The word "Bible" designates the Scriptures [Writings] of the Old and the New Testaments that are recognized as authoritative and used by the Christian churches as basis for its doctrine and instruction in the Christian faith. The word "Bible" comes from the Greek word biblia ["books"], the plural of biblos ["book"], which denoted the inner bark of papyrus reed from which ancient paper was made and upon which ancient books or scrolls were written. Daniel 9:2 refers to the Old Testament prophetic writings as "the books" [ta biblia in the Greek translation of the Old Testament that is called the Septuagint]. The development of the singular term "the Bible" from the plural has been viewed as providential, stressing the unity of the 39 books of the Old Testament and the 27 of the New Testament. The books of the Old Testament were originally written almost entirely in Hebrew, a Semitic dialect akin to Phoenician and Ugaritic. The only parts written in Aramaic, another Semitic language akin to Hebrew, were Ezra 4:8-6:18; 7:12-26; Dan. 2:4-7:28, and Jer. 10:11. The New Testament was written entirely in the common everyday Greek, called Koine, of the contemporary Graeco-Roman world.
Judaism recognizes only the Scriptures of the Old Testament. Other religions, such as Buddhism, Hinduism, Zoroastrianism and Islam, do not recognize the Scriptures of the Old and the New Testament, and have their own sacred writings. The Christian churches hold that there is only one Bible compared with other "sacred" writings, because (1) it is the revelation of God, (2) it is inspired, that is, "God-breathed" (2 Tim. 3:16), in a different sense from all other literature, (3) it discloses God's plan and purpose for time and eternity, and (4) it centers in the God who sent into the world His only Son, who was incarnate in the God-man Jesus Christ (John 1:1-14; Heb. 1:1-2). The Old Testament records the preparation for His coming and the New Testament records that coming and its meaning.
Since the end of the second Christian century, the terms "Old Testament" and "New Testament" have been used to distinguish between the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures. In the middle of the second century A.D., the formal collection of the Christian writings was called the New Testament and it was placed alongside the Hebrew canonical books as of equal inspiration and authority. The Hebrew Scriptures were then called the Old Testament. Tertullian, an early Latin Christian lawyer (about A.D. 200), was the first in writing to use the term Novum Testamenium for the collection of writing of the early apostles or their associates. The basis of this distinction between the Old and New Testament was the difference between the Old and New Covenant. The writings of Moses, the books of the law, was called "the book of the covenant [Hebrew, berith]" (2 Kings 23:2). The writings of the Old Testament were referred to by Jesus as "the law of Moses, and the prophets, and the psalms" (Luke 24:44) and were referred to briefly as "the law and the prophets" (Matthew 5:17; 11:13; Acts 13:15) and even more briefly as "the law" for the whole of the Hebrew writings (John 10:34; 12:34; 15:25; 1 Cor. 14:21). The Apostle Paul refers to them as the old testament [Greek, diatheke], that is, the old covenant (2 Cor. 3:14). In the Greek New Testament, the Greek word diatheke is used usually to designate the Hebrew concept of a covenant (Hebrew, berith), not as in classical Greek to refer to a will or testament, except in Heb. 9:16-17. The Old and New Testaments could be designated as the Old and New Covenants, but this would not be entirely accurate. The book of Genesis records events that occurred before the establishment of the Old or Mosaic Covenant, whose giving is recorded in the book of Exodus, and most of the events recorded in the Gospels occurred under the Old Covenant before the New Covenant was established by the death of Christ (Matt. 26:26-28; Mark 14:22-24; Luke 22:20; 1 Cor, 11:23-25), that was accompanied by the tearing of the veil or curtain that separated the most holy place from the holy place in the temple (Matthew 27:51).
There are two ways to survey the Bible: (1) as history and (2) as literature. Since the Bible is a historical record of God's revelation of Himself, the Bible may be surveyed by taking a historical approach that traces that history, relating the books of the Bible to that historical time line. Many Bible teachers take this approach and my wife, Edith Shelton, surveyed the Bible in that way. But since the Bible is a collection of writings, the Bible may also be surveyed by considering each of these writings as literature, and this is the approach that is used below, outlining each book and relating them to the historical time line. These two approaches are not mutually exclusive but are just two different but complimentary ways to survey the Bible.
