Records of the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy

The International Council on Biblical Inerrancy (ICBI) was founded in 1977 to clarify and defend the doctrine of biblical inerrancy. The Council sponsored three major "summits," each producing an important statement.

Summit I met in Chicago on October 26–28, 1978. Over 300 Christian leaders, theologians and pastors attended and adopted the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, consisting of nineteen articles with brief exposition. See signatures and typed list of signatories. Ironically, some early copies of the Statement contain typographical errors such as "progessive" for "progressive" at the top of page three. The copy of the Statement mailed to participants of the Summit on Nov. 7, 1978, just a week after the meeting, was relatively free from typographical errors. Papers delivered at the conference were published as Norman L. Geisler, ed., Inerrancy (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1980). Dr. Jay Grimstead, one of the organizers of the ICBI, describes the statement as "a landmark church document" created "by the then largest, broadest, group of evangelical protestant scholars that ever came together to create a common, theological document in the 20th century. It is probably the first systematically comprehensive, broadly based, scholarly, creed–like statement on the inspiration and authority of Scripture in the history of the church." (Link last checked 1/24/22)

The ICBI convened Summit II on November 10–13, 1982, in Chicago to discuss guidelines for principles of interpreting the Bible. Approximately one hundred people attended and adopted the Chicago Statement on Biblical Hermeneutics, comprising twenty–five articles and a brief exposition. Papers read at the conference were published as Earl D. Radmacher and Robert D. Preus, eds., Hermeneutics, Inerrancy, and the Bible (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1984).

The final ICBI conference, Summit III, met on December 10–13, 1986 in Chicago. The participants adopted the Chicago Statement on Biblical Application, composed of sixteen articles with a separate introduction. Papers read at the conference were published as Kenneth S. Kantzer, ed., Applying The Scriptures (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1987).

One of the last actions of the ICBI was to transfer records of the organization to the archives at Dallas Theological Seminary to preserve them for future research. The ICBI files date from about 1978 to 1989 and fill sixty-nine linear feet. The records include correspondence, files regarding publications, documents about seminars and lay congresses, financial records, and copies of the statements adopted at the three conferences. The collection also has some scrapbooks and preservation copies of books published by the ICBI.