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Some Second Thoughts on the Majority Text

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Editor's Note1

In his engaging volume, The Interpretation of the New Testament 1861-1961, Neill remarks, "In historical research there are few axioms; and it is good that periodically every alleged conclusion should be challenged and tested in the light of fresh evidence, or of a change in the premisses [sic] on the basis of which the evidence is weighed." 2 He was speaking of the Synoptic problem, but his words may justifiably be applied to the field of New Testament textual criticism today--at least in the United States.

In the last decade a handful of scholars has risen in protest of textual criticism as normally practiced. In 1977 Pickering advocated that the wording of the New Testament autographs was faithfully represented in the majority of extant Greek manuscripts. 3 This view had been argued in one form or another since John W. Burgon in 1883 sought to dismantle single-handedly the Westcott-Hort theory. 4

What was new, however, with Pickering's approach was perhaps a combination of things: his theological invectives were subdued

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(especially compared with those of the Textus Receptus-advocating fundamentalist pamphleteers); his theological presuppositions regarding preservation were also played down; his treatment appeared sane, reasonable, and thorough; and he was a graduate of Dallas Theological Seminary. This last point is of no small significance, for in the last several years some if not most of the leading advocates of the majority text view have received their theological training at Dallas Seminary. 5

In 1978 Gordon Fee mounted a frontal attack on the majority text view, especially as articulated by Zane Hodges. 6 The Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society then staged a battle between Fee and Hodges, in which Hodges wrote "Modern Textual Criticism and the Majority Text: A Response," 7 to which Fee responded with "Modern Textual Criticism and the Majority Text: A Rejoinder," 8 to which Hodges responded with "Modern Textual Criticism and the Majority Text: A Surrejoinder." 9 Fee and Hodges have continued to interact with each other's views elsewhere. Most notably, Hodges wrote on the authenticity of John 5:4, 10 to which Fee responded by writing "On the Inauthenticity of John 5:3b-4." 11

Then in 1982 theory was applied to practice. The Greek New Testament according to the Majority Text, edited by Zane Hodges and Arthur Farstad--with the help of Wilbur Pickering and

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others--was published. Though Hodges and Farstad wanted to publish the text on the centennial anniversary of Westcott-Hort's Greek New Testament (i.e., 1981 12 ), so as to emphasize the difference between the two approaches, 13 the missed conjuncture had no appreciable diminishing effect. A spate of book reviews followed--including a rather lengthy one by Gordon Fee. 14

To be sure, other majority text advocates have published in the last five years, 15 but the focal point of the debate has justifiably been on Hodges and Farstad's book itself. The fact that the second edition of this text was published in 1985 perhaps shows the growing popularity of the textual theory that stands behind it. 16

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This historical survey raises the question, What issues could be raised that have not already been discussed in detail? 17 Two things, at least: first, the Dallas Seminary-majority text view connection has not been addressed; second, the majority text theory, as it has been displayed concretely in the Majority Text itself, has hardly been noticed. 18 This article addresses these issues as well as a few other points that have been (relatively) neglected.

Dallas Seminary and the Majority Text

As already mentioned, some if not most of the leading advocates of the majority text view are alumni of Dallas Seminary. An inference that has been drawn from this in the evangelical community at large is that Dallas Seminary is monolithic and provincial in its views of textual criticism. However, no faculty member in the New Testament Studies department at the present time embraces the majority text theory of textual criticism. This is because Hodges is no longer on the faculty (he taught from 1959 to 1986). In any case, his view has always been a minority view among the Dallas faculty.

Now this is not pointed out as an argument against the majority text theory. Neither the majority of professors nor the majority of

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manuscripts is in itself any kind of argument at all. 19 But this is mentioned because those in the evangelical community who are interested in what the faculty of Dallas Seminary are teaching need to be aware that what individual faculty members advocate in print is not necessarily representative of what other faculty members--even the majority of them--embrace.

Some Reflections on the Majority Text: Text and Theory

There are three reasons for considering here the majority text theory as worked out in the Hodges-Farstad Majority Text.

First, before publishing the Majority Text, Hodges was inextricably linked with the advocates of the Textus Receptus. 20 As

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recently as 1978 Hodges's view was misunderstood by no less a scholar than Fee, who asked, "If they [i.e., Hodges et al.] really mean majority rule, are they ready to give up the TR at such non-superficial variants as Acts 8:37 and 1 John 5:7-8 (where a weak minority of Greek MSS supports the TR)?" 21 In fact even since the Majority Text was printed, Hodges's view has occasionally been confused with a return to the Textus Receptus in toto. 22

Second, previous judgments about the character of the Byzantine text-type can now easily be examined. The Majority Text has facilitated testing of the hypothesis that this text-type is a fuller, smoother, and more conflate text than the Alexandrian text-type or the text of the modern critical editions (i.e., UBS3 [=NA26]).

Third, the second principle of Hodges's theory--that a reconstructed family tree will vindicate the authenticity of the majority text's readings--can also be tested, at least in the pericope adulterae (John 7:53-8:11) and in the Apocalypse (the two places where the Majority Text reflects readings based on stemmatics).

Because of these considerations, this discussion will be restricted for the most part to an interaction with Hodges's text-critical method and results. 23

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Majority Text Versus The Textus Receptus

In 1977 Pickering predicted that "the Textus Receptus will be found to differ from the Original [=Majority Text] in something over a thousand places, most of them being very minor differences, whereas the critical texts will be found to differ from the Original in some five thousand places, many of them being serious differences." 24

There is much to criticize in the way this prediction is stated; 25 nevertheless the quantitative aspect of Pickering's guess is on the mark. In this writer's examination of Hodges and Farstad's Majority Text 26 he has counted 1,838 differences between it and the Textus Receptus. 27 This is indeed "something over a thousand" differences! Most notably the Majority Text excluded Acts 8:37 and the Comma Johanneum (the Textus Receptus's rendering of 1 John 5:7-8 with its Trinitarian formula). As well, in the last six verses of Revelation, which Erasmus had to translate into Greek from Latin, there are 17 differences between the Majority Text and the Textus Receptus.

The fact of almost 2,000 differences between these two texts, many of them quite significant, is a two-edged sword. On the one hand it should be rather disconcerting to Textus Receptus advocates who have been depending on Hodges's scholarship for some time. On

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the other hand it cries out for a fresh look, by New Testament students, at the Byzantine text-type, which has been seen only through a glass darkly in the printed editions of the Textus Receptus.

Majority Text Versus Critical Text (I.E., Ubs 3 [=Na26]) 28

To be sure, the Majority Text stands much closer to the Textus Receptus than it does to the critical text. According to this writer's count there are 6,577 differences between the Majority Text and the critical text. But that does not tell the whole story.

Textual variants are customarily placed in one of four categories: omission, addition, substitution, and transposition. The general character of the Byzantine text-type is normally described as smooth, conflated, harmonistic, complete. 29 Therefore one would expect it especially to imbibe in the error of addition. That is, since it is an allegedly later form of text, it must have adapted and adopted earlier traditions. But of the 6,577 differences between the Majority Text and the critical texts, in only 1,589 places is the Majority Text longer than the critical. This is less than one-fourth of the total differences. 30

Further, the Majority Text is sometimes shorter than the critical text. Though this is generally acknowledged, it is severely downplayed--by both friend and foe. Hort, for example, suggests that while "interpolations . . . are abundant," "omissions . . . are rare." 31 Metzger, in a suggestive study on the parallels between the textual criticism of the New Testament on the one hand, and The Iliad and The Mahabharata on the other, quotes with approbation Franklin Edgerton, one of the editors of The Mahabharata:

I have come to believe that any passage, long or short, which is missing in any recension or important group of manuscripts as a whole, must be very seriously suspected of being a secondary insertion . . . probably not one of the some fifty MSS. [that] I have studied for Book 2, nor any of their genealogical ancestors, ever deliberately or intentionally omitted a single line of the text. . . . It appears that no scribe, no redactor, ever knowingly sacrificed a single line which he found in his original. 32

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Metzger draws the parallel for New Testament textual criticism that the rule that the shorter reading is to be preferred (brevior lectio praeferenda est) is generally sound and that by this canon the Byzantine text-type, in being long, comes up short. 33

On the other side Pickering argues against the canon of the shorter reading. 34 He concludes that "the 'fullness' of the Traditional Text, rather than a proof of inferiority, emerges as a point in its favor." 35 Not once does he suggest that the shorter reading is at times to be preferred or that the Byzantine text-type contains shorter readings. Hodges takes a more cautious approach, saying that one must be agnostic about the principles of internal criticism at the present time. 36 Yet he cites but two studies, both of which are used to demonstrate the invalidity of brevior lectio. 37 The impression one gets, though never explicitly stated, is that the critical text will rarely if ever have a longer reading than the majority text, and the majority text will rarely if ever have a shorter one. 38

Indeed, the battle line almost seems to be drawn at this issue. But what is the evidence? In this writer's count, there are 657 places where the Majority Text is shorter than the critical. Obviously one cannot both invoke (or reject) this canon mechanically and maintain an equally mechanical preference for a given text-type.

Yet raw statistics can be tantalizingly deceptive. If the Byzantine text's "additions" are frequently due to harmonization or

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conflation, 39 while the Alexandrian text (which usually, though not always, stands behind the critical text) "adds" an article here or a pronoun there (which could easily drop out via homoioteleuton or for stylistic reasons in the Byzantine tradition), then the significance of these statistics is greatly altered. 40

Hodges Versus Hodges: Inherent Contradictions

One inconsistency has already been mentioned which applies to majority text advocates in general--as well as, to some degree, to reasoned eclecticists. That inconsistency is that too dogmatic an appeal to the superiority of shorter or longer readings in toto actually softens the dogmatic appeal to a preferred text-type.

In addition there seem to be four areas of inherent contradiction to Hodges's general theory. Before looking at them it may be helpful to examine the first principle of his method, namely, that mathematical statistics are in some way relevant to the supposition of "majority rule."

Hodges and Farstad say, "(1) Any reading overwhelmingly attested by the manuscript tradition is more likely to be original than its rival(s). . . . (2) Final decisions about readings ought to be made on the basis of a reconstruction of their history in the manuscript tradition." 41 Elsewhere Hodges adds, "Under normal circumstances the older a text is than its rivals the greater are its chances to survive in a plurality or a majority of the texts extant at any subsequent

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period." 42 He then shows, through the mathematical calculations of his brother, David Hodges, 43 that in any generation of normal transmission, the reading of the autograph will survive in the majority of manuscripts. In a hypothetical genealogy, three copies are made directly from the original. Two of them are good, one bad. Unfortunately the last generation listed on his diagram seems to contradict his thesis, for there are 13 good copies and 14 bad ones! 44

Perhaps this is why David Hodges adds, "A one-third probability of error is rather high, if careful workmanship is involved." 45 After making such adjustments, he argues, "Consequently, the conclusion is that, given the conditions described, it is highly unlikely that the erroneous reading would predominate to the extent that the majority text predominates." 46 An integral part of David Hodges's calculations is the supposition that the correct reading can arise from a faulty reading just as easily as a faulty reading can arise from the correct one. 47

This statistical demonstration has four basic problems 48 (either irrelevancies or inconsistencies): (1) "Reading" and "text" are confused, 49 giving a distorted picture of how the statistics are applied

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to the New Testament. 50 (2) The statistics are relevant only for potential variation of a singular nature (e.g., transposition of one number for another), and hence they cannot accurately be applied to the problem of New Testament textual criticism. 51 (3) The supposition that a good reading can arise from a bad reading just as easily as the reverse does not take into account the theological-literary nature of the New Testament. 52 (4) If it were true that a good reading could

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easily arise from a bad one, the result would be a hopeless labyrinth from which a stemmatic reconstruction (Hodges's second principle of textual criticism) could not possibly be accomplished. 53

Majority versus genealogy. Though the statistical demonstration is certainly Hodges's best-known argument for the supremacy of the majority text, it is not his last word. His coup de grce, as it were, is not a theoretical genealogy, but applied stemmatics, for he says, "Final decisions about readings ought to be made on the basis of a reconstruction of their history in the manuscript tradition." 54

Though not explicitly stated, since Hodges has been vigorous to defend both the majority text and the genealogical method, 55 the distinct impression arises that he is convinced that a reconstructed family tree will vindicate majority rule. In other words his second principle should validate his first.

As he has applied stemmatics only to the pericope adulterae and the Apocalypse, we can test this "validation" in only these places. For John 7:53-8:11 Hodges has constructed a family tree of the extant Greek manuscripts, using von Soden's data. He sees the manuscripts as belonging to seven subgroups, according to their distinctive readings. 56 A group of approximately 250 manuscripts, given the label M6, "is viewed as the original form of the pericope from which all other groups are descended." 57

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A look at the textual apparatus here reveals a startling fact: Of the 30 textual problems listed, the editors, on the basis of their stemmatic reconstruction, have adopted at least 15 readings supported by a minority of manuscripts. 58 In other words for the pericope adulterae, the Majority Text, in half its readings, is a minority text.

One might object, however, that every reading adopted by the editors appears within the majority text, even if it is not the predominant reading of that text-type. But this would be something of a bait-and-switch response: Does the majority text mean to Hodges a text-type per se, or does it mean the majority of manuscripts? This writer's distinct impression is that Hodges would not regard what others call the Byzantine text a text-type at all. 59 If so, then in no sense do these 15 minority text readings represent the majority text as Hodges uses the term. Of course they are representative of the Byzantine text--and Hodges has done an invaluable service by providing a provocative stemma that apparently traces the pericope back to its roots in the Byzantine tradition. 60

Admittedly 15 minority text readings in a volume called The Greek New Testament according to the Majority Text may seem hardly significant (even if these 15 variants do comprise half the readings in the test passage). Yet it must be remembered that the pericope adulterae is one of only two places where Hodges has applied his stemmatic principle--the principle he believed would vindicate majority rule. Nevertheless the stemmatic method should be given a full hearing. In the Apocalypse, where stemmatics have been applied for 22 chapters, one can see more clearly how well stemmatics have vindicated the majority text.

Hodges's stemma for Revelation is based on two magisterial pillars: the complete manuscript evidence collated by Hoskier 61 and

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the stemmatics of Schmid. 62 Hoskier supplied the raw data (the readings of the manuscripts), and Schmid interpreted the data by grouping the manuscripts into genealogically related families.

In the Hodges-Farstad Majority Text, Schmid's groups (slightly modified) are cited, but not the individual manuscripts that compose them. One can get a rather artificial impression then as to the number of manuscripts supporting each variant. Consequently Hoskier must be consulted to see where individual manuscripts line up.

This writer's comparison of Hoskier with the Majority Text has revealed 152 minority text readings that have been adopted by the editors of the Majority Text. 63 This is 15 percent of all textual problems. 64 Thus over 150 times in the Apocalypse, Hodges and Farstad have invalidated their own first principle of textual theory, that original readings will survive in the majority of manuscripts. 65

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Such minority text readings demonstrate Hodges's deep integrity; he has not altered the stemmatic evidence to save the majority's neck. In fact in many respects Hodges is moving toward a critical text and away from a purely majority text as he practices his genealogical method. On this score it seems ironic that the leading majority text advocate has produced a text that is undermining the majority text school.

Though it would be too much to label his genealogical principle the "Hodgian fallacy," 66 it must be recognized that the more the stemmatics principle is applied to the Hodges-Farstad text, the less it will deserve the name Majority Text. Ultimately it would, in the interest of truth, need to be called something like "The Intra-Byzantine Stemmatics Greek New Testament."

Normal rate of copying versus stemmatics. What stands behind the "majority rule" principle (as well as the statistical demonstration) is the idea of a normal rate of copying: "The manuscript tradition of an ancient book will, under any but the most exceptional conditions, multiply in a reasonably regular fashion with the result

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that the copies nearest the autograph will normally have the largest number of descendants." 67 Hodges's stemmatic reconstruction not only contradicts "majority rule," as well as coming into conflict with the statistical demonstration, 68 but also seems to mitigate the "normal rate of copying" hypothesis. This last point is so because in order to reconstruct a family tree by placing hundreds of extant manuscripts into less than a dozen groups, 69 one would have to posit, it seems, that concentrated copying was done in particular places (such as scriptoria) and particular times. Hodges's argument that a single hypothetical examplar stands behind one or more groups of manuscripts 70 is no different from Hort's argument that a single archetype stood behind the Byzantine text-type. As such, it destroys any notion of a normal rate of copying.

Majority versus majority. 71 Kilpatrick remarks, "Hodges' and Farstad's view must explain two features, first that there is no evidence for Hort's Syrian text before the fourth century, and second that the dominant text of the second and third centuries is so different." 72 The fact of no early Byzantine manuscripts is a well-worn issue. 73 Nevertheless three important questions are rarely brought into the discussion. First, why is it that not only are there no early Byzantine manuscripts (i.e., before the late fourth century), but also the Byzantine text-type, as far as the extant manuscripts demonstrate, did not become the majority until the ninth century? 74 Does this not indicate that the principle of "majority rule" changes from century to century? 75 Second, why do majority text advocates count only Greek

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manuscripts? Is it because inclusion of the Latin Vulgate, for example, with more than 8,000 extant copies (compared to less than 5,400 Greek manuscripts)--and a text-form closer to the critical text than to the majority text--would demolish their theory? 76 Third, what would happen to the majority text theory if a cache of thousands of New Testament manuscripts--whose textual affinities were different from the Byzantine text-type--were to be discovered? Could the majority text view survive the blow of a "Greek Ebla"? 77 Far from achieving certainty about the wording of the autographs, the so-called "majority text" seems to be built on shifting sands.

Genealogical method ultimately dependent on internal criteria. Hodges inveighs against the canons of internal criticism, speaking of them as "very broad generalizations about scribal habits," and arguing that "all such generalizations tend to cancel each other out." 78 Hodges attacks Hort on the grounds that "Hort's study of manuscript history and his investigation of documents is predicated above all on the internal evidence of readings!" 79 Hodges concludes by stating:

Modern textual criticism is psychologically "addicted" to Westcott and Hort. Westcott and Hort, in turn, were rationalists in their approach to the textual problem[s] in the New Testament and employed techniques within which rationalism and every other kind of bias are free to operate. The result of it all is a methodological quagmire where objective controls on the conclusions of critics are nearly nonexistent. It goes without saying that no Bible-believing Christian who is willing to extend the implications of his faith to textual matters can have the slightest grounds for confidence in contemporary critical texts. 80

It is well known that Hort's "approach to the textual problems in the New Testament" was the genealogical approach. That is,

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he reconstructed the relationship of the text-types according to readings contained in them. His view of the superiority of a and B squarely rested on his own judgments as to the superiority of their readings. 81 This approach, Hodges maintains, is the result of rationalism.

Thus the majority text advocates--Hodges included--prefer a more objective approach, one based on external rather than internal evidence. This is the motive behind Hodges's first principle of "majority rule." Yet Hodges's second principle of stemmatics--on which "final decisions about readings ought to be made" 82 --is none other than the genealogical method. Kilpatrick points out that in this regard "the two editors are more rigorous than Hort." 83 Even Hodges and Farstad admit that the genealogical method "remains the only logical one. If Westcott and Hort employed it poorly, it is not for that reason to be abandoned." 84

But perhaps Hodges's genealogical method is more objective than Hort's. Let us again hear what he says about it:

A valid stemma must have the power to explain the descent of the readings in a natural way. Each hypothesized intermediate archetype must show itself to be the starting point of more than one reading which appears below it on the stemma, but not above. . . . Moreover, the readings found high on the stemma should quite easily be seen as the natural progenitors of readings lower down which developed from them. In particular there ought to be some readings treated as original which are noticeably superior to their rivals. 85

One might ask, On what basis are the readings judged to be superior? And how does this differ from Hort's dictum, "Where then one of the documents is found habitually to contain these morally certain or at least strongly preferred readings, and the other habitually to contain their rejected rivals, we can have no doubt . . . that the text of the first has been transmitted in comparative purity, and that the text of the second has suffered comparatively large corruption"? 86

If Hodges responds that Hort never really applied the genealogical method to individual manuscripts (a point which is quite

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true), 87 this does not thereby obviate the problem that Hodges's genealogical method is still founded on the subjectivity of internal criteria. In his insightful study on the genealogical method, Colwell lists several problems with this approach: "It is doubtful if it can be applied to New Testament manuscripts in such a way as to advance our knowledge of the original text of the New Testament"; 88 "genealogical method can trace the tree down to the last two branches, but it can never unite these last two in the main trunk--it can never take the last step"; 89 "when there is mixture, and Westcott and Hort state that it is common, in fact almost universal to some degree, then the genealogical method as applied to manuscripts is useless"; 90 "there is no unmixed text in existence, nor any manuscript with an unmixed text"; 91 "in a field where no manuscripts have parents, where centuries and continents separate witnesses, the genealogical method is not of primary importance." 92 These statements show that the genealogical method is hardly objective, especially when it is applied to specific manuscripts (as in Hodges's approach). 93 At bottom, then, Hodges's stemmatic reconstruction is inextricably tied to the subjectivity of internal criteria which he so adamantly condemns.

Summary

Three major points were made in this article: (1) The Majority Text differs from the Textus Receptus in almost 2,000 places, suggesting that the Byzantine text-type has been seen only through a glass darkly in the printed editions of the Textus Receptus. (2) The

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Majority Text, differing from the critical text in over 6,500 places, has over 650 readings shorter than the critical text; such readings call out for an exhaustive evaluation. (3) In "Hodges versus Hodges" five points were noted: (a) The statistical demonstration of majority rule for the New Testament transmissional history, though ingenious, seemed to be irrelevant for it did not deal with the phenomenon of a literary document. (b) Hodges's second principle of stemmatics, as applied in the pericope adulterae and in Revelation, overturned, in large measure, his principle of "majority rule" (thus rendering The Greek New Testament according to the Majority Text something of a misnomer). (c) Hodges's reconstructed family tree also contradicts the "normal rate of copying" canon for it seems to imply abnormal (i.e., heavy) copying in particular places and at particular times. (d) The "majority rule" principle does not take into account the majority of Greek manuscripts in the first eight centuries, nor the versions, nor any future cache of manuscripts. (e) The genealogical method (Hodges's final vindication of "majority rule") ultimately depends on internal criteria and as such vitiates any statements about an objective method. 94


Footnotes

1 This essay is a revised and abridged version of a paper entitled "Some Reflections on the Majority Text," available for a small fee in the Dallas Theological Seminary Book Room. The longer version contains more extensive technical data.

2 Stephen Neill, The Interpretation of the New Testament 1861-1961 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1964), p. 115.

3 Wilbur N. Pickering, The Identity of the New Testament Text (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1977).

4 John W. Burgon, The Revision Revised (London: J. Murray, 1883).

5 This can most clearly be illustrated by a consideration of the pedigrees of the editors of The Greek New Testament according to the Majority Text (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1982) (hereafter referred to as Majority Text) : Zane C. Hodges (ThM, Dallas Seminary) and Arthur L. Farstad (ThM, ThD, Dallas Seminary), the editors, are assisted by William C. Dunkin (ThM, Dallas Seminary). Among the consulting editors, Jakob van Bruggen did not receive his training at Dallas. Alfred Martin (ThM, ThD, Dallas Seminary), Wilbur N. Pickering (ThM, Dallas Seminary), and Harry A. Sturz (ThM, ThD, Grace Theological Seminary, though he began his seminary training at Dallas) were also consulting editors. It should be noted that Sturz is sympathetic toward but does not hold the same view as the other editors (see n. 15). Hodges served on the faculty of Dallas Seminary for 27 years (1959-86).

6 Gordon D. Fee, "Modern Textual Criticism and the Revival of the Textus Receptus," Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 21 (1978): 19-33.

7 Ibid., pp. 143-55.

8 Ibid., pp. 157-60.

9 Ibid., pp. 161-64. Besides this front-line battle, there was a minor skirmish off center stage between Pickering and R. A. Taylor in the same issue (W. N. Pickering, "'Queen Anne . . .' and All That: A Response," Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 21 [1978]: 165-67; R. A. Taylor, "'Queen Anne' Revisited: A Rejoinder," Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 21 [1978]: 169-71).

10 "The Angel at Bethesda--John 5:4," Bibliotheca Sacra 136 (January-March 1979): 25-39.

11 Evangelical Quarterly 54 (1982): 207-18.

12 B. F. Westcott and F. J. A. Hort, The New Testament in the Original Greek (Cambridge: Macmillan & Co., 1881).

13 Personal conversation with Zane Hodges in 1980.

14 Among the book reviews are the following: J. K. Elliott, Bible Translator 34 (1983): 342-44; Gordon D. Fee, Trinity Journal 4 (1983): 107-13; L. W. Hurtado, Catholic Biblical Quarterly 46 (1984): 162-63; G. D. Kilpatrick, Novum Testamentum 26 (1984): 85-86; D. Lau, Journal of Theology 22 (December 1982): 33-38; H. A. Moellering, Concordia Journal 10 (1984): 118-19; R. L. Omanson, Review and Expositor 80 (1983): 283; A. J. Panning, Wisconsin Lutheran Quarterly 80 (1983): 239-40; Moiss Silva, Westminster Theological Journal 45 (1983): 184-88; G. C. Studer, Bible Collector 74 (April-June 1983): 2, 5-6; Daniel B. Wallace, Grace Theological Journal 4 (1983): 119-26. The volume even made an impact in the more popular periodicals including H. Otten, Christian News, September 13, 1982, p. 14; R. H. Countess, Military Chaplains' Review, Fall 1983, p. 103; R. L. Sumner, Biblical Evangelist, April 15, 1983, p. 2; C. L. Winberry, Theological Educator 14 (1983): 100-104.

15 Most notably, J. A. Borland, "Re-examining New Testament Textual-Critical Principles and Practices Used to Negate Inerrancy," Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 25 (1982): 499-506; Gordon H. Clark, Logical Criticisms of Textual Criticism (Jefferson, MD: Trinity Foundation, 1986); T. P. Letis, ed., The Majority Text: Essays and Reviews in the Continuing Debate (Fort Wayne, IN: Institute for Reformation Biblical Studies, 1987); and H. A. Sturz, The Byzantine Text-Type and New Testament Textual Criticism (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1984). It should be noted, however, that Sturz is not advocating the same view the rest of the majority text proponents are advocating. Rather, Sturz is arguing merely that the Byzantine text-type is early and independent, but does not have exclusive claims on replicating the autographs. See the helpful and balanced review by M. W. Holmes, Trinity Journal 6 (1985): 225-28.

16 The majority text view is gaining adherents in Third World countries--among pastors, missionaries, Bible translators--but the sale of The New Testament according to the Majority Text may be due to many causes. For example regardless of one's textual theory the book does give, for the first time in an easy-to-read format (unlike von Soden's), the text of the majority of manuscripts. Such a text has been longed for by text-critical scholars (cf. G. Zuntz, "The Byzantine Text in New Testament Criticism," Journal of Theological Studies 43 [1942]: 25-30; B. H. Streeter, The Four Gospels: A Study of Origins [London: Macmillan & Co., 1924], p. 147). Note also the reviews of The Greek New Testament according to the Majority Text given by Kilpatrick and Silva. Even ardent opponents of the value of the Byzantine text are indebted to Hodges and Farstad for their Majority Text, for it can now supplant the Textus Receptus as a collating baseline for text-critical studies (see Daniel B. Wallace, "The Majority Text : A New Collating Base?" [forthcoming in New Testament Studies ]).

17 The book reviews and pro-majority text essays listed in notes 14-16 are the tip of the iceberg. The more general assessments of the majority text view (i.e., those not specifically targeted at the Majority Text ) include D. A. Carson, The King James Version Debate: A Plea for Realism (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1979); B. D. Ehrman, "New Testament Textual Criticism: Quest for Methodology" (MDiv thesis, Princeton Theological Seminary, 1981), pp. 38-92; Gordon D. Fee, "A Critique of W. N. Pickering's The Identity of the New Testament Text: A Review Article," Westminster Theological Journal 41 (1978-79): 397-423; M. W. Holmes, "The 'Majority Text Debate': New Form of an Old Issue," Themelios 8 (1983): 13-19; J. P. Lewis, "The Text of the New Testament," Restoration Quarterly 27 (1984): 65-74; R. L. Omanson, "A Perspective on the Study of the New Testament Text," Bible Translator 34 (1983): 107-22; H. P. Scanlin, "The Majority Text Debate: Recent Developments," Bible Translator 36 (1985): 136-40; D. D. Shields, "Recent Attempts to Defend the Byzantine Text of the Greek New Testament" (PhD diss., Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, 1985); R. A. Taylor, "Queen Anne Resurrected? A Review Article," Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 20 (1977): 377-81.

18 Two illustrations will suffice. H. Otten, reviewing the Majority Text in Christian News, opines that the majority text does not go back to the original. He then mentions, as proof of the Majority Text 's inferiority, two studies done in previous issues of the magazine against the Textus Receptus's Comma Johanneum . If the reviewer had looked up 1 John 5:7-8, or even read the introduction, he would have recognized that the majority text is not the same as the Textus Receptus. On the other end of the spectrum, no less a scholar than Gordon Fee, after looking at Hodges's second principle of a majority text method (viz., stemmatics), asserts, "What this boils down to is an assertion that the majority is right simply because it is the majority" (Trinity Journal 4 [1983]: 109). Yet places where Hodges applies this second principle demonstrate that his resultant text is by no means always the text of the majority of Greek manuscripts.

19 It is unfair to charge Hodges with holding that the majority of manuscripts are right merely because they are the majority. A consulting editor of the Majority Text points out the irrelevancy of pitting majority against majority: "Even though it is apparently sufficient for many exegetes to note that 'most scholars' or 'modern textual criticism' reject the church text, we must agree with the modern textual criticism that the majority in itself is not decisive. Not the majority of manuscripts, but the weight decides. That also applies in a different way: not the majority of scholars in a particular century, but the weight of their arguments decides" (Jakob van Bruggen, The Ancient Text of the New Testament [Winnipeg: Premier, 1976], p. 14).

20 Unfortunately Hodges has contributed to such a misconception. First, in 1968 he wrote "The Greek Text of the King James Version" ( Bibliotheca Sacra 125 [October-December 1968]: 334-45). Besides the implied Textus Receptus link in the title, Hodges made further positive connections in the article: "A large majority of this huge mass of manuscripts . . . contain a Greek text which in most respects closely resembles the kind of text which was the basis of our King James Version" (p. 335); "scholars have set aside this large majority of manuscripts which contain a Greek text very much like that used by the translators of the AV in 1611" (p. 335). He concluded by implicitly identifying the Byzantine text with the Textus Receptus when he spoke of "the Majority text, upon which the King James Version is based" (p. 334). One searches in vain for an explicit disavowel of the Textus Receptus being identical with the majority text. The closest Hodges comes to this is in his final paragraph: "It is hoped, therefore, that the general Christian reader will exercise the utmost reserve in accepting corrections to his Authorized Version which are not supported by a large majority of manuscripts" (p. 345). Yet in light of his majority equation in the previous paragraph, as well as the next sentence ("He should go on using his King James Version with confidence"), the "general Christian reader" would have no clue as to his meaning here. This essay was reproduced in David O. Fuller, ed., Which Bible? 4th ed. (Grand Rapids: Grand Rapids International Publications, 1974), a volume where strict Textus Receptus advocates and majority text men stood side by side. David O. Fuller edited two more volumes which had the same mixture ( True or False? in 1973 and Counterfeit or Genuine? in 1975, both by Grand Rapids International Publications). Because of Hodges's essay appearing in Which Bible? coupled with his paucity of published essays, Fee and others filled in the blanks with the statements of men with whom Hodges kept company (see Fee, "Modern Textual Criticism and the Revival of the Textus Receptus," pp. 23, 25). Though it is logically fallacious to judge one man's results by another man's methods, the fact that there was no in-house critique of text critical method in Which Bible? contributed to this perception. One gets the impression that the Textus Receptus-majority text advocates will welcome anyone who ends up with the same text, no matter what his route in getting there might have been. Finally, in "A Defense of the Majority-Text" (Dallas: Dallas Seminary Book Room, n.d.), Hodges made the Textus Receptus connection on the title page: "A Revised Edition of a Paper Originally Called 'Introduction to the Textus Receptus.'" Even in his section called "Objections" he makes the Textus Receptus-majority text connection: "But do not the readings of the Textus Receptus prove repeatedly to be inferior on transcriptional or internal grounds? No" (p. 16). He does not elaborate on the distinction between the Textus Receptus and the majority text here. From this, one might think that Hodges could find no internal reasons for omitting 1 John 5:7-8.

21 Fee, "Modern Textual Criticism and the Revival of the Textus Receptus," p. 23.

22 See note 18. What seems even more astonishing are the occasional references to the Majority Text in Kurt and Barbara Aland's Text of the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1987). For example in their preface the Alands write, "Since the appearance of the German edition of this book, Arthur L. Farstad and Zane C. Hodges have published The Greek New Testament according to the Majority Text. . . . This return to the Textus Receptus of Erasmus . . . can be put to a practical test by means of the present book. In Chapter VII . . . the essential differences between the Textus Receptus and the modern scholarly text are examined carefully, providing the basis for readers to judge for themselves which of the two texts corresponds more nearly to the original wording of the New Testament" (p. vii). The Alands make other imprecise statements in referring to the Majority Text: "A movement has recently made its appearance in the United States promoting a return to the Textus Receptus" (p. 19), and " The Greek New Testament according to the Majority Text [is] the newly proclaimed return to the Textus Receptus" (p. 292). To be sure, the Alands do not think that the Majority Text is merely a reprinting of the Textus Receptus, but their very description of it betrays, it seems, either a lack of knowledge of the differences between the two editions or an intentional guilt by association.

