Sola Scriptura: The Canon of Scripture

Carrying on after proving the inerrancy of Scripture, I would like to go on to a related issue — the Canon of Scripture, before going on to the issue of ultimate authority which undergirds everything, and finishing with the preservation of Scripture.

The Canon of Scripture refers to the books which are to be found in the Scriptures, to be regarded as the Christian's Rule of Faith. In fact, the word Canon comes from a Hebrew and Greek word and basically means something by which to keep straight; a rule^[1]. Thus, the Canon delineates which books are considered to be the Word of God and which books aren't to be considered as such.

Most liberals, probably knowing the weakness of their position with regards to the Bible, question the Bible itself at its core, by questioning the Canon of Scripture. If one holds to the Canon of Scripture as delineating between the inspired writings and the non-inspired ones, then there is simply no logically consistent way that one can hold to errancy of Scripture in light of the evidences, manuscript and otherwise, and thus there is no way one can reject the other doctrines about the Bible without rejecting Christianity. Therefore, the liberals attack the Canon of Scripture, as only then can they still logically be a 'Christian' (in the sense that their worldview is logically consistent with their idea and understanding of Christianity) and remain a liberal.

The Christian Canon is typically made up of 66 books; 39 books in the Old Testament (OT), and 27 books in the New Testament. They are made up of:

OT

Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy — Torah or Law
Joshua, Judges, 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, 2 Kings, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadaih, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi — Prophets
Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Songs of songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, Esther, Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, 1 Chronicles, 2 Chronicles — Writings

NT

Matthew, Mark, Luke, John — Gospels
Acts — History
Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galations, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon — Pauline Epistles
Hebrews, James, 1 Peter, 2 Peter, 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, Jude — General Epistles
Revelation — Apocalytic

The Christian Canon differs from the Roman Catholic Canon in that they add the Apocrypha into their Canon, and their Canon differ from the Orthodox churches also. I would not go into detail over which version of the canon is correct, but instead focus more on the issue of canonicity with regards to the liberals.

The liberals question and reject the idea of the Canon by essentially positing that the Canon was decided by men and thus they could have added in or rejected certain books which are actually authentic books representing what they call 'true Christianity'. The most well-known example of such liberal thinking is that found in the blasphemous and hugely popular novel (and adopted to film) by Dan Brown entitled The Da Vinci Code, in which Brown had his fictitious expert in his novel saying that the Council of Nicea and the Emperor Constantine had decided which books were placed into the canon of Scripture. Liberals can also use the example of the different Canons found within Christendom to show the fact that the Canon is ultimately decided by Man. Of course, the historical development of the Canon shows that the Church was the one who finally decided on the Canon, after accepting some disputed books and then rejecting them, or rejecting other disputed books and then accepting them later^[2], which the liberals use to promote the idea that the Canon was decided by fallible, biased Man. The Nag Hammadi finds of the Gnostic gospels and the idea of secret gospels in general also have given liberals fuel to bolster their claims of the Bible being essentially a work of men and not the Word of God.

So, how should we respond to all these attacks? To the existence of different canons in visible Christedom, it must be said that to infer from this that the Canon of Scripture is suspect is a non sequitar. All three traditions (Protestant, Roman Catholic, Orthodox) believe in a fixed Canon while disputing on some of the books which the other side has or hasn't in the Canon of Scripture. Obviously, one side is right and the others are wrong. As an Reformed Evangelical Protestant, I would definitely say that the Protestant Canon is the Christian one, and this is backed up by historical and internal evidence of the rejected writings^[3]. Also, based on historical and literary evidences, the 'secret Gospels' like for example those in the Nag Hammadi finds are also rejected as being part of the Canon^[4].

The main thrust of the liberal arguments is the argument that the Canon was decided by Man, who were often assumed to be biased in their selection of books to add in the Canon. Feminists and New-Agers could therefore claim that these people suppress the Gnostic 'gospels' as they were patristic and biased against women. Alos, would like to take note that Roman Catholics use a similar form of argumentation also to push their argument for the primacy of the Church over that of the Word. What all these arguments have in common is the argument that people create the canon of Scripture. However, this argument is flawed. The canon was recognized by the Church, not created by it^[5]. Since the canon was recognized by the Church, the Church did not have any liberty to add to or remove books from the Scriptures, but to humbly recognized and receive these canonical books as Scripture. Was it possible for the Church and Christians in general to rebel against God and not accept those books which are meant to be canonical? No, for God has said that His Will shall be accomplished and not be thwarted (Dan. 4:35). If God intends for these books to be His Word, it will be done as such. Also, it is written that God's Word in the Scriptures is eternal, standing firm in the heavens (Ps. 119:89), and thus its contents do not dependent on Man's decision of the books of the Canon.

But what about the Roman Catholic church or the Orthodox churches, some might ask? We can see that the Roman church-state only added the Apocrypha during and after the Council of Trent^[6], and the Orthodox churches basically accepts all of the Apocrypha, even those that the Roman state-church rejects. The Roman acceptance of the Apocrypha is thus rather recent and was after the Reformation and therefore this does not infringe on the canon of Scripture. As with regards to the Orthodox churches, they do not make a clear distinction between Scripture and Tradition, in fact placing Scripture as the preeminent tradition among many forms^[7]. Therefore, nothing much about the Canon can be made from the Orthodox position.

Since this is the case, all the arguments by the liberals and the defense of Rome for Sola Ecclesia is undercut and rendered unsound. The doctrine of the existence of the inspired Canon of Scripture in its present form as stated above with 66 books is thus validated.

[to be continued]

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References:

[1] M.G. Easton (1897), Easton's Bible Dictionary, Published by Christian Classics Ethereal Library, Grand Rapids, MI. Public Domain

[2] See Disputed books of the Old Testament (http://www.bible-researcher.com/canon4.html) and The New Testament Canon (http://www.bible-researcher.com/canon3.html)

[3] See The Old Testament Canon and Apocrypha at http://www.bible-researcher.com/canon2.html . For more research into the Canon, look at http://www.bible-researcher.com/canon.html . Also Are the right books in the Bible? (http://www.angelfire.com/nt/theology/theology/04canon.html) See the articles in the Canon section at Monergism.com also at http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/topic/bible.html#canon

[4] The Gnostics and Jesus (http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/onsite/gnostics.html). Even a cursory look at some of these books will show that they are radically different in style and writing from the canonical books. See Lost Books of the Bible, so-called at http://www.carm.org/lostbooks.htm where you can read some of these books for yourself.

