I’m for freedom.  I’m a capitalist.  I believe in a democratic republic, a free country.  I preach salvation by grace through faith alone and not by works.  There is no greater freedom than that in Christ.  If I wasn’t writing this in a coffee shop, I might jump and down right now with freedom. I have the freedom to do that.

Christ freed me from sin.  I couldn’t do that.  I was helpless under the Mosaic Covenant.  I couldn’t stop sinning, but with the new covenant, Christ freed me to live righteous.  Even then, I sin, but He frees me from the punishment of sin.  I have power over sin, because of the freedom in Christ.  I praise God through Christ has set me free.  Amen!

I’m not getting to heaven by works, unless we’re talking about the work, the finished work of Christ, which produces good works in me.  I can do good works.  Paul exclaims at the end of Romans 7, thank God for the victory through the Lord Jesus Christ.  If I was stuck with only the law of sin in my members, I could never do good, but through His workmanship, I can both will and do of his good pleasure.

Someone emailed this week and said the following, “We DO have freedom in Christ. Kent mocks that idea” (caps written by original author).  Kent is me.  So, according to this statement, I mock the idea that we have freedom in Christ.  It’s a strange statement to read about myself, because I’ve preached for freedom in Christ on many occasions, really mention and preach it every week if not every day of my life (probably more than my critic), and could show notes from those sermons as evidence.

Two term Democrat mayor of South Bend, IN, and presidential hopeful, Pete Buttigieg, made the news this last week talking about “faith,” calling his own same-sex marriage “conservative” and something that “moves me closer to God.”  Furthermore, he called Mike Pence, “cheerleader of the porn star presidency,” and continuing, said:

I’m reluctant to comment on another person’s faith, but I would say it is hard to look at this president’s actions and believe that they’re the actions of somebody who believes in God. . . . I just don’t understand how you can be as worshipful of your own self as he is and be prepared to humble yourself before God. I’ve never seen him humble himself before anyone.

Then today he went further toward Mike Pence:

If you got a problem with who I am, your problem is not with me — your quarrel, sir, is with my creator.

What does Buttigieg hope to accomplish by talking about his own “Christianity” as a homosexual?  Both his and Donald Trump’s are not actual Christianity.  Neither.  Buttigieg knows that at least millennial evangelicals could vote for him.  He’s attempting to pick off professing evangelicals.  I’m saying this is the condition of evangelicalism today, and the leaders are afraid of a mass exodus of sympathetic to homosexuality.

Hailey Bieber in an interview this last week said her purpose is to ‘represent Jesus’ in the modeling industry.  In the linked article, she recognizes the contradiction, but this is a similar if not identical alternative form of Christianity as Buttigieg.

For all of Christian history these two above presentations would be in outright, diametric incongruity with the Bible and Christianity, and yet this is where a kind of professing Christianity is today.  Just like there is one truth, there is only one Christianity, the one Christ requires true churches to keep.  What has happened?  A lot.  So many things that it is difficult to put a finger on just one thing.

Today many represent the incongruity in a philosophical way as postmodernism.  It is a helpful category.  Premoderns thought truth came from God, so we know with certainty truth by faith through revelation.  Distinguished from them, moderns said we know by human reasoning or discovery, opting for rationalism.  Postmoderns conclude truth was a social construct, more of just a personal theory, our truth is our truth, so my truth is as good as any other truth.  Modernism was a machine that failed, trampling everyone into the dirt, not turning out well for whatever its basis might be.  With postmodernism, no definite terms, boundaries, or absolute truths exist.  Since everything is in error anyway, and it’s not safe to trust conclusions, nothing is absolute, except what the postmodern wants.

The philosophical explanation brings categories and the story of demise.  It chronicles transitions, but it wasn’t the cause for permissible multiple massive variations in Christianity.  Judgment begins in the house of God.  2 Peter and Jude provide a biblical explication.

