People of the Book

In discussing F.F. Bruce’s Canon of Scripture with a friend, the subject naturally led to my friend mentioning the Jews as “people of the book”. I did not have a problem with calling the Jews “people of the book”—after all, they were a very book oriented religion—probably the most of their time (of course, I don’t mean modern day Jews; we were talking about ancient Judaism)—but I had come to doubt that they were “people of the book” in the same way Protestant Christians are today. (Protestants believe in Sola Scriptura, which is Latin for “Scripture alone” and means that Scripture is to be the sole rule of faith for Christians). Feeling the need to clarify, I mentioned something David B. Currie wrote in Born Fundamentalist, Born Again Catholic about how Currie noticed certain holes, so to speak, in the Old Testament. I told how he said that there was no way to reconstruct Jewish worship that would be pleasing to God from the Old Testament alone—one of supposedly many examples—that you cannot reconstruct the process of a sin offering from the Old Testament alone.

Well if you saw what was coming next, I sure didn’t. My friend opened the Bible right up to Leviticus, browsed a little bit, and proceeded to read a quite detailed process for a sin offering. I was stunned. I had really liked Currie’s book, and was not sure how to react. We moved on to other subjects, and eventually ended our discussion. When I got home, I went to double check what he had read from Leviticus because I could hardly believe it; but I couldn’t find it. Actually, I think I found where he read, but we must have simply overlooked that the passage was referring specifically to priests who had sinned. So I read all of the offerings, looking for a regular ol’ sin offering for a regular ol’ Jew. I couldn’t find one—not that I was sure one even existed. It turns out the sin offerings are pretty specific.

Here are all of the offerings I found from reading Leviticus up to chapter six, verse seven:
1. Burnt Offering: an offering made by fire, an aroma pleasing to God.
2. Grain Offering: an offering made by fire, an aroma pleasing to God.
3. Grain offering of first fruits: an offering made to the Lord by fire.
4. Fellowship offering: An offering made by fire, a pleasing aroma.
5. If the anointed priest sins, bringing guilt on the people…
6. If the whole Israelite community sins unintentionally…
7. When a leader sins unintentionally…
8. When a member of the community sins unintentionally…
9. Sin because of not testifying in public to what he has seen… OR
if a person touches something ceremonially unclean even though unaware of it… OR
if he touches human uncleanliness even though he is unaware of it… OR
if a person thoughtlessly takes an oath even though he is unaware of it.
10. When a person commits a violation and sins unintentionally in regard to the Lord’s holy things…
11. If a person unintentionally does what is forbidden in any of the Lords commands…
12. If anyone sins and is unfaithful to the Lord by stealing/deceptively taking… So I think what my friend read was from number 5.

I noticed that although the offerings it gives are very detailed, still the list of offerings is incomplete. For instance the only offerings for individual (non-priest) non-unintentional sins are 12. and possibly the first part of 9 from my list above.

When I mentioned this to my friend, it was evident from his reply that I had not made myself very clear to him. My friend felt that Currie was suggesting that (for thousands of years) the Jews didn’t really know what they were doing. It is quite clear from his book that Currie was merely suggesting that there must have been an authoritative oral tradition. This can be seen if I quote Currie more thoroughly:

“As I read the Old Testament, I was struck by several major issues. The most revolutionary for me was that I saw that no one could have established or maintained Judaism in the way God desired from the data found only in the Bible. There were too many holes and gaps: so much was assumed. I saw that a tremendous amount of what was involved in being a God-fearing, God-pleasing Israelite must have been passed down from generation to generation in an oral instruction (tradition). You want just one example? Try to reconstruct the process of offering a sin offering from the Old Testament alone. You can’t get to first base! Reconstructing worship that would be pleasing to God from the Old Testament alone is impossible. There are many such examples.”

Until recently, I was unable to come up with any other “such example” on my own. Then I thought of marriage. I don’t believe the Bible anywhere specifies what actually constitutes a marriage. This is powerful, since, in Genesis 1, God commanded man to “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it”. I believe that God provided a way for man to obey the reproduction part of this command: marriage. It is obvious from the Bible that marriage existed; it is also evident that it started at the beginning (Matthew 19:8). Yet what actually constitutes a marriage is assumed in the Bible. It seems fair to me to call marriage a God-ordained Tradition.

