Chapter 4.
Applying Literary Criticism to Inspired Writings

Inspiration designates a religious doctrine which expresses the belief that God "breathed into" the writers of the scriptures, or caused them to write what he wanted them to. By doing this, he created a written revelation of his will for his people. It might follow that any criticism of such an inspired writing could be judged a criticism of God. However, this chapter will explain why and how a reader can apply literary criticism to inspired writings without criticizing God or risking faith. The chapter also will unveil a positive corollary—that literary criticism adds strength and legitimacy to such writings, thereby increasing their value to both religious and literary readers.

In order to pursue this often controversial subject of inspiration, we shall first summarize how the New and Old Testaments got to us in their present forms. Next we shall examine the biblical basis of the doctrine of inspiration. Then we shall compare the verbal theory of inspiration with a dynamic theory that has been adopted by hundreds of thousands of today's believers, some consciously and some unconsciously. After that we will review steps taken by church leaders in support of literary criticism of the Bible.

As an example of how complicated this subject can become, imagine that you have a one-page Ecumenical Disclosure at home that was written directly by God himself. You want to share the information on this document with friends, so you type it into your computer and print one copy. But you accidentally trash the original document, delete your computer file, and misplace your only printed copy. A few years later, after your death, your fourteen-year-old grandson finds your only printed copy, and copies it by hand as best as he can, and decides to take his handwritten copy to one of his classes. At school, his girlfriend decides to make a copy for her parents, and transcribes as he reads aloud. He inadvertently omits the final paragraph, which is on the reverse page. She starts a second copy from her first, but runs out of time and leaves it on her desk at the end of the day. A teacher finds this scrap, copies it meticulously, makes a few notes from her memory and limited knowledge of its origin and history, and stores it with her collection of notes in an old trunk in her attic, where it is forgotten for fifty years. Then, after the teacher dies, a relative finds it and passes it on to the local pastor who edits and publishes it along with some of his sermons. Now, which manuscripts are inspired? That is in some ways the type of question we are considering in this chapter.

Evolution of the New Testament

The Greek word "kanon" means a "rod," also signifying a rule or criterion. It was almost A.D. 400 before the word came to mean for most Christians a list of 27 specific books which were inspired, holy, and authoritative. This section briefly describes this 400-year evolution and why it took so long.

The Bible of Jesus and his apostles, as well as Paul, Silas, and the early church leaders in Jerusalem and Antioch (as described in the Book of Acts) contained only the Hebrew scriptures of what they called the "Tanach." These scriptures were considered to be inspired.

No "New Testament" scriptures existed for the first generation of Christians after the death and resurrection of Jesus. After the second generation (or approximately after A.D. 50 or 55) a rudimentary collection would have contained only a few letters by Paul. These probably were not widely distributed or generally accepted on a par with the Hebrew scriptures of the Tanach (Old Testament) until long after Paul's death.

The earliest writings of what later became the New Testament were circulated and honored in the early Christian churches. Some churches accepted the works of Paul and Peter and certain other writings as inspired in the same sense as the Hebrew Scriptures, and others did not. However, there was no official or unofficial canon of New Testament scriptures for many years after the death of Jesus. Even an embryonic idea of a canon hardly could have developed before the middle of the second century. Such an early listing of inspired writings probably would have included some form of the Gospels, Acts, and I Peter and a partial accumulation of Paul's letters.

When considering this slow development, we must recognize that the earlier in time the first Christians were to the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, the more reliant they were on an oral tradition, and the less they felt the need of a collection of Christian writings. Additionally, because they had anticipated the early return of Jesus, they at first perceived no need for their own distinctively Christian scriptures. But the farther they moved in time after the life of Jesus and the original apostles, the more they realized the need for a written collection of their own scriptures.

We can be sure that there was considerable resistance to any idea of adding to the ancient Hebrew Scriptures, especially after the Hebrew canon was fixed by the end of the first century A.D. Nevertheless, as time passed, the Christian Church recognized more and more the need for its own canon of sacred writings. By the middle of the second century A.D. resistance to this tide of opinion favoring Christian scriptures was probably becoming futile. As Christians developed this "New Testament," they began to call the Hebrew writings the "Old Testament."

However, the newer writings (the letters) of what we today call "The New Testament" first had to undergo a transition. Instead of being viewed as ordinary letters from highly respected apostles, they somehow would have to be accepted as inspired in the way that the books of the Hebrew Old Testament were accepted. And such a transition was not easy.

