Dr Paul Allen

When we speak of the “canon of Scripture,” we are referring to those books that the church has recognized as the authoritative Word of God. Thus, although a formal distinction can be made between canon and authority, they are closely related. Specifically, books that the church has recognized as canonical are those that are recognized as having divine authority (F.F. Bruce, The Books and the Parchments, p. 95).  Therefore, we can first note the testimony of the Scripture concerning its own authority. First, the OT itself witnesses to its own authority. This is seen especially instances where the words of Scripture are said to come directly from the Lord. Both the Mosaic Law (for examples, cf. Exod 4:30; Deut 18:21, 22; Lev 4:1, 5:1) and later parts of the OT use phrases such as, “The LORD has spoken,” “The mouth of the LORD has spoken,” or “The word of the LORD came to saying” (Josh 24:2; Isa 8:11; Jer 7:l; 11:1; 18:1; 21:1; 26:1; 27:1; 30:1,4; 50:1; 51:12; Amos 3:1). The...

Sometimes when a New Testament writer quotes the Old Testament, the two passages do not match precisely. Is the New Testament writer misquoting the Old Testament? Or is there another explanation? Luke records that when Jesus began His ministry, He went to the synagogue in Nazareth on the Sabbath day . When He stood up to read the Scriptures, “The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him” ( Luke 4:17 ). Jesus read the description of a climactic arrival of the anointed one from Isaiah 61:1-2 , excluding the last half of verse two.  The passage Christ read was Is. 61:1, 2. He stopped in the middle of v. 2. The rest of the verse prophesies judgment in the day of God’s vengeance. Since that part of the verse pertains to the second advent, He did not read it . That omission is understandable, but if you look at Luke 4:18-19 and Isaiah 61:1-2 side-by-side, several dissimilarities in what Jesus read are readily apparent. Luke 4:18-19 The Spirit of the Lord is on me,...

The value of Scripture in the life of the believer lies in its source and its function. In his exhortation to Timothy , Paul commended Scripture to Timothy by saying, "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God , and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness" (2 Tim. 3:16). When I was a little boy, there was a fellow in our community who was a couple of years older than me, and he was something of a bully. He made fun of me and called me names, which hurt my feelings. Sometimes I came home crying to my mother and told her what the other boy had said to upset me. My mother had a favorite response to this. As she wiped away my tears, she said, "When people talk like that about you, son, consider the source." That little bit of sage advice from my mother was a principle that I learned to a much more intense degree in the academic world. One of the rules of scholarship is to track down in your research the sources f...

English: Ezra Reads the Law to the People (Neh. 8:1-12) Русский: Священник Ездра читает народу Закон (Неем. 8:1-12) (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) “This Ezra went up from Babylon ; and he was a ready scribe in the law of Moses , which the LORD God of Israel had given: and the king granted him all his request, according to the hand of the LORD his God upon him.” ( Ezra 7:6 ) Neither Ezra, who was a scribe, nor Nehemiah , who was apparently a butler, had been prepared by either study or experience to supervise a great construction project, rebuilding the temple in Jerusalem and the wall of the city, both of which had been destroyed many years before by the armies of Babylon. Yet God called them to these ministries and led them and protected them as they carried them out. They were both careful, then, to give God the credit for what they had accomplished. No less than six times in Ezra and twice in Nehemiah they reminded their readers that God’s hand had been upon them as they supervi...

English: Moses striking the rock (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) “And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ .” ( 1 Corinthians 10:4 ) One of the most amazing miracles recorded in the Bible occurred when Moses smote the rock on Mount Horeb and water came forth sufficient to satisfy all the multitude there in the wilderness ( Exodus 17:6 ). In describing this great event, the psalmist later sang: “He clave the rocks in the wilderness, and gave them drink as out of the great depths. He brought streams also out of the rock, and caused waters to run down like rivers” ( Psalm 78:15-16 ). In our text above, Paul indicates that the miracle had great symbolic significance as well. “That Rock was Christ.” The Greek word used here for “rock” is petra, the same word used by Christ when He said that “upon this rock I will build my church” ( Matthew 16:18 ). Christ is the one foundation upon which the church i...

