“We believe the Holy Bible to be the inspired Word of God, inerrant in its original manuscripts. It is our standard for faith and practice and the measure by which all of life and personal revelation is to be evaluated.” (2 Timothy 3:15-17; 1 Thessalonians 2:13; 2 Peter 1:21)
So let’s talk about the Bible. Why do we believe what we do about the Bible, and why does it matter?
1.We claim the Bible is ‘breathed out,’ or inspired: [1] God expressed himself accurately, uniquely and sufficiently through human authors. All communication occurs in a context, so the writers use their language (Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek), their jargon and their personality (there are different styles), but God inspired them and guided them.
The Bible is unique in that it is the only revelation from God to which we ascribe this level of trust. There is no other revelation that carries the authority of the Bible. It is it the only revelation of this nature that we have, it’s the only revelation of this nature that we need.
2. We claim the Bible is infallible, or incapable of erring:
“When all facts are known, the Scriptures in their original autographs and properly interpreted will be shown to bewholly true in everything that they affirm.” (Dr. Paul Feinberg) [2]
“What the authors intend for us to understand or obey, properly understood in its… context, is true.” (John Piper)
To say this confidently, we need to be confident that what we have today is what we are supposed to have, and that we are able to interpret it properly. Fortunately, that’s our next sections J
3. We claim the Bible is canonical (the books are the right books). The ‘canon’ is a ruler, a measure by which all other claims to revelation are judged.
Old Testament[3]
Ezra, in the late 5th century BC, gave 22 (the 39 we have now) books to the Sopherim (priests who performed their functions at the Temple, and who eventually became the Sanhedrin). Shortly after, the Jews closed the Old Testament canon, because “ the succession of prophets ceased” (Josephus) and “the Holy Spirit departed from Israel.” (Talmud). They believed that God had said all He had to say at that point in history. Besides, Northern Israel was gone and Southern Israel was in exile. The prophets said this was a time of punishment – which included the idea that God was going to be silent. Josephus wrote in the first century AD:
For we have not an innumerable multitude of books among us, disagreeing from and contradicting one another [as the Greeks have] but only twenty-two books (they combined the 39 to 22), which contain the records of all the past times; which are justly believed to be divine; and of them five belong to Moses, which contain his laws and the traditions of the origin of mankind until his death…but as to the time from the death of Moses until the reign of Artaxerxes king of Persia, who reigned after Xerxes, the prophets, who were after Moses, wrote down what was done in their times in thirteen books. The remaining four books contain hymns to God, and precepts for the conduct of human life.”
NEW TESTAMENT
There were at least five requirements (some list more) for verifying which Holy Spirit-inspired books were to be included in the New Testament:
A. Apostolicity: Was the book written by a first generation apostle or disciple? (Which, by the way, is why all those books in the Da Vinci Code were never going to be considered.)
B. Authenticity: Do historical traditions affirm the writings’ authorship and authority?[4]
C. Ubiquity: Did the book have a history of "continuous and widespread approval” among Christians?
D. Universality: Is the book consistent with the OT and known NT writings?
E. Effect: Does the book change lives? Does it have a spiritual and moral effect?
The shape of the accepted books took place fairly quickly considering how long it would have taken for the writing to circulate and be discussed. Paul was writing in the 50’s; Matthew, Mark and Luke were written in the 70’s.
· Clement of Rome: eight New Testament books (A.D. 95)
· Polycarp, a disciple of John the Apostle: 15 books (A.D. 108)
· Ignatius of Antioch: seven books (A.D. 115)
· Irenaeus, in 130 A.D.: current canon, with some reservations
· 140 A.D: The Muratorian Fragment and the Marcionite Canon record a list of books very similar to what we have today
· 150-180: most current NT books were widely accepted
· Origen, in 185: current canon with some reservations
· Athanasius, AD 367 - accepted them all
· Following church councils affirmed the core canon, though some traditions added certain books (the ‘deuterocanonical’ books). All traditions agree on the core canon.
http://visualunit.me. Statistics taken from The Bibliographical Test Updated, Christian Research Journal, volume 35, number 03 (2012) www.equip.org/article/the-bibliographical-test-updated/
From A.D. 100 - 300, there are 36,000 early quotations of the New Testament in the existing documents from the early church fathers (typically quotes contained in sermons). We could basically recreate the New Testament from these writing if we needed to.[5]
Here’s a visual from Dan Wallace: if you could stack all the extant manuscripts from other ancient sources, the stack would be about 5 feet tall. If you could stack all the extant fragments or the New Testament only, it would be about a mile high.