Buttigieg says same sex marriage moved him closer to God and that a hypothetical rejection by Mike Pence, who hasn’t said anything to or about Buttigieg that I have heard or read, is a quarrel with Buttigieg’s “creator.”   Buttigieg doesn’t go to scripture at all to defend his claim.  The Bible repudiates homosexuality in no uncertain terms, let alone same sex marriage, based upon God’s design as Creator.  God created male and female.  A man leaves father and mother and cleaves to his wife by God’s design.  Buttigieg is not arguing from scripture, and apparently he thinks this won’t matter to his audience, especially millennial evangelicals based upon his polling.  He gives the following evidence for God “creating” him “gay”:

If me being gay was a choice, it was a choice that was made far, far above my pay grade. . . .  [I] would have done anything to not be gay, when I started to half way realize what it meant that I felt the way I did. . . . If you had offered me a pill to make me straight, I would have swallowed it before I could get a sip of water.

Buttigieg puts his own feelings on par with revelation from God.  He believes God created him homosexual because he has feelings he says that he really doesn’t want to have, even though they in the end make him a better man.  Scripture says just the opposite.  James 1:14 in a classic passage on sin says that “every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.”  Buttigieg’s sin originates in his desires.  This isn’t God communicating to him, but his own flesh.

A lot of sin is based on feelings someone wishes that he didn’t have.  He doesn’t want to lie.  He does.  He doesn’t want  to react in selfish, angry way.  He does.  He doesn’t want to mouth off.  He does.  Postmoderns can say that God said something to them without any evidence, but their own feelings.  Their churches accept this.  Nothing in the Bible or the history of Christian theology matches this view.  It’s an man-made and man-centered invention.

Buttigieg’s talk isn’t Christian.  There aren’t several Christianities and you don’t get to choose the one you want.  Again, 2 Peter and Jude both expose and foresee this perversion of Christianity.  Jude 1:3-4:

 3 Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints. 4 For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.

Don’t skip the verses.  Go back and read them.  Churches must contend for the faith.  Why?  Ungodly men infiltrate churches, “turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.”  The emphasis in Jude and 2 Peter 2 is the denial of the Lordship of Christ.  Men like Buttigieg want to do what he want to do, which is lasciviousness, and so he uses his feelings to allow for it.  This is turning the grace of God into lasciviousness and denying Jesus as Lord.  Buttigieg becomes lord, does what he wants, not what Jesus wants, and then justifies it.

The way the Lord Jesus Christ rules lives is through scripture through His churches.  Rather than submit to scripture, we see men elevate their feelings above.  This is worshiping the creature rather than the Creator (Rom 1:25).   Very often today churches are embarrassed about scripture.  They don’t like what it says.  They don’t want to expect or require what it says.  It’s easier to accept what people want to do.  This acceptance is their new love.  It isn’t love.  It’s better to call it sentimentalism, if not just lust.  They say they love each other and they feel love for one another, but their professed love contradicts scripture.

Churches and godly leaders of churches must contend for the faith, which is the one Christianity.  There are no alternatives.  I read someone recently who called the alternatives “the great omission” in contrast to the Great Commission of Matthew 28:19-20.  The great commission says “teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you,” but the alternative Christianity omits this, in so doing, “denying the Lord that bought them” (2 Peter 2:1).

Introduction to the Debate    Part One   Part Two

by Kent Brandenburg

Answer to Question 2


If Mr. Turk looked at his quote of the KJV preface in its context, he would see that the translators were arguing for translation contra Romanism, not approving of poor translations.  On the other hand, the KJ translators were linguistic scholars by most accounts, yet not quite as reliable themselves as a source for theology.  For that reason, I don’t ask WWKJTD (What Would the King James Translators Do?).   I do at times puzzle at ardor for a preface as far surpassing the translation of Holy Scripture it introduced.  Men as early as seventeenth century decided that both Jesus and the apostles quoted from a Greek version of the Hebrew OT.  Like any other historic tradition, we evaluate it with truth (John 17:17).

