The Hebrew View of the Bible and Inspiration By: Roy B. Blizzard, Jr.

We regularly receive In the mail bulletins from various churches and/or Christian groups, many of them listing their statements of beliefs or articles of faith.

Recently, I received several and, as I read them, two things were apparent. They are basically copying one from the other without giving any real serious thought to what they realty believe, and secondly, most of what they declare as articles of faith are theological statements that are fundamentally in error. For example, the one I have before me begins, "We believe that the Bible, composed of both the Old and New Testaments, is the only, infallible inerrant, and authoritative word of God." Many statements of faith begin just this way, not realizing the error and danger of what they declare as a basic, fundamental statement of belief. Recently, here in Austin, a well-known Baptist minister, pastor of one of the largest, if not the largest Baptist churches in the city, declared to his congregation in his morning message that "the greatest heresy being perpetuated in Christian circles today is the heresy of the inerrancy of the Scriptures." He went on to explain that such a doctrine or theology limits or confines God to the pages of a very small book.

This doctrine of inerrancy, and infallibility is one of relatively recent date that develops in the Church to the West and completely disregards the Hebrew concept of inspiration. To the Hebrews, the word of God was indeed inspired but not confined to the pages of a scroll, or book. Why should the Christian be concerned about the Hebrew concept of inspiration? Because I believe it represents Jesus' concept, because He was a Jew, and not just any Jew, but a rabbi, learned in the Law.

Not long ago, when I appeared on Christian television and made the statement that Jesus was not just a Jew but a rabbi, learned in the Law, one individual wrote to me and asked: How can Christians believe the teachings of the rabbis? Most were backslidden and Jesus is constantly rebuking them. Since their teaching was largely from oral tradition and not found in the inspired Bible, why should we care about anything they had to say?

It is most unfortunate that this type of thinking is prevalent in Christian circles today. Actually, it is an expression of a subtle, often subconscious attitude on the part of many Christians that is quite serious and most dangerous. We might even go so far as to define it as "hellish." Itis a "hellish" ingrained anti-semitism that expresses itself in an unwillingness to accept Jesus as a Jew. The perverted logic is, "How could anyone so dear and precious to me, someone I love so much and to whom I have surrendered my life, be a Jew?"

I believe that this type of thinking expresses the conviction of many Christians today. It is usually buried deep within the subconscious mind, or repressed, and only manifests itself overtly when one's spiritual guard is down. It is the result of the spiritual ship of the Word of God being torn loose from the moorings of the historical foundations of biblical faith. Moorings that were secured firmly in the foundations of historic Judaism. As a result, the spiritual ship has for centuries been awash in a sea of pagan theology that has led to the gentilization, i.e., paganization, of the Church. We have forgotten that we were wild olive branches grafted into the natural olive tree. We have forgotten from whence it is that the branch receives the nourishing sap. We have forgotten that we no longer have pagan ancestors, but our ancestors are Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, and that we too passed through the sea with Moses. We have lost our affinity to things Jewish, and, if you will, to a Jewish Jesus.

The Church has failed to recognize for the last 1800 years that the movement to which Jesus gave birth was a Jewish one, totally within the historic Judaism of his day. Further, Jesus himself was a Jew, a rabbi, spoke Hebrew, used well-known rabbinic methods of teaching, and perhaps most importantly, drew largely on the Scriptures and oral traditions of his day in his teaching. It is often overlooked that much of whatJesus said was not new or original but was based on what the rabbis had said and were saying. Jesus was constantly refering back to the Scriptures and to the oral traditions of rabbis who had preceded him or who were his contemporaries. Unless this fact is clearly understood one will be greatly confused when an attempt is made to, understand the magnificent sayings of our Lord.
It is very difficult for us, almost 2,000 years removed from Jesus' day, to project ourselves back across the centuries of time to a culture and language so totally foreign to the western mind of today. And yet, before we can even begin to understand these magnificent and thrilling words of Jesus, that is exactly what we must do.

The first thing that one must realize is that Jesus was a Jew. This fact should be obvious; however, it is surprising how many Christians are shocked to learn that Jesus was a Jew. And not just any ordinary Jew. He was a rabbi, a teacher; one learned in the Scriptures and the religious literature of his day, which was considerable. The way in which the rabbis, and Jesus as well, viewed this material is nearly impossible to explain to those with no backgroundin the Hebrew language and culture or rabbinic literature and thought.