The problem of the relation of revelation to reason underlies the problem of relation of the Bible to the Sciences. New interest has been stimulated in this problem of revelation to reason recently by the continental theologians, Karl Barth and Emil Brunner. Revelation has been moved to the center in their respective theologies. They both speak of their theologies as theologies of the Word. This renewed emphasis on revelation has again raised the problem of the relation of revelation to reason.
This problem was first raised in the second century A.D. when Christianity began its conquest of the Roman Empire. Among the ones converted to Christianity in these early Christain centuries, there were men who had been trained in Greek philosophy. Such was Justin Martyr who had studied in turn the teachings of the Stoics, Peripatetics, Pythagoreans and Platonists. He had received help most from the Platonism yet in the end he was disappointed and uncertain. It was when he had met a venerable old man who told him about the prophets and the faith by which one should read them that Justin Martyr turned to Christianity.
"A flame was kindled in my soul; and a love of the prophets and these men who are Christ's friends possessed me; and whilst revolving his words in my mind I found this philosophy alone to be secure and profitable. That is how and why I became a philosopher." [1]It was with such men as these or with Christians who tried to philosophize that this problem arose. For them the question of the relationship of revelation and reason took the form: What was the relationship between the Christian faith and Greek philosophy? Lactantius who succeed Justin Martyr, "thought that, if one accepted the Christian revelation, one would then be in a position to piece together all the elements that are true in the teachings of the different philosophical sects and so by a process of syncretism arrive at the true philosophy." [2] Justin Martyr had already said, "Whatever has been well said anywhere and by anyone belongs to the Christians." [3]
An abstract formulation of this problem in the Middle Ages grew more or less out of this concrete question of the relationship between the Christain faith and Greek philosophy. For Thomas Aquinas and others, the problem in abstract terms was the relationship between the "truths of Reason" and the "truths of Revelation". For them, reason was a body of propositions arrived at by the unaided intellect of man. Revelation was another body of propositions received by the Church from God and embodied in a book, the Bible, or in the traditions of the Church. The problem was essentially the problem of relating one body of propositions to another.
There seem to be at least four possible solutions to the problem when formulated in this way. They are:
Thomism, rejecting the first three possible solutions to the problem, has become the official position of the Roman Catholic Church regarding this problem. Older Protestanism differs only slightly from Roman Catholicism in regard to this formulation of the problem. Protestanism has held in regard to revelation that the body of propositions, which make up the "truths of revelation," are embodied only in the Bible and not also in the traditions of the Church. Apart from this, the older Protestanism more or less agrees with Roman Catholicism in their solution of this problem. This solution seemed satisfactory until the rise of modern physical sciences and the Newtonian view of the universe. This involved the rejection of Ptolemaic-Aristotelian geocentric view of the universe, which had been made the official view of the Roman Catholic Church at the Council of Trent (1545-1563). Luther had protested against the influence of Aristotle on Christian theology, but his protests were largely ignored by his followers and the other Protestant Reformers and their followers. But the Protestants had not committed themselves to the Ptolemaic-Aristotelian view of the universe, so that, when the Newtonian view of universe became known with the publication in 1687 of Isaac Newton's Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, or, as it known by its Latin title, the Principia, it was hailed as a revelation of God's marvelous design of his creation.
