When Ought We to Call Men’s Word, God’s Words

Setting aside the fact that autographs are in one respect the words of God and the preaching of the word so long as it accords with God’s revealed words is also in one respect the word of God, in what sense do we say that men’s words are God’s words?

Before there ever was creation God knew and knows a form of the Scripture, or a blueprint if you will as He did with all revelatory particulars [heavenly bodies, plants, animals, and man]. In philosophy we speak of this particular kind of cause as the formal cause. Just as God had/has a blueprint of the makeup of a man or a woman so He had/has a blueprint of the word of God. With man, God determined what spiritual and physical aspects comprise a man. In the same manner, God determined what words of what language and in what order those words appear in comprising the written word of God. To stray from this blueprint, from this formal cause, is not to make some other good thing but to make of that thing something bad.

Take for instance a man who grows his hair out, endures hormone therapy, and has a bout of plastic surgery or two. Is that man still a man? According to many in the current wester ethos, that man is no longer a man, first because of his desires and second because of his chosen appearance. Indeed, we are told that he is a woman now and we are compelled to believe this under pain of ostracization in the USA and prison in Canada. But is this person a woman and by whose definition? If we take the position that a man is a man by God’s definition and according to His blueprint, then a man who tries to be a woman is not a woman but a bad man.

Now the word bad here can have several referents. Among them is a moral component and an aesthetic component. The moral component is that anyone who goes against God’s ordained law whether special or general is in violation of that law and has fallen short of God’s glory [i.e., has sinned]. The man’s soul is in rebellion against God’s ordained order. The aesthetic element is that if a man were to seek to change his sex/gender He can no more do that than a leopard can change his spots. As such, the attempt to make an aesthetic change is an attempt to change his very being. That is, the change attempted is not an attempt at accidental change [i.e., peripherals] but an attempt at substantial change [i.e., his very being] through aesthetics. His attempts have made His maleness less clear, less complete, and less symmetrical. And for these reasons he is a bad man both morally and aesthetically. But what has he really changed?

He has changed his hair, his nails, he now wears makeup, he has surgically altered his body, but he has not changed his soul he has not changed his being and so he has failed to change his being though he would like to but has only changed certain accidental elements. As such he remains a man, but a bad one both morally as well as aesthetically.

So now we come to the words of Scripture. We here at StandardSacredText.com maintain that there is not a single word of Scripture which is peripheral or accidental or a secondary substance or merely aesthetic. Every word is essential because every word is included in God’s blueprint for this particular structure – the structure called written inspired Scripture. And while we do hold that every word is essential to the teaching of Scripture at one point or another, that is not the emphasis I intend to dwell on here. The point I am making is that every word is essential in a substantive way. God is the formal cause of His revealed written word. God determined what words, in what order, and in what language count as the inspired infallible word of God.

Every word is essential because every word is part of the formal structure found in the divine mind, the substantive structure of the thing we call Scripture. And not because we say so but because God made and implemented the blueprint of revealed Scripture with certain verbal constitutive elements. If God calls for 1,721 rivets to build a sea-worthy vessel, then we get 1,721 rivets. If God’s blueprint calls for these words in this order in this language, then who are we to say that any element of God’s blueprint as formal cause is peripheral or doesn’t matter or doesn’t affect doctrine? If God is the formal cause of Scripture and as the formal cause He has called for certain words, in a certain order, in a certain language, then the claim that “Our build is good enough” does affect doctrine – the doctrine that God and not man is the formal cause of Scripture [2 Peter 1:20-21].

So, when modern evangelical text-critic after modern evangelical text-critic expresses doubt in their Greek text they are in effect saying that our build is good enough. In fact, in my experience, most evangelical textual critics will demur to claim that even a single word of Scripture is certainly the word of the original let alone a whole chapter or the Bible itself and still claim their build is good enough. Of course, we have to ask, who appointed man to say, “We admit our build is not according to God’s blueprint, but our build is good enough”?

What is more, our more critically inclined pastors across the fruited plain admit that their Bible is mostly God’s word and then proclaim every Sunday, “Hear the word of God.” They mean, in other words, “There is a high probability that we have God’s words, but we know that we don’t have some of them, and it is in this sense that I mean, word of God.” So, when do we call the words of men, God’s words? When we simultaneously claim that most of our Bible is probably God’s word and some of it probably is not only to turn around and say, “Hear the word of God.”

Are they really sawing the lady in half?

If the 4th century neutral text of Westcott and Hort or the 4th century initial text of Wasserman and Gurry have an unquantifiable link to the autographs, the 16th century Received Text may also be reasonably considered to possesses an unquantifiable link to the autographa through the apographa. Unquantifiable cannot be quantified by historical duration, which is of course relative to your place in history. It is a different duration epochally but of the same kind unquantifiably. If the Lord further delays his coming, in a millennium secular scholars will be calling the Received Text another iteration of the “initial” text. The vast difference is that the foundations of the critical text was rejected by the Church while the Received Text has been the ecclesiastical text since the early 16th century.

