Is the Holy Bible 100% perfect?

[Andreas]

Is it the pure word of God without Man's thoughts going in it that may be mistaken?

[尼古拉前执事]

The proper translation, when understood with the correct light (that of the Church tradition in knowing what is allegorical, what is prophecy, what is literal and what is more than one [or even all] of the above), the Bible is without error.

[ORPRcamper]

Please remember the story of St. Symeon.

[Justin Kissel]

I would agree with Nicholas, I think. Approached from the mindset of searching out errors and contradictions, you will most certainly find them. But approached with the same mindset (or something of an attempt at the same mindset!) as that of the Saints, the Holy Bible does indeed become the pure word of God.

I would add though that I wouldn't use the word "infallible" for two reasons. First, that word just has too much baggage because of it's usage among Evangelicals and others. And second, while the holy Bible might be pure and spotless (as originally written), none of us are perfect (infallible) interpreters of the Bible, so the issue of "infallibility" is really unnecessary precision. I think it makes us get bogged down in the things of lesser importance (like debating for hours on end the question "is the Bible infallible?"), so that we spend less time on more important things (ie. acknowledging that the Bible is spotless and then asking "what can God teach me through it?")

[Reader Michael]

Please remember the story of St. Symeon.

from the Prologue from Ohrid
During the reign of the Egyptian Emperor Ptolemy Philadelphus, Simeon was chosen as one of the prominent Seventy to whom was entrusted the task of translating the Bible from the Hebrew language into the Greek language [The Septuagint]. Simeon was performing his task conscientiously but when he was translating the book of the Prophet Isaiah and came upon the prophecy: "Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and will give birth to a son" (Isaiah 7:14), he became confused and took a knife to remove the word "virgin" and to replace it with the words, "young woman," and as such to translate it into Greek. At that moment, however, an angel of God appeared to Simeon and restrained him from his intention, explaining to him that the prophecy is true; that the prophecy is correctly written: that it is true and correct. The messenger of God also said that Simeon would be convinced of it personally for, according to the Will of God, he will not die until he sees the Messiah born of the Virgin. The righteous Simeon rejoiced to hear such a voice from heaven, left the prophecy unchanged and thanked God Who is making him worthy to live and to see the Promised One. When the young Child Jesus was presented in the Temple in Jerusalem by the Virgin Mary, the Spirit of God appeared to Simeon who was very old and as "white as a swan." Simeon quickly entered the Temple and there recognized both the Virgin and the young Child by the light that shone around their heads as an aureal. The joyful Simeon took Christ into his hands and prayed to God to release him from this life: "Now, Master, You may let Your servant go in peace, according to Your word, for my eyes have seen Your salvation" (St. Luke 2: 29-30).

http://www.westsrbdio.org/prolog/my.htm ... h=February

[Justin Kissel]

Just wanted to add a clarifying remark to my last post. The Church (as a whole, with Christ as her head) is a perfect ("infallible") interpreter. I was just speaking of how important the issue was to our day to day lives. And once we start speaking about the Church, that gets more into issues like tradition, epistemological disputes, etc.

[OrthodoxyOrDeath]

Nick Harmon,

I read that somewhere before, but this time I was really struck by the beauty! Thank you.