But how can this be, since Jesus condemned all traditions, right? I don’t think so—at least not all. Of course Jesus did sometimes condemn traditions, but if you notice, he always qualifies them. One instance is in Matthew 15:3 “why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition?” (emphasis mine) In Mark 7:8 people “let go of the commands of God and are holding on to the traditions of men”, and in verse 9, he calls them “your own traditions”. Yet Jesus does not condemn all tradition; it is evident that he is simply condemning those traditions which are really just excuses for sin. In fact Jesus upheld good Tradition (capital “t’ used to denote tradition from God). Jesus says in Matthew 23: 2-3 “The teachers of the law and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. So you must obey them and do everything they tell you. But do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach”. For almost the whole chapter after this, Jesus exposes the hypocrisy of the Pharisees, but here he commands his disciples to “Obey them and do everything they tell you.” This flies in the face of the notion that all tradition is man-made, corrupt, or evil.

In fact, in my protestant upbringing, I have held many traditions that I just didn’t know were actually traditions. For example, Christmas, Worship on Sunday, or, though this may sound funny at first, the canon of scripture. If any practice or teaching not in the Bible is to be considered tradition, then the list of books that make up the Bible is tradition. How does one know which books are supposed to be in the Bible? What is inspired, and what isn’t? We can’t have a fallible list of infallible books! I have found this a very powerful question for a long time, and that is why I wrote my first post on the books of the Bible. The main reason I have been given for belief in the Protestant Inspired Canon of Scripture is that we are to have faith. The hard thing to get out is: faith in what.

Now I don’t intend to diminish the role of faith at all. I only want to narrow down more precisely what the faith is in. For instance, one person might have faith that God sent down the King James Version of the Bible, table of contents and all, from Heaven. While I believe this position is historically ignorant, and lacking of any real basis, it would answer the questions “where does the Bible come from?” and “how do we know which books are to be in the Bible”?

In my search for the real answers to these questions (and others), this is what I have found: The Bible, taken at first as a purely historical document, shows that Jesus claimed to be God—the messiah. So as C.S. Lewis says, he was either what he claimed to be—God—or a madman, or a devil of hell. He cannot be taken as just a great teacher. From his teaching, he evidently was no madman; and no devil would be so loving, so he was God. One can also see from the Bible, still taken as a merely historical reference, that Jesus intended to found an infallible Church (Matthew 16:18; 18:17). That infallible Church tells us that the Bible is inspired. Only after being assured by the authority of the infallible church does one accept the Bible as inspired.

Many people think the reason that one accepts the Bible as inspired is unimportant as long as one does accept it. If asked, a simple claim of inspiration in the Bible is thought to be enough proof. The problem with that is that not all of the books claim inspiration. In fact, very few do. Also, the Qua ran claims inspiration, not to mention other “Christian” literature also claiming inspiration. Some people may contend something to the effect that they can “just tell” because of the inspired works are “inspirational”. While much of the Bible is inspiring, I would have a hard time finding many of the long genealogies and repetitive histories “inspirational”. There are many other encouraging but definitely uninspired writings that most, if not all, Christians would consider more inspirational that certain books of the Bible.

The thing is, the reason one accepts the Bible as inspired is important, because it makes a big difference in how one interprets scripture. I’ve heard it said (though I don’t recall ever having been explicitly taught this) that protestants believe that each individual is guided to the truth by the holy Spirit when he reads the Bible. If this is so, then why do only some protestants believe that baptism is regenerative while others believe it to be merely symbolic? Surely it is not the holy Spirit’s fault. Blaming it on sin is no use either, since you would have to change the statement to “the holy Spirit guides each sinless person unto true interpretation”.

This reminds me of something I’ve often asked myself while traveling back and forth from home to school. That is, why is 1st So-and-so Church right down the street from 2nd So-and-so Church? Why are they separate? Obviously, one of them was there first. Did the people who started the second church try to resolve it’s differences with the first church? How could the differences be considered minor if they had to separate and build a whole new building? How does one know which one is right? Both believe the Bible alone is their rule of faith, but they do not agree on how to interpret certain passages. Does each church accuse the other of lying? Is one more educated? (Even the best biblical scholars run the gamut when it comes to interpretation). You could just always go with the church that was there first, but that would eventually lead you back to the Catholic church.

I think it sort of comes down to the question: how do I know what is the truth? My guess is that if I asked most of my protestant Christian friends what the Foundation of the Truth is, they would quite confidently reply—”the Bible”. Yet 1 Timothy 3:15 says that the Church is the pillar and foundation of the truth.