The rabbis of Jesus' day had a reverence for the inspired Word of God that transcends that of most Christians. However, they believed that God had communicated his Word in both oral and written form. The Oral Law they considered to be no less authoritative than the Written Law. The rabbis, and I believe we can also establish, Jesus himself, believed that the Oral Law was given to Moses at Sinai simultaneously with the Written Law. Not only did they beleve that the Written Law was inspired, they believed that men of God who came later to interpret or to enable us to better understand the Word of God were also directed by the Holy Spirit. They believed that God gave the Holy Spirit to the interpreters (those who gave, understanding to the Written Law) just as he did to the writer. The interpreter needed to be equally as inspired by God to understand the text as the writer was inspired to write. Unless the Holy Spirit directs the reader, he can not understand God's great written truths. This is a view of inspiration that is much more sophisticated and abstract than themore limited view often put forward in Christianity.

One rabbi would sometimes disagree with another rabbi In his interpretation of a particular passage. In the view of the rabbis, this did not mean that one interpretation was less valid than the other. Both were led in their interpretation by the Holy Spirit. In the same way in which a magnificent, many-faceted diamond can be viewed from many different angles, so God's Word possesses inexhaustible facets that can be viewed from nnumerable angles. In the New Testament we can find many examples, to illustrate our point. The Apostle Paul states that "a man is justified by faith apart from works of the law" (Romans 3:28). But James says that "a man is justified by works and not by faith alone" (James 2:24). Both Paul and James are interpreting the same °Scripture: "And he [Abraham] believed the Lord, and He reckoned it to him as righteousness" (Genesis 15:6). That this is indeed the passage upon which both are basing their interpretation is evident from Romans 4:3 and James 2:23, where Genesis 15:6 Is quoted.

Both authors are presenting, as it were, their oral law, or interpretation, of the written law. At first glance, these two interpretations--one, that man is justified by faith, and the other, that man is justified by works--seem to be contradictory. Actually, both interpretations are different facets of the same scriptural truth. As James says, "You see that faith was active along with his [Abraham's] works, and faith was completed by works" (James 2:22). Both are looking at the same diamond, but each from a different perspective, and each with a different point, to impress upon his readers. Again, the Jewish concept of inspiration is much more sophisticated than that in Christianity. In the Jewish view there can be any number of interpretations. In the more fundamental Christian view of inerrancy there can be only one view. Recently, a well-known, Christian Bible teacher stated on television that God so directed the writing of the New Testament that He even inspired the tense of the Greek verbs...the conjugation of every verb and the declension of every noun. Every word, every tense and mood was God-breathed. This type of perspective on inspiration is unfortunate and immature. Apparently, the teacher was not aware that we have over 4000 Greek manuscripts (approximately 480 complete) of the New Testament, and there, are no two, that are identical or agree on all points. Which of these 4000 is the inspired text, the God-breathed text? Furthermore, Mr. David Bivin and I established in our book, Understanding the Difficult Words of Jesus, that the original Gospel was not communicated in Greek, but rather in Hebrew. Most -Christians have never realized that the Greek text of the New Testament which is in use today by pastors, students, and scholars, and from which all modern English translations of the New Testament are made, is an eclectic, or composite text. That is, it is an artificial text which does not represent any known Greek manuscript. It is also important to understand that it is on the basis of this eclectic or artificial text that all arguments and/or discussions on inerrancy and infallibility are carried on.

What should be the obvious conclusion on the subject for the thoughtful and honest student of the Scriptures? That all such discussions are moot, given the nature of the New Testament text. Our modern critical editions* of the New Testament, such as Griesbach (1775-1806), Tischendorf (1869- 1872), Westcott and Hort (1881), Weiss (1894-1900), Nestle (1904 until its 26th edition in 1977), and the latest Bible Society edition, are each the creation of a scholar or group of scholars. Word by word, the evidence of the thousands of New Testament manuscripts is weighed. Finally, after all the evidence has been considered, a decision is taken on what should have been the original word at a given point in the text. Often there are several different words or variants among the thousands of ancient manuscripts, and scholars must decide at each word which of the variants must have been the original!

