Martin Luther and John Calvin held high views of Scripture that saw the Bible as the divinely inspired and inerrant Word of God. However, over subsequent centuries philosophical movements like rationalism, skepticism, and evolutionism influenced destructive biblical criticism that rejected the supernatural aspects and authority of Scripture. This manifested in theological criticisms from scholars like Strauss and Wellhausen that undermined the historicity and reliability of the Bible. The result has been serious attacks on the inspiration, inerrancy, and credibility of Scripture and Christianity.

1. CHAPTERS 18-21
PowerPoints prepared by Dr. Mark E. Hardgrove

2. The Historical Church on the Bible

3. Martin Luther (1483-1546)
 Origin of Scripture: Believed the Bible
came from God through the
instrumentality of the men God used.
 The Bible is the Word of God: Luther
wrote, “This is exactly as it is with God.
His word is so much like himself, that
the godhead is wholly in it, and he who
has the word has the whole godhead.”

4. Martin Luther
 The Bible is Words from God: “The
Scriptures, although they too are written
by men, are neither of men nor from
men but from God.”
 The Divinely Authoritative Nature of
Scripture: “Nothing but God’s Word
alone should be preached in
Christendom.”

5. Martin Luther
 The Infallibility and Inerrancy of
Scripture: “My friend, God’s Word is
God’s Word; this point does not require
much haggling!”
 The Scriptures are a Revelation of
Christ: “Here you will find the swaddling
clothes and the manger in which Christ
lies, and to which the angel points the
shepherds.”

6. Martin Luther
 The Bible is Scientifically Accurate:
Luther was so convinced of the scientific
accuracy of the Bible that he even cited
it as believing that the sun actually
moves around the earth.
 The Bible is Self-Consistent: He was
so convinced that the Bible could not err
that he found it difficult to accept James,
since James appeared to him to
contradict other Scripture.

7. John Calvin (1509-1564)
 The Origin of Scripture: Calvin believed
the Bible found its ultimate source in
God; the very words of the Bible came
from the mouth of God, though through
the instrumentality of man
 The Words of the Bible are from God
Calvin stated that “the Bible has come
down to us from the mouth of God.”

8. John Calvin
 The Bible is Conveyed Through
Humans: Calvin says of the apostles and
other authors of the Bible that “they were
sure and authentic amanuenses of the
Holy Spirit; and, therefore, their writing
are to be regarded as the oracles of
God.”
 Scripture Has Divine Authority: The
Bible has divine authority and inerrancy.

9. The Evangelical Tradition
 Ulrich Zwingli (1484-1531): Agreed with
the majority of Reformers on the issues
of inspiration and authority of Scriptures.
 John Knox (1513-1572): Believed in the
inspiration and authority of Scripture.
 Francis Turretin (1623-1687):
Influenced by the work of Calvin also
maintained the inspiration and authority
of Scripture.

10. The Evangelical Tradition
 The Synod at Dort (1618-19):
This Word of God was not sent nor derived
by the will of man, but holy men of God
spake as they were moved by the Holy
Ghost, as the apostle Peter saith . . .
Afterwards God, from a special care which
he has for us and for our salvation,
commanded his servants, the Prophets and
Apostles with his own finger the two tables of
the law. Therefore we call such writings holy
and divine Scriptures.

11. The Westminster Tradition
(1538-1918)
 The Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of
England became the official view of the
Church of England (1571) and Ireland (1615).
These articles affirm the following:
Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary
to salvation: so that whatsoever is not read
therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to
be required of any man, that should be
believed as an article of the Faith, or be
thought requisite or necessary of salvation.

12. The Westminster Tradition
(1538-1918)
 The Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church
of England go on to affirm the inspiration
and authority of Scripture.
The authority of Scripture, for which it
ought to be believed and obeyed,
dependeth not upon the testimony of any
man or church, but wholly upon God (who
is truth itself), the Author thereof . . .

13. The Wesleyan Tradition
(1703-1791)
 The Twenty-Five Articles of Religion
(1784): Affirms “the sufficiency of the Holy
Scriptures for Salvation.”
 Wesley frequently affirmed his belief in the
inspiration and authority of Scripture as “the
oracles of God,” written by “men divinely
inspired.”
 Wesleyan Adam Clark (1760-1832) affirmed
his belief in the plenary inspiration and
infallibility of Scripture as “the only complete
directory of faith and practice of man.”

14. Other Traditions
 Anabaptists and Baptists (1524-1918)
the leaders of this tradition likewise
affirmed the inspiration and authority of
Scripture. Though avoiding creedal
statements, they did affirm, that “the
Holy Scripture is the only sufficient,
certain and infallible rule of the all-
saving knowledge.”

