Is the Newsweek article about the Bible accurate?

Question:

I just read the Newsweek article, "The Bible: So Misunderstood It's a Sin." After having read that, how can anyone honestly remain a Christian?

Answer:

If anyone wishes to read this article, the full text can be found here.

If much of what the Newsweek article said were actually true, Christianity would be in serious trouble. The truth is the article is filled with false information, twisted facts, and insinuations that are simply not true.

The first few paragraphs paint a grim picture of biblical illiteracy and misuse in America. Personally, I think this part contains some valid criticisms, and we believers would do well to address these kinds of issues in our church.

Six paragraphs into the article is this claim:

No television preacher has ever read the Bible. Neither has any evangelical politician. Neither has the pope. Neither have I. And neither have you. At best, we’ve all read a bad translation—a translation of translations of translations of hand-copied copies of copies of copies of copies, and on and on, hundreds of times.

About 400 years passed between the writing of the first Christian manuscripts and their compilation into the New Testament. (That’s the same amount of time between the arrival of the Pilgrims on the Mayflower and today.)

Very little of what is said here is true.

Claim: "No television preacher has ever read the Bible. Neither has any evangelical politician. Neither has the pope. Neither have I. And neither have you. At best, we’ve all read a bad translation..."

Truth: The Old Testament was written in Hebrew and Aramaic, while the New Testament was written in Greek. There are tens of thousands, maybe even millions of people around the world, myself included, who can read these testaments in the original Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek languages. 

But are they reading the Bible?

Claim: At best, we’ve all read a bad translation—a translation of translations of translations of hand-copied copies of copies of copies of copies, and on and on, hundreds of times.

Truth: While it is true the original first century documents no longer exist, with over 5800 Greek copies of the books found in the New Testament in existence, modern textual scholars have declared with a high degree of confidence that at least 96.4% of the Greek New Testament that exists today is letter for letter identical to the originals. Further, when it comes to confidence in the information related in the New Testament, the most conservative estimate is that 98.33% of the information related in our current Greek Text is identical to the information contained in the original. Further, when it comes to the fundamental doctrines, the "articles of faith," virtually all scholars are in agreement that the Greek New Testament as it exists today is 100% accurate to the doctrines taught in the original documents.

To those not familiar with the field of textual research, 5800 Greek copies of the New Testament might not seem like a lot. But consider this: there are more copies of the books in the New Testament than the next 100 ancient manuscripts combined! The second place for most copies goes to Homer's Illiad, of which there are now almost 1800 copies in existence, but after this, the numbers drop off rapidly. Third place goes to Sophocles, with 193 copies. In fourth place is Aristotle, with 49 copies. In fifth place is Tacitus with 20 copies. By the time we get to the manuscript in ninth place (Euripides), we are down to single digits at 9 copies. All other ancient manuscripts are less than that.

These 5800 Greek manuscripts of the New Testament are NOT translations. The originals were written in Greek, and these are COPIES of the Greek. For more on this information, you can read this article, this web site, or this blog.

Further, the oldest manuscripts of the NT are from the second century, and are likely only a few dozen copies out from the originals; maybe even closer than that. While many of them probably are copies of copies of copies out hundreds of times, there are so many copies in existence that by comparing them to each other, as noted above, provides us with a very high degree of confidence that what we are reading today is virtually identical to what the disciples wrote 2000 years ago.

So, yes, contrary to what this article claims, many tens of thousands of people around the world are literally reading what amounts to exact words of the New Testament as it was written 2000 years ago, and many millions more are reading ONE translation of the New Testament, directly from the Greek into their native languages.

Claim: About 400 years passed between the writing of the first Christian manuscripts and their compilation into the New Testament. (That’s the same amount of time between the arrival of the Pilgrims on the Mayflower and today.)

Truth: The implication of this statement is that for the first 400 years of Christianity, no one had access to the New Testament. The truth is that for the first several hundred years after the originals were written, the various books of the New Testament were copied and circulated individually. So while many early churches may not have had the entire New Testament in one binding, they did contain most of the content of the New Testament as individual books.

Further, we have proof that within a generation or two, many of the books were circulating in collections. We have copy of the four gospels together in a group (in the same order as they are today) and another copy of Paul's letters (plus Hebrews) that date to about 100-150 years after they were written (between 175 and 225 AD). And the first complete Bibles (including OT and NT) date to about 250 years after the manuscripts were completed (about 325 AD). We have TWO complete Bibles (created in two DIFFERENT scriptoriums) that date from this time period.

