Biblia

Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of 2 Timothy 3:16

Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of 2 Timothy 3:16

All Scripture [is] given by inspiration of God, and [is] profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

16. All scripture ] The word for ‘Scripture’ occurs fifty-one times in N.T., always, except 2Pe 3:16, of the recognised Old Testament Scriptures, the Law, the Prophets, and the Hagiographa, or of one or more of them; in 2Pe 3:16 the reference is to St Paul’s epistles and to ‘the other Scriptures.’ The A.V. of a.d. 1611 is therefore not wrong (though many printed copies have altered it) in rendering the word as ‘Scripture’ with a capital S; for it is by itself the recognised technical term.

We should translate Every Scripture probably, as is the proper rendering when there is no article. The word ‘Scripture’ is without the article also in Joh 19:37; 1Pe 2:6 ; 2Pe 1:20. Those who retain the rendering ‘All Scripture’ with A.V. would lay stress on the technical use of the word shewn above, so that it may be treated as a proper name, comparing Act 2:36, ‘all (the) house of Israel.’ But this is unnecessary, especially as the three places where the word occurs without the article in the singular have the meaning ‘a Book or passage of Scripture’ and they are in date as late as or later than this Epistle.

given by inspiration of God ] One word in the original, a passive verbal, occurring only here in N.T., and meaning ‘filled with the breath of God’ so as to be ‘living oracles,’ Act 7:38. Cf. 2Pe 1:21, ‘holy men of God moved by the Holy Spirit.’ Compare also the following passage written about a.d. 95, at the same time as the last N.T. book, St John’s Gospel: ‘Search the Scriptures, the true Scriptures, the Scriptures of the Holy Ghost: ye know that there is nothing unrighteous, nothing counterfeit written in them.’ Clem. Rom. ad Cor. c. 45.

There are two ways of taking this adjective, either as an attribute (so R.V.) or a predicate (so A.V.); either ‘Every Scripture, inasmuch as it is inspired of God, is also useful &c.’ or ‘Every Scripture is inspired and is profitable &c.’ In the latter case the second predicate comes in tamely. In the one case inspiration is assumed, in the other it is asserted.

profitable for doctrine ] For teaching.

for reproof ] The noun occurs only Heb 11:1, ‘the proving of things not seen.’ The corresponding verb is used five times by St Paul in these epistles, e.g. 2Ti 4:2.

correction ] Only here in N.T. though a good classical word, cf. Dem. c. Timocr. 707, 7 ‘they shall lose their promotion to the Areopagus for putting down the amendment of the laws.’

for instruction in righteousness ] Lit. discipline which is in righteousness; the verb ‘disciplining’ has occurred, 1Ti 1:20; 2Ti 2:25, where see notes. It occurs with ‘reprove’ in the letter to the church at Laodicea, Rev 3:19, where R.V. ‘chasten.’ ‘Which is in righteousness’ just as ‘faith which is in Christ Jesus’ above; the definite article indicates the definite sphere of exercise for the discipline and the faith. See note on 1Ti 1:2, where without the article the preposition and its case are shewn to be very nearly equivalent to an adjective. Ellicott well sums up the meaning ‘that Holy Scripture teaches the ignorant, convicts the evil and prejudiced, corrects the fallen and erring, and trains in righteousness all men, especially those that need bringing to fuller measures of perfection.’

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

All Scripture – This properly refers to the Old Testament, and should not be applied to any part of the New Testament, unless it can be shown that that part was then written, and was included under the general name of the Scriptures; compare 2Pe 3:15-16. But it includes the whole of the Old Testament, and is the solemn testimony of Paul that it was all inspired. If now it can be proved that Paul himself was an inspired man, this settles the question as to the inspiration of the Old Testament.