In addition to the uncertainty of the inspiration of apostolic writings is the manner in which the early Christians viewed the Septuagint Greek translation of the ancient scriptures in relation to the Hebrew version. We can not be sure that they all regarded the Hebrew version as any more inspired than the Greek translation.

Finally, it is evident that Paul and the other early Christian writers did not write with the object either of adding to the Hebrew or Greek Bible or of creating another Bible. Neither did the other later writers who produced their portions of the "New Testament" over approximately a century after Paul and Peter.

And so it is that the New Testament canon evolved by a slow process much as a system of merit certifies itself over time. Many pseudepigraphal and apocryphal writings were popular for a time and then were discarded. Other books claimed authority in certain areas for awhile, but did not survive the test of time. Many fabulous legends about the life of the Christ child fell by the wayside as nothing more than fanciful folklore.

The canon evolved just like cream rises to the top of a dairy can of fresh milk, and the writings that survived the original authors attained a lasting and universal significance. As Frank Kermode says about the books of the Bible, "It is their capacity to be applied, their applicability to historical circumstances other than those of their origin, that has saved them alive" (The Literary Study of the Bible 607). We must remember that this quality of universal applicability is a mark of great literature.

Today's Bible

In order to discuss today's Bible, we first must clarify which Bible and which version we are talking about. It is not the one Paul and Silas had. Neither is it the Bible that Christians used one hundred years after the birth of Jesus. Its many versions along the historic trail to the present time have changed as much as the trail itself. As we follow this trail, it might help to keep in mind the example of the theoretical "Ecumenical Disclosure" discussed at the beginning of this chapter.

Leaving the question of inspiration aside, most modern readers probably would agree that the original Hebrew manuscripts—which we don't have—might be classified as authentic writings produced at least in part from oral or external sources. Highly qualified preparers of most succeeding versions of the Bible probably created authentic works to the best of their ability.

We cannot deny the authenticity of the Latin Vulgate Version, the basis of the old Catholic Bible. It was translated by Jerome from the original languages, which were copies of copies of the original Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek scrolls or parchments. Since its completion in the early fifth century the Vulgate was widely used in Catholic churches not only in Europe but around the world, through the Middle Ages, and, indeed, until the middle of the twentieth century.

However, few people up through the Renaissance period other than priests and certain Church and state officials could read Latin, so the common people had to rely upon the Church to interpret the Vulgate's message. Although it was quite natural for Christians of early times to desire a Bible they could read in their own language, such a Bible would be delayed for more than a millennium. Consequently, for generations the idea of reading the Bible as literature wasn't even an option for the average barely literate person.

Then in the 15th century, an English scholar named William Tyndale translated the entire New Testament and a part of the Old Testament from the original Greek and Hebrew languages into English. He was not allowed to publish these scriptures or to distribute them legally in England, so he published an English New Testament in 1526 in Worms, Germany, and smuggled copies of it into England.

At that time the church authorities in England tolerated only fragments of scripture in Latin, and certainly not complete New Testaments in English, for the common people. However, Tyndale carefully revised his New Testament translation in 1534, creating a version which was recognized as a triumph of Greek scholarship. In 1535 he was tricked into being arrested, imprisoned, and was tried for heresy, ceremonially strangled and then burned on October 6th, 1536.

Tyndale had opened the gates to freedom of Bible publishing and distribution. Later in the sixteenth century, several English translations, or versions, were published on the continent and in England. In 1560 a group of English Christians in Geneva revised and published an English edition which quickly became the people's Bible. Known as "The Geneva Bible," it was probably the Bible most used by Shakespeare, John Bunyan, and the Puritans who settled in the American Colonies.

In 1604 King James I commissioned 54 of the best scholars in the realm to produce a new English version of the Old and New Testaments "as consonant as can be to the original Hebrew and Greek." This version of the Bible, dedicated to King James, was published in 1611, containing 39 books of the Old Testament and 27 books of the New Testament. Those 66 books compose of the Bible used by most Protestants to this date.