Indeed, Wasserman and Gurry’s CBGM and the “initial” text have given the critical text community something to ponder. If these men are correct in their assessment of data and the conclusion that only the initial not the original text of Scripture is scientifically discoverable, then, Westcott, Hort, Tregelles, Warfield, Wikgren, Martini, Black, Aland, Nestles, Metzger, et al., along with all their pliant evangelical and fundamentalist disciples, were fundamentally mistaken and the publishing and academic empire built upon this failed premise is constructed on thin air. With a schism in the critical tradition, which tradition of critical scholarship is now owed allegiance, the old school mainline textual critical search for the originals or the conspicuously truer to the historical critical method presentation of Wasserman and Gurry and the “initial” text?

The controversy then is between the ecclesiastical reception of an unquantifiable text and the two ideas of the critical unquantifiable text. It seems that the expressed purpose of reconstructing the originals was necessary to counter the Orthodox historical, exegetical, and theological argument of providential preservation through the apographa. It is logical to conclude that the façade was maintained because no one would accept the critical text if the critic acknowledged it could not reconstruct the autographs. Furthermore, to solidify the ruse, the textual critical discipline was performed by elite scholars writing in highly specialized and technical terminology. The entire method, however, was nothing more than a highly elaborate magic trick. They did not saw the lady in half, and after 150 years they did not reconstruct the autographa all the while like all magicians giving the impression that the impossible was actually being done. This magic trick has been so convincing that the Evangelical seminaries of America have taught this method as orthodoxy. “Yes,” seminary X tells the student, “they really are sawing the lady in half,” giving the impression that to reject this alternate reality is to be unscholarly.

How then should the evangelical and fundamental institutions of higher learning proceed? Like any change in trajectory, practical adjustments must be made. For example, stock the bookstore with Turretin, Whitaker, Owen, and Muller, and prepare lectures based on their writings. Already having a handle on the critical process, a robust series of apologetic lectures could be produced to show the rise and fall of the historical critical method and the strength of the Christian principium. To round out the return to a philosophical, exegetical, and theological grounding of the Doctrine of Scripture also make the Trinitarian Bible Societies Received Text available in the bookstore and require that the TR be used in language and NT theological courses.

The Church and Christian Academy are on the threshold of great strides for the sake of the Gospel if it will only admit that the critical path has run its course, no longer serves the church and academy as it might have once been thought to do and return to the Protestant orthodox theological bedrock of pre-critical exegesis and theology.

The King James Bible, 1611, and Psalm 12:6-7

The Hebrew translation of “them” in 7a, is interpreted as people following Rabbi Kimshi in the Great, Geneva, and Bishops’ Bibles, not based on a change in the Hebrew grammar or diction but because of the choice of antecedent. For these three versions, the single reading assigned to the pronoun “them” refers to the larger theme of the passage, the oppressed people. The Great Bible because of its temporary paragraph format, lends itself to referring to people. For the Geneva Bible, the marginal note informs the reader of the translator’s selection. The Bishops’ takes an unwarranted course replacing the pronoun with a noun.

Jerome, Ayguan, Luther, Rogers, Medieval Rabbis Kimchi and Abraham Ibn Ezra, and Becke are all aware of the interpretation of “them” within the churchly exegetical tradition as either words or people, with Jerome, Ayguan, Luther, Rogers, and Ibn Ezra arguing that the pronoun in 7a refers to the words.

It appears that without some formatting, marginal note or editorial change to the version, the reader would not be compelled to accept people as the single interpretation of “them” in 12:7a. Indeed, as Muller noted, “the choice of the antecedent is what limits the exegesis, and in fact excludes the broader interpretation of the ‘them’ as a reference to Israel and God’s people.” Which brings us to the rendering of the King James Version. “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.” At preserve them, a marginal note in the King James Version explains, “Hebrew: him, i.e., every one of them.”[1]

While the Geneva Bible includes a marginal note at 7a referring to people, the King James Version does not designate the rendering of the Geneva and rather includes a marginal gloss at v. 7b. While the comment indicates the translators’ knowledge of the tradition, noting a regular practice in the Hebrew to change the number, the text nonetheless reads “them.” Considering the first stanza of 12:7 for the Geneva and King James Version is the same, that the King James translators allowed the immediate antecedent to take precedent without reorienting the reader’s interpretation to another antecedent by a marginal gloss. By so doing, the King James Version translators followed Abraham Ibn Ezra’s rendering of the passage referring to the words. Also, by duplicating the pronoun “them” in this passage, the King James Bible translators provide an unambiguous rendering of the verse limited by the immediate antecedent, words.