Is given by inspiration of God – All this is expressed in the original by one word – Theopneustos. This word occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. It properly means, God-inspired – from Theos, God, and pneo, to breathe, to breathe out. The idea of breathing upon, or breathing into the soul, is that which the word naturally conveys. Thus, God breathed into the nostrils of Adam the breath of life Gen 2:7, and thus the Saviour breathed on his disciples, and said, receive ye the Holy Ghost; Joh 20:22. The idea seems to have been, that the life was in the breath, and that an intelligent spirit was communicated with the breath. The expression was used among the Greeks, and a similar one was employed by the Romans. Plutarch ed. R. 9:p. 583. 9. tous oneirous tous theopneustous. Phocylid. 121. tes de theopnoustou sophies logos estin aristos.

Perhaps, however, this is not an expression of Phocylides, but of the pseudo Phocylides. So it is understood by Bloomfield. Cicero, pro Arch. 8. poetam – quasi divino quodam spiritu inflari. The word does not occur in the Septuagint, but is found in Josephus, Contra Apion, i. 7. The Scripture of the prophets who were taught according to the inspiration of God – kata ten epipnoian ten apo tou Theou. In regard to the manner of inspiration, and to the various questions which have been started as to its nature, nothing can be learned from the use of this word. It asserts a fact – that the Old Testament was composed under a divine influence, which might be represented by breathing on one, and so imparting life. But the language must be figurative; for God does not breathe, though the fair inference is, that those Scriptures are as much the production of God, or are as much to be traced to him, as life is; compare Mat 22:43; 2Pe 1:21. The question as to the degree of inspiration, and whether it extends to the words of Scripture, and how far the sacred writers were left to the exercise of their own faculties, is foreign to the design of these notes. All that is necessary to be held is, that the sacred writers were kept from error on those subjects which were matters of their own observation, or which pertained to memory; and that there were truths imparted to them directly by the Spirit of God, which they could never have arrived at by the unaided exercise of their own minds. Compare the introduction to Isaiah and Job.

And is profitable. – It is useful; it is adapted to give instruction, to administer reproof, etc. If all Scripture is thus valuable, then we are to esteem no part of the Old Testament as worthless. There is no portion of it, even now, which may not be fitted, in certain circumstances, to furnish us valuable lessons, and, consequently, no part of it which could be spared from the sacred canon. There is no part of the human body which is not useful in its place, and no part of it which can be spared without sensible loss.

For doctrine – For teaching or communicating instruction; compare the notes on 1Ti 4:16.

For reproof – On the meaning of the word here rendered reproof – elengmos – see the notes on Heb 11:1. It here means, probably, for convincing; that is, convincing a man of his sins, of the truth and claims of religion, etc.; see the notes on Joh 16:8.

For correction – The word here used – epanorthosis – occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. It means, properly, a setting to rights, reparation, restoration, (from epanorthoo, to right up again, to restore); and here means, the leading to a correction or amendment of life – a reformation. The meaning is, that the Scriptures are a powerful means of reformation, or of putting men into the proper condition in regard to morals. After all the means which have been employed to reform mankind; all the appeals which are made to them on the score of health, happiness, respectability, property, and long life, the word of God is still the most powerful and the most effectual means of recovering those who have fallen into vice. No reformation can be permanent which is not based on the principles of the word of God.

For instruction in righteousness – Instruction in regard to the principles of justice, or what is right. Man needs not only to be made acquainted with truth, to be convinced of his error, and to be reformed; but he needs to be taught what is right, or what is required of him, in order that he may lead a holy life. Every reformed and regenerated man needs instruction, and should not be left merely with the evidence that he is reformed, or converted. He should be followed with the principles of the word of God, to show him how he may lead an upright life. The Scriptures furnish the rules of holy living in abundance, and thus they are adapted to the whole work of recovering man, and of guiding him to heaven.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

2Ti 3:16-17

All Scripture is given by inspiration of God.