Since publication of the King James Version, many revisions and new English translations have been produced. These reflect the changes that have taken place in the English language as well as new discoveries and insights from more ancient, authoritative, and reliable copies of old manuscripts. Some of the more popular and influential translations include

• English Revised Version (1885)
• American Standard Version (1901)
• New American Standard Version (1960)
• Revised Standard Version (2nd ed.,1971)
• The New English Bible (1971)
• New American Bible (Catholic trans. from the original languages, not from the Latin Vulgate, 1970)
• Today's English Version (1976)
• New International Version (1973, 1978)
• New Jewish Version (trans. from the Heb., 1982)
• New Revised Standard Version (NRSV, 1989)
• Oxford Study Bible Revised English Bible with the Apocrypha (1992)
• Contemporary English Version (American Bible Society, 1995)
• New Revised Standard Version (NRSV, 1989)

These and the reprinted or slightly updated King James Versions account for most of the significant English language Bibles published before or in the final decade of the twentieth century. It is not the Bible of Paul and Silas or the one used by the Christians one hundred years after the death of Jesus. But it is our Bible for the twenty-first century, and the one to which we must turn when considering the question of inspiration.

The Basis of the Doctrine of Inspiration

"God-breathed" Scriptures

A key word is the Greek word theopneustos (translated as "God-breathed," "inspiration of God," or "inspired by God"). This word appears only once in the entire Bible in connection with the word "scripture," and it is never used in that context in the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible. The New Testament reference is 2nd Timothy 3:16, which is translated as "All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness" (RSV).

An unwary reader might say, "That's all there is to it." But that's not all there is to it. In the marginal note the Revised Standard Version suggests the alternate translation "every scripture inspired by God is also profitable." The Greek allows either translation, which prompts the suggestion that the translation given in the marginal note may be the better. In support of this is the sense of the translation in the Revised English Bible (1992), which is "All inspired scripture."

The Revised Standard Version margin alternative translation understands the "inspired by God" adjective (one word in the Greek, "theopneustos") to be attributive, modifying "scripture," as in "every God-breathed scripture," or "every scripture inspired by God." This translation conceivably leaves open the possibility that there are some scriptures "inspired by God" and other scriptures not inspired by God. On the other hand, the King James Version reads as the first translation given in the Revised Standard Version. In both of these two translations, the Greek adjective is used as a predicate adjective, in the sense "is inspired by God." It is difficult to decide just how it should be translated into English. The difficulty is compounded when translating the first word of the verse, because that word can mean either "all" or "every." "All" emphasizes the collective idea, and "every" emphasizes the distributive idea. Again, either translation is allowable; and neither is incorrect.

Three additional observations may be made regarding the word theopneustos:

1. The Context in Which the Word Scripture is Used. The term, "scripture," here and in the previous verse (vs. 15) is generally believed to refer to the Old Testament in either the original Hebrew or the Greek translation (the Septuagint). This is because the expressions "holy scriptures" or "sacred writings" were common terms for the Old Testament among Greek-speaking Jews and Christians of the period.

2. The Authorship of 2nd Timothy. Any analysis of 2nd Timothy 3:16 must consider the matter of its authorship, because of the relationship between dating and authorship and interpretation. Although some able conservative Bible scholars contend for the traditional Pauline authorship of the Pastoral Epistles, much of the weight of current literary evidence favors the view of later pseudonymous authorship. We must at least keep the door open to the possibility that a disciple of Paul who lived in the first half of the second century A.D. may have written 2nd Timothy.

Those who prefer the later dating of 2nd Timothy and its pseudonymous authorship usually choose to interpret the references to "scripture" here as primarily to the Old Testament. They recognize, also, that the later date allows for an embryonic development of a "canon" of distinctively Christian writings.

3. The Impact of 2nd Peter 3:15-16. If the second-century church did not already have a second letter by Paul to Timothy or a second epistle written by Peter, probably certain Christian leaders would feel that if Paul and Peter were alive and writing in their time, they would have written something like we find in 2nd Timothy 2:15-16 and 2nd Peter 3:15-16. For comparison, let's quote 2nd Peter 3:15-16: "Even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him has written unto you; As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood ['knotty points,' Moffatt; or 'obscure passages,' REB, 1992], which they that are unlearned [ignorant] and unstable wrest [twist, or misinterpret], as they do also the other Scriptures, unto their own destruction."

The evidence for pseudonymity is probably stronger for 2nd Peter than it is for 2nd Timothy. But is there any link between these passages which might shed some light on a common concern and reference to the word "scripture"?

