Appendix: Extracts on the Verbal Inspiration of the Scriptures
The following are Extracts on the Verbal Inspiration of the Scriptures, from the Works of Eminent Christian Writers.
Irex,eus, who conversed with Polycarp, the disciple of John, and who himself lived hut a few years after that Apostle, says, “Well knowing that the Scriptures are perfect, as dictated (or spoken) by the word of God, and his Spirit, — a heavy punishment awaits those who add to, or take from, the Scriptures. But we follow the one and only true God, as our teacher; and having his words as a rule of truth, do always speak the same things concerning the same tilings!.”
To the same purpose, Origen, horn in the second century, speaks of it as a common opinion, “That the sacred books are not writings of men, hut have been written and delivered to us from the inspiration of the* Holy Spirit, by the will of the Father of all things, through Jesus Christ.” And again, “The sacred Scriptures come from the fulness of the Spirit; so that there is nothing in the Prophets, or the Law, or the Gospel, and the Epistles, which descends not from the Divine Majesty,” — one and the same Spirit proceeding from the one God, teacheth the like things in the Scriptures written before the coming of Christ, and in the Gospels and Apostles.” “For my part, I believe that not one jot or tittle of the divine instructions is in vain.” “Let us come daily to the wells of the Scriptures, the waters of the Holy Spirit, and there draw and carry home a full vessel.” — Lardner, vol. II. 172, 488, 495.
“It is asked — If in writing, they (the sacred writers) were so acted upon and inspired by the Holy Spirit, both as to the things themselves, and as to the words, that they were free from all error, and that their writings are truly authentic and divine? The adversaries deny this. We affirm it.”
“Scripture proves itself divine from its style; Divine Majesty shining not less from the simplicity than the gravity of its diction.”
“Nor can it easily be believed that God, who has dictated and inspired all and the very words, to men divinely inspired, has not taken care also about the preservation of them all.”*
“But God has instituted the Scripture, partly by revelation, which has been accomplished, 1. By writing, as was shown in the giving of the Law. 2. By commanding, that it might be written, Deut. xxxi. 19. Rev. i. 1 9, 3. By inspiring, 2 Tim. iii. 1 6, that is, by suggesting the things that were to be written, and infallibly directing the writing; so fully, that in all things, whether relating to matters of doctrine or of fact, he not only inspired the things themselves, but has even dictated the very words “f
* Institutio Theologian Francisco Turretino, Vol. 1. p. 70. — “Quseritur — An in scribendo ita acti et inspirati fuerint a Spiritu Sancto, (scriptores sacri,) et quoad res ipsas, et quoad verba, ut ab omni error e immunes fuerint, et scripta ipsorum vere sint authentica et divina? Adversarii negant; nos affirmamus.”
“Scriptura seipsam divinam probat — ex parte styli; Divina Majestas, non minus ex simplicitate quam gravitate dictionis elucens.” Page 71.
<£ Nec facile credi potest, Deum, qui omnia et singula verba viris Szotfvzvtrois dictavit et inspiravit, de omnibus etiam oonservandis non curasse.” Page 80.
f Theologia, &c. Petro Van Mastricht, Vol. I. p. 21. sect.
“The Scripture is principally called the Word of God, on account of the infallible inspiration which belongs to it — to the words equally as to the things, in which, therefore, nothing irrelevant occurs, although God has wisely accommodated himself to the style of each of the amanuenses in writing, as to the sound of the voice in speaking.”*
“The Holy Spirit made use of the pens of the Evangelists, and of the Apostles, for the writings of the New Testament, as he had formerly made use of those of Moses and the Prophets for the Old. He furnished them with the occasions for writing. He gave them the desire, the power to do it. The matter, the form, the order, the economy, the expressions, are of his immediate inspiration, and of his direction.”f
19” Condidit autem Deus scripturam: partim revelatione,
quae peracta est, 1. Scribendo, ut in decalogo conspicuum.
