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Objections to Christians Learning Greek and Hebrew (6/7)
The first five blog posts summarizing the argument in Reasons Christians Should and Can Learn Greek and Hebrew, the Biblical Languages explained the value of learning the Biblical languages and explained that the languages are not too difficult to learn–indeed, Biblical Greek and Hebrew are easier languages to learn than modern English. Clearly, knowing the languages is valuable and attainable. But people have objections.
1.) “Greek letters look different from English ones! Hebrew letters, even more so! Greek and Hebrew must be hard languages!”
While some people who begin to learn Greek and Hebrew do not finish what they started, there is just about nobody that cannot learn the Greek and Hebrew alphabet. If toddlers can learn the alphabet in Israel and in Greece, adults can learn the same alphabet in English-speaking countries.
2.) “Learning Greek and Hebrew is dangerous: such knowledge makes the person who knows the languages proud.”
There is no reason why learning God’s Word in Greek or Hebrew would contribute to pride rather than to humility, any more than learning God’s Word in English would contribute to pride rather than to humility.
3.) “Learning Greek and Hebrew is too hard.”
This objection was already examined in the part four of this seven part series. However, even if learning the languages was very hard, it would not be as hard as being crucified. But all Christians are called to daily cross-bearing, so they are all already called to something that is much harder than learning Greek or Hebrew.
4.) “Greek and Hebrew can be abused.”
Yes, the Bible in Greek or in Hebrew can be abused, as can the Bible in English. Should we refrain from learning the English language because innumerable cults and false religions abuse the English Bible? Because many preachers who warn about the dangers of Greek and Hebrew do not even know how to properly exposit the English text, should we avoid English?
5.) “I do not have time to learn Greek and Hebrew—I am too busy preparing for ministry or too busy, already serving in the ministry.”
Over the course of a lifetime of ministry, learning Greek and Hebrew actually saves tremendous amounts of time. Exegetical conclusions that are easily and quickly determined by an examination of the original language text are hard and time consuming to someone who does not know the Biblical languages.
The objections above to learning the Biblical languages are insufficient. They do not even come close to refuting the positive case for learning Greek and Hebrew summarized in the first five sections of this blog series or in the more comprehensive work Reasons Christians Should and Can Learn Greek and Hebrew, the Biblical Languages, pages 52-57 of which are summarized here.
–TDR
The Conflicting, Perplexing Calvinistic Doctrine of Free Will (Part Four)
A Hebrew word for “repent” in the Old Testament is nocham and it’s mainly used of God. It first appears in Genesis 6:6: “And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.” The Old Testament makes those kinds of statements several times. Compatible with that, consider the last two verses of the Old Testament (Malachi 4:5-6):
5 Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD: 6 And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.
Elijah comes, who is John the Baptist, and preaches to Israel. The LORD motivates Israel with His coming and smiting the earth with a curse. If they listen, God withholds the curse. If they don’t listen, the curse comes. The curse may or may not come. This is a warning. So what happens? A relatively few listen. The rest are cursed. This isn’t predetermination. This is how the sovereignty of God works. God does intervene with the warning and then later with the curse or punishment.
To read Malachi 4:5-6 any other way, complicating it with a wrong view of determinism, would pervert the plain meaning. The two ideas of Genesis 6 and Malachi 4 are complimentary: (1) God repents of what He was going to do because of what men have done, and (2) Men repent and God changes what He was going to do. Both of those concepts, which are in scripture in multiple places, speak of men, including unsaved ones, having a free will. They can make choices.
Men making choices doesn’t limit God. God makes up the rules, His laws, and He uses the responses of men to orchestrate His will according to providence. Man is not the determiner. He doesn’t make the rules or the laws. The Lord uses the wrong response by man and the right response by man both to still accomplish His purpose.
God does predetermine events. He knows everything. He has the power and wisdom to do whatever He wills. His will is perfect. Because all of this, God has free will to the greatest extent.
