By Ryan Leasure
This article is part 5 in a nine-part series on how we got our Bible. Part 1 considered inspiration and inerrancy. Part 2 looked at the unfolding of the Old Testament. Part 3 examined the Old Testament canon and the Apocrypha. Part 4 considered the canonical attributes for New Testament books. This article will unpack how the early church received the New Testament canon.
Marcion (AD 85-160)
Before diving into the the corporate reception of the canon, it’s first necessary to say a brief word about Marcion. According to church historian Henry Chadwick, Marcion was “the most radical and to the church the most formidable of heretics.”[1] What was Marcion’s heresy? He promoted Gnosticism—the belief that the god who created the world was evil, and thus the OT was evil. This belief led Marcion to reject the entire OT and most parts of the NT which spoke positively of the OT.
Therefore, Marcion’s canon included a mutilated version of Luke which left out all positive references to the OT as well as any hints that Jesus might have actually been a physical human. Gnosticism, after all, taught that the physical world was evil. Jesus, then, only appeared to be human—a view known as Docetism.
The Church universally rejected Marcion. Not one church Father has anything remotely positive to say about him. In fact, after Marcion made a sizable donation to the church in Rome, they returned it to him after they learned of his heretical views.
When did the Church Receive the Canon?
Marcion’s so-called canon suggests that the church already had some kind of functional canon by the middle-part of the second century. Which raises a significant question: When did the Church receive the NT canon? One’s answer to this question depends largely on how they define the canon. Michael Kruger gives three definitions:[2]
Exclusive Canon — The church solidified the canonical boundaries in the fourth century.
Functional Canon — The core canonical texts were functioning authoritatively by the second century.
Ontological Canon — The texts were authoritative as soon the apostles finished writing them.
The rest of this post will focus mostly on the functional canon and a little on the exclusive canon. For more on the ontological canon, see the first post in this series on the inspiration of biblical texts. In that article, I draw attention to the fact that the biblical authors were aware that they were writing authoritative Scripture.
The Reception of the New Testament Canon
In the remaining space, I’m going to argue that the church recoginzed most of the NT as authoritative by the second century. The church later affirmed the fringes of the canon in the fourth century. To support this claim, I will consider four key points.
1. Statements by Church Fathers
Several statements from the church fathers suggest that they recognized certain texts as authoritative. Irenaeus (AD 180), for example, notes, “It is not possible that the gospels can be either more or fewer than the number they are. For since there are four zones of the world in which we live and four principle winds . . . [and] the cherubim, too were four-faced.”[3] While we may scratch our heads at Irenaeus’ logic, one thing is for certain: He believed that four and only four Gospels were authoritative.
Justin Martyr (AD 150) also recognized their authority when he mentioned that the church was reading these texts in corporate worship alongside the OT. He remarks, “And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together in one place, and the memoir of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits.”[4] No one questions whether the early church recognized the authority of the OT. The fact that they were reading NT texts alongside the OT suggests they believed both were Scripture.
Ignatius (AD 110) recognizes the apostles’ authority verses his own when he said, “I am not commanding you as Peter and Paul did. They were apostles, I am condemned.”[5] Ignatius was an influential church leader in the second century. But even he recognized that Peter and Paul’s writings were on a whole other level from his own.
As you peruse the early church fathers, you will find several quotes referencing the authority of the NT texts.
2. Appeals to Texts as Scripture
Not only do the early church fathers state that the New Testament texts were authoritative, they also appeal to them as divinely inspired Scripture. The Epistle of Barnabas (AD 130), for example, uses the formula “it is written” when it quotes from the Gospel of Matthew. It’s well-noted that the NT authors frequently employ this formula when they quote an OT text. The Epistle of Barnabas reads, “As it is written, ‘Many are called, but few are chosen.’”[6]
Polycarp (AD 110) makes an even more explicit reference. He notes, “As it is written in these Scriptures, ‘Be angry and do not sin and do not let the sun go down on your anger.”[7] Interestingly, Polycarp quotes two texts and refers to them both as “Scripture.” The first text was Psalm 4:5, and the second was Ephesians 4:26.
In fact, by the middle to end of the second century, a few well-known church fathers appeal to a core set of canonical books, indicating that they believed those books were in fact Scripture. Irenaeus appeals to the following books as Scripture:
Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Hebrews, James, 1 Peter, 1 John, 2 John, and Revelation.[8]
Only Philemon, 2 Peter, 3 John, and Jude are missing.
Similarly, Clement of Alexandria appeals to the following books as Scripture:
Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thesalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon, Hebrews, 1 Peter, 1 John, 2 John, Jude, and Revelation.[9]
Only James, 2 Peter, and 3 John are missing.
Around AD 250, Origen gives us a complete canonical list in his homily on Joshua. Notice carefully all the books that he references:
But when our Lord Jesus Christ comes, whose arrival that prior son of Nun designated, he sends priests, his apostles, bearing “trumpets hammered thin,” the magnificent and heavenly instruction of proclamation. Matthew first sounded the priestly trumpet in his Gospel; Mark also; Luke and John each played their own priestly trumpets. Even Peter cries out with trumpets in two of his epistles; also James and Jude. In addition, John also sounds the trumpet through his epistles [and Revelation], and Luke, as he describes the Acts of the Apostles. And now that last one comes, the one who said, “I think God displays us apostles last,” and in fourteen of his epistles, thundering with trumpets, he casts down the walls of Jericho and all the devices of idolatry and dogmas of philosophers, all the way to the foundations.[10]
You’ll notice that Origen attributes fourteen letters to Paul instead of thirteen. The most likely explanation for this error is the common belief that Paul wrote the book of Hebrews.
3. Manuscript Evidence
One of the best indications that the NT books functioned authoritatively in the second and third century is the amount of extant manuscripts we have in our possession. As of right now, we have over sixty NT manuscripts from the second and third century. The Gospel of John has the most with eighteen. Matthew comes in second with twelve. By comparison, we have seventeen second and third century manuscripts of all the apocryphal texts combined. In other words, we have more manuscripts of John than all the apocryphal books put together. The most manuscripts for any apocryphal text is the Gospel of Thomas which has three.
The amount of extant manuscripts indicates which books the church used most often. John and Matthew were apparently the two most popular books in the early church based on the number of extant manuscripts in our possession. The fact that we have hardly any apocryphal manuscripts indicates that the early church didn’t have much use for them.
Also of note is the fact that all of the second and third century New Testament manuscripts are in a codex format (precursor to modern books). None are on a scroll. That said, the scroll was the most popular book form of the second and third century. Over time, as Christianity grew, codex became the dominant book form in the ancient world.
While none of the New Testament texts are on a scroll, apocryphal texts are. Furthermore, because the codex allowed the church to conveniently place several books into a single codex, we have several codices with multiple Gospels and Paul’s letters. P46, for example, is a collection of nine of Paul’s letters. P75 contains Luke and John. P45 is a four Gospel codex. We don’t have a single codex which combines canonical and apocryphal gospels. In other words, no manuscript has Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Thomas. The manuscripts tell us all we need to know about which books the early church thought were authoritative.
4. Canonical Lists
In 1740, Lodovico Antonio Muratori published a Latin list of NT books known as the Muratorian Fragment. This fragment contains an early canonical list that most trace back to the second century church in Rome. The canon includes the following books:
Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon, 1 John, 2 John, Jude, and Revelation.
Only Hebrews, James, 1 Peter, 2 Peter, and 3 John are missing. This list, along with the lists from the early church fathers, indicates that the second century church recognized a core group of canonical books by the middle to late second century. Only a few fringe books are missing. As time progressed, the church eventually affirmed the twenty-seven book canon that we have today.
Around AD 320, church historian Eusebius gave a canonical list that he subdivided into four categories:[11]
Recognized Books: Eusebius remarks that these books were universally accepted.
Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon, Hebrews, 1 Peter, 1 John, and Revelation
Disputed Books: Eusebius remarked that these books were “disputed yet known by most.”
James, 2 Peter, 2 John, 3 John, and Jude
Spurious Books: Eusebius notes that these were books that the early church found helpful, but they weren’t Scripture.
Acts of Paul, Shepherd of Hermes, Revelation of Peter, Epistle of Barnabas, Didache, and Gospel of Hebrews
Heretical Books: Eusebius says these books have been universally rejected.