Claim: While there were professional scribes whose lives were dedicated to this grueling work, they did not start copying the letters and testaments about Jesus’s time until centuries after they were written. Prior to that, amateurs handled the job.

Truth: Papyrus 66, which contains the Gospel According to John, dates from sometime between 150-200 AD, and is now accepted to be the work of a professional scribe. That means the church employed professional scribes very early on.

However, many of the copies were done by amateurs. Papyrus 75, which contains both Luke and John, and dates to somewhere between 175-225 AD, is known to be a copy made by an amateur. Detailed analysis of both texts have revealed that P-66, which was produced by a professional, has at least four times as many provable copy errors as P-75, which was produced by an amateur. So the actual evidence shows that, contrary to the implications of this claim, just because a scribe was an amateur does not mean what he produced was sloppy or inaccurate.

Claim: And Koiné was written in what is known as scriptio continua—meaning no spaces between words and no punctuation. So, a sentence like weshouldgoeatmom could be interpreted as “We should go eat, Mom,” or “We should go eat Mom.”

First, all the oldest manuscripts have pauses and punctuation at the end of the thought, so we do have rudimentary punctuation.

Second, because all nouns, adjectives, verbs, and many other Greek words had endings that tell us how that word is being used in the sentence, it is actually not that hard to read once you learn the language. I've been reading scriptio continua manuscipts for so long that I barely notice any more, and I rarely have any difficulty reading the text.

Third, while there are a few places where punctuation really could change the meaning of the sentence, that is actually kind of rare, and for the most part, because Greek is a free form language, punctuation in the middle of a sentence would make no sense (and would be largely unneeded, as the endings tell us the function of the words).

For example, in Greek, the sentence above ("weshouldgoeatmom") would be crystal clear no matter what the word order, because the endings on the words would make it clear what function each word served in the sentence. With a few simple exceptions (such as plurals), English doesn't use endings to clarify the use of a word in a sentence. To get a feel for how it works in Greek, let's create a few "endings" that tell us how a word is being used. For our example, we will say that @ at the end of a word will indicate direct address (we are talking directly to that person), and $  at the end of a word will indicate the subject of the sentence.

Using our invented endings, the above sentence would read "we$shouldgoeatmom@." Now we know, no matter where the word "mom" appears in the sentence, we are talking TO mom, not suggesting that we eat her. This also means we can put these words in any order, and we will still know what the sentence means. Thus, if we read "mom@shouldgoeatwe$" or "shouldgowe$mom@eat", we still know that we are talking to mom, and the subject is "we." So, when you take into consideration that all verbs in Greek also had endings, with no punctuation or spaces, and regardless of word order, we can immediately decipher all of these to mean, "Mom, we should go eat."

This means that contrary to what this article implies, scriptio continua is not that hard to figure out in Greek, and is not that much of a hindrance to understanding the content of the New Testament manuscripts.

Claim: And what biblical scholars now know is that later versions of the books differ significantly from earlier ones—in fact, even copies from the same time periods differ from each other. “There are more variations among our manuscripts than there are words in the New Testament,” says Dr. Bart D. Ehrman, a groundbreaking biblical scholar and professor at the University of North Carolina who has written many books on the New Testament.

Truth: In case any of you are not familiar with the expert referenced here, Bart Ehrman is an atheist whose many books and articles on the Bible have one purpose: to discredit the Bible, and with it, Christianity. So when this article quotes Ehrman, it is using what an attorney would call, "a hostile witness," and this alone should make it clear the real intent of this article.

I've read almost every copy of every published copy of the New Testament from the first few hundred years of Christianity, and I can personally testify that there are ZERO significant differences between early manuscripts and later manuscripts. But if there are so many variations in the manuscripts, how can I make that claim?

Because while it might be technically true that there are more variations among the many manuscripts than there are words in the New Testament (400,000 variations when taking all manuscripts into consideration, and the NT in Greek contains 138,020 words), what this article doesn't say is that by far the vast majority of these variations literally have no impact on the meaning of the text, or are so subtle the differences cannot be translated into English.

When you get to variations that actually impact the meaning of the text, we are down to a few hundred, and if you go to variations that would literally change a teaching or doctrine, maybe a couple dozen. But when it comes to fundamental, critical doctrines, ZERO variations that would change the teaching (such as salvation, the death and resurrection, faith, grace, etc.). In case anyone is wondering, there are no scholars, including Ehrman, who dispute these facts.

