Is the content of the bible divine?

[dr_parsley]

Branch from http://www.puritanboard.com/f15/help-me-flesh-out-idea-please-53169/#post687486

If we have no problem capitalizing "Bible", and if Word of God is an alternate title, then where would be the problem?

"The Bible" can be taken to be a title, and capitalised in the same way as "Crime and Punishment". I personally don't capitalise it, but for that reason I don't mind if others do. But "Word" is different because when you capitalise "word" you immediately evoke divinity (because the Word of God is God) and cause a (potentially lethal) confusion. I thought that was the standard practice, but perhaps I've lived a sheltered life. More and more I'm appreciating the advice of my pastor that I need to read more modern material as well as the Puritans. In most cases it seems to me it would be reading it to be aware of modern errors, but I do seem to be naive about these modern trends.

As a result, I worship according to the content of the Bible.

It seems like the claim is getting less and less - from "the content of the bible is divine" to now "we worship according to the content of the bible". I of course agree with the latter, but the former scares me no end and I'm surprised it doesn't apparently scare anybody else. There's a lot of hairpin triggers on this board for any slight whiff of error, so it seems from the absence of firing that most are in agreement with the idea that the content of the bible is divine. To me the idea is in the same category as Pantheism, worship of Mary and the host, and it scares me. The arm-waving arguments offered so far have done nothing to calm my alarm bells.... According the WCF, God's goodness, wisdom and power are manifested through the light of nature, providence and the works of creation, but we would never say those things are divine. God has made special revelations through the history of the Israelites and specially committed them to writing. This book is another revelation of God, the greatest by far and the only one which leads to knowledge of salvation, but the WCF puts it in the same category of God-revelation.

The danger is here clearly:

To reverence/worship God's Word written is to reverence and worship God, because the Word is God

Because of the confusion here between the Word of John 1:1 and the word of Hebrews 12:14, there is no way to avoid the conclusion that the bible is God. This may be a relatively new convention and its fruit may not be yet clearly seen, but they could be terrible.

Let me address the things that have been said to back up the claim:

It's clear that we must reverence scripture

Well of course we reverence it, but that doesn't equate to worship of the divine.

Ps.138:2 "I will worship toward thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth: for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name."

The word order of the Hebrew makes the translation of Psalm 138:2 eminently disputable. The ESV has "you have exalted above all things your name and your word."

On the other hand, the form of Word-revelation is so closely associated with God himself, that reverence is mandatory. If Moses was to bow before the burning bush, then so must we--even when it is only present to us in the content of the Word.

It was an angel of the Lord who appeared to him, not just a burning bush. Clearly it is appropriate to show all humility, respect, reverence and fear before an angel of the Lord. Again, neither the angel nor the bush was divine.

You could take out "commandments" "word" "statues", all the dozen or so words for word-revelation that appear in many of the 176vv of the text, and insert "GOD" "LORD" JEHOVAH" etc. And it would make perfect sense.

Apply the same test to any number of sentences and its passing wouldn't prove the replaced words were divine. "I love Dostoevsky".

"Lift up my hands unto thy commandments." What exactly is that, if not adoration?

Again, one can adore things that are not divine.

BTW, the capitalization of "Word" in Ans's 112&113 are original.

This does surprise me - thanks for that. I don't have a lot of confidence in the consistent orthography of the 17th century as it was relatively new, but it seems this problem may not be an innovation.

Romans 10 / Deu 30 - "But the word is very near you"

In my humble opinion, Paul is comparing the word of Moses to the gospel, not the words of the bible to Christ.

Friends, you won't find anyone more ready than me to look for any reason to interpret words charitably and favourably to the praise of those saying them, but I can't see a way round this one. I have serious concerns that even worshipping our mental and logical images of God may be idolatry, but I wouldn't cause a fuss over that. I think this is most serious and that's the only reason I'll challenge it passionately. I can't think of anything over which we should exercise more exactness of care than over what we consider to be divine.

 

[Zenas]

Question: Has God revealed Himself in the Bible?

Question: Do you worship God as He revealed Himself in the Bible?

 

[dr_parsley]

Question: Has God revealed Himself in the Bible?

Question: Do you worship God as He revealed Himself in the Bible?

Yes and yes.