23 Where Hodges has been silent, this writer will try to refrain from imputing a viewpoint to him. And even where Hodges has spoken, most of the issues he has raised have been responded to--adequately and otherwise (see references in previous notes). It is not this writer's intention to ignore Arthur Farstad, the coeditor of the Majority Text, in this discussion. But as he has not published separately, one has no way of knowing his particular contribution. Could it be that he, as Westcott was to Hort, is the "silent partner" in the articulation of the theory advanced?

24 Pickering, The Identity of the New Testament Text, p. 177.

25 First, Pickering's comparison of " most of them being very minor differences" (italics added) and " many of them being serious differences" (italics added) is throwing the apples into the orange bin. He could just as accurately have stated, "Most of the differences between the critical texts and the Majority Text are very minor indeed, though many of the differences with the Textus Receptus are quite serious." A glance at the dual apparatuses on virtually any page of the Majority Text will verify this. Second, in perhaps hundreds of places the Textus Receptus agrees with the "critical texts" against the Majority Text. In Matthew alone this writer counted 48 such agreements. Thus, contrary to what one might have expected, with every step the Majority Text is taking away from the Textus Receptus, it is not necessarily getting closer to the critical text. Ironically then in some measure the Majority Text in the eyes of most textual critics today might be doing something of a disservice to its advocates, for what it gives with one hand (viz., authentic readings) it takes away with the other. (Cf. the comments to the same effect by Streeter, The Four Gospels: A Study of Origins, p. 94, and especially Zuntz: "The Textus Receptus exhibits, in a generally Byzantine setting, a certain, or rather an uncertain, number of individual, and also some 'good, old' readings" ("The Byzantine Text in New Testament Criticism," p. 26).

26 All collations are from the first edition. According to the preface to the second edition (p. v) and personal conversation with Arthur Farstad (March 3, 1987), the second makes only a few alterations in citing the relevant evidence.

27 The Textus Receptus here refers to the edition used by Hodges and Farstad, namely, the Oxford edition of 1825.

28 For the remainder of the paper, "critical text(s)" will refer, in accord with the Hodges-Farstad nomenclature, to UBS 3 (=NA 26 ).

29 See any standard text on textual criticism (e.g., Bruce M. Metzger, The Text of the New Testament, 2d ed. [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1968], p. 131; B. F. Westcott and F. J. A. Hort, Introduction [and] Appendix, vol. 2 of The New Testament in the Original Greek [Cambridge: Macmillan & Co., 1882], pp. 115, 134-35).

30 And hence the category of "additions" is actually smaller than the average category of variation.

31 Westcott and Hort, Introduction [and] Appendix, p. 135.

32 Bruce M. Metzger, "Trends in the Textual Criticism of the Iliad and the Maha ba rata," in Chapters in the History of New Testament Textual Criticism, vol. 4 of New Testament Tools and Studies (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1963), p. 151. The citation is taken from F. Edgerton, ed., The Sabhaparvan, vol. 2 of The Maha bha rata, V. S. Sukthankar and S. K. Belvalkar et al., eds. (Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, 1944), p. xxxiv.

33 Metzger, "Trends in the Textual Criticism of The Iliad and The Mah bh rata," p. 153. He quickly adds, however, that "responsible textual critics have never applied this canon in a mechanical way." Of course he means responsible New Testament textual critics, for those who worked on The Iliad (p. 152) and The Mah bh rata seem close to applying this canon in a mechanical way. One might, with some justification, wonder why the textual critics responsible for UBS 3 seem to suspend this canon almost exactly as many times as the Byzantine text had shorter readings (i.e., if the Western readings are not in the purview of the discussion).

34 Pickering, The Identity of the New Testament Text, pp. 79-83.

35 Ibid., p. 83.

36 Hodges, "A Defense of the Majority-Text," p. 16; idem, "The Greek Text of the King James Version," pp. 342-44.

37 Hodges, "A Defense of the Majority-Text," pp. 16-17.

38 Alfred Martin goes so far as to say, "A Bible-believing Christian had better be careful what he says about the Textus Receptus, for the question is not at all the precise wording of that text, but rather a choice between two different kinds of texts, a fuller one and a shorter one" ("A Critical Examination of the Westcott-Hort Textual Theory," in Which Bible? pp. 149-50).

39 See the extended treatment of this point in the author's "Some Reflections on the Majority Text," pp. 15-21. That section can be summarized as follows: (1) The fact of harmonization (e.g., assimilation of the wording in one Gospel to another) in general makes a most damaging case against the purity and antiquity of the Byzantine text, for the undeniable fact is that harmonization occurs much more often in the majority text than in the Alexandrian text (majority text advocates have either tacitly ignored this point or have inadvertently agreed that harmonization is a secondary feature). (2) In spite of the fact that there are logical guidelines to determine whether or not a reading is a harmonization (which renders this aspect of internal criticism far less subjective than some others), the tendency of majority text advocates when faced with an obvious harmonization in the Byzantine manuscripts is to label all internal considerations equally subjective. (3) At the same time, a perusal of the Majority Text will bring to light several potential harmonizations found in the Alexandrian text-type which the Byzantine has somehow avoided.

40 The verdict is not yet out as to why the Byzantine text has shorter readings. These call for careful examination. Only one study specifically on the shorter readings of the Byzantine text is known to this writer: D. Karavidopoulos, "Merike" Suntome" Grafe" tou Ekklhsiastikou Keimenou th" Kainh" Diaqhkh"" ["Some Short Readings of the Ecclesiastical Text of the New Testament"], Deltion Bibli k n Mel t n 13 (1984): 36-40. Karavidopoulos argues, on the basis of some selected readings of the Byzantine text, that occasionally this text-type by itself contains the original. He calls such readings "Eastern Non-Interpolations." The present writer is working on an exhaustive study of Byzantine shorter readings.

41 Hodges and Farstad, eds., Majority Text, pp. xi-xii.

42 Hodges, "A Defense of the Majority-Text," p. 4.

43 Ibid., p. 8.

44 The fifth generation really should be called the fifth, sixth, and seventh generations, for there is direct lineage involved ("A Defense of the Majority-Text," p. 5). The present writer is referring to the seventh in the tabulation (or, 5c).

45 Ibid., p. 9.

46 Ibid., p. 8.

47 "The probability of introducing a bad reading into a copy made from a good manuscript is equal to the probability of reinserting a good reading into a copy made from a bad manuscript" (ibid., p. 6). Earlier Hodges argued that "erroneous readings are introduced into good manuscripts, as well as the reverse process in which good readings are introduced into bad ones" (ibid., p. 5).

48 These are problems mainly within Hodges's own system. That is, no mention is made here of the primary argument used against Hodges's statistical method, namely, evidence from history.

49 Notice again the statement by David Hodges: "It is highly unlikely that the erroneous reading would predominate to the extent that the majority text predominates" ("A Defense of the Majority-Text," p. 8, italics added). His diagram is not instructive, for it is an example of a text with only one original reading. Further, Zane Hodges in the Majority Text speaks of a "reading" which is "overwhelmingly attested by the manuscript tradition," while in his "Defense of the Majority-Text" he switches to "text": "Under normal circumstances the older a text is than its rivals the greater are its chances to survive in a plurality or a majority of the texts extant at any subsequent period" (ibid., italics added). Meanwhile his brother argues that "if the probability of introducing an error is less than one-third, the probability that the erroneous reading occurs 75% of the time is even less" (ibid., italics added).

50 Only if a text has one possible variant reading is it licit to equate text with reading. But such is obviously not the case with the New Testament. So what do the statistics mean? What does David Hodges signify when he says an erroneous reading is unlikely to occur 75 percent of the time? Does he suppose that the Alexandrian witnesses disagree with the Byzantines 75 percent of the time? If so, he errs by a wide margin, for these two text-forms have more than a 90 percent agreement. (See "Some Reflections on the Majority Text," pp. 24-27, for a demonstration of this point.) Or does he mean that 75 percent of the manuscripts will have the original wording 100 percent of the time? This again is demonstrably untrue, since no two manuscripts are identical (the closest two have 6 to 10 variants per chapter). Could it be then that 100 percent of the manuscripts have the original wording 75 percent of the time? That seems to be a lower figure than the data, on any textual theory, display.

51 The statistics of David Hodges, as far as this writer can decipher them, operate on the basis of hypothetical variation of a manageable sort (as opposed to the actual variants found in the manuscripts). As such, his statistics might work if the only kind of variant were substitution, say, of one number for another--and the substitution could only be of single digit numbers for single digit numbers. Otherwise, two errant readings could be generated from one true reading (e.g., 17 arising from 7); David Hodges did not discuss this kind of variation, even though something quite similar to this happens frequently in New Testament manuscripts. Thus if the original reading were "7" one could easily see the logic of the scheme: in any generation "7" would be found in a majority of manuscripts. But when dealing with four broad categories of variation, and with words, not numbers, in a text with over 138,000 of them--whose potential corruptibility is infinite (and in extant manuscripts is over 300,000)--it is difficult to see how this model can handle the data. It is just too simplistic and hence not useful.

52 Unlike a list of numbers, the New Testament is capable of being corrupted (in the process of transcription) in countless predictable ways that are unlikely to be reversed by a later scribe. Otherwise the fundamental principle of internal criticism--and the one on which Hodges bases the second leg of his theory--is worthless (i.e., "choose the reading which best explains the rise of the others"). In Matthew 1:7-8, for example, the critical text reads Asavf. Since the man is in Jesus' genealogy, one would rightly expect the king (Asa) rather than the psalmist (Asaph) to be mentioned. What scribe would intentionally change Asav to Asavf? (Further it is difficult to posit an unintentional reason for such a change.) On the other hand Matthew's less common spelling of the king's name (Asavf) would naturally tend to be "corrected" to Asav. (It is not insignificant that the Byzantines have Asav, while the Alexandrian witnesses read Asaf.) Another example is the many scribally generated harmonizations between the Synoptic Gospels. Once the wording of one Gospel had been assimilated to that of another, what scribe would be able to determine what each Gospel writer originally penned? (Cf., e.g., the two versions of the Lord's prayer in Matthew 6:9-13 and Luke 11:1-4.) No wonder F. Wisse, who wrote his doctoral dissertation on classifying the Byzantine minuscules, remarks, "A MS much more often adds group readings other than its own than it misses a majority reading of the group to which it belongs" ( The Profile Method for the Classification and Evaluation of Manuscript Evidence [Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1982], p. 38).

53 See discussion under "Genealogical method ultimately dependent on internal criteria" (pp. 287-89) for an elaboration of this point, as well as "Majority versus genealogy" (pp. 282-85) for other contradictions between Hodges's first two principles. What is stressed here is that statistics and stemmatics tend to cancel each other out.

54 Hodges and Farstad, eds., Majority Text, p. xii.

55 See, for example, "The Greek Text of the King James Version," pp. 334-45 (1968), especially page 344 for the "majority" principle, and "The Critical Text and the Alexandrian Family of Revelation," Bibliotheca Sacra 119 (April-June 1962): 129-38 for his tightly argued case for stemmatics in Revelation. It is significant that in the 1962 article Hodges spends no time defending the majority text view per se. It is unnecessary of course to assume that Hodges's approach to textual criticism changed between the writing of these two articles (though he has been misunderstood in that way by, e.g., J. D. Price, "A Computer Aid for Textual Criticism," Grace Theological Journal 8 [1987]: 118), for Hodges later defends both approaches.

56 His stemmatic method is as follows: "A valid stemma must have the power to explain the descent of the readings in a natural way. Each hypothesized intermediate archetype must show itself to be the starting point of more than one reading which appears below it on the stemma, but not above. Where there is mixture, as there always is, the stemma should be able to disclose the probable source of most of it. Moreover, the readings found high on the stemma should quite often easily be seen as the natural progenitors of readings lower down which developed from them. In particular there ought to be some readings treated as original which are noticeably superior to their rivals. When a stemmatic tree can pass all these tests at once, it has a high probability of being correct" ( Majority Text, p. xxv).

57 Ibid.

58 Kai o Ihsou" (John 8:1); baqew" (v. 2); hlqen o Ihsou" (v. 2); eipon (v. 4); liqazein (v. 5); peri auth" (v. 5); ghn (v. 6); eperwtwnte" (v. 7); anableyi" (v. 7); autoi" (v. 7); liqon baletw ep authn (v. 7); oi de akousante" (v. 9); eiden authn kai (v. 10); gunai (v. 10); oi kathgoroi sou (v. 10).

59 Pickering certainly argues this way ( The Identity of the New Testament Text, pp. 50-54). Although Hodges himself has not made the same explicit statements in print, he did argue against the validity of text-types in 1978 when the present writer took Hodges's course on New Testament textual criticism at Dallas Seminary. Further, by implication, if the majority text is identified with a text-type, then all Hodges's arguments about normal transmission and normal rate of copying are invalidated.

60 Of course it is quite possible that Hodges has still misconstrued the original wording of this pericope. This is especially so because his stemmatic approach is still governed, it seems, by considerations of majority rule. In other words there is every likelihood that Hodges began his stemmatic work with the a priori assumption that M 6 , being one of the largest groups of manuscripts for this pericope, would stand closer to the original than a smaller group.

61 H. C. Hoskier, Concerning the Text of the Apocalypse, 2 vols. (London: Bernard Quaritch, 1929). Hoskier's work stands out as the only complete collation of the Greek witnesses for any New Testament book.

62 Josef Schmid, Studien zur Geschichte des griechischen Apokalypse-Textes, 3 vols. (Munich: Karl Zink, 1955-56). Though indebted to Schmid, Hodges has made some rather significant adjustments to Schmid's family tree (see Hodges, "Critical Text and the Alexandrian Family of Revelation," pp. 129-38).

63 The complete list of minority readings is found in note 84 on pages 33-34 of "Some Reflections on the Majority Text."

64 There are 986 textual problems listed in the Majority Text 's Revelation.

65 Though this is not a shocking percentage, majority text advocates need to keep two things in mind: (1) It is the consensus of textual critics today that the majority text makes by far its best case for authenticity in the Apocalypse. Fee, for example, argues as follows: "Given the fact that the historical data point to conclusions different from H-F's, one wonders how they could convince themselves to the contrary. . . . perhaps the clue is to be found in this Introduction. It has to do with where Hodges has spent the vast majority of time in the NT text, viz., the text of the Revelation. Could it be that his starting here, and spending most of his time here, led him to extrapolate some things he found in the Revelation to the rest of the NT? If so, one could well understand how he might have gone down so many wrong paths. The problem with this, as is well known, is that the textual history of the Revelation differs so radically from all others (see K. Aland in the Introduction to NA 26 , p. 53*). The reasons for this are probably related to its unique struggle for canonicity. In any case, stemmatic arguments from the unique data of the Revelation are hardly fitting for the Gospels or Acts" ( Trinity Journal 4 [1983]: 112). If here Hodges and Farstad go against the majority text 15 percent of the time, how far afield might they go if they were to perform stemmatics on other New Testament books? (As already seen, in the pericope adulterae, stemmatics invalidated the majority text 50 percent of the time.) (2) The fact that the resultant text even has 85 percent of the majority readings is due in large measure to Hodges's alterations of Schmid's stemma. In brief Schmid saw four main families of manuscripts: "( a ) The most important family is that represented by manuscripts A and C and the text of Oecumenius (particularly MS. 2053). ( b ) Next in importance is the text represented by 47 , a, and several minuscules. According to Schmid these two families stand closer to each other than to the following two groups, and closer than the following stand to each other. ( c ) The minuscule manuscripts preserving the Commentary of Andreas of Caesarea. ( d ) The so-called K(oinhv)-text" (Bruce M. Metzger, "Recent Developments in the Textual Criticism of the New Testament," in Historical and Literary Studies, vol. 8 of New Testament Tools and Studies [Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1968], p. 156). Hodges demurs on this arrangement, on two significant points: (1) "It is the contention of this study that, per contra Schmid, A and C on the one hand and a and 47 on the other do not actually comprise two major stems of the textual tradition of the Apocalypse but rather simply two branches of a single haupstmm [ sic ]" ("The Critical Text and the Alexandrian Family of Revelation," p. 130). Hodges adds that "it is hard to suppress a doubt that most, if not all, of the readings in the list could be easily explained as the idiosyncracies of a single archetypal manuscript lying behind all four of these ancient witnesses" (ibid., p. 132). (2) He considers Av (=Andreas) and K to be two independent strands which join only in the autographs (ibid., p. 136). In other words it is Hodges's contention that when M de (=Andreas) and M a (=K) converge on a reading it is because both groups go back independently to the original. But does this convergence ever produce an errant reading? Though Hodges denies this (ibid.), Schmid produces numerous probable examples (Rev. 2:64-85), among them the aorist subjunctive after i{na in 3:9, which is most likely a corruption of the Alexandrian reading of a future indicative after i{na. Here in fact is an instance of the Byzantine text displaying atticizing tendencies (in preferring the more formally correct form)! In passing it may also be noted that if Hodges seriously took into account the high probability of some mixture--not just from group to group, but between individual manuscripts--even early in the tradition, it would soften substantially many of his stemmatic conclusions. Colwell points out that "when there is mixture, and Westcott and Hort state that it is common, in fact almost universal in some degree, then the genealogical method as applied to manuscripts is useless" (E. C. Colwell, "Genealogical Method: Its Achievements and Its Limitations," Journal of Biblical Literature 66 [1947]: 114). In point of fact, as already noted, Hodges does recognize mixture in textual transmission, but of a most curious kind, namely, that in which "good readings are introduced into bad [manuscripts]" ("A Defense of the Majority-Text," p. 5)--and this as much as the reverse phenomenon. If this were true, how would any stemmatic reconstruction ever be possible? Thus on the one hand Hodges's stemmatics invalidate his statistics, while on the other hand his statistics invalidate his stemmatics.

66 Darrell L. Bock of Dallas Seminary suggested this title (no doubt with tongue in cheek a l the "Hortian fallacy").

67 Hodges, "The Greek Text of the King James Version," p. 344.

68 See note 65.

69 Including, for the pericope adulterae, four hypothesized exemplars (i.e., those that have no extant manuscripts).

70 For example in the introduction to The Greek New Testament according to the Majority Text, Hodges speaks of several groups of manuscripts in the pericope adulterae that "show signs of derivation from a common [non-extant] archetype" (p. xxvi).

71 Harold W. Hoehner of Dallas Seminary is to be credited with the seminal form of this section.

72 G. D. Kilpatrick, review of Majority Text, in Novum Testamentum 26 (1984): 85-86.

73 Pickering's response to this problem is representative of the majority text school: "We should not necessarily expect to find any early 'Byzantine' manuscripts. They would have been used and worn out" ( The Identity of the New Testament Text, p. 124). Hodges gives a similar response in "A Defense of the Majority-Text," pp. 14-15.

74 Kurt and Barbara Aland illustrate this in their Text of the New Testament with a table entitled "Distribution of Greek manuscripts by century and category" (pp. 156-59; also cf. the table, "Distribution of Byzantine type minuscules by century," pp. 153-55).

75 One might also ask Pickering why Byzantine manuscripts of the ninth and following centuries no longer seem to wear out, while Alexandrian and Western manuscripts do.

76 Apart from questions of majority rule, the Vulgate also illustrates the invalidity of the canons of "normal rate of copying" and "normal transmissional history," since Vulgate manuscripts outnumber the Greek and yet are based on only a few Greek manuscripts.

77 Such a cache is not out of the realm of possibility. In 1975, for example, between 3,000 and 4,000 manuscripts were discovered in a "secret compartment" in Saint Catherine's Monastery--the very place where Constantin von Tischendorf in 1844 discovered Codex Sinaiticus. Though the manuscripts are by no means all in Greek, and their contents have still to be examined by the scholarly community, a great number of them are biblical manuscripts and among them is "the largest collection of [Greek] uncials in the world" (J. H. Charlesworth, "The Manuscripts of St. Catherine's Monastery," Biblical Archaeology 43 [Winter 1980]: 28).

78 "A Defense of the Majority-Text," p. 16.

79 "Rationalism and Contemporary New Testament Textual Criticism," Bibliotheca Sacra 128 (January-March 1971): 33.

80 Ibid., p. 35.

81 Westcott and Hort, Introduction [and] Appendix, pp. 19-72, 90-145.

82 Hodges and Farstad, eds., Majority Text, p. xii.

83 Kilpatrick, review of Majority Text, p. 86.

84 Hodges and Farstad, eds., Majority Text, p. xii.

85 Ibid., p. xxv.

86 Westcott and Hort, Introduction [and] Appendix, p. 32 (italics added). It should be noted that this very quotation is found in Hodges, "Rationalism and Contemporary New Testament Textual Criticism," p. 33, n. 18 and incidentally with the same words underlined. He concludes the note in an apparent mimicking of Caiaphas (Mark 14:63): "It is needless to multiply references!"

87 Cf. Colwell, "Genealogical Method: Its Achievements and Its Limitations," pp. 109-10, 112.

88 Ibid., pp. 109-10.

89 Ibid., p. 113.

90 Ibid., p. 114.

91 Ibid., p. 117.

92 Ibid., p. 132.

93 This can be illustrated in another way. Recently a stemmatic reconstruction of Philippians, 1 Timothy, and Jude was done with the aid of a computer (J. D. Price, "A Computer Aid for Textual Criticism," Grace Theological Journal 8 [1987]: 115-29). In the study the author repeatedly avowed objectivity and concluded, "The Byzantine text is located in one of the later branches. Nothing in the logic of the program could have predetermined this late secondary descent of the Byzantine text" (p. 126). The point is not that Price's genealogical reconstruction is more valid than Hodges's (there are serious problems with Price's approach, too), but that if two recent applications of the genealogical method can produce such contradictory results, the objectivity of the method is a myth.

94 The writer would be remiss not to conclude with a personal comment. The work that went into this article as well as its intended irenic tenor has been motivated by the character and scholarship of Zane Hodges himself. Never has this writer known a more humble or godly man. As a former student of Hodges and for a brief tenure his "colleague" (in a very broad sense), the present writer has been profoundly influenced by Hodges's perfect blend of scholarship and spirituality. Specifically, this paper is intended to fulfill Hodges's stated desire: "I sincerely hope that no informed person will pretend that there is nothing to discuss and I also hope that the dialogue that is sure to follow will be carried on at a high level of accuracy and fairness and with a maximum of Christian grace" ("Modern Textual Criticism and the Majority Text: A Response," p. 155).


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and Idea of the Word "Mystery"

    1. It is the Greek word musterion from meuo which meant "to initiate into (the mysteries)," i.e., to make known special secrets.

    2. Musterion means a secret, rite, or teaching which the initiate knows but no one else knows.

    3. The root idea then is information known only to those on the inside, but hidden to those who are without (Mark 4:11). It refers to information which has been kept secret, veiled (Rom. 16:25-26).

The Biblical Significance
and Use of the Word "Mystery"

It refers to God's secrets, His counsels and purposes which are not known to man apart from His special revelation in Scripture or by his prophets (Dan. 2:18-23; 27-30).

In most cases in the New Testament it refers to church truth which was not known in Old Testament times, but has become revealed in the New Testament (cf. Eph. 3:1-9). The Old Testament revealed the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ and the salvation of the Gentiles, etc., but there was no mention of the church and certain aspects of the church age. These things were mysteries (Rom. 16: 25-26).

It is also used of spiritual-truth revealed in Scripture, Old or New Testament truth, but which remains a secret, veiled truth to the unbeliever because he cannot fathom or spiritually understand it. It refers to truth which man cannot comprehend by experience, trial and error, testing, or by his own reason or human philosophy (1 Cor. 2:6 -14; Mark 4:11). Through the Word of God, the new nature and the ministry of the Holy Spirit, the believer becomes the initiate of God's mysteries (cf. Phil. 4:12 where Paul uses the Greek word mueo). For this more general use, compare also 1 Cor. 4:1 and perhaps Eph. 6:19; Col. 4:3; and 1 Tim. 3:9.

The "Mysteries" of the New Testament

    1. The mystery of the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 13). The mystery of the interim program of God between Christ's first and second advents.

    2. The mystery of the blindness of Israel and God's purpose with Israel's blindness (Rom. 11:1-25).

    3. The mystery of the departure of the church at the end of this age (1 Cor. 15:51-57; 1 Thess. 4:13f).

    4. The mystery of the church as the body of Christ where Jew and Gentile become one new man in Christ (Eph. 3:1-11; 2:11f).

    5. The mystery of the church as the bride of Christ (Eph. 5:25-32).

    6. The mystery of the indwelling of Christ as the hope of glory or spiritual deliverance by the power of the indwelling Christ (Col. 1:26-27; 2:2).

    7. The mystery of lawlessness--the continuation and gradual build up of the state of lawlessness which will culminate in the man of lawlessness (I Thess. 2:7).

    8. The mystery of godliness, or the process by which man becomes God-like in character through the person, work and life of Jesus Christ as He is faithfully proclaimed and defended by the church of Jesus Christ (I Tim. 3:16).

    9. The mystery of the church as the seven stars (Rev. 1:20).

    10. The mystery of God, the answer to the age old question, why has God allowed Satan and evil to continue to exist (Rev. 10:7).

    11. Please note that the answer to this is found in Scripture, it was preached to God's prophets. There are two key parts to this answer: (a) To resolve the angelic warfare, to answer and demonstrate that Satan, the accuser and slanderer of God's character is wrong in his accusations and that he is worthy of God's judgment for his sin. (b) To demonstrate God's patience and love, and to provide ample opportunity for men to come to Christ (2 Pet. 3:7-8).

    12. So when the angel of Revelation 10:7 says "time shall be no more" he means that once the seventh trumpet is sounded, this time of demonstrating God's character and of demonstrating man and Satan for what they are, this time of allowing Satan and rebellion to continue, will be over; God will act swiftly now to establish His rule of righteousness on earth. This period of the patience of God is over.

    13. The mystery of Babylon, the truth regarding the source of the ancient and godless mother-child cult (Rev. 17:5, 7).

Related Topics: Bibliology (The Written Word)

Is the Bible the Only Revelation from God?

Related Media

Introduction

Has God made himself known only in the Bible and/or Jesus? Are there any other ways in which He has revealed himself to us? If so, how? What is the nature, extent, and value of that revelation and how does it compare with the knowledge we have of God through Christ and Scripture? Does everyone inherently know God? If so, in what way(s)? These are just some of the questions we will treat in this brief paper.

Our use of the term “revelation” comes from the Greek term ajpokavluyi" (apokalupsis) and means “to uncover, reveal, disclose,” or “make known” (cf. Rom 16:25; Rev 1:1).1 Therefore, in terms of divine revelation, it is God making himself known to the objects of that revelation, e.g., angels and people. The fact that God must make himself known in order for us to know him is necessary since we are finite and he is infinite, and we are sinful and he is holy.

Those that have studied revelation have suggested that Scripture affirms a two part division to God’s revelation, namely, (1) general, and (2) particular. Some have used the terms (1) general, and (2) special. General revelation refers to God making himself known in creation, providentially orchestrated history, and conscience (i.e., in conjunction with the moral law).2 Thus, it is general in the sense that it is equally available to all men and women, everywhere, all the time, and is less specific information about God than one acquires in special revelation. Special revelation refers to God making himself known through special acts (e.g., signs and miracles), appearances, Christ, and Scripture.

The Meaning of General Revelation

Let us briefly state again what we mean by the expression “general revelation.” General revelation refers to God’s self-disclosure in creation, providentially orchestrated history, and in human nature (i.e., conscience in conjunction with the moral law). As we said above, it is general in the sense that it is equally available to all people, everywhere, all the time. It is less specific information about God, however, than is found, say, in the life and teaching of Jesus and the explicit commands, teachings, etc. in the Bible.

A Brief History of the
Interpretation of General Revelation

According to Bruce A. Demarest, there have been at least five different responses to the concept of general revelation. First, there are those who along with Karl Barth, flat-out deny any reality to general revelation. According to Barth, there is such a qualitative difference between man and God—coupled with the fact that the “image of God” is now totally corrupted in man—that the idea of general revelation is a non-reality. The redeemed man projects such thoughts upon creation, but in truth, such revelation is not there. Second, the Dutch Reformed school, including men like Kuyper, Berkhouwer, and VanTil, argues that nature and history point to God only for those who are already regenerated. Third, many liberal traditions affirm general revelation to the degree that the knowledge afforded through it is salvific. Schleiermacher, Tillich, and Rahner would characterize one stream within Liberalism which argued for a non-cognitive salvific experience in the religious feeling of absolute dependence. Fourth, Thomas Aquinas, while not attempting to prove the existence of God—at least not in the sense of basing his faith on such proofs—did attempt to show in his Summa Theologiae that creation itself points to the existence of God (cf. his five ways).3 Fifth, and final, theologians such as Augustine, Luther, Calvin, Hodge, Warfield, and Henry argued for “the objective reality of general revelation and its limited utility in mediating an elemental knowledge of God’s existence and character.”4 One aspect of general revelation, namely, conscience and moral law, has been extensively developed in recent times by such writers as C. S. Lewis and Francis Schaeffer. Both of these men stressed the revelatory value of the fact of moral law.5 We turn now to examine some of the Biblical passages cited in the discussion of general revelation.

A Look at Some Major Biblical Passages

Psalm 19:1-6 (cf. Job 36:22-26; 38:1-39:30)

The psalmist claims that creation6 declares God’s glory (v. 1), displays his handiwork (v. 1), continuously speaks out and reveals God’s greatness, power and majesty (v. 2). The proclamation is universal (v. 4, 6) and may have an apologetic force to it regarding God’s existence (cf. “escape” in v. 6 [NET]).7

The connection of v. 3 (in English versions) to vv. 1-2 is not by way of contrast as Barth taught—so as to negate the objective revelation in creation—but rather to heighten the irony, that although the message is proclaimed “day to day” and “night to night” (v. 2), it is nonetheless inaudible.8 There is no audible voice, yet the message is loud and clear: Creation reveals the supreme power of God. But as Calvin put it: “When a man, from beholding and contemplating the heavens, has been brought to acknowledge God, he will learn also to reflect upon and to admire his wisdom and power as displayed on the face of the earth, not only in general, but even in the minutest plants” (Inst. 1.308-9).9

The relationship of vv. 7-14, then, to vv. 1-6, is not to overturn the truth of general revelation by implying (and this is the best one can say) that it is projected on creation by those who are already in a saving relationship with God (i.e., those described in vv. 7-14). Rather, the psalmist desires in vv. 7-14 to express another, more specific revelation of God. This interpretation is further buttressed by the fact that in extolling the Torah in vv. 7-14, the psalmist never once mentions the subject of creation—so prominent in vv. 1-6 and in the Torah—but, instead, celebrates the sanctifying role of the Law as given by God his redeemer.

Therefore, Psalm 19:1-6 teaches that there is an objective, rationale revelation from God in and through creation, whether anyone is there to receive it or not.

Romans 1:18-20

Paul repeatedly affirms that people apart from special revelation (i.e., the Jewish law) know God (vv.19, 21 the sensus divinitatis) and that this knowledge is mediated to them in and through creation. From this objective revelation men know that God, while he is unseen (v. 20), is nonetheless knowable in terms of his divine power and eternal nature. They also know something of his moral demands and judgment for those who disobey (1:32).10

Romans 2:14-15

Paul says that there are times when the Gentiles do “by nature” things required by the moral imperatives of the law. The term “nature” indicates that this is something designed by the Creator. When Gentiles do these things they demonstrate that the righteous requirements (lit. “work”) of the law are written (by God) on their hearts (cf. 1:32). This is in turn confirmed by an inward reality, namely, the testimony of conscience. It too bears witness to the fact of the moral law within. People may have different ways of dealing with their conscience, but all have a conscience and all are cognizant of the moral law.11 Other aspects of man’s being, including his mind, emotions and will also reveal something of the one who created him.

Acts 14:15-17

In Acts 14:15-17 the Lycaonians attributed divinity to Barnabas and Paul after the latter had healed a crippled man (v. 8-10).12 At the sound of such blasphemy, the apostles rushed into the crowd and tearing their clothes, shouted that they were only human messengers, but that the God about whom they spoke was the Creator of everything. They urged that the Lycaonians to turn to this living God from their idols since God had demonstrated to them providential grace in the provision of food and livelihoods. He had also filled their hearts with joy. Thus Paul uses neither Jewish scripture nor philosophy (cf. 17:22-31 and his preaching in Athens) in his attempt to win the Lycaonians to the “good news,” but instead argues from the witness of God in nature and providence.

Acts 17:22-31

In proclaiming the unknown God to these Athenian philosophers, Paul appeals first to their religious nature and constant need to worship (vv. 22-23). This is easily accounted for according to categories of general revelation.

Then Paul refers to God as the “one who made the world and everything in it;” he is the Lord of heaven and earth, the Creator (vv. 24a). Further, he appeals to several attributes of God, including his omnipresence (v. 24b), omnipotence (i.e., he needs nothing, v. 25a), and his sovereignty, exercised redemptively in determining the times set for people and the exact places where they should live (v. 26-27). He even argues that God is one who created everything and sustains human life (v. 25b). Thus the Biblical God, being completely separate from, yet vitally involved in creation, is quite different from the deistic and pantheistic gods of the Epicurean and Stoic Athenian philosophers.13

In order to bridge the gap with his listeners, in v. 28 Paul cites a couple lines from their own poets. The first line comes from the poem Cretica written by Epimenides (ca. 600 BCE) and goes as follows:

They fashioned a tomb for you, O holy and high one—The Cretans, always liars, evil beasts, idle bellies! But you are not dead; you live and abide forever, For in you we live and move and have our being

The second citation is taken from the Cilician poet Aratus (ca. 315-240 BCE): “It is with Zeus that every one of us in every way has to do, for we are also his offspring” (Phaenonlena 5). This has also been found in Cleanthes’s (331-233 BCE) earlier Hymn to Zeus.14

The point we wish to make about the lines of poetry from Epimenides and Aratus is that here Paul uses pagan sources to confirm a truth of special revelation and set the foundation for personal accountability. The truth that Paul wanted to confirm by using these sources is monotheism and a proper understanding of the divine being. Having made it clear from their own poets that there is only one God and that he is Spirit—not part of creation—Paul summarily calls these philosophers to repent and warns them of the coming, appointed “day” of judgment.