Jonah was not swallowed by a fish, there was never an exodus, and Moses never existed, according to atheist and biblical scholar Professor Francesca Stavrakopoulou (a Professor of Hebrew Bible and Ancient Religion in the Theology and Religion department at Exeter University ) who appeared on The Weekly on Wednesday evening, making outrageous claims about the Bible. Eternity asked historian John Dickson to respond to some of her comments. Stavrakopoulou claimed that Jonah was not swallowed by a fish, there was never an exodus, and that there’s no evidence for Moses being a historical figure. Should Christians be troubled by her claim that there is no evidence for these events and people? Um, no! If there’s one thing the media has taught us over the last ten years or so it’s that almost nothing that gets aired to the general public represents what mainstream scholars really believe. I don’t think the media is out to get Christians, or scholarship. It’s just that idiosyncratic and ...

Jesus is considered by scholars such as Weber to be an example of a charismatic religious leader. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) No better answer is given in perhaps all the Bible than in the great eleventh chapter of the book of Hebrews . Here a tapestry is unfolded, depicting great examples of faith from the record of Old Testament heroes. In great castles, dark tapestries hang on musty walls to portray the exploits of great knights and lords from long ago, preserving the virtues and valors that made the kingdom great. Hebrews 11 is no musty hallway! It is a spiritual walkway adorned by the weaving of God 's living Word, depicting faith as the key virtue by which God has made His kingdom great. Hebrews 11 is often called the " Hall of Heroes ." But the true hero of this chapter is God who gives faith to His own, by which the smallest of men and women have done great things in His strength. Hebrews 11 shows that faith is so important because God's people are bese...

I Get Money (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Thou shalt not be required to financially support your church – but you should anyway. That’s the upshot of a new informal survey of evangelical leaders finding that less than half believe that the Bible requires church members to tithe , the practice of giving at least 10 percent of one’s income to the church. The survey, conducted by the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) among its 100- member board of directors , found that 42% of evangelical leaders believe the Bible requires tithing, while 58% do not. “The Old Testament called for multiple tithes, sort of combining government taxes with religious stewardship,” NAE President Leith Anderson said, reacting to the survey. “Since there is such a strong tradition of tithing, I was a little surprised that a majority of our evangelical leaders say the tithe system of the Old Testament does not carry over to the New Testament or to us,” Anderson said in a statement. The National Asso...

English: Sara was the wife of Abraham and the mother of Ishmaelas described in the Hebrew Bible and the Quran. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) 2 Samuel 4:4 Generations of scribes, working for the most part in anonymity, have faithfully rendered the Bible as the best preserved work of the ancient world. Although each pen stroke was the result of a scribe’s action, there are in fact very few places where a scribe appears to have  intentionally altered the “received” text. Such changes in the Hebrew Bible are identified by the scribal tradition as tiqqune sopherim (“emendations of the scribes”). Various rabbinic lists enumerate specific emendations, ranging in total from seven to eighteen. Most of these early scribal emendations were introduced based on religious motives in an effort to preserve the sanctity and dignity of the Biblical  text. For example, Genesis 18:22 reports that “the men turned away and went toward Sodom , but Abraham remaine...

The Holy Spirit depicted as a dove, surrounded by angels, by Giaquinto, 1750s. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) The names and titles of the Holy Spirit reveal much to us about who God the Holy Spirit is. Although the name “Holy Spirit” does not appear in the Old Testament , a number of equivalent titles are used. The theological problem of the personality of the Holy Spirit revolves around the issue of progressive revelation and understanding, as well as the reader’s understanding of the nature of the Bible.  The Holy Spirit as member of the Trinity, as revealed in the New Testament, is not revealed in the Hebrew Bible . However, the fact that the doctrine of the Holy Spirit is not fully revealed in the Hebrew Bible does not change the reality of the Holy Spirit’s existence and work in Old Testament times. There has yet to be an audience of God’s self-revelation, both in the Bible and in creation, which has fully comprehended all that God is saying or doing. The post-Resurrecti...