tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20213892.post2378143638113421129..comments2023-12-22T08:29:29.230-08:00Comments on WHAT IS TRUTH: Big Talk with Little to Show at Evangelical Textual CriticismKent Brandenburghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13419354741455959191noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20213892.post-39172599433391160842009-05-06T06:10:00.000-07:002009-05-06T06:10:00.000-07:00Titus, I get a big laugh, a real one, not a virtua...<I>Titus, I get a big laugh, a real one, not a virtual one, every time you call me Dr. Brandenburger.</I>I don't get it. That's you're name, right? Dr. Brandenburger? Dr. Ken Brandenburger?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20213892.post-17087993245977726092009-05-05T17:37:00.000-07:002009-05-05T17:37:00.000-07:00By the way, I was thinking a little about a few of...By the way, I was thinking a little about a few of the guys over at Evangelical Textual Criticism and how that this view, the one I am espousing, the one that all Christians took before enlightenment, seemed so foreign. These textual critics are unaware of the historic position on preservation. It is not at all a basis for how they come to what God's Words are, and yet men are to trust them.Kent Brandenburghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13419354741455959191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20213892.post-25640767587950971972009-05-05T12:07:00.000-07:002009-05-05T12:07:00.000-07:00Amazing comments from Paul and Titus. Very good. ...Amazing comments from Paul and Titus. Very good. We've got some excellent contributors here, especially on this issue.<br /><br />Titus, I get a big laugh, a real one, not a virtual one, every time you call me Dr. Brandenburger.Kent Brandenburghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13419354741455959191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20213892.post-60619323221774283232009-05-05T11:44:00.000-07:002009-05-05T11:44:00.000-07:00I wonder why Ryan is so enamoured with "empiricism...I wonder why Ryan is so enamoured with "empiricism" when that method of epistemology is so limited?<br /><br />To put it into the context of NT textual criticism, why does he think "empiricism" answers our questions when "empiricism" is obviously limited to the scope of what mss. we have available? <br /><br />Before he, or other "textual criticism fans" jump on this and accuse KJVers of making empirically unsubstantiated claims, I would point out that so do critical texters. There is no way - none whatsoever - that any of the claims about textual reconstruction on the part of the CTers can ever be evidentially validated. Not when most of the evidence has been destroyed or has degraded to dust. When a CTer makes a statement about "such and such verse really doesn't belong" or "such and such verse should read this way," they are making a fideistic statement, since there is no way they can ever positively verify (or even test) their statement, not with the extremely limited data set they are operating from.<br /><br />What's doubly ironic is the way CTers tend to, well, <I>ignore</I> evidences that don't <I>their</I> fideism. Take the case of I John 5:7-8, the Johannine Comma. Standard line is - those dumb ol' KJVers really don't know what they're talking about, since all of us smart people <B>know</B> that it was introduced into the text in the 5th-6th centuries. <br /><br />Nevermind that Augustine alludes to the verse in the late 4th. Nevermind that Cyprian quotes it ~250 AD. Nevermind that Tertullian cites it ~200 AD. <br /><br />But see, the typical standard rebuttal to these is, "Well, they didn't <I>really</I> cite it." How do they know this, especially when an actually reading of these writers says they did? Because admitting this evidence would take their apple cart and turn it completely over, and dump it into the river. Ergo, none of this evidence really "counts." And if you think it does, then you're just an idiot who obviously didn't go to the right seminary.<br /><br />You know, the type of seminary that teaches you to ignore evidences uncomfortable to the CT position. <br /><br />But see, it all comes back to this empiricism Ryan seems to love so much. Not only is it limited in scope and ability, but for many CTers, it is also quite dispensable, when it leads to the "wrong" conclusions. <br /><br />I.e. - just the sort of fideism that they decry Pastor Brandenburger for showing. <br /><br />I think fideism is necessary, I just choose my fideism (as does Dr. Brandenburger) on the basis of the Bible, not on the lesser and imperfect authority of Daniel Wallace and Co.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20213892.post-17010641861723668362009-05-05T10:59:00.000-07:002009-05-05T10:59:00.000-07:00Well then, just to be clear on this, I'm neither t...Well then, just to be clear on this, I'm neither the baseball player, the real estate salesman, nor the British boxer.Mike Aubreyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04335768638306462369noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20213892.post-2438522361224291852009-05-05T07:49:00.000-07:002009-05-05T07:49:00.000-07:00Dan Wallace’s conclusions are wrong on both exeget...Dan Wallace’s conclusions are wrong on both exegetical and historical grounds. The truth is that every believer, using either Biblical or philosophical presuppositions, is led to some conclusion as to the content of the original autographs. The Scriptures do not simply promise the preservation of God’s “truth” or “message” but the Words. The church has historically held fast to these promises concerning the Words of God; not only in respect of divine inspiration, but also in regard to perfect providential preservation throughout the ages. However, since the Enlightenment, Protestantism has granted science increasingly independent authority and has surrendered the Bible’s authority whenever any supposed conflict arose between the two. The Enlightenment brought the age of the “sovereignty of reason” which attempted to verify everything in Scripture by modern critical methods of historical research. Just as in the case of creationism, until the eighteenth century the Church held to the historic doctrine of the perfect inspiration and preservation of the Words of God in all ages.