Pastor in the Hat Podcast
Fearlessly tackling tough questions about faith from a progressive Christian perspective. This production of First Presbyterian Church Concord, CA We dive deep into the doubts and uncertainties that many listeners face, offering thoughtful insights to help navigate the complexities of each one’s own spiritual journey. Hosted by Darryl McCollum Commissioned Pastor, PCUSA and author of “In All Things Grace”.
Pastor in the Hat Podcast
Is the Bible True? A Journey with Pastor in the Hat
Is the Bible true? That's the fascinating question we tackle in this episode of the Pastor in the Hat podcast. Promising to lift the veil on one of the most important texts in human history, we take a 30,000 ft view at the Bible's composition and canonization. Think of the Bible as an ancient mixtape filled with stories and teachings that have been passed down through generations. We'll explain how oral traditions transitioned into written records and discuss the complexities behind authorship, including traditional attributions and pseudepigraphic books. Plus, we'll explore how the Jewish exile and the hand-copied nature of ancient manuscripts have influenced the content of the Torah. Modern archaeology, anthropology, and linguistics play a crucial role in reshaping our understanding, with intriguing examples like the differing endings in the Gospel of Mark.
But that's just the beginning. In the second part of our conversation, we delve into the transformative power of a Friday night Bible study group. Emphasizing the importance of asking profound questions and embracing the learning journey, I share my pastoral perspective on humility and the joy of exploring the Bible's deep truths. This episode encourages you to keep seeking, to find beauty in the Bible's message, and to love one another well. Join us for a thoughtful and inspiring exploration that will enrich your spiritual journey. God bless you, be safe, be blessed, and be well.
The Pastor in the Hat Podcast is a production of First Presbyterian Church Concord, CA
Welcome to today's episode of the Pastor in the Hat podcast, brought to you by First Presbyterian Church of Concord, california, where we believe that in Christ we are one family, loving, imperfect, messy and beautiful. We welcome you to find your place here. Today we're going to embark on a fun question is the Bible true? Now, this question is bigger than a bread box. Before answering, we need to understand what the Bible is and how we use it. We're going to do a series of podcasts to try to get to the answer. Today we'll do a 30,000-foot view of the Bible, exploring how it was put together, the different types of stories inside the authors or lack thereof, little known edits, copying errors and the journey to becoming an official book. So get ready, because there might be some uncomfortable twists and turns. Let's take a look at this and we'll start from understanding. Let's begin to understand the Bible's composition and how it came to be.
Pastor Darryl:The Bible is like a mixtape that I used to make back in the 80s for my girlfriends. It had all kinds of different songs and genres on it. Each one was different and each one had a purpose. The power ballad had one purpose. The dance music had a purpose. The power ballad had one purpose. The dance music had another purpose. And the Bible is similar, except, rather than music, it uses ancient texts, individual writings, and these took centuries to compile. And just like I used to compile those different songs, the Bible wasn't a collection until it was actually put together like the mixtape.
Pastor Darryl:These stories were initially passed down orally, meaning transmitted by mouth. They weren't written down. Before the written records arose, there was a potential for transmission errors, oral transmission errors. So the journey of writing these texts down ensured their preservation and prevented embellishments over time. For example, the embellishment like the fish I caught last summer. It started out, like you know, 11 inches long and before you knew it it was like big enough to swallow Jonah. So you know, those embellishments can happen over time. So the writing down of the Bible was an important step in its composition. And when you open the Bible you're going to encounter a variety of stories, and we're going to talk about those different kinds of stories in another podcast. We're going to get into what the different genres were.
Pastor Darryl:But just for today let's look at the Christian Bible as we have it. It's divided into Old and New Testaments, so basically two parts. The Old Testament contains the Torah, or the law. Now, these books are foundational books on which Jewish life and identity are built. This is the Mosaic Law, as it's called, or the Pentateuch Five penta and tuch for books, five books, the law of Moses. And they're traditionally attributed to having been written by Moses, but this is now currently debated among scholars.
