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1. The Integrity of
The Word
God’s Word Stands Against All
Attacks
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2. Questions
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3. Questions
 Where does the Bible come
from?
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4. Questions
 Where does the Bible come
from?
 How did we get the books that
make up the Bible?
2

5. Questions
 Where does the Bible come
from?
 How did we get the books that
make up the Bible?
 Have there been challenges to
the make-up of the Bible?
2

6. The Origin of The Bible?
“The Bible did not arrive by fax from heaven…
The Bible is the product of man, my dear.
Not of God. The Bible did not fall magically
from the clouds. Man created it as a
historical record of tumultuous times, and it
has evolved through countless translations,
additions, and revisions. History has never
had a definitive version of the book…”
--Dan Brown in The Da Vinci Code
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7. The Origin of The Bible?
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8. The New Testament Canon
 The New Testament is mostly a bunch of
letters written to churches around the
world
 While there was general consensus on
what was Scripture, a recognized canon
(measuring rod, standard, rule) of
Scripture was required to correct heresy
 Canon refers to the collection of books
that passed a test of authenticity and
authority; it also means that those books
are our rule of life – both in this world and
the next
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9. The Canon and The Church
 When the decision was made as to what books
were canonical, the Church used the Latin term
“recipemus”, which means “we receive”
 What the Church said is that we receive these
particular books as being canonical, as being the
Word of God, and therefore we submit to their
authority
 It’s one thing to make something authoritative,
and it’s another thing to recognize something
that already is authoritative
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10. Under Consideration
 The books that were tested for canonicity fall
into four categories:
 accepted by all (homologoumena)
 rejected by all (pseudepigrapha)
 disputed by some (antilegomena)
 and those accepted by some (apocrypha)
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11. Under Consideration
 The books that were tested for canonicity fall
into four categories:
 accepted by all (homologoumena)
 rejected by all (pseudepigrapha)
 disputed by some (antilegomena)
 and those accepted by some (apocrypha)
 20 of the 27 we have today in the New
Testament were undisputed
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12. Many Gospels?
“More than eighty gospels were considered for
the New Testament, and yet only a relatively
few were chosen for inclusion – Matthew,
Mark, Luke, and John among them… The
early church needed to convince the world
that the mortal prophet Jesus was a divine
being. Therefore, any gospels that
described earthly aspects of Jesus’ life had
to be omitted from the Bible.”
--Dan Brown in The Da Vinci Code
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13. Many Gospels?
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14. Clearly Rejected
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15. Clearly Rejected
 Examples:
 the Gospel of Thomas (a Gnostic writing with Jesus’ doing childhood
miracles)
 Arabic Gospel of Childhood (more childhood miracles of Jesus while in
Egypt)
 the Gospel of Joseph the Carpenter (written by a cult that glorified Joseph)
 the Passing of Mary (relates the bodily assumption of Mary and other things
involving Mary worship)
 the Gospel of Mary (promotes Mary worship and served as the basis for
popular medieval stories)
 the Acts of Peter (contains the legend that Peter was crucified upside down)
 the Acts of Andrew (a Gnostic story of the imprisonment and death of
Andrew)
 the Acts of Thomas (presents the mission work and martyrdom of Thomas
in India)
 Since some of them may contain some truth (and certainly present a clear view
of various teachings of the time), they are of value for historians, but are
fanciful and contain many errors & heresies
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16. Modern Interest In Gnostic
 The Gospel of Thomas has gained a tremendous
amount of attention lately. From the Amazon.com
synopsis on one of the major translations:
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17. Modern Interest In Gnostic
 The Gospel of Thomas has gained a tremendous
amount of attention lately. From the Amazon.com
synopsis on one of the major translations:
The gospel according to Thomas is an ancient collection of
sayings attributed to Jesus and thought to be recorded by his
brother Judas, the Twin (Thomas means ‘twin’ in Aramaic). Some
scholars suggest that this gospel was collected from New
Testament sayings, while others believe it springs from a
completely independent author because many of the quotations
are not in the New Testament at all… It is considered by many to
be perhaps the closest we’ll ever get to reading what was actually
said by the historical Jesus. In The Gospel of Thomas, you’ll
discover a different kind of Christ – a wandering spiritual teacher
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18. The Tests for Canonicity
 Written by an Apostle (defined as person
seeing Jesus Christ after His resurrection) or
companion of Apostle
 Testified to by other Scripture (self recognition)
 No contradiction in core teachings of the faith
(analogy of faith)
 Accepted early and by majority of churches
(catholicity)
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19. Self Recognition
 “and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation;
just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to
the wisdom given him, wrote to you, as also in all
his letters, speaking in them of these things, in
which are some things hard to understand, which
the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also
the rest of the Scriptures, to their own
destruction.” (2 Peter 3:15-16)
 “For the Scripture says, “You shall not muzzle the
ox while he is threshing,” and “The laborer is worthy
of his wages.”” (1 Timothy 5:18; cf. Luke 10:7)
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20. Written By An Apostle
 What about Paul/Saul?
 He was not “one of the Twelve” that studied at Jesus’
feet
