D Bible as a source of wisdom and authority

Biblical canon

The official, standardised list of scripture established by the Early Church

Issues of accepting NTest and OTest

-Biblical canon may not be regarded as a source of authority and wisdom because:

So much time has passed

The differences in languages mean mistranslations are inevitable

Inconsistencies in forms of text suggests different purposes (parables, poems)

Different authors have different aims

Creation of Hebrew + Christian Bible and its effect on its status as a wise

-Creation of Jewish cannon began in 6th BC post Roman destruction of Jewish temple

>Jewish cannon was constantly evolving showing a conscious effort for accuracy OR undermining its importance

-30 AD Christianity started being established

-Both were being created at the same time and thus the Christian Bible havent transplanted the Jewish bible exactly, they’ve selected specific texts for their purposes

-Jews wouldn’t call the Hebrew bible old because

>theres nothing new

>the word of God cannot be irrelevant

-The fact that the Christian Bible differs from the Hebrew it makes its position as a source of authority less clear

Jewish Canon

-Did the book survive

-Does it support the Torah

-Does it support the faith and practice of a range of Jews

-Have added things to create a consistent story

Hebrew Bible is comprised of

Three parts: law prophets and diverse set of writings (poetry)

Apocrypha

-Biblical writings not accepted as cannon

-Catholics call books that they use and others don’t deutero cannonical (Luther called them apocryphal to indicate that they aren’t equal to holy scriptures + placed them in a different area of his Bible to indicate this)

-The different beliefs about the validity of the stories added into the vulgate led to division between Catholic and Protestant canon

Eg Maccabees ‘therefore a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead’

>its teachings on purgatory contradicted Prot views and were later excluded

Why were the gospels written down when they were

-70-100CE

>eye witnesses beginning to die out, the oral tradition cannot be relied upon n

Peter’s view on the Pauline epistles

-referred to as ‘scripture’

>very quickly viewed as equally important to the Hebrew Scriptures

Diatesseron

-Syrian churches used a harmony of all four gospels

Muratorian fragment

-dates from 7th century, suggests there is a translation of the Greek from 170CE

>shows early considerations of canon

>contains 22/27 books in our NT

New Tetsament

-Originally transferred orally Before being written down

2 CE

Moratorian canon

-oldest known list of books of the NTest

-Contained 22/27

-This shows selective the early church was

Criteria for canonising EC

-When adding to the New Testament, the early Church wanted texts to support the central beliefs: Jesus, his death, and resurrection. They also needed to have a reliable source and support faith & practice.

1. Connection to the Apostles

2. Connection with the Churches, supporting faith and practices in a diverse range of places.

3. Not contradicting any key Christian beliefs such as the Jesus’ incarnation, death and resurrection.

Marcion’s Bible

-Developed alongside the Bible

>removed Jewish elements (only the gospel of Luke was left, without the birth narratives)

>believed the god of JC was completely different and superior to the Hebrew

>rejected as the early church fathers valued the OTest for context

-Asserts its authority by showing the thought put in

New Testament order

-Life death res

-Birth of church

-Paul to churches

-Paul to individuals

-Letters not Paul

-Revelations (apocalyptic lit)

-sometimes ordered by author, genre, importance or impact

BUT

-Was the order inspired by God?

>is it just an accident of history? Humans decided the order

>OT originally written on scrolls but ordered into 3- JC seems to support this “all things must be fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms concerning me”

>was the HS involved? Is God’s spirit equally involved

Why is the Hebrew bible ordered differently to the OT

in Hebrew Bible it’s ordered by importance (begin with Torah focused on God’s covenant and laws of Moses), OT follows order from Septuagint which is different,

OT ends with references to the messiah as opposed to looking back to the temple as in Hebrew bible

What books were doubted by EC fathers

-hebrews and revelation

>not clear whether they had apostolic authorship

>controversal (prized by some groups viewed as heretical)

>other books eg Didache + shepherd of hermas + gnostic gospels were rejected

What does it mean for the Bible to be inspired

-Bible as inspiration means

-Something can inspire us to feel a certain way, make us act in a certain way or do something differently.

-Christians believe that the Bible is inspired because when they read it, they often want to think and act differently.

>eg Love thy neighbour

-Is the Bible a result of human inspiration?

>’inspire’ in Greek suggests ‘to breathe on or in’- would suggest not a subjective view inspired by JC actions but an objective product of the HS

>’God breathed’

>what was the human role? Is the Bible part divine? Can it contain errors?

How do Christians respond to the questions:

1. The authors of the Bible were just transcribing what was told to them.

>eg God speaks directly through Moses Hebrews 1:1 “In the past, God spoke to our people through the prophets.”