But the situation was different in Roman Catholic France. There the Roman Catholic Church took it as a challenge to their official theology which incorportated the Ptolemaic-Aristotelian geocentric view of the world, they opposed it and tried to suppress it as they had done with Galileo's views in 1632 after the publication of his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World System. But this time they could not force Newton to recant as they did Galileo. And in addition the French intellectuals and philosophers, such as Voltaire, defended and popularized Newton's views, as the accomplishement of man's reason. Some French philosophers, but not Voltaire, interpeted Newton's views as implying an infinite and eternal universe in which God did not exist. This raised anew the problem of the relationship of revelation and reason, the "truths of reason" now being understood as the truths discovered by the new science and according to these rationalistic philosophers there are no "truths of revelation" and that the only truths are the "truths of reason". Accordingly, in the name of Reason they attacked the Roman Catholic Church, claiming that the Bible is a collection of myths and the teaching of the Church are based on superstitions. Other of the rationalistic philosophers, like Voltaire, called deist, believed that God as a perfect being existed, but after God had created the universe with its perfect laws, God had no need to interfere with the operation of this perfect cosmic machine. Voltaire denied that there is any special revelation and miracles because that would mean that God was interfering with the perfect machine that God had created, but he did believe that the existence of God could be proved by the fact that such a perfect machine required a perfect being to make it. Some writers referred to this design in nature as a natural or general revelation of God. Because Voltaire believed that there was no special revelation of God, he joined with those who attacked the Roman Catholic Church. Now the problems had become: Are there "truths of revelation" in addition to "truths of reason"? That is, is there a special revelation in addition to the general revelation of God? Liberal Protestants have answered "No," and Conservative Protestants have answered: "Yes."
Now the problem of revelation and reason was also formulated in
another way. As we pointed out above, the problem was formulated in
terms of the "truths of reason" and the "truths of revelation." And the
problem stated thus was: What is the relationship between the "truths of
reason" and the "truths of revelation"? Now this other formulation of
the problem was in terms of faith and reason as human acts or
activities. The problem when formulated in these terms was:
What is the relationship between faith and reason?
It was Augustine who first perceived clearly the problem in these terms. The famous principle attributed to Augustine, credo ut intellegam ["I believe in order that I may understand"] is a formulation of his solution of this problem stated in terms of faith and reason. However, the problem formulated in these terms was often confused with the other formulation in terms of the "truths of reason" and the "truths of revelation". This is not too surprising as long as revelation was conceived in terms of propositions, doctrines, or a book. Faith thus was regarded as the acceptance of this propositional revelation.
Four solutions are possible when the problem is formulated in terms of faith and reason as human acts or activities. They are:
In this formulation of the problem as the relationship between faith and reason, theologians labored under the handicap of the traditional understanding of revelation as only propositional. Revelation as an activity was understood as inspiration - the giving or the dictation of certain propositions. Thus revelation, as the result of the activity of revealing or inspiring, was a set of propositions contained in a book. The Bible is the revelation of God. It was difficult for Augustine not to identify faith only with the believing of certain propositions, the intellectual acceptance of a creed or doctrinal formula. But "despite the temptation which that theory must have presented to him to do so, Augustine does not confuse Christian Faith with the acceptance of Scriptural propositions. He notes that Scriptures are unintelligible to those who do not read them with Christian eyes: 'the Spirit giveth life' to the words of Scripture." [4]
The recent discussion of revelation in theological circles has brought about a revision in the concept of revelation. In British theological circles, the concept of revelation has been attached to specific historical events and persons. Revelation is to these theologians the self-manifestation of God or the disclosure of His plan and demands in certain historical events, such as the history of the Hebrews. In continental theological circles, revelation is connected with the idea of a personal or, at least, a dynamic Godhead. Revelation is to these theologians the personal disclosure by a personal God of His reality, nature and presence to human persons.
One of these continental theologians is Emil Brunner. While not denying historical revelation [5], Brunner sees revelation basically as personal encounter. God is not an object or thing but a subject. Our knowledge of a subject, a person, is wholly contingent upon the act of self-disclosure on the part of the person to be known. However, revelation is not complete without the subjective act of perceiving, faith. Revelation is not purely an objective phenomenon, independent of the subjective act of receiving. Revelation is not a Something, a Thing, but a process, an event. [6] And as such it is transitive, proceeding from God and ending in man. The subjective act of perceiving on man's side is part of revelation. There is therefore no point in setting an objective fact of revelation over against a subjective act of receiving that revelation because revelation actually consists in the meeting of two subjects. [7]
Now the act of perceiving on man's side of the process of revelation is called faith. Faith is an act that involves the total person. As the central act of the person it is a process of willing, feeling and thinking. When man answers God's word in the act of faith, he is also accomplishing an act of thinking. [8] Hence reason has a place in faith.
