These questions, and others like them, are the basis of seven historical views. The following outline categorizes the seven views regarding the death of Christ and the mechanics of the atonement.  I present these views with a special emphasis on the newest of the seven: Liberation Theology (being the theology of President Obama’s Chicago church, Trinity United Church of Christ — in mentioning him, I mean no disrespect, I simply desire to articulate one aspect of theology his church teaches).

I assure you, if you are an American, Liberation Theology deserves your attention. It has come along to explain the death of Jesus as a paradigm for reform movements. It holds that Jesus is the paradigm for those who champion the cause of so-called oppressed classes.

I have divided the seven views of the atonement into three sections (A. B. and C.). Each section represents a worldview that gives emphasis to some aspect of the Bible. Section A outlines the Atonement from its legal aspects. Most conservatives have a legal worldview with a strong sense of exact justice and adherence to equal application of law. These folks would hold to one of the views of the atonement listed under this first division.

Liberals tend to emphasize freedom, love and tender feelings for the oppressed; they may lean to the second division, Section B, which represents a more social worldview.

While categorizing these, I found it interesting that Calvinistic and Arminian lines are also detectable among the divisions. Calvinistic Protestants, for example, have majored on ideas represented in Section A.

The final division, Section C., holds its own place. To keep this as an outline, I won’t elaborate on any of these seven elements in great detail (and some, not at all).

With each view, I will name one author who is well known for starting or popularizing the view. For each group, I list the basic Worldview and the Biblical-Center most emphasized.

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A. Legal View (Tending to Calvinistic and Conservative)

Legal views of the cross of Christ explain that his death was a legal transaction of some sort,  “Western theology has witnessed a juridicizing of the human-divine relationship” (Boersma, p. 183).

1. The Ransom View, Mark 10:45 (Origen, AD 210)

2. The Satisfaction/Debt View (Anselm, AD 1098, Cur Deus Homo)

3. The Penal-Substitution View (Vicar/Vicarious)

a. By sinning, man has committed a cosmic offence against God

b. The magnitude of a crime is proportional to the one against whom the crime is committed

c. Only a human can be penalized for sin, and a human must offer satisfaction for human sin

d. A finite creature cannot offer anything near the magnitude required to bring satisfaction

e. A substitute is needed: The divine God-Man must offer satisfaction for the sins of his people if there will be any

Legal Views
Biblical Center: God’s Glory vs. Man’s Sin
Worldview: Retributive justice and Human Culpability

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B. Social Views (Tending to Arminian and Liberalism)

Social Views are not completely wrong, over and against the above legal views of the Cross. There are aspects of truth in all the views, but mistakes are made when a wrong emphasis is placed upon the social aspects.

4. The Governmental View (Grotius, AD 1610)

5. The Moral Influence View (Peter Abelard, AD 1110)

6. Liberation Theology View

a. Latin American (Roman Catholic, AD 1955)

b. Native American (Gustavo Gutierrez, AD 1971—Notre Dame)

c. African American (James Cone, AD 1969)

Social Views
Biblical Center: Care for the Disadvantaged: Retelling the Exodus Story
Worldview: Redistributive Justice and Human Worth

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C. The Biblical-Theological Way

This final division of the seven views may be the more ancient of the ideas (at least most well represented among the Church Fathers), and has seen a resurgence of late.

7. Christus Victor View (Irenaeus, AD 160)

a. The Story of Forces (God vs. The Universe)

b. The Alignment of Forces

c. Salvation: Defeat of Satan, Victory of God’s Image and his Forces

d. Incarnation of God Entering the Battle (an Exodus)

e. The Unexpected God: The Hidden God is the Revealed God

Christus Victor
Biblical Center:God’s Glory in The Incarnation as a Recapitulation of the Exodus Story and OT types
Worldview: Divine Self-Vindication in a Human

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Liberation theology is able to use the Exodus story for every story that involves a hero or a champion who comes to the rescue of the disadvantaged. And this is where it goes wrong. In contrast, the Chrisus Victor view sees the Exodus story finding its meaning one time and one time only in the death and resurrection of Jesus. The OT finds its “yes” and “amen” in Jesus as an end unto himself. Instead, Liberation Theology puts Jesus as the best example of all liberators, meaning he stands beside Martin Luther King, Jr., or anyone else who is the voice of a people needing relief.

The death of Jesus in Liberation Theology is mostly a paradigm for showing us that the real work is that of helping the least — the poor, the outcast and the hurting. That is, his death is not primarily salvation of souls, nor is it about God securing his glory (in and of itself), but is a program for the material causes in the world. The material needs of the disadvantaged classes must be addressed. In an economic way, that is through the redistribution of materials (i.e., material justice). It is also a redistribution of power, so that class differences can be erased. Liberation Theology takes Marxism and calls it Christianity.

An equitable and measurable redistribution of wealth becomes the key way of determining freedom and liberation within this rival view of the Cross. The first three views of the atonement (the legal views) dealt with retributive justice; Liberation Theology deals with power and material redistributive justice.

Liberation Theology is appealing to Americans today, and is growing. It is being called the Gospel by its adherents — it is the theology of many people and one must understand its basis so that it can be refuted for what it is: another Gospel. Liberation Theology turns the death of Christ into the death of the Gospel. Instead of a risen savior emerging from the grave, they have Marxism coming to life to dethrone anyone who has means, authority or power.

When God cursed Satan, he said that the Devil was consigned to eat dust — עָפָר — and the wordplay is no accident (Gen 3:14). Demons consume humans. We are their food (see C. S. Lewis and his Screwtape Letters). Demons eat dust; they consume us. Humans are the sustenance of Satan and his friends. We are their nourishment. They feed on our souls. The demonic minions find energy in taking that which belongs to God.

But not all humans fuel the demons. Some humans are captured for the worship of Christ. Some humans move beyond the curse, and are translated into the kingdom of light. Jesus takes the demonic dust and turns it into glory. Demon-food proves useful to the Great King. Jesus takes enemies and makes them friends. He captures dust for his glory, and raises up worshipers from the ashes. He plunders Satan’s pantry, and makes brothers out of enemies.

Answer: All of them.

Attached are the notes for a sermon (or Bible study) on Psalm 147, written to relate all the parts to Christ. The first page (a PDF file) has notes for use by the teacher, and the second PDF is a one-page handout to accompany.

Introductory Remarks

Every Psalm is Christo-centric — i.e., centered on Christ. That means, when Jesus was reading the Psalms, he was reading about himself, and that’s how he quotes them (always). He was identifying with King David, for David was but anticipating the reality of Jesus. Jesus, in a few places, spoke of scripture working this way. Jesus was clear: The Old Testament is about Jesus.

In this way, each Psalm is to be read with Christ at the center of our understanding. Jesus is at the center of our understanding of God, History, Israel, Kingship, Suffering, Hardship, Praise, etc., and all of this is captured by the Psalms. But the Psalms were written before Jesus came in flesh. So how can this be?

The Psalms are part of the shadow-world which foretold his arrival. To that end, Israel was a copy of the reality that was to come. The reality has arrived, and where Israel was called God’s son (Exodus 4:22), they but anticipated the reality where Jesus proves to be the true Son. And this way of reckoning extends in every direction: Israel’s temple was preparing us for Jesus, the true Temple; Israel’s king was preparing us for the true (lasting) King; Israel’s high priest was preparatory for Christ, the eternal High Priest (Hebrews 5-8).

The Old Testament is the shadow that was cast by the standing of the resurrected Christ. Jesus rose up from the grave, and his shadow extends backwards as the Old Testament. Strangely, the shadow appeared first as the King strode over the horizon onto this plane of fleshly incarnation. Jesus emerged from eternity past, and his shadow came before him. When he appeared, we discovered that the shadow of the Old Testament was found to map to the reality which is God-in-flesh.

The Psalms are now seen in the reality of Incarnated-Deity. To that end, I put in one column the text of Psalm 147, and in the other column I put New Testament verses which map shadow to reality. To present this material, one need only read a verse in the Psalm column, and then see how it consummates in Jesus as per the New Testament column (which also lists other Old Testament verses that had been preparing us for the same conclusion).