 Jesus did come to and teach Paul after Accession (Acts
9)
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21. Written By An Apostle
 What about Paul/Saul?
 He was not “one of the Twelve” that studied at Jesus’
feet
 Jesus did come to and teach Paul after Accession (Acts
9)
 What about the book of Hebrews?
 Though the ideas and form are similar to Paul, the
Greek is much more “educated” than Paul. It also
specifically denies that it was written by one who
“heard” the Lord (i.e., an Apostle) in 2:3.
 Virtually everyone agrees from many clues in the book
that it was written by someone commissioned/trained
by Paul
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22. 7 of the 27
 The books that were included in the Canon but were questioned
were:
 Hebrews
 James (because of apparent conflicts with the Gospel as
presented in the clearly accepted books)
 2 Peter (because of significant style differences between this
and 1 Peter)
 2 & 3 John (because of the anonymity of the author [“the elder”]
and they had a very limited distribution)
 Jude (because it referenced clearly non-Biblical books)
 Revelation (because of the “millennium” of Revelation 20)
 Despite the questions, once all of the facts were known, no one
questioned their place in the Canon
 The only serious questioning since the Forth Century was in
regards to James...
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23. James: No Contradictions In The
Core Faith
“You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.”
–James 2:4
“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from
yourselves, it is the gift of God — not by works, so that no one can boast.”
–Ephesians 2:8,9
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24. James: No Contradictions In The
Core Faith
“You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.”
–James 2:4
“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from
yourselves, it is the gift of God — not by works, so that no one can boast.”
–Ephesians 2:8,9
 It was because of things like this that James was one of the
“debated” books, and Martin Luther famously called it “an
epistle of straw”
 Luther didn’t have the all the writings of the Fathers that we have
now, so he didn’t know that battle had already been fought
 Once it was understood that James confirms and reinforces the
“by faith alone, but not a faith that is alone” position of the rest
of the Bible, James’ position as part of the Canon became
stronger than ever
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25. “Changes” to the Canon
 The Canon is something we recognize/receive
from God, but there are religious groups that
have taken it upon themselves to sit in
judgement upon what makes up Scripture
 Reasons vary, but the examples we’ll look at all
have the defining feature of people wanting
Scripture to support their views/beliefs
 It’s very inconvenient when you want God to agree
with you, but the Bible expressly contradicts your
teachings...
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26. Apocryphal Books
 In Roman Catholic and Eastern/Oriental Orthodox
Bibles, there are several books (and amendments to
Esther and Daniel) that are not in “catholic” Bibles
 They were part of the Septuagint, but not the Hebrew
Bible
 Three are not considered canonical, but the others are
termed “Deuterocanonical” (“second canon”; delayed
acceptance)
 While they fail the tests that the the other books had
to go through and therefore clearly not the same
status as Scripture, they are generally good for study
and reflection
 They were included in many Bibles over the centuries
as “supplemental” reading
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27. Rome Elevates Some
 Before the Council of Trent, Rome had held them as
holy, but not Scripture (per prior Popes and Councils
that had made express declarations to that point)
 Rome considers itself to be the Mother of
Scripture, and therefore having the authority to
elevate books
 Why declare them to be Scripture? (And why then?)
 Trent is where Rome condemns the Protestants as
heretics, and the “deuterocanonical” books are the
only scriptural support Rome has for some of the
major points of contention with the Protestants
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28. Mormon View of
 Joseph Smith was “divinely inspired” to declare the King
James Bible to be the closest to actual Scripture, then make
thousands of changes to it, including adding a passage to
Genesis 50 saying “That seer will I bless... And his name
shall be called Joseph.”
 The Book of Mormon (which would be “deuterocanonical”) is
an exact recitation into English of the Reformed Egyptian
tablets Smith found
 Apparently Smith was not a very good conveyor of what the
angel told him, because it has been edit/revised over four
thousand times
 Includes a number of “lifts” from the the original KJV along
with the KJV translators’ comments and errors...
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29.  Founded in 1985, this is a group of about 150 scholars
with advanced degrees in biblical studies, religious
studies or related fields
 One of the most active groups in biblical criticism, the
seminar uses votes with colored beads to decide their
collective view of the historicity of Jesus, specifically
what he may or may not have said and done as a
historical figure
 In addition, the seminar popularizes the quest for the
historical Jesus
 They produced new translations of the New Testament
and apocrypha to use as textual sources
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30. 20

31. 20

32. The Final Words
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33. The Final Words
But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in
my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of
everything I have said to you.–John 14:26
Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow
citizens with God's people and members of God's household, built on
the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus
himself as the chief cornerstone.–Eph 2:19-20
"Behold, I am coming soon! Blessed is he who keeps the words of the prophecy in this
book." ... I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone
adds anything to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book. And if
anyone takes words away from this book of prophecy, God will take away from him his
share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.–Rev
22:7,18-19
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