The Influence of Calvinism
Calvinists say, “Man doesn’t have free will, he has natural will, which is not free.” There are many ideas behind it, but nothing in scripture backs it up. The idea, that I read, is two main influences on the Protestant view of free will, Augustine and then later Luther’s writing, The Bondage of the Will. The Bible will get you a certain distance toward the point of Calvinism about free will, but it doesn’t get you all the way.
Calvinism, out of what seems like desperation, crafts a title, like R. C. Sproul uses, the “humanist view of free will.” He surmises this view is the majority view of believers, but when I read the view, I can’t imagine anyone believes it. Is this a scientific study based on poll research? He defines it this way:
[T]he choices we make are in no wise conditioned or determined by any prior prejudice, inclination, or disposition. Let me say that again: this view says that we make our choices spontaneously. Nothing previous to the choice determines the choice—no prejudice, prior disposition, or prior inclination—the choice comes literally on its own as a spontaneous action by the person.
Every choice comes because of prejudice, prior disposition or inclination. A high enough percentage thinks there is prior inclination or disposition, that I would say everyone believes that, just the opposite of what Sproul says.
The Bondage of the Will
Just because someone acts on the basis of his strongest inclination at the moment of that choice, terminology used by Jonathan Edwards in his work, Freedom of Will, does not contradict freedom of will. An unsaved man lacks in moral ability, but there are other means by which someone can choose Jesus Christ. He has the freedom to choose.
Romans 3:10-12 say man neither seeks after God nor understands God. Ephesians 2:1-5 say the lost are dead. I read though that the truth sets some free from being a slave to sin (John 8:32-36). All these though say to me that man can’t initiate the salvation. That’s also what I read in the Bible; we love Him because He first loved us (1 John 4:19).
Can there be spiritual death and bondage to sin and free will? I’m writing, yes, but it’s also because it’s what I read in scripture. If man can’t do anything, because he’s in bondage, then he’s not responsible for anything. Yet, he is responsible. He’s responsible because God does reveal Himself to man. I read this in Romans 1 among other places.
When men asked Jesus in Luke 13:23, are there few that be saved? His answer put it on man and his obvious not striving to enter into the narrow gate. Everything fits this way. You read the parable of the soils in Matthew 13. Jesus starts teaching in parables so as not to harden their hearts. A less hard heart results in greater reception to the seed. The truth can harden a heart. Jesus talks about four types of hearts and all of these are about reception of the truth.
The Word of God, God’s Revelation
The Word of God, God’s revelation, is the supernatural cure for spiritual death and bondage to sin. Hebrews 4:12 says the Word of God is powerful. It is the sword of the Spirit (Eph 6:17).
Revelation that defeats bondage and spiritual death starts with general revelation, which is general in its audience. This is the grace of God that appears to all men (Titus 2:11). Jesus said the truth is what sets someone free (Jn 8:32). Determination isn’t what sets people free. Regeneration isn’t what is said to set people free. Jesus freed dead Lazarus from the grave with His Words (Jn 11:43). God said, let there be light and there was light (Gen 1:3). Paul wrote, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God (Rom 10:17).
Faith is not a work. It is a gift. Philippians 1:29, “For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake.” It is given to believe on Christ. 2 Peter 1:1, “Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.” These saints obtained like precious faith.
God gives faith. God gives it by means of His revelation. He gives it by means of the Word of God. Without revelation and without the Word of God, someone cannot believe. God initiates salvation. Salvation is of the Lord.
Tension
I don’t mind the claim of “a tension.” I think there’s a tension. The tension comes with two possible questions. For the Calvinist the question concerns why someone or who is predetermined to Heaven or predetermined to Hell. For a non Calvinist at least like myself the question concerns why someone responds to God’s revelation and some don’t. I have many verses behind the tension that I believe. All of scripture fits that tension. The Calvinist says something like, God is sovereign over everything and He doesn’t have to answer, like the Potter doesn’t have to answer to clay.