I hope all of this will aid us in reading the scriptures in the light of Christ. Jesus was revealed in flesh, and he is the paradigm for understanding the Old Testament; we don’t just have the Old Testament, we have the Resurrection of Jesus and the New Testament as well! And so we look back at what was once only known as shadow, and we read it in the light of the Risen King. All the Psalms are to be read with this understanding, and to that end, Psalm 147 is here presented so that we can fix our gaze upon Jesus.

Note: The perspective of the sermon notes come from a reformed and covenantal, amillennial, Vosian (Gerhardus Vos) and Klineian (Merdith G. Kline) view of redemptive-history. If you know what all that means, great, but if not, the notes are still highly useful and are devoid of such technical terms.

Why Johnny Can’t Preach. By T. David Gordon. New Jersey: P&R Publishing, 2009, 108 pp., $9.99 on Amazon.

Dr. Gordon was diagnosed with stage III cancer. Uncertain of how long he had left to live, he wrote what he thought could be his last contribution to the world, Why Johnny Can’t Preach. He survived the cancer, but his last 30 years of sermon analysis reveals a worse disease that persists. As a conservative Christian who loves Jesus and the preaching of the Word, his diagnosis is that the American Church is plagued by ministers who can’t preach.

He writes from within the Reformed and Presbyterian world where pastors are required to be seminary graduates able to pass Hebrew and Greek exams. Within that tradition, with its high regard for the original texts of scripture, he concludes that most ministers are not skilled in handling the bible. It is not the fault of the seminaries, he argues, but the fault of the students who arrive at seminary incapable of dealing with literary works.

Our image-based systems of communication have shaped the culture, and that culture is the matrix from which we obtain pastors. Pastors are not conversant in written texts because they swim in images. The rub comes when they try to converse about the sacred texts.

An unskilled preacher reads the bible the same way he reads a computer manual, sports magazine or newspaper. The bible, it turns out, is not read with the regard one would give to Shakespearian literature because there is no enjoyment of Shakespeare or literature. Instead, the bible is culled for data, quotes or proofs to be dumped into a sermon machine. A sermon machine generates the exact same sermon for John 3:16 as for Romans 5:8. The minister who is insensitive to the significant differences between John 3 and Romans 5 will produce the same sermon regardless of the text.

The sermon becomes the point, and the scripture is incidental. The preaching is not shaped by the text, for the text is only the prompt that reminds the preacher of what he already thought. The text does not shape the sermon because it has no moving pictures to shape the minister, and that cascades down to the hearers. Johnny Can’t Preach because Johnny Can’t Read Literature. He is not skilled in any literature, including the bible, because the dominant media has nourished him with constantly switching camera angles, tempo-intense music, pithy dialog, and now multi-sensory white-board markers that are scented in order to distract him from the pain he experiences when slowly writing actual words. (Scented markers are a sign of the end of our civilization.)

Americans read but they don’t read literary works. Dr. Gordon calls this aliteracy: the ability to read, but not reading well. Being aliterate, the pastor is able to see the text and not see it. The sermon is preached, but it is not a sermon. The lauded sermon has become a media event that resonates with an aliterate culture.

The church can help solve this problem by preparing seminarians for seminary. Johnny can help too. Before entering into biblical studies he should turn off his T.V. and adopt a life of reading and writing. Dr. Gordon’s most controversial suggestion is a system of sermon reviews. I happen to agree, and I would love for more people to scrutinize what I am trying to preach. However, the problem will be with the reviewers themselves who are also immersed in the dominate media ecosystem. Are they above the fray? Are they in a better position for analysis than the man incapable of preaching? I ask because if Johnny Can’t Preach then it probably goes unnoticed since Sally Can’t Hear.

By measuring and observing the sad state of preaching, Dr. Gordon is helping to change it with a happy instance of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. I have the members of our church read Why Johnny Can’t Preach because it is medicinal. It promotes Christ-centered preaching as the cure for the disease.

Theme of Genesis

Gerhard von Rad (1949): “The basic theme of the Hexateuch [Genesis-Joshua] may be stated as follows: God, the creator of the world, called the patriarchs and promised them the Land of Canaan. When Israel became numerous in Egypt, God led the people through the wilderness with wonderful demonstrations of grace; then after their lengthy wandering he gave them under Joshua the Promised Land.” Since von Rad is known for his methods, listen to how he uses this theme to justify a theory, “If we compare this table of contents with the Hexateuch itself, we are struck by the incongruity between the theme and its development, with the colossal massing and arranging of the most varied kinds of material around so simple a basic design….This strange fashioning of the basic theme into such gigantic proportions, when considered from the viewpoint of the history of literature, cannot have been a first conception, not even one that blossomed…. Rather, it is a final conception that has burgeoned from earlier stages to the limits of the possible and readable.” Von Rad then says that the majority of the parts that make up the gigantic proportions where, “aetiologies, i.e., their purpose was to explain some facts in tribal history, about a place, or in the cult.”

David Cline (1999): Genesis is part of the larger Pentateuchal theme of partial fulfillment. See, Theme of the Pentateuch, ch 4.

Desmond (1995): From Paradise to the Promised Land: An Introduction to the Main Themes of the Pentateuch. These themes include Royal Lineage, Paradise Lost, Blessing of the Nations, Abraham, Who is the Lord, Passover, Covenant at Sinai, Tabernacle, Be Holy, Sacrificial System, Clean and Unclean Foods, Promise Land, Murmurings, Love and Loyalty, Why Israel,

Bill Arnold 2008, writes that Genesis addresses the most profound questions of life. Who are we? Why are we here? More to the focus: Who is God? How does God relate to the universe? What are the origins of God’s chosen people, Israel? Central is God’s salvation of Israel; redemption from Egypt is the starting point (context) from which Genesis is then written by the Exodus people (Moses). That redemption was covenantal (Sinai). The saving God is the Creating God who revealed himself. Genesis develops his work as Creator and Revelator. See Genesis (New Cambridge Bible Commentary)

John Sailhamer (2009) identifies the theme of prophetic Hope for a New Covenant, Covenant and Blessing, Law and Salvation — at the center of these there is a King over God’s People (who he rightly identifies as Jesus!). The Meaning of the Pentateuch: Revelation, Composition and Interpretation

Eden: Genesis 2-3

There are authors who have especially impacted what is being said about Genesis 3; there are a host of authors and ideas especially worth knowing (for good or ill), and I list those names next. As you read through this, note the unfortunate reality that higher criticism and the closely related documentary hypothesis dominate Genesis studies. I have already critiqued these theories elsewhere.

The following list of authors is collected from consulting their works and other lists. It is mostly chronological. I made good use of Wallace’s dissertation, The Eden Narrative (1985). Blank entries are meant for me to come back to and fill in when I have done more research:

I. Earlier Publications about Eden

Martin Luther

Karl Bubbe (1883)

Feldman (1913), Paradies und Sündenfall : der Sinn der biblischen Erzählung nach der Auffassung der Exegese und unter Berücksichtigung der ausserbiblischen Überlieferungen, on pages 501-605 gives a survey of interpretation of Eden from the early church on.

II. Literary Critics on Eden

Hermann Gunkel: Gunkel is known for his literary-critical methods, form criticism, his application of the transmission of oral traditions (see Axil Olrik), and for his Religionsgeschichte. Sagen units make up Genesis, and Sage (like German folklore) is the category of Genesis (which he preferred over the idea of Genesis as history). Holding to a form of the documentary hypothesis, he postulated that “J” and “E” are behind these Sagen which were combined into one. Each Sagen had its own Sitz im Leben. In the third edition of his Genesis commentary, he said that Genesis 2-3 had as its central theme the origins of the present state of the world, our sorry estate and the pains of toiling and childbirth (p. 29). The most relevant pages of Gunkel are relatively few, pages 28-33. Stordalen, in his book on Genesis 2-3, concludes his survey of Gunkel this way, “Gunkel was not actually examining Genesis 2-3.”

Joachim Begrich, son-in-law of Gunkel, published, “Die Paradieserzahlung. Eine literargeschichtliche Studie” in 1932 where he was able to untangle a collection of stories out of Genesis 2-3 (a peasant story and a patch-work paradise story).

H. Schmidt (1931) identified more stories than Begrich.

Mowinckel was a little more clever, in 1937 he published his “discovery” of a Canaanite source and a Sethite source behind Genesis 2-3.