"There is no body of ancient literature in the world which enjoys such a wealth of good textual attestation as the New Testament… if the New Testament were a collection of secular writings, their authenticity would generally be regarded as beyond all doubt." F. F. Bruce
" It can be asserted with confidence that the sacred text is exact and valid and that no article of faith and no moral precept in it has been distorted or lost." - B.B Warfield
5. We claim the Bible is knowable. It can be studied accurately.
“We affirm the necessity of interpreting the Bible according to its literal, or normal, sense. The literal sense is… the meaning which the writer expressed. Interpretation according to the literal sense will take account of all figures of speech and literary forms found in the text. This means the correct interpretation is the one which discovers the meaning of the text in its grammatical forms and in the historical, cultural context in which the text is expressed.” Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy
6. We claim the Bible is true. Everything else in our Statement of Faith builds from that premise.
“… here is a faith firmly rooted in certain... historical events, a faith which would be false and misleading if those events had not actually taken place, but which, if they did take place, is unique in its relevance and exclusive in its demands on our allegiance. For these events did not merely set a process in motion and then themselves sink back into the past. The unique historical origin of Christianity is ascribed permanent, authoritative, absolute significance; what happened once is said to have happened once for all..." J.N.D Anderson
The Bible reveals who God is.
The Bible reveals who we are (human nature).
The Bible reveals what is wrong with the world, and the solution.
The Bible reveals how we are designed to live.
The Bible reveals why we have value, dignity and worth.
The Bible reveals Truth.
7. We claim the Bible is “existentially meaningful.” It says something profound about human experience. In other words, the way in which the Bible matches up with and explains reality has profound implications. [6]
The Bible says our existence is very real. Some religions teach that our experience of life as an illusion – in fact, even Stephen Hawking before he died claimed that our universe as a holographic projection.[7] But that’s not what we experience. We experience a very real world, where we have to look both ways before we cross the street, and food keeps us alive, and the Lions are terrible. The Bible says that the Universe and Humanity were created by a Good Creator. He made a real world, and Jesus blessed it by entering into it Himself. Christianity explains the origin and continuation of what you are experiencing now: real life, in a real world.
The Bible says there is good and evil. Atheism has no room for this language.
“In a world of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won’t find rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.” - Richard Dawkins.
Eastern religions struggle with this same dilemma. If all is one – if pantheism is true – then everything that happens is part of God, and any distinction between good and evil is an illusion. The Bible speaks of real categories of good and evil just like we experience. There is a God who is completely good, and by which we can understand good and evil. There is a world in which evil is not an illusion (so I don’t have to pretend it’s not there). Acknowledging evil makes the good of healing and justice possible.
The Bible claims we are morally significant people. We have the ability to make moral choices for which we are culpable– remember, that’s biblically grounded language - and we are responsible. People in every worldview at least live and order society as if we do good and bad things, and everybody believes SOMETHING is responsible – but there are remarkably different explanations.
· genetics (humanism)
· societal pressure (postmodernism)
· religious oppression (Islam)
Apparently, we go wrong because fate has forced us, through nature or nurture, in a particular direction to the degree that we might be merely helpless victims and not responsible in any meaningful sense of the word. But we don’t respond to life this way. If someone robs, or murders, or rapes, or drives impaired….we expect for the people involved to be treated as morally responsible people. But why should we do that if it’s not their fault?
I think the Christian worldview allows us to exercise wisdom in determining if there are times when trauma genuinely takes decision-making abilities away from people. However, we are created as beings capable of doing moral actions that are praiseworthy or blameworthy because at some point we have chosen to do them. Creation groans or rejoices because we have made it so.