[5] See James R. White (2004), Scripture Alone, pp. 101-103, published by Bethany House, Minneapolis, Minnesota

[6] Reasons why the Apocyrpha doesn not belong to the Bible! (http://www.bible.ca/catholic-apocrypha.htm)

[7] Eastern Orthodoxy (http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/topic/EasternOrthodoxy.html)

Chinese theological words...

Just for some fun, I would like to post some names and theological words in Chinese. [Note: Chinese (simplified) font must be enabled to see them]

John Calvin = 约翰 。 加尔文

James Arminius = 雅各 。 阿民念

Calvinism = 加尔文主义

Arminianism = 阿民念主义

Reformed = 改教

Reformation = 改革时期

Puritan = 清教

Canons of Dordt = 多特信条

Heiderberg Catechism = 海德堡要理问题

Belgic Confession of Faith = 比利时信条

Westminster Confession of Faith = 韦斯敏斯德信条

Monergism = 神恩独作论

Synergism = 神人合作论

For the last two, I sortof coined them on the spot. Perhaps there already exists translated words for these two. If so, does anyone know of them?

Sola Scriptura: The inerrancy of Scripture

With the theory of partial inerrancy done away with, let us go to the next topic: the Inerrancy of Scripture.

Now, to say that Scripture is inerrant is to say that all of Scripture, every word of Scripture as it is in the autorgraphs is inerrant (Verbal Plenary Inspiration). The opposite view is that the Scriptures are errant; with errors in it, with no viable middle ground. As stated before, there are no explicit evidence for inerrancy, but there are a lot of implict evidences in Scripture for it. If one abides by the absolute authority and truth of Scripture, one can be confident that there are no errors in the Bible, since the Bible itself say it is without error. Of course, this is a circular argument, but we are getting ahead of ourselves.

So how do opponents of the inerrancy of Scriptures, all liberals, try to disprove inerrancy? Basically, they use the same points and more which the partial inerrantists borrowed to argue against total inerrancy. However, at least the liberals are consistent with their philosophy, since they do not postulate certain parts of Scripture as being inerrant. They attempt to prove their case by (i) Pointing out alleged contradictions in the Bible, (ii) Contradiction with established scientific and historical facts, (iii) Pointing out textual variants and then extrapolating that to say that this show errors in the Bible, and when all else fails, (iv) Saying that doing so makes the Bible a 'paper pope' and is bibliolatry (OR Christ is bigger than the Scriptures).

Now, what do we Christians say to this? All of these are extra-biblical evidences, for sure. That does not necessarily make it wrong, but we must see if they are actually sound arguments against the doctrine of the inerrancy of Scripture.

(i) Pointing out alleged contradictions in the Bible

If Scripture is inerrant, then all of its facts must be correct. One way of testing this is to see if facts stated in the Scripture are consistent among the different accounts found in certain parts of Scripture. For example, the Resurrection accounts in the different Gospels seem to be different in some places. In the account in Matthew, it is stated that Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb (Mt. 28:1) whereas in John, it is stated that Mary Magdalene came to the tomb (Jn. 20:1). This appears to be a contradiction here. However, just because the Johannine account mention Mary Magdalene only does not imply that only Mary Magdalene was present. If I say that there is one marble (on a plate containing two marbles), I would not be lying unless I say there is only one marble. Thus, in evaluating supposed contradictions in the Bible, we must check to see whether the 'contradictions' is due to our reading our low-context interpretation into the Bible, as the Bible is a high-context text rather than a low-context one as our modern society now is. It is my belief that most of the supposed errors and contradictions in the Bible are in actually neither and are simply presenting the truth in different ways which may cause difficulties due to our low-context reading lenses^[1].

However, are there any errors or contradictions in the Bible which are really valid? A few numerical errors found in the Bible, like a numerical inflation of 10 times could be seen when comparing passages like 2 Sam. 10:18 and 1 Chron. 19:18. Also, there seem to be a discrepancy found between the genealogies of Luke and Genesis, with Lk 3:36 having an extra Cainan, supposedly the son of Arphaxad, in it, which is not found in the Genesis account^[2]. However, when one counts such errors, there are in actual fact extremely few of such genuine errors in the manuscripts^[3],[4] and such errors do not necessarily show that these contradictions are also found in the autographs. Also, such errors only implicate a small amount of the Scriptures and their existence do not touch any major teaching or doctrine in the Bible. Since such is the case, their existence do not negate the teaching of the inerrancy of the Bible in its autographs.

But then some may say that such a move make the inerrancy of Scripture unfalsifiable and also it is ridiculous for us to say that the Bible is inerrant except for the few errors in the Bible. First of all, inerrancy is preserved for the autographs only, not the apographs, which are inerrant inasmuch as they conform to the autograph. For the charge that such a claim would make the teaching unfalsifiable, let it be clear first that this doctrine is primarily for Scriptural and theological reasons, not for its 'scientific' verifiability. Secondly, that is what the science of (lower) textual criticism is for, to correct any copyist errors which had made its way into some of the manuscripts and our Bibles. Thirdly, as I have mentioned, no major doctrines, in fact not even one doctrine mentioned in the Bible, is affected by these copyist errors^[3]. For all these reasons, the doctrines of the inerrancy of Scripture and the preservation of Scripture, which will be talked about later, are still maintained.