Inspiration of Scripture

The word Inspiration itself is evidently a figure. It may be illustrated by another word. Inspiration is a breathing into: influence is a flowing into: neither word is self-explanatory; the former, like the latter, may clearly admit of degrees and modifications. The word Inspiration occurs twice in the English Version of the Bible. But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding (Job 32:8). All Scripture is given by inspiration of God , and is profitable for doctrine, etc. (2Ti 3:16). In the one passage instruction is the chief thought, in the other edification. The word occurs twice also in the Prayer-book. Grant to us Thy humble servants that by Thy holy inspiration we may think those things that be good, etc. (Collect for the fifth Sunday after Easter). Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of Thy Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love Thee, etc. (Collect in the Communion service). In both these sanctification is the end in view. Definition is still wanting. In several passages of the Epistles (as, for example, Rom 15:4, and 2Pe 1:20-21) strong terms are employed to describe the objects and uses of Old Testament Scripture as a whole, and its source in the agency of the Holy Spirit. Nothing can be more inclusive than St. Pauls , nothing more emphatic than St. Peters . Yet definition is still wanting alike of the word and of the thing. Theories of Inspiration have been many, but it is not in conjecture or in reasoning that our idea of it should be sought. The only true view of Inspiration will be that which is the net result of a lifelong study of Scripture itself, with all freedom in registering its phenomena, and all candour in pondering the question, What saith it concerning itself? It is easy to see (and the Church of the present day is honest in avowing it) that the real truth must lie somewhere between two extremes–the extreme of verbal inspiration on the one side, and the extreme of a merely human composition on the other.


I.
Against the idea of a verbal inspiration of Scripture we are warned by many considerations. Amongst these we may place–

1. Its utter unlikeness to all Gods dealings in nature and grace. Where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom–freedom, not bondage; freedom, not rigidity.

2. The language of the New Testament as to the difference between letter and spirit, between and –the deadness of the one, the power of the other. As soon as Inspiration itself is tied to the clause and the sentence, to the precise shape and form of the utterance, and the black and white page of the written or printed book, it too is turned from the into the , and has lost the very of the Spirit which made it a (2Pe 1:21).

3. Such passages, for example, as the opening verses of St. Lukes Gospel, which speak only of diligent research and a thoughtful judgment as his guides in composing; or St. Pauls expressions in the seventh chapter of his First Epistle to the Corinthians, as to his speaking not always with authority, but sometimes in the tone of suggestion and advice; or again, St. Peters remarks upon the Epistles of St. Paul, which in the same breath he describes, by clear implication, as scriptures, and yet characterises with a freedom which would be irreverent and almost impertinent if each line of those scriptures had been verbally inspired.

4. The observation of differences of style and method between one Scripture writer and another; the employment, for example, by one of irony and sarcasm, by another of no weapons but those of simple persuasion.

5. The fearful importance attached to each reading and each rendering of each verse and clause of Scripture, if one was, and another was not; the very word dictated or the very thought breathed from heaven.

6. Also the utter grotesqueness of such an idea as the revelation of science, whether astronomy, geology, or ethnology–which yet there would have been if, where such objects are involved, the phrases and the sentences had been literally and verbally inspired of God; implying an anticipation, perhaps by many centuries, of discoveries for which God had made provision in His other gift of reason, and which it would have been contrary to all His dealings thus to forestall. Mans extremity is Gods opportunity; that which lie had given faculties for finding out in time, He would not interpose, before the time came, to precipitate.

7. The terrible risk to mankind of pinning down the faith to statements utterly indifferent to spiritual profiting, which yet, if philosophically accurate, must for whole ages bear the appearance of error. And who shall guarantee the Bible, even if accurately written up to the science of the nineteenth century, from being condemned by the science of the twentieth?


II.
If such are the confusions and contradictions of the one extreme, the other extreme is yet more perilous. The practical elimination (now so common)of the Divine element in Scripture is fatal in every sense to its inspiration.

1. It reduces Scripture to the level (at best) of works of human genius; and, when this is done, makes the question, for each book, a comparative one, in which some books would be exposed to a disparaging judgment.

2. It sends us back to human reasoning, which is on many topics (such, for example, as immortality, forgiveness, and spiritual grace) human guessing, for all our information on things of gravest concern.

3. It contradicts

(1) express declarations of the New Testament Scriptures as to the Divine authority of the Old, as well as

(2) express assertion of Divine illumination, promised and experienced, in the blew Testament writers themselves.

4. It does violence to the continuous doctrine of the Church of all ages, which has from the very first been express and peremptory in its view of the Divinity of the Scripture.

