THE WORDS ARE IMPORTANT (Continued)
When we consider the importance of revelation as it pertains to the Words which were immediately inspired of God as they are transferred to another language we must consider the mindset of those who are engaged in the translation. Fuller (Which Bible) says that �No reasonable person imagines that the translators [of the King James Version] were infallible or that their work was perfect, but no one acquainted with the facts can deny that they were men of outstanding scholarship.�
I have often heard opponents of the King James Bible who will attack the ability of the translators of the committee which produced the Authorized Version. They are called unlearned by the standards of today. I would challenge any who honestly feel this way to produce, even on paper, a group of men as qualified at were these scholars. They were uniquely qualified by the scope of their knowledge of the original languages, the breadth of their knowledge of the history of the transmission of the Scripture, and their fidelity to the True Author of the Book. Such cannot be found in this day or, in my estimation, in any other.
But, even beyond their scholastic ability, the translating committee of the Authorized Version were committed to the doctrine of the Preservation of the Scripture. They honestly believed that their hands and eyes were upon the unique Words of God. They had no suggestion in their souls that His Volume was to be edited by their own minds and biases.
Those who�ve manned the battle stations of the ships of the newer English versions and translations had no such faith in the ability, or the resolve, of God to preserve His Words. They began their task with the single uniting factor of belief that the words of the manuscript were corrupted by the copyist, by time, and by �pious error.�
The correctors of God�s lost Words honestly believe, as an article of faith, that they have been given the Divine right to decide just which words God is allowed to have considered as His Reading. Sitting in a time far removed from the original writings, alleging that men had made error and mistake due to carelessness or error, they have made themselves the arbitrator of what God has said. Never mind the Spirit of God speaking to the churches of the ages, never mind that God has promised to preserve His Words, never mind that God�s message was so vitally important that He inspired those Words, they have the only say as to what He had originally meant to say!
Scholarship is good. Scholarship is wonderful. Scholarship could even be called a gift from God. But, never forget, that even the best scholarship is a task embarked upon by men with sin darkened minds who have never experienced the intricacies of the spiritual and the eternal. If God has not revealed Himself in an eternal, and therefore a preserved, manner, how can a minion of earth hope to understand that of which he has no experience?
Hills (The King James Version Defended) has noted that �God reveals HIMSELF, not mere information concerning Himself. The Protestant Reforms understood this fact. To them the Bible was no mere book of doctrine but a revelation of the living God.�
I corresponded with a lady who could not believe that I used the email name of �oldandfatguy.� She was convinced that this was an error. After all, she had seen some pictures of my head. I sent her a picture of me standing with my son and grandson. She then understood why I said I was old and fat. It was because I am old and fat!
The lady had seen a couple of �head shot� pictures of me on the web sites. She thought she knew what I, physically, looked like. When she saw a complete picture of me she knew what I, physically at least, was.
We can have a general idea of Who God is by looking at the great order of nature. We can think we understand all about Him. We can not. We can only understand that He exists when we look at nature. The only complete picture we have of Him is contained within the pages of His Book. If humans attempt to �correct� this picture they will edit a �fun house mirror� image of Him because it is only through this Book that we can know Him.
We need a preserved Scripture to have a trustworthy Scripture. The Scripture is the revelation of Who God is and what He deems important for His created beings to learn.
Gilmour (The Memoirs Called Gospels) has mentioned the felt need for translations into the native tongues of humans in time and on earth.
�Translation has been most vehemently desired since the day when the Renaissance, the Reformation and the invention of printing made possible the wide circulation of the Bible in the vernacular. Such enthusiasm was based on at least two typical convictions.�
Personally I would argue against the base premise in this statement. Christians, under the tutelage of the Spirit, have always yearned for a copy of the Scripture which they would be able to read in their own tongues. Copies of portions were made quite early. Complete translations were made into other languages within one hundred years of the death of Jesus. Where the Living Word is glorified the Written Word is desired.