As a result of this reinterpretation of revelation, the problem of the relationship of revelation and reason may at last receive a satisfactory solution. For as long as revelation was interpreted entirely in terms of propositions, the problem was formulated in a misleading form. As pointed out above, the problem was formerly formulated as the relationship of the "truths of revelation" to the "truths of reason", of theology to philosophy or science. Now revelation must be understood to be personal and historical, as well as propositional. Faith is not just believing the "truths of revelation", but a personal act of decision in response to that personal revelation. Faith is a personal commitment to the person Jesus Christ who is the historical revelation of God and who is revealed personally by the God the Holy Spirit in the preaching of the Gospel. And Reason is not just a set of propositions arrived at by man's unaided reason, the "truths of reason", but an activity of man. Theology as well as philosophy is an activity of thought, of reason. The problem of the relationship of revelation to reason is solved in the interpretation of revelation as an event in the divine activity of divine self-disclosure; faith is man's response to this revelation. Reason as an human activity should be grounded in faith, the human responsive side to divine revelation, both historical and personal. Thus reason has a place in faith.
[1] Dial. Trypho, Chap. 8, cited in
Richardson, Alan, Christian Apologetics, 232
(New York: Harper & Brothers, 1947).
[3] Apol. II, 13, cited in Ibid., 229.
[5] Brunner, Emil, The Scandal of Christianity, chapter 1
(Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1951).
[6] Brunner, Emil, The Christian Doctrine of God, 19
(London: Lutterworth Press, 1949).
[7] Brunner, Emil, Revelation and Reason, 33
(Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1946).
[8] Brunner, The Christian Doctrine of God, 73.
Brunner, Emil. The Christian Doctrine of God, Dogmatics, Vol. I.
London: Lutterworth Press, 1949.
Brunner, Emil. Revelation and Reason
Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1946.
Brunner, Emil. The Scandal of Christianity
Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1951.
Burtt, Edwin A. Types of Religious Philosophy
New York: Harper & Brothers, 1951.
Ferm, Vergilius, ed. An Encyclopedia of Religion
New York: The Philosophical Library, 1945.
Gilson, Etienne. The Spirit of Medieval Philosophy
New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1940.
Jewett, Paul King. "Ebnerian Personalism and
Its Influence Upon Brunner's Theology,"
The Westminster Theological Journal
Vol. XIV, May, 1952, No. 2.
Philadelphia: Westminster Theological Seminary.
Richardson, Alan. Christian Apologetics
New York: Harper & Brothers, 1947.
According II Tim. 3:16, the scriptures are inspired by God.
"All scripture is given by inspiration of God,This scripture raises the problem of inspiration of scriptures:
and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction,
for instruction in righteousness." (II Tim. 3:16 KJV)
In the King James Version (KJV), the noun "inspiration" occurs twice: Job 32:8, and II Tim. 3:16, quoted above.
"But there is a spirit in man;In II Tim. 3:16, the word "inspiration" translates the Greek word theopneustos which literally means "God-breathed". So some modern English versions translates it.
and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding." (Job 32:8 KJV)
"All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking,
correcting, and training in righteousness." (II Tim. 316 NIV)."Every Scripture is God-breathed - given by inspiration -
and is profitable for instruction,
for reproof and conviction of sin,
for correction of errror and discipline in obedience,
and for training in righteousness
[that is, in holy living, in conformity to God's will
in thought, purpose and action]," (II Tim. 3:16 Amplified)
Although the word "inspiration" occurs infrequently in English versions and paraphrases, the conception affirms that the living God is the author of the Scriptures and that the Scriptures is the product of His creative breath, as was the creation of universe (Psa. 33:6) and the creation of man's spirit (Gen. 2:7). This biblical sense is different from the modern tendency to assign the term "inspiration" merely to dynamic or functional significance, largely through a critical dependence on Scheiermacher's artifical disjunction that God communicates life, not truths about Himself. Geoffery W. Bromiley (the translator of Karl Barth's Church Dogmatics) points out that whereas Barth emphasizes the "inspiring" of the Scriptures -- that is, its present use by the Holy Spirit towards the hearers and readers of the Scriptures -- the Bible itself begins further back with the very "inspiredness" of the scared writings. The writings themselves, as the end product, are asserted as God-breathed. It is precisely this conception of inspired writings, and not simply inspired men, that sets the biblical conception of inspiration clearly over against the pagan representation of inspiration in which heavy stress is placed on the subjective psychological mood and condition of those individuals overmastered by the divine afflatus. [1]
This passage from Paul's writing ( II Tim. 3:16) indicates not only the nature of inspiration but also the extent ("all scripture") of God's inspiration of the Scriptures. By the Scriptures, Paul here is referring to what we now call the Old Testament. Although Paul is the only New Testament writer that uses this word "God-breathed", the other writers in referring to the Scriptures claim that they are the word of God. The words "God said" introduce many of the passages of the Old Testament Scriptures that are quoted. Both Jesus and His Apostles assert of the Old Testament Scriptures that they are the word of God. In Matthew 5:18, Jesus declared that even the tiniest detail of the Scripture, as it anticipated the completion of God's redemptive work, would be fulfilled.