Augustine: there are no contradictions in the Bible. Believing otherwise would have "disastrous consequences"

Athenagorus: "as a flautist might blow into a flute”

>Irenaeus: the scriptures are "perfect" because they were "spoken by the Word of God and his Spirit"

>Early church fathers were literalists

>God speaking through prophets

-Influence of Aristotle: efficient (initiates event) and instrumental (used by efficient to bring about event) causes

>Analogy: marble sculpture- the efficient cause is the sculptor, the instrumental cause is the chisel that they use.

>These images of inspiration emphasise the objective side of this process though the instruments may have had some impacts (eg why writers sound different)

-Aquinas the instrument does have a part in influencing and shaping the revelation.

>The Bible is the result of divine guidance, God uses humans as the tool.

>Understanding the word author- there was a different understanding of what author or dictation was- in Latin 'auctor' can be applied to things like bridges/buildings- it can mean producer.

BUT

Most theologians recognise there is a human side to inspiration as the books have their own character/feel based on the author.

-The Enlightenement period involved greater analysis of scientific, historical, and literary methods

>became difficult to ignore the influences of humans in scripture

2. Literalism- all or nothing approach

   >can't have only some parts being true. Rejection of Enlightenment discoveries E.g. Creationists will deny evolution as it goes against Genesis.

   >ken ham

   BUT difficult to deny science

3. Plenary verb inspiration: 'every word inspired'. Accepts evidence of human influence but holds all the words are inspired and from God- at the same time the gospel writers did have some influence.

   This view becomes more attractive with evidence of science as it is difficult to deny science.

   Craig: "everything that the Bible affirms to be true is true". But the Bible presents things as symbolic/metaphorical and so not literally true. This means that they can support science as well.

BUT

-Insists there is a confluence (both God and man have a role) which seems to be a paradox, Newman claims it is just a mystery

-Erhman claims that it is impossible to reconcile differences in birth/res narratives

BUT Geisler claims when two appear to contradict it doesnt mean there is an error, we dont understand how to harmonise them

Should have faith in God’s omnipotence

2. Liberal

   The other extreme is that the Bible isn't inspired, it was the human authors inspired and influenced by Jesus and the Church- i.e. God did not act in a certain way to write the Bible, rather acted in human history.

   >This view means the Bible is inspired because it was written by inspired people.

   >Hick should view the Bible as a record of how ancient humans interpreted events like JC’s life- they wrote down stories with a symbolic meaning (eg res=God’s gift of renewal, doesnt believe its historical, views JC as a guru)

   BUT Crisis of authority + opens it up for interpretation as it cant provide stable theology (Augustine terrible consequences)

   BUT Just because it leads to chaos that doesnt make it false, maybe God wanted it to be individual (maybe he wanted FLUIDITY>DALY) what God wants isn’t the same as what the church wants

Barth

-emphasis on faith alone

-believed only JC was the word of god

>the preaching of Kerygma is an opportunity to meet the person of JC in the word which inspires faith

>the Bible is not the word, it can only communicate the truth of JC when interacted with through faith

>Bible connects the mind of the believer to the word of God

>inspiration is not a quality of the text but a reaction to ti

Ken Ham

Literalism- he proposed the all or nothing approach- can't have only some parts being true. Rejection of Enlightenment discoveries E.g. Creationists will deny evolution as it goes against Genesis.

BUT difficult to deny science

>makes plenary verb inspiration more attractive

>Erhman we do not have the original manuscripts but copies of copies which all differ, some parts were clearly added later, questions of Paul’s authenticity

Ehrman: "not have the originals, we don't have the first copies of the originals... what we have are copies made later- much later. In most instances, they are copies made many centuries later. And these copies all differ from one another, in many thousands of places"

Modern views on objective inspiration

Plenary verb inspiration: 'every word inspired'. Accepts evidence of human influence but holds all the words are inspired and from God- at the same time the gospel writers did have some influence.

This view becomes more attractive with evidence of science as it is difficult to deny science.

Craig: "everything that the Bible affirms to be true is true". But the Bible presents things as symbolic/metaphorical and so not literally true. This means that they can support science as well.