The Bible claims that justice is important, in this life and the next. Justice has no meaning in a world in which there is no good or evil and no one is responsible. Either we all seek an illusion, or we seek a real thing. Yet we all seek justice. From the time we are born, we see the need for situations to be made right. If there is no evil (the claims of atheism and some eastern religions), there is no such thing as justice, which seeks to make bad things right; there is only stopping people from doing things the majority does not prefer. Christianity recognizes that justice is a real thing, and God requires us to pursue it now.
The Bible claims that people have intrinsic, eternal worth. How we treat them physically, spiritually, emotionally, relationally…these all matter because we are image bearers of God with eternal souls.
· Modern physicists say we are “chemicals running around in a bag,” according to Time magazine.
· Dawkins says, “We are machines built by our DNA.”
· Scott Adams, the guy behind Dilbert, likes to describe us as “moist robots.”
· There’s an idea floating around in some circles that we are zombies in a sense, just bodies stumbling around with no self, soul, or consciousness inside.
Dinesh D’Souza gives two competing stories:
"You are the descendant of a tiny cell of primordial protoplasm washed up on an empty beach 3 1/2 billion years ago. You are a mere grab bag of atomic particles, a conglomeration of genetic substance. You exist on a tiny planet in a minute solar system in an empty corner of a meaningless universe. You came from nothing and are going nowhere."
"You are the special creation of a good and all-powerful God. You are the climax of His creation. Not only is your kind unique, but you are unique among your kind. Your Creator loves you so much and so intensely desires your companionship and affection that He gave the life of His only son that you might spend eternity with him.
When we treat people like people matter, we do so because we hold a view of life that lines up with the Bible.
Now, do we live these important revelations in the Bible? Do we follow them to their conclusions and practically apply them to our lives?
· There is a design for the universe? That makes sense. “There is a design for my finances and my sex life? Well, the Bible is such an old book.”
· People matter? Absolutely. “I just have to look out for myself and do what’s right for me.”
· We are moral beings with the privilege of making choices. Awesome. “But that thing I did last weekend was not my fault.”
· Justice is an amazing gift from God. “Please don’t make me feel the consequences.”
· People have inherent value, dignity and worth. “I love reality shows where people are humiliated.”“Wow, I really gave Bob a piece of my mind! You should have seen his face!” “It’s just porn.”
· The love of money is the root of all evil. Generosity rules! But the first question we ask when we get a paycheck is “What can I buy?” rather than “Who can I help?”
If the Bible is the best explanation for life, then it’s the best explanation for life. We cannot pick and choose the sections of the Bible that we think are relevant to our lives. It’s all or nothing.
RECOMMENDED RESOURCES
http://biblos.com. An excellent site with parallel versions, links to other similar verses, cross references, commentary.
http://www.biblegateway.com. Bible Gateway has a searchable online Bible in over 100 versions and 50 languages, plus TONS of helps.
http://www.followtherabbi.com/Brix?pageID=1458. Ray Vander Laan’s site called “Follow the Rabbi.” An intriguing look into Jewish worldviews and customs, as well as other cultural insights.
http://www.str.org/site/PageServer. Greg Koukl’s site, Stand To Reason, has a ton of helpful information, including a lot of insight on how to read the Bible accurately. Just search “Reading the Bible” on his site, and you will be off and running.
http://bible.cc/. A great online parallel Bible with TONS of resources.
Dan Wallace (a great place to start are his commentaries at bible.org) is the current gold standard on biblical manuscripts. https://www.dts.edu/people/daniel-wallace/
Cold Case Christianity (http://coldcasechristianity.com) – the website and J. Warner Wallace’s books, Cold Case Christianity and God’s Crime Scene.
Can We Still Believe the Bible? An Evangelical Engagement with Contemporary Questions, by Craig Blomberg (I have not read it, but it’s been highly recommended).
The Case for Christ and The Case For Faith by Lee Strobel
Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes, by Kenneth Bailey.
Insights into Bible Times and Customs, by G. Christian Weiss
Understanding the Difficult Words of Jesus, by David Bivin and Roy Blizzard.
Hard Sayings of the Bible, by Walter Kaiser, F.F. Bruce, and others.
Is God a Moral Monster? Making Sense of the Old Testament God, by Paul Copan. A book on how to read the Old and New Testament faithfully, with a focus on understanding God in the Old Testament.
