Old Testament Intro. (OTI) - part 5b: What OT Books are In/Out?

In the previous post, we looked at the relationship between salvation and scripture. When God saves, He speaks. He tells us what He does so we know how to respond with love, obedience, and worship. We see this pattern when God rescued his people out of slavery in Egypt and when He brought them into the Promised Land. We see this pattern continue until the coming of Christ, the ultimate act of salvation.

When we talk about the Old Testament (OT) canon, we should ask ourselves, “What was the OT recognized by Jesus and the people of God?” What did Jesus recognize as scripture and what was rejected? Was the Apocrypha (extra books in the Catholic OT) recognized?

JESUS AND THE PHARISEES

Remember that Jesus often clashed with the Jewish leaders. Though Jesus and the Pharisees disagreed on the meaning of scripture, both sides searched, quoted, and read the same scripture, though they came to different conclusions. Jesus rebukes the Pharisees because they refused to come to Him as Savior and Lord:

“You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me” (John 5:39)

When Jesus was defending himself against the accusation that He was breaking the Sabbath, Jesus cites a somewhat obscure passage (Psalm 82) and asserts that “scripture cannot be broken” (John 10:35). Again, both the Jewish religious leaders and Jesus are using the same Hebrew OT as their Bible.

What was the Hebrew OT at that time? It is the OT that the Protestants have today. Neither Jesus nor the Jewish leaders recognized the Apocrypha. After the resurrection, when Jesus walks with 2 disciples on the Road to Emmaus, Jesus opens up God's word to show them that He fulfills all the OT prophecies for the coming Messiah. Jesus actually provides the 3 broad categories for scripture, and they don't include the Apocrypha.

"These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled." Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.” (Luke 24:44-47).

Is there evidence that the Protestant OT is right? For evidence, we can look at the OT used by the different groups in Judaism during the time of Jesus. The groups included the Pharisees and Sadducees. But they also included a group called the Essenes (the ones who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls). The Essences quoted the Hebrew OT in their writings. The Essences never cited the books in the Apocrypha as God's word. They only recognized the books of the Hebrew OT. The same can be said about the Pharisees, Sadducees, and the Samaritans. None of these groups ever recognized the extra books as scripture. And most of all, Jesus never recognized these extra books either.

JEROME'S HEBREW PRINCIPLE

In the 4th century, St. Jerome was asked by the Pope to make a new Latin translation of the Bible. His completed work was called the Latin Vulgate (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_Vulgate). When he worked on his translation, he had to determine which books to include and which ones to leave out.

For Jerome, the Hebrew Bible should be the OT for Christians. The books from the Apocrypha were put in the back of the Bible in a separate category. Jerome left them in because he thought they could be helpful. His decision to separate what was God's word and what wasn't is known as “Jerome's Hebrew Principle.” The Protestant Reformation followed Jerome, and their conclusion was this: Jesus' canon is our canon too. But, they went a step further by taking them out. This would eliminate any confusion on what was God's word. The reformers wanted to be absolutely clear that the Bible is true and must be obeyed, while nothing else, including the Apocrypha, has no such authority. Unfortunately, the Catholic church reversed Jerome's Hebrew Principle and added the Apocrypha into their Bible.

TAKEAWAY

What does this mean for us? We need to receive God's word as it is. Scripture warns us against adding or taking away from God's word:

"You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the LORD your God that I command you" (Deu 4:2)

"I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book." (Rev 22:18-19)

To change God's word by adding or removing things is nothing short of lying- those who do it claim that God has said something when He hasn't:

“Do not add to his words, lest he rebuke you and you be found a liar.” (Proverbs 30: 6)

The issue of the OT canon isn't something we can just brush aside as a minor point of doctrine.

On the flip side, the OT canon is a source of comfort for Christians. It is our duty and delight to meditate on God's Word day and night, that we may be careful to obey everything written in it. And, we have freedom to take or leave any other human writings because they aren't God's Word. We have clarity on our final standard of truth for our faith, a standard that we can use to evaluate everything else in this world. We do this with humility towards God and others, yet with confidence. God has spoken, and His Word is trustworthy and true!

“Every word of God proves true; he is a shield to those who take refuge in him.” (Pro 30:5).

Old Testament Intro. (OTI) - part 5a: What OT Books are In/Out?

This is installment number 5 in a series of posts that have hit some of the highlights from the Old Testament Intro. class I took at Westminster. Today I'll start tackling an issue that has been debated quite a bit between Roman Catholics and Protestants. The issue is the Old Testament (OT) Canon. The OT canon is the official list of books that should be included in the Old Testament. In the table of contents in your Bible, the canon is the list of books you'll see. Anything that's not there is not part of God's word. Protestants have 39 books in the OT, while Catholics have added a few extras. These extras are called the Apocrypha, and they include books such as the Maccabees, the Book of Enoch, Additions to Daniel and the Psalms, etc...)

So, who has the right list? Should Protestants include the Apocrypha? But more importantly, why does this matter?

The OT is the foundation for our faith. The canon matters because it's God's word. Something written by a human author may have interesting or useful ideas, but we can take it or leave it without eternal consequences. However, rejecting the word of God is rejecting God's message of salvation:

• “You have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus” (2 Tim 3:15).
• ”You have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God” (1 Pet 1:23)
  

We need some way to draw a line so we can say what is God's word and what isn't. John Frame put it well when he said this: “It is God's intention to speak personal words to us, words that have more authority than any other. These words govern our use of all other words and all other knowledge. They must be distinguished from all other words for us to know that these are God's words and not man's.”