Yes, indeed, there is such a common link. The writer of 2nd Peter 3:15-16 classifies Paul's letters with "the other scriptures." Both writers seem to be using the term "scripture" in a similar way. Both also open the door to the possibility that distinctive Christian writings may be treated as "scriptures" in the way Jews and early Christians (whether Jewish Christians or Gentile Christians) considered the books of the Hebrew Bible or the Greek Septuagint as "holy scripture" or "sacred writings." This not only implies that the Gospels and other Christian writings might be included as "other" (holy) scriptures, but the passage in 2nd Peter 3:15-16 explicitly suggests that Paul's letters may be included in these "other scriptures."

Another New Testament passage (again, in the possibly pseudonymous 2nd Peter) often used to support the doctrine of "God-breathed" inspiration is 2nd Peter 1:20-21. This passage states that "no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by the impulse of man, but men moved by the Holy spirit spoke from God" (RSV). Another recent version states, "no prophetic writing is a matter for private interpretation. It was not on any human initiative that prophecy came; rather, it was under the compulsion of the Holy Spirit that people spoke as messengers of God" (REB, 1992).

The statements in either of these versions indicate that the early Christians continued the Jewish belief that the Hebrew Bible was made up of divinely inspired ("God-breathed") scriptures. For the Old Testament writers to have been "moved by the Holy Spirit" as they wrote was tantamount to inspiration for orthodox Jews and early Christians, whether Jewish Christians or Gentile Christians. They all seemed to agree basically on the inspiration of the ancient Hebrew prophets.

The Muratorian Canon

The earliest known canon or list of books accepted in certain circles as New Testament scripture is dated around 200 A.D. This Muratorian Canon was named for Italian priest and scholar Lodovico Antonio Muratori, who discovered an eighth century copy of it in Milan and published it in 1740. The canon had been compiled by a group of biblical scholars from Rome or possibly from the Eastern Mediterranean. The seven Pauline letters listed in the Muratorian canon are Corinthians, Ephesians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Romans, Philippians, and Galatians. The document goes on to say that Paul wrote additional letters to the Corinthians and the Thessalonians, and to Titus, Philemon, and twice to Timothy. There is sufficient time for a pseudonymous 2nd Timothy letter to have been written long before this Muratorian Canon was compiled. And if 2nd Timothy is pseudonymous, that may explain why the biblical scholars who compiled the Muratorian Canon put the personal letters to Timothy and Titus in a sort of a postscript note instead of including them among the other canonical letters of Paul.

Faith

Although strong evidences persist for the inspiration of the Bible, inspiration cannot be proven scientifically or logically beyond any reasonable doubt. Like many other religious doctrines, this doctrine relies largely upon a principle of faith, not scientific certainty. We would be presumptuous and shallow to suggest that the arguments presented in this section adequately cover the question. Nor is it the purpose of this small chapter to prove or disprove the doctrine. As stated in the beginning, our primary purpose is to explain why and how a reader can apply literary criticism to inspired writings without criticizing God and without risking faith. With that in mind, we believe that any reader can confidently proceed to the next section.

Two Basic Theories of Inspiration

Neither "verbal inspiration" nor "dynamic inspiration" of the Bible is claimed or specifically mentioned anywhere in the Bible itself. Nor is either expression found in any of the ancient Christian creeds such as the Apostles Creed, the Nicene Creed, or the Athanasian Creed. Therefore, each theory must be discussed only on its merits.

On the left side of Figure 1 are characteristics of the theory of "verbal inspiration," which emphasizes that God inspired not only the thoughts and ideas, but all of the very words, of the writers. Proponents of this theory sometimes use the word "plenary," which means "all," specifying that all the words in the Bible are directly inspired by God and are therefore inerrant.

On the right side of Figure 1 are attributes of the "dynamic" theory. Advocates of this theory emphasize that God guided the writers, but that he did not necessarily give them the very words to use. They believe that God allowed the writers to use their own styles of writing, vocabulary, knowledge, sources and resources, without in any sense dictating the words to them. Some who support this theory of inspiration also use the word "plenary," in the sense that inspiration is evident throughout all the scripture, without suggesting that all scripture is of equal value and quality.

Many current preachers and writers, such as James C. Denison, an Atlanta, GA, pastor and former seminary professor, attempt to keep the best qualities of the verbal, dictation, and dynamic theories together and "combine them in one concept" (7 Crucial Questions About the Bible 86-87). However, neither Denison nor his colleagues demonstrate how this can be done.