(ii) Contradictions with established scientific and historical facts

As I have mentioned before in the previous sections, the scientific method is fallible, especially when dealing with the historical sciences, as there are way too many variables and events which are assumed a priori when trying to reconstruct what actually happaned. Typically, the philosophical theory of uniformitarianism is assumed which the scientific data can neither prove nor disprove. The historical theories and 'facts' of relevance to the biblical data falls to the same fallacy also since their dates are often found using scientific methods such as carbon dating. Since such is the case, such contradictions are not important to the doctrine of inerrancy, since if there exists a contradiction, the scientific or historical 'facts' can legitimately be assumed to be wrong as they rest on an unproved philosophical principle.

(iii) Pointing out textual variants and then extrapolating that to say that this show errors in the Bible

The existence of textual variants, most notably that between the Critical Text and the Majority Text traditions, could very well be exploited and extrapolated to say that such variants show that there are errors in the Bible, since the autograph would definitely have only one reading. However, approximately 99.5% of the Bible which account for all the doctrines in the Bible agree completely all of the time^[3], and therefore to extrapolate from the existence of textual variants to the existence of errors found in the Bible is invalid.

(iv) Saying that doing so makes the Bible a 'paper pope' and is bibliolatry (OR Christ is bigger than the Scriptures).

When all else fails, this is often the 'best' accusation, often made by the liberals within so-called Protestant circles^[5]. However, this is simply ridiculous, as obviously, this charge is not about people bowing down to a physical Bible and offering incense and sacrifices to it (which would be true bibliolatry) but of people revering God's Word. If the Bible is truly the Word of God, and the words therein are God-breathed, then what the Bible says is what God says. Since that is the case, believing the Bible and following its precepts is the same as following God. These people therefore blaspheme God by implying that to obeying Him and to treat His words with reverence is idolatry. To liken the words of God to the pope is highly insulting, noting that the Pope is an antichrist^[6]. Nevertheless, the issue of the comparison is related to that of ultimate authority, which we shall cover later.

(to be continued)

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References:

[1] For more information, see Josh McDowell (1999), The New Evidence That Demands a Verdict, IMprint Edition (2006), published by Campus Crusade Asia Limited, Singapore.

[2] For an examination of this contradiction, see the article Cainan: How do you explain the difference between Luke 3:36 and Gen. 11:12? at http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/3748.asp

[3] Illustration of Bible text manuscript tree and variant readings (http://www.carm.org/bible/textualexample.htm)

[4] See also Gleason L. Archer, Alleged Errors and Discrepancies in the Original Manuscripts of the Bible, in Norman L. Geisler (1980), Ed., Inerrancy, published by Zondervan Publishing House, Gran Rapids, MI.

[5] Making the Bible an Idol, Mainstream Messenger, 3:3 at (http://www.mainstreambaptists.org/mob1/bibliolatry.htm)

[6] The Wesminster Confession of Faith Chapter XXV Sentence VI states that the Pope is The Antichrist. I will not speculate about whether the Pope is indeed THE Antichrist, but I believe he is definitely one of the anitichrists.

Another article on judging

I would just like to link to this article on the topic of Judging here, especially for those people who are tempted to pass judgment on what I am doing without even proving anything. Here also is my earlier article on judging, on my website.

Regarding my review of Ed Silvoso's sermon

I have received some feedback on my review of the Ed Silvoso's sermon and would just like to briefly comment on them.

The negative feedback regarding the review focuses mainly on my calling Silvoso a heretic and insinuating that he is possibly unsaved. I would like to show here why my doing so is justified.

First of all, I would like to just say that before writing my review of Ed Silvoso's sermon, I did a background study on him first. I try to see where he is coming from, what worldview does he holds to and so on so as to find out what he means by his words and thus what he actually believes. Although I do not have the time or opportunity to read his books, his website and affiliations prove invaluable in discerning his worldview. With much popularity comes much public scrutiny and more exposure of your views to the public, and thus from his website and other apologetic sites which research on him, I manage to discern his worldview and thus interpret what he says in light of his own worldview.

Therefore, regarding certain punchline sentences and phrases made by Silvoso such as "There are some cities where people will find it very hard to go to hell. They can go there if they want to, but they will have a heaven of a time to go there", they are not to be treated as hyberbole but as actual factual beliefs that Silvoso holds to. Since such is the case, Silvoso is a semi-Pelagian heretic. Ditto for his statements on his website which show his liberation thelogy leanings. For those who do not see his semi-Pelagianism, the question is asked why is he so confident that people will find it hard not to come to Christ when there are a lot of Christians evangelising. Let us ignore his false 'Christ-less gospel of miracles' for the moment and answer such a question. Why is Silvoso so confident that people will find it hard to reject Christ when there are a lot of Christians evangelising? It can only be due to two reasons: semi-Pelagians thinking on the partial depravity of Man, or presumption of God to act when we believe so (Word of Faith), which shows a person's occultic view of faith. Silvoso further adds that such a person is still able to go to hell, which shows his synergism, as despite all that God and believers do to try to win them for Christ, people are still able to reject God and go to hell. Therefore, Silvoso is a semi-Pelagian heretic and possibly also an Occultist.

Since Silvoso has been proven to be a heretic, I further add that he is most likely unsaved. This is an extension of the fact that Jesus said that he will preserve His flock (Jn. 6:39) and also the fact that heretics were said to be cut off from salvation (Gal. 1:8; 2 Peter 2:1-3; 1 Jn. 2:19-20), thus if one is truly a heretic, then one is not saved. These passages talk about people who are teaching heresies, thus teachers of heresies are not saved at all. Since the Lord preserve His flock, no true Christians would ever be allowed to teach heresy at all. This has nothing to do with judging hypocritically (cf. Mt. 7:1), but of judging rightly (Jn. 7:24)

In conclusion, I trust that some of the questions people may have had have been answered here. Anyone with more questions on the topic are welcomed to contact me here.

More on the NAR

Upon further research, it seems that there is a link between Rick Warren, the Global Day of Prayer (GDOP), Ed Silvoso and the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR). All of them are working to bring about the "second reformation", which undermines the first one and will lead to totalitarianism and oppresion. You can read more about it here. Oh well, birds of a feather ....

Billy Graham: Universalist?

