CHAPTER II

Our Rule of Faith and Life

INTRODUCTION

In answer to the second question of the Shorter Catechism inquiring how we may glorify and enjoy God, we have these significant words:

“The word of God, which is contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him.”

Thus we have stated one of the fundamental principles of Protestantism. We bow to no pope, no council, no man or group of men, but rather before the sovereign God who speaks through the scriptures. As stated in the Confession of Faith, Chapter I, Article X:

“The Supreme Judge, by which all controversies of religion are to be determined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men, and private spirits, are to be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no other but the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scripture.” [All references by chapter and article are to the edition of the Confession of Faith which includes amendments of 1944.]

Presbyterians have kept this fundamental principle of the authority of God speaking through the scriptures as a significant cornerstone of their faith even when many philosophers and theologians have surrendered it in an appeal to human reason. Let us therefore strive to understand more clearly what Presbyterians believe about the Bible.

A. THE BIBLE CONTAINS A REVELATION FROM GOD

There are some Christians who dislike an interpretation of the Catechism statement which recognizes that the word of God is contained in the Scriptures. They prefer to say that the Bible is the word of God. Both points of view should be defined carefully by all who use them, for words often become very misleading.

Let us begin with the point of view of the Bible, which is the point of view of revelation. By revelation we mean that God discloses to man those things necessary for man’s salvation. The Bible does not speak of “the development of the idea of God.” It rather says, “In the beginning, God—.” God creates a universe which reveals His glory. God acts in human experience and in history. God calls His leaders to service. God reveals Himself in Jesus Christ. God speaks through the Holy Spirit. We shall define this point of view more fully in the next two lessons. Suffice it to say here that the Bible is not a series of stories containing man’s best thought about God. It is rather an inspired record of God’s continuous disclosure of Himself to man. This is part of what we mean by revelation.

B. THE BIBLE IS AN INSPIRED RECORD OF GOD’S REVELATION OF HIMSELF TO MAN

We shall consider the nature of man in another lesson. It might be asked, how did Abraham or Moses, or Elijah, or Isaiah, or Micah, or John or Paul know that God spoke to them? How did the Hebrews know that the voice on the Mount was the voice of God? Sinful men do not always recognize God or understand what He is trying to say to them. No matter how great the disclosure of God, there had to be a way for men to know what God meant to say through His disclosures.

1. INSPIRATION, COMMUNICATION AND SELECTION

This brings us to the doctrine of inspiration. The word inspired means breathed into. A New Testament passage, II Peter 1:21, states that no prophecy of scripture ever came into existence by the impulse or will of man, but that holy men of God were moved to write by the Holy Spirit. This is to say that holy men, who were given peculiar insight by the Holy Spirit, understood something of God’s revelation of Himself and interpreted that revelation to their fellow men.

These inspired men discovered God revealing himself “at sundry times and in divers manners.” In spite of the primitive and limited understanding of God in early Old Testament times or later Old Testament times, God was speaking to His people. The hearing was often poor or badly interpreted. So Abraham had more than one wife and David took Uriah’s wife away from him. But Abraham’s self-made plans backfired and in his experience David learned from God that he had done wrong. When taken in larger segments, the Old Testament story, with all of its limited understanding of God, reveals more and more clearly the character and the will of God. In the prophets there is a clearer word and in Jesus Christ we find the final word. Hence the New Testament writers, standing in the light of Jesus Christ, reflect a clearer understanding of the redemptive love and will of God. This point of view, which is suggested but not developed in Chapter I, Article I of our Confession, is sometimes called “progressive revelation.” The term is not too good, for there was one unchanging God revealing Himself all along. But there was a progressive understanding of God’s revelation under the guidance and inspiration of the Holy Spirit. In the first place, therefore, inspiration provides for a growing understanding of God’s self-disclosure.

