Preservation: How and What?
The doctrine of preservation of the Scriptures has been hotly debated in recent years. Much has been written and said, but most of the rhetoric on the subject has been closely connected to defending or rejecting one view or another on the translation issue. The result has often been that important foundational questions have been overlooked in a rush to get to conclusion A or B in the translation debate.
Among the neglected questions are these: (1) what process did God say He would use to preserve His word and (2) what form did He say that preserved word would take? Both of these are subsets of another neglected question: What does Scripture actually claim (and not claim) about it’s own preservation?
The questions of process (“how”) and form (“what”) are at the heart of the controversy because nobody (among fundamentalists or conservative evangelicals) denies that the word has, and will, endure. The question of what Scripture actually claims is critical as well, for multiple reasons. For one, only a clear answer to that question can put us on the right track to answering the others.
Two general schools of thought exist regarding the how and what of preservation.
Discrete preservation
One set of views on the how and what of preservation holds that the word must be preserved in a form that is accessible and identifiable with certainty as the preserved form. In other words, preservation means there is an original language text one can identify as “the preserved text.” In most cases, discrete preservationists believe this must also extend to a translation—one existing (or future) translation in each language, which we can identify as “the preserved translation.”
A missionary I spoke with on the subject a few years ago offered the following observations:
I believe since we do not have a copy of the originals, and Scripture mentions God would preserve His word, we have to have His word in a translation. I believe the only translation that was preserved in the English language is the translation coming from the Textus Receptus; the King James Bible.
A more detailed and incisive variation of the view is expressed in this Bible college doctrinal statement:1
We believe … that the King James Bible is God’s preserved word in English. We reject any attempt to correct it with the Greek critical text as is done in the Revised Standard Version, New International Version, and the New King James Version.
We believe … that God’s Word was spread around the world by the Reformation Era Bibles and Bible translations made from them during the beginning of the modern missions movement (1700’s and early 1800’s). Tragically, for nearly two hundred years, the United Bible Society … has tried to replace these Received Text Bibles with corrupt translations.
… the Word of God in Spanish is to be found in the Reformation era 1602 Valera Bible and properly done revisions …
Book length cases for word perfect preservation in discrete form are now available as well (for example, Thou Shalt Keep Them: A Biblical Theology of the Perfect Preservation of Scripture edited by Kent Brandenburg, 2003) in addition to numerous articles and blog posts on the Web.2
Dispersed preservation
Another approach to the how and what of preservation emphasizes the challenge we face in looking for answers to preservation questions. For example, the writers of Bible Preservation and the Providence of God offer the following caution:
What is less clear is how God is preserving the Bible. Though the Bible describes a little of the process of inspiration, it does not describe in detail the process of preservation. Since God also chose in His providence not to preserve the autographs [originals], it takes more effort to understand the process. (Schnaiter and Tagliapietra, 33)
In the chapters that follow, Schnaiter and Tagliapietra detail their view of the process and form of preservation. In an appendix, Schnaiter summarizes as follows:
I believe that the presence of copyists’ errors or translator’s errors or publishers’ errors in every copy of the New Testament … justifies the conclusion that God has not preserved the precise wording of the text … in any particular manuscript or copy or translation, but that He has indeed preserved both wording and sense. The sense is preserved in every copy since each is generally unaffected by the wording variations. (Schnaiter and Tagliapietra, 285. Emphasis original.)3
James White describes a similarly complex process and form of preservation:
You see, if readings could just “disappear” without a trace, we would have to face the fact that the original reading may have “fallen through the cracks” as well. But the tenacity of the New Testament text, while forcing us to deal with textual variants, also provides us with the assurance that our work is not in vain. One of those variant readings is indeed the original. (White, 48)
To these writers, and many others, preservation is not something God does by maintaining a singular certainly-identifiable form, but rather, something He has done (and is doing) in a dispersed way in the manuscripts He has kept from extinction.
The Bible on preservation
To most of us the burning question is, “What does the Bible itself say about its preservation?” In particular, what does the Bible reveal about God’s preservation process and what does it reveal about the form in which His preserved word will reach His people?
Seven passages speak most directly and clearly about the enduring nature of God’s word. Those who believe God has preserved His word in each language in one translation based on the proper Greek text often cite one or more of these in support of their view. For summary purposes I list them here with brief excerpts (in the KJV).
