Featured The Bible Is Clear: Adam Was a Historical Person

In the Gospels is often used the phrase "woman of him" or "woman of (a man's name)" for wife. It is a way that the Hebrew language worded it and not Greek. Hebrew has no word for wife.

Mark 1:2, 3 are quotes from Isaiah and Malachi. Yet the text says it is from Isaiah the prophet. One must understand how the scrolls were referenced to understand the reference to the texts as found in Isaiah.

While I do not question the wording of the text I question what people say about scripture and how what they say is understood by the average person today. I believe there is a lot of nonsense out there today being said that scripture never claims.

My job as a student is to study and understand the text not tear it apart to make something out of it that it is not, and make statements which are not true. My belief is that we must know God and Him as the author of His Word not a bunch of man made statements that do nothing to explain the text of scripture nor help us know God better. reading man created statements would be like reading a systematic theology to help interpret scripture and reading it back into the text. That would be doing eisegesis and does nothing to explain the passage correctly

When we tell people that scripture has no errors and someone challenges that statement it sets up a situation where the person see two sides and one they have with no answers. I have seen some who have left the faith and others as though they were hanging on a limb about ready to break. If we teach them how to interpret and understand scripture in light of its historical and literary context we open a huge door of understanding for them. It also challenges them to do a better job of study because they have started on a journey of being a better student with more tools to use.

Scripture is not debatable and so we must avoid man made statements about inspiration which cause confusion for people. They must know what God breathed (inspired by God) means not some statement made by a man. God is the standard not men.

 

The Greek/Hebrew texts have known copying mistakes in them, also difference in what varients to have priority to traNSLATION...

Are you saying the copies we have to use have some errors/mistakes creeping into them, or that the original were also mixed with errors/mistakes?

Obe view acceptable, other not!

 

Some of the variants were brought into the text but before that they were an attempt to explain the text. While I know there are textual variants I also believe there are ways to essentially rid the text of that to determine the original text. Is it perfect? No. However such things are insignificant when it comes to doctrines we value.

There are some who believe that Paul dictated what he wanted and if the text was not what he wanted then he made a correction. Some words sound very similar but are not spelled alike.

What I am saying would be much the same thing as one who speaks from God but his language usage is not perfect. The message is perfect and perfectly understood but his lack of language skills shows. It does not detract from the value and accuracy of the message but his language usage has errors.

not sure what you mean by this.

 

The original books, as penned down by Paul/peter/Moses etc comtained NO errors/mistakes within them, but the Greek/hebew texts that we have now to study from have minor errors/mistakes known to have been caused when copied down over the years!

We hold to verbal plenary inspiration of the originals, so that the Holy Spirit made sure each word itself was the right God intended to be written down!

 

Your statement does not agree with 2 Timothy 3:16. It leaves out part of what was "God-breathed". That is one of the problems with man's statements rather than God's. Scripture does such a great job compared to man. Why study man's statements when you should be studying scripture? Studying man's statements is much like using a systematic theology to interpret the Bible. The problem that while you may be right much of the time it is still eisegesis which leads to false interpretation.

How does this improve on 2 Timothy 3:16?

Man's statements abound but they are worthless compared to scripture in that scripture is living.

 

A spelling error, the seeming omission of inconsequential facts, and the ignorance of ancient literary devices are no basis for the faithless and arbitrary assumptions that Egyptian mythology is woven into the Penteteuch and that the prophets wrote only according to their own understanding.

 

I agree and that is the reason why I never deal with what critics call errors, but rather steer the conversation to how to correctly interpretation in light of the historical and literary context of a passage. That is the standard for any text whether it is scripture or something else. To spend time on explaining man made statements is to steer away from what God said and that is time spent. Time spent on studying what God said is an investment. Let God speak rather than muddy it with what man said.

To recognize a counterfeit one must know what the genuine looks like.

To recognize a crooked stick all one has to do is to lay a straight one next to it.

 

The Scriptures, in the originals, were JUST as much from God as God Himself, as there were the written Word of the Lord, just as Jjesus was that Word becoming flesh!

Are you denying that the Holy Spired HImself worked thru the writers to give us a record without any errors/mistakes?

 

It is how you view those "errors" that is most important. Language errors which do not take away from the accuracy of the message and the message itself are there. The Greek text of the NT is not perfect Greek so in a "perfect" sense it is Greek with language errors. Those "errors" were probably a good thing for the listener's understanding because the words that were used they would have understood.

For example would a Greek at the time say, "woman of him"? Those who come from a Hebrew background would, but not a Greek. Would the recipients and writers of scripture have known what "wife" was if the writers had used the correct Greek word? It is doubtful. They would have easily understood what was used in their culture.

When God speaks to me, he speaks to me in English the language I understand. He speaks to a child in the message he understands and the child does not have near the vocabulary I do. There are many ways God communicates what he wants me to receive and what he wants a child to receive. Whenever I have studied another language sometimes it is difficult to understand a particular word because we do not have anything in our language we use. It is quite possible that those with a Jewish background both those who received the writings and those who wrote them did not understand the correct Greek words (such as "woman of him" would be properly translated as "wife"). The word "wife" would have been something that needed explanation so they understood but "woman of him" would have needed no explanation.

So I would contend that the language errors were a good thing for those who listened to God's word. To make the claim it is without errors of any kind is to invite a kind of scrutiny that detracts from scripture and the Bible does make those claims. Scripture in most cases could be argued that it was written by and to those with a Jewish background and so to reach them ideas and language must have been used they understood.

If we take a look at the text of scripture and judge it on the basis of being a perfect text without any errors of any kind then we are saying the text qualifies as error free in every way and that includes language usage. I do not believe for one second that God really cared or cares today about that and never had recorded what man claims today. Scripture claims it is God's Word and it is "God breathed". What else is needed? How can we add to and improve on what God said?