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Answering Mark Ward’s Last Attack on Preservation of Scripture
Mark Ward summarized almost all of his views on the issue of the preservation of scripture towards the end of his most recent video (here next is a transcript):
Stories?
King James Onlyists in my experience tend to tell themselves one of two neat and tidy stories: a Masoretic Text/TR story or a Ruckmanite story. The MT/TR story goes like this. Once upon a time God inspired the Hebrew Bible and the Greek New Testament and He promised in Psalm 12 and Matthew 5 to preserve them perfectly down to the jot and tittle. Satan came along and produced counterfeits of the Greek New Testament, but thankfully the King James Version translators perfectly translated the perfect Hebrew and Greek texts once and for all. And it’s easy to spot the terrible Satanic corruptions in other Bibles.
When difficulties and inconsistencies are pointed out, however, in this MT/TR story, as I’ve done in this video, it tends to turn into the Ruckmanite story, which goes like this. Once upon a time God gave special blessings to the King James Translators so that all of their textual choices and all of their translation choices were perfect. If there are a few places in the King James that have no textual support in the Greek or the Hebrew manuscripts, that’s okay because God inspired the King James Translators to choose the right reading. If there are a few places in the King James Version where the translators actually followed readings taken from Erasmus that were translated from the Vulgate, that’s okay because God inspired the King James translators to recover the right reading.
The Ward Viewpoint
Now I told the pastor who sent me some of these examples that I don’t enjoy having to point out these difficulties and complexities. But let me build another bridge of trust, the one that I myself use all the time in my Bible study travels. Who gave us the situation in which we have incredible well preserved copies of the Hebrew Bible and Greek New Testament, but there are numerous minor uncertainties and difficulties? Who gave us a world in which perfect translation between languages is impossible?
Who inspired the New Testament apostles to quote a Greek translation of the Old Testament rather than make new and doubtless perfect translations of the Hebrew? (And by the way I draw that last question directly from the King James Translators and their preface.) Who chose not to give us inspired translators, yeah, even a pope to give the best translation in each language his official imprimatur, the seal of divine approval?
Who gave us a Bible that comes in two very different languages, Hebrew and Greek, and actually Aramaic, three, and would therefore require translation in the first place? Who gave us a Bible over the course of 1500 years instead of all at once? Who chose to commit His precious Word to fragile papyrus and sheepskin?
Who gave us the excellent but not perfect situation we’re in? But who told us that one day the perfect would come that we would know even as also we are known? I think you know the answer to my not so rhetorical questions. God did all of these things, and He is good. He is my refuge even when I don’t understand His choices.
Overall Observations and Criticisms of Ward’s Statements
Ward’s little speech makes it easier to deal with what he thinks and says. First, I have some overall observations or criticisms. One, Ward caricatures and misrepresents especially the MT/TR position, and even gets wrong how Ruckmanism arose. He’s not telling the truth. Why do his followers give him a pass on this?
Two, Ward lumps the MT/TR people together with the Ruckmanites. I don’t know if he thinks this, or just conveniently tells it as a story. Either way, it is false. The MT/TR position arises from scripture like he says (albeit in a mocking way), but it also mirrors historic Christian doctrine as seen in creeds, confessions, and many other writings. His view did not exist among professing believers until the 19th century. This has been established, but Mark Ward and others like him just ignore it for a lie of a story. I will return to this point later.
Three, do consider that Mark Ward uses the word “story” to describe MT/TR people. Ward knows what words mean and he knows that the popular usage of “story” today is fiction. Notice then when he starts talking about his view, he calls it a “bridge of trust” and a “situation.” He doesn’t call that another story, a third story as the first two are stories.
Ward on Truth Serum
It seems to me that Ward has “lost it.” His primary target essentially rejects what he says, and he’s lost it, perhaps because of that. And then because he’s lost it, he did something I have not seen him do. I’m not saying he’s never done it, but I’ve never seen it myself. Mark Ward takes truth serum. He plainly states his viewpoint as I’ve never heard him. Ward acknowledges a lack of perfection of the Bible, based not on scriptural doctrine but on his experience. His stark confession reminds me of two examples.
In the last year, I saw a clip of Bill Maher in which he says that all pro-choice people know abortion is murder. He said he knows abortion is murder and he is fine with that. Maher’s two guest sat with jaws dropping at the sheer admission. In one sense, I can respect Maher because at least he tells the truth about his position on abortion. Another popular figure, Bernie Sanders, just comes out and in an obvious way supports socialism. He states his leftist positions without hiding them. Mark Ward does the same in this latest video like no other time.
I think it is important that someone hear what Ward says and understands what’s wrong with it. This is a teaching moment for a true bibliology. Ward admits what a big chunk of his side thinks. It is akin to neo-orthodoxy, not a biblical position. When Bart Ehrman came to this realization, it turned him apostate, which is a danger. I’m going to go through the above paragraphs by Ward and give a scriptural, truthful analysis to it. He’s wrong in so many ways.
First, what’s wrong with Ward’s MT/TR story?
“Neat and Tidy”
Mark Ward mocks the idea of a “neat and tidy” position. Don’t miss that. He would have his audience believe that the truth is not so neat and tidy. To him this is worth mocking with his articulation. The neatness and tidiness of the MT/TR position is that, one, God said He would preserve every Word He inspired and, two, He did it. That is neat and tidy. Modern version onlyists, critical text supporters are in a never-ending quest to improve the text of scripture. God didn’t preserve it perfectly — it’s really disorderly and messy. If you won’t embrace that, Ward will mock you for it.
“Tells Themselves”
Ward says that MT/TR people tell themselves a story. It’s as if they are repeating this story as a mantra, abracadabra and suddenly it will be true, because they keep telling it to themselves. It’s like spinning a talisman in one’s pocket or a lucky rabbit’s foot. “Just keep telling yourself.” He’s the nice guy regularly using this type of derogatory style. Yet, he won’t allow his opposition to comment on his constant youtube presentations on the subject. It gives the impression that everyone agrees. Just because someone tells himself something doesn’t make it true. When God says it, it is true.