- Psalm 119:89 “forever … thy word is settled in heaven”
- Psalm 119:152 “thy testimonies … thou hast founded them forever”
- 1 Peter 1:24-25 “the word of the Lord endureth for ever”
- Psalm 12:6-7 “thou shalt preserve them from this generation forever”
- Psalm 119:160 “every one of thy righteous judgments endureth for ever”
- Matthew 24:35 “my words shall not pass away”
- Matthew 5:18 “one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass”
Analysis
In Psalm 119:89 we have probably the least helpful passage of the seven for discerning the how and what of preservation on earth. The Psalmist’s goal is to magnify the Lord by pointing out that His word is natsav, firmly fixed and unchanging, just as God Himself is. But the location is “in heaven.” Similarly, Psalm 119:152 reveals that God’s word is “founded” (yacad) forever. The idea again is a firm (and by implication, unmoving) placing. But we do not gain any information as to what we should expect to be able to hold in our hands and read.
Psalm 12:6-7 are a special case because what is meant by “them” in “preserve them” has often been debated. However, if we grant for the sake of argument that “them” refers to God’s “words” (in v.6), what we have again, is a promise that the words of God will not be destroyed by any evil generation (“from this generation” refers to the idle speakers, flatterers and oppressors described in 12:1-5). We do not have a promise here that the words will be accessible or identifiable with certainty.
In 1 Peter 1:24-25 and Psalm 119:160, however, we gain—by inference—a little information about God’s preservation of His word for readers. Peter describes the contrast between the short and frail lives of mortals and the eternally enduring word of God, quoting from Isaiah 40:8. The psalmist indicates that what will endure is comprehensive: not one of God’s judgments will be lost. But it’s the context of these two passages that is most helpful. In both texts, part of the point seems to be that God’s word endures for us. It endures in some form believers will be able to access from generation to generation.
With Matthew 24:35, we gain still more information. Here Jesus affirms that His own words will never pass away. And, though we have no details concerning the form or process of their preservation, we do have a hint regarding the location of their preservation. “Pass away” translates the Greek parerchomai, meaning a passing by or passing from. Jesus’ implication is that His words will continue to exist in the world where His followers live.
Jots and tittles
Matthew 5:18 might be the most important passage on the subject. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus assures His listeners that “one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass until … ” The statement actually includes two conditions, two “untils”: until heaven and earth pass away and until all (the law) is fulfilled. Here again, we learn more about what God will preserve: every iota and keraia, every smallest letter and smallest stroke. The verb parerchomai (pass from) occurs again indicating that the words will be preserved here below.
What has been promised
Discrete preservationists see in these passages a promise that every “jot and tittle” of Scripture will be available to every generation in a certainly-recognizable, written form. That is, believers of every age will be able to point to a copy and say with certainty, “Every jot and tittle is right here.” But there are several reasons to believe this is not what has been promised:
- The passages do not actually say there will be a recognized form with every jot and tittle perfectly preserved.
- Neither Jesus nor the other speakers or writers in these passages say that the word will be accessible for “every generation.” Even if a letter-perfect form of God’s word could be identified with certainty, the promises do not preclude the possibility that this form could be lost for some generations then recovered again (the fact that something has not passed away does not mean we must know exactly where it is.)
- None of those who heard these promises when they were given could point to a written form they knew to contain every preserved jot and tittle. That is, already multiple copies existed, and variations among them existed—not only in jots and tittles but (by Jesus’ day) in whole words. (When Jesus spoke, the Scriptures available were hand made copies of the Hebrew OT and Greek versions of the OT known collectively as the Septuagint).
Conclusions
A close examination of what Scripture claims about its own preservation reveals that God’s word is preserved forever independently of anyone’s access to it (“in heaven”). This examination also reveals, however, that every word—even every letter—will always be preserved, and at least potentially accessible, on the earth. Scripture does not claim, however, that its availability in word-perfect form will be without interruption or that God’s people will always be able to identify it with certainty. There is nothing close to a promise that a word-perfect translation of such a text will exist in English or any other language. (If we have no promise that the Scriptures will be translated at all we cannot possibly have any promises about the quality of translations.)
Some will object that if we cannot identify the perfectly preserved text or translation, we do not have preservation in any meaningful sense. But this argument is a distraction from facts we cannot escape. Whether or not we like the implications of what Scripture says (and doesn’t say), the Bible still says only what it says—no more and no less.