One rational for the translation of the Scripture into the native tongue of the hearers is that the churches be kept pure. Gilmour continues: �...that the Church must be brought under the judgment of �the Word� as that only institutions and observances clearly justified by or �agreeable� to the Word of God will be recognized...�
The churches need to be kept pure or they will tend to mislead the faithful. We have seen this over and over in the past one hundred and fifty years, or so, as faith in the revealed and preserved Scriptures has waned among academics, from them the colleges and Bible Schools have failed to remain faithful, from them the churches have drifted from sound doctrine, from them the people of God have been moved into doubt, falsehood, and ultimately abject apostasy. The churches have been weakened and society has lost the �salt� of the gospel message and progressed into the downward spiral of moral indulgence and intellectual laxity which we witness in our day.
This degradation need not be. Gilmour continues: �...that the �perspicuity� [insight] of scripture is such that, aided by the inner witness of the Spirit, the humblest as well as the greatest may hear the voice of God sufficiently.�
A trust in the revelation of Scripture is a trust that we abandon at great spiritual peril. Indeed, without a trust in the revelation of Scripture we have no guide to, or interest in, the spiritual things of God as we are left without His gift of written witness to Himself, His glories, His salvation, and His Spirit of leadership.
Burton (Let�s Weigh the Evidence) presents a picture of our spiritual health when we remove a trust in the preserved revelation from God.
�If God was lying when He said �The grass withereth, the flower fadeth, but the Word of God shall stand forever,� Isaiah 40:8, THEN ... How do you know that He wasn�t lying when He said... �He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life...� John 3:36"
Well, how do you know? The simple truth is that if we have a Scripture that was �lost� for centuries before being �restored� by the correctors of God�s Words, if the King James Bible and the Reformation were founded upon a faulty edition of the Scriptural record because the true was not yet unearthed by the wizardry of human reason, if the Bible is not settled in heaven (Psalm 119:89), if all of this is true, why in the world do you expect what you have today to be the authentic Words of God? And, if those Words be not the authentic Words of God then we have no reason to accept any of them as binding upon our spiritual lives. We are lost, adrift in a sea of... Of What? We have no need for a rudder because we do not know where the Land of Milk and Honey, the streets of gold, or the abode of our immortal souls may exist.
To be honest, if all the above be true, if the Word of God be untrue or unstable, we don�t even know if we have an immortal soul. All we know is that the grass grows green every summer until it grows over our grave.
God has not left us in this situation. His Word is sure and preserved. His Word is His eternal message to each of us. Fuller (Which Bible) speaks of this guarantee from God.
�There exists no reason for supposing that the Divine Agent, who in the first instance thus gave to mankind the Scriptures of Truth, straightway abdicated His office; took no further care of His work; abandoned those precious writings to their fate.�
Actually, God did abandon His Inspired Words to their fate. Their fate was to be preserved for all the ages of time and eternity. We can hold our hearts in perfect peace because He has promised that He would hold us in perfect peace through the Words of His inspired and preserved Words to humanity, the Scripture.
In our next session we will look at just a few of the verses from Scripture which promise this preservation of His Words.
9 November 2007
THE WORDS ARE IMPORTANT (Continued)
In this session we will conclude our discussion about the importance of the very Words of Scripture. There are those, as we have noted, who believe in only a preservation of the thoughts, or the general theme, of the Scripture. When we consider that the purpose of inspiration was that God would give to man a message about that which man could not understand from simple general revelation, we must consider that this is not enough. The purpose of inspiration was that God would give a precise message, His Message, to humanity.
A concept preservation would inevitably lead to defeating the very purpose of inspiration. The Bible correctors of the day argue that the base text of the King James Bible is a flawed text. They argue that it is flawed because man entered upon the scene as copyist and inserted some portions while deleting others. Yet we are asked to consider that God preserved the general concept of His message even through the fabrications which man entered into that text.
Foolishness. We believe that God has preserved His Words for all time and eternity. He is powerful enough to have done this. His love demands that He has done this. The importance of His message demands that He has done this. To allege less is to argue for a holey Bible. I know this is a trite saying; but it is also a true saying.
Fuller (Which Bible) argues for a preserved Scripture.
�The compiler of this book [Which Bible], and the able writers whom he quotes, all contend that the Bible is the inspired, inerrant and authoritative Word of God and that there has been a gracious exercise of the Divine providence in its preservation and transmission.�
I can�t say the same about all the persons whose works I have quoted in this study. All of them, however, were committed to the concept of the total inspiration of God in His Message to humanity. It is my contention that any concept of complete inspiration should include a concept of complete preservation. To accept inspiration is to accept the Power of God to act within human history. To disallow, after accepting inspiration, the concept of preservation is to say that God had the power to intervene in human history but refused to do so.
