Post by Ben on Aug 1, 2007 17:05:16 GMT 8
Alright pretty long i know. but worth the read. For those who can, carry on.
THE BIBLE’S CLAIMS FOR ITS INSPIRATION
Imagine, if you can, that somehow you could have access to every religious book that has ever been written. Imagine, further, that you could run those books through some sort of a sieve, to winnow out only those volumes that claim to be a creed book, by which you should pattern and live your life. That, admittedly, is a tough test—one, likely, that very few books could pass. Imagine further that you could take the books that passed this test, and run them through a second sieve. This time you would winnow out only those books that claim to be both a creed book to be used in regulating your life, and inspired of God. Interestingly, you could count that number on the fingers of a single hand!
The claim of inspiration at the hand of God is rare indeed. Sadly, misguided devotees of various religions clamor about, defending this book or that book as allegedly being “inspired of God,” when, in fact, the books themselves do not even make such a claim. So, the first question that should be asked of any volume for which inspiration is touted is this: Does the book itself claim to be inspired?
When it comes to the Bible, that question can be answered easily in the affirmative. In his second letter to his coworker, Timothy, Paul stated: “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). Peter wrote: “Knowing this first, that no prophecy of scripture is of private interpretation. For no prophecy ever came by the will of man: but men spake from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:20-21). When he wrote his first epistle to the Christians at Corinth, Paul reminded them:
But we received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is from God; that we might know the things that were freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Spirit teacheth; combining spiritual things with spiritual words (1 Corinthians 2:12-13).
Furthermore, statements such as “God said...” or “these are the words of the Lord...” appear thousands of times in both the Old and New Testaments. Moses wrote in Exodus 20:1: “And God spake all these words....” The psalmist wrote in 119:89: “For ever, O Jehovah, Thy word is settled in heaven.” In Matthew 22:31, the Lord asked: “Have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God?” In fact, “There are 2,700 such statements in the Old Testament alone, all of which make direct claim that the Bible is the Word of God” (Ridenour, 1967, p. 2).
When the Bible claims to be “inspired,” what is meant by that term? The English term, “inspiration,” derives from the Latin inspirare, which means “to breathe upon or into something.” The five English words , “given by inspiration of God,” in the King James Version of 1611 actually are translated from the single Greek adjective, theopneustos, which is derived from two Greek root words (theos—God, pneo—to blow or breathe). Theologically, “inspiration” is used for the condition of being directly under divine influence. Thus, Paul’s point was that every scripture is “God breathed.” [The word “scripture” in 2 Timothy 3:16 refers primarily to the Old Testament Scriptures. However, as the New Testament was written, it, too, was referred to as “scripture.” Peter, for example, referred to Paul’s epistles as authoritative and “scripture” (2 Peter 3:15-16). Thus, “all scripture” refers to both testaments.]
In addition, when Peter wrote in 2 Peter 1:20-21 that “men spake from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit,” he employed the Greek word pheromenoi, which literally means “borne along.” His point was that the Bible writers did not speak from themselves, but were “borne along” by God’s Holy Spirit to write what they did. The Bible writers never credited their words to mere human reason. Both Old and New Testament passages bear this out. In 2 Samuel 23:2 it is written: “The Spirit of Jehovah spake by me, And his word was upon my tongue.” In Acts 1:16, Luke observed that “the Holy Spirit spake before by the mouth of David.” Likely, however, the best explanatory passage regarding inspiration is Paul’s commentary in 1 Corinthians 2:12-13, wherein he affirmed that the information the Bible writers received came not from human wisdom, but directly from God. Further, that wisdom was not expressed in man’s choice of words, but via words guided by the Holy Spirit.
But exactly what form does inspiration take? In any discussion of the Bible’s inspiration, two words generally are used to amplify the meaning of the term: verbal and plenary. By “verbal,” it is meant that every word in the Bible is there because God permitted it by the direction of the Holy Spirit. By “plenary” (from the Latin, plenus—full), it is meant that each and every part of the Bible is inspired, with nothing having been omitted.
In other words, by employing what we today call verbal (word-for-word), plenary (full) inspiration, God ensured that the writings were correct and consistent with His will. This view holds that men wrote exactly what God wanted them to write, without errors or mistakes, yet with their own individual characteristics in evidence in their writings. While the various books of the Bible reflect the writers’ personalities as expressed in the human element that often is so evident (type of language used, fears expressed, prayers offered, etc.), it was only by verbal, plenary inspiration that God could convey, objectively and accurately, His Word to mankind.