Case-making
One additional distinction is important here. The fact that we have not been promised a certainly-identifiable, perfect text or translation does not prove that we are without one. What that fact does do, however, is point the way to what kind of case must be made for a perfectly preserved text or translation. Such a case must consist of inferences from Scripture, historical data, other external evidence, and reasoning from these. In short, just as the case for preservation “somewhere in the manuscripts” derives from the silence of Scripture plus external data, the case for perfect preservation must also be made by appealing to external data. Divine authority cannot be properly claimed for either position.
Works Cited
Schnaiter, Sam, and Ron Tagliapietra. Bible Preservation and the Providence of God. Self published. Xlibris Corp., 2003.
White, James. The King James Only Controversy: Can You Trust the Modern Translations? Minneapolis. Bethany House Publishers, 1995.
Notes
1 I regret that I can no longer identify the source of this quotation. Either I am misremembering the college that posted the statement or they have since replaced it with something more conciliatory. In any case, the view they described is not unique to them.
2 Examples include “The Modern Texts and Versions Have Produced the Fruit of Theological Liberalism,” “Reasoned Preservation of Scripture, “A Sniff Test for the History of Preservation of Scripture,” “Biblical Preservation: B. B. Warfield and the Reformation Doctrine of the Providential Preservation of the Biblical Text,” and many, many more.
3 In the book, the emphasis in this paragraph is in all caps rather than italics, probably because the section is a response to correspondence in which all caps occur frequently in reference to Schnaiter’s views.
Aaron Blumer, SI’s site publisher, is a native of lower Michigan and a graduate of Bob Jones University (Greenville, SC) and Central Baptist Theological Seminary (Plymouth, MN). He, his wife, and their two children live in a small town in western Wisconsin, where he has pastored Grace Baptist Church (Boyceville, WI) since 2000. Prior to serving as a pastor, Aaron taught school in Stone Mountain, Georgia, and served in customer service and technical support for Unisys Corporation (Eagan, MN). He enjoys science fiction, music, and dabbling in software development.
- 236 views
[RPittman]I see what you’re getting at here. θεόπνευστος (theopneustos) in 2 Tim 3:16 is not a verb. Ironically, KJV supports my interpretation earlier that 3:16 is about how Scripture orginates rather than description of a quality it possesses. If indeed Paul is talking to Tim. there about how we get Scripture in the first place, a distinction between γραμματα (grammata) in v.15 and γραφη (graphe) in v.16 is not necessary because it’s what’s being predicated that makes the distinction. Paul would be making a different assertion about the Scriptures in v.16, one that has to do with how they originate. And it would not make sense to suppose that he is “not thinking of originals” if he is talking about origin![Aaron Blumer] For what it’s worth at this point, I’ve been reading Thou Shalt Keep Them edited by Kent Brandenburg, which is as thorough a case for perfect preservation as I’ve seen to date.Aaron, I respectfully disagree. You need to support your assertion. Unless, you are willing to make a referent difference between the “holy Scriptures” (ιερα γραμματα) in II Timothy 3:15 and the “all Scripture” (πασα γραφη) in II Timothy 3:16, then inspiration did extend to a present copy of the Scriptures, probably in translation (i.e. The Septuagint). On the other hand, I can find no support whatsoever that Paul was writing about original autographs, which were no longer extant. Whereas one may say there is “no concept of inspiration extending beyond the original act,” it is hard to envision Paul speaking of a nonexistent inspired original when he makes present application founded on inspiration. The dots don’t connect.
But even Kent’s book does not confuse where inspiration begins and ends. 2 Tim.3:16, 2 Peter 1:21 are clear about what is inspired. It is “prophecy” in written form. The assertion that there is no concept of originals can’t get off the ground because there is also no concept of inspiration extending beyond the original act on “men moved by the Holy Spirit.”{emphasis added}
But as it turns out, θεόπνευστος (theopneustos) is an adjective and parallel with ὠφέλιμος “profitable.” So a less confusing translation would be “All Scripture is God-breathed and profitable…” (I’m still not completely sure the adjective itself doesn’t refer to origin, though)
However, that said, over the millennia, students of the Bible have used the term “inspiration” in two ways. One to describe a quality Scripture possesses (not an “all or nothing” quality) and another to describe the act of origin. So 2 Peter 1:21, which is clearly about how Scripture originates, has been understood to describe “inspiration” as an act.