I can agree with the Calvinist about tension. God can do whatever He wants, and it’s always righteous. He’s always righteous. We are clay and He is the Potter. However, the Potter gives answers all over His Word.
Let’s say you’re the parent and your child asks why? You answer, I’m your Dad, that’s why. That’s true, but that’s not the kind of answer that we get again and again and again in scripture.
I would say that man’s will is in bondage. Maybe I and the Calvinist agree. Perhaps it’s just how the bondage is removed. Scripture says that God’s revelation is the delivering agent. Since the Calvinist believes in determinism, it seems to me that he makes up this regeneration by the Holy Spirit that precedes faith. I’ll leave it at that.
Faith pleases God and faith comes by hearing the Word of God. God isn’t glorified by adding something to scripture even if it’s for the purpose of glorifying God. I’ve noticed with Calvinists today, that for apparently completely depending on God’s sovereignty, they use Finney-esque new measures to accomplish church growth. I can listen to most Calvinists and hear them tie church growth success to human methodology. This is where I tell them I’m more Calvinistic than the Calvinists. I’m not trolling them. I think it’s true.
In another ironic turn, I say, the truth shall set you free. The Calvinistic view of free will is not biblical. It is not the truth. I have often heard and read Calvinists say that they just got their Calvinism from scripture. I can’t imagine anyone reading the Bible and getting a deterministic position. Unlike the Bible, it is conflicting and perplexing. From the very beginning of scripture to the end, the Bible tells a story in which men make choices based on free will.
The Conflicting, Perplexing Calvinistic Doctrine of Free Will
As I started to write this post, I thought about whether I decided to write it or whether God predetermined my writing it. After the smoke exited and cleared my ears, I started writing again. Are my fingers typing on their own?
The Calvinistic Doctrine of Free Will
Does Calvinism Square With Scripture?
The Shell Game Played With Words About the Bible
You know right now the concern about the gender of pronouns used to address the sexes. The controversy revolves around calling a biological male, “him,” or a biological female, “her.” People change the meaning of the words and expect us to play along. You know it’s a man, but you call him, a her. You call he, a she.
Let’s say we’re talking about the words of scripture. Inspiration applies to words. God inspired words. And then someone says, I believe in the inerrancy of scripture in the context of words. We think he means, no errors in the words. I think he even knows that we think he means words. However, he doesn’t mean words. He’s not saying that there are no errors in the words.
Someone holds up a Bible and calls it the inerrant Word of God. He doesn’t mean words. He means something different. It’s hard to say what he means, but it’s probably the following. Inerrancy means that you can trust that the teachings of the Bible are without error. He doesn’t bring up inerrancy in the context of the teachings of the Bible. He brings it up in the context of words. He’s playing a shell game, moving those shells around very quickly. You thought he meant words, but he didn’t.
You think the bead is under the shell. That’s what someone wants you to think. The bead is words, but you see a shell. Words aren’t under the shell. It’s teachings, and even that is ambiguous, because even with that, he doesn’t mean teachings.
When someone says the teachings of scripture are inerrant, if that’s even what he means, because that can become very ambiguous, he doesn’t mean that you can’t find errors in the Bible. You can. However, all things considered, if you take all the combined passages of the Bible to come up with those teachings, all the right teachings are available in the Bible.
Men don’t even agree on what the Bible teaches, let alone on what’s right that it does teach. Two different men can say they believe in inerrancy and then disagree on ten different doctrines of scripture. It’s a hypothetical inerrancy. Let’s just say it. It isn’t inerrancy. I can agree to an ambiguous, hypothetical inerrancy, and then agree that the Bible is inerrant. I can hold up the Bible and say, this is the inerrant Word of God.
