IN SPITE of what God has done through Christ, the Incarnate Word, men still assume to criticize His teachings and actions. This is always blasphemous. Ellen White stated more than once that she considered it an unwise as well as a dangerous practice to criticize the Scriptures, God's Inspired Word. Her meaning is subject to little debate:
Brethren, let not a mind or hand be engaged in criticizing the Bible. It is a work that Satan delights to have any of you do, but it is not a work the Lord has pointed out for you to do.1
She regarded this type of study as presumptuous and speaks of it as bordering on blasphemy:
When men venture to criticize the Word of God, they venture on sacred, holy ground, and had better fear and tremble and hide their wisdom as foolishness. God sets no man to pronounce judgment on His Word, selecting some things as inspired and discrediting others as uninspired. The testimonies have been treated in the same way; but God is not in this.2
In fact, Mrs. White held those who thought that they had found apparent contradictions in the Bible, and who voiced their sentiments to others, to be actually ignorant of the true facts in the matter:
Those who take only a surface view of the Scriptures will, with their superficial knowledge, which they think is very deep, talk of the contradictions of the Bible, and question the authority of the Scriptures.3
In another place she indicated that it is contrary to God's will for His children to try to judge the merits or demerits of parts of the Scriptures. She declared:
And He [God] has not, while presenting the perils clustering about the last days, qualified any finite man to unravel hidden mysteries or inspired one man or any class of men to pronounce judgment as to that which is inspired or is not. When men, in their finite judgment, find it necessary to go into an examination of Scriptures to define that which is inspired and that which is not, they have stepped before Jesus to show Him a better way than He has led us.4
These sentiments take on a far deeper significance when we consider the context in which they were written. In the Review and Herald5 study was given to the subject of "degrees of inspiration." The point was made that Ruth, Proverbs, Song of Solomon, and Job are inspired in a way that is lower than that of the law of Moses or the discourses of Christ.6 In fact, Butler stated that Job is hardly inspired, or possesses "a very modified form of inspiration."7 The historical books are not inspired to the same degree as prophetic books.8 Butler observed that Luke 1:1-3 needs no inspiration! In short, "this form of inspiration a spiritual invigoration of the memory is all the inspiration necessary to furnish us with the most reliable facts upon which to found our faith."9
Almost the entire article of May 6 was devoted to demonstrating the unreasonableness, nay, impossibility, of verbal inspiration. In the next article of May 27, Butler showed a remarkable grasp of neo-orthodox views! He went to great lengths to demonstrate that the Bible was a moral book designed solely to aid in our journey to heaven. "The Bible is not," he stated, "complete or perfect as a historical narrative."10 In his final article he wrote:
But we have shown also from the Bible itself that so far as clearness and fullness of light is concerned relative to history and prophecy, and things not directly connected with moral principles and our salvation, there is a degree of obscurity and imperfection.11
He then went on to demonstrate pas sages in which these imperfections occurred, and observed: "There are, in some few instances at least, in the Scriptures writings which we could hardly call inspired." 12 He listed several.13 Then he repeats that "... a degree of human imperfection is in some instances discernible in it in reference to points which are not specially connected with moral duty."14 The article ends with the usual neo-orthodox plea to accept the message of God contained in the Bible and live by it!