There is compelling evidence from within the Bible itself about the nature of its own inspiration. In the midst of Jesus’ discussion with the Sadducees about their denial of the resurrection of the dead (Matthew 22:23-33), Jesus referred Exodus 3:6 wherein God said to Moses: “I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” When God spoke these words, Abraham had been dead some 400 years, yet He still said, “I am the God of Abraham.” As Jesus correctly pointed out to the Sadducees, “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living” (Matthew 22:32). Thus, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob must have been living. The only way they could be living was if their spirits continued to survive the death of their bodies. That kind of conscious existence implies a future ressurection of the body—the very point Christ was attempting to make. Of interest is the fact that His entire argument rested on the tense of the verb!
The same kind of reliance on a single word was expressed by Paul (as he referred to Genesis 22:18) in Galatians 3:16: “Now to Abraham were the promises spoken, and to his seed. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ” (emp. added). The force of his argument rested on the number of the noun (singular, as opposed to plural). In John 8:58, Jesus said: “I say unto you, Before Abraham was born, I am.” He was attempting to impress upon the Jews His eternal nature, and to do so, He once again based His entire argument on the tense of the verb. This kind of evidence regarding the verbal inspiration of God’s Word should not be overlooked.
We should note, however, that this inspiration process applied only to the original autographs of the sacred writings (i.e., the actual document as penned initially by the writer). While Bible writers were inspired, the scribes, translators, and others who followed were not. This does not mean, as some have suggested, that we do not have God’s Word in an accurate form today. The text of the Bible we possess can be trusted, and counted as reliable. The modernistic idea which suggests that the copying process through the ages has destroyed the essence of inspiration is a “theological scarecrow to frighten those who are not knowledgeable of the art of transmission of the Bible” (thingyson, 1997, p. 319). The copying process through the centuries was so meticulous, and the number of extant manuscripts available for comparison is so large, that the minute variations which do occur are detected easily. Further, these variations are insignificant in nature, and do not affect points of doctrine. Timothy, from his early years, had known the Old Testament “sacred writings” that were able to make him “wise unto salvation” (2 Timothy 3:15). Interestingly, those “sacred writings” were mere copies of the original Old Testament manuscripts, but had been preserved so faithfully through the centuries that the apostle Paul could affirm that their original design—making men wise unto salvation—remained intact.
Several other points should be clarified as well. First, there is an important difference between revelation and inspiration. Revelation represents the revealing of facts and truths by God to humans. Inspiration is the process by which God guided the writing down of those facts and truths. “Revelation is the body of truth which God desired men to possess; inspiration is the way in which He gave this body of truth to men” (Woods, n.d., p. 6). The whole Bible is the result of inspiration, but not all inspired material was revelatory in nature. Paul could quote pagan poets in Acts 17:28 and Titus 1:12 because he already had access to this information, and did not need revelation to employ it. But God inspired him to record these sayings, and to record them accurately. Thus, whether the Bible writer used information already available to him, his own eyewitness accounts, or revelation from God, inspiration guaranteed that it was placed in print in the form in which God desired.
Second, the fact that a person wrote by inspiration does not mean that he was free from personal sin in his life. Israel’s King David penned several Old Testament psalms. The apostle Peter acknowledged that “the Holy Spirit spake before by the mouth of David” (Acts 1:16). Yet this was the same king who committed adultery with Bathsheba, and had her husband, Uriah the Hittite, slain to cover his own sin. Peter himself presented some extremely powerful sermons (e.g., Acts 2:14ff.), and penned two New Testament epistles. Yet he played the hypocrite when he separated himself from the Gentiles to seek favor with the Jews, and received a public rebuke from Paul for it (Galatians 2:11ff.). Thus, while inspiration preserved the integrity of the writer’s words as he was “moved by the Holy Spirit,” that process did not diminish his freedom of choice or compel him to live a sinful life.
Third, inspiration was not a twenty-four-hour-a-day process. A few months prior to His death, the Lord informed His disciples that He would shortly enter Jerusalem, where He would suffer and eventually die. Peter, however, rebuked the Lord and said: “Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall never be unto thee” (Matthew 16:22). Obviously, that impetuous utterance was not inspired. In Luke, the story is told of how a group of Samaritans refused aid and comfort to the Lord (9:51ff.). James and John bitterly suggested that the Lord enjoin a “heavenly barbecue” to consume these ill-tempered Samaritans. Their attempt at vengeance—for which they drew the Lord’s ire—hardly was inspired. The truth of the matter is that inspiration guided the writers in what they wrote and spoke from God as they were “borne along” by God’s Spirit—a process that was not active every minute of every day.
Fourth, inspiration extended to a variety of disparate subjects. Today, it is not uncommon to hear liberal theologians, and those sympathetic with them, suggest that the “spiritual” sections of Scripture are inspired, but that all other portions dealing with matters of history, science, geography, medicine, and the like are not.