When I say the Bible is without error, I mean that it is without error. Every Word that God inspired has been preserved in the language in which it is written. Since inerrancy relates to what God inspired, if there are missing words, then it isn’t inerrant any more. I believe that and not in a hypothetical way. I’m not going to say that we both agree the Bible is inerrant, fully realizing that when you say “inerrant” you don’t even mean “inerrant.” You mean something that allows you to believe the Bible is inerrant without believing that it is inerrant. This is like calling him, her.
If the Bible is perfect, then it can’t be given extra perfection. There are those who do not believe it is perfect. They also don’t believe that scripture says that scripture is perfect. They believe that it is inerrant, but it isn’t perfect.
I would say, don’t call the Bible perfect if you don’t believe it. Also, don’t call it inerrant, if you don’t believe it is inerrant. Don’t make perfect and inerrant mean something different than what they obviously mean in light of what the Bible says about itself.
I can go through my Bible and show you a doctrine of its inerrancy and perfection. Then I ask, “Does the Bible teach that it is inerrant and perfect?” You say, “Yes.” So then I ask, “Okay, so which Bible is the inerrant and perfect one?” You say, “None are.” So is the teaching of the Bible inerrant and perfect?
I believe the Bible is perfect and inerrant because the Bible says so. Then you start peppering me with individual words, phrases, verses, and even larger passages. I explain every one of those texts based on the presupposition that I have. I can do it. Now let me get into your presuppositions, how you came to having them, or whether they are reverse engineered.
You say, I can see that there isn’t a perfect Bible. So now when you look at the passages that teach the Bible is perfect, they’ve got to mean something else. Where do those presuppositions come from? How did you get those presuppositions? How is that conservative?
I’m not playing a shell game when I say the Bible is inerrant and perfect. Many others are.
Free Logos & Accordance Books!
Free books with Logos and Accordance Bible software–great! I own–and use regularly–both Logos and Accordance Bible software. I believe Accordance has superior resources for detailed exegetical study of Scripture in the original languages, so I use mainly Accordance for my study of the Bible itself, whether for my own devotional reading, for sermons and for teaching, and so on. I also use Accordance in case I need to look a word up while hearing the great expository preaching at Bethel Baptist Church. I use Logos for most of my commentaries and reference tools, because, in my opinion, the books are easier to read and reference in Logos. Logos also has a superior read-aloud feature, so I can listen to practically every book I have in my Logos library read aloud to me while I am doing errands, driving, and so on.
You can regularly get free books with both Accordance and Logos. To get free books on Accordance, sign up here for their mailing list where they tell you about their free books. Make sure you read down or at least scroll down to the end of their emails, as they sometimes put the free books at the bottom, to get you to read the whole thing. There are several free books you can get from Logos each month. Click here to find out about the Logos free book of the month. You can also get on their mailing list so that they tell you each month about the free book. Logos has a Catholic division called Verbum which also offers a free book every month; you can get this month’s free book and sign up to get notified each month here. Sometimes the Catholic free books are idolatrous garbage, since Catholicism is an evil false religion, but other times they are useful works by patristic writers or some other worthwhile volume (at least for free!). Logos also offer free e-books that are not searchable in the same way their Logos and Verbum resources are; I sometimes get those for free as well, although I have not found them especially helpful.
Maybe you say, “I don’t own Accordance or Logos. Why should I get free books from them?” You can get the free books and use them even if you never buy anything with Accordance or Logos. For example, sometimes Logos has given away expensive and very useful commentaries as their free book of the month. (Other months the books are not as useful, but the price is still right.) You can open and read the free books within the Accordance or Logos laptop/desktop or phone apps even if you never buy a Logos or Accordance base package. What is more, if you ever do buy an Accordance or Logos base package, you don’t have to pay for what you already own, so if you have gotten a lot of books for free already, then you are also getting a discount on whatever base package you eventually purchase. (That’s another reason I take the free Catholic book each month as well as the free Christian/non-Catholic one; if they throw the Catholic book into a base package I end up buying later, I am paying less for the base package.)
