Post six in this series examined five common objections to Christians learning Greek and Hebrew. Part six followed the first five blog posts summarizing Reasons Christians Should and Can Learn Greek and Hebrew, the Biblical Languages, which explained the value of learning the Biblical languages and explained that the languages are not too difficult to learn–indeed, Biblical Greek and Hebrew are easier languages to learn than modern English.  This final post will examine some remaining common objections, #6-12 on pages 57-68 of Reasons Christians Should and Can Learn Greek and Hebrew, the Biblical Languages.

 

6.) “The many computer tools and other study helps available today make knowledge of the original languages superfluous.”

 

Computer tools are certainly very valuable.  However, they do not come close to eliminating the value of learning the languages themselves.  Furthermore, the Christian who does not know Greek or Hebrew runs the serious risk of misunderstanding what his computer Bible software is telling him.

 

7.) “People have gone to big-name seminaries, learned Greek and Hebrew, and come back full of doctrinal compromise.”

 

Sadly, this has certainly happened.  But it has been the consequence of compromise in the seminary and in the sinful heart of the person who compromises.  It is not a problem with God’s Greek and Hebrew words.

 

8.) “There have been godly servants of the Lord who never learned the Biblical languages.”

 

There certainly have been godly servants of the Lord who never learned the Biblical languages.  There have been godly servants of the Lord who never learned to read at all, or who were even unable to read because they were blind of possessed some other unfortunate handicap.  That God can use illiterate Christians for His glory does not mean that learning to read has no value.  No more does the fact that God can use Christians who do not know Greek and Hebrew serve as a sufficient cause to fail to learn the Biblical languages.

 

9.) “I have heard that learning the Biblical languages was useless.”

 

People who actually know Hebrew and Greek do not say that they are useless.  Only people who do not know the languages seem to make this claim.  Someone who voices this objection should be asked:  “Do you claim that Hebrew and Greek are useless for understanding the Bible because of your experience and in-depth study of those languages, or are you making that claim from a position of ignorance?”

 

10.) “Learning Greek and Hebrew undermines the King James Version.”

 

Why?  Does this objection assume that the translation cannot withstand scrutiny?  Who is undermining the KJV then?  The KJV translators would have viewed a low view of Greek and Hebrew as a Catholic false teaching.  They would have viewed it as utterly antithetical to a Bible-believing Protestantism.

 

 

11.) “Maybe Protestants valued Greek and Hebrew, but Baptists did not.”

 

Such a claim is simply ignorant.  Countless Baptists, from Hetzer and Denck who translated the Bible into German before Luther did, to William Carey, the “father of modern missions,” to expositors like Alexander Maclaren, to martyrs like Felix Mantz, to fundamentalists like James Josiah Reeve, to Landmarkers like Ben Bogard have viewed knowledge of the Biblical languages as tremendously valuable.

 

12.) “It is wrong for a woman to learn the original languages of Scripture.”

 

The New Testament commands women to “learn” (1 Timothy 2:11), and never even once states or implies that women are to be less committed to learning Scripture than men, or that they are only to learn the Bible in the vernacular but not in the original tongues.  Why should women who have the holy duties of teaching other women teaching children (Titus 2:3-5; 1 Timothy 5:10, 14) be kept from the increased ability to understand, teach, and practice Scripture that comes from knowing Greek and Hebrew?

 

Reasons Christians Should and Can Learn Greek and Hebrew, the Biblical Languages concludes:

 

[A]rguments against the study of Greek and Hebrew are unconvincing … [while] the reasons why Greek and Hebrew are extremely valuable, and clearly learnable, are compelling.  May the Father who revealed His glory and redemptive mind and heart in the Hebrew and Greek words He gave His Son to deliver to His saints by His Spirit bless these facts to the flourishing of reverent study, loving practice, and bold proclamation of those infallibly inspired and perfectly preserved words to His eternal glory and the advance of His spiritual kingdom.  Amen!

 

And to that conclusion, again I say, “Amen”!

 

–TDR