THE ARGUMENT OF SCRIPTURE
III. They are wrong because they think that Scripture agrees with themDear Brother Alexander:
Rather than writing a lengthy letter, I'm enclosing several articles ...
You will see in Paisley's article that he backs up all of his statements with Scripture. You will see the same in our article...(60)
The Scriptures must be examined, in any area of doctrinal importance, and what cannot find support directly from them must not be considered as doctrine. If this principle is not followed, our theology will become filled with the whims of men being taught as doctrine, for which Jesus criticized the Pharisees (Matthew 15:9). Since the Blood Indoctrinators will even, if need be, excommunicate those who preach contrary to them, there must be very strong support in their favor, or else they should not be so dogmatic. It is not enough that the Blood Indoctrinators can provide some verses to support their arguments, since that is easy enough that all the cults associated with Christianity have always done it, and they produce contradictory doctrines. Instead, the Blood Indoctrinators must show that their beliefs are consistent with the claims of their authorities, one of those authorities being the Bible. If there is a reasonable alternative to their arguments, they should carefully consider the level of dogmatism that they practice in preaching their beliefs.
As implied in earlier sections of this book, the Blood Doctrine is actually a blend of two sets of beliefs. The first set of beliefs concerns the origin of Christ's blood; it is similar to Gnosticism. It claims that an aspect of a material body has an inherent moral character, and that for Christ to be sinless, He had to abstain from this component of the human body. The second set concerns the fate of Christ's blood; it is in character with the theology of Socinianism. It claims that Christ collected all the blood that He shed during his night of trial and execution, and took that blood to Heaven.
Not much has been written in this book about the second set of beliefs concerning Christ's blood. This is partly because it is not so grossly obvious that the second set of beliefs contains errors, as it is for the first set. A more important reason is that the second set of beliefs usually are discussed in a different context than those with which this book dealt in the other sections. The first set can be fought on the battlegrounds of science, history and biblical passages, since these are used to defend the first set of beliefs. The second set is rarely fought outside the context of theology/philosophy. It is nearly impossible to provide an obvious proof that a complicated philosophical belief is incorrect, especially when that belief makes no experimentally-testable claims (that is, scientific claims).
It is the human condition to be vain in one's denominational philosophies. It has been nearly impossible to alter, let alone overcome, the conviction of the Blood Indoctrinators that Christ inherited God the Father's blood, despite the incredible body of facts against such a belief, and the meager, error-filled arguments that are used to support it. That such a battle exists leaves little hope for a reasonable discussion with the Blood Indoctrinators of their belief that Christ took His shed blood to Heaven when He arose. The Blood Indoctrinator is not interested in the truth of his beliefs; he is interested in having an esoteric belief and a few arguments to support it. He feels that since he has an explanation for his belief that his belief must be correct.
The author met a Fundamental, Independent Baptist, named Doug Crawford, who claims that the only figures of speech in the Bible are similes (a simile has a structure like the following: "My beloved is like a rose"). That man believes that if the words "like" or "as" are not used in a verse, then the verse must be interpreted literally. That eliminates metaphor (structure like, "My beloved is a rose"; Deuteronomy 24:6, Proverbs 5:15, Matthew 16:12, 26:26, 28, John 6:32, 7:38, 10:7, 9, 14, Acts 20:29), irony (structure like, "Is my beloved a hateful weed?" Genesis 2:22, Job 38:21), hyperbole (structure like, "I would rather have my heart ripped out than to lose my beloved"; Job 31:22, Psalm 137:5, 6), anthropomorphism (structure like, "My rose was planted by the hand of God"; Job 40:9), and personification (structure like, "Love is a gardener, watering my rose"; Proverbs 3:15-18, 8:1-36).
He goes so far as to say that Jesus Christ did not have human blood, but lamb's blood, for the Bible says that the saints made their robes white in the blood of the lamb (Revelation 7:14). At least he is consistent, so long as he also claims that the bread and wine of the Lord's Supper are the literal body and blood of Jesus Christ. Another possible shortcoming in his argument would be the use of the Old Testament types as analogy; the Bible says that they were analogies, but he claims that only verses with the words "like" or "as" are figurative. The Old Testament analogies do not have those words.
Doug is not ignorant; he earned a Bachelor's Degree from Tennessee Temple. He is respected in his church, sometimes even teaching the pastor's Sunday School class. He is the type of person who may confront you if you bring this book into a Fundamentalist church, for every church has someone like him. It is left to the reader to decide whether that man or this author has the more reasonable understanding of Scripture. This book takes the position that normal figures of speech were used throughout the Bible, and that understanding Scripture requires understanding something of the figures of speech used. As the reader can see in the case of Doug, one will end up with very strange beliefs if one does not accept the existence of figures of speech in the Bible.
Another of Doug's beliefs is that the King James Bible is unassailable. The only way that God's Word could be "preserved to every generation" is for God to have wrested His word from the heathen Greek and put it into Christian English (French or Swahili wouldn't have been good enough) as soon as possible. If the King James were the only Bible in existence, then God's Word would be preserved. If there were no perfect English translation available to the common English-speaking man, then God's Word would not be preserved, no matter how many other languages have the Bible, no matter how many forgotten attics may have a King James translation. Indeed, God's Word is preserved solely because there is an accurate English translation, and despite the fact that many languages do not have a Bible. Nor is it a question of the King James being the best; the King James Version is perfect, and pointing out a weakness in the translation is an attack on God and should be treated as such. If a man merely refers to the Greek or Hebrew, it is reason to be suspicious of him, and he had better not dare to suggest that a Greek word might have been better translated other than the way that the King James translators translated it.