Gospel of Peter, Gospel of Thomas, Acts of Andrew, Acts of John, and Gospel of Matthias
Notice that between the recognized and disputed books which were “known by most,” the entire New Testament canon is present. Also worth noting is that Eusebius believed the heretical books were utterly repulsive. Consider his words:
we have felt compelled to give this catalogue in order that we might be able to know both these works and those that are cited by the heretics under the name of the apostles, including, for instance, such books as the Gospels of Peter, of Thomas, of Matthias, or of any others besides them, and the Acts of Andrew and John and the other apostles, which no one belonging to the succession of ecclesiastical writers has deemed worthy of mention in his writings. And further, the character of the style is at variance with apostolic usage, and both the thoughts and the purpose of the things that are related in them are so completely out of accord with true orthodoxy that they clearly show themselves to be the fictions of heretics. Wherefore they are not to be placed even among the rejected writings, but are all of them to be cast aside as absurd and impious.
In other words, these books didn’t “almost” make it into the canon. The canon didn’t come down to an arbitrary vote. The church rejected these books from a very early time due to their devilish nature.
Following Eusebius, Athanasius gave a complete canonical list with all twenty-seven books in AD 367. In AD 393 and 397, the Councils of Hippo and Carthage also affirmed the twenty-seven books in the canon.
Recognized Not Determined
In closing, I want to make an important point. The church did not grant authority to any NT text. It merely recognized which books were already authoritative in the church. As J. I. Packer helpfully states, “The Church no more gave us the New Testament canon than Sir Isaac Newton gave us the force of gravity. God gave us gravity . . . Newton did not create gravity but recognized it.”
In the next post, we will transition to the preservation of the NT text. Specifically, we will take a look at the manuscript tradition and textual criticism.
References
[1] Henry Chadwick, The Early Church, 39.
[2] Michael Kruger, The Question of Canon, 29-46.
[3] Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 3.11.8.
[4] Justin Martyr, First Apology, 67.3.
[5] Ignatius, Romans. 4:4.
[6] Epistle of Barnabas 4.14.
[7] Polycarp, Philippians, 12.1.
[8] Michael Kruger, Canon Revisited, 228.
[9] Michael Kruger, The Question of Canon, 168.
[10] Origen, Homily on Joshua 7.1.
[11] Eusebius, Church History, 3.25.1-7.
Recommended resources related to the topic:
Why We Know the New Testament Writers Told the Truth by Frank Turek (DVD, Mp3 and Mp4) Jesus, You and the Essentials of
Christianity by Frank Turek (INSTRUCTOR Study Guide), (STUDENT Study Guide), and (DVD) Cold-Case Christianity: A Homicide
Detective Investigates the Claims of the Gospels by J. Warner Wallace (Book)
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Ryan Leasure holds a Master of Arts from Furman University and a Masters of Divinity from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Currently, he’s a Doctor of Ministry candidate at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He also serves as a pastor at Grace Bible Church in Moore, SC
Original Blog Source: https://bit.ly/3KTGEHP
The Bible Story You Are In
PodcastWhat do you think about when you hear the word “God”? Too many of us have false knowledge about God. We think God loves us more if we obey Him and less if we don’t. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, there is a story in the Bible— a story you are actually in— that just could revolutionize your understanding of God and His grace. Frank unpacks that story in this episode. Get ready to look at the prodigal son passage and God Himself in a new light.
If you would like to submit a question to be answered on the show, please email your question to Hello@Crossexamined.org.
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Silencing of the Lambs | with Dr. Michael Brown
PodcastAre you FOR a free and respectful debate about controversial issues?
Are you FOR the freedom to have your own political opinions without fear of losing your job?
Are you FOR respecting people and their positions rather than calling them names or censoring them?
Are you FOR the freedom to speak the truth to love even those who disagree with you?
Are you FOR forgiveness rather than being executed by cancel culture?
Are you FOR protecting women and children from sexual predators?
Are you FOR protecting the innocence of young children regarding sex?
Are you FOR parents having the right to teach their children their values?
Are you FOR parents having a say in what their kids are taught in school?
Are you FOR the ability to say no to a government that wants to mutilate and sterilize your children without your consent?
Are you FOR being able to cite the scientific evidence that life begins at conception?
Are you FOR being able to cite the scientific evidence that there are only two genders?
Are you FOR people having the right to get counseling for any issue they are struggling with?
Are you FOR the freedom to live out your religious beliefs?
Are you FOR your ability to preach the Gospel?
Are you FOR the freedom to live not by lies but by the truth?
If you are FOR any or all of these things, then listen to this show! Dr. Michael Brown, author of ‘Silencing of the Lambs‘ joins Frank to give us practical ways to advance freedom and Jesus in a culture that wants to cancel you.
If you would like to submit a question to be answered on the show, please email your question to Hello@Crossexamined.org.
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¿Todos los razonamientos son razonamientos circulares?
EspañolBy David Pallman
Circular reasoning is generally understood to be a fallacy. The reason is that circular arguments assume what they purport to prove. At least one of the premises of a circular argument depends on the truth of the conclusion, which makes the argument lose all justificatory force. For in order to accept the premise in question, one would have to already believe the conclusion. But if one already believes the conclusion, one does not need the argument, and if one does not believe the conclusion, the argument will not provide any basis for belief.
Despite the apparent obviousness of what I have just said, the claim that circular reasoning is, in some cases, acceptable and—worse still—ultimately inevitable remains surprisingly popular. This claim is common among Christian apologists known as presuppositionalists (though it is by no means limited to them). It is not my purpose here to criticize circular reasoning in general or to offer a noncircular alternative, though I have done so elsewhere. [1] My purpose here is to criticize a popular argument that purports to show that circular reasoning is inevitable.
The argument is often formulated as follows: “You must use reason to prove reason.” The thrust of the argument seems to be that since you cannot prove reason apart from reason, circularity is simply inescapable. [2] While I don’t encounter this argument much in the academic literature (at least not in this form), it is quite popular among presuppositionalists on the Internet. And while I generally prefer to discuss academic issues, the universality of this argument coupled with the fact that I am not aware of any direct interaction with it motivates me to write this article in response. [3]
In this article, I propose to briefly explain my motivation for taking up this argument. I will then attempt to disambiguate the argument and clarify both what it means and how it might be responded to. After disambiguating the argument, I will argue that it either assumes a theory of epistemic justification that can be rejected, or it fails to recognize an important distinction between two kinds of use. In either case, circular reasoning can be avoided.
Raising the stakes
After all, why should we care about argument? Is it really a problem if all justification is, in the end, circular? Or perhaps we shouldn’t even try to justify the reliability of reasoning. Maybe it’s simply a fundamental assumption of all philosophical inquiry that needs no justification at all.
It would be an understatement to say that many philosophers are content to say that belief in the reliability of reason can be justified only in a circular fashion. [4] Others, however, take the essential reliability of reason to be a fundamental principle incapable of justification and in need of no justification. But I have never found such answers satisfactory. I have never been content to suppose that I must demand justification for my beliefs down to the most basic level, but then give free rein to fundamental beliefs. That move seems entirely arbitrary and even incoherent. If our most fundamental beliefs are unjustified, then I take this to imply that all beliefs that depend on them for justification are equally unjustified. I suspect that many readers feel the same way.
But this conviction forces those who hold it to confront the original argument. For if there is no non-circular means of justifying core beliefs, then we may well have to face the conclusion that none of our beliefs are justified. For those who wish to avoid such a pessimistic conclusion, there is a strong motivation to address the original argument.
Clarifying the issue
Having provided some motivation, let us move on to assess the merits of the argument. Roughly speaking, it is the claim that reason should be used to justify reasoning. Put like that, the claim is quite incoherent. Reasoning is a deliberative cognitive process. It is not a proposition. It is not something that can be true or false. As such, reasoning itself does not need justification, since it is an action and not a belief. Imagine how absurd it would be to require justification for walking, or driving, or swimming. These activities do not need justification precisely because they are activities and not propositions. Once we understand that only propositions require justification because of their possibility of being false, it becomes clear that the act of reasoning does not need justification.