Exegetical reasons say Jesus quoted from the Hebrew text. Jots and tittles are Hebrew letters (Matthew 5:18). Jesus refers to the OT as the law and the prophets, the designation speaking of the Hebrew OT, not a Greek one (Luke 24:44).  James affirmed that the Torah was the text by which preaching was done on every Sabbath in every town of Judea, and elsewhere, in the synagogue (Acts 15:21). There is no question that Hebrew was a known and read language of the first century since Pilate required the title on the cross to be written in three known and read languages of the Greco-Roman world—Hebrew and Greek and Latin (Jn. 19:20). The Lord Jesus Christ spoke both Hebrew (“Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani”) and Aramaic (“Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani”) from the Cross, as the Gospels of Matthew and Mark testify (Mt. 27:46—Mk. 15:34).  The Apostle Paul, in his great apologetic speech, spoke to the Jews in Jerusalem “in the Hebrew tongue” (Acts 21:40).  The Lord also spoke to Paul “in the Hebrew tongue” at the time of his conversion (Acts 26:14). Nowhere do we find any similar doctrine of “Greek translation usage,” except to exegete the preface of translation.  This paragraph exemplifies how one gets a bibliology of preservation, something you will not see among the critical and eclectic.

This historic tradition creates a huge problem for one’s view of inspiration and inerrancy.  It says Jesus quotes an extremely flawed translation, especially textually, making error in Scripture “satisfactory.”  Then certain points debunk the historic tradition.  Many of these OT quotations in the New are significantly different from certain modern Septuagints.  Cumulatively a big majority of the quotations from Job, Zechariah, and Malachi agree solely with the Masoretic.  This same historic tradition today underlies denial of ipsissima verba of Christ for unorthodox ipsissima vox.

A high view of inspiration practices classic harmonization.  Often attacks on Scripture point at supposed conflicts with the various accounts to relegate the Bible to something only human.  Rather than capitulating to errors, our high view guides viable explanations.  In place of the one problematic historic tradition I offer two viable choices (or mixture of the two) that harmonize with God’s promises of perfect preservation.

1. Jesus targummed, that is, He quoted and commented as a rabbi would. Jesus knew the Hebrew and the Greek, so He could translate on a fly, imparting commentary as well, especially His being God Himself, speaking new Scripture based upon His own authority.  We witness this Jewish practice of targumming by Jesus in Luke 4:16-21: the teacher stands and opens scroll (vv. 16, 17), reads the OT with running interpretation or Targum (vv. 17b-19), rolls up scroll, hands back, and sits down, and then preaches his sermon (v. 21ff).  Several commentators affirm Christ’s employment of the Targum, including Geldenhuys who states (p. 167): “As far as we know, He read in Hebrew and translated into Aramaic, the common spoken language at that time…G. Dalman finds reflections of the traditional Aramaic paraphrase (Targum) in the present passage in Luke [4:18 ff.].”  Cf. also Robert H. Stein, The New American Commentary, Luke (Nashville, Broadman Press, 1992), p. 155; Craig A. Evans, New International Biblical Commentary, Luke (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publ., 1990), p. 73; and William Manson, The Moffatt New Testament Commentary, The Gospel of Luke (London: Hodder and Stoughton, Ltd., 1955), p. 41.
2.  “[T]he scribes who copied the surviving manuscripts of the LXX [which date after the composition of the gospels] were by and large Christians who would have been familiar with the NT writings.  When, in the process of producing a LXX manuscript, they came to a passage that was quoted in the NT, they sometimes adjusted the text, either inadvertently (because of their memory of the NT form) or purposefully (because they assumed the NT form was correct)” (p. 191, Invitation to the Septuagint, Moises Silva and Karen Jobes, Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2000).

There was no “the Septuagint” that we know for sure of in the first century. Even today the textual scholars don’t know exactly what “the Septuagint” is. Jerome makes mention of three different versions of the Septuagint that already existed in his day:

Alexandria and Egypt in their Septuagint acclaim Hesychius as their authority, the region from Constantinople to Antioch approves the copies of Lucian the martyr, the intermediate Palestinian provinces read the MSS which were promulgated by Eusebius and Pamphilius on the basis of Origen’s labors, and the whole world is divided among these three varieties of texts. 

H. St. J. Thackeray, “Septuagint,” The International Standard Bible Encyclopaedia, Volume IV (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publ., 1939), pp. 2724-2725, writes:

The main value of the LXX is its witness to an older Hebrew text than our own. But before we can reconstruct this Hebrew text we need to have a pure Greek text before us, and this we are at present far from possessing…the original text has yet to be recovered…Not a verse is without its array of variant readings.

