The doctrine of Scripture3
God's "baby-talk":
Calvin and the "errors" in the Bible
Dirk W. Jellema
Can we integrate the infallibility of Scripture with the
apparent errors in it? It would seem that a dilemma is
involved: either give u p infallibility or rationalize away
the apparent errors, scientific and otherwisewhich
often seems a formidable task. It is the purpose of this
article to give an account of John Calvin's treatment of
this problem, and thereby to raise the question of
whether this apparent dilemma is not a false one.
Since Calvin is one of the great figures of the Ref
ormation, it is doubtless unnecessary to go on at length
to establish his credentials as what would in today's
context be called an evangelical. His view on biblical
infallibility is also well known: he supported it strongly.
He used Scripture as the Protestant authority, in con
trast to the Roman Catholic stress on the church as au
thority. Calvin's view of the "errors" in Scripture is
therefore of some interest. And it seems to be one which
avoids both horns of the apparent dilemma mentioned
above.
Calvin's view of "accommodation"* is one which
affects other areas of his thought besides exegesis, as
we shall see. But our main concern is with the apparent
scientific and other "errors" in Scripture. Do these not
show that the Bible is fallible, if we accept them as
errors; and if we do not, aren't we involved in an em
barrassing attempt at rationalizing them away? Cal
vin's answer is a resounding No. Such "errors" are
God's accommodation of the truth to the limited under
standing of men.
T h e Bible often speaks of God in terms which clearly
cannot be taken literally (God speaks, sleeps, hears,
remembers). Considering what Calvin has to say in his
Commentaries on a few such passages might help give
us the flavor of his idea of accommodation.
Thus Calvin says on Psalm 13:3 (God "looking"),
"the Holy Spirit purposely accommodates to our under
standing." About the reference in Psalm 78:65 to God's
awaking from sleep, Calvin says "the figure . . . is em
ployed in accommodation to the stupidity of the peo
ple." The language of Psalm 86:8 (God of gods) "is
Dirk W. Jellema is professor of history at Calvin College.
Among his areas of historical interest is Dutch Calvinism.
April 1980
employed in accommodation to the ignorance of the
generality of m e n . " In Psalm 88:5 (God forgets), "the
prophet speaks according to the opinion of the gener
ality of m e n . " Similarly, commenting on Psalm 98:3
(God remembers), Calvin says, "The word is used in
accommodation to man's apprehension." Psalm 91:4
speaks of God's wings; according to Calvin, " i n accom
modation to our infirmity, he does not scruple to de
scend . . . under so humble a similitude."
Similar accommodation is found in the prophetic
books: Isaiah 40:13 (God measures): " h e accommodates
himself to our ignorance; for thus does the Lord often
prattle with us, and borrow comparisons from matters
that are familiar to us, when he speaks of his majesty;
so that our ignorant, limited minds may better under
stand." Isaiah 49:16 speaks of God's hands; Calvin re
marks: "True, indeed, God has neither hands nor bodily
shape; but Scripture accommodates itself to our weak
capacity." In Jeremiah 26, where the prophet speaks of
God's saying "if," Calvin notes that " h e made use of
a common mode of speaking," and talk of God's re
pentance is explained this way: "God thus condescend
ingly speaks to us . . . according to the comprehension
of our weak capacities." And when Jeremiah speaks of
God's heart and soul, he says, "unless he prattled, where
would be found so much understanding . . . ? It is nec
essary that he should accommodate himself to our lim
ited capacities."
Calvin's main point should already be clear. The
Bible's use of language which is not literally correct or
true is not a proof that the Bible is fallible; rather, it
shows God's willingness to accommodate his Word to
limited human understanding. The passages cited thus
far deal with one class of such biblical statements
anthropomorphic descriptions of God. One might ar
gue that these form a special category and are not strictly
speaking "errors"; and that so far all we have shown
is that Calvin used rather unusual language in explain-
*This general idea of a c c o m m o d a t i o n is clearly expressed by
A Kuyper (The Work of the Holy Spirit, 72) "God must conde
scend to our limitations For the consciousness is subject to the
mental conditions of the world in which it lives " A person "can
have no other consciousness than that developed by ins environ
ment and acquired by his language Hence the divine speaking
is always adapted to the capacities of the person addressed "
25

BELIEVING THE BIBLE
TO BE INFALLIBLE
WE NEVERTHELESS NOTE
APPARENT SCIENTIFIC
ERRORS IN IT.
ing these literary forms. We might, therefore, give a
few more miscellaneous citations, to establish that more
is involved.