Why do Accordance and Logos give away free books? They do it because they think you will eventually buy something from them if you sign up. With the free books, they also tell you about discounts on other books in order to get you to buy them. It probably works, too; if you get enough free books, you probably will eventually buy a base package. But that wouldn’t be too bad–both Accordance and Logos Bible software base packages are very useful for studying God’s holy Word. There are definitely worse things to spend money on.
–TDR
The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, Postmodernism, and Critical Theory
People in general don’t want to be told what to do. This arises from the sin nature of mankind, a cursed rebellion passed down from Adam. So people won’t have to do what an authority tells them, they disparage the credibility of it. They especially attack God in diverse manners so He won’t hinder or impede what they want.
Premodernism, Modernism, Postmodernism, Critical Theory, and Epistemology
The premoderns, even if some did not view themselves or the world correctly, related everything to God. Truth was objective. They knew truth either by natural or special revelation of God. If God said it, it was true, no matter what their opinion. Many invented various means to deal with their own contradictions, but God remained God.
Modernism then arose and said revelation wasn’t suitable for knowledge. Modernists could point to distinctions between religions and denominations and the wars fought over them. Knowledge instead came through scientific testing, man’s observations, consequently elevating man above God. Man could now do what he wanted because he changed the standard for knowledge. Faith for sure wasn’t good enough. With modernism, faith might make you feel good, but you proved something in naturalistic fashion to say you know it. Modernism then trampled the twentieth century, producing devastation, unsuccessful with its so-called knowledge.
Premoderns had an objective basis for knowledge, revelation from God. Moderns too, even if it wasn’t valid, had human reasoning, what they called “empirical proof.” Postmoderns neither believed or liked scripture or empiricism. This related to authority, whether God or government or parents, or whatever. No one should be able to tell somebody else what to do, which is to conform them to your truth or your reality. No one has proof. Institutions use language to construct power.
Postmodernism judged modernism a failure, pointing to wars, the American Indians and institutional bias, bigotry, and injustice. Since modernism constructed itself by power and language, a postmodernist possesses his own knowledge of good and evil, his own truth, by which to construct his own reality. No one will any more control him with power and language.
Critical theory proceeds from postmodernism, but is ironically constructed to sound like modernism. It’s not a theory. Theory is by definition supposed to be rational and associated with observations backed by data. Critical theory criticizes, but it isn’t a theory, rather a desire. People desire to do what they want and don’t want someone telling them what to do, so they deconstruct the language to serve their desires and change the outcome. In the United States especially, theorists criticize white males, those who constructed language and power for their own advantage. According to their theories, white men kept down women, all the other races, and sexual preferences.
The postmodernism behind critical theory procures its knowledge with total subjectivity. Those proficient in theory based on their own divination know what’s good and evil, making them woke to this secret knowledge. They have eaten of the tree. White men are evil. The patriarchy is evil. Anyone contesting gender fluidity and trangenderism is evil.
Epistemology is a field of study that explores and judges how we know what we know and whether we really know it, that it is in fact knowledge. What is a sufficient source of knowledge? You can say you know, but do you really know? The Bible uses the term “know” and “knowledge” a lot. Biblical knowledge is certain, because God reveals it. You receive knowledge when you learn what God says. You can’t say the same thing about what you experience or feel.
The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil
In Genesis 2 (vv. 9, 17), what was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? In the same context, Genesis 3:5-7 say:
5 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods,, knowing good and evil. 6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat. 7 And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons.
If Adam and Eve depended on what God knew, they would not have eaten of the forbidden tree. Instead they trusted their own knowledge. The tree wasn’t the tree of the knowledge of good. God provided that knowledge. Just listen to Him. Eating of the tree brought the knowledge of evil. The knowledge of evil, what someone might call, carnal knowledge, reminds me of three verses in the New Testament.
1 Corinthians 5:1, It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father’s wife.
Ephesians 5:3, But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not be once named among you, as becometh saints.