The renown evangelist Billy Graham seemed to have gone off the deep end. In a recent Newsweek interview, he was heard to say things which seem to imply his acceptance of Universalism. Here is an article by Ingrid Schlueter on this subject.

Analysis of Ed Silvoso's sermon

OK, finally here is my analysis of Ed Silvoso' sermon during this year's Festival of Praise. For those who missed it, here is my report on the FOP this year. In summary, I would just ask all and every person to stay away from Ed Silvoso. He is a heretic and Scripture commands him to repent of his errors or face the wrath of God.

He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches ... (Rev. 3:6)

Thank You Lord!

I just want to share with all my readers how joyful I am today. Even as I work to expose the errors in the various 'Christian' movements and also perhaps to edify the Body of Christ by my articles on various doctrines, I can see that my efforts on behalf of the Lord has not been in vain. OK, I know that as a Christian, we are not supposed to seek anyone's approval, and I endeavor to do all of this for the audience of One, our Lord Jesus Christ. Though I am reviled by Man and even so in the supposedly Christian commuity, I will continue pressing on towards the goal God has called me in Christ Jesus. Even then, I am still human. It isn't easy to go against the 'Christian' establishment, you know.

Yesterday, it was good to be encouraged (in turn) by Rev. Ken Silva of Apprising Ministries, after he quoted one of my comments in one of his missives, which had encouraged him. Although we are physically seperated by the Pacific Ocean, of different ethnicities and nationalities (and also on our views of infant baptism = P), what unites us is the family bond in our Lord Jesus Christ, in which there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, but all are one in Christ Jesus (Gal. 3:28). I am encouraged by his kind words in an email he sent to me, as I had initially misinterpret his words and thus he had emailed me to correct my misinterpretation.

Today, words of encouragement from my brothers-in-Christ Jason and Wenxian have also given me strength to carry on. Moreover, even as I talk to my fellow (Campus) Crusaders as we serve together, I can see that there is an openess in some of them in talking about some of these controversial issues, totally unlike the mainstream church leaders in Singapore who in their carnal pride often treat you like dirt and ignore the clear commands of our Lord Jesus Christ (do look up Jer. 50:6 and Ez. 34:1-16). I have yet to hear from Mr. Chen Huilin, the director of Campus Crusade Mass Media. Can I safely put him in the same category as the Singapore GDOP leaders?

Anyway, thanks God for giving me all of this. I do not deserve such grace, and I thank You for giving me all of this even though I do not even deserve to pick up the crumbs under Your table (Mt. 15:27). To God be the highest glory, amen.

Report on Festival of Praise 2006

I am taking a short break from the Sola Scriptura series for the moment. Over the weekend in Singapore, the Charismatic movement in Singapore in the Festival of Praise (FOP) committee have organized this year's Festival of Praise event. I went for the FOP on the 5^th Aug 2006 to observe the event. Here is my report of this event. An analysis of the sermon given by Rev. Ed Silvoso will be posted later.

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On Saturday the 5th Aug 2006, I decided to go to the Festival of Praise (FOP) 2006 with my brother, to see what it has become. I went for the FOP a few times in my earlier years before I came to embrace the doctrines of grace, and have not gone for the event ever since then (2003). Therefore, I have decided to go for this event as an observer, noting that most of the people going there will be youths and young adults from Charismatic churches, and even some from supposedly conservative denominations. Since this is the case, they represent the direction mainstream Christianity in Singapore is heading towards. This is especially so when I came to know of some of the churches that are supporting and taking part in the event – City Harvest Church (CHC), Riverlife Church, Church of Singapore, and even CEFC (Covenant Evangelical Free Church) is at least supporting it.

I arrived just when they were about to begin, with Canon James Wong and then Pastor Kong Hee of CHC leading the people in a time of prayer for the Middle East. After some time for the next prayer items, some of the people started to pray in tongues. As if on cue, some of the pastors on stage started to pray in tongues also. As some of them have a clip-on microphone with them, some of their prayers (in tongues) could be heard softly over the microphone. After some time, Pastor Kong Hee closed with a prayer, in which he mixes a bit of his “tongue-language” into his prayer ( … "shamballah umballah" … Hey, look, I can speak ‘tongue’! ) . Now, this is a clear violation of Scripture (1 Cor. 14: 27-33), assuming that their tongues are valid in the first place, as there is no interpretation. Also, no mass speaking or praying in tongues in public is allowed.

Next, there was worship lead by Don Moen of Integrity! Music. As a more conservative Evangelical, his music was not towards the pop rock style characteristic of more modern bands like Hillsongs or Delirious?. He played some of the classic Don Moen pieces like God is good all the time and a few others which I don’t know of. During the worship, the spotlights were used to flash around, some were dimmed and other lighting effects were done so as to manipulate the atmosphere. This is against Scripture’s injunction to worship in spirit and in truth. God did not ask us to manufacture worship but to worship Him as He commanded us to. By manipulating our emotions using lighting effects, we are first of all not worshipping God in spirit, merely hyping up our emotions, but secondly we are bringing strange fire unto the Lord, which God utterly detests (Lev. 10:1-3).

Another thing which Don Moen did was during the song God is good all the time, where he started the song by singing the first verse slowly, then he asked the audience the question “Are you ready?” to which the audience responded with a resounding yes, then he restarted the song with a fast beat. This type of question and response shows once again the orchestration of the worship experience, which is similarly antithecal to true worship of our God as we are not worshipping God in spirit but only hyping up our emotions. During another song, he started to have 'instrumental worship', in which halfway through a praise song, he stopped leading worship and then one instrument after another started to perform various harmonies to ‘praise God’. Concert is the name of the game, definitely not worship. Oh, and not to mention the repetition of choruses many times (OK, not that many. I heard one Charismatic church which did it much worse) to hype up the emotions again. All of these are antithecal to true worship and are in fact expressions of carnal rebellion against God Almighty, the Lord of hosts, the Holy One of Israel, to which everyone will one day give an account of their lives and actions before Him.

