Threads from Henry's Web

Author: henry

  • Finding an Authoritative Translation

    In George Orwell’s Animal Farm things eventually boil down to “all the animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.”

    I think I can apply this to Bible translations as well as to animals, especially when one is looking for an authoritative translation. The fact is that no translation perfectly reflects the source languages. Thus, there is no translation that is the final word on the interpretation of any particular passage. The final appeal must be to the texts in the source languages, and to the best research available there.

    This situation is very disappointing to many Bible students who don’t know their Biblical languages, which is the vast majority of Bible students. How can they successfully get finality about a point of Biblical interpretation from a translation? Surely there is a translation that is right all the time, that can simply be trusted. But the answer is no. No translation is ever perfect.

    But are some translations “more equal” on this point than others? I would say that there are, and that there are some techniques that English speaking and reading Bible students can use in order to avoid getting caught by a translation issue. These techniques are really fairly simple, and the necessary tools are widely available.

    1. Use multiple translations
      If you compare the translation of a text in more than one version, you will be alerted to translation differences. Start with the assumption that if there is a substantial difference in the way a verse is translated, i.e. that the two translations don’t simply express the same thought in different words, then there may be a significant translation issue underlying those different versions.
    2. Make your choice of versions wisely and purposefully
      Choosing multiple versions to compare when looking for translation issues is differnt than choosing a version for your own reading or study use according to your preferences. You want to find versions that are done by credible scholars, but that differ in their approach sufficiently so that they are likely to disagree on controversial issues. I’ll list some good selections for this purpose below. In particular, be aware of the translation philosophy involved. For example, comparing the rendering of the ESV with that of the CEV may give you the idea that there is a significant translation issue, when the problem is really that one is very literal while the other is dynamically expressive. With some extra attention, you will then often find that they are both trying to convey the same message, just in a different way.
    3. Check concordances with original language references
      Many people put a great deal of weight into these kinds of studies in terms of finding or even creating new definitions, but without facility in the language in question it is doubtful that your work will be all that accurate. Such study can alert you to just where the problems are in a translation. This may not give you the final answer, but at least it may keep you from being embarrassed by finding out that you based your interpretation on a faulty translation, or that you were dogmatic about something that is really very controversial.
    4. Use commentaries
      For this purpose you need an exegetical or critical commentary. You might want to look at some suggestions for materials in my reader’s guide to Bible study tools.

    Now let’s expand just a bit on which translations are “more equal than others.” If you want to catch translation problems you need to be more careful than usual in your selection. Let me suggest that your select one or more from each of the following groups. Note that the groups do overlap.

    You want to avoid hitching your star to older translations, such as the KJV, ERV, ASV, Young’s Literal and so forth. These translations can be good an helpful in reading and study, but they were made without much modern research and many recent discoveries in manuscripts and language, and thus are not nearly as helpful in identifying true translation issues.

    Literal Translations

    You can generally avoid the older RSV as most translation issues will be reflected in the newer versions. I don’t list the New King James Version simply because its focus was to reflect the text and language of the KJV, and thus it does not present as much new information as other versions.

    Dynamic Translations

    Catholic Translations

    Protestant Translations

    Mainstream/Liberal Translations

    Evangelical Translations

    Jewish Translations

    In this category, the one item to consult is the JPS Tanakh: The New JPS Translation According to the Traditional Hebrew Text. I do not have this rated yet on my list of Bible translations, but it should be consulted especially in cases of interfaith dialogue.

    As I noted earlier, there is ultimately no way short of learning the source languages to really be able to handle all translation issues. You will find, however, that the majority of the Bible is not that controversial in its translation. Translation issues deal with a small number of texts, though often these are the most contentious. Using multiple translations wisely will help you avoid errors and embarassment.

    See also my book, What’s in a Version? and my Bible Translation Selection Tool.

  • Martin Luther King Day: Man, Nation, and Myth

    I missed posting yesterday because I was suffering from the flu. In fact, I’m not all that energetic today either, but I did want to post something about Martin Luther King day.

    Many people seem not to have become comfortable with Martin Luther King day as a holiday. This was brought home to me as I talked business to somebody on the phone and mentioned that I wouldn’t be able to accomplish something yesterday because of the holiday. There was a long pause, and then, “Oh. Yes. It’s Martin Luther King day.”

    Oh yes! It is! (Or it was.)