15. Other Traditions
 Roman Catholic councils, namely The
Council of Vatican I, proclaimed the
inerrancy of Scripture saying:
They contain revelation without error
because having been written by the
inspiration of the Holy Spirit they have
God as their author.

16. Other Traditions
 Eastern Orthodox View (1643-1918) has
maintained a high view of the authority
of Scripture, in line with both the Roman
Catholic and Protestant view.

17. Summary and Conclusion
 There is virtually unanimous consent
that the Bible is the divinely inspired,
infallible, and inerrant Word of God.

18. The History of Destructive Biblical Criticism

19. Philosophical Roots of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 Inductivism: Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
Separated the realm of reason and science
from the realm of faith and religion.
 Materialism: Thomas Hobbs (1588-1679)
Launched an attack on orthodox religion in
the form of a defense of the English
monarchy. He proposed
desupernaturalized view of the Gospels
and argued that miracles are not essential
to religion.

20. Philosophical Roots of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 Antisupernaturalism: Benedict Spinoza
(1632-1677). A Jewish pantheist operating
from a rationalistic naturalistic framework of
thought. He insisted on the universal,
exceptionless nature of natural law, and
form this concluded that miracles are not
possible. He was engaged in a systematic
antisupernatural criticism of the Bible.

21. Philosophical Roots of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 Skepticism: David Hume (1711-1776). He
advanced skepticism in the modern world.
Hume rejected the claim that Scripture is
inspired or that the Bible is an authoritative
revelation of God to humanity. He also
denied the deity of Christ and rejected the
miracles as he sought to make theology the
subject of empirical testing.

22. Philosophical Roots of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 Agnosticism: Immanuel Kant (1724-1804).
Considered by many to the crossroad thinker
of modern philosophy. He synthesized the two
dominant but conflicting modes of thought of
the Enlightenment—empiricism and rationalism
—into an intellectual whole. He argued that
the mind “knows” only after it constructs the
data of experience, not before. Hence, we
know only what appears to us, not that which
really is. We cannot know the real world. He
reasoned that miracles do not occur and as
such rejected the Resurrection account of the
Gospels.

23. Philosophical Roots of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 Romanticism (1780-1840). In the late 18th
Century the dominance of reason, as
unemotional and intellectual questioning
swept away ancient superstitions and
abuses. However a shift in opposition to
that cold reasoning position arose, called
romanticism. It emphasized great people
and heroic movements of the past rather
than ideas and institution.

24. Philosophical Roots of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 Deism (1625-1800). Deism is theism minus
the miracles, or “theistic naturalism.” It is
the idea that God got the universe going
and then left it to run on its own without
divine intervention of any kind. As such the
miracles are denied, including the
Resurrection of Christ and the inspiration of
Scripture.

25. Philosophical Roots of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 Transcendentalism: Georg Wilhelm
Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831). From Kant,
Hegel concluded that we must begin with
phenomena of experience and use
transcendental method to arrive at truth. He
believed both the content and form of all
knowledge was transcendentally necessary
to posit as a condition for knowing. He saw
history as God’s self-unfolding in the
temporal world, the progressive overcoming
of the world by Absolute Spirit.

26. Philosophical Roots of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
Scientism: Auguste Comte (1798-1857). Was
the father of the naturalistic view known as
“positivism,” which was one of the early
forms of secular humanism.
Employing Kant’s antimetaphysical
agnosticism with Hegel’s historical
developmentalism, Comte developed his
law of growth, viewing human progression
from theological (child-ancient), to
metaphysical (youth-medieval), to
positivistic (adulthood-modern).

27. Philosophical Roots of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
Scientism: Auguste Comte (1798-1857).
Comte disliked Protestantism, pronouncing
it negative and productive of intellectual
anarchy.
In effect, Comte deified the scientific method,
yet he protested that others had deified
nature. Scientism was for him the method
for discovering truth. He rejected absolute
morality such as is taught in Scripture.

28. Philosophical Roots of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
Evolutionism: Spencer and Darwin (1860 - )
Spencer, following Comte and John Stewart
Mill was the first to provide an overall
philosophical framework for evolution. He
believed that the Darwinian hypothesis
could be used to explain everything in the
physical universe.

29. Philosophical Roots of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
Evolutionism: Darwin (1809 -1882).
Darwin was baptized in the Church of England and
was sent to school conducted by a Unitarian
minister. He entered the University of Cambridge
where his father had decided to prepare him for
the ministry.
Later he rejected the theistic view and denied that the
Bible was an unanswerable authority on science.
His declining Christian beliefs began with an
erosion of his belief in the trustworthiness of the
Bible.
He eventually became a Deist and saw evolution as
the plan of a Deistic god. Later he embrace an
agnostic worldview.