Lefevre in 1949 named an Eve source embedded in Genesis 3-4 and a Garden of Eden source.

Wallace summarizes the above works by writing, “While literary criticism has had been successful in delineating the larger Pentateuchal sources in most places, the suitability of its application to the J source and to Gen 2-3 in particular became questionable.” Wallace sharpens his critique, “Many of the scholars who applied literary criticism to the J material recognized the failure of the method but did not realize why it had failed.” He means that literary criticism failed because there can’t be literary coherence across diverse and distant editors all jockeying to create what is now Genesis 2-3. Wallace himself holds to the old theories about J being a source of Genesis.

P. Humbert, 1940, stumbled on the obvious idea that Genesis 2-3 is a coherent whole. Wallace seems amazed, “Humbert’s approach, while rather extreme, was something of a milestone. Many scholars have since drawn attention to the unifying features of the narrative.” Extreme? Humbert has offered a small ray of obvious clarity, and his view is called extreme.

III. Traditio-Historical Methods Applied to Eden

When your son asks you in time to come, ‘What is the meaning of the testimonies and the statutes and the rules that the Lord our God has commanded you?’ 21 then you shall say to your son, ‘We were Pharaoh’s slaves in Egypt. And the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. 22 And the Lord showed signs and wonders, great and grievous, against Egypt and against Pharaoh and all his household, before our eyes. 23 And he brought us out from there, that he might bring us in and give us the land that he swore to give to our fathers. 24 And the Lord commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day. …’ Deut 6:20-24

This is a passage that Gerhard von Rad (1940s) used to argue that literary unity was the wrong way of thinking because editors had combined oral (not written) sources to create Genesis 2-3; that is, unity in the narrative supposedly comes from later editors who, over time, each took up their turn to edit and shape what we now call Genesis until J came along and got it all tidy. Von Rad published a well known commentary as a frontier fortress for the historical traditional method of approaching Genesis; for more on this method, see Whybrays, The Making of the Pentateuch.

Where Gunkel had a supposed “J” who contributed bits and parts of the Genesis material, von Rad had “J” as the final editor of the Hexateuch (the five books of Moses + Joshua), and has him finishing Genesis in, “the time of Solomon or a little later” (von Rad, 16), “the collector of the countless old traditions which had circulated freely among the people.” Solomon is near the breaking point, when old traditions that held Israel together as one nation were deteriorating, and J can be judged “by the age of the traditions he included” (18). With this theory in place, von Rad then analyzed the form of the different bits and parts and tried to determine the situation out of which each arose.

I know this all seems like a lot of energy spent on wild and unprovable guesswork, but, von Rad (and others with him) are widely esteemed. It’s not the merits of their speculations that have my attention, but their raw influence as authors. Still, there are elements of von Rad’s work that are helpful (this aspect excepted).

A side note: Lee Irons, a former student of M. G. Kline, takes issue with the parts of von Rad I happen to find helpful. Lee is working on his PhD at Fuller. He started writing about von Rad and Cremer (mostly about Cremer) in 2007. He is documenting what people are saying about von Rad and Cremer with respect to the New Perspective.

McKenzie (1954), also convinced of a J theory, published on “Literary Characteristics” and in Genesis 3 saw two sin stories — the sin of the woman and then the sin of the man. Important for my work is his interaction with the content of Eden.

Claus Westermann, Genesis 1-11 commentary.

I. Engell

D. Neiman (1969), “Eden, the Garden of God”

IV. Structuralism Applied to Eden

E. Leache (1969), “Genesis as Myth” in Genesis as Myth and Other Essays.

J. T. Walsh, “Genesis 2:4-3:24: A Synchronic Approach”, JBL 96 (1977) 161-77.

J. W. Rosenberg

V. More Recent Works on Eden

Ernst Hagg (1970)

Odil Hannes Steck (1970)

Levison (1988), Portraits of Adam in Early Judaism

T. Stordalen (2000), Echoes of Eden, Genesis 203 and Symbolism of the Eden Garden in Biblical Hebrew Literature. This book, to me, is a good sample of the current trend to see how themes in Genesis related to sacred space. Such works seem to be popping up everywhere. For example, Greg Beale wroteThe Temple and the Church’s Mission. Beale provides a nice summary of key thoughts flowing out of Genesis. His work is not directly related to my investigation, but it is quite useful to the church and worth a read (he has an audio summary here).

Meredith G. Kline (2001), Kingdom Prologue. I wrote a reaction to this book here. I will give a proper annotated review as I have time.

Gary Anderson (2001), The Genesis of Perfection, Adam and Eve in Early Jewish and Christian Imagination.

Louth and Conti (2001), Genesis 1-11, Ancient Christian Commentary Series

Tryggve N. D. Mettinger (2007), The Eden Narrative

We are accustomed to say that there is but one truth, and that what is not true is ipso facto false. And yet the New Testament knows of two kinds of “truth.” It may be well to add immediately that this does not mean applying the predicate “true” in an identical sense to statements that are logically contradictory and hence mutually exclusive of each other. Nor do we wish to have the doubleness understood according to the somewhat loose popular habit of affirming that the truth has various sides, so that what appears true from one point of view may seem different from another. In such a case it is not, of course, the identical thing that receives at one and the same time the opposite predicates, but only the various ingredients or aspects of the thing are described per contraria.

Nor, once again, do we mean to refer to the Ritschlian attempt of assigning certain complexes of things to diverse spheres, so that, for instance, in the realm of science or metaphysics a conclusion could be called false to which nevertheless the religious consciousness in the sphere of faith could feel bound to attach the opposite predicate of true, or vice versa.

What we mean is this: The words for true, truth, possess inherently two distinct connotations. One linguistic term serves to describe two different qualities, each carrying within itself two differently meant opposites. If there is a defect or a cause for misleading here, it is an inadequacy in the precision of the language, not in the idea or the reality of things. In excuse of the language it may be properly urged that the two meanings expressed by the same terms have a close innate connection, so as to render the lack of distinction well nigh unavoidable to the average popular mind. Besides, the language has made some effort, as we shall see, to mark the distinction. Nevertheless, a real difference exists, and to miss it means the missing of a valuable and important item of biblical thought.

The two meanings can with sufficient approach to correctness be expressed by the two adjectives, veracious and veritable. True, as exchangeable with veracious, belongs to the conceptual or cognitive sphere. It denotes the agreement of a concept or its expression with the reality reflected in it. Its opposite is misrepresentation (intentional or non-intentional; in the former case falsehood). From the conception or expression it is extended to the person who conceives or conveys the thought or utterance. So soon as what he believes and what he speaks differ he can no longer be strictly called true, may this be due to an inadequacy of expression, in which case no moral blame will attach, or to a designed divergence, in which case the language stigmatizes him as untruthful or hypocritical.

It is not necessary to give many examples of this ordinary cognitive meaning of the term. Two instances may suffice: To receive Jesus’ testimony is to set one’s seal to the veracity of God (John 3:33); and, “herein is that saying true, one soweth and another reapeth” (4:37). Especially the Old Testament in a certain usage calls attention to the moral blame attaching to an untrue state of life. In the one word emeth it expresses the correctness of perception in religious things, and the loyalty to Jehovah going with or flowing from it. Thus true can become synonymous with good. This synonymity is worth noticing, because it reflects the scriptural judgment concerning the close nexus between right religious conviction and religious rightness in general (cf. John 3:30-21; 7: 18).

Cognitive truth so far touched upon is something intramental, subjective, predicable not of things in themselves, but conceptions or expressions about things. Without a thinking, thought-uttering subject, there could be no truth of this kind in the world. Even as to God this holds true; when what He declares is truth, it is because of the absolute correspondence between His declaration and the reality of some external object or of the thought or purpose in His mind.