Pastor Darryl:The Old Testament includes wisdom books, major and minor prophets and historical accounts. It's like a literary buffet with something for everyone, from epic adventures to wise sayings to even some really trippy visions. But who wrote all these texts? That's where it gets a little tricky right. Some Christians believe that God inspired all the texts and that the writers of the Bible were divinely directed by God to write down exactly these words. So in the minds of some Christians it's without error, and you know it's inerrant. It's completely literal. But there are various theories of authorship. Some books are attributed to specific authors like Moses or the Apostle Paul, while others remain anonymous. And, interestingly enough, some writers even claim to be famous figures from the past. To lend credibility to their contributions, these works are known as pseudepigraphic books. Now the New Testament also is an important part of the Christian doctrine and it includes the stories of Jesus and the writings of people like Paul and John and Peter and James, and they're trying to, you know, talk about the ministry of Jesus, his life, his death, his resurrection, and then the establishment of the new church and how we're supposed to act within that church. And then it closes out the New Testament with another very trippy vision called Revelation, which once again, is a podcast all of its own.
Pastor Darryl:A significant event happened that shaped the Bible's content and that was the exile of the Jewish people. In 597 BCE, so before Christ, before the Common Era, with the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem, the laws of the Torah remember the first five books had to be re-evaluated. You see, during this time the stories were collected, written down and edited to reflect new experiences and beliefs of the people and their new reality. 30% of the Torah was about temple law. So when the temple was destroyed, they had to do sort of this remix. Sort of this remix adding layers to the texts or taking some texts and reinterpreting them for their actuality of the day. This post-exilic makeover really helped shape the Bible's composition, because this is when it was really put together and edited.
Pastor Darryl:Now here's an interesting fact Since there weren't any fancy copy machines back in the day. Everything was written by hand and even the best scribes could make mistakes, and this led to variations between different copies of manuscripts. Some of the bloopers or tiny differences that are found ended up in the Bible that we have. There were margin notes that clerics wrote down or the copyists wrote down, and some of those became part of the text in modern translations and then some of them in the more modern translations were actually removed because it was realized that they weren't in the earlier or the original manuscripts. You see, we've done a lot of stuff in the last couple hundred years related to archaeology and anthropology and linguistics, which have really changed the textual context of the original Bible that came down to us Now. One of those things a perfect example is that in the Gospel of Mark.
Pastor Darryl:If you look at the last chapter of Mark, you'll notice that some ancient manuscripts end at verse 8, while others include additional verses, and this discrepancy has puzzled scholars for centuries. The shorter ending of Mark's gospel, which is found in the earliest manuscripts, concludes abruptly with the women discovering an empty tomb and fleeing in fear. Now, this ending leaves the readers kind of hanging, without any appearance of the resurrected Jesus or a clear resolution for the story right that we find in the other Gospels, and it left many of us wondering if this was indeed the original ending or if it was lost over time and added back in, and we don't know the real answer. We just know that the earliest manuscripts didn't have anything beyond verse 8. And the rest of the story was added later in the composition of the Bible. On the other hand, these other manuscripts that include a longer ending provide these appearances of Jesus to his disciples and instructions for spreading the gospel, and this ending, like I said, aligns more closely with the conclusions of the other gospels. Some scholars argue that the longer ending was added later to provide a more satisfactory conclusion to Mark's gospel, which better aligned with the other gospels.
Pastor Darryl:Now, this debate surrounding the ending of Mark's gospel highlights the complexities of textual criticism and the challenges involved in determining what is and what was the original text. Scholars examine the manuscript evidence, they compare different versions and they consider factors such as writing styles, theological themes and historical context to drive their conclusions. It's not just a game for them. They really work at this. It's their job to figure out what does the Bible actually mean and what does it actually say.
Pastor Darryl:Now, moving on to how the Bible became an official book. It's far from an overnight success. It took centuries of discussions, debates, negotiations and such to determine which books would be included. Now there's a very popular internet myth running around that the Bible became an official book or was, quote-unquote, canonized. It became canon in 325, at the Council of Nicaea, and this is not accurate. It took many years beyond that before an official canon was arrived at. And here's the funny thing you have to ask which canon, because different religious groups have slightly different versions, although the core stories remain consistent. Protestants have 66 books, catholics 73, eastern Orthodox have 78, and Ethiopian Orthodox have 81. They are really overachievers. The process of canonization also is a topic that's going to deserve its own podcast, and we will get to that.
