You ignored my request above.
Show us historical proof that there were churches using ONLY 66 books before the Reformation
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The Domino Theory of Scripture
- Thread starter Deadworm
- Start date
You ignored my request above.
Show us historical proof that there were churches using ONLY 66 books before the Reformation
37818
Well-Known Member
The historical proof are that those texts were handed down from since first century. That they were Scripture when they were written, not when any later group decided that they were canon. The NT (the 27 books) texts are the Apostolic authority of the churches. Provide proof of just one of those other than the 66 books that was as a whole the word of God. Just one and give its proof.
Surely you can point to a church which used only the 66 books that are contained in the Protestant OT before the Reformation. Just one Church. One sect. Any church. A so-called Baptistic kind of church would be best for your case that there were only 66 books being used in Bible believing churches , as you call them
I'm just going to duck in here and make an historical distinction that the OP misses. The claim is made that it is us fundamentalists that claim inerrancy. That claim ignores the fact that this has been a huge subject all through evangelicalism (not just fundamentalism) for a very long time.
In the 1970's especially, there was a huge controversy among broader evangelicals about this issue. There were many books and articles written on the subject, but I remember especially two men who had split from fundamentalism in the 1950's who weighed in on the side of inerrancy. Francis Schaeffer, the Presbyterian theologian-philosopher, gave a lecture at the The International Congress on World Evangelization in 1974 in which he drew a line in the sand, saying that affirming Scriptural errancy, a person has crossed the line and become non-evangelical. The attendees all signed the Lausanne Covenant, which affirms that the Bible is "without error in all that it affirms" (The Lausanne Covenant - Lausanne Movement).
Later in the decade, Harold Lindsell's 1978 book, The Battle for the Bible, exposed errantists in particular in Fuller Seminary and the Southern Baptist Convention seminaries. This kicked off the SBC conservative resurgence so that nowadays all of the SBC (with exceptions) must affirm the Baptist Faith and Message which states that the Bible is "without any mixture of error" (Southern Baptist Convention > The Baptist Faith and Message).
The upshot is that when you oppose inerrancy (in the original mss) you don't just oppose fundamentalism, you oppose the entire evangelical movement. It is errantists who are out of the mainstream of Biblical Christianity, not inerrantists.
In the 1970's especially, there was a huge controversy among broader evangelicals about this issue. There were many books and articles written on the subject, but I remember especially two men who had split from fundamentalism in the 1950's who weighed in on the side of inerrancy. Francis Schaeffer, the Presbyterian theologian-philosopher, gave a lecture at the The International Congress on World Evangelization in 1974 in which he drew a line in the sand, saying that affirming Scriptural errancy, a person has crossed the line and become non-evangelical. The attendees all signed the Lausanne Covenant, which affirms that the Bible is "without error in all that it affirms" (The Lausanne Covenant - Lausanne Movement).
Later in the decade, Harold Lindsell's 1978 book, The Battle for the Bible, exposed errantists in particular in Fuller Seminary and the Southern Baptist Convention seminaries. This kicked off the SBC conservative resurgence so that nowadays all of the SBC (with exceptions) must affirm the Baptist Faith and Message which states that the Bible is "without any mixture of error" (Southern Baptist Convention > The Baptist Faith and Message).
The upshot is that when you oppose inerrancy (in the original mss) you don't just oppose fundamentalism, you oppose the entire evangelical movement. It is errantists who are out of the mainstream of Biblical Christianity, not inerrantists.
Reformed1689
Well-Known Member
You should really study your history. This is worse than an ignorant statement it is flat stupid.
JoeT
Member
You didn't offer a correction, you merely gave an opinion of Walpole's intelligence. Who was it that canonized the 66 book bible for all of Protestantism? How did the Bible get from the first century to this century?
JoeT
Thanks for your useful historical summary. In my usage of the terms, "Fundamentalist" and "Evangelical" were interchangeable in the 1970s. Perhaps the foremost evangelical apologist and champion of inerrancy at that time was Clark Pinnock. But Pinnock soon renounced his inerrantist position and I realized that he no longer believed in his book that I purchased. As a young first-year Pentecostal Fuller seminarian (with John Piper as a fellow student), I saw our more conservative students ridiculed by supposedly evangelical Wheaton grads and was exposed to the question of whether our evangelical congregations were ready for these more enlightened and liberal views of biblical authority. This threw my faith into crisis, and so, I raised questions in class about apparent biblical errors, but was told that my questions arose from outside the faith camp. So I made one of my best academic decisions and transferred to Princeton Seminary, where research into my theological issues was encouraged and where the evangelical students were far more competent and mature. When I got my Harvard doctorate in New Testament, evangelical pastors encouraged me to "fudge" my assent to a Bible school's statement of faith "because you believe in the spirit of the Statement," but my integrity prevented me from doing so and I wound up teaching in a Catholic university theology department.