2. Mandando, ut scriberetur, Deut. xxxi. 19. Apoc. i. 19.
3. Inspirando, 2 Tim. iii. 16. h. e. suggerendo scribenda, et infallihiliter dirigendo scriptionem. Usque adeo, ut in omnibus, sive injure versentur, sire in facto; non solum res ipsas inspiraverit, sed etiam singula verba dictarit: partim canonizatione” &c.
* Joharmis Marckii Theologise Medulla, Sec. — “Scriptura verbum Dei praecipue dicitur ob inspirationem infallibilem, 2 Tim. iii. 16. 2 Pet. i. 20, 21, quae pertinet — ad verba denique aeque quam ad res, in quibus proinde nihil ineptioccurrit; etiamsi singulorum xlmanuensium stylo prudenter Deus se accommodaverit in scribendo, aeque quam vocis sono in loquendo.” Page 12 and 13, sect. 5.
f Claude Posthumous Works, Vol. IV. p. 228. —” Le
Saint Esprit s’est servi de la plume des Evangelistes et des Apotres pour les ecritures du NouVeau Testament, comme il fe’eteit autre fois servi de celles de Moyse et des Prophetes pour 1’ Ancien. II leur a fourni les occasions d’ecrire, il leur en a
Hooker, in his first sermon on Jude, says,” God, which lightened thus the eyes of their understanding, giving them knowledge by unusual and extraordinary means, did also miraculously himself frame and fashion tjieir words and writings, insomuch that a greater difference there seemeth not to be between the manner of their knowledge, than there is between
the manner of their speech and ours But God
haih made my mouth like a sword, saith I say. And we have received, saith the Apostle, not the Spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God, that we might know the things lohich are given to us of God, which things also we speak, not in words, which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost doth teach. This is that which the Prophets mean by those books written full, within and without; which books were so often delivered them to eat, not because God fed them with ink and paper, but to teach us, that so oft as he employed them in this heavenly work, they neither spake nor wrote any word of their own, but uttered syllable by syllable as the Spirit put it into their mouths, no otherwise than the harp or the lute doth give a sound according to the discretion of his hands that holdeth and striketh it with skill. The difference is only this: An instrument, whether it be a pipe or harp, maketh a distinction in the times and sounds, which distinction is well perceived of the hearer, the instrument itself undertanding not what is piped or harped. The Prophets and holy men of God not so. * / opened my mouth? saith Ezechiel, c and God reached me a scroul, saying, Son of man, cause thy belly to eat, and
donne le desir et les forces. La matiere, la forme, la ordre, l’oeconomie, les expressions sont de son inspiration immediate et de sa direction,” fill thy bowels with this I give thee. I eat, and it was sweet in my mouth as honey J saith the Prophet. Yea sweeter, I am persuaded, than either honey or the honey comb. For herein they were not like harps or lutes, but they felt, they felt the power and strength of their own words. When they spake of our peace, every corner of their hearts was filled with joy. When they prophesied of mournings, lamentations, and woes to fall upon us, they wept in the bitterness and indignation of spirit, the arm of the Lord being mighty and strong upon them.”
In the dedication of Hooker’s Sermon of Mr Henry Jackson to Mr George Summaster, Principal of Broad-Gates Hall, in Oxford, the former says,” Sir — Your kind acceptance of a former testification of that respect I owe you, hath made me venture to show the world these Godly Sermons under your name. In which, as every point is worth observation, so some especially are to be noted. The first, that, as the spirit of Prophecy is from God himself, who doth inwardly heat and enlighten the hearts and minds of his holy penmen, (which if some would diligently consider, they would not puzzle themselves with the contentions of Scott, and Thomas, whether God only, or his ministering spirits, do infuse into men ’s minds prophetical revelations, per species intelligibiles,) so God framed their words also. Whence the holy father St Augustine religiously observeth, That all those that understand the sacred writers, will also perceive, that they ought not to use other words than they did, in expressing those heavenly mysteries which their hearts conceived, as the Blessed Virgin did our Saviour, by the Holy Ghost:1 — Hooker’s Works, 1662, pp. 283, 4.