Sometimes the argument is phrased as a question: How do you know your reasoning is valid? But put like that, the argument is guilty of a category mistake. Validity is not a property of reasoning, but a property of arguments. [5] Saying that one’s reasoning is valid makes as little sense as saying that one’s driving is valid. Validity simply does not apply to activities.
But it may be objected that I have missed the point. After all, I am seizing on very poorly worded versions of the argument. And that is, of course, quite true. As I have noted before, this argument is not as prominent among academics as it is among those on the Internet. But I think that addressing these confused versions of the argument is an important task because it helps us clarify what is and is not at issue. It also forces those who use these problematic formulations of the argument to be more precise. Finally, pointing out the incoherence of these simplistic formulations of the argument can also serve to rob them of their rhetorical force.
Strengthening the Argument
So let me try to reconstruct a more sensible version of the argument. It seems to me that when someone says that we should use reason to justify reasoning, they mean that one should use one’s ability to reason to defend the proposition that reasoning is reliable. One should, in effect, assume that one’s ability to reason is reliable. This is certainly a much stronger argument. But to answer it, we must look for even further clarification.
Before we move on to respond to the strong version of the argument, we must ask what the phrase “reason is reliable” means. Taken literally, it means that the cognitive process of reasoning itself somehow produces justification for beliefs in virtue of its reliability. Thus, the argument says that one must assume that reasoning produces justification for beliefs by virtue of being reliable in order to conclude that reasoning produces justification for beliefs by virtue of being reliable.
Reliability vs. Evidentialism
So construed, the argument starts from a reliabilist epistemology. Reliabilism is a theory of epistemic justification according to which beliefs are justified if they have been produced by a reliable process. If this is what the proponent of the argument claims, then we can happily agree with him. It is not at all controversial that reliabilism is guilty of epistemic circularity. This is a well-known fact and is admitted by both reliabilists and critics of reliabilism.
However, it should be noted that if this is what the argument is trying to establish, then it assumes reliabilism and arrives at the incontrovertible conclusion that reliabilism leads to circularity. Not all philosophers are reliabilists, however. The main contender for reliabilism is so-called evidentialism. According to evidentialism, the justification any subject has for a belief is always relative to the evidence that subject possesses for that belief. [6] Evidentialism looks for justification in evidence – not in reliable processes. Thus, the argument considered above simply will not work against evidentialism because it assumes a theory of justification that the evidentialist rejects. [7] As such, one need only reject reliabilism for the argument not to establish that circularity is inevitable.
Functional Use vs. Justification Use
However, evidentialists still use reason to arrive at justified beliefs. Does this indicate that there is still some circularity on the evidentialist’s part? To answer this question, we need to be clear about what is meant by the use of reason. There are two very different ways in which we use things to justify our beliefs. We use things in a justificatory sense , and we also use things in a functional sense . Something is used in a justificatory sense when it is offered as a rational justification for a belief. Something is used in a functional sense when it is employed as a tool in the process of offering a rational justification. Fundamentally, nothing about a functional use contributes to the rational justification of a belief. It is simply a means to help a subject see that justification for what it is. The upshot is that the functional use does not even have the potential to be circular because circularity can only apply to justification.
We can see the distinction most clearly by way of an illustration. Suppose that I am debating with a friend about the existence of pencils. I am trying to convince him that pencils really exist. Suppose further that this debate is conducted via letters. In my attempt to convince my friend that pencils are real, I offer him numerous syllogistic arguments in support of the existence of pencils. Suppose that I use a pencil to write these arguments to him. In this case, it would be quite correct to say that I used a pencil to justify my belief in the existence of pencils. But the use was entirely functional. At no point did I use the proposition that pencils exist as a premise in an argument concluding that pencils exist. The premises of my arguments are the ones I use to justify my belief in pencils. Therefore, the justification for my belief in pencils is not circular, even though I used a pencil to justify the belief. This is because the use of the pencil was functional and not justificatory.
This illustration is quite analogous to what I have in mind when I say that evidentialists “use reason” to justify their beliefs. While it is true that we must think critically—we must reason—to justify our beliefs, we do not use reason as the rational basis for any of our beliefs. Evidence provides the justification for our beliefs, and reason is only the process of evaluating it. At no point does the process of reasoning itself justify a belief. Reasoning without evidence to reason with gets us nowhere. Reason is not some mystical ability that leads us to truth on its own. Reason requires facts to work with. It is simply a necessary means to arrive at justified beliefs. On the critical view, since we do not attribute justification to the process of reasoning itself, our use of it is not justificatory. It is functional. As such, our use of reason when seeking to justify our beliefs is not circular.
Summary and Conclusion
In this article, I have assessed the claim that epistemic circularity is inevitable, since one must, in fact, use reason to justify one’s beliefs about the truth-seeking nature of reasoning. I have determined that the argument is often unclearly and incoherently framed. When made intelligible, it assumes epistemic reliabilism and thus has no force against evidentialism. Any attempt to press the argument against evidentialism will raise the issue against evidentialism. Furthermore, attempts to modify it to meet evidentialism on the grounds that evidentialists “use reason” fail to recognize the distinction between functional and justificatory use. Since evidentialists only “use reason” in a functional sense, they are not guilty of epistemic circularity.
It has not been my purpose here to evaluate all the arguments for epistemic circularity or to offer a detailed exposition of a non-circular theory of knowledge. Others more able than I have done so elsewhere. [8] My purpose has been minimal. I have simply attempted to show that a single popular argument for the inescapability of circular reasoning fails as long as evidentialism is a viable option.
Grades
[1] See my video “Internalism Versus Externalism” available here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxOg5zKUYmU&t=12s
[2] For a set of arguments along these lines, see Sye Ten Bruggencate’s video “How To Answer The Fool (full film)” available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQKjUzotw_Y&vl=en&t=329
[3] In particular, conversations with Seth Bloomsburg and Tyler Vela convinced me of the need for this article.
[4] Examples include William Alston, Alvin Plantinga, Michael Bergmann, and Andrew Moon.
[5] We certainly sometimes talk about valid and invalid reasoning. But this kind of language does not refer to cognitive processes, but to the validity of the logical inferences that follow from reasoning.
[6] Earl Conee and Richard Feldman, Evidentialism, Oxford University Press, 2004, p. 83
[7] See Berit Brogaard, “Phenomenal Dogmatism, Seeming Evidentialism and Inferential Justification”, in Believing in Accordance with the Evidence, Springer International Publishing, 2018, Kevin McCain editor, Pg. 55
[8] Some examples are Richard Fumerton, Metaepistemology and Skepticism, Rowman & Littlefield, 1995; Timothy McGrew and Lydia McGrew, Internalism and Epistemology, Routledge, 2007; Paul K. Moser, Knowledge and Evidence, Cambridge University Press, 1989; Brie Gertler, Self-Knowledge, Routledge, 2011
Recommended resources in Spanish:
Stealing from God ( Paperback ), ( Teacher Study Guide ), and ( Student Study Guide ) by Dr. Frank Turek
Why I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist ( Complete DVD Series ), ( Teacher’s Workbook ), and ( Student’s Handbook ) by Dr. Frank Turek
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David Pallmann is a student at Trinity College of the Bible and Theological Seminary. He is also a member of the Society of Evangelical Arminians and runs the YouTube apologetics ministry Faith Because of Reason.
Original Blog Source : https://bit.ly/3KPtewf
Translated by Jennifer Chavez
Edited by Elenita Romero
How We Got Our Bible: New Testament Canonical Reception
4. Is the NT True?, Jesus Christ, Theology and Christian ApologeticsBy Ryan Leasure
This article is part 5 in a nine-part series on how we got our Bible. Part 1 considered inspiration and inerrancy. Part 2 looked at the unfolding of the Old Testament. Part 3 examined the Old Testament canon and the Apocrypha. Part 4 considered the canonical attributes for New Testament books. This article will unpack how the early church received the New Testament canon.
Marcion (AD 85-160)
Before diving into the the corporate reception of the canon, it’s first necessary to say a brief word about Marcion. According to church historian Henry Chadwick, Marcion was “the most radical and to the church the most formidable of heretics.”[1] What was Marcion’s heresy? He promoted Gnosticism—the belief that the god who created the world was evil, and thus the OT was evil. This belief led Marcion to reject the entire OT and most parts of the NT which spoke positively of the OT.