This concept, known as the doctrine of “partial inspiration,” is false. Were it true, everyone who reads the text would have the personal responsibility of wading through the biblical documents to decide which matters are “spiritual” (thus, inspired) and which are not (thus, uninspired). On some occasions, therefore, God would have “breathed” truth, while on others He would have “breathed” error. But the question must be asked: If God cannot handle correctly trivial matters (such as geographical directions, or the name of an individual), why would anyone think that they could trust Him with something as critically important as the safety of their eternal soul and expect Him to handle it in a more appropriate fashion? The psalmist stated: “The sum of thy word is truth; And every one of thy righteous ordinances endureth for ever” (Psalm 119:160; emp. added). The concept of partial inspiration impugns the integrity of God, conflicts with the evidences for inspiration, and should be rejected.
Fifth, not only did the Bible writers view each others’ works as inspired, but no Bible writer ever criticized another. Today, it is not at all unusual for one religious writer to take issue with another, even when they share the same religious views, or are members of the same religious group. But the Bible writers do not fall into that category—even when one might expect them to do so. For example, as mentioned above, Paul rebuked Peter publicly for his dissimulation (Galatians 2:11ff.). Yet Peter never avenged himself by denigrating Paul’s writings. In fact, Peter wrote:
And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given to him, wrote unto you; as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; wherein are some things hard to be understood, which the ignorant and unstedfast wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction (2 Peter 3:15-16, emp. added).
Note especially that Peter referred to Paul’s writings as being classified by the same kind of inspiration as the “other scriptures.” Additionally, in defending the right of elders to receive remuneration from the church treasury for their work, Paul quoted both Deuteronomy 25:4 and Luke 10:7, classifying them both as “scripture” (1 Timothy 5:18). It is clear that the Bible writers considered each others’ works to be inspired—a view we today would do well to entertain.
EVIDENCE FOR THE BIBLE’S INSPIRATION
Evidence to substantiate the Bible’s claim for its own inspiration can be drawn from two general sources. External evidences for inspiration include such things as historical documentation of biblical people, places, and events, or archaeological artifacts that corroborate biblical statements or circumstances. Internal evidences are part of the warp and woof of the actual biblical fabric itself. These are self-authenticating phenomena from within the Sacred Volume that bear singular testimony to the fact that the very existence of the Holy Scriptures cannot be explained in any other way except to acknowledge that they are the result of an overriding, superintending, guiding Mind.
Critics, of course, have objected to the use of the Bible as a witness to its own inspiration. thingyson has pointed out correctly, however, that
...this contention is really unjust. One does not have a right to deny the authenticity of a document without considering the document itself. We would not deny Shakespeare’s authorship of the Shakespearean plays without first considering their text. The Bible should at least be treated as just another book. Nevertheless, even this right is rejected by the prejudiced minds of some (1997, p. 328).
When the evidences for the Bible’s inspiration are allowed to speak for themselves, however, the story they tell is totally in accord with the Bible’s claim of inspiration. Consider, for example, the following.
The Unity of the Bible
The Bible exhibits a unity that—on purely human terms—is utterly inexplicable. In order to appreciate that unity, one first must come to terms with how The Book was put together. The Bible was written by more than forty different men from practically every walk of life. Nehemiah was a royal cupbearer. Peter was a fisherman. Luke was a physician. Matthew was a tax collector. Solomon was a king. Moses was a shepherd. Paul was a tentmaker. Furthermore, these men wrote from almost every conceivable human condition. David wrote from heights of joy on the rolling, grassy hills of Judea. Paul wrote from pits of despair caused by Roman incarceration. They wrote in three languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek), from at least two continents (Europe and Asia), over a period of time that spanned sixteen centuries (approximately 1500 B.C. to approximately A.D. 100). And they covered topics as diverse as eschatology, soteriology, theology, psychology, geography, history, medicine, and many others.
All this being true, one might expect that so diverse a group of men, writing on so varied a group of subjects, over such a lengthy span of time, would have produced a book that would be a tangled mishmash of subjects more often than not marred by inconsistencies, errors, and incongruities. Yet this hardly is the case. In fact, quite the opposite is true. The Bible exhibits such astounding harmony, such consistent flow, and such unparalleled unity that it defies any purely naturalistic explanation. It is as if the Bible were a magnificent symphony orchestrated by a single Conductor. The “musicians” each may have played a different instrument, in a different place, at a different time. But when the talented Maestro combined the individual efforts, the end-result was a striking masterpiece.