This is an insult to the reasoning process, the love, and the ability of God. It alleges that He only allowed one generation to view each portion of His message to humanity. After this, the thought continues, He stood back and allowed decay in that Message. He, then, continued this slipshod process with each new revelation He inspired.
If that isn�t an insult to The Holy God, I am not able to conceive what might be!
Morgan (An Exposition on the Whole Bible) notes that God had promised to preserved His Scripture.
Concerning Psalm 12:6-7 - �This answer of Jehovah is most precious. It promises he preservation of the trusting. The psalmist breaks out in praise of the purity of Jehovah�s words and declares that Jehovah will �keep them� and �preserve them.� The �them� here refers to the words. There is no promise of widespread revival or renewal. It is the salvation of a remnant and the preservation of His Own Words which Jehovah promises.�
Although some of the commentaries, and most of the modern English �versions� will allege that this verse speaks of preserving the people, this is not the case. This is a prophecy, and a promise, that God will preserve His Own Words. This fact is so obvious from the context that it bears little remark. Only a �revisionist� would take issue with this case.
�The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.� (Psalm 12:6-7)
The New Bible commentary references Isaiah 49:8. �Its [this verse] full implication will emerge in I Pet. 1:23-25, where the Word, in its final form as gospel, is no longer the mere contrast to our transience, but the cure for it.�
The argument here is that the passage from the Old Testament was preserved as it was alluded to in the New Testament. If the Scripture of the Old Testament was preserved, how could anyone not agree that so also would the New Testament, the fullest expression of the Gospel of Grace, would not be preserved as well?
�The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: because the spirit of the LORD bloweth upon it: surely the people is grass.� (Isaiah 40:8)
Rice appeals to John 5:46-47 with these words: �...we remind you that Christ and the Bible stand or fall together.�
This is true! If we do not have a preserved Bible we can have no confidence that Jesus can be our Savior!
�For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me: for he wrote of me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?� (John 5:46-47)
In our next session we will begin to look at some of the �problem texts,� as they reflect upon the doctrine of the preservation of Scripture, which we find in our New Testament studies.
16 November 2007
PROBLEM TEXTS
With this session we are beginning what is, to me at least, the most interesting section of our study. We will be looking at some of the verses which the scholars tell us are not really part of the inspired record. We will look at why the scholar makes this argument and why we disagree.
The naturalistic critic, even the �Fundamentalist� one, who sees the Bible as simply another book from antiquity will have a real problem considering that God has been able to preserve His Words. He will argue that God has done no such thing.
He is wrong! Our God is The God of Power and Love. He has used His love to give us the only record of Him and His Glory. He has used His love to give us the only record which can give us instruction as to how to most fully live our lives in this medium of time and creation. He has used His love to give us the only record which lays out the path to renounce the limitation of sin and reunite with Him in that love.
The great Love of God argues against any thought that He might allow this tremendously important record of that love to be lost in time. His power has promised that His Words are eternal. It is sheer madness to suggest that He lacks the power to preserve that Word. It is near blasphemy to suggest that His love is so shallow as to not use His power to preserve His Own message to humanity.
Most of the naturalistic critics will argue that they believe the evidence argues that He did not preserve His Words. That is simply these persons interpretation of the evidence. The naturalistic evolutionist will also argue that the evidence decrees that there is no possibility of the Creative acts of God. Again, the interpretation of evidence, when dulled by eyes with the malady of a sin nature, will be inaccurate unless the grandeur which is God is part of the consideration of that evidence.
It is only the eye of faith, transformed by the Written Word of God which is able to behold the truth of the Living Word of God. It is that same eye of faith, alone, which is able to consider that God has placed His Hand upon His Volume and shielded it from the decay of time. God is eternal. God�s Words, likewise, are eternal.