Must we abandon the plain teaching of Scripture, which evidences the Lord’s use of the Hebrew OT, as demonstrated by Strouse, for the bruised reed of the “evidence” from a reconstructed, hypothetical, non-preserved modern edition of “the” LXX?  Mr. Turk may do the latter, if he please; we will go with the “thus saith the Lord.”

I do wonder if Mr. Turk believes that the Septuagint is God’s Word in the places it comes from corrupt text or is translated incorrectly.  With that in mind, I also wonder if he believes that the modern versions are the Word of God when they, for instance, say that Isaiah wrote the book of Malachi (Mark 1:2-3).  If Mr. Turk kept reading a little further in the uninspired preface, he would have arrived at this—

[T]hey joined them together with the Hebrew original, and the translation of the Seventy (as hath been before signified out of Epiphanius) and set them forth openly to be considered of and perused by all.

—which explains the reason for the KJ translators’ Septuagint illustration.  Contradicting the Romanists, they believed in the translation of the Hebrew and Greek text into known languages.  They weren’t using their conjecture about the Septuagint to endorse a poor translation.  Neither the KJ translators, nor many others, would say that a translation in the places where it is faulty is the Word of God.  How would that point of their preface apply to modern translations?  The KJ translators would support translations into known languages, i.e., ones other than Latin.

Comments to A2

Perhaps Mr. Turk could just say what he believes about the preservation of Scripture, what God did preserve, and why, so we can stop speculating on what “grammatical promises” are.  If he means that God didn’t promise to preserve His Words; i.e. no verbal, plenary preservation, and so he enters this debate with that presupposition, it’s no wonder our conclusions differ.  Just saying that preservation isn’t in Scripture doesn’t count as debate—we could both say, “He’s wrong,” and we’d be done.

I asked if the Bible was evidence.  Mr. Turk implies “Yes” with “merely evidence.”  I ask if it is superior to other forms of evidence—no answer.  A “plain” answer would include a “yes” or “no.” “Ontologically reliable” and “metaphysically authoritative” aren’t plain.  Those two descriptions are about as nebulous as one could get, especially in light of what Scripture says about itself.  I think by “ontologically reliable,” he means that the reliability of Scripture is found in its essence and unique nature, but not in the actual, accessible words.  I think by saying “metaphysically authoritative” he separates Scripture from the available, physical text itself.  If the text of the Bible has no integrity of its own, then readers can have their own way with it—disregard what it says and say what it means to them.  Mr. Turk’s answers read like definitional gobbly-gook to allow belief in error in Scripture.

Mr. Turk should have seen that what I believe about preservation doesn’t contradict what Turretin said. Neither Turretin nor I believe that copyists were without error.  I even gave a Scriptural basis for errors in copies.  God said there would be errors.  Both Turretin and I believe that those errors were always corrected.  Both Turretin and I believe in perfect preservation based upon God’s promises, including a great defense of 1 John 5:7.

I still call on Mr. Turk to tell me what he believes about preservation of Scripture and to prove it.  While I’m waiting, here are references that among others promise the perfect, Divine preservation of Scripture: Deuteronomy 8:3; Psalm 12:6-7; 111:7-8; 119:152; 119:160; Isaiah 59:21; Matthew 4:4; 5:18-19; 24:35; Mark 13:31; Luke 3:3; 16:17; 21:33; John 12:48; 1 Peter 1:23-25; 2 Peter 3:2.  These cumulatively give a stronger testimony for perfect preservation than the Bible even gives for its own inspiration.  If you believe the latter, then you should believe the former.  In addition, among the above verses and others, we have testimony to the general accessibility of God’s verbally, plenarily preserved Words: Deuteronomy 30:11-14; Isaiah 59:21; Matthew 4:4.  Implied in the ability to keep all the Words of God is their availability: Deuteronomy 6:24; 10:2; 12:28; 27:26; 28:14; 28:58; 29:9; 31:12.  The Bible affirms that people will be held eternally accountable for disobeying the Words contained therein: Psalm 50:16-17; Luke 24:35; 2 Timothy 3:15-17.