So when we’re talking about “inspiration” in the fullest sense, I think we have to say that only the originals came to be as an act of inspiration. But the copies partake in the quality of inspiration (θεόπνευστος) to the degree they match what originated in the act of inspiration.
Anachronism
I would add that there seems to be alot of anachronism in discussions on the subject. That is, the absence of statements of one sort or another in the Fathers, Reformers, etc., is taken to mean they had a particular view of today’s controversy. But they were simply not wrestling with several problems that have only become issues in the last 50 years or so. In particular, using “inspired” to refer to a particular Hebrew or Greek text or translation in the sense of “word perfect” (and all others therefore fraudulent) was not a phenomenon they had to deal with. Given what has occurred since the era of Ruckman, for example, we need to make distinctions that did not need to be made before.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
[RPittman] One of the objections to an inspired preserved text is the difficulty in conveying an accurate meaning in translation. On the one hand, it is fairly easy to translate the description of a simple physical action such as “The boy threw the ball.” On the other hand, the subtle interaction of human relationships laden with emotion and connotation is difficult. So is theological language and concepts. However, much of Scripture is narrative and meaning is contained in action rather than nuances of words. Scripture is down-to-earth and practical as pertaining to “life and godliness (II Peter 1:3).” Philosophical and theological terms are minimal. Even the theological terms may have theological import only because of the load assigned by academicians. Greek and Hebrew scholars plumb every word for any nuance or subtlety of meaning with the ardor of Bible code fanatics looking for some esoteric meaning hidden from a normal reader. The result, IMHO, is semantic overload. The question is how much is God’s intended meaning or how much is the accommodation to the human writer’s style and vocabulary or how much is the scholar’s imagination? Also, perhaps academic language study has attained a life of its own so that a grid of language theory is imposed upon Scripture. Could it be that we make translation more difficult than what it ought to be? Do the problems exist in conveying the meaning of the text or do they exist in our minds and methods?1. While your description of scholars as “Greek and Hebrew scholars plumb every word for any nuance or subtlety of meaning with the ardor of Bible code fanatics looking for some esoteric meaning hidden from a normal reader” might be true is some instances (and I would say less than the majority with ease) one thing is for certain it is not true of all, therefore this form of vilification fails to provide a prescriptive rule and thus cannot rightly be used as a weight in arguing against the proper exercise of the use of Greek and Hebrew manuscripts or for preserved inspiration in translations.
2. As to your question, “how much is God’s intended meaning or how much is the accommodation to the human writer’s style and vocabulary or how much is the scholar’s imagination?”, while it is a valid question it appears you have either an incomplete response or inconclusive response yourself. And for a case based on this inquiry, unless one has a de facto assumption that their personal determination regarding God’s intent is a sufficient answer, being unanswered damages any platform for furthering such arguments and no doubt few would take such a self-serving position seeing it would be unraveled quickly (I will revisit the question with a second response below).
My personal response is that God intended every jot and tittle (one might retort to this response that this jot and tittle reference is, in context, a reference to the law to which I would say indeed but it also reveals God’s disposition regarding even the smallest grammatical element in his Word or communication to man because here he specifically references an object of grammar). While scholars are not infallible nor we who also have possession of God’s Spirit for enlightenment and discovery, the problem certainly is not with discovering God’s intent regarding whether he really meant to have an aorist tense, participle, jot, tittle and so on, he did, rather our problem is in discovering its proper use. The problem lies with our eyes not God’s lips (you did not present your case this way, I know, but I believe it ultimately ends up here, thus the proposition).
If we are what is being described as “overly scholarly” then it is not the fault of the perfect intent of God in determining every jot and tittle is the nature of his superintending his communication through man, rather the misuse of a tool provided by God.
_______
Now one might follow with, “how, then, did he intend every jot and tittle”? Okay fair and even more on the road to enlightenment. And that is where the rules of interpretation are established and applied which brings us back to the original consideration and response:
1. “How much is God’s intended meaning?”…all of it
2. “How much is the accommodation to the human writer’s style and vocabulary?”… wherever it exists in Scripture, all of it.
3. “How much to the scholar’s imagination?”…none of it, our imagination is not a permissible tool for theological discovery.
Finally, you ask if we make “translation more difficult than what it ought to be?” to which I offer some thoughts.