The first verse we are going to look at is the ending of �The Lord�s Prayer� from Matthew 6:13b. �For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.�
Some critics argue that the ending to the Lord�s prayer is a late addition and not part of the original manuscripts. Hills (The King James Version Defended) argues against this view. He notes that these early Christians would not have ended this prayer, which came from the lips of the Savior, with a Jewish prayer formula.
The unusual thing , if this were an addition made later to the text, is that no mention of the Name of Jesus is given. �...the early Christians were united in their emphasis on the name of Jesus.� (Acts 2:38; 4:12; 9:21; Rom. 1:5; John 20:31)
These early Christians did not invoke the name of Jesus as a talisman, rather they revered Him as the Risen Savior and as God, Almighty. He was their reason for existence as a group of churches in His Name.
Hills continues, �...if the early Christian had invented this doxology or had adopted it from contemporary non-Christian usage, they would have included in it or inserted into their Saviour�s name.� In other words, there is ample reason why this verse would not have ended this way. There is no reasonable explanation as to why these words were included in the form which it is except that it be an honest quotation of the Savior�s Words.
As for evidence of the inclusion of this formula in the original manuscript of Matthew�s Gospel, Hills also notes that The Didache (or, �The Teaching�) of the twelve Apostles, a liturgical book from the �...first half of the 2nd century...� contains the phrase, �...for Thine is the power and the glory for ever...� at the end of the Lord�s Prayer.�
For those who have seen the phrase, �The oldest and best manuscripts omit this verse,� it must be noted that those �oldest� manuscripts date from the fourth century. To make the ending of this verse a �late addition to the text� which would be �inconsistent� with these old manuscripts, we must remember that the Didache predates them by over one hundred years. Which is really the �oldest� evidence as to the wording?�
This is somewhat of a short session. However, in our next session we will tackle the last half of the final chapter of the Book of Mark. While today�s session covered only about half a page in our outline, the next session is planned to cover nearly four pages. We may not get it all in; but we will try.
23 November 2007
PROBLEM TEXTS (Continued)
In this week�s session we will begin to look at the last half (vv. 9-20) of the sixteenth chapter of Mark. Most of your Bible�s, even the King James Bibles, will have a footnote which says that these verses lack authority because they are omitted in the �oldest and best� manuscripts.
I would submit that if these verses were added, and therefore not part of the inspired Scripture, what other verses are bogus. Does God really so love the world? Is Jesus really the only Name by which we must be saved? Did God really create the heavens and the earth? Most importantly, do we really have a Bible Whose message we can trust with the eternal destiny of our immortal souls?
For that matter, are our souls really immortal? The only reason we have to believe that is contained in the old song: �The Bible Tells Me So.� If the Bible is unreliable in this instance, where else? Can we really trust that God gave the Words if He didn�t care enough to preserved the Words?
Merrill Unger (Unger�s Bible Handbook) tries to bridge the gap between a Bible we can trust and a bible we can merely use.
�Probably Mark�s original copy was transcribed and became a textual tradition before he finished it. Later he finished it, giving rise to another text (the fuller one, consisting of verses 9_20). This later text is referred to by Irenaeus (c. A. D. 170) and is found in the Alexandrian and Cambridge manuscripts.�
I find this explanation somewhat troubling. Why did Mark send out a rough �first draft� before the Spirit had finished inspiring the text? Or, perhaps God said, �Mark! Get back that copy. I forget to inspire a few lines.�
The New Bible Commentary adds their own reasoning as to how this bogus section found its way into some late manuscripts.
�Conbeare found in an Armenian MS of the 10th century a note ascribing the verses to Aristion, the disciple of John of whom Papias speaks. This would meant that they are at least very early (perhaps A. D. 100), even if non-Markian, and would have something of the authority of John.�
�Something of the authority of John.� Nice. That�s a real nice touch. It would be better if they had �Something of the authority of God.� The concept of inspiration is that God moved upon certain human writers and breathed out HIS WORDS.
Then there is the footnote which appears in �The Full Life Study Bible.�
�Although vv. 9-20 are omitted from two of the oldest Greek manuscripts, they do appear in other old manuscripts as well as in the majority of Greek manuscripts from all over the ancient world. Many scholars conclude, therefore, that any reading attested to by the majority of ancient manuscripts is likely to be part of the original writing of the Biblical author; vv. 9-20 should thus be considered part of the inspired Word of God.�
Now, there is a strong affirmation of the authenticity of these verses. Or is it? This particular version places a line and the following between v. 8 and v. 9: �(The most reliable early manuscripts and other ancient witnesses do not have Mark 16:9-20)� Bear in mind that this is in the line of text and not in a footnote!