Some Implications and Conclusions

A Synopsis of General Revelation

There are several conclusions that can be drawn from the general revelation of God in creation, history, and human nature.15 First, let us not assume that general revelation saves (some liberal traditions) or that it simply does not exist (Barth and neo-orthodox writers). Romans 1:18-20 and Psalm 19:1-6 clearly establish both the reality of general revelation as well as its limited efficacy (i.e., because of the human condition). Second, from general revelation we learn that God is the Creator, and as such, he is integrally involved in his creation, giving all things life and continually caring for their basic needs. From this truth, one might discern that God must be loving. Third, God is not to be strictly identified with anything in creation, but rather he upholds it and is distinct from it. Fourth, the unity of the human race argues for the essential oneness of God and not a plurality of gods. Fifth, the moral law, of which all are cognizant, argues for the ultimate justice and righteousness of God, the creator. Sixth, idolatry of any kind—i.e., the replacement of God for anything material or immaterial—is worthy of just punishment. The revelation of the wrath of God in human history, as expressed in judgments against human sin, reveal his righteous character (Rom 1:18ff).

Thus, through general revelation we ought to conclude that a theistic world-view best conforms to the pertinent information.16 Pantheism, Panentheism, Deism, and Atheism, all of which seem at times to capture some of the important details of experience, do not in the end, harness the explanatory power evidenced by theism.17

General Revelation and Community Life

As Grudem points out, the fact that all people have some understanding of right and wrong, vis--vis general revelation in conscience, is a great blessing for society. This means that—at all levels of government, civic, state, and federal, including all relationships, personal and professional—we as Christians can find much common ground with many non-Christians.18 The particular degree to which we are involved with non-Christians in any relationship, however, requires an a priori commitment to the Lordship of Christ, holiness, love, and wisdom. Involvement is not an option, but it is Spirit-directed, Scripturally-informed involvement that God is after.19

General Revelation and the Unregenerate Heart

Though there is much that can be positively known about God from general revelation, people have habitually suppressed this knowledge. They have not “approved” of God’s thoughts and have, through (or, “because of”) their own unrighteousness suppressed such information (Rom 1:18-20, 32). On this matter, they approve of others who join them in their wickedness (Rom 1:32), yet their own consciences accuse them of such wrongdoing. If the conscience is continually seared in this manner, its voice gets softer and softer, until barely ever heard (2:14-15; 1 Tim 4:2). We must encourage people not to violate their consciences, but rather to educate them properly.

General Revelation, Accountability, and the Gospel

It is clear from our statements above that general revelation is not enough to bring a person into a right relationship with God. For that, there must be a hearing of the gospel, i.e., the redemptive truths that God has made known through Christ and Scripture (i.e., special revelation; cf. Rom 10:14-17). General revelation, however, when suppressed and distorted—as it always is—leads to judgment and divine wrath. The nature of God’s wrath, as outlined in Romans 1:18-3:20 is a serious thing for it renders the guilty even more guilty as they plunge further into the darkest reaches of sin. The end result of general revelation is that men are without excuse, as Paul says (Rom 1:21).

Calvin argued:

That there exists in the human minds and indeed by natural instinct, some sense of Deity, we hold to be beyond dispute, since God himself, to prevent any man from pretending ignorance, has endued all men with some idea of his Godhead, the memory of which he constantly renews and occasionally enlarges, that all to a man being aware that there is a God, and that he is their Maker, may be condemned by their own conscience when they neither worship him nor consecrate their lives to his service.20

There is, however, a therapeutic aspect to God’s wrath that must not be overlooked: from a human standpoint there is always the hope that those who have been given over to the sinful desires of their hearts, after having experienced loneliness in the wasteland of personal autonomy, will return to God with repentant hearts and seek his mercy. This mercy is available to all who believe, no matter what they’ve done (Rom 3:21-26; 1 Cor 6:9-11).

There is another point to consider as well. It is directed more toward Christians and refers to the idea of packaging the gospel for unbelievers. In 1 Corinthians 9:19-27 Paul explains the modus operandi for his ministry. While never changing the gospel, he nonetheless goes out of his way to find points of contact with non-Christians so as to lead an effective, intelligent, “not unnecessarily offensive” ministry to those who do not know Christ yet. This truth was seen in Paul’s discussion with the Athenian philosophers in Acts 17:22-31. We also should look for “points of contact” with people in our culture, including “truth” found in magazines, movies, culture, events, reason, sports, etc. We can then applaud truth where it is found and use it as a means to establish a beachhead with unbelievers.


1 Cf. Paul Enns, The Moody Handbook of Theology (Chicago: Moody Press, 1989), 155.

2 Millard J. Erickson, Christian Theology (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1985), 154.

3 Cf. Alister E. McGrath, Christian Theology: An Introduction, 2d ed. (Oxford: Blackwell, 1997), 160-62, who rejects the idea that Aquinas was trying to prove the existence of God (cf. p. 157).

4 Bruce A. Demarest, “Revelation, General,” in Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, ed. Walter A. Elwell (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1984), 944.

5 See C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (Glasgow: Fount, 1952), 15-38: “These, then, are the two points I wanted to make. First, that human beings, all over the earth, have this curious idea that they ought to behave in a certain way, and cannot really get rid of it. Secondly, that they do not in fact behave in that way. They know the Law of Nature; they break it. These two facts are the foundation of all clear thinking about ourselves and the universe we live in”; Francis Schaeffer, The God Who Is There (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1968), 119-25.

6 Peter C. Craigie, Psalms 1-50, Word Biblical Commentary, ed. David A. Hubbard and Glenn W. Barker, vol. 19 (Dallas: Word, 1983), in loc.: “The first part of the hymn (vv. 2–3) contains an affirmation that the world of nature testifies, by its very existence, to God’s glory. But it is a specific part of the world of nature which the poet has in mind; it is the “heavens,” or sky, and the associated aspects of light and darkness. “Heavens” and “firmament” (in effect, a poetic synonym for “heavens”) are mentioned first (v 2), and then “day” and “night” are introduced (v 3) as the two fundamental perspectives from which the heavens may be perceived. By day, the sky is characterized by sun and light, and by night its darkness is punctuated by the light of moon and stars; both these dimensions combine to recount God’s glory.”

7 NET Bible note #4: “it (i.e., the sky) declares knowledge,” i.e., knowledge about God’s royal majesty and power (see v. 1). This apparently refers to the splendor and movements of the stars. The imperfect verbal forms in v. 2, like the participles in the preceding verse, combine with the temporal phrases (“day after day” and “night after night”) to emphasize the ongoing testimony of the sky.

8 Craigie, Psalms 1-50, in loc.

9 The message of God’s glory is there continually in creation as this Psalm affirms. Thus it is not the projection of the redeemed upon creation (e.g., Barth). But, those who are separated from the creator through sin, cannot “hear” the message properly. Those who are redeemed and have the light of God’s Spirit can “hear” the voice about which the psalmist speaks.

10 See Douglas Moo, Romans 1-8, The Wycliffe Exegetical Commentary, ed. Kenneth Barker (Chicago: Moody, 1991), 1:121-124.

11 C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (Glasgow: Fount, 1952), 15-38.

12 Richard N. Longenecker, “Acts,” in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, ed. Frank E. Gaebelein, vol. 9 (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1981), 436, who says: “There is no reason to think that the majority of the Lystrans knew anything of Jewish history or of the Jewish Scriptures, or that they were vitally affected by Athenian philosophies. Culturally, they were probably peasants living in the hinterland of Greco-Roman civilization, with all of the lack of advantages of people in their situation.”

13 On Epicureanism and Stoicism, see Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1993), n.p., electronic media. See his comments on Acts 17:18 where he discusses the two philosophical groups: “Epicureans were influential only in the educated upper classes, and their views about God were similar to deism (he was uninvolved in the universe and irrelevant); if there were gods, they were only those known through sense knowledge, like stars or planets. Life’s goal was pleasure—the lack of physical pain and emotional disturbance. Stoics were more popular, opposed pleasure, and criticized Epicureans (though not as much as they had in previous times).”

14 Longenecker, “Acts,” 476; See also I. Howard Marshall, Acts, The Tyndale New Testament Commentaries, ed. R.V.G. Tasker, vol. 5 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980), 288-89. He states that the first expression “for in him we live and move and have our being” is found in a ninth century Syriac writer who cites it in the passage in which it was found. The second comment, “we are his offspring,” is more likely to be from Aratus, but it is also found in a slightly different form in Cleanthes, Hymn to Zeus; Keener, IVP Background, comments on Acts 17:29: “The quote from the Greek poet Epimenides (v. 28) appears in Jewish anthologies of proof texts useful for showing pagans the truth about God, and Paul may have learned it from such a text.”

15 See also Gordon R. Lewis and Bruce A. Demarest, Integrative Theology (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1996), 1:72-90. Especially helpful are their comments concerning the proper dualisms that exist in light of God’s ordering of creation: (1) metaphysical (God is not part of creation and creatures are not divine); (2) ethical (there is right and wrong; good and evil); (3) epistemological dualism (there is a knowable difference between truth and falsehood).

16 For an interesting discussion of the nature of a worldview, including a distinctly Christian worldview, see Ronald H. Nash, Worldviews in Conflict: Choosing Christianity in a World of Ideas (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1992), 16-53.

17 Norman L. Geisler, Christian Apologetics (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1976),151-259.

18 Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994), 123.

19 For some helpful essays on the topic of the Christian in the world, the reader is urged to consult Mark A. Noll and David F. Wells, eds., Christian Faith and Practice in the Modern World: Theology from an Evangelical Point of View (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1988). One should also read the works of Francis Schaeffer.

20 John Calvin, Calvin’s Institutes (Garland, TX: Electronic edition by Galaxie Software, 1999), 1.3.1.

Related Topics: Revelation

Inspiration & Inerrancy

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Introduction

In previous lessons we have looked at the concept of revelation both general and special. In one sense revelation involves the self-disclosure of God to man of that which would otherwise remain unknown. As we have employed the terminology in the previous lesson, special revelation includes all ways in which God has revealed himself redemptively to mankind. Additionally, it includes both the event of revelation and its interpretation. Thus, the Bible can be said to be special revelation recorded in a durable form. Inspiration, on the other hand, refers to the process of God’s superintendence of the human author of Scripture whereby the veracity of the recorded message was ensured.

We legitimately refer to the Bible as special revelation, although we recognize that not all the contents of the Bible are directly revealed by God. In so saying we recognize that portions of the Scriptures are historical in nature, and that the human authors at times involved themselves in historical research before they undertook to write their books. Luke informs us, “. . . since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account . . .” Likewise the authors of Kings and Chronicles inform us of the sources which they used in the composition of their works. (These included, the Chrionicles of King David The Book of the kings of Israel and Judah, the writings of Samuel the Seer, Nathan the Prophet, Gad the Seer, Iddo the Seer, Isaiah the Prophet, and the Chronicles of the Seer, among others.) Other portions of Scripture are the direct result of special revelation (e.g. the creation accounts in Genesis. There were no human witnesses to these events, hence if anything were to be known of them it would of necessity have to be revealed.)

To carry this a step further, the description of many events of is that which is open to the historian. However, the interpretation of these events must come from God Himself and thus be special revelation. It is this process of recording the work o God in history and its interpretation which we refer to as inspiration.

This gives God’s special revelation

(1) Immediacy (i.e. it has immediate authority as the Word of God.)

(2) Catholicity (i.e. it has universal authority, not just temporary and local authority.)

(3) Durability (i.e. because it continues in written form it continues throughout time to exercise authority over all who hear it.

Thus it is legitimate to say Sacra Scriptura est Verbum Dei (Holy Scripture is the Word of God)

The Fact of Inspiration

The word “inspire” and its derivatives seem to have come into Middle English from the French, and have been employed form the first (early 14th century) in a considerable number of significations, physical and metaphorical, secular and religious. The derivatives have been multiplied and their application extended during the procession of the years, until they have acquired a very wide and varied use. Underlying all, however is the constant implication of an influence form without, producing in its object movements and effects beyond its native, or at least its ordinary powers. The noun “inspiration,” although already in use in the 14th century, seems not to occur in any but a theological sense until late in the 16th century. The specifically theological sense of all these terms is governed, of course, by their usage in Latin theology; and this rests ultimately n their employment in the Latin Bible. . . In the development of theological nomenclature, however, they have acquired (along with other less frequent applications ) a technical sense with reference to the Biblical writers or the Biblical books. THe Biblical books are called inspired as the Divinely determined products of inspired men; the Biblical writers are call inspired as breathed into by the Holy Spirit, so that the product of their activities transcends human powers and becomes Divinely authoritative. Inspiration is, therefore, usually defined as a supernatural influence exerted on the sacred writers by the Spirit of God, by virtue of which their writings are given Divine trustworthiness. --B.B. Warfield, ISBE, vol. 3, pg. 1453, s.v. “Inspiration.”

qeovpneusto"

(B.A.G. p. 357, “inspired by God” (found only in Scripture in 2 Tim. 3:16) cf. Lampe’s Patristic Lexicon, “divinely inspired.” The term is late and rare, this has given rise to numerous interpretations of the meaning of the term:

  • Some suggest that the term has reference to the effect the Scriptures have on their hearers. That reading the Scriptures lifts the hearers to spiritual heights (c.f. Cremer). Or to put it another way, Scripture breathes God’s Spirit.
  • Some contend that God inspired His Scripture. (i.e. He breathed into them His Holy Spirit. See previous lecture on C.S. Lewis’ view of Scripture)
  • “God Breathed”

Warfield has stridently argued:

qeovpneusto" —very distinctly does not mean “inspired by God.” This phrase is rather the rendering of the Latin divinitus inspirata. . . The Greek term has, however, nothing to say of inspiring or of inspiration: it speaks only of “spiring” or “spiration.” What it says of Scripture is not that it is “breathed into by God” or is the product of divine “inbreatheing” into the human authors, but that it “breathed out by God” or “God-breathed.” In a word, what is being declared by this fundamental passage is simply that the Scriptures are a divine product, without any indication of how God has operated in producing them. No term could have been chosen, however, which would have more emphatically asserted the divine production of Scripture that that which is here employed. The “breath of God” in Scripture is the symbol of His almighty bower, the bearer of His creative word. “By the word of Jehovah,” we read in a significant parallel of Ps 33:6, “were the heavens made, and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth.” . . . God’s breath is the irresistible outflow of His power. When Paul declares, then, that “every scripture” is a product of the divine breath, “is God-breathed,” he asserts with as much energy as he could employ that Scripture is a product of a specifically divine operation. (Warfield, ISBE 3:1474 s.v. “Inspiration”)

While basically agreeing with Warfield on the sense of “God-breathed,” Goodrick objects to Warfield’s “spired” noting, “This word triggers such unacceptable images as a church building, an inflated tire, and a man holding his breath.” He continues:

Etymology forces itself upon rate words, and theopneustos is a rare word. It combines two stems and an adjective suffix: theo-pneu-stos. The first stem, theo-, means “God,” “god,” or “divine.” The second stem, pneu-, means “breath,” breath,” “Spirit,” or “spirit.” And the suffix,-tos, makes the adjective passive in voice. In almost all combined form starting with -theo, God is the active agent.

When an adjective ending in -tos is recast into a transitive sentence the first stem becomes its subject, the second its verb and the noun modified by the adjective its direct object. For instance qeodidakto", “God-taught’ (1 Thess. 4:9), breaks down into qeo- “God”), didak- (“teach”), and -to". Converting the first stem to subject, the second to verb and the noun modified by the adjective to direct object produces the sentence, “God teaches you.” When you do the same with theopneustos you produce the sentence “God breathes the Scripture” or God breathes out the Scripture or (my preference) “God breathes into the Scripture.” So all Scripture is God-breathed” (NIV) suits the etymology plus the patristic idea as stated by Lampe.

I suspect that to one schooled as well as Timothy was in the OT, the new word, theopneustos, would have triggered his recollection of that primeval episode in which God, by breathing into the nostrils of an image molded from inert clay, made it spring into life. Certainly Adam was God-breathed. Furthermore, by this analogy, Timothy might effortlessly conceive that as it was with Adam, so also this theopneustos is used to describe not only the Bible’s vitality but also the Agent he used to bring it into existence. If this is how Timothy understood the inspiration of Scripture s did the writer of Hebrews, who says that the Word of God is zon, (“alive”). The parallel is remarkable, for just like our target text it is an equative sentence with the Bible as subject, an elided copula, and a pair of predicate adjectives, one stating the inspired quality of the Bible and the other its purpose with considerable amount of subordination elaborating on the value: “For the Word of God is alive and effective.” (Heb. 4:12).

The Text: 2 Tim 3:16-17

pa'sa grafhV qeovpneusto" kaiV wjfevlimo" pro"j didaskalivan, proVj ejlegmovn, pro"Vj ejpanovrqwsin, pro"Vj paideivan thVn ejn dikaiosuvnh/, iJvna ajvrtioj" h/j' oJ tou' qeou' ajvnqrwpo"j, pro"pa'n ejvrgon ajgaqoVn ejxhrtismevno".

All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

    pa'sa, “all” or “every” Scripture?

Pa" can be used collectively or distributively. The question here is how did Paul intend it to be understood? In the immediate context (v. 15) the Scripture is equate with the sacred writings, hence, Paul is here referring collectively to the Scriptures. Therefore all Scripture is in view here.

The verse is without a verb.

It could legitimately be translated “every/all Scripture inspired by God is also profitable.” This is not however, normal Pauline style (cf. 1 Tim 4:4, same author, same grammar). Some who have rejected plenary inspiration have adopted this translation since it seemingly draws a distinction between inspired and non-inspired Scripture. However this sense is not plausible since the previous verse describes the sacred writings which are in this verse described as Scripture. Also, such a distinction was totally foreign to first century Judaism.

    grafh. Literally, “the writing”

This is a technical term for Scripture as can be seen from Philo, Josephus and the NT itself.

The Point: God is the author of all Scripture. Therefore inspiration is Plenary or full

Other Passages: Gal 3:8, 22; Acts 13:32-35; Gal 3:16; Acts 1:16; 4:25; Heb 3:7; 10:15

N.B. In the context in which it was written this passage is speaking of the inspiration of the OT. The NT was not yet completed, nor was there yet a New Testament canon.

The Process of Inspiration

2 Peter 1:20-21

tou'to prw'ton ginwvskonte" oJvti pa'sa profhteiva grafh'j" ijdivaj" ejpiluvsew" ouj givnetai: ouj gaVr qelhvmati ajnqrwvpou hjnevxqh profhteiva potev, ajllaV uJpoV pneuvmato" aJgivou ferovmenoi ejlavlhsan ajpoV qeou' ajvnqrwpoi.

First of all you must understand this, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by the impulse of man, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.

Prophecy--profhteiva

This is not just the foretelling of an event. Prophecy also involved forthtelling. All Scripture was regarded by the Jews as prophetic, and all scriptural authors were regarded as prophets.

Spoke—ejlavlhsan

This implies a verbal aspect to the divine communicative process.

From God--ajpo qeou

This speaks of the origination of the message, Human authors were not involved in the origination of the message but spoke as they were moved by God. They were instruments through whom God spoke,

Moved—ferovmenoi

This indicates that the human authors did not carry the message, but rather they were carried by the Holy Spirit when writing Scripture. God moved them. They were passive in the message, but active in the writing. The Holy Spirit (uJpoV pneuvmato") was the active agent.

Acts 27:14-19 gives an illustration of the process. The boat was driven (ferovmenoij) by the wind. On board the passengers and crew had relative freedom. They could go below deck, or up on deck, stern or aft, port or starboard, but the wind (pneuvmato") determined the course. In this context ferw means to be carried along by the power of another .

Illustration of Inspiration

Note: This is an limited illustration and there it breaks down at several points, however that does not totally invalidate the significant parallels between these two distinct manifestations of the Word.

The Phenomena

There is an Identification of God and Scriptures

OT passages in which God is speaker are quoted authoritatively in the NT under the rubric “Scripture said.” Likewise OT passages in which there is no indication that God is the speaker are quoted in the NT under the rubric, “God said.”

    Word of God=Scripture

    God Said

    Scripture Said

    Gen. 12:3

    Gal. 3:8

    Ex. 9:16

    Rom. 9:17

    Scripture=Word of God

    Scripture Said

    God Said

    Gen 2:24

    Matt 19:4-5

    Ps 94:7

    Heb 3:7

    Ps 2:1

    Acts 4:24-25

    Is 55:3

    Acts 13:34

    Ps 16:10

    Acts 13:35

    Deut 32:43

    Heb 1:5-6

    Ps 104:4

    Heb 1:5-6

    Ps 95:7

    Heb 1:5-6

    Ps 102:26

    Heb 1:5

Note: This is a representative list. Numerous other Scriptures could cited.

The Extent of Inspiration

It extends to the whole Bible (plenary)

John 10:34-36

Timothy 3:16

It extends to every word in the autographa (original manuscripts)

Peter 1:20-21

Scripture appeals to grammatical number to establish an argument. (the singular as opposed to the plural of seed in Gal 3:16)

Scripture appeals to verb tense to settle an argument. (present as opposed to the past tense: I am the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. As opposed to I was the God. Matt. 22:32)

The New Testament Witness to its Own Inspiration

Peter considers the letters of Paul inspired. (2 Peter 3:15-16)

Paul treats a quotation from the gospel of Luke as inspired citing Luke 10:7 as scripture. (1 Tim. 5:18)

Revelation is adamant about its own inspiration. (Rev 22:18-19 cf. 1:10-11)

Paul (at least) was aware that he was writing with divine authority (Cor. 2:12; 14:37; Gal. 1:11-12; Thess. 2:13).

Problems in Verbal Inspiration

Inexact Quotations

    Problem:

There are about 300 direct references or quotations in the NT from the OT. Combined with clear allusions to the OT material, this material comprises about 10% of the NT text. There is great liberty taken with these citations. For example compare the following:

    Is 6:9-10

    Matt 13:15

    Is 6:9-10

    John 12:39-40

    Is 6:9-10

    Acts 28: 25-27

    Is. 40:3

    Matt 3

    Answers:

The requirement is not verbal exactitude in citation, but truth without error. (See Warfield, The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible, 43-45) The same truth can be stated in a variety of forms while retaining the full veracity of the original.

The scriptural authors were saturated with the OT concepts so they naturally employed these vocabulary and concepts in expressing the truth of the NT.

A writer may only be giving and interpretation rather than a quotation of a particular passage.

Translations produce variations of expression. The dynamic flexible nature of language makes it impossible to render verbally exact equivalent translations. The OT was written in Hebrew (with a small portion in Aramaic) and the NT was written in Koine Greek. One ought not expect one for one verbal exactitude. We see this same phenomenon today in the plethora of Bible translations all based on the same Hebrew and Greek text of the Bible.

Literary conventions for citation of material were different in the first century than they are in the twentieth. They did not have quote marks and they had never heard of Turabian style.

Variant Reports

    Problem:

There are several places in Scripture where the descriptions of the same event given by different authors seem to be at odds with each other. (e.g. the death of Saul, the resurrection of Jesus)

    Answer:

The nature of the Historical Method

  • An author records what is important to himself as an historian.
  • No one has all the details. Hence the details can vary.
    Saul’s death:

(10 It is reported in 1 Samuel 31 that Saul fell on his sword. It is reported in 2 Samuel 1 that an Amalekite killed Saul at Saul’s request. Several possibilities exist. Among the more likely:

(2) Saul took his own life and the Amalekite came upon his body and invented the story to gain favor with David.

(3) Saul fell on his sword but didn’t die immediately and the Amalekite finished the job.

(4) It should be noted that 1 & 2 Samuel are one book in Hebrew and the two accounts are back to back. It is likely the whole account was well known in Israel when this was composed and no problem was perceived. It is likely that the account of the Amalekite is included to demonstrate David’s character and continuing respect for Saul as the Lord’s anointed, even after Saul’s death. (see point a. above.)

Perspective (Perspective on an event can alter the way details are reported)

Illustration: 3 blind men and the elephant.

Three blind men came upon an elephant and set about to describe it. The first, feeling the elephant’s trunk said that the elephant is like a snake. The second feeling the tall side of the animal said that the elephant was tall, like a wall. The third, felt the tail and said that the elephant is like a tree with flexible branches. Each one described accurately his experience of the elephant, yet the experiences were so vastly different that someone who had never heard of an elephant would not be able to imagine that these three descriptions fit the same beast. Each . account way true, but partial.

Unscientific Expression

The Bible describes things phenomenologically, i.e. as they appear to the human observer. For example the scripture speaks of the sun rising in the east. This is a phenomenological statement. Scientifically, the sun doesn’t rise at all. The Earth turns on its axis while revolving around the sun. But even the Naval Almanac uses the term sunrise and no one would charge tie Naval Almanac with error.

The Scriptures have been understood throughout history in all cultures because it describes things the way they appear( i.e. phenomenologically). The point is Scripture is not a scientific text book, and it is not written to the standards of 20th century scientific accuracy. But where it does touch on scientific matter, it does not impart misinformation. (See Gerstner, The Foundation of Biblical Authority, p. 24-25); also see Paul Little, Know What You Believe, 21-22)

Contradictory Statements

This is the crux of the problem. If a true contradiction can be demonstrated irrefutably, then the concepts on verbal plenary inspiration and the deduced concept of the inerrancy of the Scripture as they have been understood must fall by the wayside and some other explanation of the Bible’s divine nature must be found.

Most contradictory statements are only superficially contradictory. (e.g. Galatians 6:2, 5 KJV, but cf. The translation of the NASB and the context.

Harmonization with more information

Some contradictory statements are harmonized upon gaining more information. (e.g. the death of Judas as reported by Matthew [27:5] and Luke [Acts 1:16-25] are harmonized through an understanding of the geography.

By way of illustration:

Several years ago I received word that the chaplain of the seminary I attended had died in an automobile accident. Later, I heard that he had died of a heart attack. I was confused, which was it? When more details became available I discovered that he had been driving one icy morning and at a traffic light had had an accident. It was also discovered that concurrently he had suffered a fatal heart attack. It was never determined if the accident caused the heart attack or the heart attack caused the accident.

Real Difficulties

There are a number of real difficulties in the text which without further information we are unable to answer fully. Dewey Beegle cites about a dozen, mostly dealing with the variant numbers between Kings and Chronicles. Many of these have been answered by Edwin Thiele in his Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings. Some difficulties still remain. We must remember Warfield’s comment here:

. . . it is a first principle of historical science that any solution which affords a possible method of harmonizing any two statements is preferable to the assumption of inaccuracy or error—whether those statements are found in the same of different writers. To act on any other basis, it is clearly acknowledged, is to assume, not prove, error. (Warfield, Inspiration and Authority of the Bible, p. 439)

The Divine and the Human in Scripture

The Divine and the human are not properly conceived of when one element is emphasized so that it excludes the other. (e.g. mechanical inspiration or natural inspiration)

The Divine and the human are not properly conceived of as opposing one another. Over a century ago, William Sanday observed: “The tendency of the last 50 or 100 years of investigation is to make it appear that the human element is larger than had been supposed.” The implication is that the Divine element is smaller.

Kirkpatrick stated: “In the origin of Scripture there has been a large human element, larger than was at one time supposed.”

G.T. Ladd observed: the chief difficulty in the matter of being the determination on the “exact place where the Divine element meets the human and is limited by it. On this theory, every discovery of a human element in Scripture is a disproving of its divinity—ultimately then the entire Bible becomes human and the Divine is eliminated.”

Concursus: The proper conception

Every word is at once both Divine and human. By way of analogy see Philippians 2:12-13. Also Scripture is attributed to both God and man.

(1) The Bible is truly the Word of God, having infallible authority in all that it affirms or enjoins.

(2) The Bible is truly the production of man. It is marked by all the evidence of human authorship as clearly and certainly as any other book ever written by man.

(3) This two-fold authorship extends to every part of Scripture as well as to the general ideas expressed

Dr. Basil Manley

Observations on the
Dual Nature of Scripture

(1) The Bible is divine yet it has come to us in human form.

(2) The commands of the Bible are absolute, yet the historical context of the writings appears to relativize certain elements.

(3) The Bible’s message is clear, yet many passages seem ambiguous.

(4) We are dependent only of the Spirit for instruction, yet scholarship is surely necessary.

(5) The Scriptures seem to presuppose a literal and historical reading, yet we are also confronted by the figurative and nonhistorical (e.g. the parables).

(6) Proper interpretation requires the interpreter’s persona freedom, yet some degree of external, corporate authority seems imperative.

(7) The objectivity of the biblical message is essential, yet our presuppositions seem to inject a degree of subjectivity into the interpretive process.

(Moises Silva, Has the Church Misread the Bible, 37-38)

Inerrancy

Definition:

“When all the facts become known, they will demonstrate that the Bible in its original autographs and correctly interpreted is entirely true and never false in all it affirms, whether relative to doctrine or ethics or the social, physical or life sciences.” (P. D. Feinberg, s.v. “inerrancy, Evangelical Dictionary of Theology

Inerrancy: a theological deduction from inspiration.

Inerrancy: not demonstrable empirically because of:

    Human finitude
    Human sinfulness
    lack of complete data

Inerrancy & the autographa.

Inerrancy applies to the autographa, not to copies or translations of Scripture. This qualification is made because we realize that errors have crept into the text during the transmission process. It is not an appeal to a “Bible which no one has ever seen or can see.” Such a charge fails to take into account the nature of textual criticism and the very high degree of certainty we possess concerning the original text of Scripture.

Inerrancy relates to hermeneutics.

The theologian must interpret the text properly in order to ascertain the truth of falsity of its assertions. Inerrancy also recognizes the analogy of faith and that apparent contradictions be harmonized if possible.

Inerrancy does not demand scientific precision.

The issue is, “Is the truth expressed accurate within accepted cultural norms when it was written?” It issue is not 20th century scientific accuracy. This is a point sometimes missed by defenders of inerrancy who try to establish that the Bible conforms to 20th century norms of precision. (see for example; Harold Lindsell, The Battle for the Bible)

Inerrancy: not a biblical term,

Inerrancy is not a biblical term, it is theological. Nonetheless this does not mean that it does not express a biblical truth. (cf. The term Trinity)

Arguments for Inerrancy

    The Biblical argument:

Inerrancy is a necessary deduction from the Bible’s teaching concerning its inspiration.

    The Historical argument:

Inerrancy has been the faith of the Church. It is recognized that inerrancy was often assumed rather than explicitly defended. However from its earliest days the Church’s use of Scripture has demonstrated an underlying commitment to inerrancy.

Inerrancy is a capstone rather than a foundational doctrine.

See Warfield, Inspiration and Authority, 210-211.

Inerrancy does not demand a “wooden literal” method of interpretation.

Inerrancy and Authorial Intent

Inerrancy is to be understood in terms of the Author’s intended meaning in the text which is discovered by historical, grammatical, theological interpretation.

Inerrancy and Truth

Inerrancy has to do with truth, simple truth, as opposed to absolute truth. (i.e. the philosophically absolute.)

Inerrancy means having AN ADVANCE COMMITMENT TO RECEIVE AS TRUTH FROM GOD ALL THAT SCRIPTURE IS FOUND ON INSPECTION ACTUALLY TO TEACH. J. I. Packer, “Hermeneutics and Biblical Authority,” Themelios, I (1975) p. 11.

The Legionier Statement on Inerrancy

We believe the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments to be the inspired and inerrant Word of God: We hold the Bible, as originally given through human agents of revelation to be infallible and see this a crucial article of faith with implication for the entire life and practice of all Christian people. With the great fathers of the Christian history we declare our confidence in the total trustworthiness of the Scriptures, urging that any view which impure to them a lesser degree of inerrancy than total, is in conflict with the Bible’s self-testimony in general and with the teaching of Jesus Christ in particular. Out of obedience to the Lord of The Church we submit ourselves unreservedly to his authoritative view of Holy Writ.

Related Topics: Inspiration, Inerrancy

Introduction to Esther

Many Christians suffer from what I have come to call a “pious bias.” Simply put, “pious bias” is the presumption that all the people we find in the Bible were “pious”. We are therefore reluctant to see Jonah as the scoundrel he is: willful, arrogant, rebellious, and (worse yet) self-righteous. Here is a man who stations himself outside the city of Nineveh so that he can watch the entire city (including innocent children and cattle) go up in flames, even when he knows that God has purposed to save it. We are reluctant to see that Jonah is a prophet in ways other than his short speech to the Ninevites. Jonah, the man, exemplifies Israel, the nation. His self-righteousness, lack of compassion, and disdain for grace is precisely that of the nation he represents.

Many people try to “pietize” Esther, to make her into a great woman of faith and piety. I marvel at what they have to do in order to look upon her in this manner. Here is a woman who is willing to stay in Persia and to sleep with a heathen king, rather than to return to Israel and become the wife of a godly Israelite. Esther never prays, and the name of God is never mentioned throughout the book. Yet some still wish to make her a model saint. Theirs is a monumental task indeed.

I shall not go to such heroic efforts to make this woman look good. She is Jewish, like Jonah, and like her uncle Mordecai. She is a schemer and a manipulator. She has learned well from her uncle Mordecai. Mordecai refuses to show honor and respect to those in authority. His belligerence is not rooted in piety, but in pride and stubbornness. The Book of Esther is a wonderful compliment to the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. The latter depict the return of godly Jews to the Promised Land, under divinely appointed leaders. The Book of Esther makes a unique contribution to our understanding of this period in Israel’s history. It depicts the lives of those Jews who stayed on in Persia during this same period of time. The focus of this book is upon those Jews who knew that God had instructed them to return to the Promised Land, but did not. This book is about unfaithful Jews. The deliverance of the Jews in the Book of Esther is not due to man’s piety, but solely to God’s grace, in spite of Israel’s sins.