First, if we do not accept the reality of the difficulty of translating from one language to another which already exists in all processes of translation, Scripture or no Scripture, then we begin as lazy students, inconsiderate gatekeepers and lend aid to deny the author the respect due in discovering his full communication.
Secondly, some do add to their difficulty no doubt and some of those, in adding to their difficulty, actually do come away with a misapprehension of the true meaning of a text, again whether it be Scripture or some other document. But those that add unwarranted complexity don’t stand as evidence that the general process and necessity of thoroughly knowing the original language and the subsequent language for the translation are not essential. They simply stand as evidence of overreaching.
Finally, let’s take the most ideal circumstances for those favoring English translations or any other language which is that it is not as difficult as it is treated to translate to another language and good intending scholars have added too much complexity and that God, in most parts (or as you said “much of Scripture is narrative and meaning is contained in action rather than nuances of words” a claim I would like to see validated however) has the intention of an idea being communicated and so long as that idea is passed on we do not have to investigate the original languages, what do we do about the inevitable exceptions?
What do you do when you are, at some point no matter the ideal circumstances as described above, forced to investigate the language of the Greek and Hebrew in some passage? The only thing one can do is concede that attempting to prescribe as a rule that translations are sufficient, in and of themselves, to contain all of the inspired and preserved communication of God is not possible otherwise you would not refer to such sources and treat them as a greater authority.
I’m bowing out of this conversation for now. I think we’ve both made our positions clear and won’t be able to convince one another otherwise. In the interest of preserving my time and not getting bogged down in an endless and fruitless debate, I’ll need to bow out.
Blessings in Christ,
Bob
Striving for the unity of the faith, for the glory of God ~ Eph. 4:3, 13; Rom. 15:5-7 I blog at Fundamentally Reformed. Follow me on Twitter.
[RPittman]Certainly, but your proposition, though earnest, suffers greatly from appeals based in rationalism and equivocations.
Alex, please forgive me but I am unable, due to time constraints, to answer each of your questions or points in detail. I will offer a few general ideas on this last section. I favor translations in the language of the people. Is not this the spirit of the Reformation and the dissenters throughout church history? When we make Greek or Hebrew the authority, we shut up the Scriptures from the people. There is a ruling elite, the Greek and Hebrew scholars, similar to the Roman Catholic establishment who claimed sole authority to interpret the Scriptures. Let each man read for himself and believe. Thank you for your comments.
1. To state that, “when we make Greek or Hebrew the authority, we shut up the Scriptures from the people” is to deny the very source from which translations are derived. Obviously Bible translations are based on and in another source, the Greek and Hebrew manuscripts.
2. I am not sure what you mean when you invoke the spirit of the Reformation. I don’t know of any element in the Reformation that expressed a denial of the Greek and Hebrew texts as authoritative. It is spirited to invoke the Reformation, no doubt, but its application as an appeal here is at best, ambiguous.
3. Referring back to shutting up the Scriptures because the Greek and Hebrew remain the source of exegetical/interpretive authority, you seem to have ignored the acknowledgment by almost all here of their (translations) faithfulness and adequacy for a great deal of doctrinal understanding. I, myself, earlier stated that:
[Alex Guggenheim] While it is true that some, maybe most (for the sake of argument), languages possess sufficient development to enable a translation from the original languages that maintains fidelity…will enable the student to learn a great deal of bible doctrine with accuracy, they will not and cannot discover without the help of the language of the originals, all that is present in those texts.So sweeping claims that the Scriptures are “shut up” simply because ultimately our interpretive authority rests in the Greek in Hebrew is an exploitation and exaggeration of the point with a circular basis in reasoning. Obviously they are not shut up but to conclude that because a translation provides for a great deal of learning and doctrinal apprehension we are now freed from our exegetical obligations or that because we have an exegetical obligation our translations are rendered impotent is to depart from a reasonable consideration of the facts of the matter and introduce extremes that don’t exist in any case.
4. Finally, your attempt to parallel, due to their alleged similarity, Greek and Hebrew scholars and the RCC is a disservice to scholars universally and certainly an indictment on Greek and Hebrews scholars drawn up but not substantiated anywhere. The RCC’s claim of sole authority of Scriptural interpretation has nothing to do with scholarship, rather it has to do with the RCC’s doctrine of apostolic authority (succession) that only through this succession, exercised by the Pope and college of bishops, can the Scripture be rightly interpreted. While they may subsequently offer some scholarly arguments, they begin with the doctrine that no others are ordained or permitted by God to interpret Scriptures.