For instance, those who hold the verbal inspiration theory contend that their theory applies throughout the Bible. They often say that if even a small part of the Bible is not the "verbally inspired" Word of God, they cannot believe in any of it. Yet Denison, while obviously preferring the verbal theory, admits that at times God allowed and used the "free thinking" of the writers (19). That simply won't wash, as some say, because a strict fundamentalist will not grant that one can believe that God allowed the word choices and free and undirected thinking of the authors in writing these ideas and words. To do so would undermine the distinctive nature of their theory of verbal inspiration.

Five Flaws in the Verbal Theory of Inspiration

1. It Demands Unquestioned Acceptance. This is the first of several fatal flaws which the majority of biblical scholars around the world have found in the verbal theory of inspiration. The well-known European theologian of the twentieth century, Karl Barth, believes in the divinity or inspiration of scripture. But, according to Bernard Ramm, Barth "understands the evangelical and fundamentalist version of inspiration to be a specific historic development out of religious conditions prevailing in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries" (After Fundamentalism, 118). This is at variance with most of those who hold the verbal inspiration theory, for they contend that their view has always been the view of orthodox believers.

2. It Places an Overemphasis on Words. The verbal theory overlooks the fact that the words as well as the ideas of the writers were conditioned by the writer's own time. For example, the claim is made that whenever the Bible contains the words "Thus says the Lord" we have a proof of verbal inspiration. But another credible interpretation of such passages is that when the prophets used such words they were merely using a formula of their times which equals the similar expressions of modern preachers who identify their sermonic declarations with the will of God or the Word of God. Neither one necessarily claims to transmit the very words of God, and neither presents a proof of verbal inspiration.

3. It Fosters Materialization. Referring to verbal inspiration and inerrancy, Ramm declares in a very forthright way that it "represents a materialization [his original emphasis] of the doctrine of inspiration. By materialization is meant that the Word of God is reduced literally to a book that one can carry around in one's pocket. The Word of God in its spiritual dimension has been lost" (p. 118).

4. It Leads to Obscurantism. The dictionary defines an "obscurantist" as "someone who opposes the development of new ideas or new learning." The verb form of the word "to obscure" means "to darken." No one admits to deliberately setting out to obscure (or darken) a discussion instead of to cast light on it. But champions of the verbal theory often have an obscurantist and anti-intellectual tendency. Mark A. Noll, himself an evangelical professor of theology at a conservative Christian college, documents and laments this fact quite convincingly in his recent book The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind (10-12, 96-107, 123-126, 228-235). Moreover, those who hold the theory of verbal inspiration often obscure not only biblical and literary criticism, but also free, open-minded approaches to wider academic studies and social issues.

Why is this dangerous? Because it is easy to move from obscurantism to dishonesty with facts. And this is one of the greatest tragedies of controversy. When facts are obscured, truth cannot be fearlessly proclaimed.

Of course, no one wants to wear a placard over his shoulders openly proclaiming "I am an obscurantist and proud of it." Perhaps because of this, some moderate fundamentalists have accepted parts of a critical-historical-literary approach to the Bible. They are quick to make this known, except when The Evangelical Theological Society, or heresy-hunting seminary administrators and trustees and denominational inquisitors oppose their tolerance and academic freedom.

Being a fundamentalist does not automatically make a person an obscurantist, but, as Mark Noll has demonstrated, the tendency of historical fundamentalism has been in the direction of obscurantism in biblical criticism. Some open-minded fundamentalists might agree with George Ladd when he expresses a positive approach to certain aspects of biblical criticism in the following words:

To be a critic means to ask questions about the authorship, date, place, sources, purpose, and so on, of any ancient literary work. The opposite of a properly "critical" approach to the study of the Bible is, therefore, an unthinking, unquestioning acceptance of tradition. To be non-critical means simply to ignore altogether the historical dimension of the Bible and to view it as a magical book (The New Testament and Criticism 115).

The suspicion is well-founded, however, that many fundamentalists say they accept the findings of biblical criticism, when in fact they fully accept very few of those findings.

5. It Sets Up Dictation and Translation Dilemmas. Hardly any qualified biblical scholar could hold that today's Bible—even as close as we can come to the original manuscripts—was dictated word for word by God. Yet the doctrine of original verbal inspiration logically requires such a leap of faith from the oldest and best manuscripts available, to the "original" manuscripts which are not known to exist.