That brings to mind the words of an old song (sorry, I don�t remember the tune�s name) �First you say you do, then you say you don�t.�
I guess this edition is just being fair. They are letting the reader make up his own mind. �But,� they seem to imply by putting the disclaimer in the text and the disagreement in the footnote, �Don�t go out on a limb trusting this one.�
Folks, these people above are defending the passage in question. I don�t think I need to list those who deride the concept of Bible preservation in this case.
Hills (The King James Version Defended) is one of the proponents of Bible preservation. He finds an area of agreement between John Burgon, a defender of the Traditional Text and Drs. Westcott and Hort, strong opponents of the Traditional Text.
Hills notes that Burgon (The Last Twelve Verses of Mark) and Westcott and Hort (New Testament in the Original Greek) both agreed that:
�...just as Jerome and other later writers copied Eusebuis� Epistle to Marinus so in this Epistle Eusebius himself was merely copying some lost treatise of Origen... If this suggestion is correct and Origen was the original author of the Epistle to Marinus, then the consequences for textual criticism are very important. For all the documents that omit Mark 16:9-20 are in some way connected with Alexandria or Caesarea, the two localities in which Origen, the great textual critic of antiquity, lived and labored. The absence of Mark 16:9-20 from these documents and the doubts which Eusebius seemed to have felt about them may all be due to an error in judgment on the part of Origen.�
Origen, we may recall from earlier in this study, was the driving influence behind the Scriptorium which produced both Aleph and B. These are the two often mentioned �oldest and best� manuscripts which are used to �correct� both the Traditional Text and our King James Bibles which are based upon that textual basis.
Remember, when someone says that either the Traditional Text, or the King James Bible has �x� amount of error, they are counting as error any deviation from the eclectic text which draws heavily upon these two manuscripts. Might it not be just as correct, actually more correct in my estimation, that the redacted text which is the basis of the modern English language editions is the one �in error?�
Hills also noted that many early Christians had difficulty reconciling Mark 16:9 with Matthew 28:1. Matthew seems to indicate a Saturday evening resurrection while Mark seems to suggest a Sunday morning resurrection. Couple this with the practice to put the Gospels in Wester Order, that is Matthew, John, Luke, and Mark. If a scribe, especially an Alexandrian scribe who were accustomed to favor shorter readings, found a copy of a codex with the last page (Mark 16:9-20) missing, this problem would be �solved.� The last pages, he would reason, was not part of the original.
Couple this with the theological and critical predisposition of Origin that nothing in Scripture should go against his own human reasoning, and we can easily see how the passage might have been deleted.
However, as to the alleged difference between Mark and Matthew on the day of resurrection, I really see no conflict. Mark says that Jesus was risen early the first day of the week. Matthew says that it was the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week that the women went to the sepulchre. Matthew does not say when the women arrived. Remember, they were walking. Even a short trip might take from before the ending of the Sabbath, when religious law forbid them to walk long distances, and the beginning of the first day of the week.
Neither passage really speaks to the time of the resurrection. They only point toward the event.
Hills, from the evidence, notes that there is no reason to suggest that the ending of the final chapter of Mark was an addition.
�...it is an easy thing to say that the genuine portion of the Gospel of Mark ends at 16:8, but it is a difficult task to support this statement with a satisfactory explanation as to how the Gospel came to end there, a task so difficult that it has not yet been adequately accomplished.�
To leave the women standing, or fleeing, in fear is at odds with the remainder of the Scriptural record. The resurrection of Jesus was the event which distinguished Christianity as true. This was the reason that the apostles were ready to die rather than to renounce the faith. To end this Book with no real mention of the resurrection is not a reasonable assumption.
Actually, there is a reason why the last few verses might have been left out of some of the Egyptian manuscripts. Egypt was a hot bed of Gnostic activity. With the last part of the final chapter of Mark missing, there is no resurrection record in the Book. The Gnostic ideal of �spirit� over �material� could not accept that Jesus had risen bodily from the grace. This would give too much credence to the physical body of Jesus in violation of Gnostic belief.