“Once Upon a Time”
“Once upon a time” again is a reference to make believe or fantasy. It’s like opening up Cinderella as an actual book of history. He equates the truth with something that is a fable. Ward treats historical and scriptural doctrine like it is a fable.
It is difficult to separate some of what Mark Ward says from other of what he says. He bunches inspiration of scripture into his storybook mode. Is that a story too? I don’t think he means to do that, but it is the net result of this style of criticism he employs. Inspiration is supernatural. Our reason for believing inspiration is the inspired Bible itself. I believe Ward accepts this, but the attacks on inspiration from the neo-orthodox are the same as those on preservation. They question the veracity of inspiration based on so-called external evidence and reject the biblical teaching on inspiration.
Scriptural Presuppositions
Ward is correct that MT/TR folk presuppose perfect preservation based upon preservation passages in scripture. This wasn’t odd through Christian history and yet it is now, because of the attack on the doctrine mainly in the last thirty or so years. Ward is part of this attack. I’m using him here as a representative. He cherry picks two chapters for the simplicity of his storybook, Psalm 12 and Matthew 5. There are numbers of passages that teach preservation, as many or more than teach inspiration. This is presuppositionalism. We presuppose God fulfilled what He said. What’s wrong with that?
Is the teaching of preservation a story as in a storybook? True Christians have long believed it. The doctrine of the perfect preservation of scripture comes from the Bible. I and others didn’t invent this. Many people in the pews of churches believe this too. They see it in the Bible and it is not buttressed only by Psalm 12 and Matthew 5. There are many others (some of which we exposed in our book, Thou Shalt Keep Them).
Ward himself recently started taking on scripture to support his doctrine of “edification requires intelligibility,” teaching it on a level unprecedented in the history of biblical doctrine. People like myself and others support his notion, even if we question his reliance on 1 Corinthians 14, a passage on using the known language of the congregation rather than gibberish. In other words, it’s a stretch to make so much of that principle due to even fifty to one hundred of his “false friends.”
Satan Counterfeiting
Next Ward says that MT/TR people assert that Satan took on the strategy of counterfeiting the MT/TR. Nope. Not true. Satan attacks scripture, yes. You see that in classic passages like Genesis 3 and Matthew 4. It’s also something seen in 2 Peter 3, where false teachers wrest the scripture. Also, Paul wrote in 2 Thessalonians 2, that false teachers spread a false epistle with teaching contradictory to his, feigning as though it was from him.
MT/TR people like myself would agree that the attack by Satan starts by attacking the doctrine of preservation. Satan also wants people to be unsure, have doubt, about the perfection of scripture. This takes away from authority. Rather than a settled text, it is a disorderly and messy one that is uncertain. Mark Ward calls this confidence. It is a relative term, meaning something like 95% to 98%, what I like to say is less pure than tide detergent.
More to Come
Textual Criticism Related to the Bible Bows to Modernity
Christianity is old. There is no new and improved version of it. It is what it started to be. Changing it isn’t a good thing. Let me expand.
Modern and Modernity
Right now as I implement the term “modern” I am using it in the way it is in the word “modernity” or “modernism.” I think modernism is a perversion of something good that occurred, which is the advancement proceeding from the printing and vastly greater distribution of the Bible after 1440. It fulfilled a cultural mandate lost with the domination of Roman Catholicism, “subdue and have dominion.” Feudalism went by the wayside. Quality of life improved.
In Judges in the Old Testament, Israel turned away from God, which resulted in bad consequences both indirect and direct from God. Israel cried out to God. God delivered and Israel then prospered again. Prosperity led back to turning away again, the bad consequences, and the cycle begins again.
The prosperity brought by the printing, distribution, and reading of the Bible brought the modern life. With all the massive new amounts of published material to read, people saw themselves as smarter than they were. They thought they could take that to God, the church, worship, and to the Bible. In essence, “let’s take our superior knowledge and apply it now to the Bible.”
Evidentialism
Modernism included evidentialism. Something isn’t true without exposure to man’s reason and evidence. No, the Bible stands on its own. It is self-evident truth, higher than reason and evidence, at the same time not contradicting reason or evidence.
Modern textual criticism arose out of modernism. The prosperity from the fulfillment of the cultural mandate proceeding from publication and distribution of scripture brought this proud intellectualism. Like in the days of the Judges, it isn’t even true. It isn’t better.
People have cell phones today, but who right now thinks that we are superior to when men believed the transcendentals? Objective truth, objective goodness, and objective beauty? We have a 60 inch television with a thousand channels, but we lost the greater transcendence. Modernists put the Bible under their scrutiny, undermining its objective nature.
Sincere Milk
The Apostle Peter called the Word of God “the sincere milk,” which is “the pure mother’s milk.” Like James wrote and identical to God, the Word of God is pure with neither “variableness, neither shadow of turning” (James 1:17). This is why true believers of the gospel message of scripture are begotten “with the word of truth” (James 1:18). God inspired His Words and He preserves His Words using His means, His churches.
Modernists came to the Bible to improve it with their humanistic theories. They would say, textual variants prove its corruption. They would restore it to near purity using modernistic means of the modern academy.
The text of true churches, they believed “God . . . by his singular care and providence, kept pure in all ages.” They received that text. The modernist academy came along saying, that text is not the oldest, so not the best. The better text is shorter for ideological reasons. Therefore, everyone has a basis only for relative and proportional confidence, not absolute certainty in the Words of God. Scripture became subject to modern intellectual tinkering.
Proud Intellectualism
Even in an evidential way, the critical text, a product of critical theories, is not superior. It allured the proud intellect of modern academics. It shifted scripture into the laboratory of the university and outside of the God-ordained institution of preservation.