I pray that God will give us open minds and hearts to look at this book in a different light, to understand it better, and to see its application to our own lives.

Related Topics: Introductions, Arguments, Outlines

Inspiration, Authority & Criticism In the Thought of Charles Augustus Briggs

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As conservative Evangelicals we have recently emerged from “the Battle for the Bible.” During the decades of the 1970s and 1980s we have again asserted the primacy of the Scriptures and their truthfulness against those who would impugn their integrity. This battle has had a sense of deja vu in that the church fought virtually the same battle a century ago as higher critical theories threatened the authority of the Scriptures. Then as now, the very foundations of the faith were perceived to be threatened. In the center of the original firestorm concerning inerrancy was Charles Augustus Briggs, Professor of Semitic Languages at Union Seminary New York. Briggs’ inaugural address at his installation as Edward Robins Professor of Biblical Theology, one century ago this past December, attacked the conservative forces within the PCUSA and the doctrine of inspiration advocated by the Princetonians. This provoked a reaction that ultimately led to Briggs’ conviction of heresy and Union Seminary severing its denominational ties with the PCUSA. Briggs is remembered as an infamous liberal or rationalist who championed higher critical theories at the expense of the divine authority of the Bible.

Briggs the Man

Briggs was not, however, an opponent of Biblical authority, nor of the supernatural nature of the text, rather he vehemently opposed the elevation of dogmatics over the authority of the text. Briggs completed two years of study at Union with the thought of study abroad. He decided that study in Germany would best prepare him for the ministry he envisioned. Still of the Old School theologically,1 he was naturally attracted to Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg, the senior professor of Old Testament, and staunch defender of conservative orthodoxy. While Hengstenberg commanded Briggs’ respect personally, he proved to be a disappointment to Briggs academically. A convinced Lutheran with scholastic tendencies, Hengstenberg had no use for the new higher critical methodology. Rather than interact with the critics, he taught his Old Testament classes from a chiefly traditional approach neither interacting substantially with nor refuting the critical methodology. Years later Briggs himself reflected on his experience with Hengstenberg:

In 1866, it was this author’s privilege to study under Hengstenberg at the University of Berlin. His studies were at first on the traditional side. He can say that he worked over the chief authorities on that side, and they had all the advantages of his predilections in their favor. But Hengstenberg himself convinced him in his own lecture room that he was defending a lost cause.2

One further factor which seems to have had an impact on Briggs at this time was the defection of his uncle Marvin Briggs from the ministry. Marvin had spent two years at Princeton Seminary after which he had left in 1860 to become a missionary in New York City. In 1863 he became an evangelist in the Union Army. After the war he became disenchanted with “Old School” theology and left full-time ministry in 1865. His letters to Charles in Germany revealed a deep suspicion of the orthodoxy he was taught at Princeton. Charles was deeply disturbed, and counseled Marvin not to turn his back on the faith because of problems with the received theological system.3

Already personally suspicious of theological systems, Marvin’s personal crisis very probably played a part in Briggs’ decisive break with the dogmatic orthodoxy which, he felt, characterized both Hengstenberg and the “Old School” generally and Princeton in particular.4 From this point onward he became an implacable foe of “scholasticism.” This marked the turning point in his theological thinking. From this point forward, Briggs cast his lot with the mediating school of theological opinion, taking for his own key conceptions of Dorner.5

In Isaac A. Dorner, Briggs found fully developed the theology to which that of his mentor at Union, H. B. Smith, only pointed.6 Rather than defend a system, Dorner’s approach was historical, beginning with the teachings of the Scriptures themselves in their historical contexts and tracing in systematic fashion the growth of a doctrine, first, in the pages of Scripture, and then, in the life of the Church. Finally, he would conclude with a “scientific statement” of the doctrine.7 Dorner’s method, which made the starting point of theological investigation the Scriptures rather than a creed or system, meshed with Briggs’ own developing passion for exegesis. It was also through Dorner that Briggs became convinced that a Christian could remain orthodox and employ critical methodology. Dorner did not perceive criticism as a threat to Christianity. Instead he employed the results of criticism in his work of constructing theology. Again writing to Smith, Briggs observed: “Dr. Dorner is exceedingly liberal and charitable, using all the results of critical study. He does not abuse the critics, whilst condemning their false tendencies and opinions.”8

Following his negative experiences with “scholastic” orthodoxy and two years of instruction under Dorner, he confessed his shifting loyalties to H. B. Smith: “I am connected with the Old School and would prefer that side to the other, but I feel more sympathy with the mediating theology, which it seems to me you advocate than with the extreme views of either school.”9

After three years, he returned home, prepared for a role as an advocate. He had become convinced of the legitimacy of higher critical theories with reference to Scripture, the principle of the Witness of the Spirit as the ground of certainty and assurance of truth in matters of faith, and that God was actively working in the ongoing processes of history developing and training the human race through the church. Additionally he had become a determined foe of “scholasticism” as it was propagated at Princeton.

A major part of his theological program was to overthrow “scholasticism” with its dogmatic conclusions, which he viewed as having, in practice, usurped the Scriptures as the authoritative voice within the Presbyterian Church. Upon his return to America from Germany, he began publishing articles in various journals on topics relating to Scripture, exegesis and criticism. These continued for about a decade occasioning only mild response.

The year 1880 saw the founding of the Presbyterian Review, a joint publication of the faculties of Union Theological Seminary and Princeton Theological Seminary, dedicated to securing cooperation among and promoting unity between the New and Old School parties which had remained since the reunion of the denomination in 1869.10 The editorial work of the Review was to be shared jointly by the faculties of the two seminaries. Briggs was chosen as Union’s representative, A. A. Hodge became Princeton’s choice. Under an agreement between Briggs and Hodge the Review prohibited opinions more conservative than those of Princeton or more latitudinal than Union. In the original plan, controversial topics which might lead to divisiveness were to be avoided. However, the case of W. Robertson Smith, the Scottish Presbyterian, who had been tried and convicted of heresy for his adoption of a documentary analysis of the Pentateuch, raised questions which Hodge believed needed to be addressed by the denomination, despite the highly emotional nature of the subject. Briggs agreed to Hodge’s request with the stipulation that the question be addressed from both the inerrantist and non-inerrantist perspectives. As a result, the Review undertook a series of eight articles on subjects related to inspiration. The articles, penned alternately by an Old School representative and a New School representative, served to heighten the consciousness within the denomination regarding the issues and implications raised by the adoption of higher critical methodology.11

Rather than serving as a bridge to build understanding, this series of articles polarized the denomination. As a result of this heightened consciousness, inspiration became the rallying point for the conservative forces in the Presbyterian Church in the 1880’s and the battleground for the fight over new trends in theological study. In the eyes of the Conservatives higher criticism became a foe which betokened rationalism12 and antisupernaturalism. To them, the adoption of critical methodology threatened the divine authority of the Scriptures. Just as dedicated to their cause were the advocates of higher criticism who had been convinced that the prevailing conception of biblical inspiration and infallibility had been undermined. Briggs became the figure in the eye of the storm. Beginning with the publication of his articles, “Robertson Smith Case” and “Critical Theories of Sacred Scripture in Relation to their Inspiration” in The Presbyterian Review13 and followed by Biblical Study14 in 1883, Briggs became the unofficial spokesman for the non-conservative forces.

With controversy concerning the revision of the Westminster Confession brewing, Briggs published his highly controversial work Whither?, in which he took aim at the conservative forces within the denomination.15 He charged that, rather than promoting orthodoxy, they were proponents of orthodoxism, which was in fact a perversion of orthodoxy both in content and spirit.

Orthodoxism assumes to know the truth and is unwilling to learn; it is haughty and arrogant, assuming the divine prerogatives of infallibility and inerrancy; it hates all truth that is unfamiliar to it, and persecutes it to the uttermost.16

Under the rubric of orthodoxism fell the Hodges, Warfield and the PCUSA generally. Specifically, the doctrine of verbal inspiration and the consequent inerrancy of Scripture drew his fire. His opposition to verbal inspiration had become a life-long passion and appeared in all his bibliological works.

This opposition reached its pinnacle in Briggs’ inaugural address. In that address he said nothing which he had not said in print during the preceding two decades. But, the genre of a public address did not allow the luxury of qualifications which he had always been careful to make in print.17 Additionally, the tone of the address was so militant that the conservative forces could not allow it to go unanswered.

Briggs was charged with heresy and eventually convicted and defrocked. After three years he joined the Episcopal Church. Following his heresy conviction he turned much of his attention to Christological themes, first from the perspective of biblical theology. In the two years following his heresy conviction he published The Messiah of the Gospels and The Messiah of the Apostles, which set forth his understanding of Christology from a biblical perspective. Following his ordination in the Episcopal Church his Christological writings took on an apologetic tone contending for the validity of the Chalcedonian dogmatic formulation. He also labored for a reunion of Christendom under a consensus creed based on the ancient creeds and headed by some form of historic episcopate. During these years his opposition to “modernism” and “liberalism” became pronounced. He even gained renown as a defender of the faith among those who had prosecuted him for heresy a decade earlier.18

Reason and Criticism

Briggs believed in the capacity of the Reason and the rational faculties to accurately lead men to true information.19 Indeed, the whole critical enterprise was founded upon the premise that the reason was able to discover truth which had been buried under the accretions of tradition. The premise that each age is blinded by its own presuppositions was to him self-evident. This premise had monumental significance in his understanding. It meant that no age or system could make an absolute claim upon truth. All human knowledge was heuristic, approximate, and liable to future revision.20

Truth is the daughter of God. She is one, and she cannot be rightly known in parts or sections; for no one can rightly know the various parts who does not see them centering in their unity. . . . Hence all human orthodoxy is partial and incomplete. No one can be altogether orthodox, as no one can be altogether good, save God only.

Orthodoxy, so far as man is concerned, is relative and defective; it is measured by the knowledge that he has of the truth. Man’s knowledge is not a constant quantity. It varies in different men, in different nations and societies, and still more in different epochs of history. 21

With human knowledge only tentatively established, criticism became a tool by which pretended knowledge could be tested and verified. Briggs asserted that criticism was in fact a “method of knowledge” which had a legitimate place wherever there was a sphere of pretended knowledge. Criticism had as its task the testing of that knowledge in order to verify its accuracy and thus assure certainty.22 As a method of knowledge, he saw criticism as both destructive and constructive. It was destructive in that it eliminated that which was false from the sphere of knowledge, constructive in that it established that which was true. However, its results were not infallible and thus stood in need of “self-criticism for its own rectification, security and progress.”23 It became a tool for granting assurance and certainty rather than a weapon to be feared. He asserted, “No one need fear criticism, save those who are uncertain in their knowledge; for criticism leads to certitude, it dissipates doubt.” 24

The certitude to which Briggs referred was a scientific certitude. In Briggs’ thinking, criticism was altogether unfit to give religious/spiritual certitude, for that realm lay outside the realm of scientific inquiry. Following Dorner he posited an essential difference between “religious” truth and all other knowledge.25 Criticism answered only literary and historical matters. No matter what the critical conclusions concerning a book of Scripture, its canonical authority remained unimpaired because the Spirit witnessed to the essential divinity of its contents. 26

Scripture as Revelation

Briggs rejected unequivocally the doctrine of verbal inspiration. In so doing, he did not reject the possibility or the genuineness of biblical revelation. This he staunchly defended. “The Bible is the divine revelation as it has become fixed and permanent in written documents of various persons in different periods of history, collected in one body called the Canon, or Holy Scripture.”27 Briggs saw God truly revealing Himself in the pages of Scripture. The content of that revelation was information which man could not gain for himself by any other method.28 Thus, Scripture was neither a mere history of the religious consciousness of the nation Israel, nor a mere record of revelation.29

In Briggs’ understanding, the possibility of revelation stemmed from the fact that God was immanent30 in his creation as well as transcendent above it. He was at once active animating creation, yet in such a way that He could not be perceived by the unaided eye of man. Even in His animating activity he hid Himself by the forms of nature.31 Thus, if God were to be known, it must be by an act of self-disclosure. Any a priori objection to the idea of God revealing Himself even to the senses of mankind could not be entertained.32 He thus dispensed with the Kantian objection to God’s knowability by asserting that God’s self-disclosure occurred in history, a realm observable to man.

The means which God employed to disclose Himself to man was theophany. It was theophany which distinguished Biblical History from all other history. And it was theophany which was the guarantee that the contents of Scripture were genuine revelation rather than human religious speculation. God took the initiative and personally revealed Himself to man. In these encounters God assumed various forms: fire, cloud, angel, man and occasionally a disembodied voice. The form by which God disclosed Himself was not important. The fact at issue was that the one to whom God revealed Himself recognized Him as physically present. God did not intend for these forms to be mistaken for an “inerrant representation of the invisible God.”33 Theophanies initiated Biblical prophecy and were present at every advance in revelation. The theophanies of God in the Old Testament formed a great series of divine disclosures culminating in the Incarnation. They were the “divine seals to the roll of Hebrew prophecy, sealing every page with an objective divine verification and authentication.”34

By making theophany central to his understanding of the divine self-disclosure, Briggs did not imply that every prophecy came at the behest of a physical manifestation of God. On the contrary, theophanies were present only at the initiation of religious and reform movements. They marked the beginning of the next stage of development and revelation, rather than being a constant feature of revelation. The normal vehicle of prophecy was the subjective impression of the Holy Spirit on the consciousness of the prophet. In such cases the assurance of a message from God was subjective and inner rather than physical and observable. He saw such assurance that the prophet was in possession of a genuine message from God as analogous to the testimony of the Spirit giving the Christian assurance of salvation. In each case, it was an assurance imparted to the believing soul by a supernatural energy. The difference between the two cases was found in the content of the divine influence, and in the measure and degree of this divine energy.35

Not only did the theophanic presence of God assure the divine authority of the Scriptures, it was also that which guaranteed their unity. It was these divine self-manifestations which bound “the prophets into an organic whole.”36 The goal of the theophanies was to prepare mankind for the “grandest of all theophanies--The Incarnation of the Son of God.”37 Thus, Briggs saw all theophanies as redemptive, pointing to the ultimate redemption provided by Messiah;38 which redemption was both the goal and nucleus of Scripture.

He saw an amazing unity in the Scripture particularly in contrast to the religious authorities of other religions. The Bible presented a completely different type of writing than the sacred books of the heathen. Rather than being the work of a single individual, as was, for example, the Koran, Scripture was the result of the work of a series of prophetic authors over a series of centuries. Although separated temporally by centuries, by many miles geographically and by various political systems, these prophets did not produce a heterogeneous mass of disconnected fragments, nor a “library of religious books of varying religious value, springing from different and unconnected schools of thought.” Instead, within a great diversity of individual idiosyncrasy of style and even method, they have produced “one harmonious whole, a real organization of redemption.”39

Briggs saw revelation occurring as God condescended to make Himself known to man. Frequently the means was an objective physical manifestation of His presence. More often it was through a subjective inner impression upon the human spirit. Such impressions were, he contended, of two types, the ecstatic and the rational. In ecstatic revelation the human spirit became a passive instrument under the control of the Holy Spirit. The prophet saw or heard something external to himself which he then declared as an external reality although only he could sense it. Willingly or unwillingly the prophet yielded his faculties to the control of the Holy Spirit so that “his speech and writing [were] no longer his own, but the Spirit’s using him as an instrument.”40 He saw this means of revelation as the inferior means because the recipient is deprived of his personality. Even profane and wicked men have been instruments of God in this sense. Ecstatic prophecy offered no sense of communion with God. Baalam was forced to prophesy against his will. Even his ass was the vehicle for such a prophetic utterance. This type of prophecy characterized the seer, so named for the visions to which he was subject. It was in contrast to the higher form of revelation given to the Nabi, the preacher. The revelation given the seer was not, with rare exception, the revelation which produced the Scripture.41

It was to the Nabi, a servant of God who walked in close union and communion with Him, that the Divine Spirit gave the revelation which produced Scripture. The Holy Spirit suggested the message to the exalted human spirit of the prophet. He was subject to “internal communication through the stimulation of his higher nature to perception, conception, comprehension, and expressive utterance of the mysterious counsels of divine revelation, by voice and pen.”42 Briggs saw the spirit of prophecy working in conjunction with the human mind of the prophet, disclosing the presence of God in man, “stimulating him to use all the powers of his intellectual and moral nature in the instruction of the people of God.”43 This process at times approached a dialogue in which the Holy Spirit was:

. . .“pointing to them” or “showing them” certain things, as “testifying beforehand,” as “revealing to them,” . . . stimulating them to know things by intellectual processes. . . [The prophets] used their intellectual powers in quest for truth and fact; therefore we may know that the teaching of these prophets was a joint product of the subjective investigation made by the prophets themselves and the objective revelation made by the Divine Spirit. All this is strictly in accord with the laws and operations of the human mind. The Divine Spirit enters into the human mind and takes possession of it for the time and for the purpose of religious guidance. He occupies the throne-room of the reason, in the innermost seat and fountain-source of authority in man. He touches the most sensitive point of the religious feeling, and quickens it so as to make the man conscious of his union with God and his call to be a prophet. . . . He fills the chamber of the metaphysical reason and guides the intellect in its working in all the categories. So the Biblical prophets dig deep into the recesses of the human soul; they soar to the heights of God. . . . The Biblical prophets are distinguished for their grasp--they were men of their times, but they were men beyond their times.44

Compare this to Hodge’s and Warfield’s explanation of the inspiration process:

. . . supernatural knowledge became confluent with the natural in a manner which violated no law of reason or freedom. And throughout the whole of his work the Holy Spirit was present, causing his energies to flow into the spontaneous exercises of the writer’s faculties, elevating and directing where need be, and everywhere securing the errorless expression in language of the thought designed by God.45

The processes they proposed were startlingly similar. The key difference was that the Princetonians saw errorlessness insured by the process, while Briggs did not. Briggs’ emphasis upon the active role of the human mind in the reception of revelation, indicates that he perceived the proponents of verbal inspiration adhered to the “dictation theory” of inspiration, by which God overrode the human mind of the prophet using the individual as a “speaking tube” to convey the divine message to man.46 These words, penned nearly twenty years after the “Inspiration” article in the Presbyterian Review, indicate that this concept persisted even after the vehement denials of this conception by Warfield. The conception of the work of the Spirit in the revelation process was very similar to the process set forth by Hodge and Warfield, but restricted to conceptions rather than words.

Briggs could and did affirm that the Bible was genuine divine self-disclosure, a revelation. However, that revelation was not, in his view, absolute truth. It was historically conditioned by the finite limitations of the human authors to adequately perceive the truth revealed by the Spirit. The human authors were subject to their own knowledge of history, geography, science, medicine, and overriding world-view.47 Briggs thus restricted revelation, subjecting it to historical process. The biblical revelation could not, in his mind, be considered apart from the perspective of the various authors, the times in which they lived, and the history of the development of the canon. This necessitated the discipline of Biblical Theology in order to determine the content of the divine revelation and its meaning for the modern believer.

While all the elements of human character show the evident humanity of its composition, the marks of the divine tracings may be clearly seen, giving to the human elements their direction and efficacy, their sacred harmony and glory. Biblical Theology alone can solve the problem of the Inspiration of the Scriptures, and show the proper relation of the divine and human elements therein.48

This position stood in stark contrast to Warfield who defended the concept of concursus to explain the relationship between the human and the divine.49

The Holy Spirit had indeed inspired the sacred text. Briggs was as emphatic about this fact as were the Princetonians. He even went so far as to assert that inspiration was plenary,50 but not verbal. Briggs saw an essential disjuncture between God and Man, which was necessarily reflected in the relationship between the human and the divine in Scripture. This disjuncture became central in his understanding of the nature of Scripture. However, this disjuncture was not absolute, for this would preclude the possibility of any revelation whatsoever. Briggs held in tension the possibility of revelation based on man’s creation in God’s image on the one hand, and the infinitude of God juxtaposed against human finiteness on the other.51

Man was akin to deity by the “inheritance of the reason and all the wondrous faculties associated therewith.”52 In so asserting, Briggs clearly had in mind the Genesis account of the creation of man as the image of God. He is like deity. This fact coupled with the divine immanence made communication between God and man possible. God might even reveal Himself, Spirit to spirit, more clearly and fully than would be possible in physical communication.53

Divine Accommodation to Human Finitude

Although man was like God by virtue of his rational faculties and could thus communicate with Him, Briggs contended that there yet remained an immense distance between God even in His condescension and man at his highest and best. The question for him was not, “Is communication between God and man possible?” This he had established. The question involved the capacity of the human mind to comprehend fully the divine revelation. The Princetonians affirmed the ability of the mind to receive and preserve revelation with infallible accuracy. Briggs challenged this assumption.54 Even in human communication, instruction by a teacher must be adapted to the capability of the pupil. If the pupil was ignorant or unprepared, no matter how clearly the instructor communicated the level of understanding would be imperfect and distorted. How much more would this be true when speaking of communication between a finite and infinite being. He asserted that even Jesus Christ Himself could not communicate the things which He wanted to tell His disciples, because they were not able to comprehend.55 If the apostles were incapable of comprehending the teaching of Jesus, who condescended to become a man . . . and to speak their own language, in their idiom, in their methods of instruction; . . . how much more difficult for the Divine Spirit to communicate to men by internal suggestion, divine truth in such inerrant forms that the prophets and apostles could only deliver it in the same inerrant forms in which they received it.56

Thus, if God were to communicate with man, He must accommodate Himself to man’s abilities and conceptions. But in so doing, Briggs asserted that God’s revelation would suffer in measure. The concept of accommodation57 had been used by theologians from the time of Clement of Alexandria onward as an explanation of the method by which the infinite Creator communicated with His finite creation. Calvin, for example stated:

For who even of slight intelligence does not understand that as nurses commonly do with infants, God is wont in a measure to “lisp” in speaking to us? Thus such forms of speaking do not so much express clearly what God is like as accommodate the knowledge of him to our slight capacity. To do this he must descend far beneath his loftiness.58

Briggs asserted that accommodation involved more than accommodation to finitude; it involved accommodation to error. Briggs would ascribe to the adage “to err is human.” It is clear from his discussion of accommodation that error is linked to finitude rather than sinfulness.59 For example, he stated:

It is necessary that we should consider that in all his relations to man and nature, God condescends. The finite can only contain a part of the infinite. God limits himself when he imparts anything of himself to the creature. . . . The Holy Spirit could not communicate the inerrant word to men without, in measure, depriving it of its inerrancy.60

Concept Inspiration

The second disjuncture crucial to an understanding of Briggs’ understanding of the nature of Scripture was the essential bifurcation between thought and word, or form and substance. Again, he used Hodge and Warfield as a foil, against which he explained his conception. They had asserted in the “Inspiration” article, “The line can never be rationally drawn between the thoughts and the words of Scripture.”61 The Princetonians saw thought and word as inseparably tied. This understanding, for all intents and purposes, established verbal inspiration. Briggs charged that this understanding locked the message, in the absolute sense, in the autographic text.62

For Briggs words were but an imprecise vehicle for the communication of thought which lay behind words. Thought had a universal significance and could be communicated into any language without doing essential violence to the communication of the meaning. It might “find expression in any one of a thousand languages; it may be dressed in a great variety of synonyms, phrases and literary forms in any highly developed language.” Although the thought be expressed in so many varied forms “yet the meaning . . . [is] essentially the same.”63

Briggs intuitively recognized what modern linguists refer to as surface structure and deep structure in language.64 According to this understanding, deep structure involves meaning and is universally applicable. Meaning can be transferred from one language to another intact. Surface structure on the other hand, involves the form which this universal meaning takes in any given language.65 It varies from language to language and there is no direct relationship between the surface structures of different languages. The question here is theoretical and abstract. For, apart from surface structure, this deep structure does not exist by itself, but is extrapolated from surface structure.

For Briggs such an understanding of language had implications for the inspiration process. “Inspiration lies back of the external letter.”66 His understanding of the inspiration process was one of “concept inspiration.” That is, on occasion the Holy Spirit condescended to take control of an individual and employ that person as his mouthpiece. At such times, inspiration was actually dictation. The normal process, however, was a meeting of the minds. The Holy Spirit non-verbally suggested the ideas which He wanted to communicate to man. The prophet, then left to himself, sought for adequate verbal expression of those ideas in his own language. The inspiration process involved an elevation of the human spirit to the peak of its capacity. The Holy Spirit gave each author “unerring certainty to the conception of the truth” which he was to teach, suggesting to him the ideas even as might one man to another.67 While the Holy Spirit only instructed directly with reference to the spiritual truth being taught, the surrounding material was not unaffected. “Even those contents of the Bible which are not revealed, are colored and shaped by the revelations with which they are connected.”68 However, the guidance of the Holy Spirit did not, in his opinion, extend outside the spiritual realm. As historians, the Biblical authors were subject to error as would be any other historian. What the Holy Spirit did was to guide “them in their religious instruction in the lessons they taught from history.”69

His “concept inspiration” opposed verbal inspiration. By stressing the importance of thought, however, he in no way mitigated the importance of its verbal expression. In Briggs’ understanding the verbal expression of the text and the thought behind it were tied inseparably but not absolutely.

The connection between language and thought is not loose, but an essential connection. Language is not merely a dress that thought may put on or off at its pleasure; it is the body of which thought is the soul; it is the flesh and rounded form of which thought is the life and emotion the energy.70

The verbal form of God’s revelation was the only means available by which the student could come to grips with the meaning of the text. Indeed, the verbal form was chosen by God as His method for the conveyance of truth.71 So closely tied were thought and word that an interpreter of Scripture could never rely on a translation to take the “place of the original Scriptures.” For the translation was at best only a good interpretation of what a competent scholar, guided by the Holy Spirit, understood the text to be saying.72 The translation was thus removed in authority from the original.73

Thus Briggs’ understanding of inspiration is a process by which the infinite divine majesty condescended to communicate to his finite creatures truth about himself which they could not otherwise gather. This divine self-disclosure was a personal revelation made to the mind of the prophet. Even in his exalted spiritual state the prophet could not adequately communicate all that had been disclosed to him because of his own finite limitations and the inadequacy of language as a vehicle, as a means of communication. The divine revelation concerned spiritual and redemptive truth. It was communicated in a human setting and in history. This human setting was beyond the realm of divine providential guidance. Although the scriptural authors were careful observers and accurate reporters, errors of ignorance were to be found in the text. Although the text might err on a given point of history, it could not err when it interpreted history in a redemptive sense.74 Thus, the Bible is the Word of God in the sense that it contains God’s redemptive revelation for mankind. It became the task of Biblical Theology to determine what was divine and spiritual truth and what was historical conditioning.

With this approach to inspiration one finds a studied looseness in the theology which is developed, coupled with a shift away from a rational certainty that the words of Scripture are the ipsissima verba of God to a non-rational certainty based upon the testimony of the Spirit.

Assurance of truth rested upon the testimony of the Spirit. The Spirit did not, however, work in a vacuum. He bore witness of the infallible divine truth found in Scripture. Briggs affirmed the infallibility of the Biblical text, but, echoing the language of the Westminster Confession, limited that infallibility to faith and morals.75 Any Biblical matters which did not affect these issues were to be excluded from the realm of infallibility. As noted above, he excluded any matters of science, geography or chronology. History, too, was excluded from the realm of infallibility, except as it touched upon matters of faith and morals. He further limited infallibility to matters of universal significance. The reasoning behind this qualification was that much of the text is temporally conditioned, e.g. the Old Testament cultus, or even some of the apostolic instruction to specific historical situations. “Not every thing that has been approved by God, or even commanded by God through His inspired prophets, can be regarded as infallible.”76 Furthermore, since the Scriptures were given for the purpose of human salvation,77 infallibility should be limited to articles which touch on this issue. Infallibility, too, he felt, should be defined as having reference only to concrete practical matters rather than theoretical theological speculation. By “practical matters” he had reference to the vital saving doctrines of Scripture which could transform lives, rather than issues which did not directly affect the Christian life, even if those issues were taught by the apostles themselves.78 In addition, infallibility should be limited to the substance of doctrine, rather than to the verbal form or structure used to present that substance. In the final analysis, infallibility was not to be found in the printed page, but the Spirit speaking to the individual through the page. Ultimately, it was God Himself who was infallible, and the believer was to submit to that infallible authority whenever He was heard, whether it be in the words of Scripture, or in the proddings of conscience.

This opened the door for individual subjectivity in determining what is and is not infallible. Briggs recognized this fact, and to this objection he answered, “ . . . every pious man does have his own Bible, in the use of passages which are his favorites because the Divine Spirit has spoken in them to him.”79 The factor which mediated this principle, keeping it from plunging into total subjectivity, was a recognition of the fact that others beside the individual have heard the voice of the Spirit in other passages. This corporate witness of the Church, too, became an important factor in confirmation of the Spirit’s witness to the individual, since he was always liable to deception, confusing his own desires and opinions with the voice of the Spirit. Thus, in practice the consensus of Christian experience must be considered when the individual sought to verify his own experience.80

Briggs’ concepts of revelation and inspiration stressed the chasm between God and man. He denied that the human mind was able to bridge that chasm, nor was the divine able to condescend to the level of the human. Yet he recognized the need to bring God and man together and that Scripture was given to somehow bridge that gap. There was a need for “some principle that will enable us to combine the subject and the object--God and man--in the unity of its conception.”81 For Briggs, that meeting of the minds could not be found in an inerrant revelation. His answer lay not in the realm of the certainty of inerrancy, but rather in the great organizing principle of the Scripture itself, Covenant. “The covenant is the fundamental principle of the divine revelation, to which the divine revelation commits its treasures and from which man continually draws upon them.”82 In covenant, the infinite and holy God met finite and sinful man.

There were in covenant three principal features regarding the meeting of God and man. First, the union effected was a personal one. “It involves a personal relationship which it originates and maintains by certain events and institutions.”83 It was religion as opposed to theology. For the Christian, the covenant involved a personal relationship with the glorified Jesus Christ. His personal initiation into the covenant was effected by the Holy Spirit, and the institution which maintained the covenant was the church.

Briggs saw the second feature of covenant as being a personal relationship which was not purely existential, devoid of objective content. It was addressed to man as an intelligent being, who by meditation, reflection and reasoning, could apprehend the Covenant and its relations. “All this he comprehends in doctrines which he apprehends and believes and maintains as his faith.”84 While this would have reference primarily to the biblical material, it would also include theological systems. In such an understanding, however, the theological system would become a response of faith rather than a system of truth demanding assent.

The final consideration of covenant involved man’s moral nature. “The Covenant still further has to do with man as a moral being, imposing moral obligations upon him with reference to God and man and the creatures of God.”85

Thus for Briggs the method of Biblical theology with all that it implied replaced the orthodox doctrine of inerrancy and introduced a theological imprecision into a world which sought for precision in its theological formulations. Yet, he maintained the Scriptures as genuine revelation, attacking those who would reduce them to mere history of religion. He was able to maintain this position by shifting the focus of the Scriptures from their objective inspiration to the subjective relationship established by covenant.

Having observed this, the question arises, “What kind of authority could such a revelation possess?”

Biblical Authority:
Scripture as a Means of Grace

The final chapter of Briggs’ magnum opus on the Scripture, General Introduction to the Study of Holy Scripture, “The Holy Scripture as a means of Grace,” is instructive in imparting an understanding of Briggs’ concept of the precise nature and purpose of Scripture. He felt he had driven a wedge between the form and the substance of Scripture, thus banning forever the use of Scripture as an ahistorical theological sourcebook in the sense it had been used by the Post-Reformation Scholastics. The text could no longer be appealed to without reference to historical, cultural and critical considerations. Having said all that has been said concerning inspiration, infallibility and canon, the question still remains, “In light of the theological imprecision introduced by Biblical Theology, what kind of authority does such a text have for the believer?”