Kerygma Greek word NTest for preaching or proclamation

>refers to the core of early church’s oral tradition about Jesus

-Involves the announcement or preaching of doctrines/teachings about and from Jesus

-Dodd distinguishes Kerygma from didache - initial proclomation used to introduce people to fath (Kerygma) v teachings/doctrine which was decided on and fixed later (didache)

>Dodd Christianity presnts itself as a religion linked to history- BUT reasons to doubt credibility

>aimed to discover the content of the oral tradition/Kerygma so we would have more historical evid for JC

-Dodd claims: “the Gospel is not a statement of the general truths of religion, but an interpretation of that which once happened”

>Gospel didnt contain pure facts because they were influenced by early church kerygma as opposed to doctrine

>must discover what the preaching involved- aimed to analyse the Bible and try to figure out what ideas were involved in the very first presentation/proclamation of Christianity by those like the Apostles who first spread the faith.

>could count as evid for historical Jesus- he thinks is nec to believe in Christianity as a realised eschatology

>Kerygma is not historical fact, nor is it teaching, though it can include both- it contains ethical claims that give the reader a decision about whether to engage in its call to moral improvement

>claimed that Peter’s speeches in the Book of Acts and Paul’s letters both contained six key elements, which adds to their historical credibility as being genuine representations of kerygmata

BUT how valid is the preaching of Early Church during the oral period before being written

>did the church rep him as intended or distort his message

REALISED ESCHATOLOGY

Dodd Christianity presents utself as a historical religion

-Viewed life of Jesus as ‘realised eschatology’

>meaning that “This world has become the scene of a divine drama, in which the eternal issues are laid bare. It is the hour of decision”.

>Christianity is based on certain events in history which it claims were revelations from God.

>THUS historical research is essential to understanding Christianity

-Some argue Christianity has been influenced by other religions

-The analytic methods of form critics attempted to unveil the original sources that the authors of the gospels drew on.

BUT many theologians deny Christianity as anchored in religion

>revelation could thus only be discovered by faith in the Bible not by reason

>Barth available historical evidence wasn’t sufficient to inform Christian life and that we should rely on faith instead.

>Bultmann insisted that there just wasn’t enough historical evidence to create a historical profile of Jesus.

BUT Dodd if Christianity is to be understood as realised eschatology, Christianity must be combined with history

>unify faith in rev as duscovered in the Bible with reason applied to historical evid

>must be done by understanding the original preaching (kerygma)

>took place closer to JC, more historically credible

>have enough historical evidence (he claims) for a deep understanding of the key aspects of Jesus’ life and teachings because we can rely on the primitive kerygma of the early Christian communities.

DODD’S EVIDENCE FOR HISTORICAL RELIABILITY

-Dodd claimed that Peter’s speeches in the Book of Acts and Paul’s letters both contained six key elements, which adds to their historical credibility as being genuine representations of kerygmata

1. The prophesised age of fulfilment, the ‘latter days’ have arrived.

2. This age has dawned due to the birth, life, ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

3. By being resurrected, Jesus was exalted to the right hand of God as the Messiah of the new Israel.

4. The presence of the Holy Spirit in the church is a sign of Christ’s exalted power and glory.

5. The Messianic Age will be completed by the return of Christ.

6. Those who repent will be offered forgiveness, the Holy Spirit, and salvation.

>very similar to Mark 1:14-15, where Jesus came to ‘proclaim’ the gospel, saying “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel”.

>The early Christians thought the eschaton (final stage of a divine plan) had occurred; the Messiah had come the second coming would happen very soon.

>When the second coming didn’t happen, readjustment of that expectation was the motivating factor behind the development of early Christian theological thought.

CHALLENGES TO THE HISTORICAL RELIABILITY OF ACTS

-Some argue that Acts is more like a literary creation than a historical document or record.

>Acts is considerably organized, suggesting it has been edited.

>Paul’s key themes from his letters are not found in the presentation of his preaching in Acts.

>There are miracle stories which are unscientific.

>Luke was a Gentile and so would not have been present for some of the events he supposedly wrote about.

>Dibelius argued that the speeches in Acts were unreliable because they were designed to convert people, therefore they would ultimately have said whatever worked to appeal to the audience.

BUT it featured as public events by many people- wouldve been widely condemned if fabricated]

>B Gartner criticised Dibelius, the early Church would have insisted on the reliability of Acts- would not have allowed false preaching that happened to be persuasive in a certain context.

>If Luke travelled with Paul during his missionary work, he would have been an eyewitness (historical credibility)

>Luke may have been acquainted with the Apostles and been an eyewitness to their spreading of the Gospel. Luke’s intention is to relate how the Gospel was spread by the disciples, which suggests he would get the history right.

>The language used by the author is more characteristic of Luke than Paul. This could suggest that Acts was made up by Luke rather than Luke reporting on Paul’s speeches.

>The change in Paul’s writing style could be due to the different purposes of Acts compared to his letters. Dodd claimed that the letters of Paul do contain the same key elements of the kerygma as Acts.