5. It leaves us practically destitute, even of a revelation. Because, though there might be a revelation without an inspiration (that is, a gospel of Christ, brought into the world by Him, and by Him communicated to His apostles, and by them to after ages, without a separate inspiration of the writers of its records), yet, as a matter of fact, it is by Scripture that we test our revelation, and that which shakes the authority of Scripture shakes the certainty of the revelation which Scripture enshrines.


III.
Between these two extremes lies somewhere the very truth itself about inspiration. It would be arbitrary to define it so precisely as to unchristianise those who cannot see with us. That there is both a human and also a Divine element in the Bible is quite certain. Some things we may say with confidence.

1. Inspiration left the writer free to use his own phraseology, even his mode of illustrating and arguing.

2. It did not level the characteristic features of different minds, life one could imagine the Epistle to the Galatians written by St. John, or the Epistle of St. James written by St. Paul.

3. It did not supersede the necessity of diligence in investigating facts, nor the possibility of discrepancies in recording them; though it is more than probable that most or all of these would be reconciled if we knew all.

4. While it left the man free in the exercise of all that was distinctive in his nature, education, and habits of thought, it communicated nevertheless an elevation of tone, an earnestness of purpose, a force and fire of holy influence, quite apart and different from that observable in common men.

5. It communicated knowledge to the man of things otherwise indiscoverable, and also to the writer of things which it was the will of God to say by him to the hearer or reader.


IV.
While we refrain from definition, it is our duty as Christians to form a high conception of the thing itself for which inspiration is the name.

1. Let us think what would have become of the itself, under whichever or whatever dispensation, if it had been left to depend upon oral transmission.

2. Let us give weight to the passages (some of them quoted above) which assert Inspiration in the strongest possible terms.

3. Most of all, let us live so much in the study of Scripture, as to acquire that reverent and devout conception of it which is ever deepest and strongest in those who best know it. A Christian man able to treat the Bible slightingly would be a contradiction in terms. (Dean Vaughan.)