    And that got me to thinking about the day itself and the man who inspired it. Dr. King was not all that popular a man during his life. He spent his time fighting against the cultural standards of his region in his time. There were even those who were happy to see him die. We like to think of those days as “bad old times” that won’t be coming back. But the basic problems of human nature, of fear of things that are different, and of resistance to change, no matter how much needed, are still a part of our lives and culture.

    That’s where we need the myth. People look down on the word “myth” as though somehow a person is diminished as part of a myth, as though a myth is less than any other story, rather than greater. But the fact is that a person lives on and accomplishes more as a myth. Many people have written historically about Dr. King, and some have thought to tarnish his image. I don’t really know how much their historical data has impacted people individually, but I don’t think they’ve succeeded in tarnishing the myth. It is myth that allows him to still speak, even though he is dead.

    Hebrews 11:4 says that Abel offered a better sacrifice than his brother Cain, and in that way, even though he is dead, he still speaks. That’s the myth in action. There’s a great deal more than just believing something involved in faith here. Dr. King managed to see the vision of what could be instead of what was, he visualized a path that others hadn’t seen, his faith in his vision, in his God, and even in his country was strong enough to allow him to take action. Through that faith he offered a better sacrifice.

    I need to say one thing about faith in his country. Non-violent protest requires a faith that is beyond oneself. The military leader, prepared with weaponry, personnel, and a plan, needs faith in his own abilities and that of his troops to take action. The non-violent protester believes that somewhere inside his opponents and in those who are apathetically standing by there is a whisper of conscience, enough goodness or divine spark, enough something to make them step up and do the right thing, even if they must be pressured to do it.

    And that myth–that story that lives on, that provides a challenge and a form to our actions–lives on, and keeps calling us to change the inequities and injustices that we see before us today. The question is whether we will live up to the myth, perhaps even creating new and greater myths to drive us. Will we learn to be a nation that deserves to enshrine a day to deal not just with inequalities, but to celebrate and carry forward the fight for justice? Will Martin Luther King day become a true part of the American mythos, for all of us?

    Or will it be “Oh. Yes! Martin Luther King day,” as we regret the lack of hours for business.

  • Suffering Little Children

    Wayne Leman on his Better Bibles blog, created an exceptional entry on the need for having translations that put the Bible into comprehensible, current English.

    Too often in the church we assume that people know things. We assume they know how to find the church, when services are, what is appropriate for them or for their children, what to do in church, where to find a Sunday School class, and many other things. We do the same thing with many of our doctrines. People are assumed to understand justification, sanctification, glorification, atonement, expiation, and so forth.

    But many people don’t understand these words, and they don’t know our ways. They may not be willing to expose themselves to potential ridicule by asking what may seem to be a stupid question.

    I’m going to refer you to Wayne’s blog for more, but let me suggest quickly that there are two ways we can address this. First, we can translate what we say on a daily basis into real, everyday English. This is something I need to work on! Second, some of the things we do may be incomprehensible because they’ve lost their meaning. Perhaps we need to change our ways, so that we can communicate God’s love more effectively through our actions.

  • Widespread Vision!

    I wrote this from my wife’s devotional list today and thought I’d share it with the blog as well.

    Now the young man Samuel was serving the LORD under Eli’s supervision. The Word of the LORD was rare in those days, vision was not widespread. 1 Samuel 3:1

    This passage of scripture is both wonderful and challenging. The verse I quoted introduces the story of the first time that Samuel, soon to be known as one of Israel’s greatest prophets and judges, hears the word of the Lord. God’s word was rare, vision was not widespread. Samuel was not acquainted with God’s voice and how to respond.

    God calls Samuel three times, and three times he goes to Eli, because Eli is the only one he knows. He can’t imagine that anyone else would be calling. It takes Eli those three times to realize what is going on. I wonder what went on in the mind of Eli, the high priest, the one who was supposed to know God and to go into God’s presence in the sanctuary. Was there a moment when he wondered why God didn’t talk to him?

    Eli knows what should be done. He tells Samuel to say, “Speak Lord, for your servant is listening.”?

    How’s your vision and your hearing doing this morning? Is God’s Word rare or common in your life? Is vision widespread, or would you fail to recognize it if it came to you. Now someone is bound to point out to me that “vision” here is something special, the sort of vision from God that a prophet would get. But there’s a reason we use that same word for an individual’s vision, their ability to see what should be done and go do it.