Therefore, Marcion’s canon included a mutilated version of Luke which left out all positive references to the OT as well as any hints that Jesus might have actually been a physical human. Gnosticism, after all, taught that the physical world was evil. Jesus, then, only appeared to be human—a view known as Docetism.
The Church universally rejected Marcion. Not one church Father has anything remotely positive to say about him. In fact, after Marcion made a sizable donation to the church in Rome, they returned it to him after they learned of his heretical views.
When did the Church Receive the Canon?
Marcion’s so-called canon suggests that the church already had some kind of functional canon by the middle-part of the second century. Which raises a significant question: When did the Church receive the NT canon? One’s answer to this question depends largely on how they define the canon. Michael Kruger gives three definitions:[2]
Exclusive Canon — The church solidified the canonical boundaries in the fourth century.
Functional Canon — The core canonical texts were functioning authoritatively by the second century.
Ontological Canon — The texts were authoritative as soon the apostles finished writing them.
The rest of this post will focus mostly on the functional canon and a little on the exclusive canon. For more on the ontological canon, see the first post in this series on the inspiration of biblical texts. In that article, I draw attention to the fact that the biblical authors were aware that they were writing authoritative Scripture.
The Reception of the New Testament Canon
In the remaining space, I’m going to argue that the church recoginzed most of the NT as authoritative by the second century. The church later affirmed the fringes of the canon in the fourth century. To support this claim, I will consider four key points.
1. Statements by Church Fathers
Several statements from the church fathers suggest that they recognized certain texts as authoritative. Irenaeus (AD 180), for example, notes, “It is not possible that the gospels can be either more or fewer than the number they are. For since there are four zones of the world in which we live and four principle winds . . . [and] the cherubim, too were four-faced.”[3] While we may scratch our heads at Irenaeus’ logic, one thing is for certain: He believed that four and only four Gospels were authoritative.
Justin Martyr (AD 150) also recognized their authority when he mentioned that the church was reading these texts in corporate worship alongside the OT. He remarks, “And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together in one place, and the memoir of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits.”[4] No one questions whether the early church recognized the authority of the OT. The fact that they were reading NT texts alongside the OT suggests they believed both were Scripture.
Ignatius (AD 110) recognizes the apostles’ authority verses his own when he said, “I am not commanding you as Peter and Paul did. They were apostles, I am condemned.”[5] Ignatius was an influential church leader in the second century. But even he recognized that Peter and Paul’s writings were on a whole other level from his own.
As you peruse the early church fathers, you will find several quotes referencing the authority of the NT texts.
2. Appeals to Texts as Scripture
Not only do the early church fathers state that the New Testament texts were authoritative, they also appeal to them as divinely inspired Scripture. The Epistle of Barnabas (AD 130), for example, uses the formula “it is written” when it quotes from the Gospel of Matthew. It’s well-noted that the NT authors frequently employ this formula when they quote an OT text. The Epistle of Barnabas reads, “As it is written, ‘Many are called, but few are chosen.’”[6]
Polycarp (AD 110) makes an even more explicit reference. He notes, “As it is written in these Scriptures, ‘Be angry and do not sin and do not let the sun go down on your anger.”[7] Interestingly, Polycarp quotes two texts and refers to them both as “Scripture.” The first text was Psalm 4:5, and the second was Ephesians 4:26.
In fact, by the middle to end of the second century, a few well-known church fathers appeal to a core set of canonical books, indicating that they believed those books were in fact Scripture. Irenaeus appeals to the following books as Scripture:
Only Philemon, 2 Peter, 3 John, and Jude are missing.
Similarly, Clement of Alexandria appeals to the following books as Scripture:
Only James, 2 Peter, and 3 John are missing.
Around AD 250, Origen gives us a complete canonical list in his homily on Joshua. Notice carefully all the books that he references:
You’ll notice that Origen attributes fourteen letters to Paul instead of thirteen. The most likely explanation for this error is the common belief that Paul wrote the book of Hebrews.
3. Manuscript Evidence
One of the best indications that the NT books functioned authoritatively in the second and third century is the amount of extant manuscripts we have in our possession. As of right now, we have over sixty NT manuscripts from the second and third century. The Gospel of John has the most with eighteen. Matthew comes in second with twelve. By comparison, we have seventeen second and third century manuscripts of all the apocryphal texts combined. In other words, we have more manuscripts of John than all the apocryphal books put together. The most manuscripts for any apocryphal text is the Gospel of Thomas which has three.
The amount of extant manuscripts indicates which books the church used most often. John and Matthew were apparently the two most popular books in the early church based on the number of extant manuscripts in our possession. The fact that we have hardly any apocryphal manuscripts indicates that the early church didn’t have much use for them.
Also of note is the fact that all of the second and third century New Testament manuscripts are in a codex format (precursor to modern books). None are on a scroll. That said, the scroll was the most popular book form of the second and third century. Over time, as Christianity grew, codex became the dominant book form in the ancient world.
While none of the New Testament texts are on a scroll, apocryphal texts are. Furthermore, because the codex allowed the church to conveniently place several books into a single codex, we have several codices with multiple Gospels and Paul’s letters. P46, for example, is a collection of nine of Paul’s letters. P75 contains Luke and John. P45 is a four Gospel codex. We don’t have a single codex which combines canonical and apocryphal gospels. In other words, no manuscript has Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Thomas. The manuscripts tell us all we need to know about which books the early church thought were authoritative.
4. Canonical Lists
In 1740, Lodovico Antonio Muratori published a Latin list of NT books known as the Muratorian Fragment. This fragment contains an early canonical list that most trace back to the second century church in Rome. The canon includes the following books:
Only Hebrews, James, 1 Peter, 2 Peter, and 3 John are missing. This list, along with the lists from the early church fathers, indicates that the second century church recognized a core group of canonical books by the middle to late second century. Only a few fringe books are missing. As time progressed, the church eventually affirmed the twenty-seven book canon that we have today.
Around AD 320, church historian Eusebius gave a canonical list that he subdivided into four categories:[11]
Recognized Books: Eusebius remarks that these books were universally accepted.
Disputed Books: Eusebius remarked that these books were “disputed yet known by most.”
Spurious Books: Eusebius notes that these were books that the early church found helpful, but they weren’t Scripture.
Heretical Books: Eusebius says these books have been universally rejected.
Notice that between the recognized and disputed books which were “known by most,” the entire New Testament canon is present. Also worth noting is that Eusebius believed the heretical books were utterly repulsive. Consider his words:
In other words, these books didn’t “almost” make it into the canon. The canon didn’t come down to an arbitrary vote. The church rejected these books from a very early time due to their devilish nature.
Following Eusebius, Athanasius gave a complete canonical list with all twenty-seven books in AD 367. In AD 393 and 397, the Councils of Hippo and Carthage also affirmed the twenty-seven books in the canon.
Recognized Not Determined
In closing, I want to make an important point. The church did not grant authority to any NT text. It merely recognized which books were already authoritative in the church. As J. I. Packer helpfully states, “The Church no more gave us the New Testament canon than Sir Isaac Newton gave us the force of gravity. God gave us gravity . . . Newton did not create gravity but recognized it.”
In the next post, we will transition to the preservation of the NT text. Specifically, we will take a look at the manuscript tradition and textual criticism.
References
[1] Henry Chadwick, The Early Church, 39.
[2] Michael Kruger, The Question of Canon, 29-46.
[3] Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 3.11.8.
[4] Justin Martyr, First Apology, 67.3.
[5] Ignatius, Romans. 4:4.
[6] Epistle of Barnabas 4.14.
[7] Polycarp, Philippians, 12.1.
[8] Michael Kruger, Canon Revisited, 228.
[9] Michael Kruger, The Question of Canon, 168.
[10] Origen, Homily on Joshua 7.1.
[11] Eusebius, Church History, 3.25.1-7.