Five factors are in play:

  1. Dependency upon the Hebrew text
  2. Limitation of the v. 7 pronouns by the immediate antecedent, words.
  3. Knowledge of the practice in the Hebrew to change the number for the pronouns noted in v. 7b.
  4. Providing an unambiguous, single reading of the verse so that both pronouns have a single antecedent. Note that in word order the two verbs with pronominal suffixes are sequential תִּשְׁמְרֵ֑ם תִּצְּרֶ֓נּוּ contributing to the case for a common antecedent “pure words.”
  5. With v. 7’s reference to preserving the words, or promises, the case can still be made for God’s care for his people. In that these promises are kept forever; it is through the keeping of the promise that the people are preserved.

[1] Holy Bible: 1611 King James Version (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1982). Also see John Calvin, Commentary on the Book of Psalms translated by James Anderson (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1949), 179. Calvin notes a common Hebrew practice of changing the number but referring to the same thing, commenting, “With respect to his changing the number, for, he first says, thou wilt keep them, and, next, Thou wilt preserve him,) it is a thing quite common in Hebrew, and the sense is not thereby rendered ambiguous…But as the Jews, when they speak generally, often change the number, I leave my readers freely to form their own judgment.” Henry Ainsworth, Annotations Upon the Five Books of Moses, the Book of the Psalms, and the Song of Songs, or, Canticles (London: Printed by John Haviland for John Bellamie, 1627) For verse 8 [v. 7 in the English Bible], Ainsworth interprets “preserve him” as, “every one of them: so before in the end of the sixth verse, and often in the scripture, like sudden change of number may be observed.”

Please note, that there is no exegetical or hermeneutical case for “people” being the singular antecedent to “keep them” concluding that Psalm 12:6-7 is a passage of Scripture teaching the providential preservation of “pure words.” To say otherwise is to express a prejudiced, non-exegetical interpretive presupposition. Please also note, that because there is a category called “Providential Preservation,” Matthew 5:18, et al, can now fall under that paradigm.

“Our Lord” In 1 Corinthians 15:47

This is the first of a series dealing with text-critical issues in the Pre-Critical era. The purpose of these posts will be to demonstrate that Pre-Critical Exegetes and Theologians were well aware that there were discrepancies in the apographa [i.e., the copies] but that did not mean they abandoned a standard sacred text. Rather they turned around and used their standard sacred Greek and Hebrew text to combat the standard sacred text of Rome identified as the Latin Vulgate. Furthermore, the Reformers did not do there “text-critical” work via recourse to a wholly or largely naturalistic methodology in an attempt to interpret these discrepancies. Oldest, shortest, and hardest are not by default the best. The Reformers had encountered too much old but faulty medieval theology to conclude that oldest is defacto best in any human category.

As a part of writing these posts, I am going to draw on Roger Omanson’s A Textual Guide to the Greek New Testament. Concerning every variant in the UBS text, Omanson’s book offers a brief reason as to why the editors of the UBS text chose the text they chose and, in some cases, why they did not choose the other available options. To sweeten the deal, I am going to draw on Reformers like Francis Turretin and William Whitaker to show that they engaged the very same textual issues we debate about today were debated about during the Reformation. Our first candidate is 1 Corinthians 15:47 and the words “the Lord.”

In the late 1600’s Turretin writes,

“There is no corruption in the Greek text of 1 Cor. 15:47, but only in the Vulgate. The latter omits the word Kyrios (which here refers to Christ to make it evident that the Lord is Jehovah, not a mere man).”

Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, vol. 1, Second Topic, Q. X, Sec XXI.

In Turretin’s text, Kyrios or the Lord, is present in 1 Corinthians 15:47 and it is the Latin Vulgate that is in error on this point. Why does Turretin believe this is the case? He makes a theological argument centered on clarity for its originality. Turretin writes,

“The antithesis of the first and second Adam becomes much stronger: ‘the first man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is the Lord (kyrios) from heaven.'”

Turretin, Institutes, Second Topic, Q. X, Sec XXI.

For Turretin the presence of Lord is the best reading because it lends clarity to the theological examination of that passage. In this case the longer reading is better because Paul wished to clarify what he meant by this second man. So, in the TR “the Lord” is preserved in the Greek and then in the English, but what of the CT. Do you think that Omanson overserves an agreement here or does the CT diverge from the traditional rendering? Omanson writes 1 Corinthians 15:47,

“The reading in the text best accounts for the original of the other readings, and it has the support of a strong combination of early and good witnesses representing several text-types. The insertion of the article and the noun ὃ κύριος (the Lord) in many witnesses is an obvious addition made in order to explain the nature of ‘the man from heaven.'”

Omanson, A Textual Guide, 351.

Here it seems to Omanson that the addition of ὃ κύριος (the Lord) is an “obvious” addition. And on what account does Omanson make this claim? 1.) Shortest is best – the omission of ὃ κύριος makes the reading shorter. 2.) Oldest is best – The omission has “a strong combination of early and good witnesses.” So, on the one hand, the oldest and shortest reading makes it “obvious” to the editors that the ὃ κύριος should be omitted. While Turretin argues on the other hand that the longer reading is the original reading because it lends clarity to the passage. In sum and in this case, the CT advocate says that shorter is better and the TR advocate says longer is better. The CT advocate makes a largely naturalistic assessment of the reading while the TR advocate makes a largely theological assessment of the reading.

In all, as the Preacher tells us in Ecclesiastes, “That which hath been is now; and that which is to be hath already been” [Ecc. 3:15]. There is no new thing under the sun. And this will not be the only time the Reformers had to answer text-critical questions which are the exact same questions brought up by CT advocates today as if there haven’t been sufficient answers already. Indeed, Reformation era TR advocates did a form of textual criticism, and they did indeed use historical evidence to make their claims, but it is clear that their theological precommitments played a substantial role in their text-critical efforts. Sound familiar? For this reason, we here at StandardSacredText.com have said and will continue to say that the text-criticism of the past and that which is practiced now are not the same species and we will continue to advocate for the obvious and substantial role theological precommitments when doing textual criticism.

Manuscript Witnesses Are Not a Special Species of Historical Witness

It seems we live in a time; indeed, it has been this way my whole academic carrier and for generations before me, that the oldest manuscripts are said to be the best manuscripts but that does not seem to bear itself out theologically. I have been told innumerable times that the oldest is best because these manuscripts are closest to the original. Yet if we take a look at the theology closest to the original theology of the apostles in time, we see that there is a bit of trouble brewing, indeed, considerable dispute.

Before the end of the first century Paul warns that there are those which may preach another Gospel other than the one preached by Paul [Galatians 1:8]. We see that during Paul’s time there are some preaching out of contention and adding to Paul’s bonds [Philippians 1:15]. The apostle John observes that some would not receive him, particularly Diotrephes [3 John 9]. Then in the end of Revelation John warns not to take away from or add to Revelation and by extension, the whole canon [Revelation 22:18-19]. I say all of this to say that before the end of the first century church there is significant and sufficient divergence from the Apostolic Message that the apostles themselves are issuing numerous warnings to combat that real divergence.

Then there are the host of early church heresies. Let me name a few: Adoptionism [c. 190 AD – taught the Father adopted the Son], Apollinarianism [ 4th century AD – taught Jesus had a human body and divine mind], Arabici [3rd century AD – taught the soul died with the body], Arianism [2nd-3rd century AD – taught Jesus was created], Collyridianism [4th century AD – taught that the Trinity was composed of the Father, Spirit and Mary], Docetism [2nd century AD – taught that Jesus did not really have a body], and Monophysitism [482 AD – taught that Jesus’ divinity overrode His humanity].

Note that Sinaiticus and Vaticanus are considered a 4th century manuscript. So, while the Church is arguing over the nature of the soul, the nature of Jesus’ hypostatic union and the nature of the Trinity we also get written manuscripts during these same times of uncertainty. But these two species of witnesses (i.e., theological and manuscript) do not get the same treatment. We do not embrace the theological machinations of Arianism within orthodox evangelical circles even though those machinations are old in the history of theology. But we do embrace old manuscripts simply because they are old.

It is clear that the further back you go into the early church the more varied are the opinions of the early church going all the way back to the time of the apostles. Then through years of discussion, debate, and things more severe the Church endured a winnowing effect with regard to her theology. The result of which was that the Church by the leading of the Holy Spirit through the word of God by faith rejected Arianism, Nestorianism, Sabellianism and the like. Thus, the further along the theological timeline we go the more uniform the beliefs of the Church become. Why? It takes time for revelation to sanctify the people of God no matter if they are scholars or illiterate laity.

Interestingly enough this is the same argument we here at StandardSacredText.com make about the textual issue. It is a fact that the earliest manuscripts in the extant tradition vary far more among themselves than the later manuscripts among themselves, just like the theology of the Ancient Church compared to following generations of the Church. It is a fact that through the progression of time the later manuscripts are far more uniform, just like the theological progression of the Church from the Ancient to the Reformation for instance. As such there is a winnowing effect which the textual tradition has undergone just like the winnowing effect which the theological tradition has undergone. That winnowing effect in the manuscript tradition has over time excluded the Gospel of Thomas from the Bible and included the long ending in Mark and the account of the woman caught in adultery just like the winnowing effect of the theological tradition has excluded Arianism and included that Jesus is the same substance as the Father or that the persons of the Trinity are three subsistences of one essence.

Using the winnowing effect of theology as a lens it is preposterous to think that simply because Patripassianism [i.e., the belief that the Father died on the cross] is an old theological system it therefore by default receives greater weight in the formulation of theological systems going forward. Yet this is the exact argument made by the CT/MVO position. The older the manuscript the greater the weight it receives among other manuscripts in the manuscript tradition going forward.