 

[Jimmy the Greek]

Do I worship the Bible? No.

Do I consider the Bible the divinely inspired written Word of God? Yes.

 

[Romans 9:16]

It is definitely an error to confuse God’s essence and attributes with his words and actions. There is an obvious distinction that should be maintained. A couple things though:

1)There is a profound connection between God and his words. They are the object of our faith and the context for worship (we don’t worship words, but we worship according to the words and in the ‘midst’ of contemplating the words). Thus one can substitute the ‘Bible/Scriptures/Word’ for ‘God’ in certain contexts (as indeed most translations do in their capatilization in Romans 9:17). Nevertheless, note the next point:

2)There is an obvious ontological distinction between God and text (even if there is not an epistemological separation from the human standpoint). Because of point one above, some may be looser than they should be on capitalization on the use of the term ‘word’ when its referent is not the person Jesus. You are right to point this out. Precision of language matters.

 

[Zenas]

As I can see it, you can only worship God's essence and attributes according to what He has revealed to you in His Word, i.e. the Bible. Perhaps I'm in some error though.

 

[py3ak]

Paul, I think your question is not sufficiently clear yet. Titling conventions would have us capitalize "Bible", "Holy Scripture", "Word of God" when they are used as some of the titles of God's written revelation. Leaving that aside, though, it is undoubtedly convenient to signify the uniqueness of that book, as compared to any other, which we do when we call it the Bible, which is to say, the Book, the unique and outstanding and incomparable Book.

But asking "is the content of the Bible divine" is not altogether clear. The content of the Bible is God-breathed - it is the very words of God. Well, just as my words are human words, God's words are divine words. But I don't think that was your question.

 

[Andres]

I believe I understand Paul (TS) completely and I am pretty sure I would agree with him. My answer to the question, "Is the content of the bible divine?" would be no. The content is most certainly divinely inspired and for that reason it should be reverenced, however the content itself is not divine. If we actually worshipped the bible as God then we would make it an idol.

 

[Contra_Mundum]

duplicate response in both threads

Here are a couple quotations from BB Warfield:

As our Lord declared that whatever was written in Scripture must needs be fulfilled (Mt.26:54; Lk.22:37; 24:44), so His followers explained one of the most startling facts which had occurred in their experience by pointing out that “it was needful that the scripture should be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spake before by the mouth of David” (Act.1:16). Here the ground of this constant appeal to Scripture, so that it is enough that a thing “is contained in scripture” (1Pet.2:6) for it to be of indefectible authority, is plainly enough declared: Scripture must needs be fulfilled, for what is contained in it is the declaration of the Holy Ghost through the human author. What Scripture says, God says; and accordingly we read such remarkable declarations as these: “For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, For this very purpose did I raise thee up” (Rom.9:17); “And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand unto Abraham,... In thee shall all the nations be blessed” (Gal.3:8). These are not instances of simple personification of Scripture, which is itself a sufficiently remarkable usage (Mk.15:28; Jn.7:38,42; 19:37; Rom.4:3; 10:11; 11:2; Gal.4:30; 1Tim.5:18; Jas.2:23; 4:5 f), vocal with the conviction expressed by James (Jas.4:5) that Scripture cannot speak in vain. They indicate a certain confusion in current speech between “Scripture” and “God,” the outgrowth of a deep-seated conviction that the word of Scripture is the word of God. It was not “Scripture” that spoke to Pharaoh, or gave his great promise to Abraham, but God. But “Scripture” and “God” lay so close together in the minds of the writers of the New Testament that they could naturally speak of “Scripture” doing what Scripture records God as doing. It was, however, even more natural to them to speak casually of God saying what the Scriptures say; and accordingly we meet with forms of speech such as these: “Wherefore, even as the Holy Spirit saith, Today if ye shall hear His voice,” etc. (Heb.3:7, quoting Ps.95:7); “Thou art God ... who by the mouth of thy servant David hast said, Why did the heathen rage,” etc. (Act.4:25 the King James Version, quoting Ps.2:1); “He that raised him from the dead ... hath spoken on this wise, I will give you ... because he saith also in another (place) ....” (Act.13:34, quoting Is.55:3 and Ps.16:10), and the like. The words put into God's mouth in each case are not words of God recorded in the Scriptures, but just Scripture words in themselves. When we take the two classes of passages together, in the one of which the Scriptures are spoken of as God, while in the other God is spoken of as if He were the Scriptures, we may perceive how close the identification of the two was in the minds of the writers of the New Testament.