So, I guess ironically, the Bible actually does tell us what constitutes a marriage—when it tells us that the Church is the pillar and foundation of the truth.

A Biblical Baptism

I’ve been thinking a little bit about baptism. In my last post, I gave a little background for those of you who haven’t known me as long. I mentioned my baptism, and while I was writing it was probably the first time I really realized that it wasn’t very biblical to have waited so long to be baptized. I’m not saying that my church taught that believers should wait to be baptized; that’s just what happened. But what is a biblical baptism? More specifically: does baptism actually do something, or is it merely a symbol? Here is what I have found so far.

Mark 16:16

Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved; whoever does not believe will be condemned.

One way of looking at it is to say, “See, unbelief is the only thing this passage says condemns a man.” This is true, but it does not take into account the whole sentence. To borrow an analogy from Dave Armstrong, consider this:

In order to win the gold medal for a particular event in the Olympics, there are these two criteria:

1) One must come in 1st place.

2) One must be free of any performance enhancing drugs.

(Of course, there may be other criteria not mentioned here that could possibly prevent one from receiving a gold medal, but we know for sure that these two are necessary.)

In order for one to win the gold medal, one must meet both the above criteria: he must place first in the event, and he must be free of any performance enhancing drugs. That means that if only one criterion is met, then he will not receive the gold medal. Many people compete in the Olympics without performance enhancing drugs, yet do not win the gold medal because they do not come in first place. Likewise, a contestant may come in first, but if found to have been on performance enhancing drugs, will forfeit his medal–as has happened in the past.

So, in the passage above, the fact that unbelief is the only criterion for condemnation does not mean that both belief and baptism are not necessary for salvation. In the analogy, it would be like saying of someone who was refused the gold medal because they were found to be on performance enhancing drugs: “See, the use of performance enhancing drugs is the only thing that keeps a man from the gold medal.”

John 3:5

Jesus answered, “Amen, amen, I say to you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit.”

In opposition to those who say that by “born of water and spirit” Jesus is referring to baptism, some people say that that the “water” part merely refers to our natural birth. They claim that such an interpretation would contradict the Bible, which they believe clearly advocates “faith alone“. I don’t believe that we are saved by faith alone simply because I don’t believe the holy Spirit would inspire the only passage in the bible where faith and alone are together to say “See how a person is justified by works and not by faith alone” (James 2:24 emphasis added) if the truth were the complete opposite. Apart from that, it seems odd to me that Jesus would tell people who have already been naturally born that they must be naturally born. Jesus often shows much more insight than that when talking to specific individuals, knowing exactly what they lack, and addressing them along those lines (e.g. Matthew 19:16-22, John 4:7-19).

Acts 2:37-39

Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart, and they asked Peter and the other apostles, “What are we to do, my brothers?” Peter [said] to them, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the holy Spirit. For the promise is made to you and to your children and to all those far off, whomever the Lord our God will call.”

This passage takes place right after Pentecost. Peter had just preached the gospel to the crowd there, and the passage says they “were cut to the heart”, and they asked “What are we to do, my brothers?” It seems evident to me from their response that these people believed and accepted the gospel. Yet, similar (in it’s twofold command) to the passage in Mark above, Peter responds: “Repent and be baptized”… for the forgiveness of your sins”. The Bible Knowledge Commentary, on this passage, suggests that “a problem revolves around the command ‘be baptized’ and its connection with the remainder of 2:38.” Their objection to the view that both baptism and repentance result in the forgiveness of sins (the more natural reading) is solely based on the belief that other parts of scripture base forgiveness on “faith alone”. Of course, none of their cited passages contain “faith alone”, and, as I mentioned earlier, the one place in scripture where “faith alone” occurs would not suit their objection. Let’s look at this passage without the word “baptism” it it at all:

Acts 2:37-39 (edited for example)

Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart, and they asked Peter and the other apostles, “What are we to do, my brothers?” Peter [said] to them, “Repent, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the holy Spirit. For the promise is made to you and to your children and to all those far off, whomever the Lord our God will call.”

Taking the word “baptism” out of this passage, to me, clearly shows its connection with forgiveness. The phrase “in the name of” is either connected with repentance or baptism (or , as I believe is the case, both); so what sense does make to repent “in the name of” when Jesus specifically commanded to baptize in the name of the Father, the son and the holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19). The passage is quite clear that whatever is done “in the name of Jesus Christ” is done for the forgiveness of sins–”for the promise is made to you and your children and to all those far off, whomever the Lord our God will call.”