What is more, and this is a common plague among my CT/MVO brothers, they have little patience for questioning the divinity of Christ or the nature of the Trinity like those of the Ancient Church did, but they have nearly infinite patience to doubt the Scriptures on this or that point. So, they will doubt the source of their theology, but they will not allow you do doubt their theology. Put another way they will allow you to doubt the nature of the rule [Scripture], but they will not allow you to doubt the nature of that which is ruled [theology].

Finally, it is widely held that each manuscript in addition to being a record of this or that NT text it is also a witness to the time in which it was written and specifically a witness to the beliefs of the Church at that time. In this sense the manuscript is the same kind of witness as a theological treatise. They are both written and tell the story of the beliefs of the Chruch at that epoch in time. So just as age of a theological witness is not a prime factor in its truth so too the age of a manuscript is not a prime factor in determining its reliability.

Rather, in both cases the prime factors are the leading of the Holy Spirit through His words, the word of God, to His people by faith. This is how we sorted out theological differences over time and this is how we have ultimately sorted out manuscript differences over time. Certainly, there were brilliant, studied academicians making theological arguments in defense of orthodoxy as there are brilliant, studied academicians making arguments in defense of this or that reading. Still, it is not the Clements or Augustines that settled orthodox theology nor is it the Wallaces, Gurrys, and Wassermans that settle what is the NT. Both in theology and in manuscripts it is the Spirit of God through the word of God to the people of God which settles what is orthodox theology and what is the NT.

It’s about time we jumped off the oldest-reading-is-the-best train.

The unquantifiability of the historic canonical collating process, part 3

This is the third and last installment of the “The unquantifiability of the historic canonical collating process” series. This post argues for the traditional Protestant orthodox understanding of Matthew 5:18 based on Isaiah 59:21 and scientific support for the traditional orthodox rendering.

OPTION 2:

Supposition: The last received iteration of Matt. 5:18 is accepted as being historically defensible based upon the self-authentication of the inspired words, the leading of the Holy Spirit, and the submission of the Church to the prior and last iteration of the unquantifiable collated canon.

Answer 1: Like all the preceding iterations it is defensible as the collation of inspired canonical words up to that point in history. For example, Aleph and B, Westcott and Hort’s so-called “neutral texts” were prior iterations of texts containing inspired canonical words as far as the collation of canonical words existed to that point in history (4th c.) but failed to be the last canonical iteration as received by the Church.

Answer 2: As stated before, prior iterations confirm the canonical product of the historically unquantifiable collating process of Matthew 5:18. Aleph and B are near or at the beginning of the “initial” text premise because, except for papyrus fragments, there is a three-century textual void between the autographa and Aleph and B again demonstrating the unquantifiability of the historic canonical collating process of inspired words. The transmission of inspired words to the 3rd century is scientifically unquantifiable. See Wasserman and Gurry, A New Approach, 12: “From this definition its follows that the initial text may refer to the author’s text or to something later.”

Answer 3: Textual criticism therefore argues indirectly, but positively for the truth content of Matthew 5:18 finding value in prior iterations, like Aleph and B, of the canonical collating process by appealing to an unquantifiable historical canonical collating process. In the historical critical method’s failure and subsequent nuanced CBGM methodology, the scientific method confirms both negatively and positively the unquantifiability of the truth content of Matthew 5:18.

Answer 4: To reject the inspired canonical product proven to be such by the historically unquantifiable process is to deny the eschatological trajectory of Matthew 5:18 of the historically unquantifiable process of collating the totality of the inspired canonical words. This collation process, in that its end point is only inspired words, has a winnowing effect upon the historically unquantifiable canonical process. Only certain words in a text belong in the inspired canon, those determined by the historically unquantifiable process. To reject the last iteration of the inspired canonical product and revert to an iteration of the historically unquantifiable process would be to deny the very purpose of the canonical collating process, the hypothetical trajectory of the historical critical method.

Answer 5: Therefore, until such a time that the unquantifiable canonical collating process again begins, which is uncertain being unquantifiable, the last received iteration stands as Canon, the historical demonstration of Matthew 5:18, the Greek Received Text and traditional Masoretic Hebrew. There is the revival of prior iterations of the canon, but there is only one Canon of Scripture.

Summary: Matthew 5:18, therefore, has been, and continues to be, historically accurate. Not one jot or tittle has passed from the law,” and speaking of the “law” synecdochically, it applies to the entire Canon. Moreover, it is impossible to say that Matthew 5:18 is false in that the Church possesses the last, received iteration of the Greek and Hebrew text in the Received Text and traditional Masoretic texts through an unquantified historical canonical collation process of inspired words. The last, received iteration is no more indefensible than any of the preceding iterations as far as the collation of the canon existed to that point in history, e.g., Aleph and B or the “initial text.” The notion of the passage being indefensible is contrary to the historic canonical development of each preceding iteration’s testimony to the truth of Matthew 5:18. Indeed, the textual critical return to prior iterations of the unqualified canonical collating process demonstrates significant support for the last iteration of the canonical collating process, the Canon, the Received Text, and Traditional Masoretic Hebrew, the original language apographa underlying the English Standard Sacred Text, the King James Version. Just read any new version; they sound like a prior, stilted, incomplete iteration of King James Bible.  Blessings!