Next, when referencing the story of the woman caught in adultery (John 8:1-11), while it is true that John likely did not write it, the claims in this article are simply not true.

Claim: Unfortunately, John didn’t write it. Scribes made it up sometime in the Middle Ages.

This is blatantly wrong.

This passage is called the Pericope de Adultera, and first appears in Codex Bezea, which dates from somewhere in the range of 375-425 AD. Further, of the three complete Bibles that predate Codex Bezea, one is missing the page (Alexandrinus), so it is unknown if it does not contain it; one has diacritical marks at that spot (Vaticanus), indicating a known alternate reading exists; and one (Sinaiticus) does not contain it.

Didymus the Blind made it clear in his writings that most copies of John from about 300 AD on contained that passage (we should note the the oldest complete Bible in existence date from 325-400 AD, which is this same period). Jerome reports that it was found in most Greek and Latin texts by 375 AD. And further, several of the early church fathers from the first or second centuries (such as Papias) indicated a familiarity with the story.

All of that is a long, long time before the Middle Ages.

Claim: Moreover, according to Ehrman, the writing style for that story is different from the rest of John, and the section includes phrases that do not appear anywhere else in the Bible.

This is also misleading.

First, it is not clear that the writing style of this passage is different from the rest of John.

Second, there are 5446 different Greek words in the New Testament. Of these, almost half of them only appear ONE time in the New Testament. In fact, every single section of John contains words and phrases not found in any other section of John. For example, the famous opening section of John, 1:1-14, which is completely undisputed, contains three words not found anywhere else in John, and two words only found in ONE other place in John. And if you expand out to the whole first chapter, there are no less than 16 words that are not found anywhere else in John, and another 11 words that are only found in ONE other place in John.

It is true that at first glance, the Pericope de Adultera seems to have a high number of words not found anywhere else in John. In the 12 disputed verses, there are 13 words not found anywhere else in John. But this is not actually so unusual for John. In the 12 undisputed verses from John 19:30-41, there are 14 words not found anywhere else in John.

But when it comes to rare phrases, it should be noted that the critical command Jesus states at the end: "Go and sin no more" (In Greek: μηκέτι ἁμάρτανε) only appears ONE other time in the entire New Testament: John 5:14.

So the critical, most often quoted climax of the story uses a phrase only found in John.
After examining all the evidence, most modern scholars believe the story is authentic, but could have originated from one of the other disciples, and after being passed down orally for a while, was added to John so it would not be forgotten.

Claim: For Pentecostal Christians, an important section of the Bible appears in the Gospel of Mark, 16:17-18. These verses say that those who believe in Jesus will speak in tongues and have extraordinary powers, such as the ability to cast out demons, heal the sick and handle snakes. Pentecostal ministers often babble incomprehensible sounds, proclaiming—based in part on these verses in Mark—that the noises they are making show that the Holy Spirit is in them.

Truth: Having grown up in a Pentecostal church, I can tell you with no hesitation that I have never actually heard anyone reference Mark as evidence that believers will speak in tongues, heal the sick or cast out demons. There is no need, as all of these are recorded as historical events that happened to numerous believers in the book of Acts.

For example:

When the day of Pentecost was being celebrated, all of them were together in one place. Suddenly, a sound like the roar of a mighty windstorm came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw tongues like flames of fire that separated, and one rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages as the Spirit gave them that ability. (Acts 2:1-4)

When handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched his skin were taken to the sick, their diseases left them and evil spirits went out of them. (Acts 19:12)

And when it comes to handling snakes without harm, there is this:

Paul gathered a bundle of sticks and put it on the fire. A poisonous snake was forced out by the heat and attached itself to Paul's hand. When the people who lived there saw the snake hanging from his hand, they told one another, "This man must be a murderer! He may have escaped from the sea, but Justice won't let him live." But he shook the snake into the fire and wasn't harmed. They were expecting him to swell up or suddenly drop dead, but after waiting a long time and seeing nothing unusual happen to him, they changed their minds and said he was a god. (Acts 28:3-6)

So contrary to the claims of this article, none of these beliefs are based on a disputed passage of scripture since they are found in numerous other, undisputed passages.

Claim: But once again, the verses came from a creative scribe long after the Gospel of Mark was written. In fact, the earliest versions of Mark stop at 16:8.

