You are here: Home

Re: Does Higher Criticism Attempt to “Destroy the Bible”?

04/16/2010 23 Comments

This is in response to: Does Higher Criticism Attempt to “Destroy the Bible”? First off, that’s a little presumptuous. Satan has been working on it for 3000 years and the Bible is still the best seller of all time.  Some, like UNC’s own Bart Ehrman, certainly do all they can to undermine it.  We actually do pray for Bart here in NC. Others, like the author of the above, enjoy patronizing sincere believers by presenting ridiculous beliefs that the average Sunday school kid would know better than, as the general consensus of us poor uneducated fundamentalists.  Wow who would have thunk the Bible had authors?

“For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. ” (Hebrews 4:12, ESV)

What is Higher Criticism?

Criticism falls into two categories. First, lower criticism, also called textual criticism, deals with the actual text with a view of determining the original manuscript. The second is higher criticism, dealing with the area of authorship, sources, dates, and historical matters. Both conservative and liberal theologians deal with lower and higher criticism. There is nothing inherently wrong with either. I am very grateful for critical scholars like: Daniel B Wallace ,  Dr. John Sailhamer and Dr. Micheal Heiser of Logos bible software. The presuppositions a person brings to the Bible and their conclusions will determine their theological position.

Despite the claims of both Moses and Jesus Christ concerning the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch, it is widely accepted among liberal higher critics today that the Pentateuch (the first 5 books of the OT) is the product of four or more writers. A German scholar, Julius Wellhausen, concluded that the five books of the Pentateuch could not have been written by Moses because writing did not exist at that time. This foundational assumption has been completely disproven by archeology. Wellhausen also worked  from the assumption that repetition or duplication of similar accounts shows separate sources and that different names for God in the text indicate different authors. Good scholars have refuted these assumptions.

Wellhausen was a product of the 18th century and heavily influenced by Hegelian philosophy. This philosophies edict was “the rational alone is real,” completely denying the possibility of miracles or the supernatural. Hegel’s dialectic approach went hand in hand with Charles Darwin’s evolutionary model set forth in his The Origin of Species. Riding on the coat tails of Darwin, Wellhausen’s view met with almost immediate acceptance. This view is called the Documentary Hypothesis (or Graf-Wellhausen Hypothesis). It theorizes that the Torah is a composite of four documents (JEDP). The order and dates of the documents were established

  • the Yahwist source: written c. 950 BCE in the southern kingdom of Judah.
  • the Elohist source: written c. 850 BCE in the northern kingdom of Israel.
  • the Deuteronomist: written c. 600 BCE in Jerusalem during a period of religious reform.
  • the Priestly source: written c. 500 BCE by Aaronid priests in exile in Babylon.
  • The Redactors: first JE, then JED, and finally JEDP, producing the final form of the Torah c.450 BCE.

(Redact means to put a literary work into appropriate form for publication)

Where Do They Get This Stuff From Anyway?

Basically from thin air. There are no source documents representing these alleged authors, it’s pure speculation. They are basing their argument on their own ability to read a Hebrew document that is 3000 years old, divide it up into vocabulary groups for each source, they slice up the concealed divisions into the different documents literally line by line and then they conjure up the mysterious unknown authors. These guys must be able to astrally project through time, see through walls and read minds! Of course, I’m kidding (just a little).  Seriously, I am not a language scholar but  it looks arbitrary to me.  Dr Heiser doesn’t buy it .  Many scholars don’t buy it either. But you would never get that impression, the elite critics really aren’t tentative about it. To claim to authoritatively extrapolate four different authors by brute force opinion is high theater. At best this is not an exact science and necessarily has a wide margin of error.

I have no problem with the idea that Ezra and scribes redacted writings made by Moses. Deuteronomy records Moses death so obviously Joshua or someone else recorded that incident. Contrary to the Grand Wazoo of higher critics, nobody is actually arguing for the Jewish legend “that an angel dictates to him the books of Moses from the heavenly tablets that have existed for eternity in heaven” and Sunday school kids understand that the bible has different genres. That post is a disingenuous attempt to patronize people that actually believe and take the text at face value. Moses never makes such a claim and conservative scholars do not either.  Still yet, Moses did not attempt to hide the source of his writing, but readily acknowledged that it came from God. “The secret things belong unto the LORD our God; but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law” (Deut. 29:29).

Should Christians Believe It?

