Article on the Use of the OT in the NT – Implications for the Inspiration and Inerrancy Discussion
Posted By MSH on January 13, 2009
My thanks to Rob Bradshaw and his Biblical Studies.org.uk blog for posting this classic article by Donald Hagner. It’s great for our current discussion about the process of inspiration, since it covers the well-known phenomenon of how the NT authors often quoted the OT from memory. The result was a lot of imprecision in their quotations when you compare the wordings in the NT to the LXX and a (hypothetically) retroverted Hebrew text. This makes sense in my view of inspiration, where the human authors (not God) were the *immediate* originators of the words they wrote, God being the ultimate “approver” of the wordings via Providence. Hagner also makes note of the synoptic “problem”, and issue which makes the “God gave the writers each word” view nonsensical. Why would God whisper different tenses of verbs, different conjunctions, different person and number, different vocabulary, etc. to writers recording the same events and conversations? This is completely understandable in my view, but it makes God seem capricious or even uncertain in the alteranative view. (I say “my view” not because I’ve come up with anything here; this issue has been around for millennia now).
Anyway, enjoy the article!
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4 Responses to “Article on the Use of the OT in the NT – Implications for the Inspiration and Inerrancy Discussion”
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Mike,
Your view or any inerrancy view for that matter is plagued with having to explain such synoptic problems as Hagner has mapped out. You have to explain why God “approves” via Providence such divergent accounts of the same occurence. Couldn’t he have just providentially went with the one that was the closest to the original? In the end, in your view you must explain away these differences as unique grammars, vocabulary, and memory of the various authors. In the orthodox verbal plenary inspiration belief (which you term ‘God gave the words’ view), we can see a divine design in the text that your view will not allow you to see.
Chris
@cwmyers007: My view isn’t “plagued” to explain the synoptics any more than any other view – the fact is they are there. One can say (with you) that God gave each and every conflicting word to the writers (and each and every change of tense, object, subject, person, number, etc.). I don’t need to explain away anything. It’s simple: they are there because PEOPLE put them there. I believe God was interested enough in the process to prevent them making from bona fide errors in the product. He let them do what they did and supervised (in simplest terms). He had already prepared them to write through everyday events that molded them — their minds, personalities, education, etc. When it was time to write, the Spirit prompted them to do so, with no need to whisper in their ears or mind. Why is Providence so offensive to you in this regard? Must God do every task do act providentially?
This book was recently published last year:
http://www.amazon.com/Erosion-Inerrancy-Evangelicalism-Responding-Challenges/dp/1433502038/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1232899447&sr=8-1
The Erosion of Inerrancy in Evangelicalism: Responding to New Challenges to Biblical Authority (Paperback)
by G. K. Beale (Author)
@blop2008: yep; be aware that there are MANY evangelicals in ETS that side with Enns (for example) and not Beale on this. He isn’t the pope.