I dearly wish I could still be a biblical inerrantist, but I'm now certain this doctrine is unhappily false. But I don't find it edifying to dwell on biblical errors and want my presence on this site to be spiritually uplifting. I faced a brutal choice: either reject the Gospel because of my former Domino Theory of Scripture or nurture my precious and intimate relationship with Christ and content myself with a doctrine of biblical authority for faith and life only. Today, the evangelical label no longer implies a belief in biblical inerrancy as it did in the 1970s. Hence, the distinction between fundamentalists and evangelicals is not as muddied as it used to be.
Reformed1689
Well-Known Member
If some of the Bible is in error, what parts are they? And if there is some of the Bible that errs how do you know any of it is trustworthy?
You have a theological degree from a liberal university. You taught at a Catholic school. You don't believe in the inerrency of the original manuscripts. I wouldn't call you an Evangelical. Evangelicals aren't as conservative as they use to be, but that doesn't make anyone this side of KJVO an Evangelical.
Liberals, who don't believe in the inerrency of the original manuscripts, feel free to reject, or mutilate, any part of the Bible they don't like, which, for some, is practically the whole thing. Other than a secret desire to trash the Bible, or a desire to convince others that they have a halo, I don't know why they bother with the Bible.
JoeT
Member
There is nothing of significance in Scripture that is in error, however there are contradictions is one does not read Scripture in light of the Holy Church.
e.g.
1. "So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven."
[Matthew 5:16]
"Take heed that you do not your justice before men, to be seen by them: otherwise you shall not have a reward of your Father who is in heaven." [Matthew 6:1] [Matthew 5:16]
Which is it?
2. "Do not think that I came to send peace upon earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword."
[Matthew 10:34]
"These things I have spoken to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you shall have distress: but have confidence, I have overcome the world." [John 16:33]
Is it peace or not?
3. "Then Pilate saith to him: Dost not thou hear how great testimonies they allege against thee? [14] And he answered him to never a word; so that the governor wondered exceedingly." [Matthew 27:13-14]
"Pilate therefore went into the hall again, and called Jesus, and said to him: Art thou the king of the Jews? Jesus answered: Sayest thou this thing of thyself, or have others told it thee of me?" [John 18:33-34]
Did Jesus Christ speak or did He not.
There are at least a dozen I can point to. The words said in the light of the Tradition of the Church however bring clarity to all these verse. You however are left to the words of others, which of course is not Scripture Alone.
JoeT
Noah Hirsch
Active Member
All Scripture is “God-breathed.” Thus, all Scripture is the Word of God. Therefore, if Scripture is not inerrant than the Word of God would not be inerrant either.
I suggest that you should change your terminology, since it is inaccurate. Read some of the historians on this, notably George Dollar's History of Fundamentalism or Francis Schaeffer's The Great Evangelical Disaster. Schaeffer strongly rejected the fundamentalist label as did the typical evangelical of the day.
My grandfather (John R. Rice) was a first generation fundamentalist. After the split between the two movements in 1957 due the the Graham NY crusade, the two sides were quite separated even in the 1970's. They almost never preached for each other or cooperated in any other way. Fundamentalists read evangelical books, but the opposite was rare. Graham sent flowers to Rice's funeral in 1981 since Rice was a mentor, but in all of the years from 1957 until then, they never saw each other personally.
Very sad to read all of this. For the record, Pinnock was somewhat of a nut.
(He was the uncle of a close friend.) True fundamentalists did not follow him at all. And for the record, fundamentalists had nothing to do with Wheaton after the early '60's, though that is where my parents graduated from in the '40's. Wheaton today is worse, from what the archivist there tells me. (I did some research there.)Sorry to hear this. I have no trouble at all, spiritually or doctrinally, being an inerrantist.
Ah, that is the question that confronts me with this choice: do I choose the comfortable but discredited inerrantist view or do I love God with my mind and with integrity and continue to serve the Lord with the Bible as my guide for life and fait h, and pray for His guidance in coping with important unanswered questions? OK, you asked for errors and errors will be provided in future posts.
And John of Japan, how spiritually unbecoming of you to resort to the typical evangelical expedient of ad hominen attacks against Christians who disagree with you. I find your cheap shot that Pinnock is a "nut" loathsome. btw, Fuller is widely considered the top evangelical seminary in the USA. and Wheaton is widely considered the top Evangelical liberal arts college, despite my disapproval of some of their snide comments about theological conservatives.
This is mistaken. "Theopneustos" is a certainly not a vague word.
1. It is hapax legomenon not only in the NT, but in all of Greek literature until the apostle Paul used it. Therefore it had great impact.