Calvin says, regarding Psalm 51:4, "the apostles do not
study verbal exactness in their quotations from the Old
Testament." The reference in Psalm 69:28 to the book
of life he calls "indeed an improper manner of speak-
ing, but . . . one well adapted to our limited capacity."
Where Psalm 148:7-10 includes hail and snow among
things from the earth, Calvin says, "these should have
been placed in the former class, but he has respect to
the common apprehension of m e n . " In Isaiah 30:33
(hell fire), the prophet "speaks metaphorically . . . oth-
erwise we cannot sufficiently comprehend; in the same
manner we do not understand the blessed immortal
life, unless it be shadowed out by some figures adapted
to our capacity."
Similarly, on Isaiah 32:19 Calvin notes how "the
prophets borrow their metaphors from an earthly king-
dom" when speaking of Christ's Kingdom, "because
our ignorance would make it almost impossible to com-
prehend in any other way." He addresses the same
subject in Jeremiah 23:5: "God accommodates himself
to our ignorance . . . according to the measure of our
capacities"; also in Jeremiah 30:12: "they describe the
Kingdom of Christ in a way suitable to the compre-
hension of a rude people . . . according to the condition
and comprehension of childhood"; and 33:16,19: "spir-
itual truth, without any metaphor, could not have been
sufficiently understood by a rude people in their child-
hood. . . . The prophets accommodate their words to
the capacities of the Jews; . . . they accommodate their
discourses to the men of their own age and time . . .
under those external symbols which were then in use."
Commenting on Jeremiah 29:18, Calvin says that the
prophets "brought forth nothing new, but accommo-
dated the doctrine of Moses to the circumstances of the
time in which each lived."
Thus Calvin uses the idea of accommodation to
explain not only anthropomorphic references to God,
26
but also, in a rather far-reaching manner, metaphorical
references of various types, apparent errors in quota-
tions and lists, and the like.
Once again, Calvin's idea of accommodation would
seem to amount to this: the Bible is infallible, but often
makes statements which are not literally true. When it
does so, God is accommodating the truth to limited
h u m a n understanding, and particularly the limited
understanding of the primitive Hebrews to whom the
biblical writings were originally addressed.
O u r interest here is to raise the question whether Cal-
vin's approach furnishes a possible way out of the ap-
parent dilemma which bothers many evangelicals: that
is, believing the Bible to be infallible, we nevertheless
note apparent scientific errors in it; and so it seems we
must give up either the Bible or science. Let us turn,
then, to Calvin's application of the idea of accommo-
dation to signs and sacraments, and to apparent sci-
entific errors in Scripture. Some of these passages are
quite provocative.
On Psalm 3:4, regarding the Ark, Calvin says it
was a "visible sign which the Lord had appointed on
account of the rudeness of the times." In Psalm 96:8,
"the inspired penmen describe the inward worship
under symbols common in the age when they lived."
He explains the analogy to Mount Zion in Psalm 125:1
this way: "in exhibiting to the eyes a visible image of
the church, he accommodates himself to the rudeness
(of men)." Regarding Psalm 132:7 (symbols of wor-
ship), he says, "It is thus that the Holy Spirit conde-
scends for our profit, and in accommodation to our
infirmity, raising our thoughts to heavenly and divine
things by these worldly elements."
The book of Isaiah also provides examples of what
Calvin sees as accommodation in reference to signs and
symbols. "It was customary for the sacred writers to
accommodate their descriptions of God to these out-
ward signs which were commonly used" is Calvin's
explanation of Isaiah's famous vision (6:2). Similarly
for Isaiah 19:19 (statue to the Lord): "Isaiah simply de-
scribes the pure worship of God under the figure of
signs which were then in use; for he has his eye upon
his own age and the men with whom he had to do.
. . . The prophets addressed them as children." Isaiah
27:13 speaks of the holy mount at Jerusalem. Calvin
sees this as another case in which prophets "accom-
modate themselves to the usages of the people that they
might be better understood." Regarding Isaiah 37:17,
he says, "It is proper that we should strive to approach
to His loftiness, since He invites us by the Word and
sacraments; . . . since God accommodates himself to
our weakness for no other reason than that the sacra-
ments may serve to us the purpose of ladders." And on
Isaiah 38:7: "He commonly gave, as we have said, other
The Reformed Journal
signs in accommodation to the weakness of men; as to
Adam the tree of life; . . . the same remarks apply to
the passover and to all the sacraments, both those which
were formerly observed and those which have now
been appointed by Christ."