Textual critics cherry pick words and phrases, attacking the text received by the churches, saying, this is found in only one late manuscript. Meanwhile, 99% of their text comes from two manuscripts. A hundred lines of text have no manuscript evidence. They admit themselves educated guessing. They elevate the date of extant manuscripts above all criteria, including scriptural presuppositions.
Call to Consider Former Things
I ask that we reconsider the spoiled or poison fruit of modernity, arising from a corruption of the prosperity of the printing and wide distribution of the Bible. God through Isaiah in 41:21-22 says:
21 Produce your cause, saith the Lord; bring forth your strong reasons, saith the King of Jacob. 22 Let them bring them forth, and shew us what shall happen: let them shew the former things, what they be, that we may consider them, and know the latter end of them; or declare us things for to come.
“Former things” relate to the present and to the future, “the latter end of them.” To understand the present and the future, we need to look to the past. When did we go off the rails into modernism and now postmodernism? I call on churches to turn back the clock to former things in a former time. See the cycle of the Judges, repent and cry out to God. Like James wrote later in chapter one (verse 21):
Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls.
Do We Need Evidence Outside of the Bible or Do Biblical Presuppositions Count as Evidence?
This post relates to the Ross-White Debate and the Related Subject of Landmarkism
In numerous ways God established the truth and authority of His Word. Believers rely on scripture for their faith and practice. They trust the Word of God as evidence. God said it, so it is true.
Scripture talks about Noah, so there is a Noah, Abraham, so there is an Abraham, and Moses, so there is a Moses. You don’t have to find something outside of the Bible about these figures to believe what God says about them in the Bible. It is self-evident. Whatever scripture says is true.
The Bible teaches justification by faith. Does evidence show that God imputes the righteousness of Christ to us, forgives all our sins, or justifies us by faith? I can’t point to the truth of this outside of the Bible. I believe it because God’s Word says it.
Was there a tree of life? Yes. Did the sun stand still in Joshua? Yes. Was there a Samson? Yes. How can we answer “yes” to any of these questions without something outside of the Bible?
Authentication of Scripture
Authentication of scripture exists outside the Bible. Men investigate the people and events recorded in it, outside of it. Nothing men find contradicts what it says. They can’t confirm everything, but for what they can find confirmation of the Bible outside of the Bible, it confirms it.
The Bible makes thousands of predictions. These are most often layered predictions with many different details to the prophecies. For the prophecies to come true, much happens that involves many different people and places. Fulfillment of every prophecy occurred.
Extra-scriptural written materials validate people and events in scripture. Archaeology confirms people and events in the Bible. When comparing one part of the Bible with another, one part or more confirms another part. Different sections confirm each other with their agreement. Fulfilled prophecies authenticate the truth and authority of what scripture says.
Copying Scripture
Scripture so impressed its readers and adherents that they copied it more than any other document. More hand copies exist than any other document in all of history, and by far. Hand copies of the Bible far exceed any other book. Many, many throughout history accepted it as true.
We can look at this world and know that it didn’t occur by accident. What we witness in nature requires more than naturalistic explanation. The supernatural explanation of the Bible matches what we see in the world. The comparison of passages within the Bible attest to their explanation of the origins of the world, people, nations, nature, civilization, events, and language. It provides a cohesive view of the world in which we live.
The Bible is its own evidence. By itself, it is a standard. The writings themselves ring with authority and truth. No one could just make them up.
Scripture Is Evidence
With everything that I have written so far, a reader of the Bible can depend on its contents to believe its doctrine. Where there is no sure evidence outside of scripture, scripture is the evidence. If God says holy men of God wrote the words of God under verbal, plenary inspiration, we believe that. If He says He will preserve all of those same words and how He will do that, we believe that. Whatever might contradict what scripture says, we hold to scripture and reject what contradicts it.
Jesus said that the gates of hell would not prevail against His church, so they didn’t. Jesus said His Words would not pass away, so they didn’t. Believers deny whatever contradicts what God said. They deny modern textual critics who deny the perfect preservation of scripture. Believers deny the disappearance of true churches outside of the state church. They deny alterations of the creation story in Genesis 1 through 3. True Christians accept the table of nations in Genesis 10. Everything God says is true and every man a liar.
Scripture is the test of truth. Jesus said, God’s Word is truth. As an example, today so-called experts talk about climate change and the end of life on earth. We reject those claims. Even the evidence outside the Bible challenges their assertions, but the Bible presents a different view.
The Bible Guides the Right Interpretation of History
The Bible provides the authoritative basis for the right interpretation of history. If a view of history contradicts the Bible, believers accept the Bible over the view. Isaiah 40 to 48 talks about the interpretation of history. Isaiah calls these “the former matters.” Isaiah, because of God, could relate former matters with present and future ones. God sees it all at all times. He knows it all.
Since the Bible is true, it is also evidence. This is a matter of faith. We believe it, based on that evidence. It guides our interpretation. When we look back at what happened, we start with presuppositions based upon the Bible. Our interpretation of history must conform to the Bible.
In the recent debate with James White, Thomas Ross started with scriptural presuppositions. They are true. God said what He would do with scripture. We might not prove the fulfillment of these presuppositions outside of scripture. They’re still true.
If God said He would preserve every word, God would make all of them available to every generation of believers, and He would use the church to do it, that’s what we believe. What God said provides the authoritative basis for the right interpretation of history. I believe what God said He would do, because what He said is true.
What Pleases God
When people come up with other points of view on preservation that reject or deny what God said, I reject those. They may say they have evidence. I will look at it, and I have. Their so-called evidence is an interpretation of history. That’s all it is. They say this and that about Erasmus or Beza or Athanasius that all conforms to their naturalistic point of view. I listen to it, see how it fits into a biblical view of history, and if it doesn’t, I don’t believe it. That is what pleases God.
How I look at the history of the preservation of scripture is also how I look at the history of the preservation of the church. It is how I look at the history of Christian doctrine. Because I don’t believe in an apostasy of orthodox doctrine and practice, I reject that it happened. History seems to say it did in certain instances, but how trustworthy is history before the printing press?
