“The Bible” doesn’t claim anything, because the Bible is a library of writings, not a univocal monolith. A writer in the Bible may claim something, but that doesn’t mean all of the other writers claim it too. Be careful with “the Bible says” as if the dozens of authors across thousands of years included in the Bible all said and agreed to something just because one of them did. Just because one book in a library says something, does not mean “the library says.”

The doctrine of biblical inerrancy makes a claim about pieces of literature that is demonstrably false, because first it denies the basic reality of the imperfect nature of human language (because language is just an extension and manifestation of imperfect human nature and perception). It also denies the many historical and scientific errors and discrepancies that can be found in the Bible, as well as the contradictory statements concerning the nature of God from different people in the Bible. There has never been a piece of literature in history that is “inerrant”, much less a library of writings from dozens of men over thousands of years who are all evolving with the times and gaining new insights on God and the nature of reality.

The doctrine of inerrancy is just wishful thinking based in the fact that one has been told their religion is staked on it. The claim of inerrancy is not based on people reading the Bible and then bewilderingly and undeniably finding that it is the first piece of literature in human history that has no errors or misstatements, rather it is based on the insecure need for it to be inerrant so that one can feel safe and certain in their beliefs and push them on others. If we say something is inerrant, it should be because it is, not because if it wasn’t then we would feel less secure. Islam does the same thing with their holy book, except their claim of inerrancy has a slight advantage seeing that they have the original text and it was all written by one man in one time.

This is why if a blatant contradiction in the Bible is pointed out, the staunch inerrantist will double down and use any and every excuse to explain the contradiction away i.e. “you’re reading it carnally”, “you’re using man’s reasoning”, “you need to read it spiritually”, or if all else fails use semantical tricks to make the words mean something other than what they say. Then they go on their way in their safe certainty of an inerrant Bible. (This is not to deny such a thing as metaphor, parable, symbolism, hyperbole, etc. which the Bible is full of, but it also has straight up errors and contradictions.)

What this person has only proven is that they don’t believe there is such thing as contradiction at all, because such twisted logic and semantical games could be applied to anything in the world. For example, I could angrily say to someone “I hate you and would happily torture and kill you”, and then affectionately say “I love you and only desire your joy and flourishing”, and then later claim I did not contradict myself because the first statement I simply meant it metaphorically or some nonsense. In this case there is simply no such thing as contradiction at all.

All that said, you might think I hate the Bible, but it couldn’t be further from the truth. I love the Bible for what it is, not for what I want it to be. It is inerrantists who don’t love the Bible for what it is, and want it to be something else. It’s a shame that some Christians believe you think low of the Bible simply because you accept the Bible for what it is and don’t put unrealistic expectations on it. I love the Bible for the reason that it is God being revealed through imperfect human experience and language, through our anthropological and ethical evolution, through our cultural preconditions, projecting all we know onto the divine and receiving revelation through this filter of the vast array of human nature and experience, all reaching for the divine and the divine meeting us in our mess. Just like Jesus. And then we get to Jesus and see the true face of God in his healing, restoring, forgiving, death-conquering humanity.

The fact that many people wrestled with their different divine conceptions throughout the ages, progressing towards the revelation of God in Christ is a beautiful testament to our own story today and throughout history, individually and corporately. The very people of God that the divine revelation came forth from was named after Jacob/Israel, the one who wrestled with God. We have 30,000 denominations now, who all voice opposing contradicting ideas of God in some way or another. And we have seven billion people on the planet who do the same.