T h u s , for Calvin, the idea of accommodation is one
with far-reaching implications. In this context, let us
now consider his approach to apparent scientific errors
in Scripture.
"The history of the creation," Calvin says, com-
menting on Genesis 1:6, "is the book of the unlearned."
Time and again he returns to this theme when dis-
cussing Genesis. "It must be remembered that Moses
does not speak with scientific acuteness; . . . as it be-
came a theologian, he had respect to us rather than to
the stars" (1:14-15). "Moses accommodated his topog-
raphy [i.e., geography] to the capacity of his age" (2:8).
"Moses, by a homely and uncultivated style, accom-
modates what he delivers to the capacity of the people
. . . an untaught race of men" (3:1). "Moses did not
speak scientifically, but in a popular style" (24:4).
The Genesis account of the "lights in the firma-
ment" (1:15) ought not to be misread: "It is not here
scientifically discussed how great the sun is in the
heaven, and how great, or how little, is the moon."
"Moses does not here subtly descant as a scientist,"
Calvin remarks. "If the astronomer inquires regarding
the actual dimensions of the stars, he will find the moon
to be less than Saturn . . . but to the common sight it
appears differently. Moses therefore adopts his dis-
course to common usage." He returns to this point a
few chapters later, when he comments on Genesis 6:11.
"We know," he says, "that Moses everywhere spoke in
a homely style, to suit the capacity of the people, and
that he purposely abstained from acute disputations,
which might savor of the schools and of deeper learn-
ing. . . . In the first chapter he did not treat scientifi-
cally of the stars, as a scientist would do; but he called
them, in a popular manner, according to their appear-
ance to the uneducated rather than according to truth, two
great lights." Indeed, the whole notion of a "firma-
ment" presents problems:
For it appears opposed to common sense, and quite
incredible, that there should be waters above the
heaven. Hence some resort to allegory, and philoso-
phize concerning angels; but quite beside the pur-
pose. For, to my mind, this is a certain principle, that
nothing is here treated but the visible [i.e., apparent]
form of the world. He who would learn astronomy
. . . let him go elsewhere. . . . The assertion of some,
that they embrace by faith what they have read con-
cerning the waters above the heavens, notwithstand-
ing their ignorance respecting them, is not in
accordance with the design of Moses.
Elsewhere in the Bible, too, we must read the text
April 1980
"MOSES AND THE PROPHETS
ORDINARILY SPEAK
IN A POPULAR STYLE,
SUITED TO THE LOWEST
APPREHENSION/'
according to the author's intention. In Psalm 19 David
"does not discourse scientifically . . . but, accommo-
dating himself to the rudest and dullest, he confines
himself to the ordinary appearances presented to the
eye." Again, in Psalm 24 "David does not dispute sci-
entifically concerning the situation of the earth; . . . he
uses popular language, and adapts himself to the ca-
pacity of the unlearned." With the litany of creation in
Psalm 136, "the Holy Spirit had no intention to teach
astronomy. . . . The Holy Spirit would rather speak
childishly than unintelligibly to the humble and un-
learned." "We know that Moses and the prophets or-
dinarily speak in a popular style, suited to the lowest
apprehension," Calvin comments on Psalm 148:3. "It
would be absurd to seek to reduce what they say to the
rules of science." When Isaiah speaks of the skies being
rolled up like a scroll (34:4), this "must be understood
to relate to man's apprehension, for heaven is not moved
out of its place." And in Jeremiah 10:2, "the prophet
does not use the word 'signs' in its proper meaning;
for he refers not to its true origin, but accommodates
himself to the notions which then prevailed."
It would seem, then, that Calvin refused to be caught
in the dilemma of either giving up infallibility or being
forced to rationalize away the apparent errors in Scrip-
ture. He holds strongly to infallibility, and at the same
time holds that there are statements which are erro-
neous from the point of view of modern learning. He
explains the latter in terms of God's accommodating the
truth of his Word to limited human understanding.
This idea of accommodation is applied not only to an-
thropomorphic terms for God and to metaphorical lan-
guage in general, but also to signs and symbols and
sacraments; and to scientific "errors" in Scripture.
Could the approach of Calvin, a great evangelical,
be profitable for evangelicals today to consider as a way
out of the dilemma? It surely would seem to be worthy
of investigation as an evangelical approach to the prob-
lems surrounding infallibility and inerrancy.
27
 ^ s
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