Example
James White uses the example of Athanasius as proof that the Comma Johanneum (important part of 1 John 5:7) did not exist at that time. Athanasius didn’t quote it apparently. First, we have to depend on Athanasius. Then we have to rely on the report of Athanasius. Did someone report him accurately? And then we have to trust the preservation of the report of Athanasius. Why was this report preserved and other reports not? To the victors go the spoils.
On some doctrinal content, not necessarily this one, did the Roman Catholics control the flow of information and destroy what did not confirm its doctrine? Someone can say it’s true, because they read something. James White did that. It works today for his point of view. Did what he say fit with scriptural presuppositions? He says it fit with Athanasius, and what scripture says, be gone. I reject his interpretation of it because it contradicts scriptural presuppositions. That is how believers should interpret history.
Greeks Seek After Wisdom
Paul said the Jews seek after signs. They validated with signs. He said, Greeks seek after wisdom. They validated with wisdom. For something to be true, was it accompanied by signs? For something to be true, does wisdom confirm it? Believers say, the foolishness of preaching, which is the substance of preaching from scripture. That glorifies God.
When James White and others present their wisdom, who is glorified? They are. When we speak, they say it sounds like foolishness. Does this sound familiar when you think about what the Apostle Paul said?
The Biblical Presuppositions for the Critical Text that Underlie the Modern Versions, Pt. 3
Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four Part Five
I have never heard a critical text proponent care about the biblical and historical doctrine of preservation. Most just ignore it. It doesn’t matter to them. Others attempt to explain it away, as if guilt exists over denying the obvious. Professing theologians, pastors, and teachers deal with this doctrine differently than any other and in many varied ways. Circumstances and experience should not engineer the interpretation of scripture.
Serious About Words of God, Plural
Many years ago, I listened to a sermon by John MacArthur, titled, “The Doctrine of Inspiration Explained.” At one point, he took off against “thought inspiration” of scripture by saying:
This is a denial of verbal inspiration. If this is true, we’re really wasting our time doing exegesis of the text because the words aren’t the issue. Like the gentleman said to me on the Larry King Show the other night, which I mentioned, “You’re so caught up in the words you’re missing the message of the Bible.” That’s a convenient view. The idea that there’s some idea, concept, religious notion there that may or may not be connected to the words, but the Bible claims to be the very words of God.
First Corinthians 2:13, “We speak not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches.” Paul says when I give the revelation of God, when I write down that which God inspires in me, it is not words coming from man’s wisdom, but which the Spirit teaches.
In John 17:8 Jesus said, “I have given unto them the words which You gave Me and they have received them.” The message was in the words, there is no message apart from the words, there is no inspiration apart from the words. More than 3800 times in the Old Testament we have expressions like “Thus says the Lord,” “The Word of the Lord came,” “God said,” it’s about the words. There are no such things as wordless concepts anyway.
When Moses would excuse himself from serving the Lord, he said, “I need to do something else because I’m not eloquent.” God didn’t say, “I’ll give you a lot of great ideas, you’ll figure out how to communicate them.” God didn’t say, “I’ll be with your mind.” God said to him this, “I will be with your mouth and I will teach you what you shall say.” And that explains why 40 years later, according to Deuteronomy 4:2, Moses said to Israel, “You shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall you diminish ought from it that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you.” Don’t touch anything I command you because this is from God.
He continued later:
In fact, the opposite is true. Bible writers wrote down words they didn’t understand. In 1 Peter chapter 1 we are told there that the prophets wrote down the words and didn’t understand what they meant. The prophets, verse 10 of 1 Peter 1, who prophesied of the grace that would come made careful search and inquiry, seeking to know what person or time the Spirit of Christ within them was indicating as he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories to follow. Here they are writing about the sufferings of the coming Messiah, writing about the glory to follow the suffering of the Messiah, and then they’re searching what they wrote. They’re inquiring in the very words which they were inspired to write, to figure out what person and what time is in view. They couldn’t even interpret fully the meaning of the words they were actually writing. God did not give ideas without words but in some cases He gave words without complete ideas.
Taking Matthew 24:35 honestly, he says:
In Matthew 24:35 the Scripture is very clear, “Heaven and earth shall pass away but My words…My words shall not pass away.” When God speaks, He speaks with words and the Bible are the…is the representation in writing of the words that came from God…the words that God spoke.
In the same sermon, he later preaches:
It was Jesus who emphasized the importance of every word…every word and every letter when He said, “Not a jot or tittle will ever fail.” He said in Luke 18:31, “All the things that are written through the prophets shall be accomplished.” He even based His interpretation of the Old Testament on a single word…a single word. The words do matter.
Jesus was answering the Sadducees in Matthew 22 and He said to them, “You are mistaken, not understanding the scriptures, or the power of God, for in the resurrection they neither marry…talking about the angels…nor are given in marriage but are like angels in heaven. But regarding the resurrection of the dead, have you not read that which was spoken to you by God saying, ’I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob?’” He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. And His proof is that God said, “I am…I am the eternal living one.” And furthermore, He is not only the eternal living one but all will live eternally as well. They didn’t believe in a resurrection and He proved His point or certainly to our satisfaction proved His point by talking about the eternality of God in the verb to be in the present tense.
MacArthur teaches like the very words are important, because they come from God. As part of the emphasis, he stresses the vitality of the words to faith and obedience to God, down to the very letters. He’s just taking these passages at face value, not thinking of how he might devalue or diminish them to smuggle in a critical text view that speaks of generic preservation of the singular Word of God and not the Words, plural.
History of Preservation of Words
The doctrine of inspiration comes entirely from scripture. The doctrine of preservation should too. We walk by faith, not by sight. In his volume 2 of Post Reformation Reformed Dogmatics, Holy Scripture: The Cognitive Foundation of Theology, Richard Muller writes concerning John Owen and Francis Turretin:
He (Owen) had not, it is true, predicated his doctrine of Scripture as Word on his ability to prove the perfection of the text. Rather, like Turretin and the other orthodox, he had done precisely the opposite: he assumed the authority, infallibility, and integrity of the text on doctrinal grounds.