This identification is strikingly observable in certain catenae of quotations, in which there are brought together a number of passages of Scripture closely connected with one another. The first chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews supplies an example. We may begin with Heb.1:5 :”For unto which of the angels said he” - the subject being necessarily “God” - “at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee?” - the citation being from Ps.2:7 and very appropriate in the mouth of God - “and again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son?” - from 2Sam.7:14, again a declaration of God's own - “And when he again bringeth in the firstborn into the world he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him” - from Dt.32:43, Septuagint, or Ps.97:7, in neither of which is God the speaker - “And of the angels he saith, Who maketh his angels winds, and his ministers a flame of fire” - from Ps.104:4, where again God is not the speaker but is spoken of in the third person - “but of the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, etc.” - from Ps.45:6,7 where again God is not the speaker, but is addressed - “And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning,” etc. - from Ps.102:25-27, where again God is not the speaker but is addressed - “But of which of the angels hath he said at any time, Sit thou on my right hand?” etc. - from Ps.110:1, in which God is the speaker. Here we have passages in which God is the speaker and passages in which God is not the speaker, but is addressed or spoken of, indiscriminately assigned to God, because they all have it in common that they are words of Scripture, and as words of Scripture are words of God. Similarly in Rom.15:9 we have a series of citations the first of which is introduced by “as it is written,” and the next two by “again he saith,” and “again,” and the last by “and again, Isaiah saith,” the first being from Ps.18:49; the second from Dt.32:43; the third from Ps.117:1; and the last from Is.11:10. Only the last (the only one here assigned to the human author) is a word of God in the text of the Old Testament.

from "The Biblical Idea of Inspiration," found in The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible, P&R, 1948, pp145-47; originally from ISBE, 1915.


And a second article:

The whole (of WCF ch1) is closed with the assertion that the Holy Spirit who speaks in every part of Scripture (cf.xiv.2) is the Supreme Judge in all controversies of religion, so that they all are to be determined, not on the ground of decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men or asserted private revelations--under whatever name they may masquerade, whether as traditions, deliverances of reason or of the Christian consciousness, individual or corporate--but on the ground of the unrepealable "thus saith the Lord" of Scripture itself (sct.10). Accordingly, in the Confession's sense, whenever the doctrine of Scripture is ascertained all religious strife is ended, and in its sentence we are to rest. As Rutherford says: "The Scripture makes itself the judge and determiner of all questions in religion."10 Or, as Reynolds puts it: "The Scriptures...are the alone rule of all controversies.... So then the only light by which differences are to be decided is the Word, being a full canon of God's revealed will, for the Lord doth not now as in former times make himslef known by dreams, or visions, or any other immediate way."11 Or, if we may look beyond the immediate circle of Westminster men to a Puritan divine whose praise is in all the churches, as Richard Sibbes says: "What is the supreme Judge? The Word, the Spirit of God in the Scriptures. And who is above God? It is a shameless ridiculous independency of men that will take upon them to be judges of Scripture."12 Shall we not say Amen to this, though it may condemn much modern practice and mayhap entail on us the charge of "bibliolatry"?

Such a reverence for God's Word as God's Word is no doubt an act of worship; but whom shall we worship if not the God of the Bible? At any rate, the Confessions closes the chapter on Scripture which it began by declaring Scripture "most necessary," by declaring it also final and decisive in all questions of religion. We cannot do without the Scriptures; having them we need no other guide. We need this light to light our pathway; having it we may well dispense with any other. Are we making it the light to lighten our feet? Are we following it whithersoever it leads? Are we prepared to test all religious truth by it, while it is tested by none? Are we prepared to stand by it in all things on the principle that it is God's Word and God will be true though every man be a liar?
_______________
10 A Free Disputation, 1649, p361.
11 Works, vol.5, pp152ff.
12 Works, vol.2, p.493.

from "The Westminster Doctrine of Holy Scripture," found in Selected Shorter Writings, P&R, 1970, pp569-71; original article pub. New York Observer, and The Independent, Apr.23, 1891.