The unquantifiability of the historic canonical collating process, part 2

In part one of this series, we argued that the historical critical method’s failure after 150 years of scientific discovery to identify the canon is sufficient grounds to say that the historic collation of canonical words is unquantifiable which agrees with Protestant orthodoxy, but of course for obviously different reasons. Consider this agreement the coming together of General and Special revelation – what takes a lifetime of General revelation to uncover God’s will, Special revelation states in a moment of reading. General revelation has shown critical scholars the unquantifiability of historical canonical collating process of inspired words after 150 years of failure. For the saint, and for the Church throughout history, we trusted the words of Christ in Matt. 5:18 and came to the same conclusion by faith. In part two we explore this commonality, while exposing further the futility of the historical critical method and popular denials of the truth of Matthew 5:18. The Church should be thankful that God did not reveal the “how” of his providential plan to preserve his word in history but only that he did. Truly, John’s note that “even the world could not contain the books that should be written” about Christ is nowhere truer than considering the magnitude of the unquantified mechanism of verbal preservation. This divine work of inestimable component parts accents the absurdity of the textual critical method to quantify the work of God as if the critic could capture the “how” of God’s infinite wisdom and oversight to keep his inspired word pure. Albeit, even if thousands of volumes were written describing to the smallest detail how preservation unfolded in history, the fallen mind would have thousands of volumes to reject as spurious. God gave us what we needed in one small library of books called the inspired canon and asks us to accept the “how” by faith.

Picking up, then where we left off,

  1. Repeat point 2 in part 1 an unspecified number of times an unquantified number of times since the autographa was penned.
  • The inspired product of this unquantifiable historic process comes to be received by the Church as its last iteration, which brings us to accepting or rejecting the last iteration. The idea of “last” is unknowable because the process is unquantifiable. “Last” is therefore what is “received” by the Church as canonical in and by Scripture through the leading of the Holy Spirit. Additionally, “last iteration” should not be understood as exclusive or unique in respect to its place in the process. Matt. 5:18 has always been historically accurate within the scope of the unquantifiable, historical collating process of inspired words, either for the part or the whole. The last iteration is a synecdochic iteration – the canonical whole standing for the multiple canonical historic iterations; the prior iterations were also synecdochic – the canonical part standing for the canonical whole, the last inspired, canon.

OPTION 1:

Supposition: The received, last iteration of Matt. 5:18 is rejected as being historically indefensible.

Answer 1:This is the position of the modern critic who fecklessly argues that the historic collating process of the inspired word of God is quantifiable according to some preconceived and arbitrary system therefore finding the Canon to be merely phenomenal as scientifically qualified. But as we have seen, the historic collating process of inspired words is not quantifiable for phenomenal and noumenal reasons. Phenomenally, all external criteria for canonicity fail — apostolicity, antiquity, public reading, doctrinal, ecclesiastical authority, and the historical critical method. Likewise, noumenally, the wisdom of God’s providence is seen only after the fact. Providence cannot be classified, categorized, or easily referenced being beyond the mind of man to comprehend until after its manifestation. Therefore, the prolonged failure of the critical, closed, and empirical method to make the argument for or recreate a scientifically quantified canon lends its support to the unquantifiable truth content of Matthew 5:18. Not only is Matthew 5:18 defensible, the historical critical method’s failure to provide scientific criteria or a standard over the past 150 years serves to confirm the unquantifiable truth claims of Matthew 5:18. Science’s failure has demonstrated that historic canonical collation is unquantifiable. This statement is not theological or dogmatic. Science cannot get the scholar back to the autographs, nor can science explain how the autographs transitioned through history. The answers to these queries are unquantifiable. Furthermore, because the scientific method confirms the object predicated by the subject, the only canon that could be located would be anthropological. The scientific method does not allow the object to transcend the subject.

Answer 2: To reject the last iteration, an error in the historically unquantifiable process must be scientifically demonstrated. With the failure of textual criticism’s qualified methodology to locate the canon comes the end of a scientific platform real or proposed to reject the last iteration of the historically unqualified process of canonical collation and therefore there are no longer any scientific grounds or criteria for showing an error in the historically unquantified process of canonical collating the inspired words. After 150 years of failed attempts to recover the autographa using quantified methods, the unquantifiable aspect of the canon’s formulation can no longer justly be in question in the mind of the serious scholar, because the scientific methodology, after a long search, has itself concluded that discovering the how of canonical formation is unquantifiable. All criticism of the last iteration is therefore ad hominem.

