Jerusalem Blade
Puritan Board Professor
Rob,
As I've said before, you are a man of worth to the Kingdom, whom the King has given good gifts, yet as dead flies in the ointment, so the sin against charity spoils the sweet savor of your wisdom and honor (Eccl 10:1).
To say a man is deceived or blinded to the truth is one thing – we all suffer this ourselves to some extent somewhere in our lives – but it is entirely another to say a man is dishonest, that is, deliberately falsifies the truth for his own advantage and to knowingly deceive others. It is beyond your knowledge to assert this of Dr. White, to his motives and the inner workings of his mind. It has to be an assumption on your part, and therein is your fault – and the commission of slander.
To call a man a lackey, an unthinking tool of another, and a sycophant, is merely to insult a pastor before the world, as the allegation doesn't fit the facts – it is but a cruel slur.
If you seek to justify yourself in these calumnies you but further dishonor yourself in the eyes of those who know the Royal Law.
You will remember when someone from aomin (left unnamed) said I was dishonest (to deliberately hoodwink my hearers) by using the 1st edition of Metzger's Textual Commentary on the Greek N.T. instead of the 2nd, as there were changes in the latter. And I said the same thing to him I've said to you, "Unjustly you make this accusation – having no clue as to my motives – for it was a thing of ignorance and not dishonesty." I also reproved him for making this unfounded charge against an elder, which, although we are not in the same local church, still violates the respect to be given officers in the Kingdom. When I was an enlisted man in the Marines, I would have gotten in as much serious trouble disrespecting an Air Force officer as I would have a Marine. How much more should this apply to the government and officers of Christ!
Open rebuke is better than secret love (Pr 27:5). And an angry countenance drives away a backbiting tongue (Pr 25:23). Anger is not hostility. I have no hostility to you, nor residual anger.
Your brother in Christ
--------
TimV,
You're getting good at the details of this debate. Let me zoom out a little, enlarge the perspective, and ask you a (perhaps) difficult question (as construction is generally harder than demolition):
Did God leave us a Bible – a settled Scripture – which we have in hand? Is it reliable in all its parts? Can we say it is the sure Word of God to us, with certainty?
What Bible do you offer, when asked thusly?
Thanks,
Steve
-----Added 12/17/2008 at 04:03:00 EST-----
More on Dabney, to add to the quote Tim V pulled from his Discussions: Evangelical and Theological, Vol. 1, 1891, p. 350. This is from the next page (Rev. Winzer already quoted the first sentence, but I wish to add more to that quote).
Dabney goes on to examine the significant variants, omissions mostly, that the received text (the TR mss) does not countenance, and finds these variants greatly wanting. He also examines the various radical text critics of his day and earlier, evaluates them (wanting as well) and also the purported "oldest and best" manuscripts. In the post-Reformation scholastic tradition he was, like Owen, "working WITHIN the TR tradition, not seeking by radical criticism to undermine it" (M. Winzer). So his caveat noted by TimV in post #164 is not at odds with the assertion of Letis (post #163) that Dabney held to the original view ("genuine heirs of Turretin") of the WCF 1:8.
As I've said before, you are a man of worth to the Kingdom, whom the King has given good gifts, yet as dead flies in the ointment, so the sin against charity spoils the sweet savor of your wisdom and honor (Eccl 10:1).
To say a man is deceived or blinded to the truth is one thing – we all suffer this ourselves to some extent somewhere in our lives – but it is entirely another to say a man is dishonest, that is, deliberately falsifies the truth for his own advantage and to knowingly deceive others. It is beyond your knowledge to assert this of Dr. White, to his motives and the inner workings of his mind. It has to be an assumption on your part, and therein is your fault – and the commission of slander.
To call a man a lackey, an unthinking tool of another, and a sycophant, is merely to insult a pastor before the world, as the allegation doesn't fit the facts – it is but a cruel slur.
If you seek to justify yourself in these calumnies you but further dishonor yourself in the eyes of those who know the Royal Law.
You will remember when someone from aomin (left unnamed) said I was dishonest (to deliberately hoodwink my hearers) by using the 1st edition of Metzger's Textual Commentary on the Greek N.T. instead of the 2nd, as there were changes in the latter. And I said the same thing to him I've said to you, "Unjustly you make this accusation – having no clue as to my motives – for it was a thing of ignorance and not dishonesty." I also reproved him for making this unfounded charge against an elder, which, although we are not in the same local church, still violates the respect to be given officers in the Kingdom. When I was an enlisted man in the Marines, I would have gotten in as much serious trouble disrespecting an Air Force officer as I would have a Marine. How much more should this apply to the government and officers of Christ!
Open rebuke is better than secret love (Pr 27:5). And an angry countenance drives away a backbiting tongue (Pr 25:23). Anger is not hostility. I have no hostility to you, nor residual anger.
Let the righteous smite me; it shall be a kindness: and let him reprove me; it shall be an excellent oil, which shall not break my head... (Psalm 141:5)
Your brother in Christ
--------
TimV,
You're getting good at the details of this debate. Let me zoom out a little, enlarge the perspective, and ask you a (perhaps) difficult question (as construction is generally harder than demolition):
Did God leave us a Bible – a settled Scripture – which we have in hand? Is it reliable in all its parts? Can we say it is the sure Word of God to us, with certainty?
What Bible do you offer, when asked thusly?
Thanks,
Steve
-----Added 12/17/2008 at 04:03:00 EST-----
More on Dabney, to add to the quote Tim V pulled from his Discussions: Evangelical and Theological, Vol. 1, 1891, p. 350. This is from the next page (Rev. Winzer already quoted the first sentence, but I wish to add more to that quote).
As more numerous collations of ancient documents are made the number of various readings is, of course, greatly increased; but yet the effect of these comparisons is, on the whole, to confirm the substantial correctness of the received text more and more. This is because these various readings, which are now counted by the hundred thousand, are nearly all exceedingly minute and trivial; and chiefly because, while they diverge, on the one side and on the other, from the received text, the divergence is always within these minute bounds; which proves that text to be always within a very slight distance, if at all removed, from the infallible autographs. p. 351
Dabney goes on to examine the significant variants, omissions mostly, that the received text (the TR mss) does not countenance, and finds these variants greatly wanting. He also examines the various radical text critics of his day and earlier, evaluates them (wanting as well) and also the purported "oldest and best" manuscripts. In the post-Reformation scholastic tradition he was, like Owen, "working WITHIN the TR tradition, not seeking by radical criticism to undermine it" (M. Winzer). So his caveat noted by TimV in post #164 is not at odds with the assertion of Letis (post #163) that Dabney held to the original view ("genuine heirs of Turretin") of the WCF 1:8.