See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ. (Colossians 2:8, ESV)

If you accept the authority of Jesus Christ then you really need to look at Mark 10:4-8, where Jesus quoted Gen. 2:24, which would be attributed to J, as “What did Moses command you”. Mark 7:10, Jesus quoted the Ten Commandments, which fall into the E category, as “For Moses said,”. In Mark 10:3, Jesus refers to Deut. 24:1f,  allegedly written by D, as being from Moses. In Matt. 8:4, Jesus quoted Lev. 14, which would be attributed to P, as “Moses commanded.”  In addition, before the higher critic can achieve any credibility in the eyes of a Christian who recognizes the Lordship of Christ, the following verses must be explained.

Matt. 4:4, 7, 10; cf. Luke 4:4, 8, 12. Luke 4:16-27. Matt. 5:17, 18, 21-43. Matt. 6:29. Matt. 8:4; cf. Mark 1:44; Luke 5:14. Matt. 8:11; cf. Luke 13:28. Matt. 9:13. Luke 16:29-31. Matt. 10:15; cf. Mark 6:11. Matt. 11:10; cf. Luke 7:26, 27. Matt. 12:3-8; cf. Mark 2:24-28; Luke 6:3-5. Matt. 12:40-42; cf. Luke 11:29-32. Matt. 13:14, 15. Matt. 15:1-9; cf. Mark 7:8-12. Matt. 16:4. Matt. 17:11; cf. Mark 9:11-13. Matt. 19:3-9; cf. Mark 10:2-12. Matt. 19:18-19; cf. Mark 10:19; Luke 10:26-27; 18:20. Luke 18:31. Matt. 21:13-16; cf. Mark 11:17; Luke 19:46. Matt. 21:42; cf. Mark 12:10, 11; Luke 20:17. Matt. 22:28-33; cf. Mark 12:24-31; Luke 20:37-39, Matt. 22:36-40. Matt. 22:34, 44, 45; cf. Mark 12:35-57; Luke 20:41-44. Matt. 23:1-3, 23, 35; cf. Luke 11:51. Matt. 24:15-16; cf. Mark 13:14. Luke 17:26-31. Matt. 24:24, 31. Mark 14:21, 27. Luke 22:37. Matt. 26:53-56. Mark 14:49. Matt. 27:46; cf. Mark 15:34. Luke 23:46. Luke 24:25-32, 44-47. John 3:14; 5:39, 45-47; 6:32, 45; 7:19-23, 38, 39; 8:39-40, 44, 56-58; 10:33-36; 13:18, 26; 17:12, 17; 19:28.

It’s abundantly clear to me (and I hope it is to you) that Jesus believed and taught that Moses wrote the Torah. Now if you have a problem with believing Jesus Christ, I regrettably submit that you have a much bigger problem than the authorship of the Pentateuch. Please choose wisely.

Sources:

Slick, Matt. Answering the Documentary Hypothesis. http://www.carm.org/answering-documentary-hypothesis (accessed 04 17, 2010).

Towns D.Min, Elmer. Theology for Today. Mason, OH: Cenage Learning, 2008.

Filed Under Apologetics Tagged With Bible, Documentary Hypothesis, Hegelian dialectic, higher critics, Moses, scotteriology, snobs, Wellhausen

Tilting at Windmills: Why We Believe in the Historicity of Jesus

04/10/2010 3 Comments

To my way of thinking, you simply cannot be a Christian without believing in the historicity of Jesus Christ. In fact, the standard is well above historicity but more on that later. Strangely, some liberal mainline churches disagree. The fact that it needs to be addressed is not disputed, albeit a sad circumstance. I suppose their doubt spawns from the murky waters of a post modern culture that views truth as relative and vacuous. Yet to call one’s self a Christian without believing in a real man named Jesus of Nazareth, that walked the shores of Galilee, is like Don Quixote tilting at windmills. It is absurd.

The unanimously accepted historical facts really don’t make any sense without Jesus. The purpose of the BC / AD dating system was to make the birth of Jesus Christ the dividing point of world history.[1] Why would that be the case, apart from a real man making a huge impact?  The early Christian church started in Jerusalem amongst the Jews. If you go to Israel you will discover that the Sabbath is still taken very seriously today. The elevators stop on every floor because pushing the button is considered work. How can you explain the fact that so many pious Jews abandoned the Saturday Sabbath for Sunday worship apart from a belief that Jesus rose on Sunday? How could you possibly account for the rapid rise of the Christian church amongst ferocious Roman and Jewish persecution apart from the fact that a really important man named Jesus of Nazareth actually lived? And how do you explain all the willing martyrs? Why would anyone die or withstand torture for a myth? Considering his impact on history, at the bare minimum don’t you think there must have been a real man named Jesus of Nazareth?

