Reformed fundamentalism
[20] The canon is considered the collection of inspired books that God alone intended to be the rule of faith, and laid on the consciences of Christians; other apostolic works, such as Paul's Epistle to the Laodiceans (Col. 4.
[21] Verbal inspiration, upheld by various Protestant churches, maintains that the individual backgrounds, personal traits, and literary styles of the writers and compilers were authentically theirs, but had been providentially prepared by God for use as His instrument in producing scripture.
[citation needed] The preservation of scripture is considered complete, kept through the providentially-guided and continuous "normal" (regular) copying of scribes, and "singular" (special) transmission, compilation and printing.
[citation needed] Chapter 1.8 of the Westminster Confession of Faith speaks of the scriptures as being "by His singular care and providence, kept pure in all ages, [and] are therefore authentical.
[citation needed] John Owen and Francis Turretin (Reformed theologians) are championed as defenders of the traditional text preservation view of the Bible, the former writing; "[w]e add that the whole scripture entire, as given out from God, without any loss, is preserved in the Copies of the Originals yet remaining; What varieties there are among the Copies themselves shall be afterwards declared; in them all, we say, is every letter and Tittle of the Word"[29] Yet, Arminian theologians have defended the traditional readings too.
[citation needed] The published notes of the King James translators, shown in Norton's New Cambridge Bible margin, indicate where they chose one TR reading over another.
Some defend the Complutensian New Testament, a likely influence on Erasmus and Stephanus et al, and the Greek Vatican manuscripts possessed by those editors; referencing John Mill's testimony that the Complutensian editors followed "one most ancient and correct [Vatican MSS] copy," Richard Smalbroke and other Puritans defended Byzantine 'minority readings' in the TR, including 1 John 5.7-8.
The ultimate dominance and authority of the Masoretic Text is underscored by Christians and Jews despite Imperial Aramaic having a similar script: the implication of causation or independence has been debated since Rev.
[35] The Trinitarian Bible Society believes the Masoretes providentially introduced the standard system of vowels,[36] imaginably upon precise vowel-vocalising tradition, veritable Jewish recitation practices (e.g. synagogues and homes), and lost and extant written records, including rabbinic commentaries (e.g. Mishnah-Tosefta, Houses of Hillel and Shammai traditions, Ezra's school of scribes etc.).
Chayyim's 2nd (Great) Rabbinic Bible lost primacy as a standard among mainstream critical scholars in the twentieth century, but has endured in fundamentalist denominations and independent evangelical churches with teaching institutions and academic facilities.
Traditional conservative evangelicals exalted the King James Version, and held that the Textus Receptus (TR) was the honoured and restorative Greek text to Latin Church.
[49] The 47[50] translators of the 1611 KJV (AKJV) used the New Testaments of Erasmus, Stephanus and Beza, yet augmented with the Tyndale, Geneva (Whittingham), Complutensian Polyglot, Coverdale, Bishops' and Matthew Bibles.
The proliferation of the New International Version (NIV) has been observed with censure,[60] but the ability for various translations to lead an individual to saving faith in Christ is freely admitted.
Evangelicals recognise the strong commitment to scriptural inspiration and sound orthodox doctrine of earlier translators, and the need for the Christian to be a regular reader of the Bible.
[citation needed] A combination of evidences, Bible apologetics, and pre-suppositional arguments for Christian faith, within the framework of a conservative theology, have been advanced.
Defenders of inerrancy argue the acceptance of biblical errancy opens the route to the general denial of revelation, subjective claims dogmatically advanced, revision of the nature of history, unwarranted over-reliance on scholarship, and presumption against (ancient) attested sources.
[79] However, evangelicals have freely acknowledged that the Bible cannot be wholly proven, and that not all particulars, nor methodologies, are readily available to reconcile the few 'difficulties;'[79] difficulties has been favoured as a term to describe passages in dispute.
[79] Conservatives contend that texts must be allowed to stand as they reflect the diverse inspired multi-purposes of the penmen, lying characters, progressive toponymy, rhetoric contradiction (Prov.
[80] 1 John 5:7–8 (Comma Johanneum) is excluded from the critical texts and most modern translations,[80] but has become a focal point of discussion on the primitive Latin-Vulgate textual sources (e.g. Vetus Latina) and the moral integrity of the classical trinitarians.
[citation needed] Traditional text adherents do not believe the New Testament requires the eclectic "scientific" approach, calling to attention the gaps in early textual transmission history and the conclusions of scholars who openly reject the evangelical view of the Bible.
[12] Opposition has been to Universalism, forms of ecumenism, modern Pelagianism, inclusivism, Unitarianism, pantheism, Social Gospel, speciation and anthropological evolutionism, high antiquity of mankind, anti-special creation, Enlightenment rationalism, historical-critical hermeneutic, Old Testament panbabylonianism, Jesus mythicism, psilanthropism or denial of the virgin birth, archaeological biblical minimalism (Copenhagen School), humanistic egalitarianism, myth of progress, neo-orthodoxy, New Perspectives on Paul, Emerging Church, Progressive Christianity, Christian left (socialism), evangelical feminism, and neo-evangelicalism/moderate Christianity.
A. J. Monty White and others,[citation needed] criticise the exploitation of dating methods (e.g. radiometric techniques) that project 'soulish' man's origin beyond a genealogical estimate for Adam's formation, and the early biblical civilisation.
[citation needed] Recognising that Genesis 1 to 3 'moves on a plane that transcends [...] mundane evaluation,' Emil Kraeling contended that a reasonable locus of any archaeological debate over the correlation between the well-attested, settled history of mankind and the story of Genesis ought to be 'from the moment [...] Adam is commanded to till the earth' and the settled, cultivated living of Cain and Abel.
[97] The use of DNA sequencing to conjecture 'molecular clocks' and phylogenetic trees, has been critically challenged,[98] and the incredulity of belief in the statistical cosmic improbability of speciation is insisted by some biblical creationists.
[citation needed] Those who interpreted the Bible as intimating time before Gen. 1.3 (Day 1) of the Genesis Week, considered the implication of the earth's prior temporary stasis.
[101] Thus, any anterior, animated creative sequence(s) of the earth (i.e. Genesis 1 as a reconstitution of life prior to the introduction of mankind) was cordially debated on exegetical (e.g. Gen. 7.17-24, Exod.
Incomplete Hebrew knowledge and understanding of purposes, leads to inadequate translation and interpretation, and the limitations of contemporary scientific methods/consensus and historical mutability of science, also produces a reverent appraisal in the early chapters of the Bible and faith in the God of scripture.
[citation needed] Critical doubt concerning the animalian source, antiquity and modern human relevance of trace fossils, singularly the alleged hominin footprints, exists too.
[108] Current Western accentuation on the remote beginning of life and the cosmos (i.e. etiology, including cosmogenesis and anthropogeny), and the historical traditions of information societies, are seen as driving factors in the elevation of evolutionary theories in opposition to the actual existence of a creator God.
Attention has been drawn to secular hostility to teleology, the development of scientific theology (e.g. theobiology and theophysics)[citation needed] and the creation science movement.