In The Bible Tells Them So, Kathleen Boone correctly points out the difficulties fundamentalists have in trying to reconcile their verbal inspiration theory with human authorship, and, moreover, in attempting to reconcile both issues with the translatability of the Bible (31). One almost insurmountable problem is that all three of the issues of (1) the verbal inspiration theory, (2) the dictation method of inspiration, and (3) the translatability of the Bible, are so closely related to each other. Boone indicates that, in spite of the "protestations to the contrary, dictation seems a necessary concomitant of verbal inspiration" (p. 31).

Most Christians believe in the inspiration of the original writers, but they do not claim that translators were in like manner inspired in their work. This allows room for errors in translations or copies of the Bible. It is commonly held, however, that such errors are minor and negligible. R. A. Torrey wrote in 1907 that "for all practical purposes the original text is now settled. There is not one important doctrine that hangs upon any doubtful reading of the text" (Difficulties and Alleged Errors 17). He may have been merely over-optimistic in claiming that "the original text is now settled," especially in view of the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls forty years later, which suggested new readings and translations of some passages. But he was certainly incorrect in claiming that there are only slight variations in copies and translations. Yet, as conservative as he was, Torrey admitted that "No one, as far as I know, holds that the English translation of the Bible is absolutely infallible and inerrant" (Difficulties, p. 17).

The inerrancy concept was highly publicized by a group of some 300 conservative and fundamentalist theologians who met in Chicago in 1978 for an International Conference on Biblical Inerrancy. Part of the statement on inerrancy which they published at the close of their conference reads as follows:

We affirm that inspiration, strictly speaking, applies only to the autographic text of Scripture, which in the providence of God can be ascertained from available manuscripts with great accuracy. We further affirm that copies and translations of Scripture are the Word of God to the extent that they faithfully represent the original.

Thus, they claim immediate inspiration only for the original manuscripts but not for the translations and copies. However, in the same paragraph of this Article X of their Statement, the conference participants make sure they do claim "great accuracy" for the copies and translations which "faithfully represent the original."

This creates two dilemmas that would be comical if they weren't so tragic. First, if verbal inspiration is claimed for undefined parts of manuscripts which "faithfully represent" manuscripts that don't exist, of what use is it to argue over an unarguable issue? And if verbal inspiration cannot be claimed for the modern language Bible translations—and these are the only Bibles people have to read—what is the sense in splitting churches over a pseudo-issue that the theory of verbal inspiration becomes?

Second, if verbal inspiration applies to the original writers, one naturally asks, shouldn't it also apply to the editors and revisers of the copies that are the basis for today's Bibles, whether in Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek? Wouldn't it defeat God's purpose if the original writers of the missing manuscripts were verbally inspired, and all the later editors, revisers, and scribes who added to or changed the copies of the scriptures acted without verbal inspiration? Humans would have converted inspired works into uninspired manuscripts and defeated God!

The process of putting the books into final form in some cases lasted for generations. For centuries there was no printing press. Professional scribes had to copy the various books by hand, word for word, with a letter by letter count in each line of handwriting, and then check carefully for the correct number of lines on each part of each scroll. Again it is Northrop Frye, the well-known Canadian literary critic, who expresses this idea so clearly: "If the Bible is to be regarded as inspired in any sense, sacred or secular, its editorial and redacting processes must be regarded as inspired too" (Anatomy of Criticism 315). This conclusion cannot be escaped or avoided.

If by this time the theory of verbal inspiration begins to look like a plate of spaghetti with a tangle of loose ends, that's because it is somewhat like that. We find ourselves facing a theory proposed by humans, with no clear biblical backing and with nothing sacrosanct about it except that it contains the rare biblical term "inspiration." We doubt that twenty-first-century believers will be able to accept such a view of the inspiration of the Bible, a view which seems to necessitate the suspension of the writer's personality, the external control of his mind, and the resulting denial or minimizing of the human side of the Bible.

Although the other theory of inspiration—the dynamic theory—comes with no more religious credentials than the verbal theory, we will find that it fills the plate with a tasty and nourishing dish that will satisfy hungry seekers of biblical knowledge, faith, spiritual nourishment, and intellectual satisfaction.

