Sermon Video: How does the Gospel of Mark end? - Mark 16:9-20

Aside from a sentence about snakes and the drinking of poison, the 'Long Ending' of the Gospel of Mark has parallels in Matthew and Luke. That continuity turns the question of the authenticity of the surviving ending to Mark from one of theological significance to one of educated opinions. After briefly discussing the evidence for and against the originality of vs. 9-20, the sermon shifts to look at the text itself, noting the continuity it has with other passages of scripture.

One way to redefine Biblical morality: theorize the original text meant the opposite

In an article recently published in the New York Times, The Secret History of Leviticus by Idan Dershowitz, the author claims that the text of Leviticus that is known to history (the earliest manuscripts, the LXX and DSS, as well as the rabbinical commentaries) is not the original text of Leviticus and that this hypothetical original text in two very culturally significant instances, that of Leviticus 18:22 ("Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable") and 20:13 ("If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable.  They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.") the original text's intention was in fact the opposite.  In other words, Dershowitz is theorizing that Leviticus was changed (sometime before our earliest extant evidence of the text) from his theoretical text which permitted sex between men to the text that is known which prohibits it.

Two paragraphs from the essay by Dershowitz will uncover his viewpoint:

Like many ancient texts, Leviticus was created gradually over a long period and includes the words of more than one writer. Many scholars believe that the section in which Leviticus 18 appears was added by a comparatively late editor, perhaps one who worked more than a century after the oldest material in the book was composed. An earlier edition of Leviticus, then, may have been silent on the matter of sex between men.

But I think a stronger claim is warranted. As I argue in an article published in the latest issue of the journal Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel, there is good evidence that an earlier version of the laws in Leviticus 18 permitted sex between men. In addition to having the prohibition against same-sex relations added to it, the earlier text, I believe, was revised in an attempt to obscure any implication that same-sex relations had once been permissible.

In the first paragraph, Dershowitz makes it clear that he does not hold to any version of the inspiration of Scripture, but rather like many modern critics views it as a collection of the ideas of various men that changed (in this case dramatically) over time.  That this theory is anti-supernatural goes without saying, but his utilization of redaction criticism (theorizing various stages of edits in the text, in this case without any manuscript evidence to support the claims) is built wholly upon what he believes an earlier text might have said.  In his essay (and the journal article it is based upon), Dershowitz does offer up some grammatical "evidence" to support his theory, but this falls far short of being convincing evidence that the text of the Bible used to mean the opposite of that which our earliest extant copies claim.  {For a more detailed refutation of the thesis of Dershowitz read the following article by Dr. Albert Mohler, the President of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary: Leviticus in the New York Times: What's the real story here? }

In the end, the reason why I comment upon this opinion piece from the NYT is not to start a new round of debate about human sexuality, homosexuality, or any other related topic (so please don't respond by arguing about it), nor is it to bash the NYT for publishing the article (so don't waste your time venting at the messenger), instead my sole purpose is to bring attention to the ongoing  and far too prevalent practice of twisting the Word of God into a pretzel by both scholars and laymen in order to get it to say what the person doing the twisting wants it to say.  Such twisting happens with good intentions and bad intentions, by those trying to defend God and those looking to jettison belief in him.  Motives and intentions do matter, but it is unethical and dangerous when the Scriptures are treated as a means to an end, just another tool to advance a viewpoint.

We can, and should, have discussions (informed by scholarship and research) about the history of the text of Scripture, that is indeed a topic that interests me greatly.  We can, and will, disagree upon how to interpret and apply the text of Scripture once we've reached a consensus about what it said in its original Hebrew and Greek and thus how it ought to be translated into English, those discussions interest me a great deal as well.  But we cannot, in any meaningful way, utilize the Word of God as anything beyond a historical curiosity if those who disagree with the text that has been historically established, decide that they will simply rewrite the text to their liking out of whole cloth.

Let those who do not view the Bible as the Word of God say what they will about it, let them twist it and warp it into anything they like, for to them it has no authority, no power.  It is unrealistic of those who belief in the Scriptures, to expect those who do not, to treat it with the respect that it deserves.  The Church, however, must reject this path of tailoring the text to suit our own opinions, in all its forms, the Church must affirm and reaffirm its commitment to the Bible as the divinely inspired Word of God, as the foundation for both our salvation from our own sins, and our moral guide in this world.  A method used to redefine the text of Scripture today pertaining to one topic, will be used to redefine it another day for a different topic.  If you build your house upon the sand, don't expect it to stay standing when the rains comes.