Answer 3: Appeal to prior iterations that differ from the last received iteration is not a negative witness against the last received iteration to the degree that the prior iteration’s inspired words are canonical or consistent with the historic unquantifiable collation of canonical words. Indeed, to varying degrees, all iterations support the collation of inspired canonical words up to a certain historical point. Corrupted 1st century manuscripts to appear apostolic undoubtedly mimicked inspired documents containing or removing the same inspired words and thus Paul’s warning in 2 Thess. 2:2. Such corrupted manuscripts may have had inspired words and sentences that served a moral or perhaps even an evangelistic purpose but were rejected as documents as corrupt and non-canonical pseudepigrapha.

Answer 4: To remove the long ending of Mark or the Pericope de adultera is recognized now as scientific fraud, lingering systemic remnants of the false assumption that science could quantify the canon. These exclusions falsely suggest that the editors, based on their qualified system, were constructing a canonical exemplar they had never seen. This illustration is precisely why a qualified critical system for canonical reconstruction fails, and in the gravity of its failure lends its support to the unquantifiable historical collation of inspired words called providential preservation. The choices now are either providential preservation or nothing. This quantified, closed system assumed a prior iteration of the last received iteration is the canon, when by the critics’ own admission, their findings were tentative, uncertain, and thus evolving, three signs of the system’s failure and incapacity of creating a “new” canon out of a possible prior canonical itration. At best, manuscripts absent these two passages were prior iterations of the canon, as were all Scriptural corruptions, of the unquantifiable collating process not received as canonical by the Church.

Answer 5: In effect, modern textual criticism is trapped in a closed scientific system of the critics own making, infinitely bouncing between prior possible iterations which are a mixture of inspired canonical words and false readings whether by modification, addition, but primarily subtraction. This process would continue ad infinitum because the system does not allow for any determinative authority external to the system to determine its worth, authority, or produce a last iteration. It seems that if not for avarice and superbia the intellectual fatigue of digging a hole only to fill it back up again repeated for decades should have pointed the scholar to a more constructive academic exercise some time ago.

Answer 6: Modern versions reflect the bouncing between possible prior iterations and are also a mixture of inspired canonical words and false readings whether by addition or subtraction. Following the critical text, modern versions serve a utilitarian purpose, as do lectionaries and gospel pamphlets, but fail to meet the standard of a vernacular, authoritative canon. The mixture of inspired words and non-inspired words, or the absence of inspired words, in conjunction with the failed persisting notion that the historic collation of the canon is quantifiable are the principal points of contention between pre-critical and post-critical Bibliology.

Summary: Therefore, by the failed limits of its own closed, empirical, quantifiable constraints, no scientific method or criteria exists to reject the unquantifiable historic collation of inspired, canonical words guaranteed by Matthew 5:18. In the simplest terms, “No one can argue scientifically that the Received Text and traditional Masoretic Hebrew text are not the Christian canon because no one has ever seen the autographa to say otherwise.” Indeed, the prolonged inability and ultimate failure of the historical critical method to locate or reconstruct the autographa scientifically reinforces the Protestant orthodox apologetic, which has been argued for at length at Standard Sacred Text, for the unquantifiability of the truth content of Matthew 5:18 based on the promise of Jesus Christ. To be continued. Blessings!

Why Won’t the Standard Sacred Text Argument Go Away?

The Plot to Kill God is an excellent accounting of the Soviet Union’s attempt to stamp out belief in God. Through a concerted effort and brutal tactics, Russian Communism did its best to intimidate, imprison, and kill all those that believed in God and specifically the religious leaders making such a profession. Yet, in the end, the data show that total Russian efforts amounted to a religious state equal to that of the USA. In short, the plot to kill God in the hearts and minds of people failed. The takeaway is that there are some beliefs which are part and parcel of what it is to be human. Humans are religious. The universe is too big and too beautiful, and humanity is essentially religious. They must believe in God. it is in their nature and on this point, man’s nature will not be undone.

In like manner I would like to submit to you that belief in a standard sacred text is essential to Christian belief. It cannot be beaten out of him. Indeed, it may be lulled out of him and only when he is distracted. Consider the following. While we would not agree on the decision of the particular text it is clear that the church broadly construed has held to a standard sacred text across the board.

The Roman Catholics regarded the Latin Vulgate as their standard sacred text as late as the mid-1500’s. As noted in this post, Richard Muller observes that the TR was indeed the Greek to which the Reformers appealed when arguing with Rome about their Vulgate. The KJV has remained the standard sacred text for a large portion of the English-speaking church for over 400 years. Then comes the Post-Modern era in which we get the inimitable [Anglican] Dean Burgon’s Traditional Text position which calls for a standard sacred text in the TR and KJV. Then [Presbyterian] Edward F. Hills’ Argument for the same. Then [Lutheran] Theodore Letis’ arguments for the Ecclesiastical Text which again argues for a standard sacred text. Now we have the Confessional Text position as propounded by Jeff Riddle [Reformed Baptist] and our work here at StandardSacredText.com [Baptist/Reformed Baptist].