Consider this analogy. Suppose you assembled forty contemporary scholars with the highest academic training possible in a single field of study (e.g., forty academicians with terminal Ph.D. degrees in world history). Suppose, further, that you placed them in a room, and asked them to write a twenty-page paper on a single topic—the causes of World War II. What kind of consensus would be exhibited when all of their treatises were completed? Likely, the forty scholars would be unable to agree on all but a few points; their compositions would be recognized more for the disagreements they contained than for the agreements. The Bible writers, by contrast, generally were not contemporaries. They worked independently, and the majority never even met another biblical writer. Most were not highly trained, and what training they did have certainly was not in the same field of study. Nor were they allowed to write on a single topic in which they already had an interest. Yet they produced a book that is unified from beginning to end. The books of 1 and 2 Chronicles and 1 and 2 Kings corroborate one another in numerous historical events. Joshua 1 verifies Deuteronomy 34. Judges 1:1 verifies Joshua 24:27-33. Jeremiah 52:31-34 verifies 2 Kings 25:25,27-30. Ezra 1 verifies 2 Chronicles 36:22-23. Daniel refers to Jeremiah (Daniel 9:2), and Ezekiel refers to Daniel (Ezekiel 28:3). And so on. This kind of unity, which is in evidence throughout the Sacred Volume, attests to the fact that there was a Superintending Intelligence behind it. So many writers, over so many years, covering so many themes, simply could not have been so harmonious by mere coincidence.
Each book of the Bible complements the others in a single unified theme. From Genesis to Revelation there is a marvelous unfolding of the general theme of man’s fall from his holy estate, God’s plan for his redemption (as carefully worked out across the centuries), the sinless life and atoning death of Jesus Christ, and the ultimate victory of the Christian system. In essence, the Bible is the story of one problem—sin—with one solution, Jesus Christ. In commenting on the Bible’s remarkable unity of theme, Wayne Jackson has noted:
The redemptive thread that runs through the Scriptures is wonderfully illustrated by a comparison between Genesis and Revelation, the first and last books of the holy canon. In Genesis the origin of the heavens and Earth is revealed (1:1), while in Revelation the consummation of earthly affairs is effected, and the old order is replaced by a “new heaven and earth” (i.e., heaven itself), spiritual in nature.... Man, who was originally perfect, but who fell into sin (Genesis 3:6), is, by virtue of his obedience, granted the opportunity to become perfect again (Revelation 7:14; 22:14). All of this is made possible, of course, by the seed of woman (Genesis 3:15), the offspring of David (Revelation 22:16), who, as a consequence of his sacrifice (Genesis 4:4), became an enthroned Lamb (Revelation 21:4). Thus, the sorrow of Eden (Genesis 3:16) will be transformed into the joy of heaven (Revelation 21:4), and that tree of life, from which our early parents were separated (Genesis 3:22-24), will be our glad possession once more (Revelation 22:14) [1991, 11:1].
Each book of the Bible complements the others in a single, unified plan. In Genesis, there is the record of humanity’s pristine origin and covenant relationship with God, followed by its tragic fall into a sinful state. But, a specific family line (the Hebrew nation) was selected to provide a remedy for this disaster (Genesis 12:1ff.; 22:18). Man needed to learn precisely what sin is, thus the books of Exodus through Deuteronomy document the giving of the law of God to Moses. Via a set of ordinances, sin would be defined and humanity would be illuminated regarding the price of rebellion against God (Romans 7:7,13; Galatians 3:19). The historical books of the Old Testament revealed mankind’s inability to keep perfectly God’s law system (Galatians 3:10), and therefore underscored the need for a Justifier—Someone to do for man what he could not do for himself. The prophets of the Old Testament heralded the arrival of that Savior (Luke 24:44); more than 300 prophecies focus on the promised Messiah.
After four silent centuries (the “inter-biblical era”), four Gospel writers described in great detail the arrival, and life’s-work, of the Justifier—Jesus of Nazareth. The books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are carefully crafted accounts of the birth, life, death, and ultimate resurrection of the Son of God (John 20:30-31). Each emphasized different parts of Christ’s ministry in order to relate the “good news” to Jews or Gentiles. Matthew directed his record primarily to the Jewish nation. Mark stressed the works of Jesus. Luke, being the only Gentile writer of a Bible book (except possibly the author of Job), wrote to Gentiles. John’s primary purpose in writing was to produce faith.
The book of Acts was written to convey the means by which mankind was to appropriate God’s saving grace. It is a historical record that instructs a person on how to become a Christian. It also teaches about how the church of Christ was established in Jerusalem, and how that same church flourished throughout the Roman Empire of the first century. The various epistles that follow the book of Acts in the English Bible were directions to individuals and churches on how to obtain, and maintain, spiritual maturity. Finally, the book of Revelation predicted (in symbolic fashion) the ultimate triumph of good over evil—acknowledging that Christians would win, and Satan would lose. To the careful reader, the unity of both theme and plan in the Bible are apparent.