That may be the real basis of the �problem.�
Chadwick, writing in The Expositor�s Bible, makes an interesting observation about the �oldest and best� manuscripts while speaking of the Revised Version.
�...it must be said that the note in the Revised Version, however accurate, does not succeed in giving any notion of the strength of the case in favor of the remainder of the Gospel. It tells us that the two oldest manuscripts omit them, but we do not read that in one of these a space is left for the insertion of something, known by the scribe to be wanting there.�
In B the copyist leaves space for the disputed version. A blank space that should be filled by the inspired Words of God.
Hills, again, notes just how often these verses are found.
These verses �...are found in all the Greek manuscripts except Aleph and B and in all Latin manuscripts except k. All the Syriac versions contain these verses, with the exception of the Sinaitic Syriac, and so also does the Bohairic version. And, even more important they are quoted as Scripture by early Church Fathers who lived one hundred and fifty years before B and Aleph were written...�
These writers who quoted the final half of Mark sixteen include men like Justin Martyr, Tatian, Irenaeus, and Hippolytus. These early Christians considered these Words we now omit as Scripture.
Hills also makes mention of the argument that the �style� appears non-Marcian.
�Meyer (1847) and other critics made much of the fact that two typically Marcian words, namely eutus (straightway) and palin (again) were not found in Mark 16:9-20. Burgon [The Last Twelve Verses of Mark] showed that eutus did not occur in chapters 12 and 13 of Mark and palin did not occur in chapters 1, 6, 9, and 13 of Mark. Thus the fact that these words did not occur in mark 16:9-20 proved nothing in regard to the genuiness of this section.�
Hills also notes this about these last twelve verses.
�It is sometimes said that the last twelve verses of Mark are not really important, so that it makes little difference whether they are accepted or rejected. This, however, is hardly the case. For Mark 16:9-20 is the only passage in the Gospel which refers specifically to the subject which is attracting so much attention today, namely, tongues, healings, and other spiritual gifts. The last verse of this passage is particularly decisive (Mark 16:20). Here we see that the purpose of the miracles promised by our Lord was to confirm the preaching of the divine Word of the Apostles. Of course, then, these signs ceased after the Apostles� death. Today we have no need of them. The Bible is the all-sufficient miracle. And if we take this high view of the Bible, we cannot possibly suppose that the ending of one of the Gospels has been completely lost.�
It would also seem that those who accept these �sign gifts� as still in operation in our day would hardly be disposed to believe that there is no mention of them in the entire Gospel of Mark until a �late ending� was �attached.�
Hills further argues, �...if the last twelve verses of Mark are in such obvious disagreement with what immediately precedes, how could they ever have been added by a late hand?�
A completely reasonable argument was made by Hills. Any forger of currency will try to make his bogus bills look as much like the original as possible. Any forger who added to the Scripture would not try to draw obvious attention to his forgery. Mark, on the other hand, would have just written what the Spirit led him to write.
Hills, again, makes note of some of the actual apocryphal writings. These apocryphal writings are false Gospels which were written to further aberrant view of Christianity. He makes note of the Gospel of Peter, written about 150 A.D. according to James (The Apocryphal New Testament). This book portrays Jesus on the cross saying, �My power, my power, thou has forsaken me.� This goes with the Docetic heresy that, at the cross, �...the divine Christ departed to heaven and left only the human Jesus to suffer and die.�
This also gives a false account of the resurrection of Christ. K, the document which gives the so-called �short� ending of Mark, gives an account of the resurrection which is similar to that found in the apocryphal Gospel of Peter, and omits His post-resurrection appearances.
Hills makes not of these facts and argues from them:
�Do not these facts fit together perfectly and explain each other? The same docetic heretics who tampered with the first half of Mark 16 in k also abbreviated the second half of Mark in this same manuscript. They evidently thought that in the last twelve verses of Mark too great emphasis was placed on the bodily appearances of Christ to His disciples. They therefore rejected these concluding verse of Marks�s Gospel and substituted a �short ending� of their own devising, a docetic conclusion in which Christ�s post resurrection appearances are almost entirely eliminated.�
Once again we can understand why some might have desired to change the ending of Mark�s Gospel. But, there is no purpose given as to why the Gospel might have ended as it does except that it be from the pen of Mark and the inspiration of God.