The nature of Biblical authority was, in Briggs’ opinion, to be found against the backdrop of the Reformed conception of salvation by grace alone, and the Lutheran insistence on justification by faith alone. He saw these two principles lying at two extremes, one stressing the divine side of salvation, the other the human. In his opinion these two traditions each over-emphasized the importance of their integration principle, producing an unbalanced theology. A place where these two principles met was necessary. For Briggs, that meeting point was in the Word of God. “The Word of God gives faith its appropriate object. The Word of God is the appointed instrument or means of grace.”86

In seeing Scripture as a means of grace there were three controlling factors which emerged. First, in any discussion of grace it was necessary to realize that grace came at the sovereign dispensation of the Holy Spirit. The written Word of Scripture had no inherent power. It was merely paper and ink, with no magical or mystical power in and of itself. It “does not work ex opere operato, by its mere use,”87 rather it was the work of the Holy Spirit dispensing grace, working in the heart and life of the believer, applying the substance of the Scripture to the individual life.88 The spiritual power in Scripture was then distinct from its inspiration. While inspiration dealt with the truthfulness and accuracy of the Scriptures, this spiritual power operated at another level which was more basic than inspiration. The power of Scriptures lay in the realm of life-changing religion rather than in the realm of theology and theological systems. Thus, the Gospel89 became the power of God unto salvation only when combined with the efficacious work of the Spirit. Briggs placed the dispensation of salvific grace under the sovereign control of the Spirit. One might study the Bible as history, might correctly ascertain the original text through textual criticism, might view the Scriptures in their literary beauty, or even do a complete and accurate exegesis and fail to avail himself of the grace offered there.90

There must be an immediate contact and energetic working upon the readers and hearers and students of the Word by a divine power. . . The Word of God is effectual only when it has become dynamic, and has wrought vital and organic changes, entering into the depths of the heart, assimilating itself to the spiritual necessities of our nature, transforming life and character. This is the purpose of the grace which the Bible contains. This is the power of grace that the Bible exhibits, in holding forth Jesus Christ as the Savior. This can be accomplished in us only by the activity of the Holy Spirit working in and through the Scriptures in their use.91

Objectively the Scripture was a means of grace through the agency of the Holy Spirit. The second feature of the grace offered in Scripture is subjective. It must be appropriated by an active, practicing faith. Briggs recoiled from the notion that faith could be mere mental assent to a set of propositions. Echoing the sentiment of the Apostle James, he stated:

Experiment is ever the victor of doubt. Faith is tested by practice. Abraham’s faith was proved by his willingness to sacrifice his well-beloved son. Mere faith is seeming faith, a shadow, a vanity. A real genuine living faith apprehends and uses divine grace. The grace of God is effectual. It is dynamic in its application of redemption. It is no less dynamic after it has been appropriated by man.92

This dynamic of grace and faith placed the Scripture’s authority outside the realm of scientific verification. As its authority was outside the realm of scientific verification, so the assurance of the veracity of the Scriptures fell outside this realm. It was only as one met God in the pages of Scripture that he “will be assured that the Bible was the Word of God.”93 Rather than making the veracity of Scripture dependent upon its inerrancy, Briggs reversed the order proposed by Hodge and Warfield. With this understanding of the grace of Scripture, the results of Higher Criticism could not touch the inherent authority of the Scriptures. Even if “errors” could be proven, the text still possessed an inherent divine power which led to salvation. This was a bifurcation to which the Princetonians could never admit, but which allowed Briggs to operate within the prevailing critical climate of the day without abdicating his faith in the Scriptures.

The third controlling principle concerning the Scripture as a means of grace followed from the second. It was based upon the disjuncture between the form and substance and upon the dynamic nature of the gospel message. The external form of the Word of God might change. The Word was incarnate in the Person of Jesus Christ. The same word was found in the substance of the Scriptures. Christians, too, in his understanding, participated in the Word, thus becoming “secondary sources of supply” of the gospel.

The word of God, the Gospel of Jesus Christ, when appropriated by the Christian, assimilated to meet his needs, transformed into his life, does not cease to be the Gospel of the grace of God. The external form has changed, but the internal substance is the same. The Word of God does not cease to be the Word of God when wrapped in other than Scripture language. Hence it is that Christians become living epistles of God, and the church as a body of such epistles, a means of grace, conveying the divine grace in another form to the world.94

“The Church not only has a message but it is a message to the world,”95 a message which is dynamic and life changing. Thus, the Scripture’s authority did not fall, for the believer, in the realm of inerrant propositions from which a proper theology could be constructed. It rather was found in the realm of Scripture’s salvific purpose, using the Word in accord with that purpose.

The Scriptures are indeed means, not ends. They are to bring us to God, to assimilate us to Christ, to unite us in organic union with Him. If this has not been accomplished, there has been a very great failure, however much we have accomplished in biblical scholarship or Dogmatic Theology, in history and polity of the Church, in devotional reading and preaching, in the application of particular passages to our souls. But those who have become personally attached to Jesus Christ have found the Master of the Scriptures.96

The Significance of Professor Briggs

Briggs as a theologian was generally a popularizer rather than an original thinker; he reflected particularly the theological formulations of Dorner. However, when it came to the area of his expertise, exegesis and linguistics, he was blessed with intuitive insight. Briggs noted features about the way language works which have only been formally recognized by linguists during the past half century.

In his struggle to establish the supremacy of exegesis over theological systems he insisted on hermeneutical principles which have only relatively recently been recognized by evangelicals as valid. He insisted on a recognition of genre, linguistic background, historical studies, and authorial intent as legitimate and necessary factors if the true meaning of the text were to be discerned. This stood in contrast to much of the conservative American exegesis of the nineteenth century which proceeded from the perspective of a fully developed creedal statement.

In contrast to Princeton in particular, Briggs contended that no one system could be raised to a normative level for all time. He saw man as culture bound and hence that theology had of necessity to be “occasional.” While Briggs’ contention that theology was “occasional” in nature raised the ire of the Princetonians who saw Westminster as the pinnacle of theological achievement, the concept of the “occasional” nature of theology is a theme which has been taken up within Evangelical circles in the late twentieth century. John Jefferson Davis, for example, has argued cogently for a legitimate contextualization of theology, building upon the kinds of distinctions Briggs was making a century ago.97 Likewise Stanley Gundry, past President of the Evangelical Theological Society, stated in his presidential address:

I wonder if we really recognize that all theology represents a contextualization, even our own theology. We speak of Latin American liberation theology, black theology, or feminist theology; but without the slightest second thought we will assume that our own theology is simply theology, undoubtedly in its purist form. Do we recognize that the versions of evangelical theology held by most in this room are in fact North American, white, and male and that they reflect and/or address those values and concerns?98

Even the venerable Carl Henry would find Charles Hodge’s famous dictum concerning a new theological opinion never arising from Princeton disconcerting. Henry has stated that Evangelical theology is, “. . . unworthy if it is only repetitious. . . . Evangelical theology . . . while preserving the Judeo-Christian verities all too often fails to project engagingly upon present-day perplexities.”99

A further area of contribution of Briggs was the reintroduction into American Presbyterian theology of the concept of the Witness of the Spirit as a immediate force within the soul which gave certainty in the area of spiritual truth. While the Princetonians did not reject the concept of the Witness of the Spirit, they insisted that it operated via the rational faculties rather than immediately upon the soul. Briggs rejected the concept that certainty in spiritual matters could be achieved via rational means or the inductive method.100 He asserted that induction could yield only probability. Following Dorner, he contended that spiritual/religious truth was of a different nature than any other. Spiritual knowledge involved not only the mental faculties; a volitional commitment was also necessary. Certainty in the area of spiritual truth came through faith. This faith, however, was not a self-generated. Rather it was a full assurance engendered by the sovereign work of the Spirit. This assurance dispelled all doubt since it involved a relationship with a Divine Person.


1 Briggs Transcripts (Hereinafter B.T.) 3:463, Charles A. Briggs to Henry B. Smith, May 6, 1868. Despite his Old School leanings, Briggs was developing a distrust of systems even before he left the U.S. He observed to a friend, “You are doubtless right in what you say about building upon another man’s system. One objection to hurrying through a Seminary course is that a person does not take the time to make a sufficiently thorough examination of the Scriptures upon which all doctrines profess to be founded.” (B.T. 3:399.)

The Briggs Transcripts consist of twelve ledger books of letters and personal material transcribed by Briggs’ eldest daughter, Emily Grace Briggs, who had intended to use the material as a basis of a biography of her father. The ledger books are of legal size, about five hundred pages in length, written on both sides of the pages, without margins at the top, bottom or sides. The original letters and various other material contained therein were burned after the death of Emily Grace Briggs in 1944 by her sister Mary Olive Briggs. The biographical material of Briggs’ life was first drawn together by Max Gray Rogers in his Ph.D. Dissertation at Colombia, “Charles Augustus Briggs: Conservative Heretic.”

2 Briggs, The Higher Criticism of the Hexateuch (New York: Scribner’s, 1897), pp. 62-63. Briggs stated: “We yielded against our wishes to insuperable arguments, and when compelled to adopt the [higher critical] analysis of the Hexateuch reserved our decision on the date of the documents until these could be definitely determined” (p. 63). Briggs’ own practice of higher criticism tended toward the conservative side, in that he was not prone to critical “faddism.” Although Philip Schaff, a colleague at Union Seminary, felt he was too hasty in accepting critical conclusions (Philip Schaff, “Other Heresy Trials and the Briggs Case,” Forum, 12 [January 1892]:632.) Briggs did not, as a matter of course, accept the latest findings without personal study of the matter. Early in his career, he accepted the Mosaic authorship of Deuteronomy and a single author for the book of Isaiah. Only after he had studied a matter would he challenge a traditional opinion. However, once he became convinced of a position, he became an avid proponent, not content to let others propound the traditional “rubbish” as he was wont to refer to it.

3 CAB to Marvin Briggs, 1868, B.T. 1:42.

4 Briggs’ letters from this point onward evidenced an increasing hostility toward Princeton. He wrote to Marvin in November of 1867: “I have one course . . . on Systematic Theology which seems to be your detestation [sic]. However the subject is treated differently from what you had at Princeton. Prof. Dorner goes back to the Bible as his first step . . .” (B. T. 1:27). Several months later he wrote: “It is unfortunate for you that you were educated at Princeton where there is an incarnation of doctrine and everything is looked on from that standpoint. Here in Germany . . . everything is looked upon from a scriptural standpoint. The only difficulty is there is too little reverence for Scripture as the Word of God and too great an exaltation of human reason as arbiter over it.” (B.T. 1:42. Underscoring original.) Later in the same letter he characterized Princeton’s system as “pernicious.”

5 Briggs noted of the mediating school:

The greatest divines of the present century have been the mediating theologians--They have accomplished their work of the reorganization of the German united church . . . and in the reconstruction of theology on the basis of the revival of Schleiermacher in a system which conserves the biblical and Confessional teachings and advances upon them into the heights of legitimate speculation. (B. T. box 52, folder 16, from The Independent, November 22, 1886.)

6 For example, Smith introduced the idea of historical development into his classes in church history and theology; in Dorner, Briggs found a system of theology which was explained by the principle. Smith advocated a Christocentricity in theology; Dorner’s system used the Christological principle to integrate it. Smith viewed Christianity as “life” (rather than doctrine), Dorner’s epistemological foundation was the doctrine of faith, defined as a personal confrontation of man with God.

7 B.T. 1:27. Briggs was attracted to Dorner during his first semester in Berlin, when he attended Dorner’s lectures on the Gospel of John. Holding him in the highest esteem, Briggs noted in his journal, “Dr. Dorner is a thorough scholar and a man of the spirit . . . he penetrates to the very soul of the subject & takes you there. He has no superior in any that I have ever listened to.” (Journal dated Oct. 3, 1866.) Briggs was so impressed with Dorner’s method of developing doctrines historically, that he adopted it as his own.

8 CAB to H. B. Smith, B.T. 3:461-462.

9 Ibid., p. 463, CAB to H. B. Smith, May 6, 1868.

10 The Editors [Charles A. Briggs], “The Idea And Aims of the Presbyterian Review,” The Presbyterian Review 1 (Jan. 1880):4-5.

11 The articles in the series proceeded from Hodge’s and Warfield’s article, “Inspiration”, to include (2) C. A. Briggs, “Critical Theories of the Sacred Scriptures in relation to Their Inspiration: I. The Right, Duty, and Limits of Biblical Criticism;” (3) William Henry Green, “Professor W. Robertson Smith on the Pentateuch;” (4) Henry Preserved Smith, “The Critical Theories of Julius Wellhausen;” 5) Samuel I. Curtiss, “Delitzsch on the Origin and Composition of the Pentateuch;” (6) Willis J. Beecher, “The Logical Methods of Professor Kuenen;” (7) C. A. Briggs, “A Critical Study of the History of Higher Criticism with Special Reference to the Pentateuch;” (8) Francis L. Patton, “The Dogmatic Aspect of Pentateuchal Criticism.” These articles appeared in consecutive issues of the Review from volume 2, number 2, until volume 4, number 2.

12 Nineteenth century American Presbyterianism had in fact consciously adopted Scottish realism as an epistemology. (See M. James Sawyer, Charles Augustus Briggs and Tensions in late Nineteenth Century American Theology. (Ph.D. Dissertation: Dallas Theological Seminary, 1987), 41-49.) Numerous historians and Reformed theologians have labeled this wedding as “Arminian,” “humanism” or “rationalistic.” It was this rationalistic spirit which caused such a profound reaction to the naturalistic rationalism perceived to be at work in higher critical methodology. H. Evan Runner has noted of Common Sense that it “had a devastating influence upon American Presbyterian Circles.” He further states, “Scottish Realism accelerated the long trend toward rational theology . . . Reformed Theology was thus emptied of its most dynamic element. A kind of rigor mortis set in.” (The Bible in Relation to Learning [Rexdale Ontario: The Association for Reformed Scientific Studies, 1967] 81-83.) This emphasis upon human reason is an aberration in the larger Reformed tradition, and was in fact eschewed explicitly by Calvin himself. While Calvin was eminently rational he denied the sufficiency of the reason with reference to spiritual truths noting that in “what human reason can discern with regard to God’s kingdom and spiritual insight,” the “greatest geniuses are blinder than moles.” “Human reason, therefore, neither approaches, nor strives toward, nor even takes a straight aim” at truth (2:2:18).

13 Published in 1881 and 1882 respectively.

14 Charles A. Briggs, Biblical Study: its Principles, Methods, and History (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1883). The publication of Biblical Study occasioned only mild reaction among reviewers. Several common threads run through the reviews of the work; (1) The perception of the work as thorough, (2) the work breathed a contagious enthusiasm for the Bible, (3) the book was reverent in spirit. The Old Testament Student astutely observed, “it is probable that the position [espoused by the book], in general, will a decade hence be accepted by many of those who today so strongly condemn it.” The most severe criticism of Biblical Study came in Briggs’ Presbyterian Review at the hand of T. W. Chambers, an Old School representative. Cf. The Presbyterian Review 5 (1884):154- 157; The Old Testament Student 3 (February 1884):213-216, The Lutheran Quarterly (New Series) 16 (Jan 1884):160-163. Andover Review 1 (1884):101-103; Bibliotheca Sacra 41 (April 1884): 414-417. Biblical Study presented in one place and in reworked form, articles which Briggs had published in various journals over the previous decade. The positions espoused in Biblical Study were already relatively mature. The publication of the General Introduction to the Study of Holy Scripture in 1899 did not signal a shift in Briggs’ thinking on the nature of Scripture or his approach to it. Rather, it incorporated further results of his study during the sixteen years which had elapsed since the original publication of Biblical Study. While General Introduction is nearly twice the length of Biblical Study, the chief development of his thought on the nature of Scripture is found in but two chapters, concerning the credibility and the truthfulness of the Scriptures. (He first gathered the material contained in these chapters for his defense at his heresy trial.)

15 C. A. Briggs, Whither? (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1889). The controversy generated by Whither? was felt even at Princeton where the students rallied to Briggs position, much to the consternation of the faculty. James Ludlow wrote to Briggs, reporting:

. . . a student at Princeton reports to me that “Briggs’ book is the rage among the students” in a very different sense from which it is the rage among the faculty. His dining club of the seniors have, (sic) canvassed unanimously, endorsed Whither?. It will soon be put on the “Index Expurg.” as dangerous to the faith of the young brethren. (B. T 8:28 [November 9, 1889]. Underscoring original.).

16 Ibid., p. 7.

17 Hatch has charged that Briggs’ unqualified statements revealed his true position with reference to the Bible and criticism. (The Charles A. Briggs Heresy Trial Prologue to Twentieth Century Liberal Protestantism [New York: Exposition Press, 1969] p. 26.) This is a highly dubious conclusion. For Briggs’ magnum opus on Scripture, General Introduction to the Study of Holy Scripture, (Hereinafter The Study of Holy Scripture) which appeared in 1899, six years after his heresy conviction, was studded with the same careful qualifications which characterized his earlier works.

18 E.g. John J. Stevenson a member of the committee which had prosecuted him for heresy a decade earlier wrote to Briggs congratulating him on an article defending historic Chalcedonian orthodoxy.

It is rattling with good common sense--good every business sense. Men ought to stop masquerading and become honest. If clergyman (sic) give up the cardinal doctrines which have always been held by Christians and which from the beginning were held to be essential to Christianity, they have no right to demand recognition as Christians. IF they reject the cardinal doctrines of the Protestant groups, let them be as honest as a Jew Broker on Wall St., and acknowledge that they are not Protestant. It is no wonder that business men sneer at ministers and that they refuse to go to church..

May you live long to carry the colors well to the front. I abandoned religious matters almost a score of years ago; it was not my calling to wage warfare and have devoted myself to geology. But I am a strict constructionalist and have great delight in finding another. (John J, Stevenson to CAB, April 22, 1912. Located among Briggs’ uncataloged letters).

19 He explicitly affirmed the laws of reason: of identity, of contradiction, of exclusion, and of sufficient reason, as well as the law of probation. He insisted that in knowledge there be no question begging, reasoning backward, in a circle, jumping to conclusions. (The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 82.) Methodologically he was as committed to the scientific method of induction as was Hodge.

20 Note the implicit testimony to the heuristic nature of human understanding in the following passage:

Each age has its own providential problems to solve in the progress of our race and seeks in the Divine Word for their solution, looking from the point of view of its own immediate and peculiar necessities. Each temperament of human nature approaches the Bible from its own needs. The subjective and the objective, the form and the substance of knowledge, the real and the ideal, are ever readjusting themselves to the advancing generations. (The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 569.)

21 Charles A. Briggs, Whither? (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1889), p. 6.

22 C. A. Briggs, “Criticism and Dogma,” The North American Review 182 (1906):861. Cf. The Study of Holy Scripture, pp. 75-81.

23 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 80. Briggs was willing to place even his own critical conclusions on the table for evaluation, as he noted in his commentary on the Psalms: “Whatever is true and sound in this work will endure, whatever is mistaken and unsound will soon be detected and perish. I would not have it any other way.” (A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Book of Psalms, 2 vols. [New York: Scribner’s, 1906], 1:viii.)

24 Ibid. In Briggs’ mind the method could be disassociated from presuppositions. The fact that a Wellhausen or a Kuenen used the tool to attack the faith did not discredit the legitimacy of the tool. Any tool was liable to misuse. He decried the fact that rationalistic presuppositions were allowed to prejudice conclusions. Those who allowed this to occur were altogether unscientific and uncritical. (e.g. see “The Virgin Birth of Our Lord,” American Journal of Theology 12 (1908):202-203; “The Christ of the Church,” American Journal of Theology 16 (1912):200-203.

25 “If one would know the Christ of the Church, he must not only study him properly, but have faith in him, love him, adore him. . . . The Christ of the church can only be known by a Christian who has come into union with him by faith. (“The Christ of the Church,” American Journal of Theology 16:211.)

26 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 317. In essence he approached the Scripture from a canonical viewpoint, a perspective which is gaining adherence even among some ETS members.

27 Ibid., p. 569.

28 Ibid., p. 2.

29 This was in contrast to Dorner.

30 C. A. Briggs, “The Inspiration of the Bible,” Cornerstones (New York: Thomas Whittaker, 1901), p. 41. See also The Study of Holy Scripture, pp. 543-45 and Isaiah 45:15.

31 Ibid.

32 This position stood in stark contrast to Harnack and McGiffert who denied a priori the possibility of noumenal knowledge .

33 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 638.

34 C. A. Briggs, Messianic Prophecy (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1886), p. 20. (Italics added.) Hereinafter, Messianic Prophecy

35 Ibid., p. 22.

36 Ibid., pp. 21-22.

37 Ibid., p. 20. (Cf. pp. 24-26, especially p. 26, where he said that the prophets combined “the sum total of the divine revelation to the patriarchs and judges, and especially of Abraham and Moses and of Samuel. . . . The prophets as an order of preachers and teachers constitute a grand stairway, advancing prophet after prophet in linked succession until the organism of prophecy is completed and the revelation of the Messiah is at hand.”

38 The Study of Holy Scripture., p. 545.

39 “Inspiration of the Bible,” p. 43. Briggs traced the history of the theophanic presence of God from the protevangelium [Gen. 3:15] throughout the antediluvian and patriarchal periods and on through the monarchy, demonstrating how it was by means of the direct theophanic presence that the promise of Messiah was advanced. Indeed, he saw the focus of all prophecy as Messianic, dealing with the arrival of the Messiah either in humiliation or in glory. In this understanding of the organic nature of Scripture, Briggs was in substantial agreement with Warfield and Hodge. (e.g. Inspiration, p. 14.) The Scriptures were an “organism consisting of many parts, each adjusted to all the rest, as the ‘many members’ to the ‘one body.’”

40 Messianic Prophecy, p. 12.

41 “Inspiration of Bible,” p. 44. Briggs’ qualitative distinction between seer and Nabi is artificial at best. The text indicates that even those who were apparently subject to ecstatic frenzies were regarded as nabim rather than seers (e.g. 1 Sam. 10:11, 12). The term seer is used but a handful of times and is qualified by the text as an archaic term for Nabi. “There is no reason to question this, though one could hardly reconstruct as older office of har the on the basis of the note” [TDNT, s.v. profhthj ] The other term translated seer by the AV is hzx which at times appears to be an official court position (2 Sam. 24:11) while at other times it is the virtual equivalent of the Nabi. (Ibid., cf. v. 5, p. 329.) Only by reading the text with the a priori of higher criticism could he establish such a distinction.

42 Messianic Prophecy, pp. 16-17.

43 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 543.

44 “Inspiration of Bible” pp. 43-44.

45 Inspiration, p. 16.

46 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 543.

47 Contrast this with Warfield who affirmed without hesitation that philosophy, science, history and even ethnology, were unavoidably involved in the affirmations of Scripture. He contended that even modern scientists affirmed that there is no real contradiction between the Bible and Science. This he contended led to the conclusion that “the scientific element (as well as all other incidental elements) of the Scriptures, as well as the doctrinal, was within the scope of inspiration.” (Inspiration, p. 31.)

48 C. A. Briggs, “Biblical Theology with Especial Reference to the New Testament,” American Presbyterian Review, 2 (1870):304. (Italics added.)

49 Warfield explained the relationship of the divine to the human as one of concursus, understanding the Bible at every point as a divine-human book. (John Meeter, ed., Selected Shorter Writings of Benjamin B. Warfield--II [Nutley, New Jersey: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1973], p. 546.) While he admitted that one must be careful not to push the analogy, he saw legitimate parallels between the unity of the divine and the human, in the Incarnation and the meeting of the divine and the human in Scripture. (Inspiration and Authority, p. 162.) Cf. Hodge Inspiration, pp. 11-17.

50 C. A. Briggs, “Critical Theories with Reference To Sacred Scripture,” The Presbyterian Review, 2 (1881): 232. Cf. Whither?, p. 65. Here he asserted the plenary inspiration of Scripture as the doctrine of Westminster. Briggs took Hodge to task for inserting the phrase “and verbal inspiration” into his definition of the doctrine of inspiration protesting that the addition of the phrase amounted to a sharpening and refining of the Westminster definition by means of logical deduction. He admitted that one might infer such a doctrine from the Confession. However, such inference could never legitimately be raised to the level of dogma.

51 Cornerstones, p. 41.

52 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 639. In this assertion Briggs was in clear agreement with Hodge who stated, “our conception of revelation. . . must be conditioned upon our general views of God’s relation to the world. . . . The whole genius of Christianity, all of its essential and most characteristic doctrines presuppose the immanence of God in all his creatures in all their spontaneous activities.” (Inspiration, p. 9.) Hodge saw this immanence as guaranteeing a verbally infallible revelation in contradistinction to Briggs.

53 Ibid.

54 He rejected Warfield’s argument of God’s superintendence over the preparation and choosing of the Scriptural authors as an undemonstrable theological a priori.

55 Briggs was alluding here to John 16:12. He did not complete his citation of the verse. John said that they could not bear them now (arti))). The following verse continues, “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth.” (NASB.) This blunts considerably the force of his argument at this point.

56 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 640.

57 Rogers and McKim have traced the concept of accommodation throughout church history demonstrating that the principle has been common among theologians down through the ages. Following in Briggs’ footsteps they try to demonstrate what Briggs only asserted: that theologians have historically seen the concept of accommodation as involving accommodation to human error.

58 John Calvin, trans. Ford Lewis Battles, ed. John T. McNeil, Institutes of the Christian Religion, 2 vols. (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1968), 1:13:1.

59 James Rila in translating this concept into the theological jargon of the 1960s, employed the Barthian terminology “the wholly otherness of God” and “the estrangedness of man.” On neither point was he technically accurate, for Briggs firmly held that it was the immanence of God which made genuine revelation possible. In addition, he rooted the problems inherent in divine-human communication in man’s finitude rather than man’s sinfulness. Only occasionally did Briggs make reference to man’s sinfulness in relationship to the problems this creates for revelation, thus making it clear this concept was only tangential in his understanding of the issue. James S. Rila, “Charles A. Briggs and the Problem of Religious Authority,” (University of Iowa: Ph.D. dissertation, 1965) p. 168.

60 The Study of Holy Scripture, pp. 637, 640.

61 Inspiration, p. 23. It should be noted at this point that Hodge was speaking here of the divine superintendence over the process of inspiration. He did not suggest that the Holy Spirit dictated the Scripture. His language even allowed that the communication of the Spirit was non-verbal. Hodge would attach the term inspiration to the final written product, whereas Briggs employed the term to refer to the process of divine communication.

62 However, his charge that verbal inspiration led to a denial of the transferability of thought from one language to another was sheer polemic made within the context of the battle over revision of the Westminster Confession.

63 Charles A. Briggs, Church Unity (New York: Longmans, 1911), p. 325. Hereinafter referred to as Church Unity

64 John Beekman and John Callow, Translating the Word of God (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1974), pp. 267-271. Cf. Eugene Nida, The Theory and Practice of Translation (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1974,) pp. 1-33.

65 “The translator does not transliterate the letters and syllables, transmute sounds, give word for word, transfer foreign words and idioms; but he ascertains the sense, the idea, and then gives expression to the idea, the sense, in the most appropriate way. It is admitted that close, literal translations are bad, misleading, worse than paraphrases. . .” (The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 623.)

66 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 625.

67 “The Inspiration of the Bible,” p. 4.

68 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 2.

69 Ibid., p. 566.

70 Ibid., p. 42.

71 Ibid., p. 29. By form he meant not just written communication but the precise words and grammatical structure which conveyed any Scriptural thought.

72 Ibid., p. 43.

73 In making this assertion Briggs in practice approached the position espoused by Hodge and Warfield in confining inspiration to the original autographs.

74 In the matters of the incarnation and the resurrection it was to Briggs inconceivable that the text should be in error since these historical matters were also redemptive and thus, under the providential guidance of the Holy Spirit.

75 The following discussion is condensed from Church Unity, pp. 236-241.

76 Ibid., p. 238.

77 Elsewhere he envisions human salvation as having a vastly broader reference than justification. He saw the term as having reference to salvation viewed comprehensively, including both sanctification and glorification.

78 He gave no hint as to what some of these second and tertiary level truths might be, although elsewhere he did state that the Apostolic decree of the Jerusalem Council was not binding upon the modern church.

79 Church Unity, p. 239.

80 Ibid., pp. 240-241. Briggs used the terms fallible and infallible in this discussion in reference to questions which are discussed today under the rubric of hermeneutics, particularly issues which have reference to normative practices as opposed to cultural practices. Cultural practices he would label as fallible, normative practices as infallible. He even expressed the hope for some future “Council of Jerusalem” to determine the infallible and the fallible in the New Testament.

81 Ibid.

82 Ibid., p. 604.

83 Ibid.

84 Ibid.

85 Ibid.

86 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 605.

87 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 660.

88 Ibid., p. 655. In so saying he was appealing to the Heidelberg Catechism, question 65, which stated, “The Holy Spirit works faith in our hearts, by the preaching of the Holy Gospel, and confirms it by the use of the holy sacraments.” (cf. Westminster Larger Catechism, question 155.)

89 Briggs drew the distinction between the written Word and the Gospel in a manner reminiscent of Luther, seeing that as divine which preaches Christ.

90 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 662.

91 Ibid., p. 660.

92 Ibid., p. 668.

93 Ibid., p. 664.

94 Ibid., p. 669.

95 Rila, p. 202. Cf. Joe Aldrich, Lifestyle Evangelism (Portland: Multnomah Press, 1981). While homiletical in style, Aldrich nevertheless proposes that the church becomes a true incarnation of the Word of God to the world as it reflects blameless character and holy conduct. (pp. 25-34.)

96 The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 667.

97 John Jefferson Davis (ed.), The Necessity of Systematic Theology, “Contextualization and the Nature of Theology,” (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1978), pp. 169-190.

98 Stanley Gundry, “Evangelical Theology: Where Should We Be Going?,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 22 (1979):11.

99 C. Henry, God Revelation and Authority 1 (Waco; Word, 1979), pp. 9-10.

100 This emphasis was clearly in harmony with the larger Reformed tradition and has its roots in Calvin himself. See Calvin, Institutes 2:2. Cf. I. John Hesselink, On Being Reformed, (New York: Reformed Church Press, 1988) 29-36; 92-97.

Related Topics: Textual Criticism, Inspiration, Inerrancy, Revelation

How Many Books Are in the Bible?

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The Doctrines That Divide
1
Erwin W. Lutzer

Even the most casual Bible student knows that there are more books in the Catholic Bible than in the one used by Protestants. Where did these differences originate? On what basis were some books selected to be in the Bible, and why were others rejected?

Upon reflection, we could expect that there would be some dispute regarding these matters. After all, the Bible did not come down from heaven bound in beautiful leather and adorned with gold gilded pages. It is a very human book that reflects the styles of the writers and the cultural setting of the times. Yet, it is also a divine book, inspired by God, and therefore free from error in the original manuscripts. Like Christ who was truly God and truly man, so the Bible has a dual authorship. Questions about which books meet this criterion are to be expected.

The word canon comes from the Greek word kanon which means a ruler or measuring rod. In a metaphorical sense, it came to refer to the standard by which various books of the Bible were judged as worthy of being called the Word of God. Within time, the word kanon was applied to the books themselves; Athanasius is the first one known to have used “canon” in such a context.

How the Books Were Collected

Some of the Old Testament books were immediately recognized as authoritative. Moses, after he wrote a book, put it in the Ark of the Covenant (Deut. 31:24-26). After the temple was built, the sacred writings were kept there (2 Kings 22:18). Early on, God commanded the kings to write for themselves a copy of the law. “And he shall read it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the Lord his God” (Deut. 17:19). As the prophets spoke God’s word, saying, “Thus saith the Lord,” they also recognized that their message had to be recorded for future generations.

The Jews realized that special revelation ceased with the prophet Malachi (c. 400 B.C.). In the Talmud (a handbook of Jewish traditions) we read, “Up to this point [the time of Alexander the Great] the prophets prophesied through the Holy Spirit; from this time onward incline thine ear and listen to the sayings of the wise.”

But what determined whether a book was considered part of the canon? Obviously, there were other books in existence that did not merit classification with the sacred writings. Examples are “The Book of the Wars of the Lord” (Num. 21:14) and “The Book of Jashar” (Josh. 10:13).

The criterion was, first, that the book had to agree with the Torah, the first five books of Moses. But this was not the only test. Some books that agreed with the Torah were also excluded. For example, Elijah wrote a book that likely met this standard; yet it was not a part of the canon. And, of course, we must ask how the Torah itself became accepted.

Second, and most important, these books were accepted because they were believed to be inspired by God. In other words, they were selected because they were recognized as having divine authority. This is not to say that the Jews gave these books their authority; these books were believed to have inherent authority. If a book is inspired by God, it would have authority whether men recognized it or not. A jeweler may recognize an authentic diamond, but his recognition does not make it so.

We must guard against the notion that the church has a right to make a book canonical. But at best the nation Israel or church body can only recognize a book as authoritative because it is inspired of God.

The Discovery of Canonicity

But how was canonicity discovered? First, the books had the ring of self-vindicating authority. Moses claimed to be the mouthpiece of God. The Old Testament prophets repeatedly said, “And the word of the Lord came to me.” The lives of the prophets and the strong affirmation that their message came from God was accepted by the Jewish nation.

This explains why the canonicity of the Book of Esther was, for a time, in doubt. Since the name of God does not appear in the book, some thought it lacked self-vindicating authority. But closer inspection showed that the providence of God was so evident in the story that it had the authenticity that gave it acceptance.

A second test was that of authorship. it had to have been written by a man of God. Was the author, they asked, a spokesman for “redemptive revelation,” either a prophet in the Old Testament times or an apostle in the new?

For example, Paul in the New Testament argued that his message was authoritative because he was an apostle, “not sent from men, nor through the agency of man, but through Jesus Christ, and God the Father” (Gal. 1:1). The Book of 2 Peter was disputed in the early church because some doubted that it had been written by Peter. The writing style appeared different from 1 Peter, hence the doubt. But within time the church was convinced that Peter the apostle was the author, therefore the book was accepted.

Yet in other instances the identity of the author was not always determinative. For example, the authorship of the Book of Hebrews is unknown, but the book was accepted without serious questioning because it bears the unmistakable stamp of the transforming power of God.

Of course, the book had to be consistent with previous revelation. Martin Luther thought that James taught salvation by works so he questioned its position in the canon. Later, when he revised his preface to the book, he dropped his criticism. A closer reading indicates that James does not contradict Paul’s teaching of salvation by faith. The early church was quite correct in receiving it as authoritative.

There is evidence that when an inspired book was written, it enjoyed immediate acceptance. For example, Peter accepted the epistles of Paul as being worthy of recognition as inspired Scripture (2 Pet. 3:16). Thus, the canon of the New Testament formed gradually as the books were written. Because communication was cumbersome in biblical times, it is understandable that the complete list of authoritative books was not agreed upon until a few centuries had passed. The Books of Revelation and 3 John were not immediately accepted, in part because they were unknown in some parts of the New Testament world. As their circulation grew, so did the recognition that they had the marks of divine inspiration.

The bottom line, of course, is that the books of the Bible were recognized as authoritative by the people of God. There is little doubt that we must exercise faith that God superintended his Word so that only inspired books were chosen to be in the canon. Equally important is the fact that the final list of books was not chosen by a synod or council of the church. These met to ratify the books that the people of God had already chosen.

