By Jeremy Myers Filed Under Bibliology Written on July 15, 2011

How you can know the Bible is Divine Revelation

Bible as Divine Revelation Lots of people wonder if the Bible is truly the Word of God.

I remember sitting in my first theology class during my first year in Bible College and the professor, Dr. Mayer, told us that the Bible is the Word of God. I had always believed and accepted this, and was excited to get some proof for the idea.

The proof consisted of several Bible verses which speaks of Scripture as being the Word of God.

Does anyone else see a problem with this?

Is the Bible correct just because it says so? At the time, I did too, and so I tentatively raised my hand and asked, “So…you’re saying that we know the Bible is the Word of God because the Bible says it is?”

I don’t remember what answer Dr. Mayer provided, but I do remember being supremely disappointed. What kind of proof is that? Anyone could write a book and include statements within it saying, “This book is the Word of God.”

Later, in Seminary, I was given a slightly more involved defense for the Bible as the Word of God. I will lay it out for you below exactly as it was given to me. I am curious if you think it is convincing or not.

So here it is:

Defense of the Bible as God’s Divine Revelation

One facet of being a person is to attempt to communicate something of oneself with some other persons, if one is able.
God is a person (from the ontological argument).
God is able to communicate (from His omnipotence).
God only communicates truth (from the ontological argument).
There has been a sufficient amount of time to give God the opportunity to communicate to some people.
Therefore, God has communicated with some people.
The Old Testament (OT) and New Testament (NT) consistently claim to be from this kind of God.
The Quran contradicts the OT and NT but claims that all these are divine revelation, so it must be rejected as contradictory.
The Book of Mormon contradicts the OT and NT but claims that all three are divine revelation, so it must be rejected as contradictory.
The Apocrypha, Vedas, Upanishads, and other religious literature do not claim to be from this kind of God.
Therefore, God has communicated truthfully the whole Bible (OT and NT), whereas no other religious literature can legitimately claim to be of divine origin.

And that’s it.

There are other arguments for the Bible as Divine revelation, such as fulfilled prophecy, and the Bible being written over thousands of years by dozens of authors, and not containing contradictions, and numerous other arguments.

I am just not sure any of these arguments are persuasive for anybody but Christians. Frankly, I am not too sure that anybody really cares except for Christians.

What do you think? Would the arguments above persuade you that the Bible is Divine Revelation? Do you think that such arguments are helpful?

Check out these related posts on Scripture, Theology, and Church:

What is Theology?

Arguments Against Inerrancy

Most Inspired Comments

Why the KJV is an Inspired Translation

Why was the Bible Written?

Want to read more about Bible and Theology? Try one of these:

http://www.graceground.com Sam

None of this convinces me that the Bible is Divine Revelation. I believe God is who He claims to be and Jesus is who He claims to be because I have chosen to do so. Some call this a “leap of faith”.

I encounter God almost daily – sometimes as I read Scripture, and often in encounters with people, as I’ve been writing about on your (Jeremy’s) blog at Graceground.com in the “Getting To Know Your Neighbors” series, and in the current “Being The Church in the Communioty” series. I connect with God through other people.

My faith does not require the high degree of perfection that some claim for Scripture. If it is straight from the mouth of God, that works for me. But I read it much more as a record of real people’s experiences and subsequent encounters with God.

My experience with people that I have personally known has ALWAYS been that those who demand that the Bible be the highest level of divine revelation, the very word of God, sometimes literally from the mouth of God, are quick to point out where their Bible (usually their English translation, but not always) proves X. Here X is their list of favorite doctrines, which usually “prove” things such as their wife should obey them, one “must go to church and give money to it”, only their brand of church understands the Bible correctly, God hates LGBTs, etc., etc.

If all those things are so self-evident, then won’t that be obvious and “provable” from other sources as well? Oh yes, if all those things are so self-evident, then what about all the other stuff in the Bible they ignore? Is that somehow in the part that is not Divine Revelation? Which part is which?

http://www.tillhecomes.org Jeremy Myers

Sam, I think you are going to like my series on inspiration of Scripture that I am starting today. I’m a bit nervous about it (primarily because I don’t really know where I’m headed with it yet).

I think it is the doctrine of Inspiration that leads many people to read and use the Bible in the way you describe above.

