Bibliology
Lesson - 1
Assignment:
    Study chapter one (1) of the book entitled, The Bible and Spiritual Criticism by A. T. Pierson.
    The following comments are gleanings from this chapter. Questions on this lesson will be based on the following comments.
Scripture:

    II Timothy 3:16-17 "All Scripture is given by the inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness; that man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works."
The Bible Divinely Inspired
    "All Scripture is given by the inspiration of God." To benefit from a study of the Bible, one must believe the Scriptures to be the very Word of God. The Bible, in unequivocal terms, declares itself to be the product of Divine inspiration. Divine inspiration means Divine inbreathing. The Holy Spirit of God moved upon the minds of the writers of the Scripture planting in their minds that part of God's counsel which constitutes the Bible. There is an analogy in Divine inspiration of the Scriptures with that of the creation of man.
    "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into (inbreathed) his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living soul," (Genesis 2:7).
    Man is formed from the dust of the ground. Before God breathed into him he was lifeless and certainly without power of discernment. He has form, but it is unanimated. In Divine inspiration God starts with human form, human language, and style of writing. But all this is to no avail until God plants or breathes into their minds what He would have them write. They were by uninspired faculties powerless to receive Divine revelation. Like the hand writing on the wall which Belshazzar saw, the writing came from the hand of man, but the words which he wrote came from God. (Daniel 5:5).
    As with the birth of Christ, the Holy Spirit overshadowed the virgin Mary. She conceived and brought forth the living Word of God. The Holy Spirit overshadowed the minds of the human authors of the Bible, causing their minds to conceive. Their minds became pregnant with the Word of God and that which was brought forth was the written Word of God. II Peter 1:21, "For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: But holy men of God spake as they were moved (borne along) by the Holy Ghost."
    "Holy men of God spake as they were borne along by the Holy Spirit." The Holy Spirit is the supreme agent in the authorship of the Bible. Men were His instruments and He effectually used them to write that part of God's counsel which He had placed in their minds. Divine authorship has produced the world's only infallible Book and God will not honor an irreverent approach to His word. It is an insult to any speaker to have only half interest of his audience. How much more does one insult God when he reads the Bible motivated by duty only and not with love, interest and reverence?

Translation Of The Bible

    Baptists believe in Divine inspiration of the original manuscripts of the Scriptures and without reservation declare them to be infallibly recorded. Baptists do not hold that translations of the original manuscripts are inspired in the sense that the originals were. Translators err. This shows they acted without being directed by the Holy Spirit. But it should be understood when Scriptures are translated intact, nothing added or omitted, the translation is as perfect as the original manuscript itself. It is the errors in translation that should be condemned and not the whole Bible. We should never cease to thank God for the better translations and it is the consensus of true theological scholarship that the King James version (1611) is far superior to any that has been translated into the English language.

Not By The Genius Of Man

    II Peter 1:21 "The prophecy came not in old time by the will of man."
    The Scriptures came not by human planning. They did not originate in the mind or will of man. When a man writes a book he does much preplanning. Sometimes he does a lot of traveling accumulating information. Sometimes data is compiled for years before the book is started. And many a book is started that is never finished, and many are finished that should never have been started. Not so with God's Book. When the prophets uttered and wrote their prophecies there was no human fore planning of what they were to speak or write. They worked according to a Divine plan they themselves did not understand. Hence, their writing and prophecies presented a problem to them. (READ - I Peter 1:10-12). Not only were the prophets confronted in their prophecies with problems they could not solve, but even angels desired to know the mysteries which those prophecies held and from them also was the prophetical revelations kept. The prophets were uttering prophecies not for themselves, but for future generations. So it was, time held the key that would unlock the prophetical door and it is God that determines, and controls all events of time. This is not in accord with the way seminaries teach inspiration. Some teach that in the Old Testament times inspiration came from certain established principles Such as; Israel must be preserved as God's witnesses. Based on this, Isaiah was able to predict the future of Israel. This theory of inspiration of the Scriptures is a grievous error and comes no way near to the truth of Divine inspiration. In fact, this theory, reduces Bible prophecy to nothing more than educated guesswork.
    There are many good books which deserve a careful study, but the gulf fixed between the very best book authored by man and the Book wrote by the Holy Spirit is a gulf that the world's most sanctified author will never bridge.
    The Bible is the Divine Book and as the Divine Book it is unique, standing above and apart from all other literature.