Romans 16:19, For your obedience is come abroad unto all men. I am glad therefore on your behalf: but yet I would have you wise unto that which is good, and simple concerning evil.
What Does “Led By or Of the Spirit” Mean?
If you are a professing Christian, you have heard such a sentence as, “I was led by the Spirit.” I’ve heard it in the form of a question, “Are you led of the Spirit of God?” It can be put in the negative, “He isn’t led of the Spirit,” very often speaking of a believer, implying that some believers are led of the Spirit and others are not.
Romans 8:14, For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.Galatians 5:18, But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law.
In the preceding context Paul discovers to us our inherent sin in all its festering rottenness. But he discovers to us also the Spirit of God as dwelling in us and forming the principle of a new life. It is by the presence of the Spirit within us alone that the bondage in which we are by nature held to sin is broken; that we are emancipated from sin and are no longer debtors to live according to the flesh. This new principle of life reveals itself in our consciousness as a power claiming regulative influence over our actions; leading us, in a word, into holiness.
When we consider this Divine work within our souls with reference to the end of the whole process we call it sanctification; when we consider it with reference to the process itself, as we struggle on day by day in the somewhat devious and always thorny pathway of life, we call it spiritual leading. Thus the “leading of the Holy Spirit” is revealed to us as simply a synonym for sanctification when looked at from the point of view of the pathway itself, through which we are led by the Spirit as we more and more advance toward that conformity to the image of His Son, which God has placed before us as our great goal.
For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.
Sermons on the Sabbath & Lord’s Day: Old and New Testament Evidence, and Seventh-Day Adventism Examined
I have had the privilege of preaching a series on the Sabbath and its relationship to the Lord’s Day. Topics covered include the Sabbath as Israel’s sign of creation and redemption; the way the Sabbath points forward to redemptive rest in the Lord Jesus Christ; Seventh-Day Adventist, Lutheran, Puritan, and dispensational Baptist views of the Sabbath; the question of whether churches in the New Testament era need to meet for worship on the Sabbath or on the Lord’s Day; and a careful study of the heresies, not just on the Sabbath, but on the doctrines of Scripture, God, Trinitarianism, Christ, salvation, last things, and many other areas of Seventh-Day Adventism, as explained in “Bible Truths for Seventh-Day Adventist Friends.”
To listen to the sermons and/or watch the preaching, please:
Click here to watch the series on the Sabbath
and feel free to add a comment, “like” the videos, and/or subscribe to the KJB1611 YouTube channel if you have not already do so.
There is probably one more message on the Sabbath coming, so feel free to check back. You can’t end a series with six messages instead of seven anyway, can you?
–TDR
An Orthodox View of Our English Bibles? Considering Fred Butler’s KJVO Book and the Doctrine of Preservation
Whenever I read the word, “Bibles,” I get a bit of a chill down my spine. Which Bible is the right Bible if there are plural Bibles, not singular Bible? Isn’t there just one? Why are we still producing more and different Bibles? How many are there? What I’m describing is the biggest issue today with translations, not the King James Version, but now it gets little to no coverage compared to other so-called problems.
Many anti-KJVO books have been written, most often, and this continues to be the case with Butler’s book, calling KJVO (King James Version Onlyism) “dangerous.” It’s true that many KJV Onlyists do not believe a scriptural bibliology. I would contend that most are sound, but it’s true also that many are not. That would be a worthwhile criticism of KJVO, confronting those who do not believe in the preservation of scripture, who do not believe God preserved His Words in the original languages, apparently necessitating God’s correction of them in an English translation. This happens to be the same doctrinal position as Fred Butler. He just deals with the consequences of that belief in a different way.
I don’t know how “dangerous” it is to believe in a single Bible of which translation for English speaking people is the King James Version. How will that get someone in trouble? What’s the danger? Even though Butler calls the position dangerous, he doesn’t explain why anywhere in his book, which I find is most often the case with books of this kind. In general, KJVO take the general position that there is only one Bible, which there is. That is a biblical, logical, and historical position: one Bible. Several Bibles is not.