The Apocrypha

Both the Roman Catholic and Protestant Bibles have thirty-nine books in the Old Testament and twenty-seven in the New. The difference is that a Roman Catholic Bible has an additional eleven books inserted between the Testaments. Where did these books come from?

To begin, we must realize that both branches of Christendom acknowledge the existence of books that are false writings that have never laid serious claim to canonicity. The Book of Enoch and The Assumption of Moses are known to have existed, but all agree that they lack the stamp of inspiration. In the New Testament the Shepherd of Hermas was thought by some to be authoritative, so it hovered around the canon for sometime before it was dismissed as a forgery

But there was another group of books that are accepted by the Roman Catholic church but rejected by Protestants. These books originated in a canon in Alexandria in Egypt. It was in this city in 250 B.C. that the Old Testament was translated into Greek and called the Septuagint, meaning “seventy.” (Allegedly the translation was made in seventy days utilizing seventy scholars.) This explains why some of the earliest manuscripts of the Septuagint that exist today (dating back to the fourth century) contain these additional books.

These books, commonly called the Apocrypha (the word means “hidden”), are interwoven among the books of the Old Testament. In all, there are fifteen books, eleven of which are accepted as canonical by the Roman Catholic church. But because four of the eleven are combined with Old Testament books, the Douay Version contains only seven additional books in its table of contents.

There are several reasons why the Roman Catholic church considers the wider Alexandrian list of books to be canonical. Briefly, they are (1) the New Testament quotes mostly from the Septuagint, which contained the Apocrypha. Then, (2) some of the early church fathers accepted the Apocrypha as canonical—Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Clement of Alexandria for example. Also, (3) Augustine and the great councils of Hippo and Carthage, which he led, are said to have accepted them. Finally, (4) the Council of Trent called to respond to the inroads of the Reformation pronounced them canonical in A.D. 1546. The council said that if anyone does not receive these books in all of their parts, “let him be anathema.”

Reasons to Reject the Apocrypha

Protestants give numerous reasons for rejecting these additional books:2

1. Though there are some allusions to the apocryphal books by New Testament writers (Hebrews 11:35 compares with 2 Maccabees 7, 12) there is no direct quote from them. Also, no New Testament writer ever refers to any of these fourteen or fifteen books as authoritative. Quotes from the accepted books are usually introduced by the phrase, “It is written,” or the passage is quoted to prove a point. But never do the New Testament writers quote the Apocrypha in this way.

2. There is no evidence that the books were in the Septuagint as early as the time of Christ. Remember, the earliest manuscripts that have them date back to the fourth century A.D. Even if they were in the Septuagint at this early date, it is noteworthy that neither Christ nor the apostles ever quoted from them.

3. Though some of the early leaders of the church accepted them, many did not—Athanasius, Origen, and Jerome, to name a few.

4. The evidence that Augustine accepted the Apocrypha is at best ambiguous. For one thing, he omits Baruch and includes 1 Esdras, thus accepting one and rejecting another in contrast to the Council of Trent. For another, he seemed to change his mind later about the validity of the Apocrypha.

Jerome, while making a Latin translation of the Bible, disputed with Augustine about the value of these additional books. Though Jerome did not want to translate them, he eventually made a hurried translation of them but kept them separate from his translation of the Bible. However, after his death, these books were brought into his Latin translation.

Augustine, as mentioned, argued in favor of the Apocrypha, though he later seemed to give them a kind of secondary canonicity. His testimony, though important, is not entirely clear.

5. Even the Roman Catholic church made a distinction between the Apocrypha and the other books of the Bible prior to the Reformation. For example, Cardinal Cajetan, who opposed Luther at Augsburg, in 1518 published A Commentary on all the Authentic Historical Books of the Old Testament. His commentary, however, did not include the Apocrypha.

6. The first official council of the Roman Catholic church to ratify these books was at the Council of Trent in 1546, only twenty-nine years after Luther posted his ninety-five theses on the door of the church at Wittenberg. The acceptance of these books at this time was convenient since the books were being quoted against Luther. For example, 2 Maccabees speaks of prayers for the dead (2 Macc. 12:45-46) and another book teaches salvation by works (Tob. 12:19).

Even so, the Roman church accepted only eleven of the fifteen books; we naturally would expect that these books, since they were together for so many centuries, would be either accepted or rejected together.

7. The content of the Apocrypha is sub-biblical. Some of the stories are clearly fanciful. Bel and the Dragon, Tobit, and Judith have the earmarks of legend; the authors of these books even give hints along the way that the stories are not to be taken seriously.

What is more, these books have historical errors. It is claimed that Tobit was alive when the Assyrians conquered Israel in 722 B.C. and also when Jeroboam revolted against Judah in 931 B.C., which would make him at least 209 years old; yet according to the account, he died when he was only 158 years. The Book of Judith speaks of Nebuchadnezzar reigning in Nineveh instead of Babylon.

These inaccuracies are inconsistent with the doctrine of inspiration which teaches that when God inspires a book it is free from all errors.

8. Finally, and most important, we must remember that the Apocrypha was never part of the Old Testament Hebrew canon. When Christ was on earth, he frequently quoted from the Old Testament but never from the Apocryphal books because they were never a part of the Hebrew canon.

In Christ’s time, there were twenty-two books in the Old Testament, but the content was identical to the thirty-nine books in our present Old Testament (several of the books in the Hebrew Bible were combined, which accounts for the different figure). Genesis was the first book in the Hebrew canon and 2 Chronicles was the last. On at least one occasion, Christ referred specifically to the content of the Hebrew canon when he said:

Therefore, behold, I am sending you prophets and wise men and scribes; some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city, that upon you may fall the guilt of all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar (Matt. 23:34-35)

In the Hebrew canon, the first book of the Bible was Genesis, where the death of Abel is recorded, and the last book was 2 Chronicles where near the end of the book the murder of Zechariah is described (24:21). In between these two events lay the entire content of the Old Testament. He assumed it ended with the Hebrew Scriptures and not the Apocrypha.

The Apocryphal books were written in Greek after the close of the Old Testament canon. Jewish scholars agree that chronologically Malachi was the last book of the Old Testament canon. The books of the Apocrypha were evidently written about 200 B.C. and occur only in Greek manuscripts of the Old Testament. Since Christ accepted only the books we have in our Old Testament today, we have no reason to add to their number.

The Lost Books

Occasionally we hear references to the so-called lost books of the Bible, books that some people think have been hidden from the general populace. In 1979, Bell Publishing Company of New York came out with a book entitled The Lost Books of the Bible. On the flyleaf it says that these books were not among those chosen to comprise the Bible, and “They were suppressed by the church, and for over fifteen hundred years were shrouded in secrecy.”3

These books are not really as secret as the authors imply. New Testament scholars have been well aware of their existence throughout the centuries, though perhaps these books were not accessible to the common man. Their credibility is rejected by both Catholics and Protestants.

These books include stories about the birth of Mary and of Christ. Also there are a dozen or more stories that took place during Christ’s lifetime. Three or four purport to relate to events in the Old Testament.

These books never even vied for a place in the canon. Unlike some other books that were actually disputed (the Shepherd of Hermas, for example), these books were recognized as legends from the beginning. These “forgotten books” are so obviously inferior to those in our Bible that they cannot be taken seriously.

Indeed, in the preface, Dr. Frank Crane admitted the point by saying that legends and apocryphal stories surround all great men such as Napoleon, Charlemagne, and Julius Caesar, so we can also expect that tales would grow up around Christ. He went on to say that Christ appealed to the “fictional minds” of his day. These writers, Crane admitted, do not pretend to write down what is strictly true, but tinge all events with their imagination.

Finally, Crane said the common man can now make his own decision as to whether the early church did right in rejecting these books. He did not hesitate to say that common sense itself will show the superiority of the accepted canonical books.

I agree. Should there be any doubt about the accepted books, the best solution would be to read these so-called lost books. And for that matter, one should also read those books that laid more serious claim to canonicity. They also are so inferior to the books of the New Testament that we become convinced that the early church did not err.

In the upper room, Christ promised that the Holy Spirit would help them recall his teachings. “When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, He Will bear witness of Me” (John 15:26). That was a tacit confirmation of the New Testament that still needed to be written. The early believers recognized those writings that were either written by an apostle or by someone personally acquainted with one. After the apostolic period, no more books could claim the stamp of divine authority.

The Book of Revelation ends with a warning:

I testify to everyone who bears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to then; God shall add to him the plagues which are written in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the tree of life and from the holy city, which are written in this book (Rev. 22.18-19)

Although these words refer specifically to the Book of Revelation and not to the New Testament as a whole (there were still questions as to which books were properly in the New Testament when Revelation was penned), yet they are a warning to the many false cults who have claimed to add to God’s Word.

In our present New Testament we have the final word from God until our Lord returns and the Bible as we know it will no longer be necessary.


1 “How Many Books Are in the Bible?” is chapter 8 from Erwin Lutzer’s book, The Doctrines That Divide and is used by permission of the publisher. No additional use of this material may be made without written permission of Kregel Publications, Grand Rapids, MI.

2 Norman Geisler and William Nix, A General Introduction to the Bible (Chicago: Moody Press, 1986). 170-177.

3 The Lost Books of the Bible (New York: Bell Publishing Co., 1979).


Biblical Studies Foundation has received so many questions concerning the number of books in the Bible that we are delighted to have been given permission to use chapter 8 in Erwin Lutzer’s book, The Doctrines That Divide: A Fresh Look at the Historic Doctrines That Separate Christians (Kregel Publications: Grand Rapids, 1998).

Other chapters in this excellent book cover questions such as:

Is Christ Truly God?
Is Christ Truly Man?
Was Mary the Mother of God?
Was Peter the First Pope?
Justification: By Faith, Sacraments, or Both?
Why Can’t We Agree about the Lord’s Supper?
Why Can’t We Agree about Baptism?
Predestination or Free Will?
Can a Saved Person Ever Be Lost?

Doctrines That Divide may be purchased at any Christian bookstore, on-line bookseller, or from:

Kregel Publications
P.O. Box 2607
Grand Rapids, MI 49501
800-733-2607
www.kregel.com

Related Topics: Bibliology (The Written Word)

The History of the Doctrine of Inspiration From the Ancient Church Through the Reformation

Related Media

Introduction

The Christian church did not arise in an historical vacuum, nor did it arise with a complete systematic theology. Rather it adopted many of its attitudes toward religion from its reluctant mother, Judaism. With this in mind, it is the purpose of this lesson to trace the historic understanding of the Church toward its sacred writings, beginning with its earliest period, up through the present.

Jewish Attitudes Towards Scripture

Revealed Religion

Judaism saw itself as a revealed religion. God had spoken from heaven to the Patriarchs and the prophets and given his divine law. In a very real sense Judaism was Noministic, founded upon the supreme authority of that God- given law. The Jews understood that God’s Revelation had been accomplished through a multitude of channels: dreams, theophanies, His word spoken from heaven inspiring the prophets in an undefined fashion. With the exception of the direct appearance of God, all these revelations were mediated by the Spirit of Yahweh. The Holy Spirit was regarded as the spirit of prophecy. Thus, any to whom God would reveal Himself was deemed to be a prophet. Thus the title prophet came to be applied not only to the major and minor prophets, but also to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, Solomon, and even Mordacai. In all, Judaism recognized forty-eight prophets and seven prophetesses who bore God’s message to Israel. (G. F. Moore, Judaism (Cambridge Mass: Harvard University Press, 1930), p. 235-237.

In defining a prophet as one to whom God spoke, the concept of an inspired Scripture naturally grew. Everything in Scripture was viewed as inspired, although everything revealed was not inscripturated. While in the first century Philo proposed a mantic theory of revelation which was reminiscent of Plato, the Rabbinical schools knew nothing of such a theory. According to the Rabbis, the Holy Spirit had inspired the prophets and the scriptural authors so that every syllable of Scripture had the verity and the authority of the Word of God. Yet despite this assertion, they did not speculate as to the method of this inspiration. In their eyes it was simply an accomplished fact.

Scripture as the “Exclamation of the Holy Spirit”

Scripture was viewed by the Jews as the “Exclamation of the Holy Spirit” (Jewish Encyclopedia sv. Inspiration, v. 4, p. 607). As such it was believed impossible for contradictions or real differences to appear in the text.

Revelation Complete in Moses

The Jews viewed Revelation as Complete in Moses. The Torah was seen as having emanated in its entirety from God, every verse and letter. This revelation was complete and final; the Rabbis had no conception of progressive revelation. The Prophets and the Hagiographa were seen to add nothing to the Torah. given to Moses. Rather these later writings served to reinforce, repeat, amplify, and explain the Torah. Not only was any contradiction between the Torah and the later writings denied, any real difference was also denied. To illustrate this mentality we may look at how the Rabbis used the Scriptures. Prooftexts for theological points were quoted in triplets; a verse form the Torah, one from the prophets and a verse from the writings. This practice did not demonstrate a confirmation of the Mosaic precept, but that God taught His lessons by reiteration. (Moore, p. 239-40)

Levels of Inspiration

In viewing all Scripture as inspired, the Jews did not see all Scripture on an equal level of inspiration. Moses’ writings were viewed as the dictation of God. The prophets and the Hagiographa were seen as inspired but in a lesser degree since these books were not given by actual dictation, but only through inspiration. (J. E. p. 608)

    Torah

The Rabbis held that Torah was the product of plenary inspiration extending to the very letters, and even to the vocalization (later when the vowel points were added the concept was extended to the pointing). Thus the normative view of the Torah held that, “he who says the Torah is not from heaven is a heretic, a despiser of the Word of God and one who has no share in the world to come.” (ibid.). If one should exclude even one verse of the Torah claiming that Moses added it on his own authority, this proscription was applied to him.

    Prophets and Hagiographa

While most of the Rabbis’ statements have to do with Torah, this is not to imply that they undervalued or derided the authority of the rest of the Scriptures, only that the Torah was the standard by which the other Scripture was judges as to its worth and canonicity. There was never a formal distinction drawn between the plenary inspiration of the Torah and the more general inspiration attributed to the other books of Scripture. It was all regarded as having full divine authority extending to its very words.

    Inspiration and the LXX

Early, the Jews regarded the LXX as divinely inspired. The apocryphal letter of Aristes states that the seventy-two translators of the LXX completed their task of translation on seventy days without error under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. While this view was later abandoned by the Rabbis who retreated to the inspiration of only the original Hebrew manuscripts, the idea of an inspired LXX took root in the Christian Church and can be seen even in the great Augustine, who chided Jerome for his use of the Hebrew text over the “inspired” and authoritative LXX.

    Christ and the Apostles
      Jesus Christ and the Scriptures

When one examines the life and ministry of our Lord, he is immediately impressed with the fact that he lived and breathed Scripture. For Him Scripture was the final authority in matters of history, doctrine and ethics.

        History

Our Lord’s acceptance of the authority of Scripture is seen n the warp and woof of His teachings. He makes references to Adam, Abel, Noah, Abraham, Sodom & Gommorah, Lot, Isaac, Jacob, and David eating the Showbread, to mention a few. Jesus Christ accepted the fabric of Old Testament History without reservation. We should note however, for Him this history was not merely academic, for him it held special relevance for each contemporary situation.

        Doctrine

That Christ accepted the Old Testament on doctrinal matters is to speak a truism. In his encounter with Satan after his baptism, He appeals to the authority of Scripture on every occasion with the formula, “it is written.” It is important to note that in his encounters with the religious leaders of the day, He never chide them for too closely observing the Old Testament. Rather the opposite was true. While theologically the Jews held a high view of Scripture, their tradition had so hedged the text that they had in effect nullified its teaching. Jesus condemned them not for their belief but their unbelief.

        Ethics

Jesus Christ made it plain that his teaching s were not opposed to Scripture, but based upon it. “Don’t think I have come to nullify/ abolish the Law and prophets but to establish them.”(Matt 5:17) In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus did not nullify the OT teachings, rather he rescued them from their then current misapplications. For example, the original injunction, “. . . an eye for an eye . . .” was meant to limit vengeance. The Jews had so twisted the injunction so as to justify it. So when Jesus said “do not resist him who is evil . . . but . . . turn the other cheek, “ (Matt 5:38-42) he was actually reasserting the principle of not taking vengeance.

As Clark Pinnock observes, “We can say that Jesus everywhere and always regards Scripture as an authoritative document whose ultimate author is God Himself.” “The importance of the phrase “Scripture cannot be broken” does not lie in an isolated prooftext for Jesus’ view of inspiration, but in the fact that it is entirely representative of his constant approach tot he Bible. This document is for Him God’s written Word to man.”

In summary: We find that our Lord’s attitude toward the authority was that of Judaism generally. He saw it as the totally trustworthy Word of God.

      Peter, Paul, Hebrews & Inspiration
        Paul

Even liberal scholars of a previous generation admit that at least Paul, among the apostles, held the view of Scripture which was prevalent in Tannitic Judaism. For example Farrar states that Paul “doubtless shared in the views of the later Jewish schools--Tanaism and Amorian--on the nature of inspiration. These views made the words of Scripture co-extensive with the words of God. One example will suffice to illustrate Paul’s strict view of inspiration, that is the case of Galatians 3:15-16. Paul states, “Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and his seed. It does not say and to seeds as to many, but ‘and to your seed,’ who is Christ

        Peter

The apostle Peter presents a striking example of one for whom the prophetic scripture was even more solidly established than personal experience. Stating that he had not followed fables of Christ’s power and glory but was an eyewitness of his majesty of the Mount of transfiguration he continues in II Pet 1:19 saying, “And we have an even surer prophetic Word.” Thus he makes it clear that while he regarded experience as a truthful witness, the divine authority of Holy Scripture coming from men borne along by the Holy Spirit had even greater authority and than experience. Concerning this Buswell has noted, “. . . it is not strange to observe that an individual personal testimony may be subject to hallucination to which the prophetic word is not subject.

        Hebrews

Tholuck has noted that the author to the Epistle to the Hebrews use of the OT text “rests on the strictest view of inspiration, since Passages in which God is not the speaker are cited as the words of God.

    The Apostolic Fathers

G. T. Ladd, himself an opponent of the doctrine of inerrancy/infallibility has conceded that this was the doctrine of the ancient church.

The Bible is, indeed considered as showing, although its different parts arose in different places and times, a wonderful and convincing and even perfect consent in all matters pertaining to religion and saving truth. This view was not the result of critical study and a detailed reconciliation of the various apparent discrepancies in the Scriptures; it is rather an immediate inference from the assumed nature of that inspiration in which the Bible has its origin to the nature of the product thus supposed to have been brought about by inspiration. . . The Holy Spirit who is the direct and responsible author of all its parts and details, can make no mistakes; the product of which he is the author is therefore, without mistakes or blemishes,--is, indeed, immaculate and infallible

While Ladd tries to limit biblical infallibility to “religion and saving truth,” the examples he puts forth make it clear that the fathers held to a doctrine of inspiration/inerrancy close to that of contemporary conservative Evangelicalism.

A few Representative examples will suffice to demonstrate the attitude of Scripture held in the ancient Church.

      Clement of Rome

Clement exhorts his readers to, “Look carefully into the Scriptures, which are the true utterances of the Holy Spirit. Observe that nothing false is written in them.” Elsewhere he refers to Scripture as the “oracles of God.”

      Ignatius

Ignatius, bishop of Antioch and an early martyr, gives evidence of the total trustworthiness of Scripture which was common in his day. One notable feature on Ignatius’ writing is that when he wished to settle an issue he would adopt the standard NT formula for citation of the OT, gegraptai.

    The Apologists and Theologians
      Justin Martyr

In Numerous places Justin asserts the full authority of the OT. To him it is a product of the Divine logos. He states: But when you hear the utterances of the prophets spoken as it were, personally, you must not assume that they are spoken by the inspired themselves, but by the divine word that moves them.” Thus it is not surprising that Scriptures do not contradict one another.

      Irenaeus & Tertullian

This pair give evidence of a more highly developed doctrine of Scripture than has been seen to date, yet without lessening the authority of the Scriptures. Concerning the apostolic authors of Scripture he states, “They are beyond falsehood.” Thus it followed that, “The Scriptures are perfect inasmuch as they were uttered by the word of God or His Spirit.” So fully divine were they considered that there was not one detail which was considered to be insignificant. Having said all this, Irenaeus also speaks of the human authors as genuine authors, not mere scribes.

With Tertullian, the most theologically astute of the apologists, one finds a conscious broadening of authority from just the Old Testament to the written developing canon of the NT. Scripture is to him a “written revelation.” Elsewhere he equates Scripture with true doctrine noting, “ . . . it is better to be ignorant when God had not spoken than to acquire knowledge form men and to be dependent upon his conjectures.”

With Irenaeus and Tertullian one finds a maturing of the concept of inspiration which is extended to the NT as well as the Old. A place is given to the human author as well as the divine, yet in such a way so as not to compromise the absolute veracity and authority of the Scriptures, down to their very letters.

      Origen

As with other early fathers, Origen insisted that the Scriptures formed a harmonious unity which was perfect in every particular. Inspiration was seen to extend to the very letters of the text. The problem in Origen comes in his application of his hermeneutics. while he dogmatically asserts the plenary inspiration of the Scriptures, he vitiates this principle by his hermeneutic. Specifically, he often denied the historicity of events which offended his platonic framework, interpreting them in an allegorical fashion.

      Cyprian and the North African Church

In citing Scripture Cyprian says: “the Holy Spirit says. . .” thus demonstrating their divine origin. HE also stated that the Old and NT were “fountains of divine fullness from which the Christian must draw strength and wisdom.” In the century and one half following Cyprian, the authority of Scripture in North Africa was, if possible, elevated to an even higher position than earlier. “The Bible was the keystone of the Christian community in North Africa.” It was regarded as the greatest sacrilege to alter even one word of Scripture.

      Augustine
        The Fact of Inspiration

Augustine in numerous places attributes the origin of Scripture to God. He states variously, “Both Testaments have been written by the one God.” “Let them know that everything, both in the Old as well as the New Testament was written by the Holy Spirit.” In The Trinity he is emphatic that it was God who inspired the Scriptures and that men wrote under the influence of divine inspiration.

He refers to Scripture variously as the word of God, the words of God, the divine word, divine oracles, the book of God, the holy book, divine Scripture, Holy Scripture, divine Scriptures, Scriptures of God, divine letters, prophetic letters, divine authority, divine testimony, and the Testimony of God, to mention but a few. He did not regard his view as being novel, rather he saw himself as holding the ancient doctrine of the Church. For Augustine the fact of inspiration was so obvious that he seldom sought to prove inspiration from the Scripture itself. Rather, he assumed it.

      The Nature of Inspiration
        Inspiration: the Human side

Augustine’s doctrine of inspiration has been perceived so strictly by some that they have accused him of holding to a verbal dictation view of the process. Such accusations come because of Augustine’s use of the term dictare. In truth, he held to the vital involvement of the human authors with their material. He states: “Each of the Evangelists believed it to have been his duty to relate the matters he was engaged in recording, in that order in which pleased God to bring them to his recollection.” Elsewhere he states: “Matthew followed the authority of the Holy Ghost, under whose guidance he felt his mind to be directed more than is the case with us.” It is under this type of recognition that he is able to deal with stylistic differences between various authors within the text.

So far removed is his theory of inspiration from mechanical dictation, at one point he asserts that revelation is not necessary for inspiration. He notes: “It is permissible for the divine authority to take truthful testimony from whatever source he may wish.”

Augustine stressed the human side of inspiration so much, at times the divine seems to have disappeared completely. While at other times the divine is stressed to the apparent exclusion of the human. Polman in trying to resolve this tension has stated: “The Bible was both the exclusive work of the Holy Spirit alone and at the same time the work of the biblical writers.”

        Inspiration: the Divine side

Augustine attributed inspiration to all three persons of the trinity. This was consistent with his belief that the external works of the trinity could not be divided among its members. Rather all three members worked in concert with one another.

God’s part in inspiration begins with an impulse to move the human author who at that point undertakes to compose a sacred composition. He noted: “Indeed it could not be truly said that God is the author of Scripture it the initiative to write came from man himself and not God.” The divine impulse was the sine qua non in the authorship of Scripture. However once moved by the Holy Spirit, the scriptural authors were not left to their own devices. The Spirit continued to influence and guide. He noted of the process as it related to the composition of the Pentateuch: “The Prophet (Moses) has compiled a narrative of human actions, under the guidance and inspiration of the Holy Ghost.” He even speaks of the Spirit bringing to mind different details to the various evangelists as they wrote. So strong is the divine imprint in Scripture that it is to be regarded as the voice of God.

It should go without saying that the divine inspiration of the Scriptures was plenary. Augustine sees the entire body of Scripture as immediately inspired, yet in such a way as to maintain the integrity of the human authors.

        Inerrancy

Augustine saw inerrancy as the necessary consequence of inspiration. He held both to the formal inerrancy of Scripture (i.e. it could not contradict itself) and to a correspondence theory of truth. He saw Scripture as absolutely trustworthy. Should a book claiming inspiration be found to contain a single error, it must be ipso facto be rejected as uninspired.

In affirming the non-contradiction of Scripture he notes:

The authority of these books has come down to us from the apostles through the succession of bishops and the extension of the church, from a position of lofty supremacy, claims the submission of every faithful and pious mind. If we are perplexed by an apparent contradiction in Scripture it is not allowable to say, “The author of this book is mistaken;” but either the manuscript is faulty or the translator is wrong, or you have not understood. In the innumerable books that have been written latterly we may sometimes find the same truth as in Scripture, but there is not the same authority. Scripture has a sacredness peculiar to itself. . . in consequence of the distinctive peculiarity of the sacred writings we are bound to receive as true whatever the canon shows to have been said by even one prophet or apostle or evangelist. Otherwise no a single page will be left for the guidance of human fallibility, if contempt for the wholesome authority of canonical books either puts an end to that authority or involves it in hopeless confusion.

The true Christian is not free to doubt the veracity of Scripture at any point. In fact inerrancy was seen as such a foundational doctrine, one could not be saved without believing it. Augustine even propounds the “domino theory” asserting, “If once you admit into the high sanctuary of authority one false statement. . . There will not be left a single sentence of those books which if appearing difficult or hard to believe, may not by the same fatal rule be explained away, as a statement in which intentionally the author declared what was not true.

The Medieval Church

During the medieval period the problem was not with the inspiration of Scripture, but rather with the subtle elevation of the Church to a position equal in authority with the Scriptures. Scriptures were still seen as divinely inspired and authoritative, but the Church held the interpretive key.

The Reformation

Martin Luther

Luther’s devotion to Scripture and its authority is well documented. One is reminded of his defense before the Diet of Worms, “--unless I am convinced by Scripture and plain reason...I do not accept the authority of popes or councils, for they have contradicted each other...my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise. God help me. Amen.” (Roland Bainton, Here I Stand)

    Inspiration

Karl Barth has noted of the reformer’s doctrine of Scripture: “The Reformers took over unquestioningly and unreservedly the statement on the inspiration and indeed the verbal inspiration of the Bible, as it is explicitly and implicitly contained in those Pauline passages which we have taken as our basis, even including the formula that God is the author of the Bible, and occasionally making use of the idea of the dictation of the Bible through the biblical writers. How could it be otherwise? Not with less, but with more radical seriousness they wanted to proclaim the subjection of the church to the Bible as the Word of God, and its authority as such. Even in his early period, Luther demanded, ut onme verbum vocale, per quemcunque dictatur, velut Domino ipse dicente suscipiamos credamos, cedumus et himiliter, subicciamus nostrum sensum. . . .At least therefore, Luther is not inconsistent when we hear him thundering at the end of his life `Therefore, we either believe roundly and wholly and utterly, or we believe nothing: The Holy Ghost doth not let Himself be severed or parted, that he should let one part be taught truly and another part falsely. . . . For it is the fashion of all heretics, that they begin first with a single article, like a ring which is of no further value when it has a break or cut . . .’”

Luther made no new claims concerning the nature of the Scripture. Even the rationalist, Adolf von Harnack, was forced to admit that Luther “confounded the Word of God and the Sacred Scripture.” In the first five volumes of Luther’s collected works (they total 55 volumes) there are over one thousand explicit references to the verbal inspiration of Scripture!

Luther himself states: “We must make a great difference between God’s Word and the word of man. A man’s word is a little sound, that flies in the air, and soon vanishes; but the Word of God is greater than heaven and earth, yea greater than death and hell, for it forms part of the power of God and endures everlastingly; we should therefore, diligently study God’s Word and assuredly believe that God Himself speaks to us.”

In another place he states: “It is cursed unbelief and odious flesh which will not permit us to see and know that God speaks to us in Scripture and that it is God’s Word, but tells us that it is merely the word of Isaiah, Paul or some other man who has not created heaven and earth.

Luther is emphatic that this inspiration extends to the from as well as the content of the Scripture. In other words he affirms the inspiration of the words of Scripture. He states: “But why by the phrase ‘by every word’? Because disbelieving one single word, you no longer live by the Word of God. For the single whole Christ is in every word, and he is wholly in all single words. When, therefore, one denies in one word Him who is in every/all words, one denies Him in His totality.”

    Inerrancy

Some have argued that Luther was not concerned with the technical accuracy of the Scripture, rather only its ability to “accomplish righteousness in us.” This contention is not borne out by Luther’s explicit testimony on the subject. Numerous times he goes to great length to defend the technical accuracy of Scripture. He states at various points:

I have learned to ascribe the honor of infallibility only to those books that are accepted as canonical. I am profoundly convinced that none of these writers has ever erred.

St. Augustine in a letter to St. Jerome, has put down a fine axiom--that only the Holy Scripture is considered inerrant.

Scripture has never erred.

I have learned to hold only the Holy Scripture inerrant.

This inerrancy was twofold: formal (i.e. Scripture did not contradict itself) and its statements corresponded with reality. If secular historians contradicted Scripture, it was the secular historians who were to be accounted as wrong. Like modern inerrantists he limited the inerrancy of Scripture to the original autographs.

John Calvin

    The Nature of Scripture

When it pleased God to raise up a more visible form of the church, He willed to have his word set down and sealed in writing. . . . He commanded also that the prophesies to be committed to writing and be accounted part of His Word. To these at the same time histories were added, also the labor of the prophets, but composed under the Holy Spirit’s dictation. I include the psalms with the prophets, That the whole body [corpus], therefore, made up of law, prophesies, psalms and histories was the Lord’s Word for the ancient people. . .

Let this be a firm principle: No other word is to be held as the Word of God, and given place as such in the church, than what is contained in the Law and the prophets, then in the writings of the apostles. . . [The Apostles] were to expound the ancient Scriptures and to show that what is taught there has been fulfilled in Christ. Yet they do not do this except from the Lord, that is, with Christ’s Spirit going before them and in a sense dictating their words. . . . [They] were sure and genuine penmen of the holy Spirit, and their writings are therefore to be considered oracles of God: and the sole office of others is to teach what is provided and sealed in the Holy Scripture.[Institutes, IV, viii]

While Calvin nowhere formally delineates his doctrine of Scripture we are able to deduce his doctrine from is use of the text and his comments on particular texts. He variously refers to Scripture as the mouth of God, doctrine, teaching from God’s mouth. He at times even speaks of the Scripture as having been dictated by God. A further important concept in Calvin’s doctrine of Scripture is that of condescension.

Concerning 2 Tim 3:16 he commented:

He [Paul] commends Scripture, first on account of its authority, second on account of the utility that springs from it. In order to uphold the authority of Scripture, he declares it to be divinely inspired: for if it be so, it is beyond all controversy that men should receive it with reverence. . . Whoever then wishes to profit in the Scriptures, let him first lay down as a settled point this--that the law and the prophets are not a teaching delivered by the will of men, but dictated by the Holy Ghost. . . . Moses and the prophets did not utter at random what we have from their hand, but since they spoke by divine impulse, they confidently and fearlessly testified, as was actually the case, that it was the mouth of the Lord that spoke. . . . We owe to the Scripture the same reverence which we owe to God, because it has proceeded from Him alone, and has nothing of man mixed with it.

The full authority which they [the scriptures] obtain with the faithful proceeds from no other consideration than that they are persuaded that they proceeded for heaven, as if God had been heard giving utterance to them.

    God’s dictating

When Calvin used the term dictate he sounds like he is endorsing what is referred to as verbal dictation, such is not the case however, what he is doing instead is affirming in the most emphatic way that Scripture bears the same relation to the mind of God which was its source as a letter written by a good secretary bears to the mind of the man from which she took it. i.e. a relationship of complete correspondence and thus absolute authenticity.

    God’s condescension

While modern writers often speak of God condescending to human terms they usually have reference to human fallibility. This was not Calvin’s understanding. Rather God simplified his language to conform to our incomplete understanding. “God condescends to our immaturity. . . When God prattles to us in Scripture in a clumsy, homely style, let us know that this is done on account of the love he bears us.” T. . L. Parker has noted:

Calvin frequently expresses this [accommodation] under the simile of an adult (usually he means a mother) communicating with a child and confining herself to concepts, syntax, and vocabulary that he can understand With a very small child this becomes baby-talk hardly recognizable as the same language the mother normally speaks. Now Calvin obviously assumes that by means of this to an adult barely comprehensible language the mother genuinely expresses meaning to the child, and the child genuinely comprehends that meaning. So God prattles or babbles with man in Scripture.

    Inerrancy

While Calvin does at times speak of mistakes in Scripture, such mistakes are limited to the transmission of the text, not the text as it was originally given.