2. Because of its rarity, Paul no doubt coined it, and this increased the impact.
3. Because it is hapax, context does not give the meaning. Etymology comes into play. To a 1st century reader, "breath/spirit" and "God" would make for a very powerful word indicating divine origin. (Japanese has a similar word, kotodama, 言霊, or a spirit word with power). Reader response theory bolsters my position.
4. Proper theology proper says that God makes no mistakes. Scripture is from God. Therefore, theopneustos simply must mean inerrancy.
I won't be able to post for a couple of days, so have a nice thread.
Sorry you feel this way. It was meant to be a light jab from someone who knew and loved him, my friend who was his neice.
Not by anyone I know.
Not by us Baptists.
JoeT
Member
We don’t find life in inanimate object, such as stones, wood timbers, a toothbrush, or books. The reality of life in man is only found in His breathing. Hence, when St. Paul says to Timothy that Scripture is God-breathed [theopneustos = "God-breathed"] he is referring to God’s afflatus or you might say the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, that which turns us away from eternal death and towards eternal life.
If however we would to understand 2 Timothy 3:16’s “God-breathed” to mean that the literal substance of God’s exhalation, a form of air once inhaled giving eternal life then the inanimate object should literally come to life. It would be a thing worthy of latria (Divine Worship) as it would be the substance of God. Thus Scripture would become the BOOK with every moral circumstance expounded, the name of every person who is or will become a Saint, the touch of which would heal body and soul. Having God’s life breathed into it rightly it becomes a Divine Object, or a talisman; a book containing its own authority and the power of salvation within itself (although it never expressed that authority within BOOK). This BOOK contains a certain magical property making one holy by being in its presence or reciting the words of the book with or without understanding.
Such a "BOOK " contrasts with the Catholic Church’s Sacred Traditions together with Sacred Scriptures venerated [revered with awe] forming a unity of faith and morals.
Through all the words of Sacred Scripture, God speaks only one single Word, his one Utterance in whom he expresses himself completely: [Cf. Heb 1:1-3]
You recall that one and the same Word of God extends throughout Scripture, that it is one and the same Utterance that resounds in the mouths of all the sacred writers, since he who was in the beginning God with God has no need of separate syllables; for he is not subject to time.[ St. Augustine, En. in Ps. 103,4,1 PL 37,1378; cf. Ps 104; John 1:1] [CCC 102]
In contrast to a breathing BOOK, Sacred Scripture is really and truthfully Divine Revelations which must be interpreted with "the living Tradition of the whole Church;” Interpreted and understood in the unifying light of the Holy Spirit (whose breath was received by the Church represented by the TWELVE) or "without which Scripture would remain a dead letter” We know one thing about God, His truth is immutable, and He doesn’t teach this or that on any one truth in 1 A.D. and a different this or that in 2018 A.D. He doesn’t teach me to be faithful in the Catholic faith and you to be faithful to another god as if there was an equivalency (semper eadem fide). Hence Sacred Scripture read within the light of Sacred Tradition within the context of the Church is the light of the living faith, the breath received on Pentecost, the fountain of Life receiving the inspiration, theopneustos, of Holy Spirit.
JoeT
Noah Hirsch
Active Member
What happens if the Bible contradicts tradition?
Noah Hirsch
Active Member
What does it mean to love God with all one’s mind? Loving God with all one’s mind involves loving God with all one’s understanding. Thus, we ought to submit our intellects and understandings to God’s Word, which is the Bible.
The KJV (NOT"KJB") is but one English translation of God's word. It has goofs & booboos, such as "Easter" in Acts 12:4. Its language is out of date. It's a "Model T" Bible version.
There's absolutely NO SCRIPTURAL SUPPORT for the KJVO myth; therefore it cannot be true.
The "Psalm 12:6-7 thingie" is FALSE. The AV makers correctly believed V7 is about PEOPLE. & proved it with their marginal note for the 2nd them in V7: "Heb. him,I. euery one of them.". That false doctrine was taken straight from SDA official Dr. Ben Wilkinson's 1930 book, Our Authorized Bible Vindicated. (Although Dr. W didn't invent it.)
Furthermore, those verses appear in every valid translation of the Old Testament. If they legitimtize the KJV, it stands to reason they legitimize every other Bible translation in which they appear.
And the fact that you cite RUCKMAN shows us you're 'WAY outta touch with the issue. Remember, the late Dr. Ruckman believed the antichrist will be a 10-foot-tall alien with huge black lips with which to impart the "mark of the beast". But yet, you choose to believe such a kook ?
If you wish to try to support the KJVO myth, please head to the "Bible Versions" forum, & I along with others, will be glad to demolish your KJVO myth for you.
Now, back to the theme of this thread: The Scriptures themselves are inerrant. However, copyists & translators, being human, can make errors in their work.