I don’t agree with the Bible not needing to be interpreted, but I do believe in fundamentalism in reading it. That has nothing to do with Islam or any other religion, as they are false beliefs with false gods. And there are plenty of more than sufficient answers for all the alleged problems you mention, like the “conflicts,” the versions, etc. I’ve studied the Bible and those very “problems” for years. There are also plenty of good sources on apologetics on the internet, so there’s no need for me to spend the time going over them. They each can be looked up.
” What if that bit about scripture is to be read, rather than interpreted, was added by a doctrinaire cleric hundreds of years after Christ, who was in tiff arguing with someone over meaning, and wanted to shut down debate?”
There are so many whole and partial copies of the New Testament texts from the earliest years which are consistent with each other that that scenario wouldn’t happen. And if it were possible, there is so much of the Bible that we have that something out of character with it would be rejected.
“It is a circular argument to say that you must accept the absolute authority of a document, based on the document itself.”
But not when it’s God’s Word.
What I’ve observed is that there’s two reasons why people want to *interpret* the Bible.
One is to justify false doctrine, to claim and explain away how Scripture doesn’t say what it says. It says what the interpreter says it means.
The other is to justify sin. We see that effort very clearly in the homosexual movement, where they are bending over backwards to excuse their sin, that God CLEARLY calls sin.
Sure there are some passages in Scripture that are confusing or ambiguous, but the vast majority of it is not and is to be OBEYED, not “interpreted.”