I have previously addressed the facts of this claim in a previous post. You can read that post here. In short, the evidence for the inclusion of the last 12 verses of Mark is far, far stronger than the evidence against it.

Claim: Then comes the problem of accurate translation. Many words in New Testament Greek don’t have clear English equivalents. Sentence structure, idioms, stylistic differences—all of these are challenges when converting versions of the New Testament books into English.

While this is true, what this article doesn't point out is that this is true of translations between ALL languages, including any modern languages. French has words English doesn't have. English has words Spanish doesn't have. German has words Russian doesn't have. Russian has words Spanish doesn't have.

Further, as a person who can read Koine Greek, and have translated John and Philippians from Greek into English, I can assure you that these translation problems have not led to massive numbers of false doctrines. It is true that some peripheral teachings can be clarified and corrected by reading the Greek directly, but it brings no changes to the vast majority of doctrines, and no alterations of any kind to the fundamental articles of faith of Christianity.

Claim: The gold standard of English Bibles is the King James Version, completed in 1611, but that was not a translation of the original Greek. Instead, a Church of England committee relied primarily on Latin manuscripts translated from Greek.

Truth: While the KJV is a fine translation, and many people prefer it over all other translations, calling it the gold standard is opinion, not fact. But more than that, despite the claims here, the KJV is primarily a translation directly from the Greek and Hebrew. Latin was only employed in the translation of the Apocrypha. Even Wikipedia acknowledges this:

In common with most other translations of the period, the New Testament was translated from Greek, the Old Testament was translated from Hebrew and Aramaic text, while the Apocrypha were translated from the Greek and Latin. (See the full Wikipedia article here.)

Claim: In other words, with a little translational trickery, a fundamental tenet of Christianity—that Jesus is God—was reinforced in the Bible, even in places where it directly contradicts the rest of the verse.

The implication of this is, of course, that the Bible doesn't claim Jesus is God, and we Christians only believe it because of bad translations. It's not true, and I address one of the most blatant examples of the Bible teaching the deity of Jesus in a previous post, which you can read here. This is not even close to being the only place the Bible teaches that Jesus is God, but it does show that the closer we look at the Greek, the more obvious it becomes that the Bible openly and boldly teaches that Jesus is God.

Claim: That kind of manipulation occurs many times. In Philippians, the King James Version translates some words to designate Jesus as “being in the form of God.” The Greek word for form could simply mean Jesus was in the image of God. 

First thing you need to know is that the Greek in this passage is poetry, so it uses poetic language. Since Paul did not normally speak in poetic language, most scholars believe Paul was actually quoting a popular Christian hymn that would be well known to his readers.

Realizing this is poetry, here is what the Greek in this passage states:

First, that Jesus was in the very form of God,
second, that He did not misuse His equality with God,
third that He then took on the form of a servant, and
finally, that He was made to resemble a man.

Now, realizing this is poetic language, what else could this passage possibly be saying except that Jesus was originally God, and that he changed His APPEARANCE so that He looked like a man?

A very new translation, called the ISV (go here to find out more about this translation), recognizing that this passage is Greek poetry, has produced an ingenious translation that attempts to preserve the meaning of the words while presenting them in a form English speakers recognize as poetry. The result preserves the intent and meaning of each clause while beautifully communicating that this is a first and foremost, a poem, or more likely, a song.

In God's own form existed he,
and shared with God equality,
deemed nothing needed grasping.
Instead, poured out in emptiness,
a servant's form did he possess,
a mortal man becoming.
In human form he chose to be,
and lived in all humility,
death on a cross obeying.
Now lifted up by God to heaven,
a name above all others given,
this matchless name possessing.
And so, when Jesus' name is called,
the knees of everyone should fall
wherever they're residing.
Then every tongue in one accord,
will say that Jesus the Messiah is Lord,
while God the Father praising.
(Philippians 2:6-11)

Claim: Which raises a big issue for Christians: the Trinity—the belief that Jesus and God are the same and, with the Holy Spirit, are a single entity—is a fundamental, yet deeply confusing, tenet. So where does the clear declaration of God and Jesus as part of a triumvirate appear in the Greek manuscripts?

Nowhere.

This, again, is blatantly misleading. It is true that the NAME of the doctrine is not found in the Bible, as that was invented, for the sake of convenience, many centuries later. But that does NOT mean the teaching is not found in the Bible. It is actually pretty easy to prove that the Bible teaches that the Father is God, that the Son is God, and that the Holy Spirit is God, that these three interact with each other as distinct individuals, and yet somehow, the Bible repeatedly insists there is only one God. What the Bible does NOT do is try to explain how these can all be true. It just claims they are.