    The story of Samuel shows us that vision in both those senses was rare in Israel in those days. Why was that so? Let me list some hints from the passage.

    1. People didn’t expect it. Samuel was lying down to sleep in God’s house, and didn’t expect any vision. He’s in the place where God placed his presence, and he doesn’t expect to hear from God.
    2. People didn’t really want it. We discover elsewhere in the story that Eli’s sons were not behaving well. In fact, the message that God gives to Samuel is one of judgment against Eli and his family. When we are not living according to the knowledge and light that we have, we may not be anxious to hear from God or to see greater vision.
    3. Samuel probably thought he was too young and too insignificant for real vision. After all, he just helped Eli out. “I get my vision from my supervisor,” he might have said.
    4. Nobody taught Samuel to recognize God’s voice. Verse 7 tells us that Samuel didn’t yet know the Lord, and that God’s Word hadn’t been revealed to him. What was Eli doing? I suspect that like most of us he was waiting for Samuel to be old enough, or ready, or for the right opportunity.

    How does this relate to us and to our lives today?

    Let me ask you something. How much vision do you have today? Is your vision to accomplish the tasks your supervisor has set for you and to make it out of the building without taking any more damage? If so, I suspect God’s Word may be rare in your life, and vision is not widespread.

    Do you think you’re too young or too old? You aren’t! God can work with young and old. Parents, have you introduced your children to the Lord? Would they know it if God spoke to them? Share the vision! Let it be widespread in your life and in your church.

    My wife told me of an opportunity she had today to witness. I’ll let her tell the story if she wants sometime, but the key is that it was an opportunity that she could have let slip if she was just seeing the vision of getting through the day undamaged. It required stepping forward and expressing a vision of life that went beyond the ordinary.

    Don’t wait for God to interrupt you with a vision that knocks you off your feet. Start practicing divine vision on a daily basis. Look for the things God has for you. Let vision be widespread in your life. Start today!!

  • Structure and the (Actual) Book of Daniel

    Oddly enough, while I’ve been commenting on The Book of Daniel on NBC, I’ve also been studying the Biblical book of Daniel for a discussion I’m having on the Compuserve Religion Forum. So if you were interested in the TV show, this is definitely not the entry for you.

    I grew up as a Seventh-day Adventist, completed my MA in Religion, concentrating in Biblical and Cognate Languages from Andrews University, working with the folks from the SDA Theological Seminary. Now, however, I’m not SDA, I’m a member of a United Methodist congregation. I reguarly am asked by SDAs how anyone can possibly have doctrinal disagreements with the SDA church. They seem to think that those who leave the SDA church can’t keep up with the standards, don’t want to keep the Sabbath, pay tithe, or any of a number of other things, or really just don’t understand the Bible.

    All of those ideas are quite wrong. People do leave the SDA church because of doctrinal issues. It’s quite possible to come to different conclusions on a number of major issues. Those who leave are often quite well educated Biblically and doctrinally. Now I don’t want to get into an anti-SDA mode here. I believe Seventh-day Adventists are as likely to be Christians as anyone else, and I think the church does much good. I do disagree with some of the doctrines.

    A showcase doctrine, in my view, is the doctrine of the investigative judgment, connected with the 2300 evening-morning prophecy (known to SDAs as the 2300 day prophecy of Daniel 8:14. I think this chapter is an excellent test bed for dealing with issues of interpretation. I’ve made an outline and written a few notes, posted in my Totally Free Bible Version project. The outline file is Daniel 8: The Vision of the Ram and He-Goat.

    Most Christians have very little understanding of the Seventh-day Adventist view on this doctrine and the scriptural and historical basis they have for it. Traditional SDAs regard it as a key doctrine. Many SDA scholars, I believe, have abandoned it, though they keep fairly quiet because it is a “red flag” issue for many members of the church. There is no better way to get in trouble with the rank and file than to question the investigative judgment.

    Basically, the investigative judgment has Jesus enter into a ministry in the outer compartment, known as the holy place, in the heavenly sanctuary on his ascension. This ministry takes continues until 1844 (October 22, 1844 to be precise) when there is a change in the nature of the ministry, and Jesus moves on to the most holy place or inner compartment. This latter phase is the investigative judgment. My first objection to this doctrine comes from Hebrews, which states (6:19-20) that Jesus has already gone in beyond the inner veil. In fact, in a post-resurrection and ascension world, the idea of an outer compartment ministry seems completely out of place.