Acts 9:17-19

So Ananias went and entered the house; laying his hands on him, he said, “Saul, my brother, the Lord has sent me, Jesus who appeared to you on the way by which you came, that you may regain your sight and be filled with the holy Spirit.” Immediately things like scales fell from his eyes and he regained his sight. He got up and was baptized, and when he had eaten, he recovered his strength.

Ananias says the Lord sent him for two things:

1) That Saul may regain his sight

2) That Saul may be filled with the holy Spirit

Saul immediately regains his sight–this fulfills the first promise. But how does he receive the holy Spirit? The scripture says that (even before eating–significant when one hasn’t eaten or drank for three days [Acts 9:9]) he was baptized.

Acts also records Paul explaining this same event to the Jews:

Acts 22:12-16

“A certain Ananias, a devout observer of the law, and highly spoken of by all the Jews who lived there,came to me and stood there and said, ‘Saul, my brother, regain your sight.’ And at that very moment I regained my sight and saw him.Then he said, ‘The God of our ancestors designated you to know his will, to see the Righteous One, and to hear the sound of his voice;for you will be his witness before all to what you have seen and heard. Now, why delay? Get up and have yourself baptized and your sins washed away, calling upon his name.’

This account is a little different than the first, saying that at his baptism, his sins were forgiven. Objectors to this interpretation claim that the phrase “sins washed away” is only referring to a symbolism of when he was “saved” when he believed in the Lord ( there is evidence that Paul already believed before his encounter with Ananias [Acts 22:10]). I see no evidence that this is so. This account more clearly shows the urgency in which baptism held. “Now, why delay?” Paul had not eaten or drank anything for three days! It makes sense that he was baptized first because supernatural life is more important than natural life. Of course baptism is symbolic in several ways–but it is not only symbolic, as this passage shows.

Romans 6:3-4

Or are you unaware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were indeed buried with him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might live in newness of life.

The Church is Christ’s body. If we were baptized into Christ Jesus, we were also baptized into the Church. It says that in being baptized into Him, we were baptized into his death–buried with Him–through which we are also born again in Him. Simply put, this passage is saying that we must die with Christ to be born again, and that it is God’s will to do this instrumentally through baptism.

1 Corinthians 12:12-13

As a body is one though it has many parts, and all the parts of the body, though many, are one body, so also Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, slaves or free persons, and we were all given to drink of one Spirit.

This passage shows more clearly the theme of Christ’s body as the Church–how we are all individual members of Christ’s body, yet we are one body–which may be a deeper statement than first appears. Baptism is given as a sort of proof or reason for this, since “in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body.” Those who hold that baptism is merely symbolic claim that baptism in this passage is not baptism in water, but a “baptism of the spirit.” I find this implausible since, earlier on in this same letter, Paul’s reference to baptism is unmistakably water baptism:

1 Corinthians 1:13-15

“Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?I give thanks (to God) that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius,so that no one can say you were baptized in my name.”

In fact, both passages are addressing the same theme–unity. In both passages, Paul urges the unity of the body of Christ with baptism, which is clearly referring to water baptism since Paul talks about how he is thankful that he didn’t baptize many of them.

1 Peter 3:18-22

For Christ also suffered for sins once, the righteous for the sake of the unrighteous, that he might lead you to God. Put to death in the flesh, he was brought to life in the spirit.In it he also went to preach to the spirits in prison,who had once been disobedient while God patiently waited in the days of Noah during the building of the ark, in which a few persons, eight in all, were saved through water.This prefigured baptism, which saves you now. It is not a removal of dirt from the body but an appeal to God for a clear conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers subject to him.

I don’t think it gets much clearer than 1 Peter 2:21 that baptism is not merely symbolic. Peter says “This [the great flood of Noah] prefigured baptism, which saves you now.” He has to be referring to water baptism because he says that the Flood prefigures baptism. In the flood, Noah was “saved through water”; as is the same in baptism–that’s what they have in common!