Some Merits of the Dynamic Theory

The dynamic theory allows today's Bible readers to maintain their intellectual integrity and hold a credible theory of inspiration if they choose to do so as a matter of faith. Such a theory will take into account the results of modern scholarship. This view cannot conceive of the writers of the sixty-six books of the Bible as mere "passive instruments in the hands of God, acting wholly under his control," as H. H. Rowley so concisely expresses in The Relevance of the Bible (p. 22).

It cannot logically be denied that the writers of the Bible were imperfect instruments through which the Word of God is "mediated to us," and, as Rowley writes, that they were "responsible for their writings as we are for ours" (p. 25). This revelation was by necessity partial and imperfect, because the writers were imperfect and conditioned by their limited capacities, understanding, and culture.

The analogy Rowley makes is to the fact that it is impossible "to explain the theory of probability or differential calculus to a child of six." It simply cannot be done "because the child could not grasp it." Rowley concludes that the matter of "spiritual receptiveness" means that "even God Himself could only communicate Himself to men in so far as their spiritual maturity enabled them to receive Him" (p. 27). He goes on to say that "perfect revelation could only be given through perfect personality." The writers and authors of the books of the Bible were not perfect. They had certain human failures and false ideas of God. Thus, as Rowley says, "They could neither receive nor communicate the perfect Word of God" (p. 28).

For a believer, the practical result of this reasoning is simply to accept that somewhere along the time line the Bible became both a divine and a human document. It is not totally divine in the sense that it has no human input, and it is not merely and totally human in the sense that God had nothing to do with it. "The divine and human factors" are, as Rowley shows, "woven together" in the Bible (p. 35). If we find mistakes, inconsistencies, and contradictions in the Bible, we need not feel that God is responsible for them. The human writers are responsible.

It follows that believers need not be bound by a theory of inspiration which causes them to question or doubt God because of the faults of human writers. Twenty-first-century believers, whether Christian, Jewish, or Moslem, are not required to accept blindly a view of inspiration which claims that God suspended the ordinary functions of the personality or intellect of the human writers. Unlike the days when the Bible was rationed into small scraps of Latin verse, today's readers can demand the freedom to examine the production and transmission processes of religious literature. Any theory of inspiration they find acceptable and credible must provide them enough room to exercise their imagination and intelligence while retaining their integrity.

Is there any law, rule, or commandment against this? Absolutely not. There are no doctrines in Christianity or Judaism, as far as is known, to prohibit free analysis of the Bible in terms of literary criticism. Such study does not carry with it any disrespect or require a diminished view of the Bible. It incurs no sin to read and study the Bible the way we discuss doing it in this book, noting the style of writing, the choice of diction, the techniques of writing and reading, the generic nature of the text, the grammatical elements, the figures of speech, and dozens of other literary aspects.

However, any recent devotee of the dynamic theory should be aware of the new trail that lies ahead. Once freed from the bonds of the verbal theory, he or she must prepare for new heights of enrichment offered by the Bible. This can be a daunting but not insurmountable challenge, but the stakes are worth it.

H. Wheeler Robinson said a half century ago that the impact of literary and historical criticism of the Bible in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was much like that of the Copernican revolution in astronomy in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. "It has swept away many ancient difficulties. . . but it has imposed upon us a harder task of study" (The Christian Experience of the Holy Spirit 160). Modern intelligent individuals prefer to do their own thinking, reading, interpreting, and applying general principles to specific situations for themselves. Robinson's recommendation for a closer study of the Bible, "critical in method, yet devotional in spirit and aim," is essential and practical advice for twenty-first-century Bible readers.

So what Bible readers face today is not an "either/or" approach, meaning either a literary critical approach or a devotional approach to the Bible. It is a "both/and" approach, including both a literary analysis and a devotional reading of the Bible. It can garner great gains for all readers, including confused seekers after truth in the information age.

Positions of Scholars and Churches Toward Literary Criticism of the Bible

The last part of the nineteenth century and the first part of the twentieth century saw the fruition of the historical-critical method and emphasis in Bible study. During this time, biblical criticism moved away from the theory of verbal inspiration (as mentioned in an earlier section). Julius Wellhausen (1844-1918) made a great contribution to biblical criticism by further developing the documentary hypothesis concerning Genesis and applying some of that method of interpretation to the New Testament. Herman Gunkel, using similar insights and approaches, published a seminal commentary on Genesis in 1909. The European theologians Martin Dibelius (1883-1947) and Rudolph Bultmann (1884-1976) led in a brilliant search for the sources which might lie behind the literary Synoptic Gospels.

