Consider with the
Biblical Research Institute says:
Historical Criticism
E. Edward Zinke
September, 1981
Historical criticism is the attempt to verify the historicity of and understand the meaning of an event that is reported to have taken place in the past. The basis for this evaluation is the tools of historical science.
The historical-critical method assumes the autonomy of the human scientist from the Bible as the word of God. It assumes that one must start with the secular world as a norm for determining meaning and for deciding what has happened in the past. This method does not accept at face value the Bible as the Word of God. It would be unscientific and unhistorical to do so. Rather its claim to be the word of God and its statements claiming to report history (and finally its statements about theology) must be verified and accepted as one would accept a statement from the documents of any other ancient national people. Such a conception implies that the Bible has come about in the same manner as has any other piece of literature…
Notice the sentence I highlighted. Now remember a week ago I delved into the meaning of the Word of God. Nowhere does the Bible make the claim that it is the word of God, individual writings in some sections of some books that today make up the Bible will say that something is the word of God or the word of the Lord but the Bible as a whole makes no such claim. It is a claim people made for the Bible after it was collected into the form we call the Bible. The Bible is in general a series of stories and these stories may or may not make up a historically accurate representation. If we can’t use higher criticism on the Bible because we claim it is the word of God, then how can we use higher criticism on the Koran or the Book of Mormon? Or should we simply accept every claim for every piece of written material? It is not really reasonable to just ignore reasoned analysis simply because it goes against something we have chosen to take on faith, often a faith that is based merely on a tradition.
A interesting example is found in
1 Chronicles 21 and
2 Samuel 24 where events recorded do not line up as well as one would expect of a literal historical documents.
(2 Sam 24:1 NIV) Again the anger of the LORD burned against Israel, and he incited David against them, saying, "Go and take a census of Israel and Judah."
(1 Chr 21:1 NIV) Satan rose up against Israel and incited David to take a census of Israel.
(2 Sam 24:8 NIV) After they had gone through the entire land, they came back to Jerusalem at the end of nine months and twenty days.(2 Sam 24:9 NIV) Joab reported the number of the fighting men to the king: In Israel there were eight hundred thousand able-bodied men who could handle a sword, and in Judah five hundred thousand.
(1 Chr 21:5 NIV) Joab reported the number of the fighting men to David: In all Israel there were one million one hundred thousand men who could handle a sword, including four hundred and seventy thousand in Judah.(1 Chr 21:6 NIV) But Joab did not include Levi and Benjamin in the numbering, because the king's command was repulsive to him.
(2 Sam 24:13 NIV) So Gad went to David and said to him, "Shall there come upon you three years of famine in your land? Or three months of fleeing from your enemies while they pursue you? Or three days of plague in your land? Now then, think it over and decide how I should answer the one who sent me."
(1 Chr 21:11 NIV) So Gad went to David and said to him, "This is what the LORD says: 'Take your choice: (1 Chr 21:12 NIV) three years of famine, three months of being swept away before your enemies, with their swords overtaking you, or three days of the sword of the LORD--days of plague in the land, with the angel of the LORD ravaging every part of Israel.' Now then, decide how I should answer the one who sent me."
Here I have to note that the King James of 2 Samuel 24:13 being based more upon the
Masoretic Text (MT) says 7 years of famine this is also the reading of the Septuagint. As I recall hearing on the
Amazing Facts lesson studies just how much more accurate the Masoretic Text is then any other family of manuscripts I thought that might be significant. It shows that through Lower Criticism there is found numerous differences in the Biblical texts. Most of these differences are merely footnotes in modern Bibles because the translators go with the manuscript texts which tend to present a more unified view of things when they are mentioned in other books of the Bible.
(2 Sam 24:24 NIV) But the king replied to Araunah, "No, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the LORD my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing." So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen and paid fifty shekels of silver for them
(1 Chr 21:24 NIV) But King David replied to Araunah, "No, I insist on paying the full price. I will not take for the LORD what is yours, or sacrifice a burnt offering that costs me nothing." (1 Chr 21:25 NIV) So David paid Araunah six hundred shekels of gold for the site.
While in general the stories are really very similar they do have at least large variations in the numbers involved. Possibly even theological implications between the different first verses also. Unless one understands through higher critical methods how the ancient Israelites viewed Satan and God this would be a history that has very contradictory elements. As it is we know that at that time the people thought both good and evil came from God so Satan meaning the adversary could just as easily come from God as anything else. If we assume with the Biblical Research Institute’s article above that this is history, factual and completely accurate we lose credibility in the Bible before we even apply higher criticism to the text. As a record of history it is impressive, but like every history written it has elements of personal bias, even the concept of inspiration does not remove the fact that people can distort information or insert their own ideas into the stories. Even something that is inaccurate can be used to correct, rebuke or train someone in righteousness. A good example especially for Seventh-day Adventists is the parable in Luke 16 of the rich man and Lazarus in the bosom of Abraham. Nothing in the story has to be accurate or historical for the message to be clear. Even if someone rises from the dead if people don’t listen to God they will never listen.
That is what this quarter’s lessons are really about, how we listen to God. How do we interpret the Bible, what parts are for us today and what can we learn about God from all these stories? It may not be the best thing to take from the story in 2 Samuel and 1 Chronicles above that because of David’s sin God killed 70,000 people by plague with his destroying angel. But if we can’t apply critical analysis we are left with a view of God that few will really be comfortable with or attracted to.
My last post which showed the statistics for Atheism in the nations of the world is important for this topic because it shows just how much different the world is today then just 50 years ago. Today we have to have a much more reasoned position to understand the messages of the Bible. Our church began by calling out other Christians from their churches and we as a denomination have stayed in that mode. Today however we have to explain the Bible and what it means to people who are far more skeptical of the Christian faith then ever before. This Lesson Study topic is very important, our Lesson Study Guide however is not taking the topic seriously though.