The second meaning, designated above by veritable, is by no means so obvious or perspicuous as the one just commented upon. In fact it is apt to startle somewhat when first brought to the attention of the Bible student. When Jesus is called “the true light” (John 1:9), or “the true bread” (6:32), this has nothing to do with His telling the truth, but may be approximately rendered “the veritable light,” “the veritable bread.” Veritable is that which answers to the highest conception or ideal of something. In the same way Jesus calls Himself the “true vine” and His Father the “husbandman” (15:1). Somewhat less obvious, but none the less surely intended, is the description of the ideal worshipers as “true worshipers” (4:23), although here what follows about the duty of worshiping “in spirit and in truth” has mistakenly led to interpreting “truth” by sincerity, of which more anon. In I John 2:8 the “true light” is not different from that of verse 9 in the Prologue of the Gospel, and there is no reason to depart from this meaning, when in I John 5:20 God is twice called the alethinos (veritable) God.

These are all the indubitable instances from the Gospel and the first epistle, so far as the adjective comes under consideration, but the same phenomenon can be observed in regard to the noun. When Jesus is called “the truth,” it would be a rash judgment to assert that this can mean nothing else than that His words are the supreme, incarnate veracity. The noun can just as well mean, and undoubtedly, in view of the usage of the adjective, sometimes does mean, that the supreme reality of the things that compose His character is incarnate in Him. The fulness of “truth,” which, side by side with “grace,” resides in the Only Begotten, must mean far more than the reliability pertaining to His words; similarly the “grace and truth” which, in contrast to the law of Moses, “came [or became] through Jesus Christ,” must have a wider and deeper reference, if justice is to be done to the context.

When Jesus, in 14:6, makes the triple identification between the “way,” the “truth,” and the “life,” and Himself, the very point of the statement is missed when, as is so frequently done, the three concepts are simply coordinated, and the content of each unfolded separately. The context shows that what was in question was the “way” to the place whither Jesus was going. This place consisted in the house of the Father with the many mansions; He is the way to this because He Himself is bound for this. The identification with Him furnishes absolute certainty of the disciples’ arriving there. This is then further made clear by the two following explicative concepts: He is specifically the truth, the veritable essence of that region to which He is going; and within that essence again He is the life characteristically belonging to it. Somewhat more doubtful, but on the whole pointing in the same direction, is the description of believers as being “out of the truth” (John 18:37; cf. I John 3:19), and of being made “free by the truth” (John 8:32; cf. vs. 36: “If the Son therefore shall make you free”).

It will be observed that most of the instances in which this notion of veritableness occurs are from the Gospel and the first epistle. In the two smaller epistles it is not in evidence, which, considering the small size and the more particular purpose of these two documents, can hardly cause surprise. But neither do we meet with it in the Apocalypse, a book of no such small extent. Possibly this is to be explained from the prophetic, strongly asseverative style here prevailing, since this naturally attracts the use of the adjective to the emphatic affirmation of the veracity of God and of Christ (cf. Rev.3:7,14; 15:3; 16:7; 19:2,9,11; 21:5; 22:6). This shows itself in the fact, also, that pistos, “faithful,” repeatedly appears as its synonym.

The idea, “veritable,” is so general as to render necessary the question, wherein the veritableness consists, or what is its cause. On this we obtain light by observing that the veritable things appear in a more or less clear association with heaven. The proximate definition is a local one. A rapid survey of the passages will bear this out. Not confining ourselves now to the Johannine writings, in which, to be sure, the bulk of the evidence appears, we note, first, Luke 16:11, toward the close of the parable of the dishonest steward. Here Jesus puts the question: “If therefore ye have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, who will commit to your trust the true?” The adjective alethinos needs to have repeated with it from the former half of the sentence “mammon,” meaning riches. There can be little doubt as to what these “veritable riches” are. They are the riches laid up in heaven (cf. Matt. 6:19-21). In this particular case what corresponds to them is the asset of assurance of a glad welcome in “the everlasting habitations” from those befriended on earth. “The veritable light” of John 1:9 is represented as a light “coming into the world,” that is, from heaven. This appears to be by far the preferable construction. The conclusion would not follow, of course, in case “coming into the world” were joined to “every man.”

In John 4:23 the ideal worshipers are those who seek and adore God in His heavenly reality and habitation. At first sight the injection of the celestial element here might seem to be uncalled for, and the idea of “spirit” fully sufficient as a qualitative definition of the worship foretold, but verse 21 proves that a detachment from earthly localities and limitations is essential to the completion of the thought of worship “in truth.” Nor is the mention of “spirit” in this connection by any means unmotivated, for at bottom spirit expresses the element, the atmosphere, wherein the heavenly reality consists. It is not improbable that here (as “grace and truth” in John 1:14, 17) “spirit and truth” must be understood on the principle of a hendiadys, equivalent to “spirit which is truth,” spirit in its heavenly manifestation.

The association between the “veritable” character of Jesus’ flesh as meat indeed and His blood as drink indeed (John 6:55) must have something to do with the emphasis placed throughout the context on the provenience of Jesus from heaven. The failure to understand this correctly is in part due to the loose translation, “bread indeed,” “drink indeed,” instead of “true bread,” “true drink,” as the Greek has. In fact, verse 32 and, following in this same chapter, 35 come near to a formal definition of what “veritableness” predicated of bread, signifies: “Moses gave you not that bread from heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven.” Decisive is, with personal reference to Jesus, “The bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven and giveth life to the world.” That this is meant in the literal sense appears from the murmuring of the Jews against it, in verse 42, where it is by them opposed to Jesus’ being the son of Joseph. No less emphatic and unequivocal is the statement of verses 50 and 51: “This is the bread which cometh down from heaven that a man may eat thereof and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever, and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.” The statement seems to verge on the idea that there is a close connection between the descent from heaven and the life-giving power of the bread suggests the somewhat analogous representation of Paul in I Corinthians 15:45, 47 to the effect that Christ is the Lord from heaven, and as such a quickening Spirit.

The two passages in the epistle to the Hebrews which use “veritable” in the same specific sense, 8:2 and 9:24, even more pointedly identify it with “in heaven.” It here is a technical term belonging to the typological system of the epistle, according to which the ritual things on earth are reflections, down-shadowings, of the ritual in heaven. The “holy places made with hands” are the figures of “the true,” that is, the heavenly, places. Nor is this parallelism in Hebrews confined to the ritual comparison. It rests on the broader theological background of the coexistence of two strata of creation (cf. Heb. 9:11, “not of this creation”; 12:22, “the heavenly Jerusalem”). Still in Hebrews the terminology of “veritableness” remains confined to the ceremonial contrast.

In John, on the other hand, the general theological background on which the distinction between true and its opposite rests is drawn in broader lines. “Veritableness” in its full, wide-ranging import cannot be comprehended here until it is placed in the light of the thorough bisection of the universe that dominates this teaching both in the discourse of Jesus and in the reflection of it in certain other statements of the Evangelist. A regular schema of contrasts with closely related forms of expression may here be recognized. It serves the formulation of the most pervasive and clean-cut differentiation between the natural and the supernatural found anywhere in Scripture. On the one side stand “the kosmos” (“this kosmos”), “the earth,” “the earthly things,” “the things beneath”; over against these stand “heaven,” “the heavenly things,” “the things above.” It will be noticed that this scheme lacks completeness only in that the term, that world, for the supernal region is not employed. The reason probably lies in the evil connotation which the word “kosmos” must have early acquired, since Paul also abstains from its use as a designation of the future eschatological state. Too pointed to be overlooked is its avoidance by Jesus in John 8:23: “Ye are from beneath; I am from above: ye are of this world; I am not of this world,” instead of, I am of that world. But apart from this, the terms named all imply the superiority and precedence of the higher sphere, and in so far entitle it to the predicate of “veritableness,” even where this is not explicitly combined with it as it is in other passages.

And this supernaturalism is all-embracing; it is more than the remedial and sporadic supernaturalism of redemption which restores the normality of things disturbed by sin; while including the latter, it reaches out much further into the structure and reconstruction of creation on the largest of scales. The destiny appointed for man is to ascend from the lower to the higher. Because man fell out of the latter through the deflection of sin, the supreme Representative of heaven had to descend and restore the harmony of the pristine appurtenance. The parallelism sometimes runs athwart the antithesis of redemption. In John 3:12 the birth from above, soterically speaking a thoroughly supernatural event, is none the less classified with the “earthly things” of which Jesus had been discoursing with Nicodemus, evidently because our Lord places above it, as still more absolutely pertaining to “the heavenly things,” a yet higher birth, of the nature of which it were perhaps presumptuous in us to endeavor to form a concrete conception, although it has led theologians, and not merely ultra-dogmatic ones, but likewise some ultra-philosophical critical exegetes of the gospel, to assume a reference by way of indirection to what is theologically called the eternal generation of the Son by the Father within the Godhead.