Inspiration

The word which is here rendered inspired of God is common enough in heathen writers, but this is the only place in which it occurs in Holy Scripture. As the word was common in heathen writers, so is the idea. Best, says an ancient Greek poet, is the word of inspired wisdom. Another Greek writer speaks of dreams inspired of God. The Roman orator Cicero says, No man was ever great without a certain Divine inspiration. This last example reminds us that in the Bible also inspiration is in the first instance the attribute of men, not of books. The prophet in the Old Testament is also called the man of the Spirit. Men from God, the Second Epistle of Peter tells us, spake as they were moved of the Holy Ghost. There is a spirit in man, we read in Job, and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding. The Divine breath, for that is the idea contained in the words inspired of God, is first in a human soul; it is only through the soul that it can be communicated to any word or work. Scripture can only be a body of inspired writings because it is the work of a body of inspired men. Now let us approach the subject from this side, and I think it will lead us to some serviceable truths. All men are not equally capable of inspiration–some have a much greater fitness than others for receiving the Spirit of God. If we wish to see the perfect type of inspiration–inspiration not limited or hampered by any unfitness in its instrument–we must find one in whom there is no sin, but an entire and perfect sympathy with the mind and will of God. One such there is in Scripture, and one only–the man Christ Jesus. No one ever had the Spirit without measure except Him; in other words, no one ever walked the earth besides who was in the true and full sense inspired of God. The Divine breath was in Him, and Him only, the life of every thought and word. Hence the words of Christ have a solitary and supreme value. He says so Himself: The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life. The difficulties which are felt at the present time in connection with inspiration should all be brought under review in this light. Every scripture, the text tells us, at least by implication, has a Divine breath in it; there is a Divine purpose which it has once served, and which, at a certain stage of human progress, it may profitably serve still; but not every scripture is equally inspired; not every scripture has the final and permanent validity of the words of Christ; and as long as these last find their way to our hearts and work the will of Christ in us, we need not disquiet ourselves because we cannot define the inspiration of Esther, for instance, or of Second Chronicles. When we take the words of Christ as the perfect type of inspired words, and the record of them as the perfect type of inspired Scripture, we see what the essential contents and purpose of inspiration must be. Christs words are not monotonous; they are inexhaustible in their fulness; but in them all there is the undertone: One thing is needful. Christ is always saying the same things, and about the same things. The nature of God, the will of God, the true life and destiny of man–these and all that gathers round these are His theme. He aims at making men wise, but it is wise unto Salvation. He never taught a school of history or of science, or even of speculative theology. It was His meat to do the will of Him that sent Him, to declare that will, to win others to do it likewise. We cannot come nearer than the study of His words brings us to a true idea of inspiration; and if what I have said is true at all, it follows that inspiration has to do only with the will of God. The man of the Spirit is not necessarily an infallible observer, an infallible scientist, an infallible historian; in matters unconnected with his inspiration he may share the ignorance or the prejudices of his uninspired contemporaries; but he is, in the measure of his inspiration, an infallible interpreter of the will of God. Could anything be more true than that the words of Christ are profitable for doctrine, or to put it in commoner words, useful for teaching? The truth about God and man and all spiritual realities is revealed in them, and brought home to the mind and heart. They have filled and fertilised the intellect of Christendom for centuries. Are they not useful also for reproof, or more exactly, for conviction? Are there any words in the world that can quicken a dead conscience and make it sting, like His? How many of us have been revealed to ourselves as we listened to Him, and been compelled to cry like the woman of Samaria–Come, see a man that told me all things that ever I did? Are they not profitable also for correction, for the putting right of what is wrong, and for discipline in righteousness? But, some one may say, though all this is plain enough in regard to Christs words, it is very difficult to apply it to everything in the Bible–for instance, to the historical books; yet the text speaks of every scripture. That is true, and no doubt by every scripture the apostle has the Old Testament in view; there was no other scripture to speak of when he wrote. But I think a little patience and attention will show that this general and practical definition of inspiration is applicable to the whole of the Bible; and if the Bible, from first to last, has this inspiring and educative power for practical spiritual purposes, we must not deny its inspiration on other and alien grounds. Let us take examples from the historical books to make clear what I mean. There are parts of the Old Testament that belong to the clear daylight of history–for example, the story of the last years of David. That story is told in 2 Samuel, from chap. 11. onward. I hardly need to recall it even by mentioning the names of Bathsheba, Uriah, Amnon, Tamar, Absalom, Ahithophel, Joab, Shimei. No one knows who wrote it, but it is not possible to doubt that it rests on the authority of some one in immediate contact with the facts. Now consider how it might have been written. A newspaper reporter often has to deal with the same materials, and the chances are a thousand to one that in his hands they minister to the defilement and degradation of the community. A secular historian would probably handle them lightly, as the inevitable disorders of an oriental despotism–the natural result of such a situation as David occupied. In neither case would there be room to speak of inspiration. But as it stands in the Bible, that terrible record of crime and its consequences, is in the full sense of the word inspired. It is not written by a sensational reporter, or a pragmatical historian, but by a man of the Spirit. We see lust and blood in it, not with the sensual eye which feels the fascination of moral horrors, but with the holy eye of God. No man ever read it but was awed, shocked, disciplined in righteousness by pity and fear. It is in that sense that the story is inspired. The facts were not inspired; they were the common property of men with and without the Spirit. There could not be a more signal illustration of the power of inspiration than that a narrative like this–all of foulest crime compact–should have virtue in it, when told by an inspired man, to quicken the conscience, and educate the man of God. Take one example more, in some ways the most difficult of all, the first eleven chapters of Genesis. According to the usual chronology these cover a space of something like two thousand years. They do not contain many incidents–Creation, the Fall, the Flood, the origin and dispersion of the nations, are the chief. Now nobody lived through all that period, and at the very earliest these narratives were not written as we have them for centuries after it expired. To what extent they embody traditions; how nearly or how remotely, in any given case, tradition may be related to things as they actually happened; whether a primitive revelation survives in them here or there–all these are questions on which men have been very positive, but on which simple regard for truth precludes positiveness. And what I want to insist upon here, is that the inspiration of these chapters, like that of the rest of the Bible, is not affected by any decision to which we may come on these points. Inspiration has to do with the spirit of the writer, not with his materials. The inspiration of Luke did not provide him with facts about the life of Jesus; he had to learn them from eyewitnesses and catechists; he had to scrutinise and compare documents like another historian. Neither did inspiration, as I believe, supply the writer of Genesis with his materials. What is inspired in his story is what speaks to the spirit, what serves to convict, to correct, to discipline in righteousness; and judged by this standard, there is nothing in the Bible better entitled to claim inspiration than the story, e.g., of the Fall. Compare such a narrative with the use made of similar materials by a pagan writer–a comparison that can fortunately be made–and we see how wonderfully the author must have been filled and uplifted by a Spirit above his own. It is because his writing has this spiritual quality, this permanent power to reveal to us both God and our own heart, that it answers to the description given by Paul of every inspired Scripture. There is only one proof, in the long run, that the Spirit of God is in the Bible; and that is, that it exerts its power through the Bible. The perfection of Scripture is perfection for its purpose, and that purpose is the transformation of character. (James Denney, B. D.)