Why the history of the Bible should matter to you.

In two weeks I will finish teaching my seminar on the history of the Bible for the sixth time in the past three years.  I am thankful for each chance that I have had to share the history of how the modern English Bible came to be, from its original Greek and Hebrew autographs to our text today.  An article on today's local newspaper (a syndicated column in the religion page) illustrated to me once again the need for an accurate understanding of the Bible based in historical fact not fantasy.  The two columnists were asked to answer the question, "Why are there so many arguments about what's in the Bible?"  An excellent question, unfortunately this particular question was put to two men who don't actually believe in the Bible, a dubious start to an answer.  The first of the two is an Elder in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints; a Mormon.  Mormons believe that the canon of scripture remains open, that new revelation continues to occur.  The Elder, after referencing "errors" in the modern text, offers up the solution of instead consulting the new revelation of the Book of Mormon (among other new texts).  In the end, a non-Christian Mormon perspective advocates for turning away from the Bible instead of answering the question at hand; not overly helpful.
The second columnist is a pastor of a congregation, but in his attack on the Biblical text, which I will quote shortly, he makes error after error of outright historical falsehoods, all while positing that the Biblical text today is more/less worthless for anything other than being a "moral compass".  The pastor, whose name I will omit so as to not make this personal, claimed that the Bible "has been tweaked, touched up, added to and deleted from to fit the viewpoints of the ruling class as well as serve the personal interest of religious authorities."  There's just one problem with this oft-repeated conspiracy theory, it has no basis in history.  Manuscripts of the Bible have been uncovered, lost in the Egyptian desert since the 2nd and 3rd century, that confirm the accuracy of the hand copied manuscripts (in their thousands, over 5,000 total copies have survived) that supposedly went through this revision.  Why have there been zero new readings found in the recently uncovered manuscripts, does he really believe that the Church changed these copies as well?  And how would they have done so, when there were copies of the text being made all over the Mediterranean world by countless copyists?  Historical fantasy of conspiracies does not make them real.
The line that really made me understand that this particular pastor's education has been sorely lacking in the history of the Bible was this, "It is important to remember, when we read the Bible today we are reading a translation of a translation of a translation in a language that didn't exist when the original Bible was written."  He is absolutely right that English didn't exist when the Bible was written in Greek and Hebrew.  The rest of the sentence is so laughably inaccurate as to be akin to claiming the moon landing was faked.  The modern English Bible (and the not-so-modern KJV as well) is a direct translation from the original Greek and Hebrew with no intermediary languages involved.  The KJV is based upon Erasmus' 16th century printed Greek text, the modern translations (NIV, NASB, ESV, etc.) are all based upon the Nestle-Aland and United Bible Society eclectic text which takes into consideration all of the over 5,000 surviving Greek manuscripts to determine the most accurate original reading.  If you don't understand a simple fact such as how the Bible was translated from its original languages into English, how can I take seriously anything else you say?  The line following that whopper was this, "Scholars agree there are more than 20,000 inconsistencies in the Bible as the result of different people with different viewpoints."  Another ludicrous figure pulled out of a hat to fit the pre-supposition that the Bible is a product of men not God.
When I looked up the columnist's church on the internet, I was not surprised to find that it is a Universalist Church built upon "Spiritual Principles"; Jesus is nowhere to be found on their website, evidently not a part of the equation.
Why does it matter that pastors and the laity know the history of the Bible?  If the faith of the Apostles, and the actual teaching of Christ matter to you, then so does the history of the Word of God.  The world has plenty of people willing to reject the Bible and search for answers elsewhere, we have nothing to fear from the truth, the history of the Bible is plain and clear for all to see, only ignorance.

An evaluation of the TR (and/or KJV) Only position's presuppositions

The presuppositions of the TR Only position, which for the most part match up with those of the KJV Only position seem to be as follows: (1) That the Bible’s passages on the preservation of Scripture require a “perfect” Bible, anything less makes God a liar and is thus a perversion of Scripture. (2) That the definition of “perfect” envisioned by this viewpoint can allow for no textual criticism, no revisions, no corrections of the text.  {Some of the KJV Only would add “no variants” to this list}(3) That other than the original autographs, this “perfect” example of Scripture exists only in the TR (or KJV). 