But just as the Reformer’s opponents, the Roman Catholic apologists, claimed a standard sacred text in the Latin Vulgate so also our opponents in the current era make the same claims. Thus, we get from the CT/MVO camp the English Standard Version, the Christian Standard Version, the New American Standard Version, the Legacy Standard Version, the American Standard Version, the Revised Standard Version, the New Revised Standard Version, and the International Standard Version.

In sum, the standard sacred text argument is not a Van Kleeck argument or a KJVO argument. Everyone desires a standard sacred text, and many claim their text is standard and sacred. The Catholics have claimed it. The Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmaticians claimed it. Post-Enlightenment conservative Anglicans, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Reformed Baptists, and Baptists claimed it. We here at StandardSacredText.com claim it. Even those who oppose our position claim it with their Christian Standard Bible and English Standard Bible. All of these positions claim a text that is sacred and standard. Why?

Because belief in a standard sacred text is part and parcel with being Christian. As such the Standard Sacred Text position will no sooner die for the Christian than belief in the existence of God will for fallen man. Christians can help but believe in a standard sacred text. It is in their nature and on this point, the Christian’s nature will not be undone.

The unquantifiability of the historic canonical collating process, part 1

Why are variations within the manuscript tradition raised as a prima facia defeater to Matt. 5:18? Acknowledging that no two manuscripts are identical is enough for almost everyone to say, “Turn off the lights on your way out.” How then, does the historical record confirm the truth of Matt. 5:18 for the Canon of Scripture?

  1. The process by which the words of the Canon were collated cannot be classified, categorized, or easily referenced because all external criteria for canonicity fails. Also, because the result of divine providence is only recognized after the fact. The product, or Canon, does not divulge how the words were identified as canonical other than that they were immediately inspired and show the evidence of that inspiration as surely as does the presence of light. The question of the truth of Matt. 5:18 then deals with the inspired character of a product brought about by a historically unquantifiable process. Unquantifiable means unspecifiable or unidentifiable. That is, the historical collating process of the canon is not bound to a system based on a text type, a neutral text, an older, shorter, harder to read text, a text from which another text would derive its origin, is not part of a genealogical system by any name, is not part of any system. This assessment is not theological, dogmatic or of a religious nature. It is undeniable, that after 150 years of failed attempts to recover the words of the canon, the unquantifiable aspect of the canon’s formulation is no longer in question and should be accepted as settled science. Work continues in the CBGM project, but its trajectory is not canonical, more like verbal archeology. To deny unquantifiability of the historic canonical collating process it therefore should be considered unscientific. Though all external scientific criteria have failed, vestiges of the failed system persist now only by slowing scholarly momentum. In another generation, I suspect, the entire historical critical enterprise will be a forgotten novelty. It is difficult but not insurmountable for the critic to admit that their life’s work had little enduring worth, or that the disciples of these men to admit they were misled.
  2. Returning then to the argument of mainstream Protestant Orthodoxy, after the Enlightenment’s incursion into the Christian principium, the historical canonical collating process is bound only to the text’s nature as the word of God, and to the capacity of the Church to identify that inspired text through the leading of the Holy Spirit. The capacity to identify inspired words throughout the course of history is unquantifiable. Science, also observed and validates the unquantifiability of the process. Though the text is a literary phenomenon, the identification of the inspired text transpires through the dynamic relationship between the Spirit, Word, and Covenant keeper whereby the written revelation of God and God the Spirit moves the Church to accept the inspired word.
  3. The inspired product of this process, because the process is historically unquantifiable, existed in history as canonical iterations, the historical process not yet complete. To say that Matt. 5:18 fails because the unquantifiable historic process had not yet concluded the final canon is historically premature, not accounting for the historical limitations of the collation of canonical words. After Christ uttered the words recorded in Matt. 5:18 the unquantifiable canonical collating process was eschatologically secure and assured. When Matt. 5:18 was uttered by the Lord, those that only possessed part of the whole of the canon, not knowing the final scope of the canon, nevertheless knew that the canon as God designed it would be infallible. The book of Matthew was synecdochically as a part of the whole to speak canonically for the whole of the canon. And because Acts 5:18 is true, and the source of all truth as God’s Word, this assessment is also scientifically consistent. Both the promise of God and science concur that the historical canonical collating process of inspired words is phenomenally unquantifiable. Each word or each Book of Scripture, designated an “iteration” was the word of God, it was canonical, it was self-authenticating, evidencing its inspiration but only as far as the collation of the canon existed to that point in history. To be continued. Blessings!