THE BIBLE’S CLAIMS FOR ITS INSPIRATION
Imagine, if you can, that somehow you could have access to every religious book that has ever been written. Imagine, further, that you could run those books through some sort of a sieve, to winnow out only those volumes that claim to be a creed book, by which you should pattern and live your life. That, admittedly, is a tough test—one, likely, that very few books could pass. Imagine further that you could take the books that passed this test, and run them through a second sieve. This time you would winnow out only those books that claim to be both a creed book to be used in regulating your life, and inspired of God. Interestingly, you could count that number on the fingers of a single hand!
The claim of inspiration at the hand of God is rare indeed. Sadly, misguided devotees of various religions clamor about, defending this book or that book as allegedly being “inspired of God,” when, in fact, the books themselves do not even make such a claim. So, the first question that should be asked of any volume for which inspiration is touted is this: Does the book itself claim to be inspired?
When it comes to the Bible, that question can be answered easily in the affirmative. In his second letter to his coworker, Timothy, Paul stated: “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). Peter wrote: “Knowing this first, that no prophecy of scripture is of private interpretation. For no prophecy ever came by the will of man: but men spake from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:20-21). When he wrote his first epistle to the Christians at Corinth, Paul reminded them:
But we received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is from God; that we might know the things that were freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Spirit teacheth; combining spiritual things with spiritual words (1 Corinthians 2:12-13).
Furthermore, statements such as “God said...” or “these are the words of the Lord...” appear thousands of times in both the Old and New Testaments. Moses wrote in Exodus 20:1: “And God spake all these words....” The psalmist wrote in 119:89: “For ever, O Jehovah, Thy word is settled in heaven.” In Matthew 22:31, the Lord asked: “Have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God?” In fact, “There are 2,700 such statements in the Old Testament alone, all of which make direct claim that the Bible is the Word of God” (Ridenour, 1967, p. 2).
When the Bible claims to be “inspired,” what is meant by that term? The English term, “inspiration,” derives from the Latin inspirare, which means “to breathe upon or into something.” The five English words , “given by inspiration of God,” in the King James Version of 1611 actually are translated from the single Greek adjective, theopneustos, which is derived from two Greek root words (theos—God, pneo—to blow or breathe). Theologically, “inspiration” is used for the condition of being directly under divine influence. Thus, Paul’s point was that every scripture is “God breathed.” [The word “scripture” in 2 Timothy 3:16 refers primarily to the Old Testament Scriptures. However, as the New Testament was written, it, too, was referred to as “scripture.” Peter, for example, referred to Paul’s epistles as authoritative and “scripture” (2 Peter 3:15-16). Thus, “all scripture” refers to both testaments.]
In addition, when Peter wrote in 2 Peter 1:20-21 that “men spake from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit,” he employed the Greek word pheromenoi, which literally means “borne along.” His point was that the Bible writers did not speak from themselves, but were “borne along” by God’s Holy Spirit to write what they did. The Bible writers never credited their words to mere human reason. Both Old and New Testament passages bear this out. In 2 Samuel 23:2 it is written: “The Spirit of Jehovah spake by me, And his word was upon my tongue.” In Acts 1:16, Luke observed that “the Holy Spirit spake before by the mouth of David.” Likely, however, the best explanatory passage regarding inspiration is Paul’s commentary in 1 Corinthians 2:12-13, wherein he affirmed that the information the Bible writers received came not from human wisdom, but directly from God. Further, that wisdom was not expressed in man’s choice of words, but via words guided by the Holy Spirit.
But exactly what form does inspiration take? In any discussion of the Bible’s inspiration, two words generally are used to amplify the meaning of the term: verbal and plenary. By “verbal,” it is meant that every word in the Bible is there because God permitted it by the direction of the Holy Spirit. By “plenary” (from the Latin, plenus—full), it is meant that each and every part of the Bible is inspired, with nothing having been omitted.
In other words, by employing what we today call verbal (word-for-word), plenary (full) inspiration, God ensured that the writings were correct and consistent with His will. This view holds that men wrote exactly what God wanted them to write, without errors or mistakes, yet with their own individual characteristics in evidence in their writings. While the various books of the Bible reflect the writers’ personalities as expressed in the human element that often is so evident (type of language used, fears expressed, prayers offered, etc.), it was only by verbal, plenary inspiration that God could convey, objectively and accurately, His Word to mankind.