This is the historic approach to the Bible, relying on scriptural presuppositions, and in contrast to modern textual criticism. Later Muller writes:
The case for Scripture as an infallible rule of faith and practice . . . . rests on an examination of the apographa and does not seek the infinite regress of the lost autographa as a prop for textual infallibility.
He continued:
A rather sharp contrast must be drawn, therefore, between the Protestant orthodox arguments concerning the autographa and the views of Archibald Alexander Hodge and Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield. . . . Those who claim an errant text, against the orthodox consensus to the contrary, must prove their case. To claim errors in the scribal copies, the apographa, is hardly a proof. The claim must be proven true of the autographa. The point made by Hodge and Warfield is a logical leap, a rhetorical flourish, a conundrum designed to confound the critics—who can only prove their case for genuine errancy by recourse to a text they do not (and surely cannot) have.
The ease at making an honest interpretation of preservation passages, as relating them to the autographa, represents a new and faithless position. Honesty should be shown all of the bibliological texts. Instead of taking the logical leap, rhetorical flourish, to confound critics, like every evangelical modern textual critic, believers should believe what God says.
In the third of seven videos in The Textual Confidence Collective series, Mark Ward criticizes E. F. Hills and Theodore Letis for their attack on inerrancy. He either assumes his audience is ignorant or he himself is ignorant. Warfield and Hodge did what Muller says they did. They invented inerrancy as a term to characterize an errant text. This conformed to their naturalistic presuppositions on the doctrine of preservation against the doctrine passed to and from Owen and Turretin. It is a careless smear on the part of Ward to discredit men believing the historical and scriptural doctrine of preservation.
Matthew 24:35
In Thou Shalt Keep Them, I wrote the chapter on Matthew 24:35. Get the book and read it. I cover the verse in the context of Matthew and the Olivet Discourse in which it appears. It reads:
Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.
The Textual Confidence Collective said that Jesus here guaranteed the fulfillment of the promises He made in His discourse. They also explained that Jesus isn’t talking about perfect textual transmission, when He said, “My words shall not pass away.” You read earlier that John MacArthur preached concerning this text: “When God speaks, He speaks with words and the Bible is the representation in writing of the words that came from God, the words that God spoke.” How MacArthur explained Matthew 24:35 is how the believers in the churches have taken the verse too.
“Perfect textual transmission” is loaded language that serves as a kind of strawman argument. The doctrine of preservation does not argue for perfect textual transmission. It argues for the divine preservation of God’s words, like Jesus promised.
The plain reading of Matthew 24:35 compares the survival of heaven and earth to that of the words of God. The former, which exude permanency from a human standpoint, will pass away, but His Words will not. Words are not tangible and they’re relatively small, so they seem less enduring than heaven and earth with their sheer immensity. However, God’s Words last. This is what Jesus said. The durability of them mean something.
At the end of 1 Corinthians 13 Paul elevates love above faith and hope because of its permanency. This isn’t unusual in scripture. This is also similar to Matthew 4:4. Men survive not with bread, but with the Words of God.
Biblical eschatology foretells the destruction of heaven and earth. Someone investing in heaven and earth will end with nothing. Those trusting in God’s Words, which include what Jesus said in His Olivet discourse, invest in something eternal. The eternality of God’s Words tethers them to the nature of God. They are eternal because God is eternal, making the Words then as well different in nature than just any words. One can count on their fulfillment.
Scripture teaches the perfect preservation of God’s Words. Matthew 24:35 is another one of the verses that do so. The existent of textual variants do not annul Christ’s teaching on the preservation of God’s Words. We should trust what Christ promised. It is more trustworthy than a group of men devoted to naturalistic textual criticism.
Changing Meaning to Conform to Naturalistic Observation or Experience
God’s Word is truth. Whatever God says is true. If He says His Words will not pass away, they will not pass away. Someone responds, “But evidence shows His Words passed away.”
Hebrews 11:1 in God’s Word says, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” There is that word, “evidence.” Mark Ward may say, “Evidence is a false friend.” The way we understand “evidence” today still fits what the King James Version says about faith. What God says gives us the assurance to say His Words do not pass away. In other words, they’re available to every generation of believer. This is a principle from scripture for the preservation of God’s Words.
One of the worst actions for anyone is to change the Word of God based on circumstances or experience. This accords greater with the beginning of cults than work to respect as believers. Through centuries doctrines change based upon men conforming to conventional wisdom or popular norms. Scripture doesn’t change, but doctrines to be derived from scripture can change when men adapt them to their own experience or circumstances.
Would men change the interpretation of scripture and the derived doctrines to fit a personal preference? Men start new religions by doing this. The proponents of modern versions have a lot at stake. When men twist scripture to fit a presupposition, it corresponds to a motive. They defy plain meaning. They have a reason.
The Biblical Presuppositions for the Critical Text that Underlie the Modern Versions
Whatever people believe about the preservation of scripture, they operate according to presuppositions, either natural or supernatural. If they start with the Bible, they come to one view, and when they start outside of it, they come to a different one. Neither side is neutral. Their presuppositions direct their conclusions. They always do.
The Textual Confidence Collective just published part 3 at youtube, a part they called, “Its Theology.” They did not provide scriptural presuppositions of their own, but they attacked those of whom they call, “textual absolutists,” mixing together various factions of King James Version advocates. Their trajectory does not start from the Bible. As a result their position does not reflect the teaching of the Bible.
The four men of the collective attacked just four different preservation passages that underlie a biblical presupposition for the preservation of scripture. They attacked the preservation teaching of one in Psalms, 12:6-7, and three in Matthew, 5:18, 4:4, and 24:35, before they veered into personal anecdotes. I’ll come back Wednesday to write about the four passages they hit.