A Few More Things

One thing that those who object to baptismal regeneration argue concerns the thief on the cross. They argue that he was saved without water baptism. I think the important thing to address concerning this type of argument is the nature of the necessity of baptism. For instance, those who argue this would hold that faith is the only necessity for salvation. Yet do they condemn infants or the mentally handicapped who do not believe because they have no capacity to believe? Of course not, they simply pray for God’s mercy! It seems (to me) to be self evident that the only ones required to believe are those who have such an ability. All of the miracles of Jesus and the prophets show how things that are definitely considered necessity (such as both a human mother and father to conceive a child) can have exceptions (the virgin birth). Not that such exceptions are common, by any means. Other exceptions given are examples of people receiving the holy Spirit at times other than baptism, but this kind of argument neglects the fact that there are quite a few examples people, such as the Apostle Paul, who were filled with the holy Spirit on more than one occasion in Scripture. Would those people assert that each time they were filled with the holy Spirit they were saved? Certainly not. I do not claim to completely understand what being filled with the holy Spirit always means, but it doesn’t seem to me to be any proof against baptismal regeneration. So the existence of examples, such as the thief on the cross, or others of people being filled with the holy Spirit, does not negate the clear Scriptural command to “repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins”.

Please keep in mind that these verses in no way diminish or abolish the necessity of faith. For those able to believe, faith is always necessary for one to be baptized.

Books of the Bible

Here is a note I posted on facebook at the end of the school year. It received little attention except by my Catholic friends. I have learned a bit more since writing this, but it is still worth posting:

Dearest Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

Finals week is a crazy time, I know, but maybe some of you are done with finals and have time for reading Facebook notes and enjoying other relaxing pastimes. I doubt, however that this will be a very relaxing note to many of you. I don’t know, maybe if I smoooothe my text a tad, taking triple alliteration tactics to the max… ahem. Never mind that. As I was going to say, I want to get some stuff out there that may be a little controversial. Mainly, I want to know what you think about some things I have been thinking about.

In my journey of searching for the truth on issues concerning Catholicism, I have learned a lot about the differences that we have (that is, my particular Non-denominational Bible-Christian upbringing vs. Theirs). I know that many of you who are not Catholic will have objections so strong to the Catholic faith that no discussion will turn you from what you believe. That is fine–that is not my intention. I, however, have come to question certain things that I have always believed. Now don’t be too alarmed, I still believe “there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved” –Jesus. But as I have tried to discuss these issues with my closest family and friends, I almost always get angry responses if any at all. I am writing in hopes that you will take my questions to heart and I will be glad to hear what you all have to say.

Here it goes:

How do we know which books are in the Bible? I never did question this as a child: I took it by faith. I trusted that, because my parents taught me that the bound volume we called the Bible was indeed the Word of God, it must have been. As I grew up, my faith in that truth was only strengthened by the contents of the book itself. The truth contained in it helped me to understand my purpose in life. The stories in it let me know I wasn’t alone. The challenges in it showed me my shortcomings and pressed me to be who God wanted me to be. That is why I believed the Bible was God’s word, and these reasons will always be evidence to the authenticity of scripture.

For this reason I had no real reason to question anything about the Bible–until I discovered that the Catholics, about whom I was taught nearly nothing, had “extra books” in their Bible. I naturally wanted to find out why their Bible was different. And as I discovered many things about the story of the Bible’s making, (all of which I will not cover here) it was not just the historical evidence, but the questions themselves which bore evidence that there was something about my belief in “scripture alone” which was lacking. If I believed there was no authority over Christians except scripture, how did I really know that all of the books of my Bible were really inspired by God, since the Bible did not list which books were to be included in the cannon (“rule” or “standard”) of scripture? And if the Bible itself were to have named the books to be included in its cannon, what witness would that be? For Jesus said: “If I alone testify about Myself, My testimony is not true.” John 5:31 As it is, the Bible itself does not bear witness to Sola Scriptura in that it does not even list which books are to be considered scripture; nor does the Bible claim to be the sole authority of Christians. Therefore it must be necessary that something outside of the Bible had authority to define what the Bible was. But what had such an authority and where did it’s authority come from?

Now since I changed my major to History, (bye bye engineering) I happened to acquire a very non-catholic history book that tells a little bit about the formation of the Bible. It says that although the core of Christian scriptures was decided by about the year 200 AD, all of the books of the Bible were not finally decided until more than 300 years after the death of the last apostle. That means that the Church, well after the apostolic age, still had the authority to decide which books were inspired by God. I found this significant because there were many books at the time that claimed to be inspired but were not accepted into the cannon, and there were many books such as Hebrews, James, 2 Peter, 2 and 3 John, Jude, and Revelation who’s inspiration was contested. Even further, it is interesting to note that at the deciding of the books of the new testament, the deuterocanonical books (the “extra” books that Catholics have in their Bible) of the old testament were included in that list of Divine Scripture. So I say that all to ask you: How do we know which books are in the Bible?