Xeno, let me thank you for a very great compliment nd for a perceptive analysis of what I’ve been trying to say.
Begbert, to the contrary, it’s a valid objection. However, IMO your point depends on the Fallacy of the Excluded Middle.
Your suggestion is that I’m using material from a flawed source to attempt to discover the flaws in that source. This presumes an equal state of unreliability for all parts of the Bible, and hence the invalidity of using any part of it as a test for other parts.
However, it’s my contention that the Bible can be critically examined in much the same was as any other work of ancient literature. (See the link to the threat where I pitted badchad for a reasoned analysis by Libertarian of the distinction between regarding the Bible as a self-closed, internally consistent system and the transitive approach of bringing the capabilities of scholarship to bear on its study.)
Further, any person who would put credence in the Bible at all would concur that some parts are of more value than others for the guidance of human life, etc. The Sermon on the Mount, the Great Commission, etc., speak to people much more than the book of Obadiah or the first nine chapters of I Chronicles with their interminable geneaologies.
There being a view that Jesus is Lord to a Christian, it follows that what one can form a reasonable assurance are His words and teachings are supreme in the context in which they were given. That this is important is self-evident in the variant understandings expressed in this very thread about the teaching on divorce. It’s the view of liberals and moderates alike that Jesus was not laying down an absolute commandment against divorce so much as he was condemning the idea of divorce for convenience. The principle – of the permanency of marriage – is absolute, but circumstances alter cases.
In any case, what I feel is proper is to apply the tests of textual criticism to the Gospels to establish insofar as possible what exactly Jesus did say, discounting the particular themes of the four Evangelists, and then, having arrived at an answer, apply it as a guide to interpreting how to apply (or not apply) the remainder of Scripture to one’s life.
There does remain the question of Jesus’s variations in speech patterns, his tendency to speak in ellipticalparable form and to invest familiar words with additional meanings (as in the I AM passages in John), and the items noted by badchad earlier in the thread. These do deserve addressing, but not in a legalistic context.
(Added on preview: Kalhoun, a good point lessened by a misuse of terminology. The Immaculate Conception, a view exclusive to Roman Catholics, is the dogma that Mary the mother of Jesus was conceived – in the normal manner – without original sin. The Virgin Birth, held by most Christians, is the idea that Luke and Matthew are accurate in reporting Mary to have conceived Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit without having had intercourse with Joseph. The issue has been raised before a number of times – do a search on parthenogenesis for some discussions of it – including an explanation of what the H. in Jesus H. Christ stands for! 
I personally am inclined to accept it despite the high improbability of a male parthenogenetic child, on the basis of a high opinion of Luke’s research abilities and the fact that Mary would have known quite well what happened when they discussed it. But I am quite aware that it is the stuff of hero legends, and it would in no way affect the character of Jesus as Son of God for God to have caused His conception by the normal sexual process. In fact, I’m fairly convinced that the significance of the story lies in the “Son of God” metaphor and in Jesus’s insistence on characterizing the First Person of the Trinity as Father – as opposed to Tyrannical Monarch, Judge, Thunderer, and all the other archetypes that might characterize Him.)