    But the reason I see this as a showcase for interpretive methods is the timing and prophetic basis for the doctrine. The key is Daniel 8, and particularly verse 14. As an SDA young person, I had to memorize that in the KJV: “Unto two thousand and three hundred days, then shall the sanctuary be cleansed.” I was much less acquainted with the verses before it and after it.

    Seventh-day Adventist interpreters then get the beginning of this time period from Daniel 9. The SDA Bible Commentary, volume 4, commenting on Daniel 8 lists 11 reasons why one should see a connection between Daniel 8:14 and the time prophecy of Daniel 9:24-27. Those 11 points make quite an excellent case that the two chapters were written by the same person, are both visionary and eschatological, and both are prophecies of time, but the connection is problematic.

    You see, the verses before Daniel 8:14 make it quite clear what the subject it. We have a ram, representing Persia, a he-goat representing Greece under Alexander the Great, then that horn splits into four, representing the four key generals whose kingdoms survived the breakup of Alexander’s empire intact. From one of those comes a little horn that does all kinds of nasty stuff including stopping sacrifices. Then in Daniel 8:13 the question “how long?” is asked. How long what? Following the text, it’s clear that “how long” relates to the destruction accomplished by the little horn. That is what the 2300 evening-mornings relates to. (The Hebrew text uses “evening-morning” rather than just “yom” (or day) to emphasize the connection with the daily sacrifice.)

    Now if we move to the connection to Daniel 9, the result in SDA interpretation is to begin the 2300 day prophecy at the same time as the 70 week prophecy, and SDAs hold that date to be 457 BCE. That is more than a century prior to the rise of Alexander the Great to power, much less to the breakup of his empire into multiple pieces, and the reduction of those pieces to four principle powers.

    What’s wrong with this? Well, we’re taking something that is clear–the positioning of the events in Daniel 8, and we’re attempting to clarify it with something that is unclear (or better contradictory). Because of some lists of similarities between the chapters, we’re supposed to believe that the time period of Daniel 8:14 begins at the same time as the time period of Daniel 9:24-27. It simply won’t work.

    Straightforward and clear trumps obscure. Absent a direct statement in Daniel 9 that the beginning of that time prophecy is the same as the one in Daniel 8, there is no reason to believe they are, and every reason to believe they are not. As I teach students learning how to study the Bible, determine first what the author says. Only after you have the specifics of what he says can you go on into interpreting what he means more deeply.

    The temptation in studying apocalyptic literature is to move very quickly into interpreting the meanings of the symbols, and going into the deeper message. But it is important to establish first the actual symbols and their relationship to one another in time, place, and logic.

  • AFA Continues Campaign against The Book of Daniel (NBC)

    The American Family Association is continuing its campaign against The Book of Daniel on NBC. I just received another e-mail calling on me not to watch the show, of course, but also to ask my local affiliate to stop airing it, and also to ask the advertisers not to sponsor it.

    In support of this, they quote mail in which their viewers discovered, horror of horrors, that the characters in this drama are human. They have problems. They do things they aren’t supposed to do. But I ask this: In precisely what way does this distinguish them from the rest of humanity? I imagine that the leaders and staffers of the AFA live in a world in which people don’t struggle with these kinds of problems. Perhaps they believe that evangelical churches are never plagued with these issues.

    Some people need to listen to the opening sermon in the show. We sin. We struggle. And our pastors and church leaders do so no less than the rest of us. If we can’t acknowledge this fact and get on with healing and building up, then Christianity does, indeed, have a problem. But our problem is not NBC for portraying Christians as people. It’s with us for trying to pretend that we’re so much better than other people.

    But all of that is beside the point here. Why cannot the AFA simply issue a note to its members that they have previewed this show and that they don’t recommend watching it? Why do we call for affiliates not to air it and for advertisers not to sponsor it? This certainly suggests that the issue is not helping their constituency make good choices. It’s about controlling what the American people can see, hear, and think.

    There is a proper way to deal with shows that we disapprove. We don’t watch them. We tell our friends we don’t like them. If we’re a big organization, we can tell all our members and those we influence not to watch them. Then people make choices.

    And to provide more evidence, currently featured on its web site (January 9, 2006) is a headline indicating they may boycott Ford Motor Company. Their complaint against the company? Ford is fostering the “gay agenda.” (This started six months ago. To get more details, see Another Swing of the Pocketbook (from MSNBC).