And that blatant New Testament teaching is what we call, "The Trinity."

The rest of the article contains just as many erroneous claims, distorted facts, and blatantly false implications as I have already addressed, but I think what I have presented here is more than enough to demonstrate that you should not to believe much of anything you read in this article.

If anyone reading this has a specific question about any of the other issues raised in this article (wise men, creation, flood, David and Goliath, homosexuality, women in authority, etc.), please feel free to contact me, and I will address them in detail.

If you would like to read a more scholarly, accurate and balanced evaluation of the Bible, there are many, many choices out there. One such book that is both scholarly and accessible to the average lay reader is "How We Got the Bible," by Neil R. Lightfoot (available through Amazon here). If you would like a deeper, more detailed (and more faith driven) account, I recommend "From God To Us Revised and Expanded: How We Got Our Bible," by Norman L. Geisler, which is available in a downloadable, Kindle version here.

Most of all, don't make the mistake of accepting anything said in this article at face value. It is, at best really, really bad scholarship, and at worst, a blatant, vicious hit piece intended to discredit both the Bible and Christianity.

Don't believe a word of it.

Do all roads lead to God?

Question:

With all the billions of people of other faiths in the world, it just seems to me that claiming Christianity is the only way is intolerant in the extreme. It seems to me a more enlightened view is that all faiths lead to the same God. Given all the different beliefs in the world, isn't it arrogant to claim that you guys have the only way to heaven?

Answer:

That depends on whether or not we are correct. Just because someone claims there is only one path to a certain destination or one answer to a specific question does not automatically mean they are narrow minded, arrogant, or intolerant. Because . . . what if they are right?

Oh, and by the way, we don't actually claim that "Christianity" is the only way to salvation, we claim that the Bible says that Jesus is the only way to salvation. The two are not the same. In other words, it is not the commands, traditions, trappings, doctrines, teachings or good works of Christianity that bring salvation: it is faith in the God of Christianity that brings salvation. This is the ultimate example of, "it's not WHAT you know, it's WHO you know."

Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." (Joh 14:6 NIV)

To know if we are correct, we need to explore three questions:

1) What does it take to be saved (or qualify for heaven)?
2) What is the problem facing mankind that might keep them from salvation?
3) What is the solution to that problem?

Almost every faith on the planet has the same basic answer to the question of what does it take to be saved (or make it to paradise, or reach nirvana, or escape the cycle of reincarnation): your good must outweigh your bad. And the vast majority of all their various teachings center on telling us what we have to do, or how we have to live, in order for that to be true in our life.

Christianity, however, has a completely different answer. The Bible teaches us that being more good than bad is simply not good enough. God's standard is much, much higher than that.

Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (Mat 5:48 NIV)

So in Christianity, the only way to be saved is to be perfect.

You see, where most other religions view the requirements for salvation as a kind of test where you need to get a certain score to pass, Christianity views it as a judgement in a criminal trial. Each person will be on trial for crimes committed against God, and the "good things" we have done will have no bearing on determining our guilt.

For example, if I am on trial for murder, no amount of good deeds that I have done will have any bearing on whether or not I am found guilty. They might effect my sentence, but they will have no effect on my guilt. Being nice to my wife, and giving money to charity has nothing to do with the question, "Did I commit murder?" Likewise, the Bible teaches that our guilt or innocence is based on one question: have I sinned? No amount of "good deeds" have any impact on this question.

Further, sin is not defined as "evil." Sin produces evil, leads to evil, can make us evil, but strictly speaking, sin is not "evil." The Geek word for sin is ἁμαρτία, and this word does not mean, "bad" or "evil," it means, "to miss the mark, to fail, to be less than morally perfect." Because "sin" is a failure to be morally perfect, it is completely legitimate to refer to an evil act as a "sin."

So the question we will all face at our trial is this: Have you been less than morally perfect? If we have committed any sins (moral failures), we will be found guilty.

In line with this, the Bible clearly teaches that the problem facing mankind is sin, and each and every one of us is afflicted by this disease.

There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Rom 3:22b-23 NIV)

Does this mean each of us are inherently evil, and if given half a chance, we will all become little Hitlers? Being thoroughly sinful does not automatically mean we are thoroughly evil, it means we are thoroughly imperfect. Thoroughly imperfect people can do good things, and can even resist doing evil things. So the problem of sin is not that it will inevitably turn us all into serial killers, the problem is that it keeps us from being perfect. And because of this inborn imperfection, we ALL will eventually do something that is a moral failure, we will do something wrong, and at that moment, we are condemned. We now fail to qualify for heaven.

No heaping of good deeds on top of our sins can make up for that crime. Thus, we all, each and every one of us, are doomed to be found guilty, and forbidden to enter heaven.

This is where Jesus comes in. The REASON He is the only way to salvation is that His death and resurrection are the only means to wash us clean of our imperfect behavior, and make us morally perfect in the eyes of God. Paul explains how it works this way:

But here is how God has shown his love for us. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. The blood of Christ has made us right with God. So we are even more sure that Jesus will save us from God's anger. Once we were God's enemies. But we have been brought back to him because his Son has died for us. Now that God has brought us back, we are even more secure. We know that we will be saved because Christ lives. (Rom 5:8-10)

Because Jesus died for us, we are forgiven and made clean, and because He rose from the grave, and now lives, we are given new life and saved.

And what does it take to get in on this awesome deal?

If you declare with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. As Scripture says, "Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame." (Rom 10:9-11)

Just a quick note: biblical faith is not only something we say, most importantly, it is something we do. In the same way that real love is demonstrated by what we do, real faith in Jesus is demonstrated by our actions, by how we live from this day forward, NOT by simply saying a prayer. In other words, if our faith is real, salvation is instantaneous, and the proof of that is that our lives are forever changed.

So here is the bottom line. If the Bible is right about how to get to heaven (be perfect), about what our problem is (we cannot be perfect) and about how that problem is solved (faith in Jesus makes us perfect), then all faiths do NOT lead to God. Only one road leads to God, and that road is called Jesus. Furthermore, if the Bible is right, there is nothing intolerant or arrogant about this claim at all.

On the contrary, we have an obligation to get this message out to as many people as we possibly can.

Can Women Be Pastors? Part Two.

Question:

How can a woman be a pastor if women are explicitly forbidden to speak in church in 1 Corinthians 14:34-35?

Answer:

As with the 1 Timothy passage, the translation on this one is usually flawed just enough to make it seem absolute, when Paul had no intention of making it as extreme as our translations often imply. Again, I will bold the translation problems. For the sake of context, I have includee verse 33 as well.

For God is not a God of disorder but of peace--as in all the congregations of the Lord's people. As in all the congregations of the saints, women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church. (1 Corinthians 14:33-35)

This passage has very similar translational issues as the 1 Timothy passage, so some of this has already been addressed.

The first thing we should note is that this passage is set in the context of verse 33, which shows that the issue facing the churches was of disorder and chaos during the meetings. Apparently, some of the women were causing some disruption in the service, and the issue had to be addressed.

As with “teaching” in the 1 Timothy passage above, "speaking" here means “continuously speaking.” It is not a prohibition against ever speaking, but against disruptive, continuous speaking. Further, the Greek word translated “speak” (λαλεω – laleo) is more accurately “converse, discuss, extended conversation.” What is disgraceful is for the wives to be disrupting the services by constantly asking their husbands questions, and engaging in ongoing conversations when they should be paying attention to the service. Again, the construction here indicates that women did speak in church, but they were not supposed to abuse that to the point of becoming a disruption. 

I have already addressed the translation issue with "submission," and the context here is the same. Women need to be respectful and reverent in a church service, which is a fairly obvious issue. 

Further, no denomination in any century has ever taught that women must literally remain silent in Church, as that would prohibit them from singing, prophesying or praying, which is something they clearly did. In fact, Paul gives instructions, in this very same letter, that in a Greek culture, the married women needed to cover their heads when they spoke out in a church service (Jewish culture was the exact opposite, with the men covering their heads during religious ceremonies, and the women leaving their heads uncovered, showing that the whole "head covering" issue is cultural). 

Every man who prays or prophesies with something on his head dishonors his head, and every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head, which is the same as having her head shaved. (1Co 11:4-5)

Now clearly, if women were not allowed to pray or prophesy in church, there would be no need for a rule about keeping their heads covered while they spoke out in a church service. No such instructions would be necessary if women literally kept silent in church. 

Further, if we take this literally, it also means it only applies to married women, as single women had no husbands to ask questions of at home.

Occasionally paraphrase translations, because they can be freer in their phraseology, manage to capture the force of the Greek passage even better than word for word translations. This is one of those verses where a popular paraphrase, The Message, catches the force of this paragraph in 1 Corinthians 14 as concisely as I have seen anywhere.

Wives must not disrupt worship, talking when they should be listening, asking questions that could more appropriately be asked of their husbands at home. God's Book of the law guides our manners and customs here. Wives have no license to use the time of worship for unwarranted speaking.

All difficult passages in scripture should always be interpreted in light of clearer verses elsewhere in the Bible. It is my contention that we should likewise do the same with the these passages, particularly since so much of the New Testament indicates that women were NOT silent in Church, and that they did hold positions of authority (I will address this in Part Three).

These passages should not be taken as absolute warnings about how women are prone to abuse their authority, but should be understood as what they are: isolated circumstances addressing unique problems within a specific cultural setting. The real principle at work here is that, just as Priscila and Aquila operated as a team in ministry (and jointly taught Apollos about Christianity, Acts chapter 18), so husbands and wives should work together in harmony within the body of Christ.

When judging how God views the issue of women in ministry, or in positions of authority within the church, we should always keep this verse in mind: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3:28). 

When Paul wrote these words to the Galatians, this was the very first time any person in human history made this statement, in ANY context, claiming all people were equal, regardless of ethnicity, status or sex. Paul, and Christianity, were on the cutting edge of human rights in the first century, and unfortunately, the church lost most of that momentum in later centuries.

The bottom-line is that in Christianity, all sincere believers are given equal access to the gospel, to ministry, and to any position of authority. Many believers in the 1850's used Galatians 3:28, among others, in stating that all believers, of all races, whether black or white, slave or free, are equal in the eyes of God. Just as so many of them had the courage to stand up to slavery when it was the law of the land, many of them eventually embraced the whole verse when they granted women the right to be ordained as pastors. Despite how controversial this issue seems to be, the vast majority of protestant denominations now ordain women, as illustrated in this Wikipedia article (it's a long list, but not complete, as the Free Methodist Church, which is where I serve as pastor, ordains women and is not listed):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ordination_of_women_in_Protestant_churches

In America, the average person no longer has a problem with a woman holding a position of authority in the government, yet many believers would forbid a sincere, Christian woman who had just proven her leadership ability as the President of the United States or the Governor of a state from serving as the pastor of a church. This disconnect should not be. Long before any society granted full and complete equal rights to all people, regardless of race, economic status or sex, Christianity was on the cutting edge of civilization by doing exactly that. Our Lord and Savior makes no distinction between races, economic status or sexes, and neither should we.

Did Jesus Claim to be God?

Question:

I know that Christians believe Jesus is God, but I can't find any place where Jesus claims to be God. Isn't that a problem for Christians?

Answer:

Well, if Jesus never did claim to be God, it might be a problem. However, the Truth is He did claim to be God on several occasions. The most blatant, and most enlightening, is found in the eighth chapter of the Gospel According to John. In this chapter, starting in verse 12, Jesus is involved in a prolonged confrontation with some of the Jewish leaders. In verses 21-24 we see this exchange:

Later on he told them again, "I am going away, and you will look for me, but you will die in your sin. You cannot come where I am going." So the Jews were asking, "He isn't going to kill himself, is he? Is that why he said, 'You cannot come where I am going'?" He told them, "You are from below, I am from above. You are of this world, but I am not of this world. That is why I told you that you will die in your sins, for unless you believe that I AM, you will die in your sins." (Joh 8:21-24 ISV)

The words translated "I AM" in verse 24 are εγω ειμι (ego eimi), which literally means "I am." Jesus is using this as a direct reference to Exodus 3:14, where Moses had asked God how he should answer the question when the Israelites asked him for God's name, and God responded with:

God replied to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM," and then said, "Tell the Israelis: 'I AM sent me to you.'" (Exo 3:14 ISV)

The problem is that in Greek, the phrase εγω ειμι was a really common phrase that was normally understood to mean "I am the one," or "I am he," or even "that is me." So all those listening understood Jesus to be saying something like "I am who I say I am," which is why they immediately responded with:

Then they asked him, "Who are you?" (Joh 8:25a ISV)

So how do we know that Jesus really meant this as a claim to divinity? Because He makes it crystal clear at the end of the chapter when the confrontation finally comes to a head.