The accounts in the Bible are powerful evidence he existed even if you don’t accept the claims of miracles. For instance, critical scholars widely agree that Paul’s letters were written very close to the time that Jesus lived. Let’s talk about 1 Corinthians which is dated at A.D. 55/56.[2] In that letter Paul uses a preexistent creed that claims over 500 eyewitnesses to the resurrected Jesus and dates back, some scholars date say to within two years of Jesus death.[3] Dr Habermas maintains that “Critics not only admit this data, but were the first ones to recognize the early date.”[4] In addition, there are many secular sources that discuss Jesus as a historical figure. For example, the Roman historian Cornelius Tacitus (ca. AD 55-120) wrote in his work the Annals,

Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, [5]

So you can see that he readily acknowledges the historicity of Jesus and his crucifixion by the Roman procurator Pontius Pilot just like the Gospels maintain. Even the Jewish historian Josephus acknowledges that Jesus lived and had a following.[6] I’m only scratching the surface perhaps take a look at the book The Case for Christ.

Despite the assertions of the neo atheists faith is not belief without evidence. Faith is firmly based on evidence. For instance, a husband has faith in his wife because he knows her track record and character from real space time history. With this faith in tow, when he sees her in a conversation with a strange man he does not feel jealous because of this well founded faith. However, if his wife had a track record of infidelity this faith would be misplaced indeed. If Jesus of Nazareth was not a true historical figure the Christian faith is likewise misplaced.

Christianity is better understood as a relationship than religion, a relationship with a real risen Lord. Christians not only affirm historicity, they maintain that Jesus is God incarnate. Our faith is evidenced by a real historical event, the resurrection. Jesus rose from the dead and authenticated his ministry for all time. No other religion has such a claim. The Apostle Paul affirmed this clearly back in the first century, “And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain.” (1 Co 15:14, ESV) Thus apart from affirming the historicity of Christ and his resurrection, you cannot be called, in any meaningful way, a Christian.

[1] Myers, Allen C. The Eerdmans Bible Dictionary. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1987.p. 58

[2] Strobel, Lee. The Case For Christ. Grand Rapids MH: Zondervan, 1998. p.213.

[3] Ibid. p.30.

[4] Habermas, Gary R. The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ. Joplin,MO: College Press Publishing Company, 1996.p.30.

[5] Ibid. p.188.

[6] Ibid. p.192.

Filed Under Apologetics Tagged With Atheists, Faith, History, Jesus, Lee Strobel, Post Modern, Skeptics

He Has Risen!

04/05/2010 Leave a Comment

Be encouraged believers! The tomb is empty today!

John 20:1-10 ESV

Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” So Peter went out with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb. Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there, and the face cloth, which had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples went back to their homes.

Filed Under Uncategorized Tagged With Easter, Empty tomb, Jesus, Resurrection

Sir Isaac Newton on Prophecy & Discernment

03/26/2010 1 Comment

I was perusing some of Isaac Newton’s writings on prophecy over at the Newton project and it dawned on me how similar his view was to mine. Keeping in mind my last post here, read Newton’s thoughts on the value of end time prophecy:

“If then the Prophesies which concerned the Apostolique age were given for the conversion of the men of that age to the truth & for the establishment of their faith, & if it was their duty to search diligently into those Prophesies: why should we not think that the Prophesies which concern the latter times into which we  are fallen were in like manner intended for our use that in the midst of Apostacies we might be able to discern the truth & be established in the faith thereof, & consequently that it is also our duty to search with all diligence into these Prophesies. And If God was so angry with the Jews for not searching more diligently into the Prophesies which he had given them to know Christ by: why should we think he will excuse us for not searching into the Prophesies which he hath given us to know Antichrist by? For certainly it must be as dangerous & as easy an error for Christians to adhere to Antichrist as it was for the Iews to reject Christ. And therefore it is as much our duty to  indeavour to  be able to know him that we may avoyd him, as it was theirs to know Christ that they might follow him.