Divine Condescension

    Jesus Christ was the God man, the one person in whom Divinity and humanity was perfectly combined. There never was such a being before and there never will be again. He was unique and separate from sinners. So with the Bible, we have Divine inspiration. God condescended to reach down and bring human agency under His direct influence, causing it to be in union with Divinity so as to Produce the perfect Book! The Bible stands eternally in a class all by itself. There will never be another book that, combines together the Divine and human element as this Book does. When we say the Divine and human was brought into combination to produce the Bible, we want to emphasize the fact that the human element had nothing whatsoever to do with the authorship of the Bible. Men are authors of the Bible in an indirect sense only. They wrote what was dictated to them by the Holy Spirit. In writing they were left to their own forms of expression and style of writing and it is only in this sense we can say, "Paul wrote the epistle to the Romans." Or, "John wrote the books of the Bible which bear his name." Some people believe and teach mechanical inspiration. That is, the writers employed of the Holy Spirit were no more than a pencil would be in the hand of a man. This is error. God allowed the writers to express themselves in their own manner, but exempted them from error in what they expressed.

The Supernatural Book

    The Bible is the supernatural Book because it is authored by the Holy Spirit and Holy Spirit authorship makes, it a spiritual Book. To be supernatural is to be beyond the natural. So, when a person agrees with the fact of Divine inspiration he is at the same time testifying to the truth that the Book can only be understood by a mind which transcends the natural. This is what Paul meant when he said, "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned," (I Corinthians 2:14). Only "born again" persons are equipped with spiritual faculties whereby they are enabled to study the Scriptures profitably. We do not mean being Holy Spirit regenerated makes one intellectually superior in the natural realm. Paul says, "Not many wise men after the flesh are called," (I Corinthians 1:26). The Lord Himself said, "The children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light," (Luke 16:8). On the other hand, the poor, despised and uneducated saint has been GIVEN a faculty whereby he is enabled to comprehend spiritual things. And if he, like the blind man Jesus healed, (John 9:25) knows only one thing in the spiritual realm; this one thing is one hundred percent more than the world's most wisest man knows.
    A man may tediously labor, and earn for himself a Ph.D., yea, he may earn and own a D.D. and labor all his life in the study of the Scripture, but until he is saved, and indwelt by the Holy Spirit he shall NEVER know any spiritual truth as he ought to know it. Salvation of the soul and illumination by the Spirit is absolutely necessary to a right understanding of God's Book.

Questions
Lesson - 1

    1. Do you believe the Scriptures are Divinely inspired?
    2. Write, in your own words, what you believe Divine inspiration means.

   3. Can a person understand the Scriptures before he experiences regeneration by the Spirit? Give Scripture supporting your answer.

    4. Who is the supreme agent in the authorship of the Scriptures?

    5. In order to benefit from a study of the Bible, one must be born again, believe the Scriptures to be inspired of God and have a _ _ _ _, _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ and reverence for the Scriptures. (Copy, and fill in the blanks).

    6. Were there any errors in the original manuscripts of the Bible?

    7. When translators err in translation, what does their errors prove?

    8. How long did the human writers of the Scriptures plan and premeditate concerning what they were to write?

    9. In writing the Scriptures men were left to their own manner of expression. Will the theory of "mechanical inspiration" agree with this assertion?

    10. Is it necessary to be educated in the schools of men before one can understand the teaching of Scripture?

    11. Why is it that the Bible is infinitely superior to the best book authored by man?
 
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