With an apparent desire for a supernatural presupposition for modern textual criticism, the collective used a basis I have never heard. These men called modern textual criticism, “general revelation.” Contemporary Christian psychology similarly says it relies on general revelation, equating it to human discovery. They elevate laboratory observations, clinical samples, to the level of revelation. In their definition, they say that revelation is general in is content, justifying the terminology. However, general revelation is general in its audience. God reveals it to everyone.
General revelation by its very nature is non-discoverable. By labeling God’s revelation, human discovery, they contradict its root meaning. If it is revelation, God reveals it. Man doesn’t discover it.
If modern textual criticism functions according to general revelation, everyone should see it. It wouldn’t narrow to a caste of experts operating on degrees of probability or speculation. The collective corrupts the meaning of general revelation to provide a supernatural presupposition. Presuppositions don’t wait for an outcome. They assume one before the outcome.
Listening to testimonies of the collective, at least two of the men said they gave up on the doctrine of preservation. They came back to a position of preservation that conformed bibliology to naturalistic presuppositions. They can provide a new definition, like they have with general revelation. This is akin to another historical example, the invention of a new doctrine of inerrancy by Benjamin Warfield in the late 19th century. No one had read that doctrine until Warfield invented it to conform to modern biblical criticism. He expressed an identical motive to the collective.
You can explore history for biblical or supernatural presuppositions for modern textual criticism. You won’t find any. They don’t start with a teaching of scripture. Just the opposite, they begin with a bias against a theological trajectory. Theology would skew their perspective. Rationalism, what the collective now calls “general revelation,” requires elimination of any theological bias when examining manuscripts.
The collective alters their expectations based on naturalistic presuppositions. One said something close to the following, “I have never preached the gospel in a perfect way, yet it is still the gospel. God still works through my imperfect communication to the salvation of souls. God can still work through an imperfect Bible in the same way. He doesn’t need a perfect text to do His work.” The collective anticipates the discovery of textual variation and to ward away unbelief, they capitulate to error in the Bible.
I couldn’t help but think of 1 Peter 1:23-25, where Peter ties the gospel to a perfect text of scripture:
23 Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever. 24 For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away: 25 But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you.
Actual physical elements, such as flesh and grass, corrupt, wither, and fall away. The “word of God” does not. Unlike those, the word of God endures. “This is the word by which the gospel is preached unto you.” Peter alternates between logos and rhema to indicate these are specific words, not word in general. Concrete words do not disappear like flesh, grass, and flowers do. His specific Words can be trusted. Their authority derives from this.
The Apostle Peter ties the gospel to perfection. The most common argument in evangelism against scripture is that it was only written by men. The idea of course is that men are not perfect, so scripture then cannot be trusted. I think I have preached the gospel in a perfect way. That confidence comes from the scripture from which that preaching comes. It is perfect. I’m an imperfect vessel, but I’m not preaching as a natural man, but a spiritual man. God uses me in a perfect way to the saving of men’s souls.
Some of what I heard from the collective some today call epistemological humility. I see it as a form of “voluntary humility” the Apostle Paul warned against in Colossians 2:18. John Gill writes:
True humility is an excellent grace; it is the clothing and ornament of a Christian; nor is there anything that makes a man more like Christ, than this grace; but in these men here respected, it was only the appearance of humility, it was not real; it was in things they devised and willed, not in things which God commanded, Christ required, or the Scriptures pointed at; they would have been thought to have been very lowly and humble, and to have a great consciousness of their own vileness and unworthiness to draw nigh to Christ the Mediator immediately, and by him to God; wherefore in pretence of great humility, they proposed to make use of angels as mediators with Christ; whereby Christ, the only Mediator between God and man, would be removed out of sight and use; and that humble boldness and holy confidence with God at the throne of grace, through Christ, which believers are allowed to use, would be discouraged and destroyed, and the saints be in danger as to the outward view of things, and in all human appearance of losing their reward.
This imperfect gospel presentation is only a pretense of great humility, as someone having a great consciousness of his own vileness and unworthiness. Humility should come in holy confidence, trusting that God would do what He said He would do.
Mark Ward said that he could not trust an interpretation of Psalm 12:7 he had never read from the entire history of the church. He referred to “thou shalt preserve them” (12:7b) as meaning the words of scripture. I can join Ward in doubting a brand new interpretation of one part of a verse. This does not debunk, “Thou shalt keep them.”
I have never read the doctrine of preservation proposed by contemporary evangelical textual criticism in the entire history of the church. They function in an entire doctrinal category against what true believers have taught on preservation. Can he and the rest of the collective join me by taking the theological presuppositions of God’s people for its entire history?
To Be Continued
“Know For a Certainty,” As Seen in the Old Testament, Especially Joshua 23:13-14 and the Hebrew Idiom There, and Its Relevance to Today
While reading through the Bible a second time this year, I came across Joshua 23:13:
Know for a certainty that the Lord your God will no more drive out any of these nations from before you; but they shall be snares and traps unto you, and scourges in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until ye perish from off this good land which the Lord your God hath given you.
In a day of uncertainty, where we are challenged to say that we “know” anything for sure, here is a strong statement at the beginning of the verse, something the audience should “know for a certainty” that would happen in the future. This could be considered a doctrine of its own, because how could anyone “know for a certainty” something is going to happen or not going to happen in the future? I decided to look at the Hebrew behind this English translation to see what the words were.
“Know for a certainty” translates a Hebrew idiom, where the same Hebrew word is used back to back, and in this case it is yawda (my transliteration). Yawda and yawda, the same Hebrew root, appear side by side. The first form is yaw-doe-a (my transliteration), which is a qal infinitive absolute verb, and the second is te-də-oo´ (my transliteration), a qal imperfect, second person, masculine, plural verb. Literally, the two words together say, “Knowing, ye will know.” The sense of those two words in the English is “know for a certainty.”
