Liberal approaches

• one liberal belief is that those who wrote the texts were guided by god
• another liberal belief is that the bible is an entirely human document, consisting of what the writers believed about god and his purposes for the world
• some liberals believe that what individual authors wrote was a product of the culture and age in which each of them lived and of their particular temperament and outlook on life
• one liberal belief is that the bible is not inspired but it may be inspiring to individuals, e.g. Jesus' statement in Matthew 26 that those who draw the sword will die by the sword may inspire some christians to adopt a pacifist approach to war
• one example of a liberal approach is the sea of faith network, which includes christians with very liberal views, who claim that faith is a purely human creation, so the bible has no authority other than any that an individual might choose to give it