Recommended resources related to the topic:
Why We Know the New Testament Writers Told the Truth by Frank Turek (DVD, Mp3 and Mp4) Jesus, You and the Essentials of
Christianity by Frank Turek (INSTRUCTOR Study Guide), (STUDENT Study Guide), and (DVD) Cold-Case Christianity: A Homicide
Detective Investigates the Claims of the Gospels by J. Warner Wallace (Book)
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Ryan Leasure holds a Master of Arts from Furman University and a Masters of Divinity from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Currently, he’s a Doctor of Ministry candidate at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He also serves as a pastor at Grace Bible Church in Moore, SC
Original Blog Source: https://bit.ly/3KTGEHP
Be a Monster or a Hero? John Cooper of Skillet
PodcastDo you have to have a degree in theology, philosophy, or apologetics in order to speak powerfully and accurately about how the church is being influenced by the culture? If you think so—if you think that all of this should be left to the professionals, to some kind of expert class or clergy—then you haven’t been reading your Bible enough. You’ve left that to the expert class or clergy, which is exactly the problem we’re seeing in the church today.
John Cooper, founder and lead singer of the wildly popular Christian rock band Skillet, gets it. He knows that all of us should be ambassadors for Christ doing ministry, not just clergy or those with advanced degrees. He joins Frank to address the scourge of high-profile Christian musicians and celebrities who have deconstructed their faith (not realizing that they have simply reconstructed another one). John has been discussing these issues recently on his CooperStuff podcast. Here he explains further and also reveals his personal testimony and how Skillet broke through to have wide appeal, even to non-Christians.
Join Frank and John, along with Alisa Childers, Hugh Ross, J. Warner Wallace, and many others at the National Conference of Christian Apologetics this April near Charlotte NC. Go to SES.edu for details.
If you would like to submit a question to be answered on the show, please email your question to Hello@Crossexamined.org.
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¿Qué pensaba Jesús sobre el Antiguo Testamento?
EspañolBy Ryan Leasure
It’s not uncommon for Christians to throw shade at the Old Testament. These Christians say they love Jesus, but they could do without those early Jewish texts. In fact, many Christians suggest that much of the Old Testament is ahistorical. Events like the flood, Jonah being swallowed by a great fish, or the fiery judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah never happened. And then there’s the infamous quote that Christians simply need to “unhook themselves from the Old Testament” because so much of it is embarrassing or difficult to understand. Why can’t we focus on Jesus?
We can certainly sympathize with these sentiments. After all, the flood and the judgment of Sodom seem pretty incredible, and pretty harsh at that. Wouldn’t it be easier to ignore this ancient corpus? This stance seems reasonable until one realizes that the same Jesus whom these Christians worship also holds the Old Testament in high regard. He not only affirms the inspiration of the Old Testament, but also its historicity and authority.
The Old Testament is inspired
Historically, Christians have affirmed the verbal plenary inspiration of the Bible. That is, they acknowledge that every word of Scripture is “God-breathed” (2 Tim. 3:16-17). At the same time, God spoke through a human agency. Therefore, Scripture not only has a divine author, it also has human authors.
Jesus affirmed the human authors of the Old Testament. He repeatedly acknowledges that Moses is the one who gave the Law (Matthew 8:4; 19:8; Mark 1:44; 7:10; Luke 5:14; 20:37; John 5:46; 7:19). He will say things like, “Do what Moses commanded” (Mark 1:44). Oh, “Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’” (Mark 7:10). Concerning other Old Testament authors, Jesus states, “Well did Isaiah prophesy…” (Mark 7:6). Also, “David himself, in the Holy Spirit, declared… .” (Mark 12:36). And “So when you see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet…” (Matthew 24:15). It is worth noting that almost all critical scholars question the authorship of these individuals, in clear contradiction to Jesus.
At the same time, Jesus affirms that these individuals wrote divinely inspired Scripture. As just alluded to, Jesus noted in Mark 12:36, “David himself, in the Holy Spirit, declared…” In other words, David wrote, but his writings were the result of the work of the Holy Spirit (2 Pet 1:20-21). He also declared, “Well did Isaiah prophesy…” (Mark 7:6). The mere mention of prophecy suggests that Isaiah wrote from God. Prophecy, after all, is by definition “a word from God.” The same could be said of Matthew 24:15 when Jesus refers to Daniel as “the prophet.” Furthermore, in addressing the scribes and Pharisees, Jesus states, “You forsake the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men” (Mark 7:8). He then clarifies that God’s commandment was what Moses wrote in Exodus 20.
As John Wenhan points out, “For [Jesus], Moses, the prophets, David, and the other writers of Scripture were truly inspired men with a message given by the Spirit of God.”
The Old Testament is historically accurate
While many are willing to concede the inspiration of the Old Testament, many of these same individuals deny that it is historically accurate on all points. They may affirm its historical nature in general (God created the world, called Abraham and the Jewish people, the Jews were exiled, etc.), but balk at some of the more difficult texts (the flood, Sodom, Jonah, etc.). That said, Jesus has no qualms about affirming the historical character of the Old Testament, even the most difficult texts to believe. Here are some examples:
He believed that Cain killed Abel (Luke 11:51), that God sent a flood but spared Noah on the ark (Matthew 24:37-39), and that God destroyed Sodom because of its wickedness (Matthew 11:23-24). He even adds, “Remember Lot’s wife” (Luke 17:32). Furthermore, Jesus believed that God sent manna from heaven (John 6:31), that the Israelites were healed by looking at the serpent (John 3:14), and that Jonah was swallowed by a great fish only to be put to death three days later (Matthew 12:39-41).
The last text about Jonah is especially significant because it shows that Jesus did not view these events merely figuratively. Indeed, at the end of the text we read: “The men of Nineveh will rise up with this generation in the judgment and condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and behold, something greater than Jonah is here” (Mt 12:41 ESV). It is difficult to imagine how Jesus could claim that Nineveh would rise up in the final judgment against the people who rejected him, if it was a farce. The same could be said of Jesus’ statement in Matthew 24:37: “For as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man” (ESV). In other words, just as God’s judgment was poured out in the days of Noah, so it will be again at the final judgment.
Again, Wenham comments, “It is evident that [Jesus] was familiar with most of our Old Testament and treated it all equally as history.”2
The Old Testament has authority
Because Jesus believed the Old Testament was divinely inspired, he also claimed its full authority. He demonstrated this authority by appealing to the scriptures dozens of times.
When asked what the greatest commandments are, He declares that “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind . . . And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:37-39). Jesus said that these two commandments (Deut. 6:4-6; Lev. 19:18) summarize the entirety of the Old Testament and are the guide for all ethical questions.
When faced with temptation, Jesus appealed to the authority of Scripture to fight Satan. He repeatedly declared, “It is written, it is written, it is written” (Matthew 4:1–11). Even when facing death, the last words He spoke were from the Old Testament (Psalm 22:1; 31:5).
Jesus appeals to Genesis 1-2 when speaking of marriage and divorce . He asks, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘ For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? They are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate . ” (Mt 19:4-6 ESV) By alluding to Genesis 1-2 here, Jesus is asserting that his position on marriage and divorce is rooted in the authority of the Old Testament text. In contrast, Jesus’ opponents rooted their position in different rabbis (Shammai and Hillel).
In disputing with the Sadducees about the resurrection, Jesus rebukes them: ” But Jesus answered and said to them, ‘ You are mistaken, not understanding the Scriptures nor the power of God . . . ‘” (Matthew 22:29 ESV). In other words, the Scriptures give us the definitive, authoritative word on the resurrection. Jesus goes on to ask them: “Have you not read what God said to you: ‘I am the God of Abraham . . . ‘” (Matthew 31–32). Again, Jesus appeals to the Old Testament text to affirm God’s power over the resurrection.
Jesus goes so far as to say that ” and the Scripture cannot be broken ” (John 10:35 ESV). For Jesus, Scripture is so powerful that nothing can undo it.
Jesus and the Old Testament
All the evidence taken together suggests that Jesus held the Old Testament in high regard. Those who claim to hold Jesus in high regard but reject some of the Old Testament teachings are being inconsistent. If Jesus is held in high regard, then the Old Testament must also be held in high regard. As John Wenham points out:
“For Christ, the Old Testament was true, authoritative, and inspired. For him, the God of the Old Testament was the living God, and the teaching of the Old Testament was the teaching of the living God. For him, what Scripture said, God said.”3
*For more information on this topic, see John Wenham’s book Christ and the Bible .