No such position within Evangelicalism is commonly forwarded. Those in the Evangelical circle do not begin with the view that only certain people of apostolic succession are permitted to interpret. Rather, they subscribe to a different hermeneutic that eschews proprietary interpretation. But within that hermeneutic they do rightly identify those who are trained and those who are not. But even if, in the most extremist case where somehow the English translation became elevated to be equal in its authority with the Greek and Hebrew Bible, it would still require people to know and understand and possess some degree of scholarship in English, particularly when it comes to diagramming a sentence so that we may properly identify its grammatical parts and determine its intended meaning. And once again you introduce the necessity of scholarship which defeats your very argument.
But this is not the case, however I present this English, equal with the Greek and Hebrew, only to demonstrate the fallacy of your objection. To lump in Greek and Hebrew scholars and to suspect them guilty of the RCC doctrine of proprietary interpretation because they seem similar is frankly a fainéant argument. The two, in fact, could not be further from similar.
BTW it is understandable that no one has time to respond to all points of all posts. It just so happens I have more time this week for responding myself.
It’s not about making the Hebrew and Greek “the authority.” That really sets up a wrong starting point to pursue the question. That is, we shouldn’t start with “what has happened in history and how can we avoid that?” We should start with “What has God given us and how do we best make use of that?”
Starting there, the answer is that He gave us Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek Scriptures and making best use involves making sure every generation has some highly skilled linguists who truly in the Faith who can help keep the derived work folks do from translations faithful… as well as increasing our understanding of the Scriptures.
Secondly, I’d point out that we’re not looking at an “either the original languages are the authority or the Bibles people have in their hands are the authority” scenario. In reality, as the KJV translators noted in their preface, every translation that seeks to, approximates the originals to some degree and, as a consequence, carries the authority of the original languages and original text to some degree.
Several translations do this to a degree that makes the difference between their authority and that of the originals negligible in most circumstances. This is why so many guys who do not believe we have a perfectly preserved text we can identify as such insist that we can call our Bibles “the word of God” and “infallible” and “inspired” etc.
(Though I personally prefer to be more precise when I’m on that subject).
In short, what we have is a “both-and” scenario with the higher authority being Hebrew and Greek.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
[RPittman] Are we really speaking of what God has given us or what is (existential)? To say that God has given implies purpose and intention. Has God purposefully, intentionally given us Greek and Hebrew, or is it simply what God used incidentally? Would any other language have served as well? How do we know? We don’t know.RPittman,
My argument is that it is too narrow to restrict the Word of God to the original languages. If translations are indeed the Word of God, then a kind of parity is achieved with the original languages. Being able to understand this without seeing an apparent contradiction means giving up a purely rationalistic mindset. One must see meaning conveyed through the tangible (text) and the intangible (contextualization, conceptualization, Holy Spirit guidance,etc.)
It seems to me that you’re asking questions for which there are no answers this side of Glory. I do know, however, that God deliberately chose to use the times in which He worked [Gal. 4:4] , that God has chosen to work through His chosen people [Israel and the Jews] , and that He works all things together for His own glory [Book of Revelation, among other places]. From that I can safely conclude that God chose to use Hebrew and Greek [and Aramaic - don’t forget that!] to give us His word when He did. I think I can also safely conclude that if God is working all things together in accordance with His will, then that would also govern His use of Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek in the past to give us His word originally.
"Our task today is to tell people — who no longer know what sin is...no longer see themselves as sinners, and no longer have room for these categories — that Christ died for sins of which they do not think they’re guilty." - David Wells
Striving for the unity of the faith, for the glory of God ~ Eph. 4:3, 13; Rom. 15:5-7 I blog at Fundamentally Reformed. Follow me on Twitter.
[RPittman]RP, you have somewhat regularly made this appeal in varying forms. It is necessary with such claims that (1) some clear examples of what you are talking about (this force of a grid of rationalism upon the sovereign working of God) be introduced and very specifically it is (2) important to demonstrate how this introduces and justifies a prescriptive (ruling) proposition with respect to the matter being discussed.
Yet, it appears to me that the state of modern Biblical scholarship, especially in the Fundamentalist camp, forces a grid of rationalist scholarship upon this sovereign working of God.