After around half an hour of worship, Don Moen left the stage for the sermon by Rev. Ed Silvoso. Now, I initially didn’t know who he is, so I was just listening to see what this man of God would preach on. Sadly to say, his ‘sermon’ was one whole bunch of biblical errors, poor exegesis, logical fallacies, and even heretical notions, which I will document in my examination of his sermon soon. Anyway, after his ‘sermon’, Don Moen came back to "lead us in a time of worship", after which Pastor Kong Hee closed the event with a prayer and a benediction, after having everyone shout out the name of the company or school whatever, their “marketplace” area, as a declaration that they will be redeemed by the Lord (we shall examine this concept in the sermon). After this, anyone is welcomed to leave, while the Christian City Church band stepped on stage to lead anyone who wants to stay for "another half an hour of worship". Basically, it was totally a pop rock music concert. If Don Moen could not get worship right, I think there are no words to describe this type of abomination which masquerades as worship. Anyway, I decided to return home then.

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May God have mercy on us all for this heretical teaching conducted in the name of Christ, and may he grant the people involved repentance unto eternal life in our Lord Jesus Christ.

UPDATE: Some unregenerate people have thought that I am attacking all people going for the event. Those people should just go back and retake their reading comprehension exam.

Last post on cessationist/ continualist issue

[Carrying on from here]

No, this is not the last post on this issue, God willing, by me or anyone else, but here is the last post of Dan. J. Phillips' response to Adrain Warnock regarding the issue.

Sola Scriptura: The extent of inspiration of Scripture (part 2)

[This is a continuation of a blog series on the topic of Sola Scriptura]

In the last post, I have proved from Scripture that Scripture itself teaches the doctrine of verbal plenary inspiration (VPI), which is to say that every word of Scripture in its totality is inspired of God, and thus necessary, sufficient, and authoritative for us. I would now go on to look at some of the arguments commonly used to disprove VPI, and to see whether the stand of the partial inerrantists are internally consistent.

When one surveys the arguments by the partial inerrantists, one is hard-pressed to find any biblical argument for partial inerrancy. Obviously, the Scriptures do not explicitly proclaim itself inerrant, but they implicitly do so. The main arguments used by partial inerrantists are mainly by pointing to alleged discrepencies and contradictions in the Bible, or to point that this doctrine of total inerrancy is not believed by others within church history. With respect to Scripture, none of them could validly refute the claims of Scripture regarding its inerrancy, since they hold to the inerrancy of the Scriptures as with regards to spiritual matters. As the inspiration of Scripture is a spiritual issue, none of them could claim that the verses used to prove the inspiration of Scripture are errant. The only thing they could do is to try to give examples of errors in the Bible so as to limit the extent of the application of these verses.

Now, it must first be said that proving errors in the Bible does not by itself disprove the theory of verbal plenary inspiration. By careful exegesis of these verses in context, these verses do not lend themselves to any other interpretation. Therefore, proving errors in the Bible could only undermine the inerrancy of Scripture in all things, including spiritual things, as the verses used to support the inspiration of Scripture are proven false. This is shown in the logical diagram below:

p = The verses used to support VPI are inerrant
q = VPI of the Scriptures is true

If p, then q
~ q
Therefore, ~ p (Modus tollens)

Therefore, we can see from this valid argument that the only conclusion that could be gotten from the proving of errors in the Bible is to disgard the theory of inerancy in all things to begin with. Therefore, these partial inerrantists are inconsistent in their view of Scripture. Unless they can prove that the verses used can not support VPI, they should either abandon their unbiblical theory or just follow the path of the liberals before them and throw out the Scriptures. Charges of circular reasoning in this case would not be applicable as the partial inerrantists do state that they believe in the inerrancy of Scripture in spiritual things.

With regards to this doctrine being a new doctrine and not held by the saints in former times, this is certaintly not the case. Granted, the term 'verbal plenary inspiration' may not be used, but the concept is still believed^[1]. Even if few people in the early church believe in it, the fact of the matter is that Scripture is the ultimate authority, not what other Christians believe.

We now come down to the major reason people embrace the partial inerrantist position — alleged discrepancies in Scripture and the contradiction the Bible has with certain theories of naturalistic science like evolution. We will deal with the alleged discrepancies in Scripture in the next section under the inerrancy of Scripture and only discuss the contradictions the Bible has with certain theories of science or history. Now, if Scripture is the ultimate authority as in a Christian's life, then Christians should uphold the Bible by faith and reject these naturalistic theories, having faith that these naturalistic theories are actually false. In fact, if one knows how science actually works, one will also know that science has no way of proving Scripture false, since in order for science to know and prove anything, a correct formula is not enough - one must also make a few assumptions regarding the object under investigation and whether there was any interference with the system. For example, science can never prove anything about the age of the earth. Using radiometric dating and rock samples, the scientist must assume uniformitarianism (that the decay rate of the radioactive elements are always constant), and more importantly, the scientist must make certain assumptions about the initial radioisotope ratio and/or amount in the rock. Both of these assumptions cannot be proven or tested, so therefore science cannot know or prove the exact age of that rock. This is the case with all scientific disciplines, so for believers the results from this type of "historical science" inquiry should be ignored. Far better by far to believe in the words of our God who created history than to believe the fallible interpretations of men who are fallible and themselves subjected to the depravity of our human nature.

For history as well as for science, the problem of replying on them is that all of us are daily faced with our own sinful desires, including those people doing the research. The idea that any discipline can ever be neutral (i.e. the myth of the objective scientist following where the evidence leads him) is a lie. As someone who is studying in the life sciences, I can personally say that there are no objective scientists. If we find data which is not consistent with our hypothesis, we would either discard the data by writing it off as contaminated data, or we come out with a hypothesis or other reasons to explain this anamoly. This is so especially when we are doing experiments where the end results are more or less known. And I think most people would be astonished by how many reasons we can use to explain why an experiment was unsuccessful (i.e. contamination due to unwashed test tubes). Of course, this is not to say that scientists are out to deceive people, but the fact of the matter is that scientists are not quite the objective enquirers of truth that they are made out to be. This is the same for historians too, who use fallible scientific methods sometimes to date artefacts, and who will sometimes make mistakes also.