Boyle, in his “Considerations touching the Style of the Holy Scriptures,” everywhere asserts that God is the author of the Scriptures, and the writers no more than his secretaries, as page 17. He calls the Holy Ghost
“the writer of the Scriptures, and the method of the Scriptures the Holy Ghost’s way of writing,” p. 56. “The inspired writers had their pens guided by an omniscient hand, and were but the several secretaries of the same enditer,” p. 76. “We are not to believe that so divine an enditer, by secretaries,” &c. p. 79. “The prophetic spirit that endited them,” (the Scriptures,) p. 81. Boyle calls God the author of the Scriptures, p. 122; and next page he calls the Bible “a book published by an omniscient enditer.” The Scriptures are “God’s dictates,” p. 125. “Amongst the thirteen articles of the Jewish creed, one acknowledges the very expressions of the Law, (or Pentateuch,) to have been inspired by God,” pp. 128, 129. “He vouchsafes to speak to us in almost as glorious a manner as he did to Moses” p. 133. And speaking against profaneness, as it relates to the Scriptures, he says, “and perhaps passing to the impudence of perverting inspired expressions,” p. 178.
Dr Owen, in his Exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews, Exercitation 1, expresses himself as follows. “And thus, not this or that part, but 2 Timothy, iii. 16, all Scripture was given by inspiration. And herein all the parts or books of it are absolutely equal. And in the going out of the whole, 2 Pet. i. 21, holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. So that whatever different means God at any time might make use of, in the communication of his mind and will unto any of the prophets or penmen of the Scripture, it was this divine inspiration, and being acted by the Holy Ghost both as to things and words, that rendered them infallible revealers of him unto the church. And thus the foundation of the canonical authority of the books of the Scripture, is absolutely the same in and unto them all, without the least variety either from any difference in kind or degree.”
Dr Owen says, in his book “Of the Divine Originail, with the authority, self-evidencing power, and light of the Holy Scriptures” p. o, 10,” The various ways of special Revelation, by Dreams, Visions, Audible Voices,, Inspirations, with that peculiar one of the Law-giver, under the Old Testament, called face to
face, Exod. xxxiii. 11, Deut. xxxiv. 10, and Numbers, xi. S, with that which is compared with it, and exalted above it, (Heb. i. 1, ‘2, 3,) in the New, by the Son,
from the bosom of the Father, John, i. 17, 18, are not of my present consideration, all of them belonging to the manner of the thing inquired after, not the thing itself.
“By the assertion then laid down of God speaking in the prophets of old, from the beginning to the end of that long tract of time, consisting of 1000 years, wherein he gave out the writings of the Old Testament; two things are ascertained unto us, which are the foundation of our present discourse.
“1. That the Laws they made known, the Doctrines they delivered, the Instructions they gave, the Stories they recorded, the Promises of Christ, the Prophecies of Gospel times they gave out, and revealed, were not their own, not conceived in their Jlinds, not formed by their Reasonings, not retained in their Memories from what they had heard, not by any means beforehand comprehended by them, (1 Pet. i. 10, 11,) but were all of them immediately from God; there being only a passive concurrence of their rational faculties in their reception, without any such active obedience, as by any Law they might be obliged unto, Hence, -dly, God was so with them, and by the Holy Ghost so spake in them, as to their receiving of the word from him, and their delivering of it unto others by speaking or writing, as that they were not themselves enabled by any habitual light, knowledge or conviction of Truth, to declare his Mind and Will, but only acted as they were immediately moved by him. Their
Tongue in what they said, or their hand in what they wrote, was no more at their own disposal, than the Pen is, in the hand of an expert Writer,
“Hence, as far as their own Personal concernments, as Saints and Believers, did lie in them, they are said to make a diligent inquiry into and investigation of the things, which the Spirit of Christ that spake in themselves did signify, 1 Pet. i. 10, 11. Without this, though their Visions were express, so that in them their eyes were said to be open, Numb. xxiv. 3, 4; yet they understood them not. Therefore also, they studied the Writings and Prophecies of one another, Dan. ix. 2. Thus they attained a saving useful habitual knowledge of the Truths delivered by themselves and others, by the Illumination of the Holy Ghost, through the Study of the Word, even as we, Psalm cxix. 104. But as to the receiving of the Word from God, as God spake in them, they obtained nothing by Study or Meditation by inquiry or reading, Amos, vii. 1 5. Whether we consider the matter or manner of what they received and delivered, or their receiving and delivering of it, they were but as an instrument of Music, giving a sound according to the hand, intention, and skill of him that strikes it.