Elias Toscano on Facebook

Maybe this is a leap of faith, but i think not. Raised in dead denominational Catholic conversos ( Jews whose families had escaped the inqusition 1500′s) in the SW USA I never heard the gospel of grace or scripture. During the 60′s I went through every “ISM!” known to man eastern, western. etc. After I accepted the Lord I thought don’t get burned again, so i went to school to study apolgetics so I know all the arguments. I (my humble opinion) choose to hang my hat on fulfilled prophecy because the probability statistics are so staggering as to be unassailable. I was already a convinced believer from the moment of my new birth (Damascus style). The inherent message in prophecy has authoritive moral cogency so as to to resonate veracity. If i was witness to the transfiguration, resurrection, and ascension and claimed that fulfilled prophecy was more sure evidence I would give serious it consideration.,.. 2 Peter 1: 15-21 I do evangelize and take seriously the mandate to give reason(s) for the hope that dwells within me which is at least sufficient to appear thoughtful. Shalom

http://www.tillhecomes.org Jeremy Myers

Elias,

Fulfilled prophecy is certainly something that sets the Bible apart from many other books of religious writings. It also is one of the reasons I believe the Bible has divine origins.

Mandy Daames on Facebook

I am not “convinced” anymore.From the little research I have done,I see that knowledge is freeing…

http://www.tillhecomes.org Jeremy Myers

Mandy,

I would love to hear more about your view of the Bible. What is it? Where did it come from? How was it written? What is it good for?

mands81

Testing to see if I can leave comments…

http://www.tillhecomes.org Jeremy Myers

Success!

http://www.gentlewisdom.org.uk/ Peter Kirk

I would say that the only really persuasive argument is the inner witness of the Holy Spirit. But of course that is also for Christians only. It does imply that we have to find apologetic arguments in evangelism other than “this is true because the Bible says so”.

http://www.tillhecomes.org Jeremy Myers

Peter,

Interesting. At one point, I would have argued against this view as “subjective experience.” But as I have been learning, much of what I thought was “objective” still is somewhat subjective.

Have you talked with Mormons at all? Almost all of them believe that the Book of Mormon is true because they had an inner warming of the heart and mind, an experience from God, which told them it was true.

How would the inner witness of the Holy Spirit differ from this? Does it differ?

http://www.gentlewisdom.org.uk/ Peter Kirk

Yes, of course I am being subjective. But then what argument about this isn’t? Perhaps the only difference from the Mormon experience is what kind of spirit it comes from. Here I could bring in your argument about the Book of Mormon contradicting the Bible, so proving that the spirit behind it is lying. But then I would get into hot water from people finding supposed contradictions in the Bible. The ultimate answer can only be “by their fruit you will know them”.

http://www.tillhecomes.org Jeremy Myers

Peter,

I was just checking out the Biblioblog. Way to go! It seems like you have a top ten blog in several categories. Nice!

When studying some of this stuff, do you ever want to just throw your hands up and “give up”?

I always feel like the more questions I get answered, the more questions I find, which gets overwhelming.

http://www.gentlewisdom.org.uk/ Peter Kirk

Thanks for the encouragement. Yes, I often want to give up. Then at other times I have a hundred ideas in my head which I want to express. For the moment I keep going! Not sure where this will go in the future.

Mandy Daames on Facebook

The whole translating the scriptures from it’s original language into english is one of the main reasons I doubt the authority of the bible.eg.many spanish words have no english equivallent.so how can there be such a accurate translation from the hebrew which is older than any of the latin languages into such a young language like english?

http://www.tillhecomes.org Jeremy Myers

Mandy,

Good point. This is true of Hebrew and Greek as well. This is one reason there are so many translations, becuase translators keep trying to get “as close as possible” to the original meaning.

Some people believe that just as God guided the writing of Scripture, He also guides the translation. This is one argument used by those who believe that the King James Version is the only correct translation of the Bible.

This is very dangerous and scary idea.

Benjamin Smith

This is my thinking. If we’re to say why we think the scriptural Word of God is inspired, we need to start with the personal Word of God in Jesus Christ. The main reason that I believe that this collection of historically contingent documents is the inerrant revelation of God is because I believe Jesus rose from the dead and I have experienced the power of that event: therefore the prophecies weren’t empty promises, the conquest of Israel wasn’t just a powerplay under the masquerade of a divine mission, and the apostles really were guided by the Holy Spirit to expound further on all matters leading to salvation. If the resurrection is the anchor of our faith in Christ, I think it can be our anchor for faith in scripture.

http://www.tillhecomes.org Jeremy Myers

Benjamin, that is a FANTASTIC point, and I completely agree with you. Everything we do must be Christ-centered, including our reading and interpreting of Scripture.

I will try to bring out that point in a later post.

Do you blog anywhere?

Benjamin Smith

Ha ha – I’m really only ripping off Karl Barth But it is the main reason I trust scripture, above any other reason.

I don’t blog, I’m afraid. I do like to write, but writing takes a lot of energy for me and so I save it for certain projects.

This looks like a good discussion. John Hobbin’s reflections on inerrancy are worth checking out on his blog.