RELEVANCE OF THE KERYGMA

-Paul’s letters seem to show that during the early church there was a shift from an initial view that the end times would come soon, to some unspecified time in the future.

>It is this later view which is the common view among Christians today.

>This suggests the Kergyma was wrong!

-H. Reimarus first to notably analyse the historical JC to see how accurate the early church’s rep was

>accused apostles of changing the view of JC (they differ)

>believes that JC was just a human who was deluded into believing he was the messiah, disciples moved his corpse

>The disciples then edited Jesus’ claims about an impending apocalypse, transforming them into claims about timeless spiritual truths.

>Jesus only did miracles to the faithful. When ‘sensible’ ‘learned’ people requested a miracle for examination, Jesus refused- no learned people could believe

-Jesus’ miracles were only written down 30-60 years after his death, and in a language that Palestinian Jews could not understand.

> It was also a time of ‘greatest disquietude and confusion’ where very few who knew Jesus still lived.

>The gospel authors thus had little fear of being understood or refuted, especially considering they also told Christians that it was soul-saving to just believe and have faith.

>This made it easy for the gospel authors to ‘invent’ the miracles of Jesus, whether out of well-intentioned deceit simply their own credulity.

-Schweitzed (influenced by him) JC really believed in the kingdom of God coming in his life time, wouldve realised he was wrong

>THUS kerygmata is worthless as obviously false

BUT Dodd while the early Church may have believed in the impending apocalypse, its teachings involves much more than that and so we should still think it relevant eg forgiveness and the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

>Early Christians were more focused on their joy that Jesus had risen than the impending end of the world, which explains why the Church had stability.

>Dodd’s views on realised eschatology meant that God had already appeared in the world, so connecting with God became possible, it wasn’t necessary to wait for the apocalypse.

>proposes that some of the passages that seem to be picturing the apocalypse are actually about the challenges people face when encountering the Kerygma and attempting to integrate it into their life.

-Bultmann thought that the Bible had become difficult for modern audiences to accept because of how scientifically and historically minded people have become since the enlightenment period.

>main issue was that the Bible contains supernatural occurrences, or ‘myths’.

two theological approaches developed in response to this problem.

1. The literalist approach was to believe the myths literally by denying the modern advances in knowledge that contradict them. Bultmann rejected this sort of blind faith as spiritually empty.

2. The liberal approach ignores the myths and focusing only on the moral teachings found in the Bible. Bultmann rejected this approach because it reduces Christianity to a mere moral philosophy, a set of teachings, rather than an encounter with a way of life.

>argued we should take them as a record of human spiritual experience which had been put into words fitting ancient culture.

>If we could translate the myths into words which would fit modern culture, we might be able to reveal the deeper truths about spiritual experience that they were intended to express. Bultmann called that process ‘demythologizing’

-mythic stories in the Bible were expressions of how the gospel authors experienced the ‘kerygma’, meaning the initial proclamation of Christianity when it was first developing and spreading before the Bible was written.

>At that time, it was a new religion spread by the apostles and so people heard, felt and experienced that proclamation.

>What the gospel writers came to write down was their attempt to put that experience of the spiritual impact of Christianity on them into words. The result is a story full of supernatural elements, as that was how people at that time expressed their understanding of themselves and their place in the world.

>SO a mistake to ignore or take literakky the supernatural elements (key spiritual ft) must decipher true mesning and put into a modern format

kerygma expresses some basic truths about humanity:

• We are not master of the world

• Our plans and powers are finite

• There is a transcendent power in the universe

• There is forgiveness

• It is false to think that we can control life

• It is possible to find a spirit of openness to the future

-Bultmann saw two mythologies at work in the New Testament.

1. Jewish belief in the apocalypse, which history had shown to be false

2. Gnosticism; a widespread belief that all creation was involved in a spiritual battle featuring demonic forces and humans, each being a ‘spark of light’. A being of light was sent down from God to bring people special knowledge so that out ‘sparks’ could be liberated. Bultmann said Christians adapted this mythology to their own beliefs in Jesus (so the gnostic myths emphasize Jesus’ high status)

-Both of these myths are difficul to accept

-Kerygma invites us to make a personal decision to commit ourselves to Christ

(not science, history or doctrine)
BUT NT Wright the sources we have for history, such as the Gospels, do not merely and simply tell us something about the gospel writers, but that through their writing we can actually learn something about historical events.