In his preface, recounting his own personal journey away from the King James Version, Butler says,
I found myself helping them [speaking of others also departing] think critically through KJVO argumentation, as well as develop an orthodox view of our English Bibles.
Why and how is it orthodox to refer to the Bible in the plural, “Bibles”? Again, there is only one Bible, and historically Christians have believed in only one. Some type of multiple-versionism, I believe, creates far more confusion and danger. Usually orthodoxy refers to doctrine. Is the doctrine behind multiple versions and textual criticism orthodox? It’s popular today, but not orthodox.
I’m not going to debunk most of the arguments of Butler’s book. His book is exploring zero new territory others cover much more than he. He mainly addresses KJVO advocates of either double inspiration or English preservationism, very low hanging fruit. He barely to if-at-all distinguishes one view from another. He lumps Peter Ruckman and Gail Riplinger with Edward Hills, D. A. Waite, and David Cloud. He uses a very broad brush. I would not anticipate his persuading one person to his position.
One unique argument I had never read was that KJVO are not Calvinist. The idea here is that if you’re not a Calvinist, then you must be wrong in this position on the Bible. The biggest movement of those who exclusively use the KJV as an English translation are Calvinists. The Westminster Confession and London Baptist Confession, as well as many of these Calvinist confessions, hold to the perfect preservation of scripture, which is a one Bible position.
An orthodox view should be a scriptural view. Butler doesn’t establish any kind of biblical and historical view of the preservation of scripture. Butler writes this:
It is true God calls us to have faith, but our faith is grounded upon objective truth.
What is objective truth? Is textual criticism objective truth? No way, and he doesn’t make that connection. It can’t be made. Scripture is the truth on which bibliological positions stand. Butler takes the view agreed by modern evangelicalism, not based upon scripture. He has not faced a bit of criticism from the evangelicals who interview him. He should sit down for a talk with someone who does not take his position to see how his arguments will stand up.
Most people who use the King James believe that it is an accurate translation of a preserved original language text. Obviously, the King James Version itself has changed since 1611. KJV supporters know that. This indicates that they believe that the preservation of scripture occurs in the Hebrew and Greek text. Butler writes:
The Bible never claims God’s Word is only found in one translation. KJV onlyism is unsupported by the Bible itself.
Maybe that confronts Ruckmanism, but I’ve never heard a single person attempt to defend single-translationism from the Bible. The French, Spanish, Russian, etc. can all have a translation from the same text as the King James Version. Butler knows this, but he makes this claim anyway, and it’s a strawman. It doesn’t help anyone. More than anything it gives fresh meat to evangelical friends in an evangelical bubble. On the other hand, he never lays out what the Bible does claim.
There are varied views on preservation among evangelicals. I don’t know of one modern version supporter, who believes in perfect preservation of scripture. Daniel Wallace doesn’t believe scripture teaches the preservation of scripture and he has many supporters. That is now a very common view. He believes in the preservation of the Word, but not the Words. Butler takes a view that might be the most common for evangelicals. Most evangelicals in the pew don’t know this position, but perhaps the majority of conservative evangelical leaders take the position Butler describes:
Yes, I believe God preserves His Word, but I believe it is in the totality of all the available manuscript evidence, variants and copyist errors included.
Try to find that in historical bibliological literature. You won’t find it. It really is a reactionary position to textual criticism among evangelicals. It isn’t a biblical position. Nowhere does the Bible teach it. It’s very much like what you might read on creation today. Confronted with science, professing Christians invent a day age theory for old earth creationism.
Almost all of what Butler finds are theologians, often unbelieving ones, willing to admit that there are copyist errors, which produce textual variants. He and others act like KJVO don’t know that or don’t believe it happened. The history of God’s preservation of scripture is not the same parchment and ink making its way down through time in a pristine condition. God preserved His Words. This physical copy view is not taught in the Bible and it’s only made up as a straw man to create a faux argument.