30. Religious Roots of Destructive
Biblical Criticism
 Pietism (1650-1725) Stressed the primary
importance of feeling, thus opening the
door to subjectivism.
 Liberalism (F. Schleiermacher, 1768-1834)
Held that basis of religion is found in
experience. Believed that all men have
religious feeling of dependence on the All;
thus there are no real atheists. Real
religion is better caught than taught.

31. Religious Roots of Destructive
Biblical Criticism
 Liberalism (F. Schleiermacher, 1768-1834)
Believed that religions are neither true nor false
as such. He was reacting to the primacy of
scientific proof and appealing to religious
feeling as a criterion of truth.
 He greatly influenced Christianity through three
major achievements: 1) made religion
acceptable to those who no longer took the
Bible seriously, 2) attracted those who were
interested in religions as an expression of the
imaginative spirit, 3) for a time, changed biblical
criticism from historical to literary analysis.

32. Religious Roots of Destructive
Biblical Criticism
 Existentialism: Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855)
The father of modern existentialism. A Danish
Christian who was orthodox enough that he could
have signed a statement subscribing to the historic
fundamentals of the faith. He wrote, “On the
whole, the doctrine as it is taught [in the church] is
entirely sound.”
He argued that religious truth is found in the
encounter with the divine. He argued that
propositional truth is not essential to the faith, that
higher criticism is not threat to real Christianity, and
since God is “wholly other” and unknowable, even
through biblical revelation.

33. Religious Roots of Destructive
Biblical Criticism
 Existentialism: Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855)
I [Dr. Hardgrove] would argue that in many
respect Geisler misrepresents Kierkegaard and
that Geisler’s penchant for objective truth forces
him to reject any element of subjectivism that
might be classified as “feeling.” Kierkegaard
would argue that having taken the leap of faith
and embracing God as revealed in Scripture,
no argument from any source of criticism can
shake that subjective knowledge of the truth of
the experience.

34. Theological Manifestations of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 Richard Simon (1638-1712): Denied Moses
wrote the Pentateuch.
 Jean Astruc (1684-1766): Argued that Genesis
1 and 2 were written by two different authors,
emphasizing the distinctions between such
words as Elohom, Yahweh Elohim, and El-
Elyon.
 Johann Salomo Semler (1729-1791): First to
advocate the accommodation theory, which set
the stage for the rise of the historical-critical
method.

35. Theological Manifestations of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 Gotthold Epharim Lessing (1729-1781).
Claimed the to expose the Gospel accounts of
Jesus as a piece of fraud because of their
alleged unfulfilled eschatological prediction.
Rejected miracles and revelation.
 Johann Gottfried Eichorn (1752-1827): Used
the term “higher criticism” later known as
“literary criticism,” to make scientific
comparisons between the biblical books and
other Semitic writings. Divided the Jehovist
and the Elohist sources of the Pentateuch.

36. Theological Manifestations of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 Heinrich E. G. Paulus (1761-1851): In his
Life of Jesus he attempted to reconcile his
belief in the substantial accuracy of the
Gospel narrative with his personal disbelief
in miracles and the supernatural.
 Wilhelm M. L. De Wette (1780-1849): A
radical rationalist who turned to theological
studies. He doubted the miracles of the
Bible reducing stories of Jesus to myths.

37. Theological Manifestations of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 David Friedrich Strauss (1808-1874):
Following Hume’s lead, he published his
famous desupernaturalized Life of Jesus.
He simply threw out the miracles of the Old
and New Testaments. His work, The Old
Faith and the New (1872), was the first
theological work to accept Darwinian
evolutionism.

38. Theological Manifestations of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 Karl E. Graf, Abraham Kuenen, and Julius
Wellhausen: These men continued the trend
in rejecting the miraculous and embracing
evolutionism as well as Hegelian
dialecticism.
 The Wellhausen tradition continued in 20th
century theology with uncertainties
expressed concerning the camparative
dating of the “documents” of the Bible.

39. Theological Manifestations of
Destructive Biblical Criticism
 F. C. Baur (1792-1860): Baur reduced what
he believed were the authentic Pauline
Epistles to four (Romans, 1 and 2
Corinthians) and denied the genuineness of
most other NT books.
 Rudolf Bultmann (1884-1976) developed an
antisupernatural form of demythologizing the
NT.

40. Results of Destructive Biblical
Criticism
 The historicity, inspiration, and inerrancy
of the Bible has been seriously attacked
through these destructive biblical
criticisms.
 Many evangelical scholars have bought
into the philosophical presuppositions of
negative higher criticism.
 If miracles do not occur then the Bible is
unreliable and historic Christianity is not
credible.