International Council on Biblical Inerrancy

(IEEE)

   The International Council on Biblical Inerrancy was created in 1978 and given the task of preparing books and other materials to shore up the belief in biblical INERRANCY and to keep the issue in the forefront among Evangelical Christians.

   For most of the 20th century, Evangelicals all tended to accept the language of PRINCEToN THEoLoGY to defend traditional views of the Bible, including its inerrancy in all matters of historical or scientific fact. Then, in the 1970s, some Evangelical leaders and scholars seemed to be drifting away from the idea of inerrancy, often by adopting Neo-Orthodoxy instead. In the early 1970s, for example, Fuller Theological Seminary had abandoned official support for the idea. In 1976, Harold Lindsell, then on the staff of Christianity Today, the leading Evangelical journal, wrote his famous volume, The Battle for the Bible, calling attention to widespread abandonment of the idea. Lindsell's book alerted many Evangelical leaders to what they now saw as an urgent problem.

   In reaction, R. C. Sproul (b. 1939) called a conference on the authority of Scripture, which was held at Mt. Hermon, California, in February 1977. Plans were laid for a national council of theologians, Bible scholars, and Evangelical leaders who could work out a theological affirmation of the full inerrancy of the Bible. Jay Grimstead, who had been active in the process from the beginning, emerged as executive of the new International Council on Biblical Inerrancy. At a meeting in Chicago in october 1978, the 300 attendees signed a Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy. Many Evangelical seminaries and schools responded positively to the Chicago statements and the work of the council, though Fuller and other faculties did not.

   The council was designed to do its work and then disband. In the 10 years of its existence, it supported the publication of a host of books on the subject and succeeded in placing it once again at the forefront of the agenda for Evangelical groups (though those from the Methodist-Holiness tradition were reluctant to engage in what they saw as a Presbyterian Baptist issue). As an outgrowth of the council's work, advocates were identified who have continued to carry on the work from their various academic positions.

   See also inspiration of the Bible.

   Further reading:

   ■ James Montgomery Boice, ed., The Foundations of Biblical Authority (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 1978)

   ■ D. A. Carson and John D. Woodbridge, eds., Scripture and Truth (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 1983)

   ■ Norman Geisler, ed., Inerrancy (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 1980)

   ■ Kenneth Kantzer, ed., Applying the Scriptures (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 1987)

   ■ Harold Lindsell, The Battle for the Bible (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 1976).