"17 Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets;The Apostles also claimed that what they wrote was divinely inspired. In I Corinthians 4:1, the Apostle Paul declared that he, like the other Apostles, had been appointed to be a steward, or a dispenser of the truths which God was pleased to reveal to men.
I did not come to abolish, but to fulfil.
18 For truely I say unto you,
until heaven and earth pass away,
not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass away from the law, until all is accomplished." (Matt. 5:17-18 NAS).
"This is how one should regard us, as servants of ChristIn I Corinthians 2:13, Paul asserted that he set forth these revelation truths in words which were selected by the Holy Spirit.
and stewards of the mysteries of God." (I Cor. 4:1)
"And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdomHere Paul is claiming to be verbally inspire, for he is saying that he was divinely enabled by the Holy Spirit, not to set forth in his own words the ideas which God had given him through the Holy Spirit, but to use the very words God wanted used for setting forth divine truth. Now this verbal inspiriation is to be distinguished from mechanical dictation - an inspiration by dictation - in which the writer's own personality and style would be set aside as he simply writes down the sentences God gave him. Paul speaks in his own distinctive way in his epistles, as do the other Biblical authors in their particular writings, but as Paul insists, he speaks with the very words that the Holy Spirit gives him. Hence, verbal inspiration means that Holy Spirit selected those words and thought forms from Paul's vocabulary and style which will be best suited for setting forth revelational truth.
but in words taught by the Spirit,
interpreting spiritual truths in spiritual language." (I Cor. 2:13 ERS)
Thus the Bible definitely claims to be the word of God. Some theologicans make the claim that because the scriptures never say that the Bible is the Word of God, that the Bible is not the Word of God. And of course, at the writing of the New Testament books, our Bible did not yet exist, but was in process of being written. Therefore, the New Testament books never say that the Bible is the word of God. But that does not mean that the Bible is not the word of God. Later, the Christian community, after the books of the New Testament were written, recognized it as the word of God and asserted it to be such. (See the discussion of the formation of canon in the chapter of my Systematic Theology on Bibliology for a discussion of this development.)
The usual line of argument against the doctrine of verbal inspiration has two prongs. The first prong says that since verbal inspiration is equal to mechanical dictation, then verbal inspiration is false because there are differences of style, vocabulary and individual backgrounds between the different writers of the Bible. Since books dictated by a person would have similarities in vocabulary, style, and background, then if God dictated all the books of the Bible, then they all should have similarities of styles and vocabulary in the different books, which they do not have. Therefore, according to this line of argument, verbal inspiration is false.
This line of argument assumes that there is only one theory of verbal inspiration and that it is mechanical dictation. It does not recognize that there are other possible views of verbal inspiration (as set forth above) besides mechanical dictation. Thus this line of argument has set up a straw man for the purpose of easily defeating the orthodox concept of verbal inspiration. Verbal inspiration is not necessarily equal to mechanical dictation. There are similarities between verbal inspiration and mechanical dictation. Both see God as the author of Scripture. Both acknowledge man is an agent involved in inspiration. Both agree that the result is a perfect and infallible text in the original manuscripts. Both hold that the words of Scripture are inerrant. On the basis of these similarities, many have concluded that verbal inspiration and mechanical dictation are equal. But this conclusion ignore the differences between verbal inspiration and mechanical dictation. The crucial difference between the two is the balance between the human and the divine. Mechanical dictation overbalances in the direction of the divine. A perfect book is the result, but at the expense of man's full involvement. The varying vocabularies and styles of the writers are by-passed -- God simply used the writers as passive tools, as a man would use a typewriter. But, a proper understanding of verbal inspiration fully balances the human and the divine, and yet produces a perfect text as the result. God, by His full power, used man in his full powers and thereby guaranteed a reliable text without error.