Since this is so, people who embrace partial inerrancy due to such factors as the Bible being contradictory to naturalistic science are actually very much in error. Whether Scripture is totally inerrant or not must be established through Scripture itself, not by appeal to fallible human disciplines.

One objection which has been raised to the theory of verbal plenary inspiration is that the New Testament writers did not seem to treat the Old Testament as being verbally inspired, since they did not exactly quote the OT writings word for word, not even the Septuagint^[2]. However, this is an invalid argument. It could very well be the case that as the NT writers quoted OT scripture, their quotes were themselves inspired to be different from the Septuagint and other Greek translations of the OT, and thus we have two different inspired wordings for certain OT texts. Another possibility is the fact that the Septuagint was never verbally inspired in the first place. Just as translations of the Bible into other languages seek to reflect the original meaning of Scripture but will never quite do justice to it, the Septuagint could be similar to our English translations of the Bible like the KJV and not primarily verbally inspired, only secondarily inspired. Since that is the case, the NT writers when quoting the OT scripture in their books would have create a 'primary verbally inspired OT scripture' in the Greek. Whatever the reason, this could not disprove the doctrine of verbal plenary inspiration, since there are ways of explaining how this could be so.

We would now go to the Achilles' heel of the theory of partial inerrancy — epistemology. Why do the partial inerrantists' claim that the spiritual content of Scripture is inerrant, whereas the 'natural' contents found in Scripture are errant? Upon what basis is such a division created? If the 'natural' contents of Scripture are errant, upon what basis could a person defend the inerrant nature of Scripture? Isn't such a division just arbitrary? As I have stated above, if Scripture is errant in its 'natural' facts, then the entire Scripture is suspect to be errant too. Therefore, the partial inerrantists' position is undefendable. Either they return to the biblical view of verbal plenary inspiration, or they should consistently follow the path of the liberals, and throw out the entire Scriptures as being errant.

In conclusion, we have shown that the doctrine of the verbal plenary inspiration (VPI) of Scripture is sound, and that the partial inerrantists' position is untenable. Those who do insist that there are errors in the Bible should reject the inerrancy of Scripture as a whole, and it is to those people that we would now turn to.

[to be continued]

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References:

[1] Norman L. Geisler (1980), ed. , Inerrancy, pp. 357-410, published by Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, Michigan

[2] Another look at Plenary Verbal Inspiration (http://www.accuros.com/thornbush/pollen/plenary_verbal_inspiration.htm)

Sola Scriptura: The extent of inspiration of Scripture

So far, Scripture has been proven to be necessary, sufficient and authoritative. All of these points are actually descriptive of the core doctrine commonly known as the inspiration of Scripture. In this and later sections, I would like to take a step back and look at the doctrine from another angle, where actually most of the attacks by the liberals are coming from — the extent of the inspiration of Scripture, the inerrancy of Scripture and the Canon of Scripture, before returning to the doctrine of the perspicuity of Scripture. In this section, I would discuss the extent of the inspiration of Scripture, which basically focuses on the extent to which the following attributes: neccessity, sufficiency and authority, could be applied to the different words and passages of Scripture.

Before I begin, I would like to state how the discussion of the extent of the inspiration of Scripture and the inerrancy of Scripture would be framed. Definitely, there is a considerable correlation and overlap between the two topics, as the degree to which Scripture is inerrant would impact the extent of the inspiration of Scripture, and also part of the discussion of the extent of the inspiration of Scripture would involve the inerrancy or errancy of certain parts or portions of Scripture. To make the discussion simpler, the discussion on the extent of the inspiration of Scripture would primarily focus on the "total inerrancy versus partial inerrancy" split within Evangelicalism and related issues, thus it would assume a priori that Scripture is infallible and is meant to function as the Word of God. Conversely, the discussion on the inerrancy of Scripture would make no such assumptions and would be geared towards the position of the Liberals who deny inerrancy altogether and treat the Bible as just another piece of literature to be deconstructed at will.

The historical backdrop upon which such a discussion about the extent of the inspiration of Scripture takes place is that of Evangelicalism in the 20^th century. After the devasting attack on the Bible by the "higher critics" in the 19^th century, followed by the Fundamentalist/ Liberal split in the early 20^th century, Evangelicalism as a whole still haven't settled the issue of biblical inerrancy. However, all Evangelicals presuppose the authority of Scripture as the Word of God which is to be obeyed and thus do not go into the type of destructive criticism which destroy the liberals' faith. Due to the onslaught of naturalism in the form of old earth theories and the theory of evolution, as well as being shown alleged discrepencies and errors in the Bible, some Evangelicals have tried to keep the authority of Scripture while caving in to "proofs" of errors found in it, by inventing the theory of Scripture being "inerrant as in matters of faith and morals" or "infallible", while being not inerrant in all things^[1].

Since such is the case, I would interact with the "partial inerrancy" position at the same foundational level as the Evangelical partial inerrantists. That is to say that I would operate under the presupposition of the authority of Scripture in the lives of believers in spiritual things. I would not be trying to refute every argument which the partial inerrantists throw forward, which many Bible scholars have done^[2], just only to see whether their claims would hold consistently to their beliefs or undermine them, after I have made the case from Scripture regarding this issue, of course.

The case from Scripture

Let us now start off where we had stopped; at 2 Tim. 3:16-17. In the earlier section, I had used the phrase "All Scripture is breathed out by God" to show that Scripture had its origin in God and not Man, thus having within in the very authority of God Himself. Another thing which must be noted is that all of scripture is said to be inspired, not some. Thus, this passage seems to extend the inspiration of Scripture to every part of it.

