Featured Riplinger the Faux Linguist

Well, now, that explains everything!

 

Oddly enough, she sells Scrivener's TR text on her website. Now if we use Scrivener, how are we going to know what the Greek words mean and how they fit together in a sentence, since she has banned the use of all lexicons and grammars and other Greek helps?

But I have to say that there is some evidence of intentional alteration of the Alexandrian text for doctrinal purposes. (Think Marcion and Origen here.)

 

IMO, Riplinger has gone even further than Ruckman in bizarre thinking, and that's saying a whole lot!

 

I think I've made my point that Gail Riplinger has no real knowledge of linguistics, and teaching English as a foreign language for three years did not make her a linguist in the eyes of anyone knowledgeable in the field. But I want to comment once more on her essay here: http://www.hacalumni.com/howtodefineaword.shtml

Notice some more blunders:

1. Here is a beautiful example of circular reasoning: "It is not necessary for Christians to go to a dictionary to define Bible words, when they actually have the original resource dictionary-makers use themselves." Well then if this were true, then it would be perfectly all right to go to a dictionary because it got its definitions from the Bible, which provides definitions for dictionaries, which get their definitions from...." :laugh:

2. She says you can get the definition of inspiration from the KJB, where the word occurs twice. So you get the definition of it in 2 Tim. 3:16 from Job 32:8 and vice versa. But then she doesn't use those verses, but the etymology of the word: "in" and "spir." So the definition is "spirit in." So she is not using the Bible but word origins to define the Bible word.

3. Again, the two verses are speaking of two different usages of the word: the giving of understanding by God, and the giving of verbal revelation by God. So Riplinger does not understand the concept of polysemy, which is that a word can have more that one meaning. So rightly, there should be other occurences of the word "inspiration" in the KJB to define the word, but there are not, only two occurrences with different meanings.

4. This brings up the point that there are hapax legomena (words that only occur once) in the Greek NT, and of course also in the KJB. So how do you define such a word from the Bible itself if it only occurs once? Riplinger doesn't say and of course doesn't know. For example, "impenitent" only occurs in Rom. 2:5. So what does it mean? Riplinger's method cannot tell you, but the Greek lexicons can! :type:

 

I think I've demonstrated sufficiently that Gail Riplinger is not only sadly mistaken when she says she is a linguist, but she doesn't even have the most basic knowledge of linguistics (phonemes and morphemes, syntax being part of grammar, etc.). So, since no one has stood up for her and contradicted a single point, I'll let this thread rest here--unless of course someone shows up who thinks she is defensible in this area. :type: