Category: SERIOUSLY FLAWED BIBLICAL CRITICISM ASSAULT ON THE BIBLE

DEFENDING JOSHUA: Authorship and Date

Rationalist critics of the Wellhausen school have attempted to include Joshua with the five books of the Pentateuch, calling the whole collection the Hexateuch. They consider the basic material to come from J and E, but with considerable editorial work and redaction by the “Deuteronomic School.” DH: Deuteronomistic history (books of Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings) dated to the 6th–5th century BCE, not the 16th-15th. Is this true? How do we respond to these liberal critics with a rational, reasonable answer?

2

DEFENDING The Authorship of the Pentateuch

The documentary hypothesis is one of the models used by biblical scholars to explain the origins and composition of the Torah. A version of the documentary hypothesis, frequently identified with the German scholar Julius Wellhausen, was almost universally accepted for most of the 20th century.

2

Critical Objections to the Genuineness of the Bible Book of Ezekiel

As recently as the eighth edition of Driver’s ILOT, the genuineness of Ezekiel had been accepted as completely authentic by the majority of rationalist critics. But in 1924 Gustav Hoelscher advanced the thesis that only a small fraction of the book was by the historical sixth-century Ezekiel (i.e., only 143 verses out of 1273) and the rest came from some later author living in Jerusalem and contemporaneous with Nehemiah (440–430 b.c.).

1

BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION: There are Weaknesses with Redaction Criticism, But Are There Any Strengths?

Redaction critics tend to favor a view that biblical books were written much later and by different authors than the text relates. Late theological editors attached names out of history to their works for the sake of prestige and credibility. In Old and New Testament studies this view arose from historical criticism, source criticism, and form criticism. As a result, it adopts many of the same presuppositions, including the documentary hypothesis in the Old Testament and the priority of Mark in the New Testament. A redactor edits or changes a text composed by another. Redaction criticism of the Bible claims that subsequent editors (redactors) changed the text of Scripture. If such alleged changes were substantial, it would seriously damage the credibility of Scripture. We could not be sure what was in the original text.

1

Powered by WordPress.com.

Up ↑