About two years prior, in a running exchange of posts dealing with the reliability and inspiration of Scriptures, after a series of salvos centered on perceived Biblical errors (and their resolutions), one atheistic post remarked, almost in an accusatory tone, "You have answers for everything." Shortly afterwards, I was introduced to the concept of "confirmation bias," a trend to find rationale for details of belief. We hold to our faith and are willing to draw up elaborate defenses to preserve what we hold to, leading to circular paths of reasoning.
I considered the concepts, but rejected them for what I determined was the ground of failure to diminish claims of reliability in the Bible.
The whole hermeneutical scheme that atheists use to devalue Scriptures is flawed.
The premises behind such a method hinge on two basic beliefs, 1) a dismissal of God as real, and 2) the rejection of the supernatural as possible. In some respects, this methodology resembles much of an idea of journeying to France with a feeling that knowing French is unnecessary.
The approach to view Scriptural content and teachings from a secular eye has met with a series of disastrous results since the initial studies of the German schools in the late 1800's. The concepts of the documentary hypothesis (remember JEDP?) have been proven inadequate, the forces of late-dating are approaching dating of the Gospels much closer to the conservative estimates (another twenty years and they will be ours!) than the original second century estimates. The trend to link Christian developments toward a Gnostic base are still looked on as ludicrous. With a core understanding of the Bible producing extreme and extremely inaccurate suppositions, it isn't unusual that a "you have answers for everything" response to such ill-formed claims to be difficult. Scriptural quotes addressed to me seem forever out of context and radically applied to situations completely unreal.
Bart Ehrmann once questioned the approaches of conservative scholarship over against secular research. But his latest book, How Jesus Became God, was duly and quickly answered by a team of Biblical scholars with their How God Became Jesus. Ah yes, an answer for everything. It is important to relate to media sources the ease in which wild speculations, drafted for popular consumption and financial remuneration, are trumped. But only in a land were both sides are offered, where strawman arguments cannot exist.
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