Mrs. White's response to these articles was clear and emphatic:
Both in the [Battle Creek] Tabernacle and in the college the subject of inspiration has been taught, and finite men have taken it upon them selves to say that some things in the Scriptures were inspired and some were not. I was shown that the Lord did not inspire the articles on inspiration published in the Review, neither did He approve their endorsement before our youth in the college.15
Her advice against this method of assessing the merits or demerits of portions of the Scriptures is found in the following sentences:
Those who think to make the supposed difficulties of Scripture plain, in measuring by their finite rule that which is inspired and that which is not inspired, had better cover their faces, as Elijah when the still small voice spoke to him; for they are in the presence of God and holy angels, who for ages have communicated to men light and knowledge, telling them what to do and what not to do, unfolding before them scenes of thrilling interest, waymark by waymark in symbols and signs and illustrations.16
Ellen G. White consistently felt that the Scriptures were far more than a book to be studied in the same way as other books. She testified:
It is one thing to treat the Bible as a book of good moral instruction, to be heeded so far as is consistent with the spirit of the times and our position in this world; it is another thing to regard it as it really is the word of the living God the word that is our life, the word that is to mold our actions, our words, and our thoughts. To hold God's Word as anything less than this is to reject it.17
Conclusion
The criterion by which the devoted Christian may judge what is actually the inspired revelation of God's will is not dependent on any study of conflicting manuscripts. The variants do not affect any vital truth. But this line of critical investigation often engenders more problems and causes more questions than it solves. The true significance of any Scripture passage whose meaning is not clear in one manuscript may be ascertained by a careful comparison of its individual words or general statement, with the cumulative import of other Scripture passages bearing upon the theme in question. The criterion is the inspired statement, "To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." 18 And in this exposition there will always be found a divine harmony of Scripture teaching.19
It should never be overlooked that "the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets." 20 Then what is in accord with the import of the rest of the Scriptures is true whether it has the support of the cur rent favorite among what may be considered by some the "best" manuscripts. The Bible is the library of God's revealed will. It is given to man in language precisely gauged to meet his mind and his needs, and is the only infallible revelation of the way of salvation. We should receive it and cherish it as such.
God has not made the reception of the gospel to depend upon human reasoning. The gospel is adapted for spiritual food, to satisfy man's spiritual appetite. In every case it is just what man needs. Those who have felt it necessary to have the students in our schools study many authors are themselves the most ignorant on the great themes of the Bible. The teachers themselves need to take up the Book of all books, and learn from the Scriptures that the gospel has power to prove its own divinity to the humble, contrite mind.21
Humility and submissive acceptance of God's truth will pave the path to rewarding Bible study.
The following statement epitomizes Ellen G. White's abiding confidence in God's infallible Word:
Our only safety is in receiving the whole Bible, not taking merely detached portions, but believing the whole truth. Your feet are upon sliding sand if you depreciate one word that is written. The Bible is a divine communication, and is as verily a message to the soul as though a voice from heaven were heard speaking to us. With what awe and reverence and humiliation should we come to the searching of the Scriptures, that we may learn of eternal realities. . . .
Let everyone study the Bible, knowing that the Word of God is as enduring as the eternal throne. If you come to the study of the Scriptures in humility, with earnest prayer for guidance, angels of God will open to you its living realities; and if you cherish the precepts of truth, they will be to you as a wall of fire against the temptation, delusions, and enchantments of Satan.22
REFERENCES
1. Selected Messages, book 1, p. 17.
2. Ibid., p. 23.
3. Ibid., p. 20.
4. Ibid., p. 17.
5. Ten articles by G. I. Butler on "Inspiration" were published in the Review and Herald in 1884.
6. Ibid., Jan. 15, p. 42; April 22, p. 266.
7. Ibid., April 22, p. 266.
8. Ibid., April 15, p. 249.
9. Ibid., p. 250.
10. Ibid., May 27, p. 345. '
11. Ibid., June 3, p. 361.
12. Ibid.
13. Tim. 4:9ff; Rom. 15:24; 1 Cor. 1:16; 4:19; 16:5-9: 7:7 10, 12; 2 Cor. 1:15-17; Phil, 2:19, 23.
14. Ibid., p. 362.
15. Selected Messages, book 1 p. 23.
16. Ibid., p. 17.
17. Education, p. 260.
18. Isa. 8:20.
19. Selected Messages, book 1, p. 22: the Scriptures are "without contradiction."
20. 1 Cor. 14:32.
21. Ibid., p. 245.
22. Ellen G. White, Our High Calling, p. 210.