Now, someone might rightly object to the universal application of 2 Tim. 3:16-17 to all of Scripture. Since this letter of Paul to Timothy was written before the New Testament Canon was completed, therefore does this verse only apply to Scripture which was written before Paul wrote 2 Timothy? Also, it does take time for the different Scriptures to be passed from each congregation to the next and then verified as Scripture by each and all of the Christian congregations, thus who knows how many books of the New Testament were known by Timothy then when he received this letter from the apostle Paul? Shouldn't the phrase "all Scripture" be interpreted in its historical context as stating only those books of Scripture which were known to Paul and Timothy at that time?

The short answer to that question is no. Although the argument sounds reasonable, the problem with the objection is that the verse does not lend itself to that type of interpretation. 2 Tim. 3:16-17 states that the extent of inspiration is to 'all Scripture' (Πασα γραφε, transliterated Pasa Graphē), thus the verse itself is saying that as long as something is Scripture, it is inspired. The verse does not concern itself with what is Scripture per se, and thus such an argument is invalid.

Another passage often used to prove the inspiration of Scripture is 2 Peter 1:20-21, which states thus:

... knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone's own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

From this passage, we can see that no 'prophecy of Scripture' comes from anyone's own personal interpretation, neither was it produced by Man's autonomous free will. Rather, Scripture says that the men who wrote the Scriptures spoke as if God himself was guiding them; being carried along by the Holy Spirit to produce the Scriptures themselves. Therefore, since no prophecy of Scripture came about just by chance or by someone deciding to write Scripture by his own autonomous free will, all of Scripture must have came about through the Holy Spirit's leading, and thus all of Scripture in its totality is inspired.

Yet another key passage which is used to defend total inerrancy is found in the words of Jesus Himself in Mt. 5:18

For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.

In this verse found within the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus was telling his Jewish hearers that not even "an iota, nor a dot" would disappear from the Law until all is accomplished, which will occur at the second judgment when heaven and earth will pass away. An iota (ι) is the smallest letter in the Greek alphabet and thus could be easily lost, especially when words are squeezed together in a document and another person has to decipher them. A dot obviously is very small and thus easily lost. In the immediate context, Jesus was telling his Jewish hearers that he did not come to abolish the Law but to fulfil it (Mt. 5:17), which was appropriate for the scenario since Jesus would seem to contradict some of the laws found in the Law later when he contrasted the normal surface interpretation of some of the laws, which the Pharisees abided by and added their own traditions to help them keep the Law, with their true spiritual meanings and application (Mt. 5:21- 6: 18). Therefore, we can see that Jesus is telling us in this verse that the very words of Scripture themselves are preserved from error, since even an iota and a dot would not disappear from the Law. Since that is the case, this verse tells us that the very words of Scripture are themselves inspired and preserved throughout history, until Christ comes back.

An objection might be raise at this point that this verse only applies to the Law, which comprises the Torah; the first five books of the Old Testament written by Moses containing the Mosaic law. Someone might say that Jesus is saying here that not one word would be altered or removed from the Torah and therefore the Mosaic law would be preserved, and not altered or abrogated or lost. When we look at the verse, definitely, we can see that the verse does speak of the Torah. Also, from the context we can see that the Mosaic law would not be altered, abrogated or lost, but would be fulfilled in Christ (Mt. 5:17). However, it is my contention that the verse can be applied to Scripture as a whole. This is because in the preceding verse the phrase "the Law and the Prophets" were mentioned which is a phrase used in the New Testament to signify the Old Testament Scriptures^[3] (the Tanakh)^[4]. Since verse 18 flows out of verse 17, Jesus was actually also implying that the other books of the Old Testament were similarly inspired. Of course, at that time, none of the New Testament books were written yet so there wasn't a way for Jesus to talk explicitly about them. However, since Jesus mentioned all the Scriptures which were present at that time as equally verbally inspired, it would seem to be the case that what Jesus had in mind was not just the Old Testament Scriptures, but also the entirety of Scripture, even of those who had not been written yet. This could be seen in the case whereby Jesus mentioned that "heaven and earth will pass away, but my (Jesus') words would not pass away" (Mt. 24:35), and where Jesus says that his words are spirit and bring life (Jn. 6:63), thus showing that Jesus treated His words with the same authority as Scripture. Since it has been proven that Scripture is the only supreme authority, at least according to Scripture, then Jesus' words must be Scripture also.

Therefore, Mt. 5:18 does teach the verbal inspiration and preservation of Scripture. We would cover the preservation of Scripture later in the section of the inerrancy of Scripture

Two more prooftexts for the verbal inspiration of Scripture (the doctrine that every word in Scripture is inspired) are Prov. 30:5-6 and Rev. 22:18-19. Prov. 30:5-6 states that

Every word of God proves true; he is a shield to those who take refuge in him. Do not add to his words, lest he rebuke you and you be found a liar (Prov. 30:5-6 -ESV)

From this verse, we can see that every word of God is true and that we should not add to the words of Scripture, thus showing forth the inspiration of every word found therein.

In Rev. 22:18-19, it is stated:

I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.

Thus, we can see in the last book of the Scriptural Canon that the words of this book of prophecy in particular are important and not to be added to or removed at will, therefore showing that each individual word in the book of Revelation is inspired. Since this is the last book of the Bible, and this phrase occurs at the end of the book, the phrase is often applied to the entire Bible. Unless one wants to assume different types of inspirations of Scripture, which Scripture does not support, this application is sound. In fact, given 2 Tim. 3:16-17 and 2 Peter 3:15-16 which prove the plenary inspiration of Scripture (the doctrine whereby the totality of Scripture is inspired), there is only one single type of inspiration in all of Scripture, and thus the passage of Rev. 2:18-19 does teach the verbal inspiration of Scripture, after supporting evidences from other Scriptural passages.

In conclusion, from the Bible alone, it can be seen that the Bible do teach what is known as full inerrancy, known as the theory of verbal plenary inspiration (VPI) rather than the theory of partial inerrancy. Thus, every single word and every single concept, history and fact found in the Bible is equally inspired. This would definitely include the Creation account of Gen. 1-2, the chronologies found in Scripture in for example Gen. 5 and Mt. 1:1-17, the book of the Songs of Songs etc.