The inspiration and utility of the Scriptures


I.
The inspiration of the scriptures.

1. What is inspiration? It is not revelation, but the infallible record of an infallible revelation.

2. The extent of inspiration. How far were these men guided by the Holy Ghost in the composition of the Scriptures? To every line and word. Yet was not the self-control or intelligent consciousness of the writer destroyed. Each writer retains his own style (see 1Co 2:13; 1Co 12:6).

3. The object of inspiration. To give certainty to that written under its guidance.

4. The proofs of inspiration. Internal evidence. Arguments drawn from the history of these books, from their contents. Christs appeal to the Old Testament as of Divine origin. The claim of both writers of Old and New Testaments.


II.
The utility of the scriptures. profitable for, etc.

1. As an unvarying standard of doctrine. Not a theological statement, but the germ of all true doctrine. From it all doctrine must be derived, and to it all doctrine must be referred.

2. Useful in the confutation of all religious error. Profitable for reproof.

3. Useful as an infallible standard of right and wrong. We cannot trust a pope, a church.

4. Useful for instruction in righteousness. By following its teachings we are brought into fuller measures of perfection. Our sanctification is by the Word. Sanctify them through Thy truth; Thy Word is truth. (James Hunter.)

Inspired Scriptures, and their Divine purpose


I.
The nature of the writings here spoken of.


II.
The object for which the scriptures were written. This object is twofold; first, what the Bible would make man; and next, holy it would accomplish its purpose.

1. What the Scriptures would make man. That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. It does this by first making him a man of God. Religion is not an abstraction–it is a Divine life, and a life which in man makes him a man of God.

2. The standard after which he ever aims is perfection!

3. But we have not only the standard announced, we have also the style of the spiritual education determined–that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished.


III.
How the scriptures propose making men of God, throughly furnished, unto all good works. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable.

1. For doctrine; that is, for conveying those truths and that learning needful to salvation.

2. Becoming profitable for reproof. This word reproof, means conviction.

3. It becomes profitable for correction. This is equally necessary in a volume suitable to save men.

4. Lastly–by instruction of righteousness. The unlearning of mans love to sin, the undoing of his evil habits–this is correction. But after all this is but the negative part of Christian character. It is the abegnation of evil. Christianity inculcates positive good.


IV.
The work which holy Scripture is yet destined to do.

1. By the Bible the Church of God mast be purified.

2. By the Bible, as an instrument, the Jews must be converted.

3. By the Bible the great apostasy must be destroyed.

4. By the Bible, instrumentally, the heathen must be converted. (A. M. Brown, LL. D.)

The Bible superhuman

I shall content myself with stating some plain facts about the Bible, which can neither be denied nor explained away. And the ground I shall take up is this–


I.
That these facts ought to satisfy every reasonable inquirer that the bible is of God, and not of man.

1. It is a fact that there is a superhuman fulness and richness in the contents of the Bible. It throws more light on a vast number of most important subjects than all the other books in the world put together. It boldly handles matters which are beyond the reach of man when left to himself.