Your father Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day, and he saw it and was glad." Then the Jews asked him, "You are not even 50 years old, yet you have seen Abraham?" Jesus told them, "Truly, I tell all of you with certainty, before there was an Abraham, I AM!" (Joh 8:56-58 ISV) 

The phrase "Before there was an Abraham, I AM" actually makes no sense in Greek. It is grammatic nonsense akin to someone telling me, "I made this for you tomorrow. Yesterday I'm going to make you another one." The only possible way to read this statement is that Jesus is claiming to be the I AM of the Old Testament, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the one who gave the law to Moses, rescued Israel from Egypt, and established the nation of Israel.

And because this statement could not be interpreted any other way, the Jews immediately responded to what they saw as blasphemy:

At this, they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the Temple. (Joh 8:59 ISV)

This also means earlier, in verse 24, Jesus made His identity central to our faith. By stating "unless you believe that I AM, you will die in your sins." Jesus made it crystal clear that faith in His deity was not optional, but was, in fact, absolutely necessary for salvation. Jesus is the Lord of creation, the God of the universe, and making this the center of the Christian faith was not something the Church did hundreds of years later, but rather, something Jesus did before the Church even existed. It is because of this clear claim by Jesus that Paul later explains that salvation involves two parts:

If you declare with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. (Rom 10:9 ISV)

Do you have questions about Christianity?

At the tender age of 19, my faith was almost destroyed by the professor of my Old Testament class. His constant barrage of "facts" about the origins of the stories and books of the Bible was systematically eroding my faith in the Bible as the Word of God. I felt utterly helpless, unable to answer his question, much less defend my faith. In desperation, I poured out my anguish to an Intervarsity Christian Fellowship worker named Joe Whitchurch. He handed me the book, "More Evidence that Demands a Verdict," and it was as though it had been written for my class. It is no understatement to say that book, and the man who just happened to have purchased it that same day on his way to meet with us, and was willing to part with it for the sake of a desperate student, saved my life that day. My debt to Josh McDowell for writing the book, and Joe Whitchurch for parting with it (even before he had a chance to read it for himself) for saving my faith can never be repaid. What I could do, however, was turn around and provide that same gift to other believers. Unfortunately, at 19 I still did not know enough to help others, and try as I might, my lack of answers prevented me from being able to save the faith of some of my fellow students in that same class.

I determined then and there that no one would ever damage the faith of another believer while I was in the room, and so I dedicated the remainder of my life to studying every nuance of Christianity, as well as all the evidence for the validity of this faith. In keeping with that, I gained a passing knowledge of Hebrew, and learned to read and write New Testament (Koine) Greek. I read every article I could find relating to creation and evolution, archaeology, church history, textual criticism, philosophy, doctrine, theology, ministry, culture, and translation. I read most of the published portions of every manuscript of the Bible (both Old and New Testament) in Greek from the first 500 years of Christianity. To better understand the issues involved in translation, I produced my own translations of the Gospel According to John and the Letter to the Philippians, as well as large portions of several other books of the New Testament.

Over the years I have had the privilege of answering hundreds of questions from believers and unbelievers alike seeking to better understand what the Bible says, and along with that, what Christianity teaches on almost every conceivable topic. Now, as the Teaching and Discipleship Pastor at Living Promise Church [Update: As of March, 2015, I am the Senior Pastor at Trinity Episcopal Church in Flushing], one of my jobs is to do exactly what I have been doing for decades: answer the questions of all who seek to understand the Bible and draw closer to our Lord and God, Jesus Christ.

And that is the purpose of this blog: to share with all of you the many questions I have received over the years, as well as any new ones I get along the way, and my answers to those questions. I do not claim to have all the answers, nor do I claim to be able to answer every question. There are things about God that I do not understand any better than any other believer, but I'm completely comfortable with that. As my beloved father-in-law used to say, "If I could understand everything about God, I would be equal with Him." What I can do, however, is lay out the evidence for Christianity, explain the seemingly convoluted history of textual research that has resulted in our modern Bibles (as well as explaining the apparent differences between some translations in certain verses), simplify complex doctrines, and expand upon some of the extraordinarily subtle aspects of the Greek that often cannot be translated into English.

Hopefully, in the process I can help you live a bolder walk with the Lord, gain a more vibrant and strengthened faith, and pursue your purpose and ministry with more confidence and conviction than ever before.

Even if you are not sure about this whole "God" thing, maybe I can still answer some of your questions, settle your fears, or give you things to think about that you had not considered before. And who knows, maybe even help you find the God that really is there.