When you read Butler’s view in his above quote, look carefully at what he says. First, he says God preserves His Word, not God preserved, completed action, like Jesus said, “It is written,” in the perfect tense. He doesn’t say “Words,” because He would never say that. It’s God’s Word in a very ambiguous sense. Jesus said, my words shall not pass away (Matthew 24:35). Where does the Bible or even history present this “totality of available manuscript evidence” position?
For Butler the text isn’t settled, like the Bible speaks about itself. He doesn’t know what the Words are. He doesn’t know all of the ones by which He is to live by. I would contend he doesn’t even believe the position he espouses. How would he account for new evidence, which is still coming? What does he do with a passage like 1 Samuel 13:1? I’ve never read an evangelical, who takes his position, who believes that we possess a manuscript with the very words of that verse.
What motivated me to write this post was one aspect of Butler’s book and that is his attack on the teaching of preservation in scripture. Among everything that he writes, I want to deal only with Psalm 12:6-7, mainly to show how men like him deal with these preservation texts. He writes:
The one passage that nearly all KJVO advocates use for establishing the promise argument is Psalm 12:6,7. . . . The immediate antecedent for the plural pronoun them is the plural pronoun, words. Thus, it would seem to make sense that we can conclude God has promised to preserve His words in a physical text.
The Hebrew language, however, is sharply different from English in that it has grammatical gender, something not common to English. In Hebrew, the pronouns will match the antecedent nouns in both number and gender. Here in Psalm 12:6, 7, the two thems of verse 7 are masculine in gender and with the second them being singular.
The closest antecedents in our English translation, the two nouns words found in verse 6, are feminine, so they do not match the masculine thems.
Butler goes on to say that “them” refers to the poor and needy back in verse 5 because they’re feminine. Butler’s argument here has been thoroughly debunked. He’s wrong. First, however, there are many verses in the Bible that teach the perfect preservation of every Word of God. Psalm 12:6, 7 are two of many. There is a great chapter on these verses by Thomas Strouse in Thou Shalt Keep Them, our book on the preservation of scripture. I’ve also written a lot on it (here, here, and here).
Here’s the short of it. Repeatedly in the Old Testament, and as a part of Hebrew grammar, a masculine pronoun refers to a feminine Word of God. You see it again and again in Psalm 119, the psalm entirely about the Word of God (verses 111, 129, 152, 167). There are many other examples. You can find this very rule in Gesenius’s Hebrew grammar, which I used in second year Hebrew in graduate school.
The number argument doesn’t work either, which is why the KJV translators translated the pronoun, “them,” the second time. That’s also Hebrew grammar. It is very common after a plural pronoun for a singular to follow in order to particularize every individual in the group. A collective plural is suggested by the singular. This is also why the NKJV translators, who are not KJVO, translated it “them.”
The Hebrew grammar says just the opposite of what Butler writes. Critical text and modern version men continue to trot out this argument, when they should well know that it’s been answered many times. I’ve never had one of them attempt to deal with it, because it is irrefutable. It’s why many, many preachers and theologians through the centuries, including Jewish scholars, have said that “them” in verse seven refers to God’s “words” in verse six. The gender disagreement argument is a moot point. Without gender, the rule reverts back to proximity, and “words” is the closest antecedent to “them.”
Either Butler didn’t know the gender disagreement argument or he assumed that his readers wouldn’t know any better. Knowing the Hebrew grammar and reading what he wrote, it reads like he was just borrowing from the writings of other people. I’ve read this argument from Douglas Kutilek online. He’s been confronted with the Hebrew grammar and he’s never answered me or anyone else on it. He does not know what he’s talking about.
So much more could be said in review of Fred Butler’s book, but rest assured that God has preserved every one of His Words in the language in which He inspired them, and made them available for every generation of believers. The King James Version is an accurate translation of those Words.
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