There is compelling evidence from within the Bible itself about the nature of its own inspiration. In the midst of Jesus’ discussion with the Sadducees about their denial of the resurrection of the dead (Matthew 22:23-33), Jesus referred Exodus 3:6 wherein God said to Moses: “I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” When God spoke these words, Abraham had been dead some 400 years, yet He still said, “I am the God of Abraham.” As Jesus correctly pointed out to the Sadducees, “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living” (Matthew 22:32). Thus, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob must have been living. The only way they could be living was if their spirits continued to survive the death of their bodies. That kind of conscious existence implies a future ressurection of the body—the very point Christ was attempting to make. Of interest is the fact that His entire argument rested on the tense of the verb!
The same kind of reliance on a single word was expressed by Paul (as he referred to Genesis 22:18) in Galatians 3:16: “Now to Abraham were the promises spoken, and to his seed. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ” (emp. added). The force of his argument rested on the number of the noun (singular, as opposed to plural). In John 8:58, Jesus said: “I say unto you, Before Abraham was born, I am.” He was attempting to impress upon the Jews His eternal nature, and to do so, He once again based His entire argument on the tense of the verb. This kind of evidence regarding the verbal inspiration of God’s Word should not be overlooked.
We should note, however, that this inspiration process applied only to the original autographs of the sacred writings (i.e., the actual document as penned initially by the writer). While Bible writers were inspired, the scribes, translators, and others who followed were not. This does not mean, as some have suggested, that we do not have God’s Word in an accurate form today. The text of the Bible we possess can be trusted, and counted as reliable. The modernistic idea which suggests that the copying process through the ages has destroyed the essence of inspiration is a “theological scarecrow to frighten those who are not knowledgeable of the art of transmission of the Bible” (thingyson, 1997, p. 319). The copying process through the centuries was so meticulous, and the number of extant manuscripts available for comparison is so large, that the minute variations which do occur are detected easily. Further, these variations are insignificant in nature, and do not affect points of doctrine. Timothy, from his early years, had known the Old Testament “sacred writings” that were able to make him “wise unto salvation” (2 Timothy 3:15). Interestingly, those “sacred writings” were mere copies of the original Old Testament manuscripts, but had been preserved so faithfully through the centuries that the apostle Paul could affirm that their original design—making men wise unto salvation—remained intact.
Several other points should be clarified as well. First, there is an important difference between revelation and inspiration. Revelation represents the revealing of facts and truths by God to humans. Inspiration is the process by which God guided the writing down of those facts and truths. “Revelation is the body of truth which God desired men to possess; inspiration is the way in which He gave this body of truth to men” (Woods, n.d., p. 6). The whole Bible is the result of inspiration, but not all inspired material was revelatory in nature. Paul could quote pagan poets in Acts 17:28 and Titus 1:12 because he already had access to this information, and did not need revelation to employ it. But God inspired him to record these sayings, and to record them accurately. Thus, whether the Bible writer used information already available to him, his own eyewitness accounts, or revelation from God, inspiration guaranteed that it was placed in print in the form in which God desired.
Second, the fact that a person wrote by inspiration does not mean that he was free from personal sin in his life. Israel’s King David penned several Old Testament psalms. The apostle Peter acknowledged that “the Holy Spirit spake before by the mouth of David” (Acts 1:16). Yet this was the same king who committed adultery with Bathsheba, and had her husband, Uriah the Hittite, slain to cover his own sin. Peter himself presented some extremely powerful sermons (e.g., Acts 2:14ff.), and penned two New Testament epistles. Yet he played the hypocrite when he separated himself from the Gentiles to seek favor with the Jews, and received a public rebuke from Paul for it (Galatians 2:11ff.). Thus, while inspiration preserved the integrity of the writer’s words as he was “moved by the Holy Spirit,” that process did not diminish his freedom of choice or compel him to live a sinful life.
Third, inspiration was not a twenty-four-hour-a-day process. A few months prior to His death, the Lord informed His disciples that He would shortly enter Jerusalem, where He would suffer and eventually die. Peter, however, rebuked the Lord and said: “Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall never be unto thee” (Matthew 16:22). Obviously, that impetuous utterance was not inspired. In Luke, the story is told of how a group of Samaritans refused aid and comfort to the Lord (9:51ff.). James and John bitterly suggested that the Lord enjoin a “heavenly barbecue” to consume these ill-tempered Samaritans. Their attempt at vengeance—for which they drew the Lord’s ire—hardly was inspired. The truth of the matter is that inspiration guided the writers in what they wrote and spoke from God as they were “borne along” by God’s Spirit—a process that was not active every minute of every day.
Fourth, inspiration extended to a variety of disparate subjects. Today, it is not uncommon to hear liberal theologians, and those sympathetic with them, suggest that the “spiritual” sections of Scripture are inspired, but that all other portions dealing with matters of history, science, geography, medicine, and the like are not.