Let us for a moment assume each proposition to be true and see what the results would be. (1) If the passages of Scripture about preservation require a “perfect” Bible, they do not in any way indicate which text that would be.  Since it must be available in every generation, it must have first existed in the Hebrew manuscripts (aside from the Dead Sea Scrolls, all of which were lost prior to the Middle Ages), then in the Greek manuscripts, although it could only be in one text type, but without the original autographs there is no basis for choosing one and only one text type as the “perfect” text when the only thing we have to compare them to is each other. (2) If no textual criticism is to be allowed, and how can it be when the text is “perfect”, there is no ability to answer the clear evidence of a text which changed over time, with additions and corrections, throughout its history (NT in particular given the wealth of manuscripts we have of it).  If the text was already “perfect” and needed to remain “perfect” each and every generation, it could not change, at all, not even a single word.  Yet that is not the history of the manuscripts.  By comparing one generation of them to another, in any text type, this becomes clear, copyists made mistakes, both intentional and accidental that became accepted (for at least a time, by an unsuspecting Church).  But if God’s power and veracity stands or falls based upon an unchanging text, the only possible explanation is to ignore history and evidence and claim that the text must be taken on faith no matter what (that’s Sam Gipp’s stated position, any fault in the KJV, even typographical mistakes of the printer, are to be ignored and the result taken on faith). (3)  Who is the authority, Scripture is certainly silent about which future text will be the “perfect” one and which will be the corrupted ones, that determines that the TR, and only the TR (and hence the KJV) are to be deemed perfect over and against the Byzantine text, the Alexandrian, the Majority (which will always represent the Byzantine as the number of those manuscripts is such a clear majority), or the Eclectic blending of all sources?  Who designated Erasmus as the final authority on the preservation of Scripture, who sanctified his work and declared it without error?  Keep in mind, that Erasmus himself made significant changes to his printed editions with each new one, as did Stephanus and Beza after him.

In the end, I see no compelling reason to belief that we MUST believe any of those suppositions, if a TR Only (or KJV Only) advocate wishes to tweak them somewhat, fine, but the primary issues remain.  The Scriptures do promise preservation, but are silent as to how that will occur and by what agency, The text tradition does include many variants, all of them do, there are no perfect manuscript traditions, even within Erasmus’ exceedingly limited number of manuscripts representing one text tradition, there were variants that he had to sort out by doing textual criticism.  Lastly, the only way that the TR, and only the TR, can be elevated to such a status is an appeal to tradition or authority, both of which were supposed to be rejected by the Reformers, to resurrect them now would be a disservice to the ideals of men like Tyndale, Luther, and Calvin.

If you need a good laugh, watch Sam Gipp's, "What the big deal about the KJV?" video

I needed a macabre laugh today so I re-watched "Dr." Sam Gipp's "What's the Big Deal about the KJV?" video.  From the very first scene, this 40 minute video is one ridiculous example after another of the worst KJV Onlyism set in a fake college setting where "professor" Gipp enlightens his students about the "perfect" Word of God.  Straw Men abound, as per usual, as well as illogical argument like this: The KJV is from Antioch through the TR (not actually true, the 6 manuscripts Erasmus had were medieval Byzantine copies, but let that go for a minute), the Eclectic Critical text ("you should know that there's a problem right there when they say their text is critical", as if the term Biblical Criticism was somehow an evil practice, forget that Erasmus, the father of the TR engaged in Biblical Criticism, as did the translation team utilizing Tyndale, the Bishop's Bible, and Erasmus to put together the KJV and every other copyists or translator) is from Alexandria (Of course this too isn't true, the Modern Critical text utilizes all of the manuscripts Western, Alexandrian, and Byzantine, far more of them {5,500+ vs. 6} than the TR, plus Church Fathers, and other early translations).  Gipp then explains that Antioch is where the followers of Jesus were first called Christians, that must mean it is a holy place of all goodness and its manuscripts are perfect (forget that heresies also came from Antioch, such as Monothelitism and Nestorianism), and Egypt is always called a bad place in the Bible (forget for a moment, "Out of Egypt I called my son"), thus Alexandria is written off as a place full of heretics whose manuscripts must therefore be 100% corrupt.  FYI, Guilt by Association, even weak association, is a favorite KJV Only tactic.  (Such as labeling anything they don't like "Catholic" as if that somehow ruins and taints whatever person or manuscript they need to discredit).