2. It is another fact that there is a superhuman wisdom, sublimity, and majesty in the style of the Bible. Strange and unlikely as it was, the writers of Scripture have produced a book which even at this day is utterly unrivalled. With all our boasted attainments in science and art and learning we can produce nothing that can be compared with the Bible. To talk of comparing the Bible with other sacred books so called, such as the Koran, the Shasters, or the book of Mormon, is positively absurd. You might as well compare the sun with a rushlight–or Skiddaw with a mole-hill–or Saint Pauls with an Irish hovel–or the Portland vase with a garden pot–or the Koh-i-noor diamond with a bit of glass. God seems to have allowed the existence of these pretended revelations in order to prove the immeasurable superiority of His own Word.

3. It is another fact, that there is a superhuman accuracy in the facts and statements of the Bible, which is above man. Here is a book which has been finished and before the world for nearly 1800 years. These 1800 years have been the busiest and most changeful period the world has ever seen. During this period the greatest discoveries have been made in science, the greatest alterations in the ways and customs of society, the greatest improvements in the habits and usages of life. But all this time men have never discovered a really weak point or a defect in the Bible. Over and over again the enemies of the Bible have fancied they have detected defects. Again and again they have proved to be mistaken. The march of intellect never overtakes it. The wisdom of wise men never gets beyond it. The science of philosophers never proves it wrong. The discoveries of travellers never convict it of mistakes. Are the ruins of Nineveh and Egypt ransacked and explored? Nothing is found that overturns one jot or tittle of the Bibles historical statements.

4. It is another fact that there is in the Bible a superhuman suitableness to the spiritual wants of all mankind. It feeds the mind of the labourer in his cottage, and it satisfies the gigantic intellects of Newton, Chalmers, Brewster, and Faraday. It is the only book, moreover, which seems always fresh and evergreen and new. I place these four facts about the Bible before you, and I ask you to consider them well. Take them all four together, treat them fairly, and look at them honestly. Upon any other principle than that of Divine inspiration, those four facts appear to me inexplicable and unaccountable. Not only were its writers isolated and cut off in a peculiar manner from other nations, but they belonged to a people who have never produced any other book of note except the Bible! There is not the slightest proof that, unassisted and left to themselves, they were capable of writing anything remarkable, like the Greeks and Romans. Yet these men have given the world a volume which for depth, sublimity, accuracy, and suitableness to the wants of man, is perfectly unrivalled. How can this be explained? To my mind there is only one answer. The writers of the Bible were Divinely helped and qualified for the work which they did.


II.
Let us now consider the privileges which the possession of an inspired book confers upon us.

1. It is a privilege to possess the only book which gives a reasonable account of the beginning and end of the globe on which we live.

2. It is a privilege to possess the only book which gives a true and faithful account of man.

3. It is a privilege to possess the only book which gives us true views of God.

4. It is a privilege to possess the only book which gives a clear account of the full, perfect, and complete provision which God has made for the salvation of fallen man.

5. Finally, it is a privilege to possess the only book which explains the state of things that we see in the world around us.


III.
Let us now consider the duties which the possession of Gods oracles entails upon us.

1. First and foremost, let us honour the Bible by making it the supreme rule of faith, the standard measure of truth and error, of right and wrong in our churches.

2. In the next place, if we believe the Bible to be the oracles of God, let us show the reality of our belief by endeavouring to spread it throughout the world. (Bp. Ryle.)

Inspiration of the Holy Scriptures


I.
In confirmation of this doctrine, we would ask attention to the following considerations and arguments.

1. We would offer a short, clear, and strong argument, from Mr. Wesley. The Bible, says he, must be the invention either of good men or angels, bad men or devils, or of God.

(1) It could not be the invention of good men or angels; for they neither could nor would make a book, and tell lies all the time they were writing it, saying, Thus saith the Lord, when it was their own invention.

(2) It could not be the invention of bad men or devils; for they would not make a book which commands all duty, forbids all sin, and condemns their souls to hell to all eternity.