In 1933, Charles Eugene Edwards wrote a journal article about the above Hebrew idiom construction in Bibliotheca Sacra, entitled, “A Hebrew Idiom.” The first paragraph of that journal article reads [BSac 90:358 (Apr 1933) p. 232]:
In his commentary on Matthew, D. J. A. Alexander refers to a Hebrew idiom (p. 408) “which combines a finite tense and an infinitive of the same verb to express intensity, repetition, certainty, or any other accessory notion not belonging to the essential import of the verb itself”. An illustration is in Is. 6:9, which is more literally quoted in Matt. 13:14, “Hearing ye shall hear”, and “seeing ye shall see”. And Dr. Alexander remarks, (p. 358) “The Hebrew idiom is retained, which uses two forms of the same verb for intensity or more exact specification”. Too literal a translation might sometimes be barbarous or absurd. For example, Joseph never meant to say (Gen. 40:15) “For stealing I was stolen but as it is properly rendered, “For indeed I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews”.
The repetition of the same word brings intensity. For the verb “know,” bringing intensity to “know” is “certainty” or “surety.” That idiom of that exact Hebrew verb in Joshua 23:13 is found thirteen times in the Old Testament. For your reference, here are those twelve usages underlined in the King James Version, minus Joshua 23:13:
Genesis 15:13, And he said unto Abram, Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years;
Genesis 43:7, And they said, The man asked us straitly of our state, and of our kindred, saying, Is your father yet alive? have ye another brother? and we told him according to the tenor of these words: could we certainly know that he would say, Bring your brother down?
1 Samuel 20:3, And David sware moreover, and said, Thy father certainly knoweth that I have found grace in thine eyes; and he saith, Let not Jonathan know this, lest he be grieved: but truly as the LORD liveth, and as thy soul liveth, there is but a step between me and death.
1 Samuel 20:9, And Jonathan said, Far be it from thee: for if I knew certainly that evil were determined by my father to come upon thee, then would not I tell it thee?
1 Samuel 28:1, And it came to pass in those days, that the Philistines gathered their armies together for warfare, to fight with Israel. And Achish said unto David, Know thou assuredly, that thou shalt go out with me to battle, thou and thy men.
1 Kings 2:37, For it shall be, that on the day thou goest out, and passest over the brook Kidron, thou shalt know for certain that thou shalt surely die: thy blood shall be upon thine own head.
1 Kings 2:42, And the king sent and called for Shimei, and said unto him, Did I not make thee to swear by the LORD, and protested unto thee, saying, Know for a certain, on the day thou goest out, and walkest abroad any whither, that thou shalt surely die? and thou saidst unto me, The word that I have heard is good.
Proverbs 27:23, Be thou diligent to know the state of thy flocks, and look well to thy herds.
Jeremiah 26:15, But know ye for certain, that if ye put me to death, ye shall surely bring innocent blood upon yourselves, and upon this city, and upon the inhabitants thereof: for of a truth the LORD hath sent me unto you to speak all these words in your ears.
Jeremiah 40:14, And said unto him, Dost thou certainly know that Baalis the king of the Ammonites hath sent Ishmael the son of Nethaniah to slay thee? But Gedaliah the son of Ahikam believed them not.
Jeremiah 42:19 The LORD hath said concerning you, O ye remnant of Judah; Go ye not into Egypt: know certainly that I have admonished you this day.
Jeremiah 42:22, Now therefore know certainly that ye shall die by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence, in the place whither ye desire to go and to sojourn.
Joshua in his speech to gathered Israel uses the same Hebrew verb in Joshua 23:14, the next verse:
And, behold, this day I am going the way of all the earth: and ye know in all your hearts and in all your souls, that not one thing hath failed of all the good things which the Lord your God spake concerning you; all are come to pass unto you, and not one thing hath failed thereof.
Looking at the usage of the verb in verse 13 and then in verse 14, the understanding is that they should know with certainty about their futures and that they already do know in the present. They should know what’s going to occur in the future with certainty partly because they already know in the present. What they know in the present in their hearts and in their souls, an expression that also brings intensity to knowing, is that not one thing failed of all the good things which the Lord their God spoke concerning them. If they know that in the present, then they know with certainty also what God says to them through Joshua for their future.
Nothing is more sure than the Word of God. It is so sure that the knowledge is certain. If God says it, it is certain. This certain knowledge could be and should be called, the truth. It is the truth. Any contradiction to it is a lie. Today it could and should also at least be called, “science.” God created all natural laws and He spoke all moral law. They are both all true, knowledge, and scientific.
Uncertainty is a tool of Satan from the very beginning of time. Satan’s temptation of Eve created uncertainty about what God said. The uncertainty relates to the human will, giving a person liberty where he doesn’t have it. The uncertainty about what God said gave Eve what she thought was liberty to eat. Maybe she wouldn’t die if she ate of the tree. Maybe God was doing something other than what He said.
The liberty created by uncertainty is a confusion of sovereignty. Who is sovereign? Or, who is the true or actual sovereign in the world? Sovereignty shifts from God to man. If I can’t be sure of what God said, then I am free to do what I want to do. God can’t hold me responsible for something I couldn’t know. This conflicts with faith that pleases God. God isn’t pleased by the uncertainty that fuels unbelief and disobedience. He wants us to be sure.
In Joshua 23:14, Joshua says, you already know. This is a presupposition. The Apostle Paul uses the same presupposition in Romans 1:18-20:
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness; 19 Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. 20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.
Not knowing, being uncertain, is an excuse. It isn’t a valid excuse. It allows for a wide range of possibilities for men. Anticipating that excuse, in Deuteronomy God takes a preemptive strike after repeating His law to the people Israel through Moses (30:11-14):
11 For this commandment which I command thee this day, it is not hidden from thee, neither is it far off. 12 It is not in heaven, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go up for us to heaven, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? 13 Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go over the sea for us, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? 14 But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, that thou mayest do it.