Pastor Darryl:So what does it mean for the question of whether the Bible is true or not? Well, each book contains small t truths, such as historical events and cultural context. For example, if it says during the reign of Jehoiakim, that's pretty well set in a time-based situation. Or when Nebuchadnezzar ruled Babylon. Those are historical things that we can say. These are small t truths. These happen, these are events that we can validate through extra biblical references. Right, but it's not the small t truths that we're actually concerned about. It's the big t theological truths about God that we can discover through careful reading, study and guidance from the Holy Spirit.
Pastor Darryl:Imperfections and conflicting stories do not negate the big T truths that we can find in the Bible's pages. As one of my professors said, the Bible is God's message, fully divine, but with human fingerprints all over it. Some of the big T truths that we find in scripture are found through a process called hermeneutics, and this is where the translation of the scriptures come in. And then there's the process called exegesis. Exegesis is how pastors and theologians and biblical scholars try to draw those truths out of the text, and it's exegesis that's on display on Sundays when you see a pastor in the pulpit and they're looking to the text for big truths that come through and help us understand how, as a people, we can act in our role as Christians today.
Pastor Darryl:So, as we conclude today's mini-podcast, let's think about the Bible as a mix of amazing stories, national epics, and when I say national epics I'm thinking things like you know, george Washington cut down the cherry tree and he can't tell a lie kind of stuff. They are epic stories. They're little things that we tell our nation to make us feel good about ourselves. Right, the national epics in the Bible might be like the Exodus story or the conquering of Canaan these kinds of things. The Bible also includes and this is going to be controversial, guys mythology. But let's understand what mythology actually is. Mythology doesn't mean not truthful. Mythology are origin stories which help explain how we got here. Why are certain things as they are? Why are there mountains over here? What happened to cause the rain? How come there are people? How come there are animals? These mythological stories are not necessarily false or lies. They're origin stories to help us understand our beginnings or what ancient people believed were our beginnings. So don't get freaked out when we use the word mythology in the context of the Bible.
Pastor Darryl:The Bible also has some amazing poetry in it. It has wonderful histories, it has lots of prophecy in it and my favorite part, the mind-blowing visions. You know I mean I look at the book of Ezekiel and wonder okay, zeke, you know, I know you're exiled to Babylon, but what the heck's going on in this vision of the wheels within the wheels? And you know, it's really interesting stuff and it's fun to study for well, bible nerds like me.
Pastor Darryl:Let's also remember that, while authorship may be unclear in some cases and variations exist between manuscripts, the Bible still holds profound truths about God, and I mean really profound. So we need to search for those and look for them whenever we read. There's only a few ways we can learn to know God. The first one is the scriptures, so let's take them seriously and let's learn from them, and let's not bind them into things they're not supposed to be. The other thing we can do to know God is pray, because prayer is not a you know one way street. The Holy Spirit is involved. And three, we can be in community together and we can learn from one another.
Pastor Darryl:In preparation for this podcast, I had my Friday night Bible study group and they asked some great questions and through that questioning I learned things too, because sometimes people will ask profound questions that we have to look up, because guess what? Pastors, contrary to popular belief, do not know all the answers. In fact, we know a lot of answers, but probably not the ones you've got questions for. So give us an opportunity to look things up and we're going to be a lot better off. I promise I won't give you answers that I don't know. I'll look them up first.
Pastor Darryl:So, knowing that the Bible still holds these profound truths about God, it's important that, as we explore this wild book, that we remember to enjoy the journey, that we remember to enjoy the journey, because the journey of learning about God is what it's all about. So God bless you, guys, and may you love one another well. Thank you for joining us on this episode of the Pastor in a Hat podcast. We hope this exploration of the Bible's origin composition, I hope this exploration of the Bible's origin, composition and use, has provided you with some valuable insights. Remember to keep seeking truth and embracing the beauty of the Bible's message. Be safe, be blessed and be well. Bye all.