This concept, known as the doctrine of “partial inspiration,” is false. Were it true, everyone who reads the text would have the personal responsibility of wading through the biblical documents to decide which matters are “spiritual” (thus, inspired) and which are not (thus, uninspired). On some occasions, therefore, God would have “breathed” truth, while on others He would have “breathed” error. But the question must be asked: If God cannot handle correctly trivial matters (such as geographical directions, or the name of an individual), why would anyone think that they could trust Him with something as critically important as the safety of their eternal soul and expect Him to handle it in a more appropriate fashion? The psalmist stated: “The sum of thy word is truth; And every one of thy righteous ordinances endureth for ever” (Psalm 119:160; emp. added). The concept of partial inspiration impugns the integrity of God, conflicts with the evidences for inspiration, and should be rejected.
Fifth, not only did the Bible writers view each others’ works as inspired, but no Bible writer ever criticized another. Today, it is not at all unusual for one religious writer to take issue with another, even when they share the same religious views, or are members of the same religious group. But the Bible writers do not fall into that category—even when one might expect them to do so. For example, as mentioned above, Paul rebuked Peter publicly for his dissimulation (Galatians 2:11ff.). Yet Peter never avenged himself by denigrating Paul’s writings. In fact, Peter wrote:
And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given to him, wrote unto you; as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; wherein are some things hard to be understood, which the ignorant and unstedfast wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction (2 Peter 3:15-16, emp. added).
Note especially that Peter referred to Paul’s writings as being classified by the same kind of inspiration as the “other scriptures.” Additionally, in defending the right of elders to receive remuneration from the church treasury for their work, Paul quoted both Deuteronomy 25:4 and Luke 10:7, classifying them both as “scripture” (1 Timothy 5:18). It is clear that the Bible writers considered each others’ works to be inspired—a view we today would do well to entertain.
EVIDENCE FOR THE BIBLE’S INSPIRATION
Evidence to substantiate the Bible’s claim for its own inspiration can be drawn from two general sources. External evidences for inspiration include such things as historical documentation of biblical people, places, and events, or archaeological artifacts that corroborate biblical statements or circumstances. Internal evidences are part of the warp and woof of the actual biblical fabric itself. These are self-authenticating phenomena from within the Sacred Volume that bear singular testimony to the fact that the very existence of the Holy Scriptures cannot be explained in any other way except to acknowledge that they are the result of an overriding, superintending, guiding Mind.
Critics, of course, have objected to the use of the Bible as a witness to its own inspiration. thingyson has pointed out correctly, however, that
...this contention is really unjust. One does not have a right to deny the authenticity of a document without considering the document itself. We would not deny Shakespeare’s authorship of the Shakespearean plays without first considering their text. The Bible should at least be treated as just another book. Nevertheless, even this right is rejected by the prejudiced minds of some (1997, p. 328).
When the evidences for the Bible’s inspiration are allowed to speak for themselves, however, the story they tell is totally in accord with the Bible’s claim of inspiration. Consider, for example, the following.
The Unity of the Bible
The Bible exhibits a unity that—on purely human terms—is utterly inexplicable. In order to appreciate that unity, one first must come to terms with how The Book was put together. The Bible was written by more than forty different men from practically every walk of life. Nehemiah was a royal cupbearer. Peter was a fisherman. Luke was a physician. Matthew was a tax collector. Solomon was a king. Moses was a shepherd. Paul was a tentmaker. Furthermore, these men wrote from almost every conceivable human condition. David wrote from heights of joy on the rolling, grassy hills of Judea. Paul wrote from pits of despair caused by Roman incarceration. They wrote in three languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek), from at least two continents (Europe and Asia), over a period of time that spanned sixteen centuries (approximately 1500 B.C. to approximately A.D. 100). And they covered topics as diverse as eschatology, soteriology, theology, psychology, geography, history, medicine, and many others.
All this being true, one might expect that so diverse a group of men, writing on so varied a group of subjects, over such a lengthy span of time, would have produced a book that would be a tangled mishmash of subjects more often than not marred by inconsistencies, errors, and incongruities. Yet this hardly is the case. In fact, quite the opposite is true. The Bible exhibits such astounding harmony, such consistent flow, and such unparalleled unity that it defies any purely naturalistic explanation. It is as if the Bible were a magnificent symphony orchestrated by a single Conductor. The “musicians” each may have played a different instrument, in a different place, at a different time. But when the talented Maestro combined the individual efforts, the end-result was a striking masterpiece.