Lindsell (The People�s Study Bible) notes that �Some scholars think Mark 16:9-20 does not belong to the original Markian text because it is absent in the two oldest manuscripts (Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticannus); however evangelicals generally accept this passage as authentic.�
Now, this statement may be a little outdated in today�s religious scene. But, the argument is that those who accept a Bible based world and life outlook, especially as it pertains to spiritual things, are disposed to accept these verses. Those who are not so Biblically based are more likely to dismiss the verses. This construct has much to do with the leading of the Spirit and the preserving power of the Spirit through the lives of the believers.
Remember that the �professional� critic is more likely to lean upon his own understanding and ability. He is much more likely to accept the �new� and the �novel� because he trusts his own powers and abilities. He has learned to depend upon his reasoning powers. The humble believer in the pew is more likely to be attuned to the leading of the Spirit as it is upon the Spirit that he depends.
Hills also notes that �...it was evidently not Mark�s intention to satisfy our curiosity about the women or to report the meeting of Christ and His disciples which is promised in Mark 16:7. His purpose was to emphasize the importance of faith in the risen Christ.�
Faith in the risen Christ does not attempt to discredit faith in that volume which was written about Him under inspiration and preserved by the power of God.
Fuller (True or False) also argues against the few manuscripts which delete this portion of Scripture.
�The commonest of all mistakes in copying manuscripts, or in repeating a matter, are mistakes in omission, or lapses of memory, or the results of inattention. Hence it is an accepted principle of evidence that the testimony of one competent witness, who says he saw or heard a certain thing, carries more weight than that of a dozen who, though on the spot, can only say that they did not see or hear it, or that they do not remember it. Therefore, other things being equal, the affirmative evidence of the other three ancient Codices and Versions, and that of the �Fathers� who quote those verses as unquestioned Scriptures, is an hundred-fold more worthy of credence than the negative testimony of two which were allowed to control in settling the text of the R. V.�
Burton (Let�s Weigh the Evidence) suggests that we take a look at the real evidence in the mater of the reliability of these verses.
�...most modern versions infer that �most versions� agree that these versions were not in the original manuscripts. ... That is a very misleading statement! Out of 620 ancient manuscripts of the book of Mark, these 12 verses are found in 618 of them. To day that they were �probably not in the original writings; is ridiculous!�
The reason we an trust the Word of God is not simply that He inspired those Words. It is also that He has preserved those Words.
Bank on it! Eternally bank on it!
In our next session we will begin by looking at Luke 22:43-44.
30 November 2007
PROBLEM TEXTS (Continued)
The first verse, or set of verses, which we will look at in this session is Luke 22:43-44.
�And there appeared an angel unto him from heaven, strengthening him. And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground.�
Hills (The King James Version Defended) has something to say about this section being questioned by those who would change our Bibles and argue that God has not preserved His Words. Hills note that it has been argued that, since Luke 22:43-44 is not in Papyrus 75 it was omitted during the 2nd century. It is not likely that the orthodox Christians omitted it, rather the omission came, more likely from docetists.
They, the docetists, believed that �...Christ�s human nature was merely an appearance (phantom)...� Irenaeus, among others, appeal to this Scripture was an answer to the heresy. �The easiest way for the docetists to meet this orthodox appeal to Scripture was to reject Luke 23:43-44 altogether. And when once this omission was made, it would be accepted by some orthodox Christians who for various reasons found these verses hard to reconcile with Christ�s deity.�
Please note, once again, the slim evidence relied upon for those who would jettison the time honored, and God honored for that matter!, Traditional Text. It matters not to many of these that from 85% to 95% of the evidence is on the side of the Traditional Text. It matters not that the early
�Church Fathers� quoted the Scripture in question. What matters, it seems, is the firm faith of the �text doctor�s� that God either didn�t care to preserve His Words, or that He was unwilling to do so. To these scholars the Bible is simply another Book from antiquity and must be judged as such. No thought of preservation from the Spirit of God is allowed to dissuade them from their theories.