Recommended resources in Spanish:
Stealing from God ( Paperback ), ( Teacher Study Guide ), and ( Student Study Guide ) by Dr. Frank Turek
Why I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist ( Complete DVD Series ), ( Teacher’s Workbook ), and ( Student’s Handbook ) by Dr. Frank Turek
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Ryan Leasure is the pastor of Grace Bible Church in Moore, SC. For more information about his background and interests, click here .
Original Blog Source: https://bit.ly/35RC9P5
Translated by Yatniel Vega Garcia
Edited by Jennifer Chavez
Should Christians Pursue Personal Success?
Apologetics for Parents, Culture CrossExaminedBy Mike Taylor
Have you ever found yourself looking at someone else’s life on social media and wondering how they’re able to do all that they do? We see people on Instagram taking vacations, buying cars, starting businesses, quitting their jobs, and doing other glamorous things all while simultaneously raising multiple kids and finishing their Master’s degree. Or so it seems, at least.
And as we take in their glorious life, we can’t help but wonder: how on earth do they have the time and money and energy to do these things?
Then we might start to wonder, “Is living a life focused on material wealth and personal success something God wants for us?” Because it feels like the glorification of wealth is everywhere we look nowadays, and Christians are often right at the forefront of the madness.
But is it okay for Christians to pursue these things? Is it okay for Christians to pursue personal success and material wealth in a capitalistic society?
Let’s keep it simple. Let’s go back to the things we need. We all need two things in our life: comfort and significance.
Look at Maslow’s hierarchy of needs:
In that context, everything we pursue in life comes down to these two very basic categories: comfort and significance.
In fact, we will only give up one of those things inasmuch as we are able to gain from the other. It’s a very interesting dynamic.
For example, a person will only exercise (sacrificing comfort) if they believe that such an activity will give them more physical and mental significance. They’ll push themselves pretty hard in the gym if they believe that hard work and discipline will make them more significant.
The same is true of comfort. We’re typically only willing to give up the chance at being significant if it gains us a significant amount of comfort. Plenty of people spend a disproportionate amount of time outside of work and other obligations sitting on a couch eating junk food. We’re all guilty of this on some level, and the reason we do it is because we are, either consciously or unconsciously, making a decision to accept comfort in the place of significance. It’s a tradeoff we’re willing to make whether we realize it or not.
So, then, “success” is simply shorthand for more comfort and significance. If we explore what it means to be successful, we’ll find that everything we envision comes back to these two things.
So the question is: is God okay with me pursuing more comfort and significance?
Neither comfort nor significance is bad. In fact, I would argue that we are alive for these two reasons. All the best things about being alive bring some level of comfort. If we are uncomfortable, and if we are uncomfortable for no reason associated with future gain of comfort or significance, then something is probably wrong.
For example, if you’re experiencing increasing levels of discomfort in your back in the form of back pain, there’s probably something wrong. You instinctively know that because there is no end goal of achieving more comfort or significance from your back pain.
So discomfort in and of itself is not a good thing. Yet your body knows that and continually alarms you using discomfort and causing you to address potential long-term problems.
If you’re a follower of Jesus, then everything you believe is based on comfort and significance.
Heaven is comfort (Revelation 21:4), walking with God here on Earth brings comfort (2 Corinthians 1:3-4, Psalm 23:4), and being a child of God is where you find significance.
God made us to find comfort and significance in him, and like it or not, everything we do in our lives revolves around these two things.
The problem comes in when we lose focus on the right source of these two things.
Too often in our lives, we lean on other sources of both comfort and significance. We look to our jobs, our families, our social status, and any other number of things to help us gain comfort and significance.
The problem is, nothing ever fills the void, and people who mean well end up abandoning their false sources of comfort and significance without ever replacing those sources with the true source. Then we end up believing that comfort and significance are things that aren’t meant for us.
I cannot tell you how many people I’ve come across who live empty lives because they’ve come to believe that comfort and significance are bad things. And it’s true, when you’re reaching for the wrong source, they are bad things. But we were made for comfort and significance.
Think about the biblical history of the human race. At one point in our history, we had all the comfort and significance we wanted. We had every resource at our disposal and all the authority we could ever ask for. That was the garden of Eden. Except there was more.
There was one thing that seemed as if it could bring more comfort and significance, so we tried it out. We thought that if we just learned enough and tried hard enough then we could be the source of our own comfort and significance. Yet here we are today still trying the same tactics. It doesn’t bring lasting comfort or significance now just like it didn’t then.
But here’s where it gets fun. Once you can see and identify the problem, you actually have a chance at resolving it. Once you know that God intends for you to have comfort and significance, now you know what void to fill. Now you know what battle to fight.
The truth is, success is not something to be feared. Not all dreams in your heart are not things to be stifled. It’s not always pride and it’s not always the enemy trying to destroy your life through aspirations.
You’re alive for a purpose, and that purpose can and should bring you sentence comfort and significance (i.e., success). If we can learn to fight the battle within ourselves – the battle of trying to gain comfort and significance on our own instead of pulling them from God – then we’ve learned to fight the only battle worth fighting, the fight of faith.
The faith you and I are fighting for is the belief that comfort and significance come from a higher source and not from our own abilities to achieve. So don’t shy away from success. Success is just shorthand for comfort and significance, and God had every intention of making you successful.
Instead of seeing success as something to shun, see it for what it is – a gift from your Father. Once you realize that, then you’ll find increasing gratitude and fulfillment that, frankly, only come from seeing success. If you see yourself as a lowly person whose job it is to give up everything good for the sake of self-denial, then what do you have to be grateful for? How are you tasting and seeing that the Lord is good? (Psalm 34:8)
God promises prosperity for his people when they listen and follow him (Psalm 1:1-3, Leviticus 26). Jesus said, “But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” He said “all” these things – not the bare minimum of these things. God doesn’t want you to live a life in despair. In fact, I’ll say it this way: God wants you to have it all, he just doesn’t want it all to have you.
So we shouldn’t shun success, and we certainly shouldn’t speak against those who have success. Ecclesiastes 10:20 says, “Do not revile the king even in your thoughts, or curse the rich in your bedroom.” Instead, like Jesus said, “use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.” Use success as a tool for godly influence.
Success is a magnifying glass – it makes you more of what you already are. And if you ask me, the world needs more successful Christ-hearted people.
Recommended resources related to the topic:
Counter Culture Christian: Is the Bible True? by Frank Turek (Mp3), (Mp4), and (DVD)
Counter Culture Christian: Is There Truth in Religion? (DVD) by Frank Turek
Cold-Case Christianity: A Homicide Detective Investigates the Claims of the Gospels by J. Warner Wallace (Book)
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Mike P. Taylor is an author from Nashville, TN who writes at mikeptaylor.com about biblical, practical, and relevant content that re-shape how modern culture understands the goodness of God.
Should we expose false teachers?
PodcastThere are some people in the Christian church that say we ought not to expose false teachers or publicly name names. Rather, we should just focus on preaching the gospel. Question: Suppose your pastor got up one Sunday and told the congregation that they’d just found out that someone in the church had been exposing your kids to pornography and drugs. What would be your first question? “Who is this person pastor?!” Now suppose that same pastor responded with, “I don’t like to name names, let’s just focus on Jesus.” Would you accept that? No, and you shouldn’t! So it is when false teachers spread poisonous messages within the Christian church.
In this week’s episode, Frank addresses such questions as:
• How can we best preserve unity in the church?
• Is unity the most important thing?
• Is it wrong to publicly name names in the church?
• What does the Bible have to say about how we are to deal with false teachers?
BONUS: In the last segment Frank discusses Gov. Ron DeSantis’ comments regarding Disney’s woke lobbying against the Parental Rights in Education bill – also falsely dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill. You don’t want to miss it!
Also, check Greg Koukl’s statement to his high school board here.
If you would like to submit a question to be answered on the show, please email your question to Hello@Crossexamined.org.
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Serpientes, dragones y la Biblia
EspañolBy Ryan Leasure
If you’re from an Appalachian church that handles snakes, I’m sorry to disappoint you. This is not THAT kind of post. Instead, it’s a post about how the Bible portrays vipers, snakes, and dragons. What’s more, it’s about how a mighty warrior defeats a snake to rescue his precious bride. If this story sounds familiar, it’s because many great children’s stories of the past tell these same kinds of stories.