Related Topics: History, Inspiration

Evangelicals and the Canon of the New Testament

Related Media

Canon Determination for Evangelicals

Over the past two decades American Evangelical scholarship has ably risen to the defense of the doctrine of the inerrancy of the Bible as a touchstone upholding the historic position of the Church of Jesus Christ with reference to its authority. While volumes have been penned discussing the nature of biblical inspiration and the consequent authority of the scripture, it seems curious that in all the bibliological discussions one crucial issue is scarcely mentioned; that issue is the issue of canon. Apart from R. Laird Harris' Inspiration and Canonicity of the Bible, David Dunbar's chapter, "The Biblical Canon" in Hermeneutics, Authority and Canon, Geisler and Nix's discussion in their General Introduction to the Bible and the recent series of articles in Christianity Today,1 American Evangelicals who affirm the inerrancy of Scripture have had little to say concerning the shape of the canon.2 The sixty-six books which compose the Protestant Scriptures are assumed to be the complete written revelation of God to man without further comment or debate.

It has been charged that conservative evangelicalism's reticence to discuss the issue of canon is due to the fact that it "finds itself imprisoned within a 19th century biblicism which believes that to question the canon is to undermine the authority of Scripture."3 Outside the evangelical fold, the question of canon has been debated for decades with the discussion centering on the nature of canon itself. Emil Bruner has noted:

The question of canon has never, in principle, been answered, but is being continually reopened. Just as the church of the second, third and fourth centuries had the right to decide what was "apostolic" and what was not, on their own responsibilities as believers, so in the same way every church in every period in the history of the church possesses the same right and the same duty.4

While Bruner may overstate the case, the question he raises is the question of the certainty of historical knowledge. This question has profound implications for the faith.

I would propose that the evangelical approach to canon determination has historically been the weakest link in its bibliology. This weakness has persisted for several reasons. (1) Canon has not been a pressing issue of debate on the larger theological horizon. (2) It has been assumed that the canon of the New Testament was closed definitively in the fourth century. (3) Apostolicity has been assumed as the controlling issue because of the early mention of this feature by the Fathers. (4) The New Testament canon has been accepted uncritically because of the theological assumption that through divine providence the early church was led (infallibly) to its canonical decisions.

In this paper I want to (1) address the question of canon, (2) look critically at the traditional inerrantist apologetic for the canon, (3) trace briefly the development of the New Testament canon up through the Reformation, and (4) propose an alternative determination process.

Evangelical Proposals on Canon Determination

Evangelical understanding of the criteria by which the New Testament books were recognized as canonical follows the basic outline laid down by B. B. Warfield and his fellow Princetonians, Charles and A. A. Hodge over a century ago. These criteria focused exclusively upon the question of apostolicity. The unstated corollary of apostolicity was the conviction that divine providence had led the church to recognize all and only those books which were apostolic. An examination of Warfield as a principle architect, and of R. Laird Harris and Geisler and Nix as contemporary adherents will demonstrate this outlook.

B. B. Warfield

Warfield echoed the sentiment of the early church in stressing the primacy of apostolicity in canon determination.5 He argued that apostolicity was a somewhat wider concept than strictly apostolic authorship, although in the early church these two issues were often confounded.6 "The principle of canonicity was not apostolic authorship," contended Warfield, "but imposition by the apostles as law."7 The practical effect of this subtle distinction is to allow for the inclusion of books such as Mark, Luke, James, Jude and Hebrews which were not actually penned by the apostles, but were, according to tradition, written under apostolic sanction. Warfield asserted that the canon of Scripture was complete when the last book of the New Testament was penned by the Apostle John circa A.D. 95. From the divine standpoint the canon of Scripture was complete. However, human acceptance of an individual book of that canon hinged upon "authenticating proof of its apostolicity."8 The key idea here is the concept of apostolic law. Scripture was authoritative because it was written by an apostle who imposed his writing upon the church in the same fashion as Torah was imposed upon Israel. As he stated,

We rest our acceptance of the New Testament Scriptures as authoritative thus, not on the fact that they are the product of the revelation-age of the church, for so are many other books which we do not thus accept; but on the fact that God's authoritative agents in founding the church gave them as authoritative to the church which they founded. . . . It is clear that prophetic and apostolic origin is the very essence of the authority of the Scriptures.9

The fact that these manuscripts were hand copied coupled with the lack of modern methods of travel made the slow collection of the manuscripts a foregone conclusion.

The problem for the church today, as Warfield admitted, is that "we cannot at this day hear the apostolic voice in its (a New Testament book's) authorization. Beyond the witness one apostolic book was to bear to another--as Paul in 1 Timothy 5:18 authenticates Luke--and what witness an apostolic book may bear to itself, we cannot appeal at this day to immediate apostolic authorization."10

To answer the question of canonicity, Warfield took as a test case the epistle of Second Peter, a book whose canonicity had been repeatedly doubted over the centuries, and proceeded to investigate the provenance of the epistle to prove its canonicity. He asserted that if one demonstrated that the letter was old enough to have been written by an apostle and that the Church had from the beginning held the book to be an authoritative rule of faith, then "the presumption is overwhelming that the church from the apostolic age held it to be divine only because it had received it from the apostles as divine."11 Having completed his external proof, Warfield then examined critical objections to Petrine authorship based upon internal evidence to see if indeed the critical objections were valid.. Having dismissed the critical objections,12 he concluded that the book was genuine and that to question its canonicity is to lead the Church astray into heresy.13

Warfield's argument is closely reasoned and convincing. He incisively demolished the arguments of his opponents showing their inadequate basis and contradictory presuppositions. However, even his colleague and friend at Princeton, Francis Landy Patton in eulogizing Warfield, noted that the rationalism of Warfield's system of logic was built upon probability which precluded the absolute certainty of his conclusions.14

R. Laird Harris

Harris's 1957 work, Inspiration and Canonicity of the Bible, was among the first in recent years to address seriously the question of canon from an evangelical perspective. Harris follows Warfield closely in insisting upon apostolic authorship as the criterion for New Testament canonicity.15 He goes beyond Warfield by denying that the Reformation principle of the witness of the Spirit is a valid test of canonicity.16 Harris painstakingly demonstrates that the crucial question for the early church was, "Was the work written by an apostle?" To answer this question he deduces numerous quotations from the ancient fathers which attest the apostolic authorship of the New Testament books.

To answer the question of the presence of books which make no claim to apostolic authorship, he asserts that such books were written by disciples of the apostles who carefully reproduced their master's teaching. With reference to Mark, Harris notes the ancient tradition connecting the second gospel with the Apostle Peter. ". . . Papias explicitly states that the second Gospel is accepted because of Peter, not because of Mark."17

With reference to the book of Hebrews, Harris cites the early traditions which ascribe the work to Paul, noting that the lack of that apostle's characteristic salutation was, according to Pantaenus, due to the fact that Paul was apostle to the Gentiles, rather than the apostle to the Hebrews. He notes, too, the statement of Clement that the epistle had been composed in Hebrew and then translated into Greek by Luke.18 This early testimony notwithstanding, Harris denies Pauline authorship to the book of Hebrews because the author of the epistle himself claims to be a second generation believer (Heb. 2:3-4). But having said this he asserts that, "No apostle other than Paul is seriously mentioned in connection with the writing of Hebrews."19

So committed is Harris to the proposition of apostolic authorship, that having noted the fact that the author himself claims to be a second generation believer, not of the apostolic inner circle, he then notes that wherever the epistle was accepted as canonical it was accepted into the canon only in those places . . . where it was considered to be a genuine work of Paul. Appeal was not made to its antiquity nor to the testimony of the Holy Spirit, nor to any other auxiliary reason. Authorship was what was decisive.20

Harris recognizes the dilemma in which this position places him. If the book is not Pauline in authorship, should it be excised from the canon? His previous judgment notwithstanding, he proposes that the book was written by Paul employing Barnabas as his amanuensis.21 "This would at once explain the unquestioned acceptance (no other anonymous work was so accepted), variation in style from Paul's, the anonymity where the details of authorship were not known and only the style problem appeared, and the double tradition of authorship in other circles."22

While he seriously proposes the Paul-Barnabas authorship of Hebrews, he recognizes that this cannot be proved beyond the shadow of a doubt, and allows that there may have been some other amanuensis. Even so the basic thrust of the argument remains the same. Apostolicity in the strict sense remains the governing criterion for acceptance into the canon.

Geisler and Nix

Geisler and Nix in their General Introduction to the Bible23 evidence a widening of the very narrow position adopted by Harris. Taking a different starting point than Warfield and Harris, they assert that canonicity is determined by God. Humans do not determine canon, they merely discover the already existent canon which God has given. The key concept in the discovery of canonicity was the recognition of a book's inspiration by God.24 In addition, canonicity is seen as being inexorably linked to authenticity. While Harris made apostolicity the sole criterion for the church's subjective determination of the already existent objective canon, Geisler and Nix propose five principles which guided the ancient church in its discovery of canon. It should be noted that these five principles involve assumption on their part. There is no documentation from patristic sources that these principles were consciously employed.

The first of these principles is that of authority. Specifically, this criterion looks at the book itself and asks the question, "Does it have a self-vindicating authority that commands attention as it communicates?"25 Many books were either rejected or doubted because the voice of God was not heard clearly in the book.

The second test for canonicity was that of the prophetic nature of the book. Whereas the former test looked at the book itself, this test looked at authorship. ". . . A book was judged as to whether or not it was genuinely written by the stated author who was a spokesman in the mainstream of redemptive revelation, either a prophet (whether in Old or New Testament times) or an apostle."26 This criterion evidences a loosening of the principle of apostolicity which Harris asserts, since Geisler and Nix would include New Testament prophets (presumably Mark, Luke, James, Jude, the author of Hebrews, etc.). By this test all pseudonymous writings written under false pretenses and forgeries are to be rejected.27

The third test for canonicity which Geisler and Nix contend was operational in the early church was that of authenticity. (By authenticity they mean authenticity of doctrine rather than authorship.) This test would compare the teachings of any book vying for entrance into the canon with the doctrine of the already accepted books. Since truth cannot contradict truth, if the book under consideration was found to be at variance with the rest of the canon it would automatically be rejected as non-canonical.

The fourth test was one of power. "Does the book come with the power of God?" Since the Word of God was living and active and it was profitable for edification, if a book did not accomplish this goal it was rejected.28

The fifth and final test was its reception: Was it generally accepted by the orthodox church? This they admit "is rather a confirmation, and does serve the obvious purpose of making final the decision and availability of the books."29

Weaknesses of the Evangelical View

Whether the criterion be inspiration, apostolicity or something else, I believe that we must acknowledge the a posteriori nature of the methods of canon determination which have been proposed. Ridderbos has well noted:

As their artificiality indicates, these arguments are a posteriori in character. To hold that the church was led to accept these writings by such criteria, in fact speak here of a criteria canonicitais is to go too far. It is rather clear that we have to do with more or less successful attempts to cover with arguments what had already been fixed for a long time and for the fixation of which, such reasoning or such criteria had never been employed.30

. . . the church did not begin by making formal decisions as to what was valid as canon, nor did it begin by setting specific criteria of canonicity.31

Brevard Childs concurs in this assessment noting, "It is hard to escape the impression that the later expositions of the criteria of canonicity were, in large part, after-the-fact explanations of the church's experience of faith in Jesus Christ which were evoked by the continued use of certain books."32 The real problem of these a posteriori explanations is that they inject another level of canon into the discussion. As Ridderbos contended:

Every attempt to find an a posteriori element to justify the canon, whether sought in the authority of its doctrine or in the consensus of the church that gradually developed goes beyond the canon itself, and thereby posits a canon above the canon which comes in conflict with the nature of canon itself.33

The questions of inspiration and apostolicity must be briefly addressed. Geisler and Nix, as noted above, make inspiration a criterion for canonicity. While I do not dispute the truth of this statement, I contend that it is inadequate and does not solve the problem. The concept of writing under inspiration was common (albeit not universal) in the ancient church.34 Clement makes this claim for his epistle to the Corinthians.35 Even Eusebius makes the claim for his life of Constantine.36 Yet, neither Clement nor Eusebius claim that their writings have the authority of Scripture. My point here is not to argue that Clement or Eusebius were or were not inspired, but that the criterion of inspiration for canonicity was not consciously employed by the ancient church.37 With reference to the claim of apostolicity, I believe we must admit that the apostles wrote more documents than have been preserved for us (e.g. 3 Corinthians; Laodiceans) which evidently bore the full weight of their apostolic authority. While we may argue that these documents were not inspired and were therefore not preserved, from a strictly logical point of view, we merely beg the question. Thus, while either of these two criteria alone or both together can contribute to our assurance as to the shape of the New Testament canon, they fail to fully answer the question at hand.

If we insist upon apostolicity as the means by which we are assured that our twenty-seven book canon is in fact the canon of Jesus Christ, as did Warfield and Harris, we ultimately are forced to rely upon the "assured results of higher criticism" for the certainty of our Scriptures. Since even as Warfield noted, "We cannot this day hear the apostolic voice in its authorization. . . ." Ridderbos, I believe rightly, contends:

. . . an historical judgement cannot be the final and sole ground for the acceptance of the New Testament as canonical by the church. To do so would mean that the church would base its faith on the results of historical investigation.38

The Development
of the New Testament Canon

Discussions of canon tend to develop in one of two directions depending upon the definition of canon adopted by the theologian. Warfield and Geisler and Nix adopt a material definition and stress the objective existence of a God-given standard, which exists by virtue of its divine inspiration. In this sense, canon emphasizes the inherent authority of the writing. The second type of discussion, taking its clue from the original usage of the term "canon," stresses the formal development of the canon in the sense of a completed list, an authoritative collection, a closed collection, if you will, to which nothing can be added.39 These discussions view the formal recognition process and usually see the church in some sense as giving its official approval to the collection.40

The common evangelical view of the development of the New Testament canon sees the canon as having arisen gradually and through usage rather than through conciliar pronouncement which vested the books of the New Testament with some kind of authority. Athanasius' festal letter (A.D. 367) is generally viewed as the document which fixed the canon in the East, and the decision of the Council of Carthage in the West is viewed as having fixed the Latin canon. Youngblood summarizes this position in his recent Christianity Today article,

The earliest known recognition of the 27 books of the New Testament as alone canonical, to which nothing is to be added and from which nothing is to be subtracted, is the list preserved by Athanasius (A.D. 367). The Synod of Hippo (A.D. 393) and the Third Synod of Carthage (A.D. 397) duly acquiesced, again probably under the influence of the redoubtable Augustine.41

The closing of the two canons and their amalgamation into one are historical watersheds that it would be presumptuous to disturb. 42

Evangelicals insist upon the primacy of the written documents of Scripture over and against all human authority. However, in so doing we tend to overlook the fact that other authority did in fact exist in the ancient church, particularly the authority of Jesus Christ and His apostles. We often fail to appreciate that the church was founded not upon the apostolic documents, but rather the apostolic doctrine. The church existed at least a decade before the earliest book of the New Testament was penned, and possibly as long as six decades until it was completed. But during this period it was not without authority. Its standard, its canon, was ultimately Jesus Christ Himself,43 and mediately His apostles. Even in the immediate post-apostolic period we find a great stress on apostolic tradition along side a written New Testament canon.44

As the apostles died, this living stream of tradition grew fainter. The written documents became progressively more important to the on-going life of the church. The question of competing authorities in the sense of written and oral tradition subsided. However, even as late as the mid-second century we find an emphasis on oral tradition which stands in some way parallel to the written gospels as authoritative.45

The concept of an authoritative Christian tradition can be traced back into the New Testament itself. On numerous occasions Paul speaks of the chain of receiving and delivering a body of teaching.46 It is therefore not surprising to see in this early period both written works and oral tradition existing side by side in some sort of authoritative fashion.47

Without doubt, the earliest Bible for the Church consisted of the Old Testament Scriptures, interpreted Christologically. Additionally, in the New Testament itself we find at least one case of some New Testament books being placed on a par with the Old Testament.48 This probably indicates that even at this early date the writings of the apostles were viewed in some circles as being on a par with the Old Testament.49 However, as Bruce has noted:

. . . such hints would not necessarily indicate a new corpus of sacred scripture: if Paul's letters are reckoned along with "the other scriptures" in 2 Peter 3:16, that might in itself imply their addition to the Old Testament writings, perhaps in kind of an appendix, rather than the emergence of a new and distinct canon.50

The earliest solid evidence we find of a New Testament canon, in the sense of an authoritative collection of writings comes not from the hand of the orthodox church with its apostolic tradition, but from the second century heretic, Marcion.51 It was in part this heretical threat which impelled the church to come to grips with the extent of its authoritative writings. The earliest evidence we possess of a canonical collection of books by the ancient church is the Muratorian Canon, dated in the mid to late second century.52

Another factor which affected the formation of the New Testament canon was theological. The Montanist movement, with its claim to a continuing prophetic revelation, relied heavily upon the Apocalypse.53 This provoked a reaction particularly by the orthodox church of Syria, which from this point forward, rejected the Apocalypse, although it had earlier looked upon the book with favor. Evidently, this was a situation where the apostolic tradition was looked to in adjudging the heterodox nature of the Montanist position. In an attempt to discredit this position, parts of the ancient church were not averse to denying books it had previously approved, in order to cut the ground out from under the heterodox.

Yet another factor which must be considered in the canonization of the New Testament is the phenomenon of Tatian's Diatesseron. Tatian, a pupil of Justin Martyr, took the four canonical gospels and from them composed a harmony. This work supplanted the canonical gospels in the Syrian church well into the fifth century, at which time the hierarchy made a concerted effort to stamp out the work and restore the four canonical gospels to their rightful place within the canon.54

The Festal letter of Athanasius (c. A.D. 367) is well known as the first list to contain all and only the present twenty-seven book New Testament Canon. Thirty years later the Synod of Carthage, under the influence of the great Augustine, reached a similar conclusion. Youngblood gives the common Protestant evaluation of these pronouncements:

Thus led (as we believe) by divine Providence, scholars during the latter half of the fourth century settled for all time the limits of the New Testament canon. The 27 books of Matthew through Revelation constitute that New Testament, which possesses divine authority equal to that of the Old.55

The problem with such a sweeping assertion is that it does not fit the historical facts. First, the synods of Hippo and Carthage were not ecumenical councils, but local assemblies whose decisions held sway only in the local sees.56 The Festal letter of Athanasius, to be sure, gives us the judgment of a key figure of the ancient church, but it did not bind even the Eastern Church.57 The ancient church never reached a conscious and binding decision as to the extent of canon. Proof of this fact can be seen in the canons of the various churches of the empire.

While the canon in the West proved to be relatively stable from the late fourth century, the canon in the oriental churches varied, sometimes widely. The Syriac church at the beginning of the fifth century employed only the Diatesseron (in place of the four gospels), Acts, and the Pauline epistles.58 During the fifth century the Peshitta was produced and became the standard Syriac version. In it the Diatesseron was replaced by the four gospels, 3 Corinthians was removed and three Catholic epistles, James, 1 Peter and 1 John were included. The Apocalypse and the other Catholic epistles were excluded, making a twenty-two book canon. The remaining books did not make their way into the Syriac canon until the late sixth century with the appearance of the Harclean Syriac Version.59 While the Syrian church recognized an abbreviated canon, the Ethiopic Church recognized the twenty-seven books of the New Testament plus The Shepherd of Hermas, 1 & 2 Clement and eight books of the Apostolic Constitutions.60

Even in the West the canon was not closed as tightly as commonly believed. A case in point is the apocryphal Epistle to the Laodiceans. In the tenth century, Alfric, later Archbishop of Canterbury, lists the work as among the canonical Pauline epistles. Westcott observes that the history of this epistle "forms one of the most interesting episodes in the literary history of the Bible."61 He notes that from the sixth century onward Laodiceans occurs frequently in Latin manuscripts, including many which were prepared for church use. So common was the epistle in the Medieval period, it passed into several vernacular translations, including the Bohemian Bible as late as 1488. It also occurred in the Albigensian Version of Lyons, and while not translated by Wycliffe personally, it was added to several manuscripts of his translation of the New Testament.62

On the eve of the Reformation, it was not only Luther who had problems with the extent of the New Testament canon. Doubts were being expressed even by some of the loyal sons of the Church. Luther's opponent at Augsburg, Cardinal Cajetan, following Jerome, expressed doubts concerning the canonicity of Hebrews, James, 2 and 3 John, and Jude. Of the latter three he states, "They are of less authority than those which are certainly Holy Scripture."63 Erasmus likewise expressed doubts concerning Revelation as well as the apostolicity of James, Hebrews and 2 Peter. It was only as the Protestant Reformation progressed, and Luther's willingness to excise books from the canon threatened Rome that, at Trent, the Roman Catholic Church hardened its consensus stand on the extent of the New Testament canon into a conciliar pronouncement.64

The point of this survey has been to demonstrate that the New Testament canon was not closed in the fourth century. Debates continued concerning the fringe books of the canon until the Reformation. During the Reformation, both the Reformed and Catholic Churches independently asserted the twenty-seven book New Testament canon. Youngblood asserts that the canon was closed by providence and we have no right to question that closure. I believe Youngblood errs at this point. The problem I find with his assertion is that it is an extra-biblical pronouncement to which, apparently, the theological equivalent of canonical authority is being given.65 While I believe that divine providence did superintend the collection of the New Testament canon, we cannot equate providence with the belief of the majority. If this were true, we should all be Roman Catholic today! As Klyne Snodgrass has asserted, "Providence is not enough."66 Rather than focus solely upon the external criteria of apostolicity, inspiration or providence for our assurance that our present twenty-seven book NT canon is indeed the canon of Jesus Christ I believe that there is a better way for us to approach the problem. This way is not new but a return to and recognition of the Reformers' doctrine of the witness of the Spirit and the self-authenticating nature of Scripture

The Autopistie of Scripture and the Witness of the Spirit

Discomfort with the traditional conservative Evangelical apologetic for the canon is not new. A century ago this became a central focus of Charles Briggs' attack on the Princetonian bibliology.67 More recently, Ridderbos has argued that the common apologetic for canon ultimately leads a person to one of two alternatives, a certainty based upon what amounts to the assured results of higher criticism, or the infallibility of the church.68 For the evangelical Protestant neither of these alternatives is ultimately satisfying.

Ridderbos and Briggs both build their rationale for canon recognition upon the Reformers, arguing that the autopistie of the writings themselves objectively, and the witness of the Spirit subjectively form the proper matrix through which we should view the shape of the canon.69 Shifting the means of our certainty of the form of the canon from the objective external criterion of apostolicity alone should in no way imply down-playing the importance of this factor as a ground of canon. Rather as Warfield and Ridderbos both have noted, no book of the New Testament as we possess it contains a certificate of authentication as to its apostolic origin. That is, from our perspective, separated by nearly two millennia from the autographs, we cannot rely upon such means as the known signature of the apostle Paul to assure a book's authenticity. Hence, we cannot use apostolicity as the means by which we are ultimately assured of the shape of the canon. The same can be said for the criterion of prophetic authorship, unless we merely beg the question and assert that the book itself is evidence that its author was a prophet.

I believe that the starting point of canonicity must be a recognition that at the most basic level it is the risen Lord Himself who is ultimately the canon of His church.70 As Ridderbos has observed:

The very ground or basis for the recognition of the canon is therefore, in principle, redemptive-historical, i.e. Christological. For Christ himself is not only the canon in which God comes to the world, but Christ establishes the canon and gives it its concrete historical form.71

It then follows that it is also Christ who causes His church to accept the canon and to recognize it by means of the witness of the Holy Spirit. With this proposition I believe most evangelical Protestants would agree. However, this does not relieve us of the responsibility of examining the history of the canon, nor does it give us the right to identify absolutely the canon of Jesus Christ with the canon of the church. As Ridderbos has said, ". . . the absoluteness of the canon cannot be separated from the relativity of history."72 In short, we confess that our Lord has given us an objective standard of authority, for our purposes today that consists of the written documents. But we also recognize that, due to sinfulness, insensitivity or misunderstanding, it is possible for us subjectively to fail to recognize properly the objective canon Christ has given. We may include a book which does not belong, or exclude a book which does belong.

How then are we to determine what properly belongs to the canon? Is it "every man for himself"? I believe that Charles Briggs has proposed a viable method for us to consider today. Following the Reformers, he proposed a threefold program for canon determination, built upon the "rock of the Reformation principle of the Sacred Scriptures."73 The first principle in canon determination was the testimony of the church. By examining tradition and the early written documents, he contended that probable evidence could be presented to men that the Scriptures "recognized as of divine authority and canonical by such general consent are indeed what they claim to be."74

With reference to the Protestant canon this evidence was, he believed, unanimous. This evidence was not determinative, however. It was only "probable." It was the evidence of general consent, although given under the leading of the Spirit. It was from this general consent that conciliar pronouncements were made. It did not, however, settle the issue, since divine authority could not be derived from ecclesiastical pronouncement or consensus. The second and next higher level of evidence was that of the character of the Scriptures themselves. This is the Reformers' doctrine of the autopistie of the Scriptures. Their character was pure and holy, having a beauty, harmony and majesty. The Scriptures also breathed piety and devotion to God; they revealed redemption and satisfied the spiritual longing within the soul of man. All these features served to convince that the Scriptures were indeed the very Word of God. As Briggs stated, "If men are not won by the holy character of the biblical books, it must be because for some reason their eyes have been withheld from seeing it."75 It is in light of this concept that we should understand the Syriac church's rejection of the Apocalypse and Luther's rejection of the book of James. In both cases there was a pressing theological reason which kept them from seeing the divine fingerprints upon specific books of the New Testament. In a very real sense it was their zeal for the truth of the apostolic faith/gospel which blinded them.76

The third and highest principle of canon determination was that of the witness of the Spirit. He stated, "The Spirit of God bears witness by and with the particular writing . . . , in the heart of the believer, removing every doubt and assuring the soul of its possession of the truth of God."77

Briggs saw the witness of the Spirit as threefold. As noted earlier, the Spirit bore witness to the particular writing. Secondly, the Spirit bore witness "by and with the several writings in such a manner as to assure the believer"78 that they were each a part of the one divine revelation. This argument was cumulative. As one recognized one book as divine, it became easier to recognize the same marks in another of the same character.79 A systematic study of the Scriptures yielded a conviction of the fact that the canon was an organic whole. The Holy Spirit illumined the mind and heart to perceive this organic whole and thus gave certainty to the essential place of each writing in the Word of God.80

Third, the Spirit bore witness "to the church as an organized body of believers, through their free consent in their various communities and countries to the unity and variety of the . . . Scriptures as the complete and perfect canon."81 This line of evidence was a reworking of the historical argument but strengthening it with the "vital argument of the divine evidence."82 Whereas before, the church testimony was external and formal, whenever the believer came to recognize the Holy Spirit as the guiding force in the Church in both the formation and recognition of the canon, "then we may know that the testimony of the Church is the testimony of divine Spirit speaking through the Church."83

Focusing on the principle of the witness of the Spirit for assurance in canonical questions introduced a subjectivity factor which rendered the question of canon, in the absolute sense, undefinable.84 While the Reformers did attempt in their creeds to define the limits of canon, Briggs contended that in so doing they betrayed their own principle of canon determination. If Scripture was self-evidencing, then that evidence that God was the Author was to the individual.85 In addition, doctrinal definition, in order to be binding upon the Church, had to be held by consensus of the whole church. Both the Reformed churches and the Roman Catholic Church represented but a fraction of the church catholic, hence, they could not give definitive pronouncement to canon questions.86 He held that the question of canon must then be regarded as open to this day in the subjective sense. An individual believer was thus free to doubt the canonicity of a particular book without the fear of being charged with heresy.87

Summarizing Briggs' method of canon determination: first, the logical order began with the human testimony as probable evidence to the divine origin of Scripture. This testimony brought the individual to esteem the Scriptures highly. Next, when he turned to the pages of Scripture itself, they exerted an influence upon his soul. Finally, the divine testimony convinced him of the extent of the truth of God, at which point he shared in the consensus of the church.88

Conclusion

The question of the Canon of the New Testament is clearly not as simple as it appears in survey texts and popular presentations. Among evangelicals, theories of canon determination have tended to stress external criteria for assurance that the Scripture we possess today is in fact the whole extent of the Revelation which God has given to the believer. While I do not believe this is totally invalid, I have suggested weaknesses in this approach if by it we want to build absolute assurance.

Earlier I used the phrase "the assurred results of higher criticism" to describe our apologetic for our New Testament canon. I use the phrase advisedly, not hyperbolically, for it is indeed literary criticism upon which we engage when we seek to explore the provanence of a document. I use this phrase also to bring to mind the arrogant reconstructionist claims of the nineteenth century concerning the nature of Scripture. As we have watched archaeologists' shovels undercut these "assured results" we have rejoiced that the historic faith of the church in its scriptures has been vindicated again and again. Yet, American evangelicals have forsaken their Reformation heritage and slipped into the same type of rationalism regarding the canon as that for which we castigate liberals of a bygone era. My point here is that we as Evangelical Christians are by definition, people of faith. I believe that when we attempt to build our rationale for our New Testament canon solely upon rational ground we betray the faith principle.

The individual's ultimate assurance that the Scripture he has received is indeed the Word of God must be grounded upon something more (but not less) than historical investigation. Scripture as the Word of God brings with it its own witness, the Holy Spirit, who alone can give certainty and assurance.

The canon of the New Testament was not closed historically by the early church. Rather, its extent was debated until the Reformation. Even then, it was closed in a sectarian fashion. Therefore the question must be asked, is it then heresy for a person to question or reject a book of the present canon ? There have been repeated reevaluations of the church's canon. This happened during the initial sifting period. It happened again during the Renaissance and Reformation period, and it is beginning to happen again now. In such instances the fringe books of the canon have been repeatedly questioned. If an individual believer should come to question or reject a book or books of the accepted canon, should that person be regarded as a heretic, or accepted as a brother whose opinions are not necessarily endorsed?


1 The February 5, 1988 issue of Christianity Today included five brief articles covering different issues and perspectives on the subject of canon; Ronald Youngblood, "The Process; How We Got Our Bible," Richard B. Gaffin, Jr., "The New Testament: How Do We Know for Sure?"; Klyne Snodgrass, "Providence Is Not Enough"; David G. Dunbar, "Why The Canon Still Rumbles"; Kenneth S. Kantzer, "Confidence in the Face of Confusion."

2 Throughout this paper the term "conservative Evangelical" will be employed in the restricted sense of one who affirms the inerrancy of Scripture. More latitudinal Evangelicals have recently published significant works on the NT canon. Bruce Metzger's The Canon of The New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon, 1987) is the most significant of these.

3 Richard Lyon Morgan, "Let's be Honest About the Canon," The Christian Century 84 (May 31, 1967), 717.84 (May 31, 1967), 717 (italics added). This confounding of the questions of inspiration and canonicity occurs on both the conservative and liberal side of the theological spectrum. One need only remember that some of those who do not profess evangelical convictions attempt to prove that Luther did not hold to inerrancy since he questioned books on the fringes of the canon.

4 Ibid.

5 F.F. Bruce discusses surveys the concept of apostolicity in the early church and documents numerous mentions of this factor as being a primary criterion in canon determination. He also mentions other issues related to apostolicity which were mentioned by some patristic writers as offering evidence that a book was indeed canonical.(The Canon of Scripture [Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1988], 256-269, especially 256-258] R. Laird Harris, surveying the same material insists that the sole criterion was apostolic authorship. (Inspiraion and Canonicity of the Bible [Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1957, 1969], 219-245, especially 244-245.)

6 B. B. Warfield, "The Formation of the Canon of The New Testament," The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1970), 415.

7 Ibid.

8 Ibid., (italics added).

9 B. B. Warfield, "Review of A. W. Deickhoff, Das Gepredigte Wort und die Heilge Schrift and Das Wort Gottes," The Presbyterian Review 10 (1890):506.

10 B.B. Warfield, "The Canonicity of Second Peter," in The Selected Shorter Writings Of B.B.Warfield-II,(edited by John Meeter) (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1976), 48-49.

11 Ibid., 49.

12 The internal objections Warfield dealt with were six. [1] Peter's name was frequently forged in the ancient church . [2] The external support of 2 Peter is insufficient. [3] The epistle has plainly borrowed largely from Jude, which by some was judged unworthy of an apostle , while others held this to be a proof that 2 Peter belongs to the second century, on the ground of the assumed ungenuineness of Jude. [4] The author exhibits too great a desire to make himself out to be Peter. [5] The author betrays that he wrote in a later time by numerous anachronisms. [6] The style of 2 Peter is too divergent from that of 1 Peter to have been written by the same individual. In typical style, Warfield concluded:

The state of the argument, then , really is this: a mountain mass of presumption in favor of the genuineness and canonicity of 2 Peter, to be raised and overturned only by a very strong lever of rebutting evidence; a pitible show of rebutting evidence offered as a lever. It is doubtless true that we can move the world if proper lever and fulcrum be given. But if the lever is a common quarryman's tool and the fulcrum thin air! Then woe to the man who wields it. What can such rebutting evidence as we have here injure, execpt his own cause? (Ibid., 74-75)

13 Ibid., 79.

14 F. L. Patton, "Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield," The Princeton Theological Review 19 (1921), 369-91. Norman Kraus rightly observes concerning Warfield's use of reason,

His `evidence,' on his own admission, did not amount to demonstration, and yet he sought to escape the logical consequences of this admission by claiming that `probable' evidence though different in kind from `demonstrable evidence' is nonetheless objective, rational, and capable of establishing certainty of conviction. Thus he claimed that the probable evidence which he had produced was of such a quantity and quality as to overwhelmingly establish the rational ground for and force mental assent to the message and authority of Scripture. But in the final analysis, he was unable to close the gap between probability and absolute certainty with a rational demonstration of mathematical quality. . . And as long as the gap between probability and demonstration remains, there also remains the necessity of a subjective and volitional response to the appeal of truth before there can be certainty (The Principle of Authority in the Theology of B. B. Warfield, William Adams Brown, and Gerald Birney Smith, [Ann Arbor Mi: University Microfilms (Drew University Ph.D. dissertation) 1961], 270). [Italics added]

Warfield has frequently been criticized on this point by friend and foe alike. See C. Van Til's introduction to Warfield's Inspiration and Authority of the Bible (Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed) 3-68; J. J. Makarian, The Calvinistic Concept of Biblical Revelation in the Theology of Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield, (Ann Arbor, MI: University Microfilms [Drew University Ph.D. dissertation] 1963), 75; William Livingston, The Princeton Apologetic as Exemplified by the Work of Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield and J. Gresham Machen: A study in American Theology, 1880-1930 [Yale University, Ph.D. dissertation] 1963.