> claims Bultmann goes too far when he reduces the meaning of the Gospels to mere expressions of deeper truths about how the writers felt

>Critical realism (theory that everyone has their own worldview which informs their perceptions)

>ancient texts involve personal expression on the part of their authors which could include the expression of spiritual experience, that only justifies taking a critical view of the text, not abandoning realism by reducing the entire meaning of the text to expression of personal perspective or experience alone, as Bultmann attempts to do.

>Aren’t the ‘deep truth’ Myths intend to convey down to interpretation and therefore subjective? How could we ever know we had ascertained the ‘true’ meaning?

>Many parts of the bible seem to be literal. e.g saying Jesus was born in Bethlehem. Nor does the bible anywhere say you shouldn’t take it literally. So is there really biblical support for this view?

>how do we now which are myth or literal?

Critical Realism is the theory that everyone has their own worldview, their own lens through which they perceive the world, which informs, frames and biases their perception. “Realism” refers to the idea that there is a real world that we can perceive and understand, “critical” refers to the idea that we understand the world from our own evaluative perspective.

Plenary verb inspiration

Craig: "everything that the Bible affirms to be true is true".

But the Bible presents things as symbolic/metaphorical and so not literally true.

This means that they can support science as well.

• can be linked to attempt to reconcile/harmonise the differences in birth narratives, Craig claims contrary differences are periphery

BUT Erhman we cannot reconcile the differences of the the birth narratives

>suggests a subjective view

BUT

Surely it must have come from one mind

Paradox of Plenary verb inspiration it is logically incompatible for the Bible to be by God and humans at the same time

BUT epistemic distance

Paradox of Plenary verb inspiration it is logically incompatible for the Bible to be by God and humans at the same time

Objective views of inspiration

The Catholic catechism is an attempt to reaffirm the early church father teachings

Aristotle Augustine Aquinas Athenagnus

The second Vatican council document Dei Verbum (1965)

> the Bible is indeed written by humans but inspired by God via the Holy spirit such that it is "without error" and contains "that truth which God wanted put into sacred writings".

"In composing the sacred books, God chose men and while employed by Him they made use of their powers and abilities, so that with Him acting in them and through them, they, as true authors, consigned to writing everything and only those things which He wanted."

"Therefore both sacred tradition and sacred scripture are to be accepted and venerated with the same sense of loyalty and reverence"

Subjective views of inspiration

-sparked post enlightenment as they became more conscious of literary methods, science etc

>accept that the writings of the Bible was a human process

>didnt produce the exact word of God it’s meaning up for interpretation

>implied that the scriptures were written by witnesses of Gods divine events

>the writings are what people take from the events

>the bible reflects cultural and historical cobtexts of its authors

we must continuously reinterpret it to ensure its relevance

Eg mount on the sermon, he engages in a subjective view

Hick: the Bible is evidence of how ancient humans interpreted events.

>It is not historical facts, they are stories with meaning.

E.g. the resurrection is a symbol of God's gift of renewal and the chance of life after death.

BUT how do I know what to follow

>Augustine disasterous consequences, leads to a crisis in authority

>Issue with subjective views: crisis of authority- does the Bible have any authority? If everyone has an interpretation, it can't be consistent.

BUT Response to the criticism: people should be able to have their own views. Just because it might lead to chaos, doesn't mean it is a false view. This may even be what God wants- autonomy and freedom.

Neo-orthodox view

Barth: accepts the knowledge from the Enlightenment that it could not be the word of God.

>Jesus is the word of God

>If one listens to the Bible with humility and obedience, certain passages can be transformed into the word of God.

>Bible is a door way for connection with God

>Inspiration is the reader's experience, not the quality of the text.

Accommodation

John Calvin

A way to explain Gods authorship co-existing with errors in the Bible

“We must never forget that God is above and beyond our language”

>a nurse making baby talk to a young toddler the nurse can use sophisticated language but chooses to communicate in a way that encourages interaction

>in the same way god accommodates his language for us

>the transcendent Christian God has decided to his language (cause for thanksgiving)

eg though Genesis says “god made two great lights” there are other planets,

>would argue that the authors weren’t mistaken but the accommodated language may have caused errors (it’s true from their pov, and the ultimate message is accommodated through that)

Contemporary theologians and accommodation:

• Biblical writers had assumptions about science, culture etc. that would be seen incorrect today.

• These errors were accounted for by God when accommodating for human language

• The Bible's message is still relevant: God's sovereignty and provision of salvation through faith in Christ. These assumptions don't take away from that.

Contemporary theologians and accommodation

• Biblical writers had assumptions about science, culture etc. that would be seen incorrect today.

• These errors were accounted for by God when accommodating for human language

• The Bible's message is still relevant: God's sovereignty and provision of salvation through faith in Christ. These assumptions don't take away from that.