You see, the Bible presents three main characters: [1] 1) the serpent (the villain, Satan), 2) the damsel in distress (God’s people), and 3) the snake catcher (the hero, Jesus).
It should be noted that “Serpent” is a biblical term that includes both snakes and dragons [2] ; that is, serpent is a general category, while snakes and dragons are more specific. It should also be noted that the ancients did not think of dragons as winged, fire-breathing creatures. Rather, they thought of them as giant serpents. Throughout the Bible, snakes take one form or another depending on the situation. Biblical scholar Andrew Naselli notes, “As a rule, the form a serpent takes depends on its strategy. When a serpent in scripture attempts to deceive, it is a viper. When a serpent attempts to devour, it is a dragon” [3] .
With these anecdotes in mind, let’s start at the beginning.
The snake in the garden
The beginning was pure bliss. A perfect, holy God decided to share his goodness and created a universe ex nihilo . Like jewels in a crown in God’s creation, humans walked in fellowship with him in the garden. However, they let down their guard and allowed the serpent to enter. Genesis 3:1 notes, “Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made.”
Cunning (or deceit) perfectly describes this serpent, as he immediately questioned Eve, “Did God really say, ‘You shall not eat from any tree in the garden’?” Notice the serpent’s tactic. He called God’s Word into question. He planted doubt in the woman’s mind so that she would begin to consider alternative options. As soon as the woman said that eating from the tree in the middle of the garden would lead to death, the serpent went on to contradict God’s Word completely. He declared, “you will not surely die.” And then he called God’s motives into question. “For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
The serpent was successful. Eve ate the fruit, gave some to Adam, and he ate too. And immediately everything changed. Their innocence was lost, and they knew they were naked. Because of their shame, they tried to hide from God, but it was no use. God confronted them for their disobedience. Adam blamed Eve, and Eve blamed the serpent. She commented in 3:13, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” As a result, God banished them from His holy presence, where they would live in exile. Now let us remember that when the serpent takes the form of a viper, its primary tactic is to deceive. And this is what it has done.
However, God did not allow the serpent to have the final say. He judged the serpent and promised to one day destroy him when He stated, “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel” (Gen. 3:15). The rest of Scripture traces the ongoing battle waged between the seed of the woman (God’s people) and the seed of the serpent (enemies of God and His people). Ultimately, the unique seed of the woman (Gal. 3:16) will utterly destroy the serpent, even though the serpent wounds him in the process.
Snakes portrayed negatively
Before we look at some examples of the serpent’s seed fighting against the woman’s seed, I simply want to draw our attention to the fact that serpents are associated with evil throughout Scripture.
Let us consider the following texts:
Snakes often symbolize God’s enemies:
As mentioned above, the serpent takes the form of a dragon when it wants to destroy. The following texts describe the dragon as a sea monster called Leviathan and Rahab.
See also Job 41, which describes God’s sovereignty over the monstrous sea serpent Leviathan.
The Egyptian Serpent
The story of Scripture presents the seed of the serpent (God’s enemies) in conflict with the seed of the woman (God’s people). Perhaps the clearest example of the seed of the serpent is Egypt and its Pharaoh. The Lord tells Pharaoh in Ezekiel 32:2, “You are like a dragon in the seas.” Recall that the dragon seeks to destroy the seed of the woman, and this is what he set out to do when he ordered the death of all Israelite baby boys (Exodus 1:15-22).
One also thinks of the episode in which Aaron’s staff turned into a serpent and swallowed the staffs/serpents of Pharaoh’s magicians (Ex 7:8-13). Most likely, Aaron’s staff turned into a cobra, which also figured on the Pharaoh’s headdress. This headdress symbolized divine power and protection and was fashioned after an Egyptian goddess named Uraeus. By wearing the cobra headdress, the Pharaoh could channel the powers of the deity.
Thus, “when Moses had Aaron cast the serpent-rod before Pharaoh,” archaeologist John Currid argues, “he was directly attacking that symbol of pharaonic sovereignty: the scene was a polemical mockery. When Aaron’s rod swallowed up the rods of the Egyptian magicians, the pharaonic deity and his omnipotence were being denounced and rejected out of hand. Pharaoh’s cobra-crested diadem was powerless against Yahweh . ” [4]
Reflecting on the exodus from Egypt, the biblical authors saw it as a victory over the serpent. Psalm 74:12-14 states:
Although final victory still awaited, God was already foreshadowing how He would one day crush the serpent’s head.
Goliath, the serpent
One of the best-known stories in the Old Testament is that of David’s defeat of Goliath. This story presents Goliath as a giant serpent seeking to devour the woman’s seed. We know this because, as 1 Samuel 17:5 makes clear, Goliath “was clothed in scale armor” (JBS and NIV). While some translations simply translate this as “a coat of mail” (NASB), the more literal translation is “armor of scales.”
The Hebrew word for “scales” appears seven other times in the Old Testament, and each time it refers to the scales of fish—including sea dragons. [5] Notably, God also calls Pharaoh a “great dragon” with “scales” in Ezekiel 29:3-4. Pharaoh and Goliath are the only two characters in the Bible who are said to have “scales.”
In the account given in 1 Samuel 17, David proclaims that the battle is the LORD’s and then proceeds to drive a stone into the forehead of the giant serpent, which falls face downwards to the ground, eating dust like the ancient serpent (Gen 3:14). Once again, God foreshadows how He will crush the serpent’s head and free His people.
The serpent in the Gospels
We find several examples where the serpent’s seed attempts to destroy the woman’s seed. Like the ancient Pharaoh, King Herod tried to kill all the children of Bethlehem in an attempt to kill the unique seed of the woman (Matthew 2:16-18).
Repeatedly, we find the Pharisees and Sadducees portrayed as the seed of the serpent. Jesus tells them, “You are of your father the devil” (John 8:44). When John the Baptist saw them coming from afar, he cried out, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance; and do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father’” (Mt 3:7-9). Likewise, Jesus cries out to the Pharisees in Matthew 23, “You serpents! You brood of vipers! How will you escape the judgment of hell?” In short, the Pharisees and Sadducees are the seed of the serpent making war on the seed of the woman.
The dragon is killed
We complete this discussion by going all the way to the end, where the book of Revelation proclaims the final destruction of the serpent. Revelation 12:3-5 states:
Here we read that this powerful dragon, thirsty for blood, seeks to devour the seed of the woman. However, God frees the seed from his persecutions.
Revelation 12:7-9 continues:
Note that the dragon is none other than Satan himself, that old serpent and deceiver of the whole world. And he is defeated, but how? Did the archangel Michael destroy the dragon alone?
Revelation 12:11 states:
Satan was finally defeated by the blood of the Lamb! It was Jesus Christ who conquered Satan. That moment on the cross, when it seemed that the serpent would prevail, his head was crushed by the seed of the woman (Gen 3:15).
Fast forward to Revelation 20, just after the Millennium, and we read in verse 10:
Finally, the mighty snake-catcher defeated the ancient snake and rescued his bride so that she could no longer be deceived or devoured. Or to put it another way, the prince killed the dragon and had his girl. [6]
Grades
[1] Andrew Naselli, The Serpent, and the Serpent Slayer, 18.
[2] Ibid., 18.
[3] Ibid., 18.
[4] John Currid, Ancient Egypt, 93-94.
[5] Andrew Naselli, The Serpent, and the Serpent Slayer, 90.
[6] Ibid., 15.
Recommended resources in Spanish:
Stealing from God ( Paperback ), ( Teacher Study Guide ), and ( Student Study Guide ) by Dr. Frank Turek
Why I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist ( Complete DVD Series ), ( Teacher’s Workbook ), and ( Student’s Handbook ) by Dr. Frank Turek
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Ryan Leasure holds a Master of Arts degree from Furman University and a Master of Divinity degree from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is currently a Doctor of Ministry candidate at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He also serves as pastor at Grace Bible Church in Moore, SC.