Inspiration also extends to the means of communication. God communicated in ways that the Hebrews would understand and in ways that Christians could understand. This communication was in the form of acts which had redemptive meaning. But inspired writers had to communicate to their fellows. This they did through language, which is an inadequate but very helpful means of transmitting ideas. The Old Testament was written in Hebrew because that was the language known to the Hebrew people. It was a spoken more than a written language, though it was a written language long before the time of Ezra in 457 B.C. The vowel forms were not included in the language of the Old Testament, but were supplied by Hebrew scholars in the sixth and seventh Christian centuries. For this reason it is sometimes hard to know exactly what the original writer (or the compiler) intended to say. The Isaiah and Habakkuk scrolls recently discovered near the Dead Sea, are a part of the earliest Hebrew manuscripts of the Bible now in existence.

Because the Greek language had spread to all parts of the Roman Empire in the time of Christ, the New Testament was written in the Greek language. Our earliest manuscripts, except for fragments such as the Chester Beatty papyri, were copied in the fourth and fifth centuries. By the science of textual criticism, some scholars have been able to arrive at what is the most likely original. It should be said that with all of the variations in existing manuscripts, no fundamental doctrine of the Christian faith is affected. God has spoken and God still speaks in the Bible with a voice of authority.

Inspiration is also believed to extend to the selection of the books of the Old and New Testaments. The list given in our Confession is the list that we know in our Bibles. Apocryphal books are excluded because they are not believed to have been inspired in the same sense that the other writings are. While most Presbyterians would use favorite books and passages because they are more helpful than others, they would include for study only those generally accepted, namely, the thirty-nine books of the Old Testament and the twenty-seven books of the New Testament.

2. PRESERVATION

The activity of the Spirit of God is also believed to have [orig: have been] made possible the preservation of the books of the Bible. This means the preservation of their essential truth and the preservation of the books— in spite of the fact that we do not have the original copies.

3. TRANSLATION

Closely related to inspiration and preservation of the Bible is the question of translation. Since Presbyterians believe that every man has the right and the duty to study the scriptures, they also believe in translating the scriptures into the native tongue of believers. They have participated in the task of translating the Bible into approximately eleven hundred tongues and dialects. But most of them do not believe that a single translation, such as the King James or the Revised Standard Version, is inspired as over against the rest. While it is true that much is gained in translations from the original languages, something also is lost in rendering different shades of meaning. While therefore it is unsafe to make generalizations, it is perhaps fair to say that to a limited number of Presbyterians, the Confession means to say that the Bible is the word of God, word for word and letter for letter in the original languages (and virtually in their own favorite translation) ; but that the larger majority of Presbyterians who think about it conclude that God, who is not limited even to specific words, speaks through the English as well as the Hebrew and Greek translations of the Bible. His word is contained in the books of the Bible, which is completely and fully inspired even though the wording in the synoptic Gospels for instance, often differ. The truth of God is the same even though it is stated differently by different writers in different times. This view provides for full inspiration without a dictation theory in which it is asserted that men transcribed words and letters that meant nothing to them.

The reason why Presbyterians sometimes state their view of inspiration differently is that they interpret the meaning of the Catechism statement differently. Some people are so unsure that they take an extreme position and argue about it incessantly. Others are so sure that God speaks authoritatively through the scriptures that they are willing to allow for some difference in interpretation without surrendering their fundamental position. The Confession itself is strong without being rigid. It is very Presbyterian.

Since many students experience great doubts as they try to harmonize a view of inspiration with the findings of historical and literary criticism, a word might be said by the writer even though it is not said in the Presbyterian Standards. It is that Christians should never be afraid of the truth, but should be careful that they possess truth before accepting all opinions advanced. One may hold, for instance, to the full inspiration of the Pentateuch without being sure whether there are one, two, or ten authors; or one, two, three or more major sources. In the New Testament, Luke suggests that he uses several sources, yet he wrote one Gospel. Just as a cake is more than the sum of the ingredients used in making it, so the finished Bible is more than its parts. God could have inspired a writer or writers to select, edit and interpret materials so that they made Him known to man just as surely as He could have inspired a single man to write without reference to sources. To some Presbyterians whether He inspired Moses or a group of consecrated scholars to write the Pentateuch is a matter of fact and not a matter of faith. To others the belief in the Mosaic authorship is a matter of faith. Whether or not we have an inspired Bible is a matter of faith to all. Let us continue to search for facts without destroying faith when facts are brought to light. Pin faith on truth that is revealed and it will never be shaken. But distinguish between opinion about possible human authors and faith in a God who speaks with authority through the Bible.