A committee of scholars, actually takes a vote for us on which of the variants is the most original. Our modern English translations are not the translation of any one of the ancient manuscripts. They are translations of one of the modern critical editions and created by this arbitrary and artificial method. Why is this artificial method necessary? Because there is not one manuscript which is considered to be the best. Scholars could have printed one of the many complete manuscripts and listed at the bottom of each page the variant readings found in all the other manuscripts. This is the procedure which has been followed for many, ancient works. Instead, what, scholars have done in the case of the New Testament text is to arbitrarily create a text that is not identical with any manuscript. It is a reconstructed text which hopefully accurately represents the original Greek text. But the original Greek text itself, the "autograph", has never, been found not even a single fragment. Our eclectic text is an attempt to reconstruct the autograph from ancient manuscripts, which are descendants of the original and removed from it by hundreds of years.

Everyone who loves the Bible and is a serious student of the word will ask the question, . "What does the knowledge that the Greek text of the New Testament is an eclectic text do to my belief in the integrity of the Scriptures? If our text is an artificial text of what can I be certain? Doesn't this undermine the validity of the sacred text and put all Scripture in question? In other words, what can I believe anymore?"

A proper understanding and a correct knowledge of the subject of textual transmission is not a disadvantage to the lover of the Bible and of truth, but an advantage. Today we have thousands of new manuscripts which were unknown just over one hundred years ago. These additional manuscripts, rather than being a hindrance, actually make it possible to more precisely determine the exact text of the original. These thousands of manuscripts, coupled together with the enormous strides that have been made In the science of textual criticism in the last fifty years now make it more possible to arrive at the original words written down by our inspired writers of the biblical text. Our knowledge and understanding of the text of the "autograph" is thousands of times greater than in the 18th and 19th centuries when New Testament scholars first began cataloguing and comparing the relatively few manuscripts then available.

What are the results of all this? A real transformation in the view of biblical scholars regarding the genuineness and authenticity of the Scriptures. In the 18th and 19th centuries, biblical scholars, especialy those of the German school, were very critical if not skeptical of the basic accuracy of the text. They viewed almost all of the text as legend or myth. The real miracle is that today, with the thousands of texts we have at our disposal to examine and compare, scholars presently working in the field are able, as never before, to better understand and more accurately reconstruct the original text.

Especially Is this true with regard to the Synoptic Gospels and the words of Jesus. The end result is that today scholars have a much greater regard for the basic historicity and fundamental accuracy of the biblical text than at any other time in history. Think of itover 4000 Greek texts alone to study and compare! This is truly a miracle of God when one considers that the greatest number of manuscripts available for any ancient classical text is usually not more than ten to twelve. Rather than being concerned and in despair, the serious and honest student of Scripture will rejoice over God's, marvelous preservation of His word and our increased ability to understand His word as never before in history, an ability which enables him to "rightly divide [interpret] the word of truth" (II Timothy 2:15)

For all practical purposes, in order for the Bible to be inerrant one must have an inerrant method for interpreting it. But the Scriptures themselves tell us that: "No prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by the impulse of man, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God" (II Peter 1:20). Because inspiration is the Holy Spirit working in and through men it is quite possible that several men will be illuminated each by a different facet of the same diamond. When someone says that there is only one way of interpreting a Scripture, what he really means, whether he realizes it or not, is that that one way is always his own way, his own interpretation or the interpretation perhaps of his denomination. This "one way" view of interpreting the Scriptures is fraught with danger. Why? Because its rigidity, inflexibility, arrogance, and presumptuousness leads to two very unbiblical and ungodly results:
1. The interpreter plays God by assuming that finite man can confine the magnificence of God's revelation of Himself to man to just one narrow limited interpretation.
2. Factionalism or divisiveness, which ultimately leads to denominationalism.
The Jewish view of interpretation is not only more biblical, but safer and healthier than the bigoted "one way" view. It is the more lenient and therefore the more preferred method of interpretation because it allows the interpreter, under the direction of the Holy Spirit, to view God's diamond in its multifaceted form.