If the King James Bible is not the perfectly preserved Word of God, then God's Word has not been preserved! The King James Version must be the preserved Word of God, for it is in the language that we speak. Truly, God has favored the English-speaking man above all other peoples! No one has a right to criticize the work of the King James translators, since no one has the skills--er, the leading of the Holy Ghost--that those translators had, even though some of them did not have a church preference, and probably none of them were Baptists. The King James Bible is not the work of man, but of the very moving of God, although that should make a person wonder why it took 50 of the best-educated men in Europe to do the job, and why they disagreed, argued and compromised in reaching their final product. We should also wonder why the New Testament does not quote Old Testament verses exactly as they appeared in the Old Testament; it looks like even God does not require a jot-for-jot preservation of the Bible.
That man is not alone in his religious opinions. The traditional, old-fashioned, Fundamentalist church often espouses such values. They believe that the King James is the standard against which all Bibles of any language should be criticized. Other languages can only aspire to the superiority of the King James. They may not think of it in those terms, and they may actually say that the King James is the Bible for the English-speaking man just as the Greek is the Bible for the Grecians, but they really mean that the Christian world should revolve around the English translation. They believe that English is specially inspired for the English-speaking peoples, a new creation for us. The Greek must be abandoned because it is not God's Word to us, but God's Word to the Greeks. God's will for one's life depends on the single language that one speaks; everyone speaks only one language, don't they? Notice that these people become upset when one goes back to the Greek. Pastor Zahn from Arizona was one who inspired the author to write the above paragraphs, for Pastor Zahn actually makes some of those arguments to defend the King James Bible.
If you point out to these people that there was not always a Bible available for English-speaking peoples, they will counter that we cannot know that. In fact, they will assert that there must have been an English Bible from the time that people began speaking in English, but that this early perfect Bible was so mightily repressed that there is no direct evidence of it today. One might wonder why, then, did England go into such turmoil over Wiclif's imperfect English translation, and why did people risk their lives and property to possess it, when there was a perfect English translation already in existence? Why would people risk so much to step backward? The only rational answer is that the Wiclif Bible, as imperfect as it was, was the best available to those people. No one claimed that Ruckmanites or Fundamentalists or Blood Indoctrinators are rational people, though.
Sword of the LORD is correct on this issue; the King James translation is the work of men translating the passages given by God, and is no better than any translation in that regard. No preacher blesses the paper and ink to turn it into a divine book, and no translator wrote by divine ex cathedra. Unfortunately, at this point Sword of the LORD seems to be in the minority, since most of the people that the author has met have taken the more fanciful route. Pastor Zahn actually argues that it is impossible for an ordinary person to make dependable translations from the Greek texts. He claims that no one can know what the King James translators said or thought as they did their work; we are simply forced to trust their judgement.
Actually, there are probably two main reasons why these people don't like for others to study the Greek texts. There is a danger that we will notice that some of the points that the clergy makes, using the Greek as proof, are wrong. This is not limited to the study of Greek; if your pastor uses the Bible in his sermons, read one or two verses past where he stops reading. There are occasions where those extra verses will invalidate the entire sermon.
There is also the knowledge that is required for the translation of Greek, just as there is for any language. It requires work, some education, some familiarity with the nature of languages and a sense of judgement. This is contrary to the Fundamentalist's claim that the Bible is an open book and education only gets in the way of knowing God's will. A real Christian education, they say, avoids scholarly study, but devotes itself to insights gained on the field. Obviously, one doesn't learn Greek by preaching to drunks, so Greek must not be useful in practical situations.
Pastor Zahn should not be singled out; the same sort of nonsense can be heard in most of the conservative Christian pulpits in Albuquerque. At least Pastor Zahn will occasionally sprinkle a few Greek words through his sermons, if only as interesting trivia. Yet, if such an opinion of biblical interpretation is so widely held by Fundamentalists, how can it be possible to study the Bible to any depth with them? There are many Fundamentalists who become angry when someone suggests that better translations than the King James are possible, but their anger is without good reason. Evangelicism, including Fundamentalism, is driven by as much zeal as possible with as little thought or reason as possible. That's fanaticism. This book takes the position that if the source texts used by the King James translators is examined, it will provide insight to God's meaning in His Word, even if the source texts contradict the accepted English translation. The King James translators had the same belief; that's why the King James Bible came into existence.
This last section deals with the theology and philosophy that is used to support the Blood Doctrine. Both the first set and the second set of beliefs are addressed here. The King James Version of the Bible is used throughout, as that is the author's preferred English translation. There is not much Greek used; it is not necessary to use much Greek to prove the Blood Indoctrinators wrong. However, there is a little of the Greek texts discussed. This should not intimidate the reader; if it bothers him, he should simply ignore any reference to Greek. The Greek used in this book is so general and non-critical to showing the truth of the matter that even the issue of which Greek text to use is moot. Greek is used here to emphasize the point being made in English, to prove beyond doubt that the author's view is correct. Only occasionally is it vital to use the Greek, and then it is because a Blood Indoctrinator claims that the Greek supports his view. The author only asks that if the reader is going to ignore the author's references to Greek that the reader also ignore the Blood Indoctrinators when they use Greek to support their view of Scripture. That's right; Blood Indoctrinator's believe that they are the only dependable Greek scholars.
The Blood Indoctrinators claim that Scripture supports their beliefs. The author claims that Scripture contradicts their beliefs. We trust that Scripture is consistent. Therefore, someone has made an interpretational error. The evidence for making the judgement of who has made such an error, and the author's argument against the Blood Indoctrinators, is the subject of this section.
_________________________________________