It is further noteworthy that in certain contexts of the gospel the truth of Jesus’ witness is significantly associated with His preexistence, that is, with His original abode in the sphere of heaven. This, however, refers rather to the “veracity” of His Person and words than to their “veritableness,” so that, strictly speaking, it falls outside of the present discussion. Still, it may be remembered that, in so far as the things spoken in witness are information brought down from heaven, “things heard and seen” by Jesus, they would be at the same time “veracious” and things concerning the “veritable,” so that the two conceptions would practically flow together (cf. John 3: 12, 13, 19, 21, 31-33; 8:14; 17:17; 18:37; I John 2:8; 5:21). It cannot be otherwise than that the words of Him who is by nature and origin the “veritable” One should partake of the same character precisely because they are His. His kingdom is not of this world (but of the heavenly world), and for this very reason He came from the higher into the lower world that He should bear witness unto “the truth,” and that every one that is of “the truth” should hear His voice (18:37).

The precise connotation can in some instances be tested by the terms appropriate to what is opposite to “the truth.” When in I Thessalonians 1:9 Paul speaks of the readers having turned from idols “to serve the living and true God,” the opposite is, of course, “false gods,” but one immediately feels that in this “false” a totally different judgment is expressed than that of the untruthfulness of the pagan divinities. The idea is obviously that if not absolutely the existence, at least the proper reality and power belonging to the divine are denied to these so-called gods. In this sense the Christian God is “the only alethinos God” (John 17:3); what the opposite means Paul has succinctly expressed in calling the pristine objects of worship of the Galatians such as “by nature are no Gods” (Gal. 4:8). The ordinary meaning of “false” can certainly not be applied to the law with which the grace and truth come by Christ are contrasted. For it is said of this law that it was given “through Moses.” The use of “through” instead of “by” presupposes that Moses was only the instrument in giving the law, and this again has for its supposition that the actual lawgiver was none other than God (John 1:17). And this of itself refutes the charge of Gnostic tendencies sometimes brought against the gospel, particularly on the basis of this passage.

The law was not yet the highest, antitypical grace which was necessary to constitute it “truth”; it was typical adumbration, but it was not on that account “false” in the invidious sense. The contrast is the same as the epistle to the Hebrews expresses in 10:1: “The law having a shadow of good things to come, not the very eikon of the things,” etc. But the Gnostics maintained that the law was “false,” deceptive, void of veracity. The utmost charge that the New Testament (Paul, Hebrews, John) brings against the law relates to its inefficacy; hence in that passage just quoted from Hebrews the author adds “can never . . . make perfect.” The worship in spirit and truth, to which our Lord points the Samaritan woman forward, has not for its opposite a totally “false” worship. At least with reference to the worship observed by the Jews in Jerusalem it is said by Jesus, “We worship that which we know.” The reason given for this is that “salvation is from the Jews.” The dispensation that gives birth to salvation must be absolutely “veracious”; the good cannot come out of the evil. And it ought to be noted that Jesus by use of the plural pronoun “we” explicitly includes Himself in the number of those who worship according to the Old Testament rule, a thing impossible to conceive had He, or the Evangelist for that matter, regarded this rule as “false” in the odious sense.

Because of its pervasive construction of the universe on the principle of two strata and its derivation of the highest ideal and redemptive things from on high, the Fourth Gospel may be justly characterized as the most intensely anti-evolutionistic document in the New Testament, so far as the derivation of the origin and progress of religion is concerned. Nevertheless refuge is sometimes had in it as an arsenal furnishing evolutionistic ammunition. Those who employ this method must be indeed hard up for a text on which to hang their modern, quasi-scientific fashion of teaching or preaching.

Not long ago an academic preacher distilled evolution from the statement in John 10:10, “I am come that they might have life, and might have it more abundantly.” There are at least a score, if not more, passages in the Gospel which emphasize that the life represented and communicated by Jesus does not grow up from beneath, but descends from above, and receives its increase from above. The slightest scientifically exegetical and historical acquaintance with the document ought to have protected against such a caricature. In John 8:23 Jesus claims for Himself, in the most unequivocal manner, His not being from beneath, but from above. He is simply “not of this world.” And what is true of Jesus is, of course, on the principles of the Johannine teaching throughout, in the statements both of Jesus and of the Evangelist, applicable to the disciples, for in no document is the identification of Jesus with the believer more emphatically affirmed. Hence the strand that runs through the Gospel tracing the detachment of the disciples from “the world” back to the choice or love or the gift of God from eternity.

It were a mistake, however, to conceive of the contrast as primarily intended to convey philosophical ideas. The difference between “the true things” and “the not-true things” is not conceived after a Platonic or Philonic fashion. The world above is not called “true” as though it contained a higher reality of being in the substantial metaphysical sense. Both spheres are equally real. The difference comes in through an appraisal of quality and importance. What is practically involved is the principle of ultimate spiritual value in regard to destiny. The practical name for this is the principle of “otherworldliness.”

In conclusion a few words may be added as to the effort of the language to mark the differences of conception involved by the use of specific words. Only to a partial degree does such effort show itself. The language had no means in the noun form to express the difference between “veraciousness” and “veritableness.” Here the one word aletheia had to render service for both. For distinguishing these two concepts in their adjectival form, two words were available, or rather one word with two endings, a weaker and a stronger one. From the one stem spring alethes and alethinos. As the prolonged ending with the long vowel in the penult indicates, the latter is the stronger, intensified form.

Now, in the abstract it would have been possible to allot one of these two forms to the one meaning, the other to the other. But words and word-forms are not so mechanically parcelled out. A form carrying peculiar intensity will as a rule cling to the general idea in every one of its shades of meaning, and render its service of intensifying impartially. So it has happened here. The intensifying word alethinos, instead of binding itself to the meaning, veritable, which is doubtless the more intense one, if the two meanings be conceptually compared, has not separated itself from the meaning “veracious.” It has been continued in use where the necessity of saying “intensely veracious” offered itself (cf. John 4:37; 7:28; 8:16; 19:35; Rev. 15:3; 16:7; 19:2,9, 11; 21:5; 22:6).

But, while veracious can on occasion acquire this emphatic meaning, which summons the intensifying alethinos to its aid, the concept, veritable, carries the intensity in itself, and consequently makes regular use of alethinos for expression. There is but one instance of the sense, veritable, where alethinos is not employed, viz., John 6:55 (If we could follow the ordinary rendering of both A.V. and R.V., “my flesh is meat indeed”; “my blood is drink indeed,” this one exception would fall away. But a comparison with the original will show that not the adverb alethos is read here, but the adjective alethes. The latter cannot mean indeed. At the same time, the context forbids giving it any lower meaning than veritable. The exception therefore stands.) To that extent, and to that only, it may be affirmed that to veritableness corresponds in the Greek of the New Testament alethinos. But we must be careful not to reverse this by saying, as some expositors have done, that alethinos uniformly means veritable, in the technical meaning defined in this paper.

In this article, I want to explore ways of talking about truth, then I want to apply it to a Mormon article that recently appeared in an Evangelical journal (the Midwestern Journal of Theology, Spring 2010: 115-118, published by the Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary).

I. Truth in Context

Whenever the word ‘truth’ comes up in a conversation, we would do well to take into account the context of the conversation. In the case of Pilate, the context is Jesus. When he asked his question, a math class was not the context. The context of Pilate’s question was the cosmic court case of Adam’s Family vs. God with Pilate acting as judge. The idea of context is important to grasp when the word ‘truth’ is employed.

1. Facts Are Facts Everywhere
We might not think that context matters for the word ‘truth’, because truth is truth no matter its context. For example, my laptop computer works in all parts of the world just the same because context does not determine circuit logic. True facts are true fact no matter where we go (e.g., the logic that led to the construction of the computer retains its validity no matter where I travel). With this simplistic way of viewing the subject of truth, the words ‘true’ and ‘truth’ are thus treated as contextless. And so it seems strange that anyone would argue for a context with regard to the word ‘truth’ when it is used in a particular conversation.

