As Christians, we live with a sacred text that is fractured by time, culture, and language. We have to struggle with the tension between the Bible's humanity and its powerful ability to transcend time and space. Peter Rollins has taken a healthy approach to scripture in his new book “The fidelity of betrayal”. He succeeds in moving past the modern wars of inerrancy by facing the tension head on and celebrating the process of wrestling with this tension.

Whenever we fist come to the text as religious readers, we all too often approach it in a naive manner that interprets the various scientific, geographical, historical, and metaphysical claims as constituting the truth of the text. Then, as these claims become increasingly difficult to hold uncritically, we often enter into a stage in which we question such assumptions and become interested in the various academic debates. However, it would be a mistake to think that this is the last word, for it is possible to take a further step by re-engaging with a naive reading, but one that does not turn its back on critical thinking. Instead, this return to naiveté allows the individual temporarily to suspend such academic debates so as to open up a deeper mode of engagement with the text itself.

The point of the second naiveté is not to reach a position where one rejects academic debates but rather to provide a space in which readers can place these ongoing debates to one side so that they can attend to the transforming source of the text itself. It is this transforming source that we speak of when we speak of the Word of God. (p. 46)

I was first struck by this need for a “both/and” approach to scripture the first time I heard Walter Brueggemann speak. It was evident in his ability to dissect the author's intentions and then easily move back into the story and speak from the vantage point of the characters. I think that is the source of tension we face. Literalists are only concerned with the words of the characters - the actual dialog, scenes, and events as if the only reason for the text is to convince a modern reader that these ancient events "really" happened. On the other hand, biblical experts are quick to point to the motive of the human author and consider what the text can tell us about the particular community that produced the story and the reasons they chose its specific symbolism. God is found in the act of reconciling that tension between the story and reality – between a character and its author. God is alive in the experience that inspired the story and also in the reader's experience of unpacking the story.

The text was written not to be approached as an academic document detailing facts about the life of faith but rather as an invitation into the life of faith. Hence, if we lose ourselves in a sea of discussions concerning the conflicts themselves we will fail to attend to the reality that the writers hint at as lying behind, beneath, and within the conflicts: the one we call God. (p. 47)