310
He prefaces His pronouncements
with “I tell you,” and uses this
phrase nearly 140 times throughout
the Bible. Paul indicates that he
sees Jesus’s teachings as the
Word of God when he introduces
a combined quote of Deuteronomy
and Jesus with the words,
“Scripture says ...” Interestingly,
this expanded understanding
of the divinity of scripture also
encompasses the writings of Paul
himself. Peter says that Paul writes
with God-given wisdom and warns
that false teachers will attempt to
distort Paul’s writings, “as they do
the other Scriptures” (2 Peter 3:16).Dual authorship
The Bible’s words on its divine
origin stand alongside clear
acknowledgment of its human
authorship. Jesus attributes the
Pentateuch of the Old Testament
to Moses. The Psalms are
attributed to King David, while
David’s son, Solomon, is identified
as the author of many of theTHE BIBLE AS GOD’S WORD
The Bible in its entirety has been
translated into 363 languages, and
the New Testament into 1,442. These
pilgrims in Lalibela, Ethiopia, hear the
word of God in their native Amharic.proverbs. The prophetic books of
the Old Testament (from Isaiah
to Malachi) identify human authors,
as do each of the New Testament
epistles, except for the mysterious
Epistle to the Hebrews.
The human authors of the Bible
each display vast differences in
background, language, and style,
as well as geographical, cultural,
and historical location. They wrote
in ancient Hebrew, Aramaic, and
the common Greek spoken in the
first century ce. Some authors
were highly educated (for example,
Moses, Isaiah, and Paul), while
others were farmers and fishermen
(Amos and Peter), producing a wide
variety of literary genres ranging
from narratives and histories to
genealogical records. Other biblical
writings take the form of poetry,
proverb, and apocalyptic vision.
The concept of dual authorship
addresses the question of how to
reconcile the interaction between
divine and human in the scriptures.
The Bible depicts authors as
recording messages that they hadApocrypha
The apocryphal books are
an additional set of writings
associated with the Old
Testament. Mostly written
in Greek, all were completed
between 300–100 bce, and
came into use by Christians
due to their inclusion in some
Greek translations of the Old
Testament (the Septuagint).
While many early Christian
bishops did not accept the
apocryphal books, recognition
of them grew among Roman
Catholic bishops in the late
Middle Ages. They were
formally adopted as scripture
by the Council of Trent in- Of the 18 apocryphal
texts, Roman Catholics accept
seven as scripture, plus the
expanded versions of the
books of Daniel and Esther.
They can be found in the
Old Testament of the Roman
Catholic Bible.
Prophets, though human,
spoke from God as they
were carried along
by the Holy Spirit.
2 Peter 1:21US_308-311_The_Bible_as_Gods_word.indd 310 27/09/17 10:18 am
ACTS, EPISTLES, AND REVELATION 311
The theory of Verbal
Plenary Inspiration
maintains that every word
of the Bible has been
directly “God-breathed”
and preserved by God
(2 Timothy 3:16).Neo-orthodoxy teaches
that the Bible was
written by fallible humans
and only becomes the word
of God when He reveals
Himself through it.The theory of Limited
Inspiration argues God
guided the authors of the
Bible but did not preserve
them from making errors.God’s role in producing the scriptures
is interpreted in three major ways.England has two
books; the Bible and
Shakespeare. England
made Shakespeare, but
the Bible made England.
Victor Hugobeen given by God; describing
visions; explaining and applying
already-written scripture; and even
conducting investigations before
making a written account of the
findings (Luke 1:3). For the most
part, the Bible describes no fixed
process by which the authors were
“moved by God,” but Peter teaches
that the writing process was
superintended by God, so what
they wrote was God’s word.Divine authority
The belief that the scriptures were
God’s own words carried several
significant implications in the
minds of biblical figures. One
was the total trust of, and belief
in, scripture. The truthfulness of
God’s word therefore became
a proverb: “Every word of God
is flawless” (Proverbs 30:5).
Divine authorship implies divine
authority. To disregard the message
of the prophets was to disbelieve
or disobey God. Even the writings
of the Apostles were to be treated
as God’s commandments. When
tempted by Satan, Jesus quoted
scripture to rebut him. Jesus also
appealed to scripture to answerthe challenges of the religious
leaders of His day. This pattern
of appeal to, and explanation of,
Old Testament scripture was
followed by the authors of the
New Testament. Old Testament
quotations or allusions are present
in 26 of the 27 books of the New
Testament—absent only in the
Book of Philemon—making up
about a third of its content.
For Paul, the divine authorship
of the Bible is closely linked to its
transformative power. The Apostle
reminds Timothy that the “God-
breathed” nature of the Bible makes
it a fit instrument for addressing
issues of faith and behavior,
writing that the scriptures “make
you wise for salvation through
faith” (2 Timothy 3:15). Paul teaches
that the faith that unites people to
Christ comes by hearing the word
of God. Delivering “what the Lord
says,” the prophet Isaiah wrote,
“My word that goes out from my
mouth, will not return to me empty,
but will ... achieve the purpose
for which I sent it” (Isaiah 55:11).
The concept of the divinity
of scripture has also influenced
which writings are included in theBible by different Christian groups.
Jews believed that divine prophecy,
the basis for the scriptures, had
ceased by 400 bce, and Jesus
Himself only acknowledged “the
Law and the Prophets” of the
Hebrew Old Testament as Israel’s
scripture. In spite of this, some
Christians, such as those in the
Eastern Orthodox Church, accept
the so-called “apocryphal books,”
written centuries later—including
Ecclesiasticus (also known as
Sirach), 1 and 2 Maccabees, and
Judith—as scripture. ■US_308-311_The_Bible_as_Gods_word.indd 311 24/10/2017 15:36