Thou seest therefore that this is no idle speculation, no matters of indifferency but a duty of the greatest moment. Wherefore it concerns thee to look about thee narrowly least thou shouldest in so degenerate an age be dangerously seduced & not know it. Antichrist was to seduce the whole Christian world and therefore he may easily seduce thee if thou beest not well prepared to discern him. But if he should not be yet come into the world yet amidst so many religions of which there can be but one true & perhaps none of those that thou art acquainted with it is great odds but thou mayst be deceived & therefore it concerns thee to be very circumspect.” Source: The Newton Project

The point that Newton makes about God holding them accountable for understanding the prophecies is true.  Daniel had written the 70 weeks prophecy specifically enough that the Pharisees should have recognized when Jesus entered Jerusalem on a donkey presenting himself as Messiah. Jesus certainly held them accountable for knowing the prophecies,

“Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.”  (Luke 19:42–44, ESV)

Newton wrote  “Antichrist was to seduce the whole Christian world and therefore he may easily seduce thee if thou beest not well prepared to discern him.” Might Jesus hold you accountable as well?

Filed Under Apologetics Tagged With Antichrist, Apostacy, Daniel, End Times, Newton, Revelation

Why Apologetics?

03/24/2010 6 Comments

I switched career paths from what would have been a  lucrative opportunity in IT to go to seminary.  Now I am passionate about studying theology, apologetics and philosophy. The number one reason is that I truly believe God called me.  I also think I know why I was… well, drafted.

It’s a war and “No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. ” (2 Timothy 2:4, ESV)

I truly believe we are in the very last days prior to the return of Christ. There are many compelling evidences for this; the primary being Israel’s reestablishment as a nation after nearly 2000 years of Diaspora.  The Bible warns us to expect widespread deception and a falling away from orthodoxy. For this reason, apologetics is now more important than ever.

In Matthew 24  Jesus characterizes the time leading up to his return as one of unprecedented deception and emphatically warns “See that no one leads you astray…”

Scripture is chock full of admonitions concerning the deceptive nature of the last days.

“But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. ” (2 Timothy 3:1, ESV)

“knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. ” (2 Peter 3:3, ESV)

“Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, …. ” (2 Thessalonians 2:3 a , ESV)

The word rebellion is rendered from ἀποστασία apostasia;  defection, revolt:—apostasy(1), forsake(1).  (New American Standard Hebrew-Aramaic and Greek Dictionaries :  1998).

So is this occurring?

In the new American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) the percentage of people who call themselves “Christian” has dropped more than 11% in a generation. The report states “the challenge to Christianity … does not come from other religions but from a rejection of all forms of organized religion.” The percentage of Americans that claim no religion at all is 15%, up from 8% in 1990.

Back in 1994, Dr. William Lane Craig wrote concerning the trend toward postmodernism,

If the situation is not to degenerate further, it is imperative that we turn the whole intellectual climate of our culture back to a Christian worldview…our churches are filled with Christians who are idling in intellectual neutral. One result of this is an immature, superficial faith…The results of being in intellectual neutral extend far beyond oneself. If Christian laymen don’t become intellectually engaged, then we are in serious danger of losing our children, (William Lane Craig, Reasonable Faith, 1994).

So here we are in 2010, was Dr Craig’s prediction correct? In a 2007 Barna study, it was observed that Americans ages 16 to 29 were far more skeptical and resistant to Christianity than the same age group ten years before. Only 16% have a positive view of Christianity. Dr Frank Turek says we have a 75% rate of attrition,

What about those who haven’t left the church? The 2008 Pew Forum research indicated “Americans are very open. In terms of various paths to heaven, the majority tell us that there is not just one way to heaven. 70% of Americans including 57% of ‘evangelical Protestants’ believe this, while 68% believe there is more than one true way to interpret the teachings of their religions.”

Another revealing finding by the Pew Forum reflecting the dramatic postmodern turn is that 50% of Americans now say homosexuality should be accepted by society, while only 40% do not (“Massive Study Finds Most Americans Devout, Tolerant,” The Boston Globe, June 23, 2008). The recent decision by the Evangelical Lutheran Church to endorse openly homosexual pastors comes to mind.

In addition, Pew’s 2008 U.S. Religious Landscape Survey of 35,000 Americans also found a astonishing dismissal of orthodoxy: 70% said “many religions can lead to eternal life” and 68% said “there’s more than one true way to interpret the teachings of my religion.”  Unfortunately for the majority Jesus really did not leave that option open to us.

“Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few. ” (Matthew 7:13–14, ESV)

This is spiritual warfare and the hour is late.

Filed Under Apologetics Tagged With Apologetics, Apostasy, deception, End Times, last days, spiritual warfare
« Older Posts
Newer Posts »