Another disputed verse among many is the first part of Luke 23:34. �Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them...�
Hills argues, again, that the question over the authenticity of this portion is due to the efforts of early heretics.
�It may be that Marcion was ultimately responsible for this mutilation of the sacred text. For, as Williams observes [Alterations to the Text of the Synoptic Gospels and Acts], �Marcion was anti-Jewish in his sentiments.� It is true that, according to Harnack�s analysis [Marcion, Dew Evangelium van Fremden Gott], Marcion still included this prayer of Christ in his edition of Luke�s Gospel (probably relating it to the Roman soldiers), but some of his followers may have referred it to the Jews and thus come to feel that it out to be deleted from the Gospel record.�
Hills also notes that more modern hands have been used to delete this picture of forgiveness from the Gospel record.
�Westcott and Hort�s theory, however is a more improbable one [that this was merely an oral tradition which was later inserted]. This prayer of Christ would be interpreted as referring to the Jews and, thus interpreted, would not be something likely to have been added to the Gospel narrative by 2nd-century Christian scribes. For by that time the relationship between the Jews and Christians had hardened into one of permanent hostility, and the average Christian would not have welcomed the thought that the Jews ought to be forgiven or that the Saviour had so prayed.�
A very quick aside is in order at this point. There is no Scripture, when properly interpreted, which would even suggest any antipathy toward the Jew from the Christian. Jesus was a Jew. The writers of the New Testament, and the Old Testament for that matter, were Jews. We owe the Jew a debt of gratitude for our very salvation.
No sort of racial, or any other, prejudice is allowed by the Scripture. We are all the creature of the Creator. To hate another is to hate that which God has created. It is wrong every single time!
John 1:3-4 is another disputed verse. Although the dispute is only among those who do not accept the doctrine of the Preservation of Scripture. �All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men.�
Of this verse James (The Corruption of the Word) notes that heretics, again, were probably the source of the error in some (very few) early documents.
�Certain [early] heretics took the phrase �that was made� from the end of the third verse and applied it to the beginning of the fourth verse to read: �and without him was not anything made. (4) That which was made in him was life...� This supported their theology that Jesus was a created being.�
James further notes that some Christian writers, �To avoid giving aid to these blasphemers, ... simply refused to acknowledge the words.� They left them out!
Most of the modern English language editions are guilty of this same thing in that the text they have chosen to follow is much shorter than the Traditional Text. The real problem here is that lack of trust in God to preserve His Own Words. Passages are accepted, or rejected, with the base theological stand that God did not preserve His Words to man. The final product, rather than adhering to the preserved Words of God, is the perceived text of man. The eclectic texts of the modern versions is a text which trusts in the Scholarship of Man rather than the Preserving Power of God.
The final verse we will look at in this session is from John 1:18. �No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.�
Hills, again, has commented on this verse.
�This passage is very obscure, but at least it is clear that the reading favored by Valentinus was precisely that now found in Papyrus 75, the only begotten god [as opposed to the only begotten Son of God in the Traditional Text]. What could be more probable than Dean Burgon�s suggestion that Valentinus fabricated this reading by changing the only begotten son to the only begotten God? His motive for doing so would be his apparent desire to distinguish between the Son and the Word (Logos). According to the Traditional reading, the Word mentioned in John 1:14 is identified with the only begotten son mentioned in John 1:18. Is it not likely that Valentinus, denying such identification, sought to reinforce his denial by the easy method of altering Son of God (a change of only one letter in Greek) and using the word God in an inferior sense to refer to the Word rather than the Son? This procedure would enable him to deny that in John 1:14 the Word is identified with the Son. He could argue that in both these verses the reference is to the Word and therefore the Word and the Son are two distinct Beings.�
One of the hardest things for carnal man, be it early heretic or modern day Bible Critic, to grasp is that concept that Jesus is God. The entire concept that a human man who lived some twenty centuries ago is The Eternal Creator God of the Universe is had for us to understand. But, the Bible says that such is the case. Indeed, had Jesus been a mere man he (small case intended in this instance) could not have died in our place to offer us salvation.
Jesus is God. Jesus is the Savior of all who would accept Him.
In our next session we will take a look at the story of the Woman Taken in Adultery from John 7:52 - 8:11