Consider this analogy. Suppose you assembled forty contemporary scholars with the highest academic training possible in a single field of study (e.g., forty academicians with terminal Ph.D. degrees in world history). Suppose, further, that you placed them in a room, and asked them to write a twenty-page paper on a single topic—the causes of World War II. What kind of consensus would be exhibited when all of their treatises were completed? Likely, the forty scholars would be unable to agree on all but a few points; their compositions would be recognized more for the disagreements they contained than for the agreements. The Bible writers, by contrast, generally were not contemporaries. They worked independently, and the majority never even met another biblical writer. Most were not highly trained, and what training they did have certainly was not in the same field of study. Nor were they allowed to write on a single topic in which they already had an interest. Yet they produced a book that is unified from beginning to end. The books of 1 and 2 Chronicles and 1 and 2 Kings corroborate one another in numerous historical events. Joshua 1 verifies Deuteronomy 34. Judges 1:1 verifies Joshua 24:27-33. Jeremiah 52:31-34 verifies 2 Kings 25:25,27-30. Ezra 1 verifies 2 Chronicles 36:22-23. Daniel refers to Jeremiah (Daniel 9:2), and Ezekiel refers to Daniel (Ezekiel 28:3). And so on. This kind of unity, which is in evidence throughout the Sacred Volume, attests to the fact that there was a Superintending Intelligence behind it. So many writers, over so many years, covering so many themes, simply could not have been so harmonious by mere coincidence.
Each book of the Bible complements the others in a single unified theme. From Genesis to Revelation there is a marvelous unfolding of the general theme of man’s fall from his holy estate, God’s plan for his redemption (as carefully worked out across the centuries), the sinless life and atoning death of Jesus Christ, and the ultimate victory of the Christian system. In essence, the Bible is the story of one problem—sin—with one solution, Jesus Christ. In commenting on the Bible’s remarkable unity of theme, Wayne Jackson has noted:
The redemptive thread that runs through the Scriptures is wonderfully illustrated by a comparison between Genesis and Revelation, the first and last books of the holy canon. In Genesis the origin of the heavens and Earth is revealed (1:1), while in Revelation the consummation of earthly affairs is effected, and the old order is replaced by a “new heaven and earth” (i.e., heaven itself), spiritual in nature.... Man, who was originally perfect, but who fell into sin (Genesis 3:6), is, by virtue of his obedience, granted the opportunity to become perfect again (Revelation 7:14; 22:14). All of this is made possible, of course, by the seed of woman (Genesis 3:15), the offspring of David (Revelation 22:16), who, as a consequence of his sacrifice (Genesis 4:4), became an enthroned Lamb (Revelation 21:4). Thus, the sorrow of Eden (Genesis 3:16) will be transformed into the joy of heaven (Revelation 21:4), and that tree of life, from which our early parents were separated (Genesis 3:22-24), will be our glad possession once more (Revelation 22:14) [1991, 11:1].
Each book of the Bible complements the others in a single, unified plan. In Genesis, there is the record of humanity’s pristine origin and covenant relationship with God, followed by its tragic fall into a sinful state. But, a specific family line (the Hebrew nation) was selected to provide a remedy for this disaster (Genesis 12:1ff.; 22:18). Man needed to learn precisely what sin is, thus the books of Exodus through Deuteronomy document the giving of the law of God to Moses. Via a set of ordinances, sin would be defined and humanity would be illuminated regarding the price of rebellion against God (Romans 7:7,13; Galatians 3:19). The historical books of the Old Testament revealed mankind’s inability to keep perfectly God’s law system (Galatians 3:10), and therefore underscored the need for a Justifier—Someone to do for man what he could not do for himself. The prophets of the Old Testament heralded the arrival of that Savior (Luke 24:44); more than 300 prophecies focus on the promised Messiah.
After four silent centuries (the “inter-biblical era”), four Gospel writers described in great detail the arrival, and life’s-work, of the Justifier—Jesus of Nazareth. The books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are carefully crafted accounts of the birth, life, death, and ultimate resurrection of the Son of God (John 20:30-31). Each emphasized different parts of Christ’s ministry in order to relate the “good news” to Jews or Gentiles. Matthew directed his record primarily to the Jewish nation. Mark stressed the works of Jesus. Luke, being the only Gentile writer of a Bible book (except possibly the author of Job), wrote to Gentiles. John’s primary purpose in writing was to produce faith.
The book of Acts was written to convey the means by which mankind was to appropriate God’s saving grace. It is a historical record that instructs a person on how to become a Christian. It also teaches about how the church of Christ was established in Jerusalem, and how that same church flourished throughout the Roman Empire of the first century. The various epistles that follow the book of Acts in the English Bible were directions to individuals and churches on how to obtain, and maintain, spiritual maturity. Finally, the book of Revelation predicted (in symbolic fashion) the ultimate triumph of good over evil—acknowledging that Christians would win, and Satan would lose. To the careful reader, the unity of both theme and plan in the Bible are apparent.