“This is variously expressed. Generally it is said, the word was to this, or that prophet, which we have rendered, the word came unto them. Ezek. i. 3. It came expressly. It had a subsistence given unto it, or an effectual in-being, by the Spirit’s entering into him, verse 14. Now this coming of the word unto them, had oftentimes such a greatness, and expression of the majesty of God upon it, as it filled them with dread and reverence of him, Hob. iii. 16, and also greatly affected even their outward man, Ban. viii. 27. But this dread and terror (which Satan strove to imitate, in his filthy Tripodes,) was peculiar to the Old Testament, and belonged to the pcedagogie thereof; Heb. xii.
18, 19, 20, 21. The Spirit in the declaration of the New Testament, gave out his mind and will in a way of more liberty and glory. 2 Cor. 3. The expressness and immediacy of revelation was the same; but the manner of it related more to that glorious liberty in fellowship and communion with the Father, whereunto believers had then an access provided them by Jesus Christ. Heb. ix. 8. ch. x. 19, 20. ch. xii. 23, 24. So our Saviour tells his Apostles, Matt, x, 20, You are not the speakers of what you deliver, as other men are, the figment and imagination of whose hearts are the fountain of all that they speak; and he adds this reason, The Spirit of the Father (is) he that speaketh in you. Thus the word that came unto them, was a book which they took in, and gave out without any alteration of one tittle or syllable. Ezek. ii. 8, 9, 10, 11. ch. iii. 3. Revel, x. 9, 10, 11.
“Moreover, when the icord was thus come to the prophets, and God had spoken in them, it was not in their power to conceal it, the hand of the Lord being strong upon them. They were not now only on a general account to utter the truth they were made acquainted withall, and to speak the things they had heard and seen, which was their common preaching work according to the analogie of what they had received; Acts, iv. 20; but also the very individual words that they had received were to be declared. When the word w&scometo them, it was as a fire within them, that must be delivered, or it would consume them, Fsal. xxxix. 3; Jer. xx. 9; Amos, iii. 8. chap. vii. 15, 16. So Jonah found his attempt to hide the word that he had received, to be altogether vain.”
Estius, in his commentary on the words, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God” says, “It is rightly and most truly concluded from this place, that all the sacred and canonical Scripture is written by the dictate of the Holy Spirit, in such a manner certainly, that not only the sentiments, but also the particular words, and the order of the words, (verba singula et verborum ordo,) and all the arrangement, is from God speaking as by himself — for this is the meaning of the expression — that Scripture is divinely inspired.” The theologians in the University of Douay, in which Estius taught theology, had made a decree of the above tenor, directly condemning Simon’s opinion on the subject, and the Father Jesuits of Louvain. Here, then, is the decree of a whole University in support of the verbal inspiration of the Scriptures. These Douay Divines declared that they had examined the propositions of the Jesuits of Louvain, by order of the Archbishop of Cambray and of Malines, and of the Bishop of Gand.
The above extracts are not given in the way of authority; on such a subject no authority except that of the Scriptures is admissible. They are introduced in opposition to the assertions of those who speak as if the verbal inspiration of the Bible was a novel doctrine.