In addition to Turretin, John Owen also wrote in the 17th century,

The whole Scripture, entire as given out from God, without any loss, is preserved in the copies of the originals yet remaining. . . .  In them all, we say, is every letter and tittle of the word.

G. I. Williamson, writes in his 1964 commentary on the Westminster Confession of Faith (pp. 14-17):

This brings us to the matter of God’s ‘singular care and providence’ by which He has ‘kept pure in all ages’ this original text, so that we now actually possess it in ‘authentical’ form. And let us begin by giving an illustration from modern life to show that an original document may be destroyed, without the text of that document being lost. Suppose you were to write a will. Then suppose you were to have a photographic copy of that will made. If the original were then destroyed, the photographic copy would still preserve the text of that exactly the same as the original itself (emphasis his). The text of the copy would differ in no way whatever from the original, and so it would possess exactly the same ‘truth’ and meaning as the original. . . .  How then could the original text of the Word of God be preserved? The answer is that God preserved it by His own remarkable care and providence.

Professor E. D. Morris for decades taught the Westminster Confession at Lane Theological Seminary in Cincinnati, Ohio.  In 1893, Lane wrote for The Evangelist:

As a Professor in a Theological Seminary, it has been my duty to make a special study of the Westminster Confession of Faith, as have I done for twenty years; and I venture to affirm that no one who is qualified to give an opinion on the subject, would dare to risk his reputation on the statement that the Westminster divines ever thought the original manuscripts of the Bible were distinct from the copies in their possession (underline mine).

by Frank Turk

See: I like Kent’s questions in spite of their insinuations that brief, clear answers of only a few sentences are somehow evasive.

What is utterly fascinating about this current question is that Kent wants to imply that unless all the words are present, none of the words are validly considered God’s word — so for Kent, only the words which, for example, Luke wrote down when he scribed the phrase “Epeideper polloi epeceiresan avataxasthai diegesin peri ton peplerophoremenon ev hemin pragmaton” [my note:  English transliteration of Luke 1:1 in the Greek New Testament] (that’s Luke 1:1 as we account for it) can be God’s word.

Or can it? Because Luke 1:1 in the KJV reads, “Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us,” including the comma, which indicates that Luke 1:1 is not a complete sentence. Apparently, words are missing from that sentence — so citing that verse by itself, if we are to take Kent seriously in his argument so far, is not citing God’s word, but corrupting it.

Worse still for Kent is the gross problem that the phrase “Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us” is not what Luke wrote back in the day: that’s a translation of what Luke wrote. Since these are not the words that Luke wrote, they must be a corruption of the text.

And I say this because, frankly, I have met many ex-KJV guys who would say so — because they believe that since the KJV is not the original manuscript but some kind of transmitted text, it can’t be God’s word. It’s a common ploy for these men, who are usually atheists, to try to discredit the Scripture because it comes in translation. How can we possibly know those words are right?

So we have to decide something up front: is translation a legitimate pursuit when it comes to Scripture? The Muslim, for example, would say “no”. You can read the Qu’ran in English, but that’s not Scripture. But the clear fact is that the KJV translators believed that translation is a legitimate pursuit for the church of the text for the sake of the common man.

For those men, translation was in fact a necessary duty of the church in order to teach the Scripture — even if the words of the Greek and Hebrew were not perfectly handled.

Now, here’s the kicker — the place where we can answer Kent’s question without any stipulations. Is the question of translation a matter of making sure the right number of words are being used? In the example of Luke 1:1, Luke wrote 11 words — yet in English, the phrase is translated using 24 words! If what is at stake is that the very words must be transliterated, I propose that we must conclude that Scripture has been utterly adulterated by the KJV translators, and we must abandon that work because it uses more words than Luke did in Luke 1:1.

But that proposition is ludicrous on its face — because even the most novice of Bible students knows that New Testament Greek is a very different language than Renaissance English. Verbs are formed differently; tenses are built in a different grammatical way; Nouns operate differently; sentence structure is very different. It is inevitable that translating from Greek to English will render different words. That is actually the point of the exercise.