Today people will say either the Bible was written by men, it isn’t preserved in a perfect way, or it can’t be understood because of the centuries of separation from its original writing. The will of God then becomes very pliable, very adaptable to the will of man. He won’t be challenged by authority because there is none. He gets to do what he wants with uncertainty as his premise. This is a lie, just like it was in the Garden of Eden. Don’t think that you are free to go your own way because you can’t know the truth. God’s Word is true. Know with certainty.
How Does Natural Law Work in and for Evangelism of the Lost?
Romans 1:18-21 read:
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness; 19 Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. 20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: 21 Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
I’m assuming a lot of you readers know these verses. According to them though, based on what people know, they will be judged rightly by God, because what they know means that they are without excuse. At the same time, people are not going to experience the wrath of God’s judgment because of ignoring information, but because of ignoring law. When they knew God, they didn’t glorify Him as God and were not thankful unto Him. Glorifying God as God is represented by various prescriptions, which are laws. This knowledge isn’t a mere bunch of facts. Bare acknowledgement of God’s existence isn’t sufficient to avoid the wrath of God. The judgment and wrath of God is justice for disobeying natural law.
Natural law relates to the theological terminology, general revelation. “General” is general in audience, that is, everyone knows it, so everyone is responsible for these laws. Knowing God and glorifying Him as God in Romans 1 means knowing these laws to the extent that someone is responsible for obeying them. They relate to the revelation of God, so according to His nature. No one has an excuse for not knowing these. They’re natural to know. All men are responsible for them.
In my assessment, the natural laws are those most denied, and against which men are most rebellious. On the other hand, men like what they consider to be their natural rights, like what Thomas Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence mentions at the beginning:
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
He uses the language, “Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God,” “truths to be self-evident,” and “endowed by their Creator.” Natural laws are self-evident truths.
Men know natural laws. They’re natural to them, so to deny them, they are at their most rebellious. The Apostle Paul talks about some of them later in chapter 1. They rebel against God’s natural order, because it clashes with what they want. It’s natural that the woman is the weaker vessel, and women very often don’t want to hear that. The natural order of two parents and children obeying their parents is repulsive to children.
When people think of the Declaration, they especially think, “all men are created equal.” They focus on the word, “equal.” Most often, however, I’ve noticed that they ignore the first four words, “all men are created.” It is self-evident that “all men are created.” Equal, yes, but it is self-evident that man is created by God. To Jefferson, creation of man carried with it more than sheer existence. With God as Creator, He s also Lawgiver and then Judge.
I’ve found when evangelizing lost people that they will still act like they don’t know certain things. Since Romans 1 says they really do know, I assume they do. This is presuppositionalism. I presuppose people know what is natural to know. Many of those things people say they don’t know, they rely on for enjoying their lives, which is why Jefferson uses “Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of Happiness.” People like those things and yet they act as though they’ve somehow received them by accident. This is the part in Romans 1:19, “who hold the truth in unrighteousness.” As many of you know, it means they suppress the truth. The way I put it is that the problem is not intellectual, but volitional.
Romans 1:18-22 assure what is already known by everyone. I’m saying, you know that everyone knows what Romans 1:18-22 say because those verses say they do. People can act like they don’t know, but you know that they do, so that you don’t believe that they don’t know. God says they do know, so they do know.
If someone is suppressing the truth, that means he knows and he is rebelling against what he knows. In evangelism, you expose the lost on his rebellion. How do you do that?
When I encounter someone who says he is a scientist, a professing atheist, too uncertain, or just not sure because he says he’s not gotten enough proof, I rely on natural law. I refer to a number of different examples. “When you look out there at the vast and intricate world, does that look like it all came about by accident?”
I haven’t found anyone who likes to be characterized as thinking or believing that everything came about by accident, but if this world isn’t an accident, then it is design. People know this is design. Scripture says, according to the way I like to put it, that they don’t want to have a boss. The Designer would be their Boss. They like having their own way, which you can read in the rest of Romans 1 and in 2 Peter. 2 Peter 3 says these scoffers are walking after their own lust.
I continue. “Everything out there is so complex. So many occurrences have to be going right at one time, that it is mathematically impossible to be an accident. It looks like design. Four or five hundred different circumstances need to be going right for us to even survive. If just one of those hundreds does not go exactly right, we couldn’t survive. This can’t be an accident. The human body itself is so complicated, the human eye, speech, the operation of the brain, the circulatory system, our heart beat, so many that have to be functioning in just a certain way at one time. And that’s just to survive.”
Romans 1:21 says, “Neither were thankful.” “So we breathe God’s air, eat the food that comes from a seed growing from the ground, enjoy all of the good things all around on this earth, use all of that, and then just ignore Him.” This is when you can turn to scripture to point rebellion out. “Romans 1 says that everyone already knows all this and rather than worship and serve the Creator, they serve the creature. It describes this as not being thankful, being unwilling to give the credit to God, because that acknowledgement would carry with it responsibility. Next chapter, Romans 2, says the goodness of God leads us to repentance.”
The statement of what people know, natural law, aligns with what is written by God in men’s hearts as a default position (Romans 2:15). Pointing out natural law strikes a cord in men’s hearts, their conscience then also bearing witness (v. 15). They feel guilty because of their ungratefulness.
Then I may say, “What we see occurring out in the world also aligns with the Bible. The history of the world reflects what we see there. There is a God, we are here because of Him, He has put us here for a particular purpose, we are responsible to Him, and we are going to meet Him someday. This is what the gospel is about. God is just, but He also loves us, and the good news is that He wants us to save us. However, we really do need to be saved.”
Since the problem is not an intellectual one, the solution is supernatural. The volition, the will of a person, must be dealt with scripture. The Bible is powerful (Hebrews 4:12) and a spiritual weapon to pull down the strongholds in people’s minds (2 Corinthians 10:4).
The approach I’m giving you is biblical. It’s what the Apostle Paul did in Acts 17. It doesn’t mean that it will result in your audience either listening or being converted, but it gives people an opportunity, which is what you want. It might be too late for most. You don’t know. More than ever, we’re living in an age in which natural law is a necessity in an evangelism approach.
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