15 This corresponds to the requirement of prophetic authorship as the requirement for canonicity of an Old Testament book.

16 R. Laird Harris, The Inspiration and Canonicity of the Bible, (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1978), 287-289. Of the fides divina Warfield had stated, ." . . that the inspired Scriptures as such may be determined for faith, there is need, besides the witness of the Holy Ghost, of an external criterion." ("Review of A. W. Deickhoff, Das Gepredigte Wort und die Heilige Schrift und Das Wort Gottes," The Presbyterian Review 10 [1890]:507). While he did not deny the principle of the witness of the Spirit, he did reduce it to a sanctified rationalism.

17 Harris, 239-240. Similar evidence is adduced from Justin. Harris concludes concerning the authorship:

It appears that Mark and Luke were not mere second-generation disciples who followed their masters in time and wrote what they pleased, but were disciples who followed the teachings of their masters in such a way that they presented their masters' teachings, and their production had their masters' authority. . . We are reminded of Tertullian's use of the phrase "apostolic men," referring to Mark and Luke. In both cases it should be noted that these are not mere companions of the apostles but are, as it were, assistants, understudies, who reproduced their masters' teachings. . . Quite clearly Mark and Luke are not authoritative in their own right; rather they are authoritative because of their adherence to their apostolic masters. (Ibid.)

Elsewhere, Harris cites the tradition coming from Clement of Alexandria that Mark began his composition before the death of Peter. He even notes Eusebius' claim that Peter approved of the finished work. While he recognizes that the accuracy of this tradition cannot be verified, his inclusion of the tradition with pointed emphasis seems to indicate that he at least thinks the tradition may be accurate (262). But should the tradition not be accurate, and it be demonstrated that Mark composed his gospel following Peter's death (as other patristic writers indicate) and supplemented Peter's teaching with reference to the already composed Gospel of Matthew, Mark could still be seen as preserving his master's teaching (263).

As he turns our attention to the books of the antilegomena where the question of apostolicity becomes more acute, Harris goes to great lengths to demonstrate the possibility that the books in question were written by members of the original inner circle of the Twelve. With reference to James and Jude, Harris notes the tradition of two Jameses and two Judes in the apostolic church.

. . . Comparison of John 19:25 with Mark 15:40 indicates that the two Marys, sisters, were at the Cross, and one is variously called the mother of James and the wife of Cleopas. It appears that Cleopas is to be identified with Alphaeus, the father of James and Jude. So if there were half brothers of Jesus called James and Jude, they would have been cousins of the apostolic brothers James and Jude (261).

The Roman Catholic church holds that there was only one pair of brothers, hence the apostolic pair is seen by Catholics as the authors of the books bearing their names. While the usual Protestant position is that Our Lord had biological brothers, Harris notes: "We should remember that according to the usual Protesant view, these Epistles, if genuine, may very well be apostolic, written by the sons of Alphaeus" (262). However, should it be demonstrated the books were penned by the half brothers of Christ, "it may yet be inferred that the half brothers of Christ, like Paul, were also inducted into the apostolic office as those born out of due season" (263). He concludes his discussion noting, "We at least do not have enough information to deny the apostolic authorship of these two Epistles." (Ibid.) At this point Harris begs the question at hand.

18 Ibid., 264.

19 Ibid., 266.

20 Ibid., 268.

21 Ibid., 270.

22 Ibid.

23 Norman Geisler and William Nix, A General Introduction to the Bible (Chicago: Moody Press, 1968).

24 Ibid., 133.

25 Ibid., 138. This criterion is akin to the Reformed doctrine of the autopistie of Scripture.

26 Ibid., 139.

27 Ibid., 140. Geisler and Nix are careful to point out that pseudonymity adopted as a literary device would not exclude a book from the canon. The case in point here would be the book of Ecclesiastes in which many understand the author to have written autobiographically as though he were Solomon. Such a device would in their view be allowable since it involved no moral deception.

28 Ibid., 142.

29 Ibid., 143. Italics original.

30 Herman Ridderbos, The Authority of the New Testament Scriptures, (Philadelphia: Presbyterian & Reformed Publishing Co., 1963), 46-47.

31 Ibid., 44.

32 Brevard S. Childs, The New Testament as Canon: an Introduction, (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1984), 33.

33 Ridderbos, 39.

34 For a more detailed discussion of the concept of "inspiration" or writing under the leading or influence of the Holy Spirit in the ancient church see Bruce, Canon of Scripture , 266-267. This is not to imply the the term theopneustos was so employed by the patristic writers. Warfield has demonstrated that this term was early an epithet for Scripture while later it broadened to mean something approaching divine. (Inspiration and Authority, 272-276)

35 1 Clement 63:2; 59:1. Clement does not use the Pauline term theopneustos but does state variously, ." . . the things we have written through the Holy Spirit." (63:2) and "to the words which have been spoken by Him (Jesus Christ) through us."(59:1).

36 Life of Constantine 1.11.2. Here Eusebius speaks of the inspiring aid of the heavenly Word as he writes. For a fuller discussion of the concept of inspiration in the early church see Sundberg, "The Bible Canon and the Christian Doctrine of Inspiration," Interp 29 (1975):365-370.

37 See Thomas A. Hoffman, "Inspiration, Normativeness, Canonicity, and the Unique Sacred Character of the Bible," CBQ 44 (1982), 457-58.

38 Ridderbos, 36. He also notes that the judgment of the early church is an insufficient ground for accepting a book as canonical: " . . . it is equally obvious that, a posteriori the historical judgment of the church as to what is and is not apostolic can never be the final basis for the acceptance of the New Testament as holy and canonical."(35).

39 Bruce Metzger notes that the term canon had both a material and a formal sense:

. . . ecclesiastical writers during the first three centuries used the word kanon to refer to what was for Christianity an inner law and binding norm of belief (`rule of faith' and/or `rule of truth'). From the fourth century onward the word also came to be used in connection with the sacred writings of the Old and New Testaments . . . . according to Zahn and Souter, the formal meaning of canon as `a list' was primary, for otherwise it would be difficult to explain the use of the verb kanonizein (`to include in a canon') when it is applied to particular books and to the books collectively. The Canon of the New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1987), 293.

40 The question of whether the canon is a "collection of authoritative books" or an "authoritative collection of books" hinges on what definition of canon one adopts. If one argues that the individual writings are canonical because of their divine inspiration, then he would logically see the canon as a collection of authoritative books. If on the other hand, one views the canon in the sense of a completed list to which nothing can be added, he would tend to see the canon as an authoritative collection. However, I believe that at this point to be consistent one would have to admit that the authority of the collection is imposed by ecclesiastical authority.

41 Youngblood, 27.

42 Ibid., 28.

43 This is readily apparent within the pages of Scripture. Jesus Himself constantly taught "as one who had authority." This in distinction to the normal rabbinic tradition. Christ on numerous occasions declared, "You have heard it said . . . but I tell you." In the epistles of the apostles, a word of the Lord was enough to settle a matter. (e.g. 1 Cor 7:10-11, with reference to marriage and divorce; 1 Cor 11:23ff, with reference to conduct in worship) additionally, sayings of the Lord, not found in the canonical gospels are cited as authoritative (canonical) (Acts 20:35 also cf. 1 Thess 5:22).

44 In the New Testament itself we find on occasion the preference for a personal visit over a letter. In Gal 4 Paul declares his desire to be with the Galatians. In other places we find this same mentality (e.g. 1 Thess 3). On other occasions a letter was preferable to a personal visit e.g., 1 Cor. See F.F. Bruce, "Some Thoughts on the Development of the New Testament Canon" Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 65 (1983), 39.

45 Cf. 2 Pet 1:19-21. There was a problem in knowing how to sort out which tradition was genuine and which was spurious. The answer, proposed by Papias, was that a tradition which was traceable to the apostles themselves was regarded as genuine. Eusebius quotes Papias as declaring:

But I shall not hesitate to put down for you along with my interpretation whatsoever things I have at any time learned carefully from the elders and carefully remembered, guaranteeing their truth. For I did not, like the multitude, take pleasure in those that speak much, but in those that teach the truth; not in those that relate strange commandments, but in those who deliver the commandments given by the Lord to faith and springing to truth itself. If then any one came, who had been a follower of the elders,--what Andrew or what Peter said, or what was said by Philip, or by Thomas, or by James, or by John, or by Matthew, or by any other of the disciples of the Lord, and what things Aristion and the Presbyter John, the disciples of the Lord say. For I did not think that what was to be gotten out of books would profit me as much as what came from the living and abiding voice (Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, III. 39. 4).

Theo Donner objects to the interpretation of Papias' words which would make him downplay the importance of the written Scripture. He insists that Papias was "relying on oral tradition only for his commentary on the words of the Lord, not for the actual content of the words" ("Some Thoughts on the History of the New Testament Canon," Themelios 7 (1981-82), 25). McGiffert notes that Papias' statement should not be interpreted to mean that Papias' faith was in oral tradition as opposed to written tradition, but that the oral tradition supplemented the written tradition (NPNF, I, 171, n. 5). In his following discussion of Papias, Eusebius notes that Papias preserved heretofore unwritten tradition of the words of Christ on the authority of Aristion and John the elder (172). The point here is that at this period the two, written and oral tradition existed side by side.

46 e.g. 2 Tim 2:2; 1 Cor. 11:23. Kistemaker notes:

Tradition is governed by apostolic authority, which finds its origin in Christ. Behind the tradition recorded in the New Testament stands Jesus Christ. He is the first link in the chain of tradition. The apostles transmitted this tradition through sound teaching. "What you (Timothy) have heard from me, keep as the pattern of sound teaching," says Paul in 2 Timothy 1:13. The Apostolic deposit was kept by way of faithful teachers. At first they taught by word of mouth, and as time progressed they taught by means of the written page." JETS 20, 6.

47 Ibid.

48 In 2 Pet 3:16 the apostle makes reference to the ignorant and unstable who twist the letters of Paul "to their own destruction as they do the rest of Scripture." The second occurrence (disputed by some) is 1 Timothy 5:18 where Paul coordinates a quotation from Deut 25:4 (Do not muzzle the ox while he is treading out the grain) with a citation from Luke 10:7 (The laborer deserves his wages.), citing both as Scripture.

49 In a recent study on p46 Young Kyu Kim has argued on calligraphic grounds that the papyrus, which contains a majority of eight of the Pauline epistles plus the book of Hebrews should be dated duning the llate first century reign of Domitian ("Paleographic Dating of p46 to the Later First Century," Biblica 69 [1988], 254.). If correct this would argue even more strongly for the authority of the apostlic writings in the early church.

50 F. F. Bruce, "Some Thoughts on the Development of the New Testament Canon" Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 65 (1983), 39.

51 Marcion's anti-Jewish theological a priori caused him to reject all the gospels except a mutilated form of Luke, (which he attributed to Paul), and ten of Paul's epistles.

52 A fragment, it evidently originally included the four gospels, thirteen Pauline epistles, Jude, two letters of John, Wisdom, and the Apocalypses of John and Peter (Bruce, "Some Thoughts," p. 57). Sundberg has asserted that the Muratorian canon is not an early western canon, but a fourth century eastern production. If correct, this would remove a key piece of evidence from the puzzle of how the canon came to be formed ("The Bible Canon and the Christian Doctrine of Inspiration," Interpretation 29 [1975], 362. See also "The Making of the New Testament Canon," Interpreters One Volume Commentary on the Bible, [Nashville: Abingdon, 1971], 1223.) F. F. Bruce has denied the validity of Sundberg's analysis of the provenance of the document on linguistic grounds ("Some Thoughts," pp. 57-59). Metzger (Canon of The New Testament, 193), Childs (The New Testament as Canon, 238) and Edward Ferguson ("Canon Muratori; Date and Provanence" Studia Patristica, 18 [1982], 677-683) all concur with this evaluation.

53 For a fuller discussion of Montanism's influence in the formation of the canon see Metzger, The Canon of the New Testament, 99-106.

54 J.A. Lamb,"The Place of the Bible in the Liturgy" in The Cambridge History of the Bible vol. I (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) 567. Yet another factor which affected the collection of the books into a coherent collection was the introduction of the codex as it replaced the scroll. Bruce notes, "The nearly simultaneous popularization of the codex and the publication of the fourfold gospel may have been coincidental; on the other hand, one of the two may have had some influence on the other" (Bruce, 49).

55 Ronald Youngblood, "The Process, How We Got Our Bible," Christianity Today, February 5, 1988, 27.

56 Augustine, writing in A.D.397 the same year as the third council of Carthage and after the synod of Hippo gave his criteria for canonicity.

Accordingly, among the canonical Scriptures he will judge according to the following standard: to prefer those that are received by all the catholic churches to those which some do not receive. Among those again which are not received by all, he will prefer such as have sanction of the greater number and those of greater authority, to such as are held by the smaller number and those of lesser authority. If, however, he shall find that some books are held by the greater number, and others by the churches of greater authority, . . . I think that in such a case the authority on the two sides is to be looked upon as equal. (On Christian Doctrine II. 12)

It is significant that Augustine makes no appeal to any council, only to consensus. Bruce notes that it was not a councilliar pronouncement which fixed the canon in the West. Rather, it was the prestige of Augustine and Jerome. (Canon of the New Testament, 231)

57 Bruce notes that while there was a basic unity of content in the East, their canons still reflected a diversity for centuries after Athanasius. (The Canon of Scripture [Downers Grove: IVP, 1988],215)

58 The Catholic epistles and the Apocalypse were omitted. Hebrews, viewed as Pauline, was accepted, while Philemon, was either unknown or rejected. The fourth century Syrian fathers included 3 Corinthians as canonical (W. G. Kummel, Introduction to the New Testament 14th revised ed., translated by A. J. Mattill [Nashville: Abingdon, 1966], 353).

59 Ibid.

60 Ibid. The Ethiopic version is dated as early as the fourth century by some. Others would attribute it to the seventh century (Bruce Metzger, The Text of the New Testament (New York: Oxford University Press, 1968), 84.

61 B. F. Wescott, A General Survey of the History of the Canon of the New Testament, (3rd ed., London: MacMillian, 1870), 426.

62 Ibid., 429. C.f. Metzger, Canon of the New Testament, 238-240.

63 Ibid., 443.

64 It is significant that the early Lutheran Confessions did not contain a list of the canonical writings.

65 See Ridderbos, 39.

66 Klyne Snodgrass, "Providence Is Not Enough," Christianity Today, February 5, 1988, 33.

67 See this writer's Th.D. dissertation, Charles Augustus Briggs and Tensions in Late Nineteenth Century American Theology, Dallas Theological Seminary, 1987, 214-227. While Briggs' name is infamous as a convicted heretic and he did indeed deny the inerrancy of Scripture, his doctrine of canon was never challenged as being heterodox., even by his greatest theological foe B.B. Warfield.

68 David G. Dunbar has objected that Ridderbos too easily lumps Protestant appeals to divine providence in guiding the church's recognition of the canon together with Roman Catholic claims of ecclesiastical infallibility. To be sure, there is a formal similarity, but materially there is a great difference in the theological program here at work. . . ("The Biblical Canon," Hermeneutics, Authority and Canon, [Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1986], 355). I would agree that there is a difference between an appeal to an infallible Pope or hierarchy and to consensus. However, the question still remains if indeed the "leading of the Lord" does not ultimately vest some kind of infallible authority in the consensus of the church.

69 F.F. Bruce, The Canon of the Scripture (Downers Grove: IVP, 1988), asserts apostolcity as a valid objective criterionfor determining canoninicity, but goes on to assert the "self authenticating authority"(276-277) of the New Testament books. This criterion is akin if not identical to Briggs' autopistie of te Scripture.

70 It might be objected here that the earliest church did have a written canon, that of the Old Testament. While this is true, it was the OT interpreted Christologically by the Lord Himself and His Apostles. Thus, the risen Jesus Christ was the standard, the canon, by which even the OT was measured.

71 Ridderbos, 40.

72 Ibid., 41.

73 Charles A. Briggs, General Introduction to the Study of Holy Scripture (New York: Charles Scribners' Sons, 1899), 163.

74 4 Ibid.

75 Ibid.

76 See Geoffrey Wainwright, "The New Testament as Canon, SJT 28, 554. Cf. also R. Grant, JSNT 16, 39.

77 Briggs, General Introduction, 163.

78 Ibid.

79 This factor became very important for Calvin in his discussion of the canonicity of 2 Peter. He saw in the epistle nothing that was in conflict with the other Scriptures which he did accept. This became significant in his acceptance of the epistle as canonical despite reservations concerning its style.

For Calvin properly would have us understand not only that such books were accepted by the church from ancient times but also that they contain nothing which is in conflict with the remainder of Scripture, which was never contested in any way. Is not an important truth to be found, with respects (sic) to the limitations of the canon, in the statement: Sacra Scriptura sui ipsius interpres? (Ridderbos, 51).

80 Briggs, General Introduction, 163.

81 Ibid., 166.

82 Ibid.

83 Ibid., 167

84 Ibid., 142-144. Even John Warwick Montgomery has noted, "absolute certainty, both in science and theology, rests only with the data (for the former, natural phenomena; for the latter, scriptural affirmations)." ("The Theologian's Craft," CTM 37 [1966]: 82 n.72, quoted by Dunbar, "Biblical Canon," 360.) Dunbar admits that "the shape and limits of the canon are not scriptural affirmations. Therefore . . . we cannot claim absolute empirical certainty for our canonical model" (p. 360). This is not to deny that from a practical perspective some theological formulations attain a "certain" status.

85 Briggs, 142-144.

86 Ibid., 146.

87 Briggs was not here arguing for himself personally. His writings evidence no doubt that the extent of the canon includes the entire Protestant canon. In fact, he indicated doubt whether several of the apocryphal books ought not be reevaluated and included in the canon (64).

Ridderbos has noted, (44)

There was never any discussion of the canonicity of the majority of the New Testament writings. The church never regarded these writings as being anything else except the authoritative witness to the great period of redemption.

88 Ibid.

Related Topics: Reformation, Canon

The Content and Extent of the Old Testament Canon

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Introduction

The Apostle Paul wrote, regarding the Old Testament, “Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages have come” (1 Cor. 10:11). The use of the Old Testament Scriptures by the church of Christ has been the subject of some debate from the early church fathers up to the present day. The debate is primarily concerned with the question of what writings are truly in the canon of the Old Testament Scriptures. The word “canon” is from a Greek word that means a “rule” or “standard”; in the second century Christian church it came to be understood as “revealed truth.”1 Yet for some Christians the “revealed truth” represented more than for others. Augustine is a fine example of this, as he “. . . regarded the church to be the custodian of Scripture and thus may easily have concluded that on matters of the extent of the canon the church had the authority to decide. . . Augustine seemed to consider church reception to be sufficient warrant for canonical authority; this he gave as the reason for accepting the Maccabean books as canonical.”2 Initially, it was not as if the canon itself was debated as much as it was looked at differently. Some held that the canon was extensive enough to encompass all the books read in the church for edification, which would include the Apocrypha and sometimes the Pseudipigrapha (anonymous apocalyptic writings). Others held that the canon was simply that of the Jewish Bible, representing also the Protestant Bibles of today.3 It was not until the age of the Reformation that the debate began to rage. In 1546 when the Council of Trent made a formal statement that all not accepting the selected Apocryphal writings should be damned, the Protestants retorted with an equally resolute voice.

The question of canonicity is completely valid. If there are disputes about what is Scripture, the validity of faith itself is greatly at stake. For as Beckwith puts it so well, “. . . with no canon there is no Bible.”4 This paper will briefly discuss the major issues of the Old Testament canon attempting to show the contents and extent of the canon.

The Concept of the Old Testament Canon

How ironic it is that evangelicals today base their beliefs solely on Scripture, and yet their canon was recognized by tradition. The way that canon was regarded in history past plays an integral role in the recognition of the canon. The tradition and authority of the people of God throughout history have attested that there was a group of writings, divinely inspired, which were recognizable as such. The internal evidence within the Old Testament itself affirms that it is Scripture. Deuteronomy 31:24-26 says, “And it came about, when Moses finished writing the words of this law in a book until they were complete, that Moses commanded the Levites who carried the ark of the covenant of the LORD, saying, ‘Take this book of the law and place it beside the ark of the covenant of the LORD your God, that it may remain there as a witness against you.’” Deuteronomy itself, “. . .also reaffirms in Israel the idea of a ‘canon,’ a collection of written materials by which the life of the nation would be administered.”5

The inter-testament saints held that there was a known corpus of Scripture, for in their writings they would often refer to it with the authoritative phrase, “as it is written,” or “according to Scripture,” or “it is written.” In fact, references to almost all of the books of the Old Testament are considered to be Scripture by the writers of the inter-testament and the New Testament period. Beckwith says of this period that

. . . with the exception of the three short books of Ruth, Song of Songs and Esther, the canonicity of every book of the Hebrew Bible is attested, most of them several times over. . . it is very striking that, over a period ranging from the second century BC (at latest) to the first century AD, so many writers, of so many classes (Semitic, Hellenistic, Pharisaic, Essene, Christian), show such agreement about the canon. . .6

In addition, there are at least 28 documented separate titles for the Old Testament canon proving that the individual books had become a collection sufficient enough to warrant various titles to the group (i.e. canon) as a whole.7

Church history took very heavily into consideration what Jesus and the New Testament writers thought about the Old Testament in determining canonicity. The number of references to the Old Testament by New Testament writers is abundant, and it attests to the fact that there was an established canon at the time of their writing.

Probably the fullest evidence (in secular writings) on the concept of there being a canon is in the work of Josephus. In Against Apion 1.7f., or 1.37–43, Josephus gives his understanding that, not only was there a canon, but he also lists what he believes that canon is. This list is identical to the Jewish and Christian canon with one exception, that of omitting either the Song of Songs or Ecclesiastes.8 Josephus mentions that there were copies of Scripture in the Temple itself, and before its destruction in AD 70 it contained a collection of books. This collection was considered by the Jewish community to be canon, for “the main test of the canonical reception of a book must have been whether or not it was one of those laid up in the Temple.”9

This evidence reveals not what the books of the canon are, but the fact that the concept of a canon did indeed already exist before the beginning of the Christian era.

The Construct of the Old Testament Canon

Not only does the literature testify to the concept of there being a canon, but also to the construction of that canon as being in three parts: the Law, the Prophets and the Hagiographa. This is a method of arranging the various books evidenced from many sources outside the canon itself. The earliest evidence is from the prologue to the book Ecclesiasticus which specifically mentions three times the three parts of the canon. The author says, “. . . many great things have been communicated to us through the Law and the prophets, and the others who followed after. . . my grandfather Jeshua, after devoting himself for a long time to the reading of the Law and the prophets and the other books of our forefathers. . .”. Here the author, writing about 180 BC, clearly delineates the construction as being in three recognized parts, and these parts, having titles and sections, show that by the writer’s time the canon was considered closed.

Jesus Himself, the most authoritative witness for the Christian, states in Luke 24:44 the three sections of the Old Testament as “the Law of Moses and the Prophets and Psalms . . .” “Psalms” undoubtedly means the whole Hagiographa, for Christ often referred to Daniel, which was a part of that third section, as well as the book of Psalms itself, after which the section was named. Philo and the tenth century Arabian writer al-Masudi both refer to the Hagiographa as the “Psalms.”10

Since the Jews traditionally placed the book of Chronicles in the Hagiographa, another statement of Jesus alludes to the three sections of the completed canon. He said in Luke 11:50-51 (also in Matthew 23:35), “. . .in order that the blood of all the prophets, shed since the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the house {of God;} yes, I tell you, it shall be charged against this generation.” The Zechariah referred to is certainly the one in 2 Chronicles 24:21, and this is significant because His statement is, in a sense, referring to the first part of the three sections (Genesis) and to the last (Chronicles), implying the inclusion of the second section as well. Christ’s point also is in His mentioning the prophets, for “. . . prophecy, as the Jews knew well, had virtually ended with the composition of the latest book of Holy Scripture. . .,” which was the book of 2 Chronicles, written about 400 BC.

Judas Maccabaeus and his associates, in 164 BC, compiled a list of the Prophets and Hagiographa at least 250 years prior to the generally assumed date of the closing of the canon (AD 90, at the Synod of Jamnia). The historical book of 2 Maccabees 2:14f describes it this way: “And in like manner Judas (Maccabaeus) also gathered together for us all those writings that had been scattered by reason of the war that befell, and they are still with us. If therefore ye have need thereof, send some to fetch them unto you.” Beckwith says,

Judas knew that the prophetic gift had ceased a long time before (1 Macc. 9:27; cp. Also 4.46; 14;41), so what is more likely than that, in gathering together the scattered scriptures, he and his companions the Hasidim classified the now complete collection in the way which from that time became traditional. . .The manner in which Judas Maccabaeus did his work was presumably by compiling a list, not by combining books in large scrolls. . . If Judas gave such structure to the canon, he must have had a definite collection of writings to work on.11

The Old Testament books, as grouped in the canon, also had an established order. The relevancy that there was an established order--even though that order was different for different people--implies that the books in that order, however arranged, were recognized as canonical and that the canon was closed at the time of its ordering.

The number of the books is also a relevant issue, and the evidence shows that the number of the canonical books was always assumed to be 22 or 24. The books themselves were the same in both renderings; they would simply be grouped differently. “In earlier days they combined Ruth with Judges, and Lamentations with Jeremiah and thus made twenty-two books equivalent to the twenty-two letters in the Hebrew alphabet.”12 It is “. . . difficult to conceive of those books being counted, and the number being generally accepted and well known, if the canon remained open and the identity of its books uncertain. . . agreement about their number implies agreement about their identity.”13

The Contents of the Old Testament Canon

The Canonical Books

It would be logical that upon completion of an Old Testament book the book was canonical. Theoretically, this must be true, but actually, a book of Scripture was considered to be such by virtue of the authority of the human author. So while the Pentateuch was completed with the death of Moses, and the Prophets and the Hagiographa with their authors, the recognition of their canonicity may have been centuries after their actual completion. Consequently, as recognitions differ, there was some dispute about mainly five books of the Old Testament, sometimes called the “antilegomena” or the “books spoken against.” These were: Ezekiel, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, and Esther. The secular motifs in these books were the leading cause of concern to some scholars as well as was the apparent contradictions with other canonical books which were not disputed. The disputes themselves imply that the books in question were considered canonical, because contradictions in un-inspired texts would have been assumed, and therefore, non-existent. It is usually assumed that the presence of the dispute proves that the canon was still open and up for grabs and that it was not settled until the Council of Jamnia in AD 90. The motivation behind such an assertion is the desire to canonize some Apocryphal and books of the Pseudepigrapha as well. Beckwith makes a good argument14 that Ezekiel was not debated, it being part of the already closed Prophets, and not the Hagiographa, which was the subject of debate at Jamnia. In particular only the Song of Songs and Ecclesiastes were debated, or according to the Rabbi Akiba, only Ecclesiastes. Green quotes Rabbi Akiba from the Talmud regarding the Jewish opinion of the inspiration of the Song of Solomon. “‘Silence and Peace! No one is Israel has ever doubted that the Song of Solomon defiles the hands [i.e. is Scripture]. For no day in the history of the world is worth the day when the Song of Solomon was given to Israel. For all the Hagiographa are holy, but the Song of Solomon is a holy of holies. If there has been any dispute, it referred only to Ecclesiastes. . . So they disputed and they decided.”15 And what did they decide? “‘The wise men desired to withdraw (ganaz) the Book of Ecclesiastes because its language was often self-contradictory and contradicted the utterances of David. Why did they not withdraw it? Because the beginning and the end of it consist of words of the law.’ Sabbath 30b.”16 The book of 2 Esdras shows that Ezra republished the 24 books of the inspired law. “How could such an assertion be made if five of the 24 books were known to have been added to the canon about AD 90, only ten years or so earlier?”17 In the end the Hagiographa triumphed. For two factors helped, says Pfeiffer: “The first was mere survival. In ancient times, when books had to be copied laboriously by hand on papyrus or parchment, no literary work could survive for a few centuries unless it had attained considerable circulation. . . We may wonder, for instance, why Esther should have survived among the Jews, while Judith perished, since the appeal of both was mainly patriotic.”18

The Non-Canonical Books

The non-canonical books which were excluded from the canon had a foot in the canonical door mainly by virtue of the disputed books’ arguments. The thought was, “If we can dispute about these five canonical books, can we not also dispute about these other books as being canonical too?” For the most part, the books in question from the Pseudepigrapha (anonymous authors) and Apocrypha could not be included in the canon, for one reason, because their date is much later than the previously attested date of the closing of the canon recognized by Judas Maccabaeus in 164 BC. The confusion comes in that many of the books in question are impeccable historical sources, and are true in what they say, but truth does not necessarily equate with canonicity. The books such as 1 Maccabees, Judith, Wisdom of Solomon, and Ecclesiasticus, just to name a few, contain great value in and of themselves. But value is not enough to warrant canonicity. Even within the book of such value as Ecclesiasticus are personal biases that Holy Scripture would not commend. The author, Jesus the son of Sira, reveals a great deal of his personal character as he “not only expresses his views quite frankly on a variety of subjects, making no secret, for instance, of his intense dislike for the fair ‘weaker’ sex (9:8; 23:22-27. . .).”19

    Augustine believed that some of the Apocrypha was inspired.

Nevertheless, in the heat of the argument, Augustine limits his Old Testament to the Jewish canon when he writes in his tract on ‘Faith of Things not Seen’ appealing to the Scriptures as follows: ‘Unless haply unbelieving men judge those things to have been written by Christians, in order that those things which they already believed might have greater weight of authority if they should be thought to have been promised before they came. If they suspect this let them examine carefully the codices of our enemies the Jews. There let them read those things of which we have made mention.’20

“Philo, the Egyptian Jew of the first century AD, evidently accepted the twenty-two Hebrew books, for he quotes from many of them and from them only, as authoritative.”21 Jerome as well as Rufinus

. . . were crystal clear on the matter [of not considering them canonical] but their reaction to the pressure exerted on them indicates that many leaders thought the additional books ought to be recognized as inspired. . . Jerome yielded to the popular request in furnishing a translation to the church at large but never permitted his scholarly convictions to yield to the point of recognizing these books as canonical.22

The Essene canon contained some of the Pseudepigrapha which they claimed to be divine. Most of these writings were midrash on canonized books and logically therefore would not be Scripture. For if the Pseudepigrapha contained a copy of a canonical book as well as commentary on it, why would it not negate the original canonical book, because the Pseudepigrapha with its inspired commentary would be much more valuable? In addition, “If they were conscious of being inspired, why did they not have the confidence to use their own names?”23 Even the quote in Jude 14 of 1 Enoch 1:9 does not require that 1 Enoch is Scripture. To quote what is true in Scripture is different than saying that what is quoted is Scripture. Even Paul quoted a pagan poet in Acts 17:28, yet he certainly did not regard it as Scripture but as simply true. The Pharisees, the Sadducees and the Essenes also all recognized a closed canon and generally saw that prophecy had ceased before the Pseudepigrapha and Apocrypha were even written. None of the Pseudepigrapha and Apocrypha were in the canon of the Jews and it was to this canon that Jesus Himself and the Apostles appealed.

Implications and Conclusions

The implications of such a study are two-fold. For those who have held that the writings other than the Jewish and Protestant Old Testament are inspired, there needs to be serious reconsideration. Jesus Himself implied that the last prophet was Zechariah in the book of Chronicles. The previous section alone is sufficient to warrant solemn attention. The value of the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha is not the question but only whether they were even candidates for canonicity. There is no shame in a change of position, only in resolute rejection of the historical and logical data.

For those who have held to the Jewish and Protestant Old Testament there is the implication of comfort, assurance, as well as a deepening devotion to what God has not only seen fit to reveal to us, but that which He has seen fit to uphold and confirm to us through many different agencies.


1 Bauer, Walter, William F. Arndt, F. Wilbur Gingrich, and Fredrick W. Danker (BAGD), A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and other Early Christian Literature, Chicago: Univ. Of Chicago, 1979, “kanwn,” 403

2 Schultz, Samuel J. “Augustine and the Old Testament Canon,” Bibliotheca Sacra , Vol. 112 #447 -- July, 1955, 230, 232

3 Beckwith, Roger. The Old Testament Canon of the New Testament Church. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1985, 2

4 Beckwith, 5

5 Dillard, Raymond B. and Tremper Longman III. An Introduction to the Old Testament. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994, 103

6 Beckwith, 71, 76

7 Beckwith, 105-107

8 Beckwith, 80

9 Beckwith, 86

10 Beckwith, 111-112

11 Beckwith, 152, 165

12 Harris, R. Laird. “Canon of the Old Testament,” Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible. Grand Rapids: Regency, 1976, 189

13 Beckwith, 262

14 Beckwith, 274-275

15 Green, William H., General Introduction to the Old Testament: The Canon, London: Murray, 1899, 139

16 Green, 138

17 Beckwith, 275

18 Pfeiffer, Robert H. Introduction to the Old Testament. New York: Harper & Row, 1948, 62

19 Pfeiffer, Robert H. History of New Testament Times with an Introduction to the Apocrypha. New York: Harper & Row, 1949, 366

20 Schultz, 228

21 Harris, 189

22 Schultz, 231

23 Beckwith, 359

Related Topics: Canon

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