C. THE BIBLE IS OUR RULE OF FAITH AND LIFE

This leads us to the question of authority. According to the Roman Catholic Church, the Bible is as authoritative as the church lets it become, and it is authoritative because the church makes it so. The Presbyterian belief is that the Bible is authoritative because God speaks through it. His authority is recognized by the believer, not only in the beauty and order and character of the Bible, but also because he has the Amen of the Holy Spirit within his heart. While this is true of many individuals, it becomes accumulative so that it may be said that the church as a whole has held to the Bible because it has found God speaking through it with a word of authority. Nothing can be said to equal the statements of our Confession in Chapter I, Article IV and V:

“The authority of the Holy Scripture, for which it ought to be believed and obeyed, dependeth not upon the testimony of any man or church, but wholly upon God (who is truth itself), the author thereof; and therefore it is to be received, because it is the word of God. “We may be moved and induced by the testimony of the church to an high and reverent esteem for the Holy Scripture; and the heavenliness of the matter, the efficacy of the doctrine, the majesty of the style, the consent of all the parts, the scope of the whole, (which is to give all glory to God), the full discovery it makes of the only way of man’s salvation, the many other incomparable excellencies, and the entire perfection thereof, are arguments whereby it doth abundantly evidence itself to be the word of God; yet, notwithstanding, our full persuasion and assurance of the infallible truth and divine authority thereof, is from the inward work of the Holy Spirit, bearing witness by and with the word in our hearts.”

D. THE BIBLE MUST BE PROPERLY INTERPRETED AND PUT TO WORK

Presbyterians believe that it is not enough to know that God has spoken an authoritative word to be obeyed by them. They must also learn to discover what God has said to others and what God is saying to them. For they know that the truth by which they must live is the truth they have found in the Bible. Since they do not accept the word of some pope as to what the Bible means, they look to the Spirit of God to illuminate their minds as they read. They do not try to find all of science or history in the Bible. They do believe that it contains all that is necessary for God’s glory, for man’s salvation, for their faith and life. In order that the experience which produced the scriptures may be recreated in them, they follow the best principles of interpretation they can discover. Some of these, in the mind of the writer of these lessons, are as follows:

1. Read the Bible expectantly and prayerfully, listening for God to speak directly to your mind and heart.

2. Read a difficult passage several times and in several translations if you do not know how to use the original languages.

3. Study the historical background out of which the passage comes.

4. Study the context carefully. How does this verse fit into the paragraph, and how does the paragraph fit into the chapter and the book as a whole.

5. Compare other passages of scripture dealing with the same topic or theme. This is what our Standards mean by interpreting scripture by scripture.

6. Use reference books and commentaries for help in determining the meaning of a given passage.

7. Put all the truth you can to work right where you live. Fresh light often comes after the truth of God is tested in experience.

What all of this means is that Presbyterians know that it is not enough to hold a high view of inspiration concerning the writing of the Bible. They believe that it is a book to be obeyed, and that it points to a God who is to be obeyed in faith. It points to a Saviour who invites the response of the whole man.

When therefore we say we believe in the Bible, we do so without apology to any man. It has stood the test of time. It has been misinterpreted often by its friends and criticized by its foes. But always God speaks through it to call men to Himself. It reveals the life of God at work among the sons of men. It challenges us to let God come to life among us as we put its message to work in the twentieth century.