In the next post, I would continue on with this subject looking at the extent of inspiration of Scripture, this time analysing the viewpoints and touch some of the arguments put forward by the partial inerrantists.

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References and endnotes:

[1] For more information, look at Stephan L. Andrew, Biblical Inerrancy, pp 4-5, from CTS (Chafer Theological Seminary) Journal 8 (January - March 2002), as accessed from http://www.chafer.edu/journal/back_issues/v8n1_1.pdf

[2] Norman L. Geisler (1980), ed., Inerrancy, published by Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapid, Michigan.

[3] See Mt. 7:12, Mt. 22:40, Lk. 16:16, Acts 13:15 and Rom. 3:21 for places in the Bible where the Law and the Prophets do refer to Old Testament Scripture.

[4] Judaism 101 -Tanakh (http://www.ou.org/about/judaism/tanakh.htm)

Sola Scriptura: The authority of Scripture

Following on with the previous posts on Sola Scriptura, and having established the necessity and sufficiency of Scripture, I would like to continue on with the authority of Scripture.

The doctrine of the authority of Scripture states that Scripture has authority in the lives of believers and whatever it says are to be heeded and obeyed. Taken together with the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture, Scripture is said to be the supreme authority in our lives. Now, given merely the doctrine of the necessity of Scripture and the sufficiency of Scripture, the only thing we can say is that the only way to know more about Christianity; to know more about Christ, is through the Scriptures, either primarily or secondarily. However, they do not in and of themselves furnish any reason for anyone, not even Christians, to follow what it says and obey its injunctions and commands. Hence, the doctrine of the authority of Scripture is thus important for us, as it is the catalyst which is needed for the translation of sound doctrine (facts) in Scripture into practical obedience (oughts - impetus) in godliness towards God. Therefore, anytime a Bible verse is applied by a person into his/her life, that person has de facto practice the doctrine of the authority of Scripture, or at least that part of Scripture which he/she has applied.

I would now set to prove the authority of Scripture. Given the necessity and sufficiency of Scripture, I would use the Bible to prove the authority of Scripture. Later on, I would then look at the extent of the authority of Scripture, as subsumed in the extent of the inspiration of Scripture.

The proof text for the authority of Scripture will be the same one used in proving the necessity and sufficiency of Scripture — 2 Tim. 3:16-17

All Scripture is breathed out (Gr. θεοπνευστος, transliterated: theopneustos) by God and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work. (2 Tim. 3:16-17 —ESV)

For the purpose of proving the authority of Scripture, I would like to concentrate on the front part of this short passage. Whereas the middle part mainly helps in proving the necessity of Scripture, and the latter part in verse 17 mainly helps in proving the sufficiency of Scripture, the fron part of this passage speaks about the authority of Scripture. It states that "All Scripture is breathed out by God" and because of that, it THUS is profitable for all these godly works. This could be seen as all these activities (teaching, reproving, correcting, training) must of necessity presuppose the authority of Scripture to begin with. Only when a person or rule have authority over another can teaching be done by the one in authority to the one under authority. This is the same for reproving, for correcting and for training, all of which require a person to submit to another person or a rule so as to progress further. Therefore, for Scripture to be used to do such activities must of necessity presuppose the authority of Scripture over the one who is being taught, being reproved, being corrected or being trained.

"All Scripture is breathed out by God ...". The term 'breathed out (by God)' in the Greek is θεοπνευστος (transliterated theopneustos) which literally means God-breathed (theo = God & pneusto = breath) and is translated as such in the NIV. In the NASB and KJV, it is translated as "inspired by God" and "inspiration of God" respectively, from which we get the term the inspiration of Scripture. So, what does it mean for Scripture to be God-breathed or breathed out by God?

The Greek term theopneustos occur only once in the Greek New Testament text where it is used to describe all Scripture in 2 Tim. 3:16, and nothing else. First of all, this is a strong internal consistency validation (not proof) for the sufficiency of Scripture, as assuming the sufficiency of Scripture would give rise to the fact that only Scripture is described as God-breathed and nothing else (neither traditions nor emotions nor revelations obtained through prophecies) is described as such, thus validating the sufficiency of Scripture. This one-time usage of the word theopneustos as descriptive of Scripture also elevates the status of Scripture. Since theopneustos is literally translated as God-breathed, this shows firstly that Scripture has its origin in God and not man. Secondly, as breathed out by God, it reflects and shows the attributes of God. It is this property of Scripture which give Scripture its authority, for it has God's authority due to its nature as being breathed out by God. Since God is God Almighty, the Creator of the world (Gen. 1-2; Rom 1:20; Col. 1:16) and upholder of the universe (Col. 1:17b), He has ownership and thus authority over every single creature that has ever existed and will exist, including even us. Since that is the case, Scripture has authority over believers. In fact, since God creates all and owns all, Scripture has authority over all mankind, whether they believe in Him or not.

In the next post, I would continue on to look at the extent of that authority, as subsumed in the extent of the inspiration of Scripture.

[To be continued]

A glance at the Cessationist/ Continualist Issue

Well, it seems that Dan J. Phillips has started a nice 'war' with Adrain Warnock over the Cessationalist/ Continualist debate (whether the sign gifts are for today or not) at the Pyromanaics blog. OK, not exactly. The current debate is still skimming the surface in a sense, as they don't seek to prove or disprove either theory, but only certain aspects of Continualism. Anyway, I think that the 'war' is too good to pass by in silence. Here are links to the blog posts:

Red herring: Tongue of Angels by Dan J. Phillips
Sufficient and Efficient Grace - Spurgeon, Tongues and the Toronto Blessing (Response by Adrain Warnock)

Tongues across the water: response to Adrain:
(part 1)
(part 2)
(part 3)

and part 4 yet to come.

Oh, and just FYI, I am not supporting either theory at the moment. For those who want to know, I am tentatively a partial cessationist, no thanks to the many stupid, ridiculous, unbiblical and sometimes even heretical things Charismatics have been doing since they splintered off from mainline Evangelicalism quite a long time ago.