The second prong of the line of argument against verbal inspiration is that the infallibility and inerrancy claimed by verbal inspiration cannot exist because there are obvious errors in the text of the Scriptures. (Some the supposed errors will be dealt with in the section of the chapter on the inerrancy of the Scriptures.) But theologians have erred in their judgment when they conclude that the Bible is full of errors. There are problems because of our lack of knowledge, but this does not give one the right to jump to the conclusion that such gaps in knowledge are errors. Competent scholars have already answered some of the alleged errors. Other supposed errors are still being considered as more understanding of the problems come to us. Careful and patient research will bring answers to many of the alleged errors in Scripture.
On the basis of these two prongs of the argument against verbal inspiration, it is concluded that verbal inspiration is false. This conclusion opens the door for a substitute, more liberal view of the Bible and its inspiration. This view says that the "truth" in the Scriptures is inspired, but not the individual words. This dynamic view, as it sometimes called, solves the problem left by the mechanical dictation theory by allowing for a difference in styles and vocabulary of the various biblical writers. The claim is made that this dynamic view also gives a proper balance between the divine and human in the revelational encounter. And in addition, the dynamic view is said to solve the problem of errors in the Bible by acknowleging that there are errors, while still safeguarding the truth of the Bible. That is, the errors of the Bible do not negate the truth of the birth, life, death, and the resurrection of Christ. Although the Bible has errors in it, it still contains infallible doctrinal truth.
But this dynamic concept of inspiration has many weaknesses. How can doctrinal truth be expressed verbally when verbal errors may occur? And the claim that the dynamic concept best balances the human and the divine in inspiration of Scripture is not true, since its allowance of error in the original text overbalances the human and divine in the inspiration of Scripture in the direction of the human, since the divine cannot prevent the errors from occuring. Like the mechanical dictation theory of verbal inspiration, the dynamic concept overbalances the human and divine in the inspiration of the Scriptures, but in the opposite direction to the dictation theory; whereas the dictation theory overbalances in the direction of the divine, the dynamic concept overbalances in the direction of the human by allowing for errors in the original text. Now this overbalance is a fatal error in both the dictation theory and the dynamic concept of inspiration. A true understanding of verbal inspiration sees full divine power employing man's full powers, both working in complete cooperation to produce a perfect text without errors. This gives a proper balance between the human and the divine in inspiration of the Scriptures, yet without errors.
To summarize, comparing these three views:
(1) The dictation view does not balance the human and divine in the
inspiration of the Scriptures; it overbalances in the direction of the
divine, producing a perfect book without errors, but at the expense
of the human full involvment.
(2) The dynamic view also does not balance the human and divine in the
inspiration of the Scriptures; it overbalances in the direction of the
human because errors are claimed to be in the Bible. Thus the dynamic view
claims that the Bible speaks inerrant truth through erring words.
(3) The verbal view balances the human and divine in the inspiration
of the Scriptures in a perfect balance in which both God and man are involved,
yet without error. Thus the verbal view claims that the Bible speaks inerrant
truth through unerring words.
[1] C. F. H. Henry, Bible, Inspiration of in
Walter A. Elwell, ed. Evangelical Dictionary of Theology
(Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1984), pp. 145-148.
Richard R. Belcher, A layman's guide to the INERRANCY DEBATE,
Forward by W. A. Criswell
(Chicago: Moody Press, 1980, second printing, 1981).
Daniel P. Fuller, The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible,
Four Messages delivered by Daniel P. Fuller
on the Old Fashioned Revival Hour
(no publisher or publication date given).