    I emphatically reject these kinds of efforts. The only thing I will boycott or advocate boycotting is a bad product. By not buying bad products I encourage people to produce good ones. That goes for TV shows or cars.

  • In the Divine Council and Conclave

    In my initial entry on testing prophets I listed five approaches to determining whether a word someone claims comes from God is actually from God. The third of those items was “Access to inside information, or is in God’s councils.”

    You may be wondering, and rightfully so, how I distinguish this from other approaches. Surely this one is totally covered by the prediction or sign test. But I found this specifically in the foreward by Mark Chironna to Jim Goll’s recent book, The Seer, which my wife and I are studying together. The statement there was that “. . . the earmark of a true prophet was that they stood in the divine council and conclave” (p. 12).

    What struck me immediately is that this is the type of statement that is commonly made by either theologians or very spiritual people who are experienced in prayer and in dealing with issues regarding the prophetic. I don’t really take exception to it except that “earmark” normally means something like “a distinguishing or identifying mark.” I get regular questions from people who have received impressions, visions, dreams, or heard something that they believe was the voice of God. How are they going to know whether this is God’s leading or not? If someone has claimed that God told them something, how does one know whether they truly are? This “earmark” is unlikely to work well, because the question remains of where the mark is. What does the inexperienced person do?

    I have seen this kind of answer in conferences, and people appear satisfied with them, but I also know that when they go home they still have the same basic question–how can I know. In other words, the earmark doesn’t work well, or isn’t visible to most people. I’m going to deal with this more as I proceed through this series. But right now I just want to suggest that the answer to a question like this has to be practical. We can’t just discuss the theology of how inspiration works and assume that people can apply that knowledge practically. Very often I think that those who proclaim the theology don’t themselves know how to apply their knowledge practically and then just play it by ear. That can be very dangerous if the issue is a question of whether someone is speaking for God.

    Some also will simply claim that nobody now is speaking for God. (There will also be those who claim that nobody ever has spoken for God, but I’m assuming right now they’re not very intersted in this essay.) But those Christians who claim that the gifts of the Holy Spirit have ceased still need to deal with the issue of Biblical inspiration itself. Anyone can still ask why one should accept the Bible as inspired, and not other works from ancient times. In addition, there are Christian groups who claim that prophets still speak in modern times. (Jim Goll, whose book I cited earlier, is one such.) So in any case, one needs to have some kind of practical approach to these problems.

    I’ll continue through the list of tests in my next entry.

  • Testing Prophets – Godliness

    In my previous entry on this topic I listed several proposed method of testing prophets, specifically how does one respond when someone claims to speak for God? This assumes, of course, that one believes anyone can speak for God in any way.

    The second test I listed as “godliness,” but this is just a shorthand name for the test as proposed in Deuteronomy 13:1-5. I will leave you to read the passage, but what it proposes is that a person could arise who claimed to be a prophet, and who could actually produce a sign, or make a prediction that would be accurate, and yet that person would advice the Israelites to worship gods other than YHWH. Despite the fulfillment of the prediction, that person should be regarded as a false prophet.

    This is essentially a version of what I proposed as the fundamental source of what a person regards as scripture in my entry Community and Inspiration. It may annoy people who believe they have the very best scriptures in their religion to think that the major reason one accepts a particular scripture is the community in which one grew up. (Note that I do not claim this is universal–just very common.) What you expect a scripture to accomplish for you comes from your background. So the essential question, especially for written scripture, is how good the community is at finding and identifying scripture.

    In our Deuteronomy passage this is formalized into a test. If the prophet is leading you astray from your existing faith, then that prophet is not a true prophet. This argues for coherence in a community’s scripture, normally a fairly obvious need, and it provides some sort of rudder for where the stream of revelation goes for a particular group.

    Again, this test is not complete. Some of the postive aspects include:

    • It does not require you to wait for the fulfillment. You can know immediately if someone is off track.
    • It helps keep the community spiritual tradition unifed.
    • Under many circumstances it provides a clear answer.
    • It acknowledges the possibility of true predictions from someone who is not speaking for God.

    But on the negative side:

    • It does not provide any objective answer; the community simply identifies the prophet with what it already accepts
    • It is inherently conservative; a prophet bringing new light will often appear to be challenging the fundamentls of the community
    • It tends to put spiritual revelation in the hand of theologians.