2. When Context Matters
The word ‘truth’ is contextually conditioned because language is conditioned by cultural and social structures. This does not mean that reality changes from place to place (my computer works wherever I go), but the way people speak about reality is contextually delimited. I am not talking about a contradiction here, I am talking about the language of ‘truth’ and how that word, like all other words, is not really context-less.

Reality is always reality wherever one is, but the language of ‘truth’ is not thereby a special category of language that escapes the forces that other words face (the forces of context). In literature, words are not the smallest units of thought, sentences are. Sentences and paragraphs (not the dictionary) are the forces that drive the meanings of the individual words. This is as meaningful for the words ‘true’, ‘false’ and ‘truth’ as for other common words like ‘love’, ‘draft’ or ‘shoe.’ We know that the last three find their meanings in context of usage, so too the first three.

For example, it is valid to speak of ‘truth’ in the context of a math class without introducing the ways of speaking about truth found in an art or religious class. This is not to say that truth is relative, it is to say that when speaking about truth in a particular subject, the particulars matter.

There are particular ways to speak about truth (depending on the subject) and then there are big-picture abstract ways. For me, the word ‘truth’, all by itself, evokes thoughts about abstract categories and big-picture notions of absolute truth. However, a conversation about truth can be either particular or abstract. To that end, I want to examine both. I want to spend the rest of this article looking at some abstract statements about truth, then I want to look at the particulars of the Gospel of John (so that you can see the differences). Following that, I want to examine a Mormon article by Grant Palmer where he mixes all of this up, and finally I want to give you the helpful categories of Roger Nicole that nicely capture all of this.

II. Abstract Statements About Truth

As I mentioned, it is possible to speak in particular about truth (in an algebra discussion, for example) and it is equally valid to speak about the subject in big abstract categories. The following authors provide big categorical statements about truth:

Alan Padgett: Truth is “the mediated disclosure of being”

Bertrand Russell: “A belief is true when there is a corresponding fact, and is false when there is no corresponding fact.”

Augustine: “Truth is that which points to what is.”

William Alston: “A statement is true if and only if what the statement says to be the case actually is the case.”

These men are postulating that truth is that which corresponds to reality. In their definitions, there are two things: (1) what is spoken and (2) what is. Reality is one thing, and speaking about it is another. A statement, then, can have likeness to reality. It can correspond to it. Of course, these definitions have no way of establishing what is reality, and therefore assume that some reality exists and can be represented (perhaps this is why Russell also included the word ‘belief’ in his definition).

I will join with others and call this the correspondence theory of truth. And it is a highly useful way for us to think about the big and abstract idea of truth. At the same time, I am going to propose that it is insufficient (not wrong, but insufficient) when we get to talking about Jesus and the Gospel of John. Before we get there, I think I can inductively make the case of its insufficiency from common subjects, like art and math.

Given the above abstract statements about truth, what do we do with questions of this sort: Can art represent reality? Can art be true or false?

The questions may seem valid, but they may be like asking what my favorite color of Algebra is. Namely, mixing propositional truth and art requires us to make an uneasy shift in interpretation of the words, ‘true’ and ‘false’ and finally ‘truth’. It involves us in an acceptable fuzziness in categories, if you will, but it pushes the limit of words — and crossing that limit might lead to Algebra I students saying things like, “the root of the polynomial is soft and lovely, a light blue.” We may speak that way for the sake of enjoyment, because we know that language allows us be so silly and cross such boundaries, but when we do, we are obviously open are honest about it (that is, we are not term-switching in a covert or subversive way).

Truth, then, has application across language boundaries so long as we don’t break boundaries in manipulative ways (as when we subversively term-switch or use a word with a nuanced meaning while knowing that our audience has missed the switch or has a different meaning). The theologian Francis Shaeffer spent much of his life arguing for truth in art and culture, and many of us know inductively that he was not thereby violating propositional logic by applying the category of truth to art. We know that the language of truth is big enough to work this way. The authors as quoted above have narrowly applied truth to the descriptive use of words. And that is fine. But I am proposing that there is yet a third way that the language of truth is functional, particularly in talking about Jesus, especially in the Gospel of John.

III. Jesus and The Gospel of John

Jesus said to him, “I am the way the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but by me” (John 14:6). Unlike the abstract definitions of truth given by Padgett, Augustine, Russell and Alston, Jesus is not saying that he is that which corresponds to reality. He is the reality. Truth is not a super-set to which God is a sub-set, nor is truth an abstract entity outside of God that God then corresponds to or matches.

Misinterpreting John 14:6 by using the wrong definition of truth leads to two points of confusion.

1) The first being that truth becomes an eternal category independent of God — which is to say that God is eternal along with an abstract category called “truth.” When we do this with truth, we easily end up having Father, Son and Holy Spirit and then something of a fourth person of the Trinity called Eternal Truth (that which God himself conforms to).

2) The second point of confusion caused by misinterpreting John 14:6 is to wrench Jesus out of his Old Testament context. This second point is worth expanding.

Jesus and Truth in the Old Testament Context
In the Gospel of John, the word “truth” is regularly used as that which is over and against the temporary. It is that which the provisional was signifying. The Old Testament types and shadows were the transient, but the antitype is permanent. The Old Testament temple was a copy, Jesus is the reality. He is the True. When Jesus spoke of himself as “truth” he was not referring to truth as it might be employed to describe art, math, nor the correspondence theory of truth (which is not to say that he never uses truth that way). In this instance, he was speaking in reference to the Old Testament.

This is especially helpful when we get to John 1:17, which says, “For the Law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” What this is not saying is that the Law of Moses was false. The word truth, in this text, is not being used as one might expect. In fact, in hearing this uncritically, one might ask, “Wait a minute. What is truth then?” For here truth is that which is the reality of which the Law of Moses was anticipating. The Law pointed to Christ; Christ is the Truth and the Law is the copy. This is how the book of Hebrews describes the matter (see especially chapter 9).

The Gospel of John is sure to nail down that Jesus is the true temple and true sacrifice, to which the Old Testament copies were but shadowy pointers. Jesus-Truth is that which is over and against Sinai-Shadow.

This is instructive, for when an author, like Grant Palmer, claims that truth of Jesus can be found outside the Bible (perhaps in other so-called sacred books), they are term-switching. They are using ideas of truth that are not developed around the relationship of Jesus to the Old Covenant. They are filling up the word truth with a meaning from a different context, and then applying it to their holy books. In this way, they can say that the Holy Spirit is inspiring all kinds of books, especially where Jesus is found accurately described according to the rules of propositional logic. Truth, in this way, becomes a weapon against Truth.

IV. Grant Palmer in the Midwestern Journal of Theology

In a recent article that appeared in the Spring 2010 Midwestern Journal of Theology (v. 8.2/9.1, pp. 115-118), Grant Palmer used the word “truth” as an ironic weapon to attack the Truth. He argued that the Book of Mormon can be a place of truth used by the Holy Spirit to bring people to Christ:

The Holy Spirit may well tell a person the Book of Mormon is true because it testifies and brings a person to Christ, who is Truth, but not whether the Book of Mormon’s theological doctrines are true (Palmer, 117).

The editor or the journal — who inserted editorial comment one sentence later — issued no challenge to Grant’s presuppositions and derivative fallacies. So I want to comment now, and I want to use the above discussion about truth as my platform for clarity.

In this representative quote, Grant Palmer has performed a triple-salchow fallacy. That is, his error has three twists, and it is all bound up in him saying that the Holy Spirit may well use the book of Mormon to reveal Jesus because the book testifies to Christ.

1. First Twist
Palmer cleverly uses the language Christians use when they talk about the work of the Holy Spirit in relation to scripture. When I say “cleverly”, I am not referring to his motives (I don’t think he was trying to be clever) but his results. That is, when we talk about the Holy Spirit and his use of a book, the conversation is a technical one about inspiration and the Bible. The subject is not about any supposedly sacred book in general, but it is about the one sacred book in particular, the Bible.

When we speak of the Holy Spirit and his use of a book, we are in the domain of theology related to Scripture Inspiration. When Grant applied that domain of discourse to the book of Mormon, he co-opted the terms for his own purposes (unwittingly or otherwise), and that was the first spin of his triple fallacy.