Everything goes downhill from there, including a hilarious scene where Gipp has a Bible study group read Psalm 23 in half a dozen different translations to show them the "confusion" that results, as if unison reading not lining up somehow proves anything.  Another favorite "proof" of Gipp is that the Modern Critical Text omits verses from the Bible, thus throwing off the numbering system of the 16th century (What, those guys can't even count, he says).  Don't stop and wonder why those verses are in the margins in the modern text, don't ask why scholars know for certain that they were added later, just go along as Gipp tells you that they're taking things out of the Bible because he has already set up the KJV as the only standard, therefore any "change" in the text from the KJV is what counts, and don't worry about what the original Greek text says regarding the "changes" he points out, he doesn't say so in this particular video but he's said elsewhere that he wouldn't care if original autographs were found, he already has a perfect KJV.

The proof text of any KJV Only fanatic is I John 5:7, a verse that has zero manuscript evidence in Greek before the 16th century, which by the way Gipp accuses the Alexandrians of removing from the Bible because they hate the Trinity (something they couldn't have done, of course because it didn't appear until later Latin copies of the Vulgate), sad for him that none of the Byzantine manuscripts have it either, and that none of the Church Fathers quote the verse despite their blood feud with the Arians.  Thus in this one instance, Gipp is accusing other Christians of denying the Trinity by relying upon an verse addition that comes from the Latin Vulgate, the Bible of the Catholic Church (which Gipp and those like him hate with white hot fury).  Forget for a moment that the trinity is found elsewhere in the NT (in the modern texts as well), forget for a moment the horror if such an important verse could be expunged from the manuscript tradition for 1,600 years, all of this isn't supposed to matter as you feel anger toward those who deny the trinity by changing God's perfectly preserved Bible, the KJV.

In the end, "Dr." Sam Gipp, along with Peter Ruckman, Gail Riplinger, and those who follow in their wake, have faith in a perfect Bible, the same blind faith of the world's Muslims who also allow no variants in their text, and treat any questions as those of heretics, and they have a skeptics doubts about the Early Church, the manuscript copying process, and the preservation of the original text, just like that of Dr. Bart Ehrman who has no faith because the text isn't "perfect".

Keep making your propaganda movies, they're good for a laugh, at least they would be if you weren't trying to destroy Christian fellowship, the reputations of devout men of God whose work as scholars has only increased our knowledge of the real reason why our Bible can be trusted, and making things up as you go to fit a conclusion that you reached long before you started making up your conspiracy theory.  While you're at it, say hi to Dan Brown, he enjoys a good conspiracy theory.

The unexpected agreement between Dr. Bart Ehrman's skepticism and the KJV Only fanatics

"When you subjugate it to the human laboratory for testing and twisting and probing, it takes on a different nature.  If it isn't preserved perfectly, then it lacks in authority, something less than full authority."  This is a quote about the Bible from Kent Brandenburg, and it has something that he might not be happy to hear about in common with the leading agnostic critic of Biblical accuracy alive today, Bart Ehrman.  Bart is a well known critic, with best selling books like Misquoting Jesus and How Jesus Became God to his name.  One of the most crucial conclusions that Dr. Ehrman makes in his rejection of the Bible that we have today is that it isn't the same as the original as penned by the Apostles.  If we don't have the original, God must not have preserved it, if God didn't perfectly preserve it, he must not have given it in the first place.  If the modern Bible isn't a perfect copy of the original autographs, if it has any errors (despite its historically unheard of 97% accuracy), it is no longer the Word of God.  KJV Only fanatics take this same view of the preservation of Scripture.  Their answer to Bart's dilemma is to posit a new revelation from God that occurred in 1611 (don't mention to them the typographical/spelling/printing mistakes of that edition, it won't be welcome).  The King James Bible to them is a perfectly preserved English version of what the Apostles wrote, so much so that many of them have dismissed the relevance of an original autograph should one be found in some cave like the Dead Sea Scrolls, and so much so that some of them (Sam Gipp for example) contend that the only way to hear the Word of God today is for the people of the world to learn English to read the KJV (Don't point out the obvious racist white superiority behind this line of thinking, just because God treats all men equally doesn't mean they have to).  How do we know that the KJV is a perfect edition in every way, especially since in their view that's the only way it will be God's Word?  You'll have to take that on faith.
  Dr. Ehrman yearns for a perfect Bible, doesn't have one, and has lost his faith, the KJV Only crowd yearn for a perfect Bible, so they've pretended they have one.
The sad thing is, we have an amazing Biblical text today.  All of the original readings have been preserved within the manuscript tradition, none of what the Apostles wrote has been lost.  The Bible is more readily available and accessible than ever before all over the world in hundreds of languages with new ones being translated every year.  The Word of God has never been closer to ordinary people, too bad the skeptics and the fanatics can't see it.