Espousing the doctrine of inerrancy or infallibility places one in an indefensible position. If the Bible Is the Infallible Word of God, then one has to have it all, know it all, and there can be no contradictions. It must be perfect. Of course, this is exactly the position taken by those who hold to inerrancy, that the Bible is the "that which is perfect" of I Corinthians 13:10. Therefore, their reasoning continues, there is no longer any need for miracles, healings, or other manifestations of the Holy Spirit, no need for God to speak to man today. We already have in the perfect text all that is necessary for the believer. The doctrine of inerrancy is bibliolatry, a worship of the Bible or a worship of the text of the Bible. But, which text? Which of the thousands of Greek texts of the New Testament and hundreds of Hebrew texts of the Old Testament is the inerrant text? And then, we do not even possess all the known books. We do not have the Old Testament Book of Jashar mentioned in Joshua 10:13 and II Samuel 1:18, nor do we have two of the total of four books Paul wrote to the Corinthians, or his epistle written from Laodicea mentioned in Colossians 4:16. If for no other reason than this we cannot declare the Bible to be perfect. Added to this is the problem that no autograph, or original copy, of any book of the Bible has been preserved to this day. We have no complete manuscript of any book of the Bible any earlier than 200 to 300 years after its date of composition in the case of the New Testament books, and from 600 to more than 1000 years in the case of books of the Old Testament. Coupled with this is the fact that each and every text we do have, even the best of them, contains many scribal errors as well as other problems.

Of course, those espousing the "one way" method of interpretation respond that even though all that might be true, If we did possess the original or autograph text, it would be inerrant.

However, this position is simply a religious "cop-out" and again manifests a lack of understanding of the nature of biblical inspiration. In addition, its adherants must always be on the defensive. They must know it all and have answers for every textual problem.

The truth is we do not know it all nor do we have all the answers. The sooner one realizes that and admits it the closer he will be to understanding correctly the whole subject of inspiration. But, if the Bible is not the infallible Word of God, what is it? It is an inspired revelation of Him who is the Infallible Word. That is, the inspired document, i.e., one that did not arise from purely natural sources, is God's revelation of Himself to man. You see? This now allows the believer to be on the offensive. Our faith is not in a text or a document, but in a person. Maybe there are problems with the texts. Maybe we do not have all the answers. But there are no problems with God! He and He alone Is perfect. God's perfect revelation of Himself to mankind. We can now point the individual to God and challenge the individual to seek and find Him.

But, I want to emphasize that I am not saying that all Oral Law is on an equal par with the biblical text. The Oral Law is always changing from generation to generation, and as customs and circumstances change, so does the Oral Law. The Oral Law is not static. Unlike the Written Law, the Oral Law can change. Sometimes the decisions of earlier rabbis, are reversed by later rabbinical authorities to meet the needs of the changing times. But the written text is static. It can never change. Michael Wyschogrod, in Evangelicals and Jews In Conversation, published by Baker Book House, has pointed out.

After the weekly reading of the prophetic portion in the synagogue, the reader concludes with a blssing that prasies God "all of whose words are true and just" and "who is faithful to all of his words." In so doing, the reader expresses the conviction that the text he has just read is the Word of God. No such blessing is conceivable over a rabbinic text(Tanenbaum Wilson, and Rudin 1978:39).
Wyschogrod continues:
The biblical text is unique as the Word of God. The oral law elaborated ans interprests the scriptural text in such a way that in spite of all the importance Jusaism attachess to the oral law, it does not eclipse the primacy of the Bible as the Word of God (op. cit).

Through Jews view the Oral Law as highly important and authoritative coupled with and inseparable from the Written Law, they have never viewed it in quite the same way as they have the Written Law. The Oral Law is intepretation. It expands and elaborated the meaning of the Written Law.

The Oral Law in compendium of Jewish thought. It is a vast literature containing almost every opinion possible on almost any subject. Though much of rabbinic literature dating after the time of Jesus preserves and reflects traditions from Jesus' time and before, most of it was created after his time. A signigicant part of it was created in Babylon. And all of it was finally put in writing in a period when Christian polemic with, and persecution of Jews had already begun.

In spite of the above, we must not underestimate the importance which Jesus attached to the Oral Law (unwritten in his day) which was then in current circulation. There can be no doubt that Jesus considered the Oral Law to be authoritative. "Observe and practice what they [The Pharisees] say," he admonished his disciples (Matthew 23:3). "What they say" can mean only on thing-their (the Pharisees) interpretation of the Written Law, the Oral Law, since there was no question at all about the Written Law. It was accepted by all sects of Judaism. To quote Jesus:
Heaven and earth would sooner disappear than one yod [the smallest letter in the Hewbrew alphabet] or even one kotz ["thorn," a thorn-like projection used by scribes to decorate certain leters of the alphabet] from the Torah (Matthew 5:18). (See Understanding the Difficult Words of Jesus, page 155, where this passage is treated in more detail.)

*A critical edition of an ancient text is one in which most variant readings are noted, usually at the bottom of the page.