This fallacy is subtle because if a person said that the Holy Spirit can lead people to Jesus through, say, some particular edition of Sports Illustrated, we would know that the conversation is not technically about Inspiration and Scripture, but probably has to do with an especially good article in the magazine that exalts Jesus. But Grant Palmer (again, unchallenged by the editor — who did use his pen to clarify something about Mormonism) took the Christian language of Inspiration and applied it to the book of Mormon, and, oddly enough he did it in a way reminiscent of Protestant Liberalism (where scripture is said to be that which contains the Word of God).

If I stretch Palmer’s argument, I think I can demonstrate that this fallacy is not really as subtle as I first implied. If someone wrote the same article but replaced book of Mormon with Koran, the article would not have been printed by the Midwestern Journal of Theology. And that reveals, in my mind, an incredible lack of care regarding the publishing of truth. Is the Journal implying that a Mormon is closer to being a Christian than is a Muslim? Is the Journal implying that a Mormon is a Christian of a different denomination?

I think the Journal unintentionally did imply this when it published the article, unedited, as is. I take that back, the editor did insert a few comments. The editor had a willingness to guard for accuracy, and he showed it [by inserting square bracket comments] when Grant went technical regarding the minutia of Mormon theology. Alas, he did not use his square brackets regarding the larger and more important points I raise here.

The confusing part of this whole business is the very appearance of Grant’s article in an Evangelical journal. I do not believe that the Westminster Theological Journal would have published this article. I do not believe that the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society would have published this article. So why did the Midwestern Journal of Theology? Is this a move on their part to expand the tent of Christianity to include sincere Mormons who have Jesus plus their other testaments? I don’t think so, therefore clarity would be welcome from the Journal.

2. Twist Number Two
The second twist in Grant’s statement about the Holy Spirit and truth in the Book of Mormon, is that he takes the idea of truth and turns it into nothing other than the subject of propositional logic. That is, against all that is written above regarding Jesus and his relationship to the Old Testament, Grant reinterprets Jesus on the basis of a pure correspondence theory of truth, and leaves us with the impression that John 14:6 is a doorway to find Jesus any place we find a non-contradicting statement about a personage who has the five-letter name, ‘Jesus.’ For example, the Koran mentions a Jesus as an historical figure, so Grant must conclude that the Koran — in those instances, at least — is conforming to what is written in John 14:6.

And that means that Grant is able to find Jesus anywhere he finds something agreeable to his ideas of Jesus. In fact, he has replaced “burning in the bosom” theology with “agreeable to my experience” theology. In this way, he has not moved from the the bosom of the Latter Day Saints, but has merely made himself more comfortable. Claiming to be different than the LDS, he is just like them only with the words of Protestant Liberalism dripping from his pen.

3. Twist Number Three
The third twist to all of this is that many Americans already seem to view their experiences as the test of truth. Upstart religious movements feed on experience. And Grant is leveraging that hunger. Indeed, he names as “Holy Spirit” those experiences which conform to his ideas of Jesus. American experiential theology loves this stuff. So Grant is using that to his advantage.

When Grant talks about the work of the Holy Spirit, he really is talking about himself. By “Holy Spirit”, he means Grant Palmer, as when he speaks for the Spirit this way:

Nor does the Spirit confirm the truth or falsity of whether the Book of Mormon is a real record of historical people of the distant past (Palmer, 118).

By which he means that he himself does not need the Book of Mormon to be historically true for it to be what he calls “religious truth” (116). This is Grant speaking, and the Holy Spirit is supposedly in agreement — not because the Bible says so, but because Grant Palmer says so. Therefore, when Grant finds agreeable truth about Jesus in the Book of Mormon, he says that the Holy Spirit is there giving his imprimatur. He ascribes to God that which really reflects a Mormon. Grant, following Feuerbach’s dictum, is projecting his highest hopes and dreams into the metaphysical realm and calling it “Holy Spirit.” Americans love this stuff. Any good experience can be named Holy Spirit by the religious person who wants to have his theology and not have the real God. Grant is advocating a made-up truth, and not the reality, who is Jesus.

4. Perfect Landing
The final irony in Grant’s triple-fallacy has already been articulated. Namely, by being published unchallenged regarding these major fallacies (and more besides), he has landed his triple-salchow jump and proven that Evangelicals can accidentally gloss over a lie as long as it has the name of truth. He has proven how easy it is to be unaware of the use of Truth in the Gospel of John. He has proven the ease with which Christian-like language can be printed so that the true religion is switched for fallen thoughts. He has proven that a Liberal use of the right words can liberate truth from its context so that false can become the new true.

Note: When I say that Grant Palmer was published unchallenged, I don’t mean that the editor failed to reveal that Grant is Mormon and the Journal is not. This was made explicit, but in an insufficient way. That is, when the editor did distinguish between the Journal and Grant Palmer, it was in terms of Baptist vs. Mormon (as if the distance is merely denominational). I don’t imagine that a Muslim or a Jehovah’s Witness would have been afforded the same benefits.

V. Rodger Nicole with Some Helpful Categories

Earlier I mentioned that the subject of truth is not relative, but that the context of any discussion where the word ‘truth’ is used, is relevant. If we are talking about math and use ‘truth’, that is relevant to understanding the way in which truth is being discussed. Roger Nicole in Scripture and Truth (ed. Carson and Woodbrdige), identifies various uses of “truth” in the Bible. In the Old Testament, he says it often means, “faithfulness” — as in a dependable person, with the opposite being a deceitful person. It can also mean “conformity to fact”, “as when we read a true report.” Finally, it can mean “completeness”, and this is where he zeros-in specifically on the Gospel of John. It is well established that John explores distinctive characteristics of the Trinity, and to do it he powerfully quotes Jesus’ truth statements. And in doing so, the Gospel of John, like the book of Hebrews, establishes a unique context for understanding the word ‘truth’ in relationship to Jesus being the consummate reality anticipated by the Old Testament types.

When Dr. Nicole identifies three ways that truth is used, he is not opening the door to relativism. He is not giving up on absolutes. He is simply identifying the categorical ways that the word ‘truth’ can be used. He is doing with it what scholars do with all words, and scholars of the Bible are particularly keen on identifying the ways words are used. Grant Palmer, without making any of these distinctions — instead mixing up abstract statements and particular ideas — seems to have no regard for the categories as identified by Dr. Nicole.

To support Dr. Nicole’s thesis about John’s use of ‘true’ and ‘truth’, I want to direct your attention to the much earlier article by G. Vos’ “‘True’ and ‘Truth’ in the Johannine Writings” (1927). This article is useful for reading the Gospel of John, and I can’t remember how I used to read John without its insights.

VI. Summary

The Gospel of John predominately uses the words true and truth in a way that Roger Nicole calls “completeness.” But John is unique; it is possible to speak about truth in ways other than that which is complete. This is not because there are many truths, but as Dr. Nicole has written, we can analyze how truth, “is used [in scripture] and what is the range and substance of meaning that it bears.”

Having done that here, we see that there are particular and abstract ways of speaking about truth. And if we mix those categories, we can switch terms on people (we can equivocate) and use truth against truth. This is precisely what Grant Palmer has done in his article published in the last edition of the Midwestern Journal of Theology.

Grant Palmer co-opted the doctrine of Inspiration by stealing its language. He named his own experiences and feelings, “Holy Spirit”; he claimed to distance himself from LDS theology, but did nothing more than employ the methods of Protestant Liberals who have long been performing the same maneuvers with the Bible. Most of all, Grant Palmer uses the word ‘truth’ in a way that will easily trick the uncritical reader who himself may have not thought through the observations of Dr. Nicole and Geerhardus Vos.

That his article was allowed to be published without a challenge to these fatal flaws (yet with editorial notes attached to other aspects of his article) was surely an oversight.

Addendum:

1. Before publishing my reply here, I contacted Dr. Ron Huggins (a very careful minded fellow, and a very good scholar). Dr. Huggins is the editor of the Midwestern Journal of Theology, I asked him for his review of this piece, and to let him know that this blog averages 900 readers per month; I asked him to let me know about publishing the review here, and he encouraged me to post it. Maybe he will elaborate more in the comment section below and help the readers here (and of the Journal) with some of the specifics?