<br /> <br />The zeitgeist of our contemporary apostate age now demands a “new and improved” version of everything including the Scriptures. Our places of worship have dropped the name “church,” reduced worship to entertainment, and promoted effeminate “preacher gurus” in Hawaii shirts to share the latest psychological fad. We have also now a marked subservience to scientism as the dominant cultural standard. Did the church make such a gross error in over 500 years of interpretation? What has primarily changed since the Reformation is the way man defines and uses science. Modern scientific opinion has been elevated to the status of general revelation giving it an absolute a priori veto over how we interpret Scripture. So much for singing, ‘Immortal, invisible, God only wise!’ Textual criticism is built on the intolerant foundation of prejudice against the promises of Scripture. Its motive is driven by the axiom that modern man always seeks out a way of removing His Creator from the source of truth, as autonomous man aspires to fill the vacancy.<br /> <br />Dan Wallace’s facile position is not the historic position of believers and the Reformation and his objections are mere hand-waving. Critical Text (CT) advocates, such as Wallace, have no ultimate and certain standard for determining objective truth. Without the Biblical doctrine of perfect providential preservation, we are left with non-answers in these areas. This is not a minor shift but one of seismic proportions. Fortunately, most CT advocates of the past were better believers than theologians and have been able to live with the inherent contradiction of their system by simply declaring the gospel from the Textus Receptus (TR). They were incapable of following their own premises out to the end of the road they were on. This has now been challenged by the belligerent approach of the new breed of CT adherents, the proliferation of translations, and the ever mutating latest edition of the evolutionary Greek Text.<br /> <br />The CT text position is a fallacy as it claims to reach conclusions that conform to the Bible, which are not derived from the Bible. It is true that some CT advocates talk about “preservation” but only by investing in their exegesis of preservation passages such as Matthew 5:18 entirely new meanings. In effect, they act like Humpty-Dumpty who retorted scornfully to Alice’s ignorance of his meaning, “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less .” Their position is not some imaginative or honest attempt to follow the truth where it leads, but radical interpretations of biblical texts based on Enlightenment premises. However, the preservation promises are clear to those that are willing to accept their conclusions. These fundamentalist and evangelical “scholars” need correcting for when theologically educated men make absurd statements they are no less absurd than when the lay person make them. We reject their arguments because they are fundamentally illogical, and believers should not utilise unsound arguments nor appeal to unbelievers to place their confidence in them. The objections to the doctrine of perfect preservation are rooted in philosophical pre-commitments and not exegetical concerns. True fundamentalists, especially those of the Reformed faith, will not surrender our historic faith for the gods of Enlightenment thinking just to be seen as acceptable by “progressive Evangelicals.” Like Ezra we will prepare our hearts “to seek the law of the LORD, and to do it” (Ezra 7:10) whatever the cost.<br /> <br />It is axiomatic to even the most ardent critic of the KJV that the recovery of the “autograph text” is outside the possibility of recovery simply by a neutral Textual scientific methodology. Even the leading exponents of textual criticism candidly concede this. By eliminating God’s work of preservation, they have left the church disarmed, vulnerable and in total confusion. They are like those of old of whom God says in the last verse of the book of Judges “In those days there was no king in Israel: every man did that which was right in his own eyes” (Judg 21:25). These multi-versionists have no final authority, save for their own reasoning or outsourcing to a scholar to tell them what God probably said. They are attempting to compartmentalize their faith and their scholarship into separate worlds. However, since no one is viewpoint neutral and everyone has presuppositions, why do the CT advocates want to exclude Biblical presuppositions on the issue of the text?PS Fergusonnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20213892.post-86680224475894120152009-05-04T21:50:00.000-07:002009-05-04T21:50:00.000-07:00Uh-oh Mike. Now you'll be googled. :-) And seen...Uh-oh Mike. Now you'll be googled. :-) And seen on on this non-convention panel discussion.<br /><br />You're OK, Mike.<br /><br />I'll probably write one more in the epistemology series.Kent Brandenburghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13419354741455959191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20213892.post-82179883057569753682009-05-04T20:26:00.000-07:002009-05-04T20:26:00.000-07:00Cat's out of the bag! Its true. I do disagree with...Cat's out of the bag! Its true. I do disagree with you, and thus, also think you're wrong.<br /><br />But we already knew that, didn't we?<br /><br />either way, I am still listening and reading what you write though with plenty of interest.<br /><br />As for the last name, that's a whole different story. I wasn't trying to hide anything. I mean, you could have found it on my own blog had you gone to my about page. Its right there. Its more out of habit than anything else. My google/blogger account has been set up to just display "mike" for a couple years now. The ability to type in my name and website url only appeared recently and I didn't want to appear as someone else all of the sudden. Besides, its significantly less typing to just click on the "blogger" option. At ETC, they knew me first as Mike Aubrey and here I was known first as Mike. Its an accident of history, nothing more.<br /><br />Anyway, keep writing. I'll keep reading. I think I'm beginning to understand your view. It comes down to the WC, essentially, yes?<br /><br />I'm still struggling to understand how you fill in the gap of the syllogism I wrote in a previous comment, but I expect an answer will come eventually (or perhaps the syllogism, itself is wrong and I don't know it?). <br /><br />And there's my full name below.Mike Aubreyhttp://evepheso.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.com