I understand one can say, “thus and thus” is the case but it is critical not only to cite some cases in point but to demonstrate that they are not restricted cases and provide the justification for further development in the argument and prescriptive application. You have made these charges but have by-passed these two critical elements and have gone directly to your conclusion upon which your further argument is based. No matter one’s position, this does not make for proving a case or presenting it with the elements necessary for a proper adjudication.
[RPittman] It seems a small step for me to believe that if the Word of God “came not in old time by the will of man (2 Peter 1:21),” then its preservation is not necessarily by the will of man. What do you think?Remember, it might appear to be a “small step” but often it is also the last step before going off a cliff and here, I don’t see a lot of ground below your feet.
*Note: My one reservation is to specify that in God’s choosing of the languages it was appropriate to the time and circumstances rather than the idea that His Word was eternally contained only in these languages.
Sincere yes, and I do understand your reasoning here as you use the passage in its snipped form to believe there is more ground upon which to stand or walk but if one properly interprets and applies this passage, it in no way, shape or form provides such an extension.
The best one might hope is to extrapolate a “principle”. But here your unspoken or unexplained principle comes in the form of a very large assumption. Here is what I mean.
You state something which is presented in the Bible as a certainty, in fact a divine certainty, which is that “the Word of God came not in old time by the will of man” but then depart this context with divine decree in hand and attempt to reason that, if it is true here then it must be true in this other place. The problem is “this other place” isn’t the place where the divine decree was made nor its intent. And in reality you haven’t extrapolated a principle rather you have actually moved with the entire decree in hand. You have assumed an interpretive liberty where no such liberty exists for us regarding this form of interpretation and application of Scriptures.
But to the more obvious. Your belief that there is a “same” divine mechanism in preservation as in inspiration is met with a very critical point of contention. Can you say that those translating the Scriptures (thereby acting as agents of God in preserving his Word) were moved by the Holy Spirit as is used by Peter in describing the process of receiving special revelation and scripting it? Because under those conditions such men could not and would not be translating at all, their work would be directly from God? Obviously not. So here the correlation dies along with the attempt to export the text above and apply it to a different context. No matter the sincere ambition to want to see this to be valid, the inability to provide the assurance that Peter provides (and we cannot and dare not forward the notion that translators are equal to those receiving divine inspiration) denies you the force needed to make the argument, again no matter how passionate.
[RP] God’s choosing of the languages it was appropriate to the time and circumstances rather than the idea that His Word was eternally contained only in these languages.It really isn’t sustainable to argue that the very words were inspired then also argue that the language those words were inspired in is incidental… the words somehow transcend the words?
No, I appreciate the concern that unbelieving linguists are frequently involved in the linguistic studies. It is cause for caution in what we do with the data. But that nature of language—and of the narrow areas of linguistic specialization these folks are into—are such that you do not have to be a believer to make a huge contribution. Grammar works the way it works regardless of whether you’re a believer or an atheist. Is there opportunity for bias? Certainly at times there is.
But it isn’t possible to cast the situation as “original language scholarship vs. believing church” because a great many language scholars are in the believing church. So this is, again, false either-or thinking at work.
Bottom line, though: verbal inspiration requires belief that God inspired Hebrew and Greek words. And if those particular languages were “incidental,” they are the languages He chose, nonetheless. It is not verbal inspiration if we say that He inspired semantic bundles that carry the inspiration with them into whatever language they are clothed in. That would be “idea inspiration,” which the believing church has specifically rejected.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
[Aaron Blumer] Bottom line, though: verbal inspiration requires belief that God inspired Hebrew and Greek words. And if those particular languages were “incidental,” they are the languages He chose, nonetheless. It is not verbal inspiration if we say that He inspired semantic bundles that carry the inspiration with them into whatever language they are clothed in. That would be “idea inspiration,” which the believing church has specifically rejected.Excellent point!
Striving for the unity of the faith, for the glory of God ~ Eph. 4:3, 13; Rom. 15:5-7 I blog at Fundamentally Reformed. Follow me on Twitter.
We may need to modify our understanding of plenary verbal inspiration.You’re going to find that this idea gets a very chilly reception, and I’d have to say rightfully so.
These ideas are far, far older than Warfield, and how he may have defended them is a separate consideration from the understanding of the doctrines themselves. It’s a little like saying “Since some guys have tried to prove the existence of God rationalistically, our beliefs about God need to be modified.”