2. I don’t question Grant Palmer’s motives. I use language in this article that could imply otherwise. However, I assume that Grant is completely sincere, and that he is not trying to trick anyone. My point is that his words are tricky — fallacies often are — but a person can easily engage in fallacious argumentation without knowingly doing it. “Clever” is a pretty good word to describe his maneuvers, but not because he was consciously attempting any clever moves. He may be completely unaware of the nuances that I write about here, but that does not make the nuances go away, and so it is still important to address the topic as I have.

If we love God, we will what he loves… Jesus loves the church, John 21:15-17.

Because worship is ultimate and not suffering, we do not have ranking or status according to our raw capacity to suffer (nor by our personal history of pain). We are known by loving what Christ loves and by our passion for the right doctrine of God, and for our passion for Christ — and suffering is one of the provisional means to perfect those passions. Affection for God is not measured by the quantity of one’s suffering alone, but by one’s adoration of Christ, for Christ is ultimate, not suffering. To that end, we do not seek to out-do one another with Christianized horror stories of loss or tragedy — as if having been in trouble or pain is de facto the stuff of high status — nor by checking to see who has the greater Christian war stories; instead we have the Bible, and we tell each other about Jesus, the Physician. And together we adore him. Suffering administered through the providence and care of the Holy Spirit leads to the adoration of Christ. Suffering that does not now give way to the adoration of Christ is but a foretaste of unending suffering.

We do comfort one another in our suffering, and we do acknowledge the pain that wracks bodies and wrecks lives, and we do talk of these things together. We need each other. We do have personal histories of pain, and along with God, we care about the particulars. But our stories are measured. For of greater relevance is the beauty of the Comforter who applies balm to our souls. The greater story is the news of Christ who overshadows the next inevitable wound that reminds us the word is dead and dying. The Devil would have us to concentrate on the wound, and not the Doctor.

I. Biblical Revelation is Heavenly News about God, Even to Angels
The historical and the inscripturated disclosures of God always come as news to those who find out about him. And, calling it news encompasses what we mean by revelation.

Revelation includes the revelation of what was not known (or, at best, what was suspected but not experientally known in history). And that gets us back to Genesis 3. The first judgment day was a new experience and a revelation of God. It was a revelation even to Satan. Despite being a creature from another realm, Satan did not have full operational information. In fact, to this day, angels long to look into the news of God (1 Peter 1:12).

“News” is the right word to describe the revelation of God. Prophets proclaim revelation just as heralds proclaim news. Heralds of Christ deliver the news of what God has done and who he is (indeed: what he does and who he is are inseparable as he is not a mere philosophical construct, but he is the real actor who speaks and acts, revealing himself historically and actually). This news about God often goes by the name of Gospel. To herald the Gospel is not to share something that is independent of or outside of God, but it is to share the very news of God. By his Spirit (that is, by himself!), God has designed it so that us sharing news about him is how he shares himself. To that end, Gospel need not be reduced to a small set of facts about God, but it is large — so large, that it is not an it, but a who — and we can rightly say that Jesus is the Gospel: Jesus is the News of God in flesh (Mark 1:1).

A. Sharing News of God is Sharing God
When we accurately relay any news of God, we are offering more than useful headline facts, we are offering God. Is is in this way (by these means) that God has chosen to make himself known and to come to his creatures. That is, the news of God is used by God to give himself to people. Through words — through news — God comes to his image bearers.

B. The Word in Flesh and Word in Text is News
God gave himself to us as the incarnated Word (Jesus), and he makes us partakers of the Word in the inscripturated words of the Bible.

The Bible is news. It is the news of God. It is not mere news, but it is the way that God, by his Spirit (who is God), comes to us. To some, the news is an aroma of death, but to others it is the aroma of life. To some, that God would share himself in this way is an aroma of death. To Satan, the news of God aggravated his disgust of God. That is, when God came in judgment and proved to be who he said he is, the news was as an aroma of death and a Death-sentence.

C. Words from Heaven are Words that Judge
Unsuspecting rebels will discover who God is in their flesh, and they will be caught off guard and will revile in disgust when they hear (for themselves) the words of God. To them, the personal experience of the revelation of God will be news that will echo in their perfectly resurrected ears. The righteous and the wicked will all be raised, but for the damned, their resurrection bodies will serve a different purpose. Their bodies will make them fit for unending condemnation. And that judgment is the yet unexplored revelation of God that has already been shown in Christ, on the cross, where the wrath of God was revealed from heaven.

II. God is Infinite News: Infinite Gospel
The Gospel is the News of God. Any time we speak about Jesus, we share the News of God. We share the Gospel of God as we accurately herald who he is.

For example, here is news: God is the creator of all things.

Oddly, that is news to many — to those who deny or don’t know that God is the one who spoke the world into existence. But it is news. So, you see, news about God is large. It is as large as God! There is infinite Gospel news, as the news of God is more than a few points we might put on a tract. The news of God is God himself, and God is without end.

A. Infinite News is Large News, Not Narrow.
These distinctions may be helpful in identifying a certain tendency to reductionism. It has become a common practice to be so specific with our use of the word “Gospel” and the news of God, that the impression is that the news of God is far from infinite, and is instead rather narrow. In this way, it may be that Gospel is mistakenly taken to mean the parts of the Gospel most familiar to us (particularly the benefits that sinners have when God is merciful). What must be avoided, then, is the reduction of the Gospel to some aspects of God, and the tendency of conceiving of the Gospel narrowly in terms of the climactic and especially conclusive activities (namely — especially! — the death and resurrection of Jesus).

B. Pinnacle and Climactic Events DO Specially Make Known the News of God
Such pinnacle events do summarily capture all of the Gospel, just as God is always God in all of his activities. We are free to look at the entire life of Jesus as the Gospel — e.g., his virgin birth, walking on water, the Inner-Trinitarian pact before his incarnation (John 17:1-3), etc. — while at the same time, we know that his pinnacle activities are simultaneously decisive for how we know him. In this way, when we speak of the Gospel as his death and resurrection, we are not categorizing everything else about him as non-Gospel. Far from it, we are just using the climactic events as chiefly representative of the whole life of God. Language works this way (we sometimes call it pars pro toto), and we are right to use ultimate moments as a short-hand for all of God (all of the Gospel) even as we are free to examine seemingly lesser events as explorations of the same Gospel. For example, when God filled up Solomon’s temple by his Spirit (1 Kings 8:10), we are discovering the news of God — first revealed when he did it, then when we read about it and its meaning. It is the news of God and his activities.

III. God is the Gospel
If everything is carefully articulated, you can see how one can conclude that God is the Gospel. And to that, we can equally say, Jesus is the Gospel. The Holy Spirit is the Gospel. The Trinity is the Gospel. The news of the Trinity is news to many. How many are unaware of who the Trinity is or what the Triune-God has done in the world?

Any fact about God is news to men and angels. Any fact about Jesus is news.

A. This News is not from the Invented or “Discovered” Philosophy of Men
This is not concocted news, but it is news from above: facts about God come from God. Such words about God are not to be confused with the invented theories or philosophies of men, but they are the those things which he has said about himself in his Scriptures. As you discourse about the revelation of God (i.e., the Bible), you are truly discoursing about the Gospel. The Bible is the only repository of the heavenly News!

B. Summary Example of How All This Works
An infinite God is infinitely News to all of his creation. And he has chosen words — real Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic words — as that which heralds him. As you yourself join in that heralding, you testify to heavenly realities. To that end, every idle word you speak will be judged. Jesus told us so. It is in his Bible. In Matthew 12:36-37 he told the shocking news of the judging activities of God:

But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.

These words were new. And, 2000 years later, they still come as news. They catch the guilty by surprise. Satan was caught off guard in the Garden of Eden, for the God who comes to judge is surprisingly unexpected and unanticipated. That God is really like this — the kind of God who judges even idle words — is stunning. It is News. And the News is that it will be Jesus who comes to judge (Acts 17:31).

There is a man in heaven with a body (Jesus) who is coming to Judge the world as a full revelation of his divinity. Jesus is the divine God-Man and Judge. He is the News just as he is the Gospel.