* Note * Kent Brandenburg should not be identified with the KJV Only crowd of Ruckman/Gipp/Riplinger (which he rightly dismisses as an untenable position), both groups believe in "perfect preservation", the first as found in the KJV, Kent's group as found in the Textus Receptus (TR definition).  To prefer the TR is a defensible position, just as it is defensible to prefer the KJV, the TR was the Greek text basis for Tyndale, the Bishop's Bible, the KJV, the Geneva Bible, Luther's German NT, and the New King James, but to be TR ONLY is almost as erroneous as the KJV Only position in that it posits a perfect moment in Church history when the text of God's Word needs to be frozen, when all scholarship and textual criticism needs to cease.  The problem with that, is that there is no one TR (it isn't a manuscript, but a published collation of a few late Byzantine texts that were available to Erasmus), there are many published additions of Erasmus/Stephanus/Beza that were the result of their efforts at textual criticism, so why must these men be the only authorities that can offer God's people his Word?  The TR is a good text, but the Majority text is better, and the Critical Eclectic text is better still.  Christians in the 16th century like Erasmus did a great job considering the manuscripts they had available to them at the time, but we have no need to limit ourselves to what they knew then.  God has indeed preserved his Word, in EACH generation, that effort continues to this day through the work of Godly men who continue the work of their ancestors in the faith. 

The purposeful exaggeration of Bart Ehrman on Textual Variants

I'm in the process of reading Darrell Bock and Daniel Wallace's excellent book, Dethroning Jesus: Exposing Popular Culture's Quest to Unseat the Biblical Christ, and their first chapter confirms something I've noticed (not uniquely) about the writings and interviews of Biblical scholar, skeptic, and former evangelical, Bart Ehrman who is most famous for his book, Misquoting Jesus.  Dr. Ehrman routinely lists facts about the text of the N.T. that are not disputed by believing Biblical scholars, in fact most of what he says is very educational and helpful, but then he ends his recitation of the facts with a conclusion that is hardly necessary and in fact a rather significant amount of hyperbole.  For example, when listing off the most important textual variants that affect our ability to know the original text, Ehrman begins with Mark 16:9-20 and John 7:53-8:11 (the longer ending of Mark and the woman caught in adultery), as if these two texts are somehow not already well known for having been late additions to the text.  Those two additions, thirteen and twelve verses, are by far the most significant "changes" to the text, but neither passage has anything to do with Christian Orthodoxy, neither proclaims an exclusive doctrine, and concluding that both are not original doesn't hurt the Christian faith one bit.  How are these examples of significant changes that will destroy our faith?  The other passages listed by Ehrman in Misquoting Jesus (p. 208) as being a danger to the accepted Biblical text are: Mark 1:41, Hebrews 2:8-9, John 1:18, I John 5:7-8, and Matthew 24:36.  In Dethroning Jesus, Bock and Wallace look at each reference in turn, only to uncover that whether or not Jesus is "angry" in Mark 1:41 is not going to shake the foundations of the Church, nor will it harm us to have to see the Trinity in the totality of the N.T. instead of relying upon the late addition of I John 5:7-8, something that Erasmus knew was inauthentic over 500 years ago.  In the end, Ehrman is much sound and fury, eloquently stated with passion to be sure, but rest assured, his earth shattering revelations are far from it.