Many church officials had reservation about this twentieth-century "Form Criticism," but there were fewer all-out opponents than there were of historical criticism in the nineteenth century. In Switzerland Karl Barth (1886-1968), a conservative Protestant theologian and writer, revealed to the world that an evangelical could accept valid conclusions of modern historical-literary-critical studies of the Bible, and still maintain great scholarly stature and respect. The later volumes of his Church Dogmatics, in particular, helped to inspire narrative approaches to the Bible. During the 1970s many scholars began to join Northrop Frye, Robert Alter, and others, to continue to lead in a new emphasis on literary approaches to the Bible as story and poetry rather than literal history.

Meanwhile, Catholic scholars from Rome and the University of Jerusalem, and Jewish scholars and leaders from various Jewish Centers around the world, came together with interested Protestants to pursue the critical study of Scripture together. By the middle of the twentieth century there were many encouraging signs of using a critical study of the Bible to bring about reform and renewal throughout the church.

Then in 1943 Pope Pius XII reversed the previous position of the Roman Catholic Church and issued a famous encyclical which allowed a critical study of the Bible in seminaries and other institutions of the Roman Catholic Church. The opening words of the encyclical are "Divino afflante Spiritu," (meaning "Through the divine inspiring Spirit"). This encyclical approves and urgently recommends Catholic biblical scholars around the world to employ all the modern critical methods in determining the meaning of biblical texts. It states that the Roman Catholic Church "gratefully accepts and uses, as a gift of God, all that profane sciences have provided."

In the Jewish community, reformed Jewish scholars following the principles of literary and historical critical study of the Hebrew Bible began to win some victories over the power of conservative rabbinical scholarship. The Reformed scholars saw the conservative and orthodox rabbinical leaders much as moderate and mainline Christians viewed the extreme fundamentalists and traditionalists in their religious bodies.

The Ecumenical movement began to make progress, as evidenced by the Ecumenical Study Conference at Wadham College, Oxford, in 1949, which adopted the "Guiding Principles for the Interpretation of the Bible." And it was largely the historical-critical methodology which brought them together.

Since that mid-twentieth century watershed, Roman Catholics, Jews, and many Protestants have joined together on several occasions in common societies not only for historical-critical studies but also now for literary-critical studies of Scripture. This trend, moving from a historical study about biblical sources and dates toward a serious literary analysis of the Bible, has been remarkable. It is now generally recognized that twenty-first-century critical biblical studies must include a serious and scholarly literary approach to the Bible.

The good news is that such studies need not be confined to university or seminary classrooms. Individuals and small laity groups everywhere are investing time on a regular basis to enrich their Bible study. Unlike as little as forty years ago, an ample supply of books is available commercially for this type of study. The Selected Reading List at the end of this book was prepared in order to serve as a cafeteria line from which each reader can pick and choose.

Conclusion

As mentioned earlier, it is only in the comparatively recent history of the church that some have raised the claim of verbal inspiration and biblical inerrancy as a standard and test of Christian orthodoxy. Stemming from this claim, some extreme fundamentalist groups call themselves "a people of the Book." It would be more appropriate if all Christians should seek to be known as "a people of the Savior," and here is why:

From its beginning, the Christian Church has taught that Jesus Christ is the Living Word, and consequently the revelation of God and the source of authority for Christians. The first fourteen verses of the Gospel of St. John, about Jesus Christ as the Word, who was in the beginning with God, and was God, who made all things, and who "became flesh and dwelt among us," provides a biblically-supported cardinal doctrine of Christianity that is not compatible with the theory of verbal inspiration.

We might wonder if the theory of verbal inspiration would have been inaugurated if literary experts, rather than professional theologians, had been in charge of the public relations and educational institutions of the Christian Church. What would it have been like if the Church had enlisted literary critics with the caliber and stature of C. S. Lewis, Arthur Quiller-Couch, and T. S. Eliot as presidents or deans in some of the seminaries? What would one of them be likely to say about verbal inspiration? Perhaps this:

"Asking a reader to accept a verbal theory of inspiration today is like asking a modern physician to accept by faith the Elizabethan concept that diseases are caused by the four humours of blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile."

Never in history has there been a greater opportunity for anybody to study, understand, and enjoy the Bible, using the dynamic and literary approach to the inspiration question.