In that, it is transparently clear that any text is more than just a list of words. The text uses structures like idioms and metaphors to express meaning not evident in the mere words — and in many cases, those sorts of structures have to be handled carefully and not merely in a wooden literal sense by the translator to convey the meaning of the author.

So to answer Kent’s question plainly:

I reject the idea that Scripture is merely a list of words in a magical order which, when recited, somehow has an effect which one might call “perfection”. While we honor and revere the fact that God breathed out the very words of Scripture, I deny that the words, considered individually, are somehow so fragile that human operations like listening, reading, copying, translating or memorizing — which inevitably make errors in transmitting these words — will somehow invalidate what God has intended in this special revelation.

If that’s too complicated for Kent to receive as an answer, I’ll softball him this answer instead:

Because we receive the NT in translation (for example, in the KJV), we must insist that the perfection of Scripture today is found in the message and not the words. The words in which we receive Scripture (that is, English words) were never written by an apostle or prophet.

Since I have some, um, words left, let me reiterate my answers so far:
[1] God’s promises to preserve His word do not include any grammatical or scribal promises.

[2] Scripture is not merely “evidence” but in fact “testimony” — God’s revelation of Truth. Because of where those texts come from — not because of the words or the languages used — that testimony is not merely a report of truth: it is the authoritative statement of the truth.

[3] The text itself is not so fragile that it must be received as the original autograph; like any text, and as clearly affirmed by Turrentin, “an authentic writing is one in which all things are abundantly sufficient to inspire confidence”. This would include scribal copies of autographs which are not identical to the autographs and valid translations.

Here’s another Turretin quote:

Conformity to the original is different from equality. Any version (provided it is faithful) is indeed conformable to the original because the same doctrine as to substance is set forth there. But it is not on that account equal to it because it is only a human and not a divine method of setting it forth.  [underline supplied by Mr. Turk]

Although any version made by fallible men cannot be considered divine and infallible with respect to the terms, yet it can well be considered such with respect to the things, since it faithfully expresses the divine truth of the sources even as the word which the minister of the gospel preaches does not cease to be divine and infallible and to establish our faith, although it may be expressed by him in human words. Thus faith depends not on the authority of the interpreter or minister, but is built upon the truth and authenticity (authentia) of the things contained in the versions. 

Turrentin said this about translations into common languages.


Why can we not apply what Turrentin said here about translation and apply it to the human method of copying the text by hand? That is, why is this true for the more difficult work of translation, but not the less difficult work of scribal copyists? 

by Kent Brandenburg


On day one God spoke and there was light.  When God spoke, whatever He said would come to pass.  After creating Adam, God made a covenant with him (Gen. 2:16-17):

Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

Then God created for Adam the perfect companion, his wife Eve.  Shortly thereafter, in his first act Satan tempts her to doubt God’s Word (Gen. 3:1), “Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?”  And then, “Ye shall not surely die.”

He changed a few of God’s Words, caused uncertainty in Eve, so that what God said wasn’t authoritative to her any longer—you know the rest of the story.

Satan continues using the same strategy.  Modern agnostic, Bart Ehrman, illustrates this by testifying of his apostasy in his Misquoting Jesus:

This was a compelling problem. It was the words of scripture themselves that God had inspired. Surely we have to know what those words were if we want to know how he had communicated to us. . . . I kept reverting to my basic question: how does it help us to say that the Bible is the inerrant word of God if in fact we don’t have the words that God inerrantly inspired, but only the words copied by scribes—sometimes correctly but sometimes (many times!) incorrectly? What good is it to say that the autographs . . . were inspired? We don’t have the originals! . . . This became a problem for my view of inspiration, for I came to realize that it would have been no more difficult for God to preserve the words of scripture than it would have been for him to inspire them in the first place.

Satan wants us to think that God’s Word has errors, so that we don’t trust it.  Should we or can we juxtapose a perfect, holy, majestic, non-contingent, immutable God with an errant Word?   Yet, that is the position that Mr. Turk takes in opposition to my affirmation.  And if we have a Bible with errors, what authority does Scripture have?  These present some great difficulties to the orthodoxy of my opponent.

John Feinberg writes:

[I’m not] able to understand how one can be justified in claiming absolute authority for the Scriptures and at the same time deny their inerrancy. This seems to be the height of epistemological nonsense and confusion. . . .  Suppose that I have an Amtrak railroad schedule. In describing its use to you, I tell you that it is filled with numerous errors but that it is absolutely authoritative and trustworthy. I think you would be extremely dubious. At least the schedule would have one thing going for it; it declares itself to be subject to change without notice.

If God’s Word supported the doctrine of errant Scripture we should believe and expect it.  However, Scripture does not espouse that.  The Bible advocates first its verbal, plenary inspiration and then its own perfect, Divine preservation and general accessibility to every generation of God’s people.   Only the textus receptus of the Greek NT fulfills this Scriptural pattern.  The text behind the modern versions we know wasn’t always available and it is still, according to its own proponents, a work in progress.

Professing believers have historically held to perfect preservation and general accessibility.  Not only will I show this in the debate,  but Mr. Turk already has on his own blog with links just to the right, when he references the Westminster Confession (1646) and the London Baptist Confession (1689), which both state:

The Old Testament in Hebrew . . . , and the New Testament in Greek . . . , being immediately inspired by God, and by his singular care and providence kept pure in all ages, are therefore authentical.

I ask, why not just believe his own posted statement?  The debate would be over.  The confessors were convinced that God’s promises were true, as should Mr. Turk.  I am confident that my opponent will reveal greater trust in merely human statements of history and science than he does what God’s Word says about its own preservation.  I anticipate that he will eagerly lean upon works by or about Erasmus as sufficiently infallible and proclaim that not one Greek manuscript of the NT is identical without himself or even the ones who make that claim possibly being able to see the manuscripts relied upon for the printed editions of the textus receptus.

Mr. Turk might say, “But the confessions don’t say which words were God’s perfect ones.”  Yet the writings of the confessors themselves reveal that they believed a text identical to the original manuscripts was accessible to them.  In the NT, those words were the textus receptus.  Why do professing believers now reject a position of perfect preservation and general accessibility of God’s Word?  Rather than the Bible as sufficient, sole authority, they depend on their history and external evidence.  In short, toward God’s promises of preservation and accessibility, they aren’t like Abraham, who “staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God” (Rom. 4:20).  Instead, they are Thomas in John 20:25: “Except I see . . . , I will not believe.”  They’ll use terms like epistemology, but what they mean is that they don’t believe what God said He would do.

I expect many to come to aid Mr. Turk in rebuttal of my affirmation to give him more history and supposed examples of errors in Scripture.  And when they are finished, what will be their result? More certainty?  No.  No, the consequence will be more doubt about God’s Word.  Does that sound like the product of God?  Of the Holy Spirit?  Of course not.

Question:  Does God in the Bible promise His people the preservation and general accessibility of every Word of God to every generation of believers in the language in which He gave them?

by Frank Turk

Kent —

Through your opening statement, you have made a series of logical leaps which aren’t warranted, but we have 10 questions and answers through which to uncover the worst of them. Let me answer your question with two assertions, and I’m sure they’ll give you some room to run.

[1] It’s a false assumption to link “inerrancy” with one eclectic text. I wholly reject the idea that God’s word has any errors in it, but I think that means something other than what you intend here.

[2] I reject the claim that God has promised to preserve a singular text of all the books of the NT down to matters like scribal spelling errors and emendations. God didn’t make any grammatical promises to anyone in the Bible.

So God’s word has no theological and no historical errors in it, but that does not imply any kind of promise to make sure every scribe always copies every word perfectly.

Let me apologize that I haven’t been available to answer your first post in a more timely fashion. I am travelling for work this week, and I have limited internet access.

Many people have never read the KJV Translators’ 1611 preface to their work. I link to it here for everyone’s information.

Does this preface say anywhere that the Textus Receptus — the volume produces by Erasmus from a small variety of dissimilar texts — is without any differences from the original text of the books it represents?