    We’ll continue looking at these tests for inspiration in my next entry.

    For some further information on my own understanding of spiritual gifts and prophecy, see Identifying Your Gifts and Service which includes related Participatory Study Series pamphlets such as Spiritual Gifts: Prophecy. See also What is the Word of God?.

  • Watching The Book of Daniel (NBC)

    A couple of days ago I wrote a blog entry about the campaign to get NBC affiliate stations to refuse to air the new NBC program, The Book of Daniel. At the time, I said that stations should air the program, and that I would decide whether I like the program after I had seen the program, and not before. My channel changer is in good working order, as is the on/off switch on my television.

    I have now seen the program, and I believe that I will use that working channel changer to tune in to this program from time to time. I am not unequivocally pleased with it. I don’t think it is great, but I would call it pretty good. It has potential. There are some artistic problems, in my view, and the view of Christianity will certainly be troubling to Christian conservatives. Despite certain troubling elements, I think that calling the program “anti-Christian” is just plain wrong.

    First, let me address the things I really liked.

    I like the way Jesus is portrayed. Jesus is shown encouraging people to do better, but not as judgmental. During the show Jesus says that he talks to everyone, but many are not listening. In a number of conversations, I think there was a consistent good message.

    I like the portrayal of the pastor’s difficulties. He’s not a superman. He has family problems, one of his sermons is misunderstood, there are frictions with the church leaders, and so forth. His relationship with his father, a bishop, looks worth exploring.

    Next, there were some things that I think have potential to be either challenging and interesting in future episodes, but may be troubling to some viewers.

    Probably the most obvious difficulty conservatives will have with the show is the pastor’s gay son, and the way in which his parents accept his sexual orientation. They do not always appear comfortable with it. They are embarassed to have other family members and friends find out, but they seem supportive within the smaller circle. I would suggest that the struggle the family have with this issue is one that is familiar to many families, and that exploring this in entertainment is not a bad idea. It’s interesting to have people who are troubled in some ways, but nonetheless strive to respond in a Christ-like way, however difficult that is for them.

    I’m mildly troubled by a casual attitude toward premarital and extramarital sex, but this is probably a realistic portrayal of what goes on in mainline churches throughout America. I should note that the pastor himself is troubled by some of what was going on.

    On the truly negative side, I think they have overloaded this show with problems. There is simply too much going on. I think that may drive some people from watching the show. So many things are going wrong to so many people. Those people are tied together in such a complex web of relationships. I hope they can bring it all together down the road so we don’t have so many things to think about. Despite my treatment of it as though it’s pure social and spiritual commentary, this is supposed to be entertainment, and it will be hard for viewers to enjoy the show if they have to take notes to keep up with all the disasters.

    For the moment, I would rate it 4 out of 5, and I will watch a few more episodes.

  • Testing Prophets

    For the last few weeks I’ve been talking about inspiration, whether that relates to written scripture, or to someone claiming to be speaking for God. Today I’m going to start discussing the tests of a prophet, which might be equated to tests for inspiration, that are used in Christianity. These find their source somewhere in the Bible.

    As I discussed in my previous entry, these tests are derived from the community. In other words, they have their source in tradition. Somewhere along the line I will talk more about tradition, how it can be valuable and also how it can be a problem.

    The tests I’ll be discussing in my next few entries are:

    • Fulfilled prediction or sign
    • Godliness
    • Access to inside information, or is in God’s councils
    • Divine wisdom
    • Gift of discernment

    All of these have been claimed to be good methods of deciding who is a true or false prophet.

    Let’s look first at the fulfilled prediction or sign. The basic scripture for this particular test comes from Deuteronomy 18:21-22, which says that if a prophet says that something is going to happen, and then that doesn’t happen, they are a false prophet. Note that this is not stated positively, i.e. that one cannot be certain simply because a prediction comes true that the person making that prediction is a true prophet. We’ll discuss that further in the entry on “Godliness” as a test.

    This seems to be the easiest test as well as the most objective. We simply look for some external sign, normally a predicted event, and if that does not occur as predicted by the prophet, then we know the prophet is false. But the Bible does make allowances for predictions that are true, but not from God, and we ourselves know that there is a possibility of a prediction being true simply by chance, or because someone knows certain factors and gets lucky. For example, one can look at opinion polls and predict the result of an election. That doesn’t make that person a prophet.