Original Blog Source: https://bit.ly/34fxPZ2
Translated by Monica Pirateque
Edited by Daniela Checa Delgado
3 Practical Steps to Help Build Your Kids’ Immunity to Anti-Christian Ideas
Apologetics for ParentsBy Alisa Childers
When my daughter Dyllan was a toddler, I exercised quite regularly at the YMCA. (And by “exercised,” I mean that I read a book on the stationary bike and pedaled as slowly as possible while I enjoyed an hour of free childcare. Not gonna lie.) One day when I picked her up from the kid’s room, the childcare worker pulled out the unopened granola bar I had put in Dyllan’s bag, handed it to me, and said, “We can’t give this to her because it contains peanuts. We don’t allow anything with peanuts into the childcare area.” I admit I was a bit surprised because it wasn’t something I had given much thought to. But I quickly learned that there was almost nothing parents feared more in 2010 than the dreaded peanut.
Of course, peanut allergies are very real. In their book, The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure, Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt reported that before the mid-1990s, peanut allergies were extremely rare in American children. However, by 2008, fourteen out of every thousand kids had developed peanut allergies. No one knew why there was such a drastic increase until an authoritative study was released in 2015. It was discovered that many kids were developing peanut allergies because their parents avoided giving them peanuts. The study revealed that introducing peanut products to infants with a high risk for allergies actually reduced their chances of developing a peanut allergy by a whopping 81%. In other words, giving peanut products to infants caused their immune systems to respond and build up a tolerance.
Our kids have amazing bodies that react to bacteria, parasites—and yes, peanuts—with an immune response that teaches their system to adapt and fight off future threats to their health.
In the same way, I believe our kids have spiritual immune systems.
Several years ago, I was a participant in a study and discussion group about Christianity. This was the class that challenged my faith intellectually and I’ve told that story here. One day, the subject of Adam and Eve came up and it was asked, “Does anyone still believe they were actual people?” I’m a little embarrassed to admit that I was entirely naive when it came to this subject. Even as an adult, I thought the literal existence of Adam and Eve was something all professing Christians believed in. Chalk it up to the Evangelical bubble I grew up in or the fact that most of my life happened before the invention of the internet. But the question threw me because I had no idea how to answer.
Until that moment, I didn’t even know it was a question. I had zero immunity.
This was simply one of many skeptical claims raised against historic Christianity that snowballed together to send me into a dark time of doubt. I’ve often replayed that moment in my mind and imagined a different scenario. What if I had been aware of this question from childhood? What if I had already thought it through? What if when I read the Genesis account of creation, someone had told me, “Hey, some people don’t think Adam and Eve really existed. Let’s think about what the Bible says about it, what scientific evidence shows, and what that would mean for the gospel.“
If my spiritual immune system had been strengthened in this way, hearing this question as an adult would have been no big deal. It wouldn’t have shaken my faith one bit. I would have simply engaged in that conversation intelligently, without fear or doubt.
Other than teaching our kids the basics of the Christian faith, there are many practical steps we can take to help bolster their spiritual immune systems. Here are three to start with:
1. Read the Bible with your kids, and don’t skip the hard stuff.
By “don’t skip the hard stuff,” I certainly don’t mean you should freak your kids out right before bed by reading about the Levite hacking his concubine to pieces in Judges 19, or Samson getting his eyes gouged out in Judges 16. Obviously, there is an age-appropriate way to introduce biblical stories to our kids. What I mean by “don’t skip the hard stuff,” is that reading stories and accounts that skeptics typically challenge is a great way to inoculate our kids against their false ideas.
For example, when my daughter was about seven, we read through Genesis together. In chapter 26, we read the story of Isaac lying to the Philistines. He told them his wife Rebekah was his sister, fearing that someone might kill him in order to marry her. I said to my daughter, “Did you know that some people think this story is made up because it’s so similar to what Isaac’s dad Abraham did twice before? What do you think about that?” We had a great conversation about how it would make perfect sense for Isaac to repeat his father’s lie, because there seemed to be no major consequences for doing so. In fact, in both cases, Abraham left richer than he came. We also looked at the biblical theme of sons tending to repeat their father’s sins. After we talked, it all made sense. And now my daughter won’t be caught off-guard should she hear that skeptical claim in the future.
A great resource to help with this is The Apologetics Study Bible. As you read through the Bible, it footnotes the verses that skeptics typically challenge, and offers intelligent and credible responses you can talk through with your kids!
2. Expose your kids to atheism.
As a parent, it can be scary to intentionally tell your kids all the reasons why atheists reject Christianity. Based on her experience teaching apologetics to Christian parents, my friend Natasha Crain noted that many parents don’t want to risk leading their kids astray by introducing atheist arguments. But she rightly points out that all of our kids will inevitably hear these ideas. She wrote:
The only choice you have as a parent is if they’ll hear them first from you—in an environment where they’ll have your guidance readily available—or if they’ll hear them first from nonbelievers—in an environment where they’ll be processing what they hear on their own.
Brett Kunkle compares exposure to atheist ideas with teaching his kids to surf. In this video, he explains that as a parent, you wouldn’t throw your kid into the ocean to surf big waves before you teach them basics like swimming and how to handle smaller waves. Watch below:
Getting our kids used to the “smaller waves” of atheism can be a great way to prepare them to encounter the “big waves” when they are out on their own.
3. Expose your kids to false gospels and other religions.
Just like it’s important to expose our kids to atheist ideas, it’s equally important to expose them to counterfeit gospels—which almost always masquerade as authentic Christianity. It’s been said that the best lies contain the most truth. This is why false gospels can be so tricky to discern. . .they contain so much truth. They will often emphasize Jesus, use the right lingo, and even appeal to the Bible to back up their claims. Explaining the differences between authentic Christianity and Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, the prosperity gospel, or progressive Christianity will prepare our kids to interact with their ideas and see through the deceptions they espouse.
Another important step is talking with our kids about what people of other religious faiths believe about God, Jesus, and the nature of reality. Although they agree on some points, every world religion contradicts the others at a fundamental level. Logically, they can’t all be true. This is a great opportunity to expose the contradictions and talk with our kids about why Christianity is true and best explains reality.
Who would have thought that giving a baby a tiny bit of peanut butter could potentially save his life? In the same way, giving our kids tiny bits of anti-Christian ideas and allowing them to process these questions within the safety and guidance of our care could have a lasting impact on their future spiritual lives.
Other practical resources:
For years, Brett Kunkle has offered theological training for teenagers and facilitated trips to Utah to interact with Mormons. When I interviewed him on my podcast, he reported that the impact of these trips has been tremendous in the lives of young people, motivating them to study theology and apologetics on their own. He now offers trips to the Berkeley college campus where Christian kids can share the gospel and interact with atheists and skeptics. Find out more at www.maventruth.com.
Another ministry doing great work in this area is Jonathan Morrow and Impact 360. Every summer, they offer experiences in which Christian teenagers are trained in leadership, apologetics, and theology after which they are given real-world experiences to test their knowledge. They visit Buddhist and Mormon temples, meet atheists, and more. Find out more at www.impact360institute.org and listen to Jonathan’s interview on my podcast.
If you want to be intentional about this, pick up Natasha Crain’s book Talking with Your Kids about God: 30 Conversations Every Christian Parent Must Have, and follow Natasha’s blog for more great tips. Or pick up J. Warner Wallace’s trio of kids’ books (1, 2, and 3) that explore everything from the existence of God to the truthfulness of Christianity.
Recommended resources related to the topic:
Proverbs: Making Your Paths Straight Complete 9-part Series by Frank Turek DVD and Download
So the Next Generation will Know by J. Warner Wallace (Book and Participant’s Guide)
Fearless Generation – Complete DVD Series, Complete mp4 Series (download) by Mike Adams, Frank Turek, and J. Warner Wallace
Jesus, You and the Essentials of Christianity by Frank Turek (INSTRUCTOR Study Guide), (STUDENT Study Guide), and (DVD)
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Alisa Childers is an American singer and songwriter, best known for being in the all-female Christian music group ZOEgirl. She has had a string of top ten radio singles, four studio releases, and received the Dove Award during her time with ZOEgirl. In later years, Alisa found her life-long faith deeply challenged when she started attending what would later identify as a Progressive Christian church. This challenge pushed Alisa toward Christian Apologetics. Today you can read, listen and watch Alisa’s work online as well as purchase her recently published book on Progressive Christianity titled Another Gospel.
Original Blog Source: https://bit.ly/3pDSI7V