We assume two important things when we talk about the canon:

1. God has spoken (See this post on the authority of God's word)
   
2. The Holy Spirit enables God's people to recognize God's word (1 Cor. 2:14, 1 Thess. 2:13).
   

Because God has spoken, His word is final. The authority of God's word doesn't depend on pastors, scholars, or even the church. We can be wrong! Pastors can't choose what they like and throw out what they don't like. Catholics believe that people (the church) have the final say in defining the canon. Protestants believe the reverse: no one (not even the church) is in a position to approve or disapprove God's word. There is a huge difference! Catholicism believes that God's word submits to the church. But Protestantism believes that the church submits to God's word.

This reminds us that God is the all-powerful Creator, and we are dependent creatures. When God speaks, we should humbly submit to Him and worship Him as our supreme ruler, even if we don't have all the answers. All too often, we expect God to answer to us, when we must answer to God. Humility before God means that we receive His word as truthful and trustworthy.

CANON AND REDEMPTIVE HISTORY

God's word has always come to God's people when God saves them. After God saved Israel from slavery in Egypt, Moses wrote the first 5 books of the Bible to record God's history and law: "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. "You shall have no other gods before me......” (Exodus 20:2-3)

At each point in redemptive history, God gives His people everything they need to know until the next act of salvation:

• "These words the LORD spoke to all your assembly at the mountain out of the midst of the fire, the cloud, and the thick darkness, with a loud voice; and He added no more. And He wrote them on two tablets of stone and gave them to me.” (Deut. 5:22)
• "Everything that I command you, you shall be careful to do. You shall not add to it or take from it. “ (Deut. 12:32 )
  

The OT doesn't stop at Deuteronomy. God continued to work among His people. After God had saved Israel from her enemies and given them the land of Canaan, Joshua did something important: “Joshua wrote these words in the Book of the Law of God.” (Jos. 24:26)
Joshua added to the first 5 books of the Bible so that God's people would remember what God did and why He did it.

So, we begin to see a pattern in scripture. Whenever God saves His people, He also gives them His Word so they will understand and respond in the right way. When God saves, God speaks.

Notice something very important. When Joshua wrote new scripture, it was added to what was already written by Moses. The first 5 books weren't thrown away- God added new words to His old ones. Scripture builds on itself.

IN THESE LAST DAYS.....

Fast forward a few thousand years from the book of Joshua to the New Testament. When Jesus Christ came, God performed the ultimate act of salvation. Jesus Christ is the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Fully God and fully man, Jesus is the only mediator who can bridge the gap between man and God, the one we were created to love, serve, and obey. In this greatest act of salvation, shouldn't we expect God to bring additional revelation? He does!

“Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son” (Heb. 1:1-2)

In the past, God spoke through prophets like Moses and Joshua. In these last days, Jesus Christ speaks as God Himself. And since all scripture builds on itself, Jesus Christ isn't going to throw away the OT. He didn't come to abolish the law and the prophets, but to fulfill them (Matt. 5:17).

If you're still reading, thanks for hanging in there. We have seen up to this point that when God saves His people, He speaks to them. And as He continues to work, He adds to His word. This process keeps moving forward until the ultimate act of salvation found in Jesus.

The history of God's salvation should lead us to humble worship. He is not only the all-powerful Creator, but in Jesus Christ, He is our loving Savior. God stooped down to save us and then speak to us so that we could know His salvation. The canon isn't some dry, boring topic for scholars to debate. The canon is what God has provided to His people so that we may know Him and worship Him. How kind and gracious of God to do that!

So, if we want to know what should be included in the OT, we should ask ourselves, “What was the OT that Jesus had?” What was recognized by God's Son and God's people as the official word of God? Did the Jesus's Bible contain the Apocrypha? To answer this question, stay tuned to my next post....

Hey Jude

This weekend, I heard a sermon at our church on Jude from CJ Mahaney. The sermon really opened up my eyes to something that I had been struggling with. For some reason, I couldn't shake the fact that I had failed so many times the past week, be it by not getting the grade that I wanted, or for getting repeatedly distracted while trying to work on assignments. Why couldn't I see the riches of God's grace on me? Why did it matter so much what other people said about me, or how I felt I had fallen short of what I should be?

In his sermon, CJ preached on Jude 1b, "To those who are called, beloved in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ." It was the second point, "beloved in God the Father" that stirred my heart. We often have hard thoughts about God. We think that He is merely tolerating us but really is disappointed in us. We think that we are chosen, but without much enthusiasm, like the last kids to get chosen for a sports team. We need this assurance that we are much loved. Not only that we are much loved, but specifically that we are enthusiastically and with much affection loved by God because He IS love.

Because we don't believe that God would love someone who is completely unlovable, we look inside ourselves for some reason that God would want to love us. It's almost as if we had to repay God for His unconditional love by earning it back. It dawned on me that I was trying to pay God back for His love. I wouldn't just take it at face value but felt that I had to prove my worth. I always knew that I was justified, but for me that was only enough to bring me back to "0" in terms of my debt. My justification, lived out in my life, only meant that I wasn't subject to God's wrath, but it didn't mean that I was loved with the infinite affection and joy of a loving God.

CJ said that often people will say, "Why would God love me?" and he has to answer, "I haven't got a clue." If we look for a reason that God would love us that is inside of us, there is none. Be amazed at God's grace and not in a false hope in ourselves. We are only worthy of wrath. Let's not look within from our pride. Piper says, "Our biggest challenge is to feel love since we are so unworthy." We will always be unworthy but we will always be loved by God. Something that was mentioned in our prayer group was that if we only realized that God really loved us, we would be totally changed, and I would heartily agree. I thank God for showing me this truth, and for casting some much needed light into this hidden dark area in my life.