    The book of Jeremiah provides many excellent examples of the use of this test. The primary issue between Jeremiah and other prophets was over the status of Jerusalem and the temple. Many prophets were predicting that the city and temple would be saved. They held a doctrine that based on God’s promises to David, the temple could not be destroyed. Jeremiah predicted that Jerusalem and the temple would be destroyed and the rulers and many of the people taken into exile. History proved Jeremiah right, even if his behavior during an invasion did sound like treason.

    One more specific example was the conflict between Hananiah and Jeremiah in depicted in Jeremiah 28. Jeremiah uses the visual aid of a yoke that he wears to show that those who accept Babylon’s yoke will survive. Hananiah removes the yoke and prophecies that Nebuchadnezzar will be repulsed. Jeremiah then predicts Hananiah’s death as a punishment from God. In the same year Hananiah dies (Jeremiah 28).

    A further problem with this test is the vagueness of certain prophecies. People frequently object when I refer to Biblical prophecies being vague. Usually these people have a very precise interpretation in mind. But there are normally other people who are equally convinced of precisely opposite solutions. A good example is the white horse its rider of Revelation 6:2. Interpretations, strongly stated, include the contradictory positions that the rider is Jesus Christ himself, and that he is the antichrist. Some other interpreters see the early Christian church heading out to evangelize. Obviously not all of these can be true, and so the prophecy must be regarded as vague. Revelation has gone through many interpretations that have been proven false by the progress of history. Remaining interpretations put unfulfilled events in the future. Can one then know by the fulfillment/sign test whether John the Revelator was a true or false prophet?

    But the situation gets more complicated yet. In the book of Jonah we have the story of a prophet who makes a specific prediction, one that certainly cannot be regarded as vague, and does not admit of an alternate interpretation. Nineveh was to be destroyed in 40 days. Nineveh was not destroyed in 40 days. One cannot assume that the later destruction of Nineveh fulfilled this prophecy, because it did not occur within the 40 days. Failed prediction! Can we say to the Ninevites, “You don’t have to fear Jonah’s prediction (Deuteronomy 18:22)?” That is certainly not the position of the book. From the perspective of our story teller Jonah does, in fact, have a message from God, but nothing happens.

    Some will claim that Jonah is a fictional story written to make a different point. I would argue that whether fictional or not, it likely reflects its authors view of predictive prophecy. But we have a better alternative.

    Returning to Jeremiah, now to chapter 18, we have the story of Jeremiah in the potter’s house. He watches the clay pots being made, and sees the potter reshape clay into whatever form he likes. This is often used by Christians, following the example of Paul in Romans 9, to indicate God’s absolute sovereignty, apart from our own actions. But Jeremiah’s point is precisely the opposite. He is telling us that God can change his actions based on repentance. Read the entire chapter. When good is predicted, and people turn to evil, God will repent of the good he had planned to do. When evil is predicted, and the people repent, then God will repent of the evil. The entire chapter is very instructive, and basically carries the same message with reference to prophecy as the book of Jonah.

    The historical situation in Jeremiah is substantially different from that in Jonah, however. Jeremiah is responding to the doctrine I referred to above, that Jerusalem and the Temple could not be destroyed because of God’s promises to David. Jeremiah is responding to this that God can change his actions according to the decisions and actions of people. In Jeremiah’s case this resulted in his correct prediction that Judah would fall, and would go into exile. He also predicted their return to Judah with significant accuracy. Jeremiah essentially presented a doctrine that, despite Deuteronomy 18, would allow the earlier prophets, those who had brought messages in favor of Jerusalem and the temple, could be true prophets even though their prediction of an eternal throne for David and for Jerusalem’s prosperity were about to fail.

    The final difficulty with this test is simply that the results can be too late. Again let me use Jeremiah for an example. He predicts the destruction of Jerusalem. The majority of those who claimed to be prophets in Judah were predicting salvation for Jerusalem. If you were Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, or Zedekiah, who would you believe? Until the events have taken place, you cannot know whose prediction came to pass. I call this the “dead test” for a prophet, because you’re so very often dead, as were many inhabitants of Jerusalem, before you can finish applying the test.

    So this test has some value, in that it provides an objective test, but at the same time there are substantial difficulties in application.

    In my next entry on this topic I will discuss the second test, Godliness.