Mathers Systematic Theology. Norman W. Mathers

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СКАЧАТЬ that only the Old Testament books which Christ and his apostles recognized as the Word of God are to be part of the canon. They testified to the authority of the Old Testament books to be the Word of God. In the case of the New Testament, only those books proven to be written by apostles or having apostolic approval are recognized as having divine authority. They are the Word of God. The apostles were appointed by Christ. It must be underscored that the early church did not lend any authority to the Old and New Testaments. They recognized the authority of each of the 66 books of the Bible. Hebrews, James, Jude were slower to be added to the canon than others (Warfield 1948:415). Other books which were not readily accepted until later were 2 Peter, 2^nd and 3^rd John (Ryrie 1974:44). This points to the fallibility of the early church to recognize parts of the Bible to be the Word of God (Warfield 1948:416). These books had to be written by a prophet, a recognized leader in Israel or an apostle or someone who wrote under the supervision of an apostle. An example of this would be the Gospel of Mark who wrote his gospel under the supervision of Peter. Luke wrote his gospel and the book of Acts under the supervision of Paul (Ryrie 1974:43). The reader should check 1 Peter 5:13 and 2 Timothy 4:11. Warfield (1948:411) based his argument for New Testament canonicity on whether the book of the Old or New Testament was written by a prophet or an apostle. The apostles recognized the authority of the Old Testament. Paul quotes both Deuteronomy and Luke in 1 Timothy 5:18 calling them both scripture. The authenticity of the writer was recognized not only by the church but by scholars throughout the ages. The testimony of the books of the Bible claiming to be the Word of God (ibid:412). The Bible book claims to be authoritative (Ryrie 1974:43). The contents of the New Testament books must be consistent with other scripture. There must not be contradictions or other problems in the book. The book had to have a life changing power (Lightner 1972). The New Testament recognized the Old Testament as scripture (2 Tim. 3:14-17, 2 Pet. 1:20-21). The canon of our Lord Jesus Christ had a three fold division of Law, the Prophets, and the Writings (Luke 24:44). These are the major arguments for canonicity. They are the Bible’s testimony to itself and the early church recognized that authority. The Bible book had to be written by a recognized leader, prophet, or apostle or under the supervision of an apostle, content must be consistent with the rest of scripture, and the book had to have a life changing power. Secular historical books (Caesar’s Gallic War, Livy, Tacitus, Thucydides, Herodotus) are accepted upon much less manuscript evidence than the wealth of New Testament manuscripts which exceeds 5,000 in number (Bruce 1943:16-17 in Ryrie 1974:46-47). These are not complete manuscripts. Seventy five papyri date from the second century A.D. (ibid:47).

      2.3 Other views of inspiration must be considered.

      2.3.1 Six Other Theories of Inspiration.

      The Bible does not teach the mechanical theory of inspiration. God dictated the scriptures and the men who wrote the scriptures copied. 2 Peter 1:20-21 argues for dual authorship behind the writing of the scriptures. A second view is that of inspiration extending only to the concepts of scripture. The concepts of the scriptures are inspired. The words of scripture are not inspired. The words of scripture are taught by the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 2:13). Concepts must be expressed in words. Concepts and words are so interrelated that the conceptual view of inspiration is impossible. A third view is that of natural inspiration. The Hebrew writers of scripture had a genius for writing religious literature. Fourthly, the mystical view of scripture is that God worked in the writers of scripture. He works in us in the same way today (Phil. 2:13). A fifth view is that inspiration is partial extending to some parts of Scripture (Chafer 1971:1:68-71). A sixth view of inspiration views some parts of Scripture inspired to a greater degree than other parts (Walvoord 1974:19). The plenary aspect of Scripture argues that inspiration extends to all Scripture (2 Tim. 3:16-17, 2 Pet. 1:20-21).

