters as well as redemptive matters.

Augustine wrote: “For I confess to your Charity that I have learned to yield this respect and honor only to the canonical books of Scripture: of these alone do I most firmly believe that the authors were completely free from error.”

This view sees inerrancy as the bedrock for all other Christian doctrines.

Thus was born in the 1970s the biblical inerrancy debate, which has led to two perspectives on whether the Bible is inerrant on all matters: infallibility and inerrancy.

Some theologians affirm the infallibility of Scripture but not the inerrancy of it, intending thereby to indicate that the Bible can be relied on as an authority in matters of faith and practice while recognizing the possibility of scientific and historical errors.

Inerrantists pushed back against such skeptics of Scripture’s authority, birthing what is known as the “modern inerrancy debate” between 1900 and the 1920s, which developed more fully in the 1970s.

It has become one of the more hotly debated topics in the evangelical world.

The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy

The International Council on Biblical Inerrancy held a conference in October 1978, where over 300 evangelicals representing 41 churches and 38 different denominations-including John F. MacArthur, Francis Schaeffer, and J. I. Packer-signed a document that addresses the inerrancy of Scripture and reliability of the biblical text.

This document is helpful for understanding the doctrine of biblical inerrancy and how it impacts Christian life.

In article XI, the Chicago Statement says: “We deny that it is possible for the Bible to be at the same time infallible and errant in its assertions. Infallibility and inerrancy may be distinguished, but not separated.”

In article XII, the Chicago Statement says: “We deny that Biblical infallibility and inerrancy are limited to spiritual, religious, or redemptive themes, exclusive of assertions in the fields of history and science.”

The Chicago Statement is therefore contrary to the view that infallibility is limited to matters of faith and practice. It treats infallibility and inerrancy as distinct terms that nevertheless describe inseparable aspects of Scripture’s complete truthfulness.

How different groups use the terms

The terms are almost never used appropriately. As has been mentioned, technically “inerrant” means without error and “infallible” means incapable of error.

In common practice, it is just reversed as most evangelicals in mid-century held to inerrancy as the shibboleth for differentiating themselves from liberals.

In the late 60s and early 70s some places such as Fuller Seminary dropped “inerrancy” in favor of “infallibility” which to them, anyway, meant less to defend.

Some scholars see infallibility as a less restrictive term than “inerrancy” in discussing the reliability of the Bible. However, others see it the other way around, i.e. infallibility is the stronger term and specifically implies inerrancy.

Adding to the potential confusion is the layman's tendency to use the terms interchangeably.

Even though the word “infallibility” should be the stronger term, it is used because it permits more wiggle room for the phenomena of Scripture.

In the final analysis, some theologians regard shifts from “inerrancy” to broader or less defined uses of “infallibility” as signals of a desire to soften the doctrine of Scripture.

Why the distinction matters

The distinction matters because the two words make different logical claims. A fallible person may happen to produce an error-free statement, but an infallible source cannot produce a genuine error.

If Scripture is merely inerrant in the sense that it happens not to contain errors, its freedom from error could be treated as accidental. If Scripture is infallible, its freedom from error is grounded in the nature of its divine source and inspiration.

What sets Scripture apart from all else is its infallibility. Inerrancy is not a property unique to Scripture.

Human beings regularly make error-free statements. Students score 100 percent on exams; people accurately state their names to others; and so forth.

If I score 100% on a test it is “inerrant” but does not prove me to be “infallible.”

The theological claim about Scripture is therefore greater than the observation that a particular statement happens to be correct. The doctrine concerns the source, authority, truthfulness, and incapacity of God’s Word to err.

Faith, practice, history, and science

The narrower use of infallibility holds that the Bible is trustworthy in matters of faith and practice, while recognizing the possibility of scientific and historical errors.

The broader historic use of infallibility holds that Scripture is incapable of error in every matter it truly addresses, including history and science. The inerrantist view likewise holds that Scripture is free from error in all matters it addresses, including history and science.

These positions should not be confused with the claim that Scripture always uses modern scientific terminology or provides the maximal precision expected in a technical scientific report.

Scripture is, for the most part, ordinary language rather than technical language. Certainly, it is not of the modern scientific genre.

Therefore, descriptions such as “the sun rose,” round numbers, non-chronological narrative, figures, symbols, metaphors, hyperbole, parables, and other ordinary linguistic forms do not by themselves contradict inerrancy.

The relevant question is what the text claims in its linguistic and cultural context. Inerrant language makes good on its own claims, not on claims that are made for it by thoughtless readers.

A concise comparison

Why Christians trust Scripture

We can therefore trust it to be free from all error. Because God is truthful, His Word is truthful.

Because God is indeed perfect, always true, always doing exactly what He promises and always doing what is right, it is impossible for Him to err.

If Scripture is truly inspired of God, if it is truly all that it claims to be, then it too is incapable of committing error. It is infallible and inerrant.

And because the Bible gives us ample warrant to believe this, we know we can stake our very lives on the Word of God.

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