Record few Americans believe in Biblical inerrancy.

[John V]

I meant to say practical for that church at that time. Perhaps he wasn't intending for churches hundreds or thousands of years later to continue following his advice to the letter. It was practical in the sense that it was useful for his contemporaries to follow. If there was a manual on how to cut down trees written at that time, it might have suggested that an axe is the best tool for the job. It might have been correct at the time it was written. But since the advent of the chainsaw...

Yes, and people today try to discern what was due only to circumstances of the time, and what is generally applicable. Most churches today don't require a woman to have a covering on her head, for example. Inspiration doesn't need to apply to all people in all places of all times.

There is no clear set of verses that get you to the doctrine of inerrancy.

If Timothy 3;16 had said "In all the books that will one day be collected into the Christian canon, including this letter, you will not find one single error. The epistle written by James is without error. Both of Peter's epistles are without error. The accounts of Jesus' life according Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are without error"... This would be much clearer than "All scripture is god-breathed and practical..." etc...

Taken by themselves, these verses aren't vague. But when used to justify inerrancy, they require interpolation. I have trouble wrapping my head around the notion that Paul referred to works that had not been written yet and with which he himself was wholly unfamiliar. (But then again, I try to avoid magical thinking.) To summarize: by themselves, the verses might have clear meaning. As justification for inerrancy, they are vague.

As a spiritual thinker, they're clear enough to me. The Bible isn't trying to logically convince materialist atheists of its positions. I don't get why you would even consider the issue in that way.

Fair enough. I guess this brings our argument to the old crossroads: You choose faith/ I choose logic. Circularity is a lapse in logic. But I suppose strict adherence to logic may demonstrate poor faith. Kind of a deal-breaker for me personally.

More like the old false dichotomy.

I choose logic when it's appropriate to do so. Logic is a tool, not a way of life. If you looked at yourself honestly you'd find you live much less logically than you suppose. We're more emotional than rational beings.

But by the same token, logic works for me, as well as many others. There are those who would not only impose scripture on themselves but everyone else too. We can't forget the bloody history of Christianity. Left unchecked, it will move beyond the sphere of what works for a given individual and try to shape society according to its precepts-- often in a way that exudes hypocrisy.

Can you forget the bloody history of communism, a philosophy that was arrived at through logic?

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Also, getting back to logic, have you considered that confirmation bias might be at work when you "follow its precepts and life is good" ???

Yes, and I'm certain there's more to it that that. One extreme example is 20 years of sobriety following 15 years of daily alcohol and drugs.

LOL, I hate to leave a wikipedia link after what you have said, but the authorship of Peter is discussed within: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Epistle_of_Peter

I actually was drawing from memory before. My sister got me an annotated Catholic Bible which discussed scholarly interpretations of verses in the footnotes and also discussed authorship in the introduction to each book. (I think she was trying to lure me back to the flock, tee hee.) That Bible is somewhere in my many boxes of books and I wish I had the will to go dig it out. But when I use scholar, I mean "the community of educated theologians." No, I haven't surveyed them personally. But this doesn't mean such a survey hasn't been performed? The annotated Bible explored many avenues from Peter being the genuine author to pseudonymous authorship.

I can guarantee that such a survey hasn't been performed, as I know educated theologians who have never been surveyed on it. It would be impossible to identify and survey all such people. When someone says Scholars agree that... on a Biblical issue it's generally bullshit. They have no idea what the level of agreement is. They're usually referring to a general sense that they get from articles they've seen in journals. Journals aren't necessarily representative of the general population. They're likely to tend to the provocative in what they publish. Maybe most scholars agree with the conventional wisdom, but such pieces aren't going to sell magazines.

Majority vote? A majority vote among all believers

No, I'm referring to a majority vote among scholars. Even if you did conduct a survey of all scholars and found a majority position, that wouldn't make the position true.