And it’s ironic that part of your case for doing this rests on advances in our understanding of language… where did those advances come from? Linguistic studies.
As for epistemology, hopefully increasing numbers of Bible believers are waking up to the influence of post-modernism and we are not going to see a large scale flight into irrationality. It is one thing to embrace Rationalism and suppose that only what is observed through the senses or deduced from that data is “real.” It’s another thing to take up an epistemology that says something like “What we can see as fact is irrelevant in deciding what Scripture means.” Of course, what we see is subject to error, but so is our understanding of what is written. There must be interplay between the two to arrive at truth. The Bible assumes this in being given to us in written form in the first place (we must read it with our eyeballs and use the basic logic of grammar to understand it even on the most basic level).
Yes, there are perils, as we see in evolutionism motivating some to radically reinterpret Genesis. But there is no escaping the peril, and failures in proper execution are not a reason to abandon a method. Keep in mind, that we did this (used observation and reason to aid our understanding of revelation) when we all abandoned belief in a flat earth or an earth at the center of the universe.
So.. in short, yes let’s reject Rationalism. But no, let’s not reject reason.
[RP] No, I would disagree with this presentation. My point is that God’s preservative acts are not dependent upon the intentional efforts of scholarship. Furthermore, even believing scholars are influenced by their secular colleagues. Even so, God is able to achieve his purpose through the weak and wicked efforts of menIf “God is able to achieve his purpose through” wicked men, why is He unable to do so through “the intentional efforts of scholarship”?
I’ve been spending alot of time in K. Brandenberg’s Thou Shalt Keep Them and it’s becoming increasingly clear that this view has not demonstrated that there are any means of preservation God may not use. It is often repeated but so far, not demonstrated.
In any case, the statement that God does not use scholarship is in need of support if we’re going to be persuaded.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
Rationalism… I’m not just hitting on post-modernism as a whipping boy. My point was that it is typical of post-modernism to selectively embrace the non-rational on one point or another and characterize the rejected view as “Rationalism.” But reasoning to conclusions based on evidence is not Rationalism and ignoring evidence selectively when we don’t like where it leads is not a better strategy.
Some would respond to that by saying “Well, what about science and evolution?” This is to misunderstand the relationship between one form of evidence and another. Bible-believers weigh the evidence of what Scripture says (or in many cases, seems to say) as authoritative, but weigh the evidence of merely-human observation as inferior. But the logic is not different between one and the other. We look at what Scripture says and reason to conclusions from it. In many cases, we look at what it says and look at what is around us and reason to conclusions from both—but with the assertions of Scripture as “givens” and non-negotiable in the process.
In short, Bible trumps external evidence, but external evidence is important and valid.
I’m warming up a bit here for my next article on Preservation because Kent B’s view in particular relies heavily on characterizing all alternatives as embracing Enlightenment Rationalism first, then making the Bible fit it.
By the way, he has written no less than five responses to this article now. http://kentbrandenburg.blogspot.com/2010_01_01_archive.html
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
[RPittman] Aaron, I agree 100%, but did you rationally arrive at this conclusion or is it a matter of faith?I don’t really buy the premise that it has to be one or the other.
But epistemology only interests me to a point… and when it’s useful in talking about other things. Seems to me that sure way to sink into confusion is to contemplate to excess how we can know what is knowable. The only thing quicker is contemplating much how we can know how we may know what is knowable!
I’ll toss this out… but only as a guy who is not even an armchair philosopher (at best, sometimes I’m sort of half-slouching on a bean bag philosopher)… I believe the Bible assumes common sense. I am not referring to an 18th century philosophy by the term… not empiricism or anything like that. It’s hard to describe what I do mean without going on and on and on, and supper’s on, so… but basically the sort of sense that allows us to understand that we ought not to walk off a cliff and allows us to understand what sentences mean in a letter from a friend.
If one approaches the Bible with that kind of sense, he can figure out most of what it claims.
Where faith enters is in deciding whether to believe what it claims.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
At least on the ‘epistemology question’ we don’t seem to be swimming in different ponds.
I’m also looking forward to spending more time w/ Kent’s book (along with two others on the subject I’m getting familiar with). Some computer problems have slowed me down a bit the last week or so. Catching up again now though.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
Discussion