      2.4 Illuminating Ministry of the Holy Spirit

      2.4.1 The Holy Spirit illuminates the Word of God for the believer.

      The Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 2:12 writes: “Now we have not received the spirit of the world” (kosmos – world system) “but the spirit who is from God in order that we may have known” (eidomen- perfect active subjective – 1 person plural) “the things” [of God-understood] “having been given to us by God” (Aland & Black 1968:582). “We may have known” is a consummative perfect – action is completed. This is from the perspective of eternity. It is subjunctive mood in a subordinate clause expexegetical of purpose introduced by hina (Williams 1971:22, 25-26). Yet the active voice is something that the subject does. This means that we are to study the Word of God – and allow the Holy Spirit to teach us – open the scriptures to our understanding. Jesus predicted this ministry of the Holy Spirit during his last week on earth (John 14:26, 16:13-15). The Holy Spirit illuminates the Bible to the born again Christians so that they will have insight into the meaning of a particular Bible passage or book. “To pneuma” is neuter gender. “To ek tou theou” (1 Cor. 2:12) (Aland & Black 1968:582) “which is from God” [author’s translation] refers not to the person of the Holy Spirit. The person of the Holy Spirit is established in other paragraphs of Scripture. It refers rather to the procession of the Holy Spirit. Grammatical rules state that a neuter noun referred to by a pronoun would have to be a neuter noun. The writers of the Scriptures did not follow this grammatical rule but instead used masculine pronouns (Ryrie 1973:14). This indicates that the Holy Spirit is a person and not a thing. He is the third person of the triune God (ibid:14). Ryrie cites John 16:13-14 where the demonstrative masculine pronoun that one (ekeinos) is used. The reflexive pronoun himself (eautou) is used in John 16:13. The relative masculine pronoun in John 15:26 and Ephesians 1:14 is used with the neuter noun spirit (pneuma). Jesus said: “Whenever the parakletos may have come whom” (relative masculine pronoun) “I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth He Himself proceeds from the Father, that one will testify concerning me” [author’s translation](John 15:26) (Aland & Black 1968:392). Ephesians 1:14 has the relative masculine nominative singular pronoun referring to the person of the Holy Spirit. “He is earnest” (down payment) “of our inheritance to redemption of his possession to praise of His glory” [author’s translation ](Aland & Black 1968:665). The Aland and Black critical text (1968:665) has two textual readings. The reading “hos” is preferred to “ho” because the Holy Spirit is a person. “Hos” is a relative masculine singular pronoun. The relative pronoun “ho” is masculine neuter singular. Therefore, Ephesians 1:14 should be translated who rather than that. The relative masculine pronoun “hos” has as its antecedent the dative masculine singular noun “the Holy Spirit” (ibid: 665). The relative pronoun’s number and gender is determined by the antecedent to which it refers (Goetchius 1965:236). In John 16:7, the reflexive masculine pronoun “auton” is used. It is to be translated him. In John 16:8 (Aland & Black 1968:393), the demonstrative masculine pronoun “ekeinos” is to be translated “that one.” Grammatical rules follow the gender of the noun rather than the grammar of the text. Walvoord (1974:14) adds that the procession of the Spirit must be distinguished from the illumination ministry of the Holy Spirit. The first epistle of John (2:27) confirms the illumination ministry of the Holy Spirit as a teaching ministry to the believer. John writes: “And you the anointing whom you have received” (Aorist Active Indicative 2^nd person plural – Constative – completed action – one time only – the anointing of the Holy Spirit – is what the apostle Paul calls – the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in 1 Corinthians 6:19) “from Him” (Christ) “abides in you” [indwells you] “and you have” (present active indicative 2^nd person plural – continuous action) “not need that anyone may teach you” (present active subjective 3^rd person singular) “but as His anointing” (reference to the indwelling ministry of the Holy Spirit) “teaches” (present active indicative – 3^rd person singular – customary or gnomic – refers to timeless fact) “concerning all things” (at present the 66 books of the bible) “and it is true and is Not” (emphatic form of the negative) “a lie.” The apostle John refers to the fact the the teaching ministry of the Holy Spirit to the believer is true and is not a lie. “Alethes” meaning true is used with this nuance in 1 John 2:27 (Arndt & Gingrich 1973:36(2)). John draws to the attention of his readers СКАЧАТЬ