The Lost World Of Scripture, by John Walton.
Hard Saying of the Old Testament, by Walter C. Kaiser, Jr. Insight into the historical, cultural, and linguistic backgrounds of troublesome passages in the Old Testament.
Hard Sayings of Paul, by Manfred T. Brauch. This book takes forty-eight different teachings of Paul, and provides background and context.
Misreading Scripture With Western Eyes, by E. Randolph Roberts and Brandon O’Brien
Walking In The Dust Of Rabbi Jesus, Lois Tverberg. (her website is ourrabbijesus.com)
Series on Biblical books by Timothy Keller (such as Galatians For You) or N.T. Wright (his New Testament for Everyone set)
__________________________________________________________________________
[1] In 2 Timothy 3:15-17, Paul says to Timothy, “You have been taught the holy Scriptures from childhood, and they have given you the wisdom to receive the salvation that comes by trusting in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
[2] John Frame adds an important explanation of this. He notes that we describe our ages truthfully but imprecisely (“I am 50”), or we say things like, “That book is 300 pages long” when it’s actually 298, or “I got there at 5:00” when I got there at 5:01. Nobody holds this against us.
“I think it is helpful to define inerrancy… by saying that inerrant language makes good on its claims….Many writers have enumerated what are sometimes called qualifications: non-chronological narrative, round numbers, imprecise quotations, pre-scientific descriptions of natural phenomenon (e.g., “the sun rose”), use of figures and symbols, imprecise descriptions (as Mark 1:5, which says that ‘everyone’ from Judea and Jerusalem went to hear John the Baptist). I do not describe them as “qualifications” of inerrancy. These are merely applications of the basic meaning of inerrancy: that it asserts truth, not precision. Inerrant language… makes good on its own claims, not on claims that are made for it by thoughtless readers.” - “What Does Inerrancy Mean?”
Justin Taylor, Gospel Coalition. https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/justin-taylor/what-does-inerrancy-mean/
[3] The Law of Moses was taught to the priests and commanded to be publically read aloud every seven years so that the Israelites would not forget God’s laws (Deut. 31:9-11); nothing was to be added to or subtracted from its words (Deut. 4:2; 12:32). The stone tablets upon which God inscribed the Ten Commandments were stored in the Ark of the Covenant (Exod. 25:16, 21; Deut. 10:2-5; 1 Kgs 8:9; Heb. 9:4), a sacred place. Biblical authors make reference to earlier biblical writings (2 Kgs 14:6; 2 Chron. 25:4; 35:12; Ezra 6:18; Neh. 8:1, 3, 5, 8; etc.) The prophets often rebuked Israel for not obeying the words of their predecessors (2 Chron. 24:19; 36:15-16; Ezra 9:11; Neh. 9:26, 30; Jer. 7:25-26; etc.). There were written forms of prophetic oracles (2 Chron. 21:12; Isa. 30:8; Jer. 25:13; 29:1; etc.), as well as histories recorded by prophets (1 Chron. 29:29; 2 Chron. 9:29; 12:15; 13:22; etc.). - http://www.credomag.com/2015/03/25/how-did-we-get-the-old-testament-paul-d-wegner/)
[4] For example, Papias, a student of the Apostle John, observed that John said of the Apostle Mark that he "wrote down accurately... whatsoever [Peter] remembered of the things said or done by Christ. Mark committed no error... for he was careful of one thing, not to omit any of the things [Peter] had heard, and not to state any of them falsely."
[5] An example of reliability: When comparing Massoretic texts (900s) and Qumran texts (100s), Isaiah 53 has 17 letters different: 10 are spelling differences (honor/honour); 4 are additional conjunctions (‘and’). One is the last 3 letters for the Hebrew word for ‘light,’ added to complete the thought of "they shall see" at the end of verse 11. In other words, the accuracy is remarkable. This accuracy is seen over and over as more and more ancient manuscripts are uncovered.
[6] See my series “The Shape Of Reality” on my blog for a more detailed discussion on the following list. http://empiresandmangers.blogspot.com/2017/06/the-shape-of-reality.html
[7] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/05/02/professor-stephen-hawkings-final-theory-universe-hologram/