(3) Therefore we must draw this conclusion, that the Bible must have been given by Divine inspiration–that it is the work of God.

2. Our second argument is derived from prophecy. The ability to foretell future events, especially hundreds of years beforehand, belongs to God alone.

3. The declarations of the Scriptures themselves plainly prove this doctrine. But will not this be proving inspiration by inspiration? It would be so, indeed, did we assume the Bible in this argument to be inspired. But now we take it only as a book of truth, declaring true doctrines and true history; as such we receive it, and by itself prove its inspiration.


II.
We pass to consider some objections.

1. The first, and one which is frequently in the mouths of infidels, is that there are contradictions in the Scriptures, and therefore they cannot be inspired.

2. Another class of objections against the plenary inspiration of the Scriptures is founded on the imperfect state of the text, its variations in the reading and punctuations.

3. Another objection which has been urged against plenary or verbal inspiration is founded on the individuality of the sacred writers. The following is our answer:–God speaks to man after the manner of men; and hence He uses human language, and, of course, human language with its imperfections.

Inferences:

1. If the Holy Scriptures are Divinely inspired, human reason ought to be held in abeyance to their teachings.

2. If Divinely inspired, they must teach us truth without any admixture of error.

3. We also infer that, if Divinely inspired, they contain a sufficiency of truth for our salvation. (Stephen M. Vail, M. A.)

The Word of God commended to the man of God in the perilous times of the last days

1. The subject of this text is our own precious Bible.

2. And, assuredly, of the very deepest interest must such a subject be to the sort of person to whom in the text the Spirit, by Paul, addresses Himself, on the Divine inspiration, and authority, and profitableness of the Bible. For it is to the man of God the apostle here speaks in commendation of the Word of God. It is to one he writes who (2Ti 3:14-15) had learned and been assured of the things revealed in the Holy Scriptures, which from a child he had known–who had experimentally proved them to be able to make him wise unto salvation, through faith which is in Christ Jesus. To that sort of person no theme could be more attractive of the deepest interest, than the incalculable preciousness of the Holy Bible (Psa 19:7-11). One thing only could enhance such a mans estimate of their infinite value, and that one thing was the character of the times in which, as peculiarly threatening of dangerous assaults on the Christian faith, the apostle commended the profitableness of the Scriptures and exhorted the man of God to continue to confide in the profitableness of all Scripture as given by inspiration of God.

3. And yet, though thus employed as the means of enforcing his exhortation to Timothy to continue in the things which he had learned, the perilous controversies of the times are not suffered by any insinuation on the part of the apostle to disturb the certainty in which his young disciple had been assured of the things which he had learned.

4. Are we men of God, taught of God to know Him, and with profoundest reverence to acknowledge His authority speaking in His own Word? Then we are of those who spiritually see. To our renewed hearts, as to open healthy eyes, the light of Holy Scripture has come and entered in, carrying with it its own evidence of its Divine authority, and with a power that is irresistible.


I.
Whence have we the Bible? It is of God–its authority is Divine. When God speaks the highest exercise of mans reason surely is, in silent submission, to believe and obey, simply because it is the Word of God that is spoken. It is the exercise of a prerogative the noblest birthright of man, to believe Gods truth. In that submission of human reason to the authority of Divine truth, man escapes into freedom! The truth as nothing else can do, emancipates the mind from the debasing slavery to the opinions of men. It puts man as to unseen things in immediate and direct communication alone with God. No creature is allowed to intervene as the Lord of the conscience, when, for the authority of God speaking in it, the word in Holy Scripture is believed. God is then by His Word and Spirit in actual contact with your soul, for your enjoying the most ennobling fellowship with Himself, in the light of truth, and in the perfect freedom of a willing obedience of the truth.


II.
In what manner is it given us by God?–It is given by inspiration of god! The text here, you observe, does not point to such a mode of communication with man as was used in the Garden of Eden, when, in the cool of the day, the voice of God was heard by Adam talking with him. Nor yet does the text here refer to such a mode of writing down what the voice of God had uttered in mans hearing, as was once and again practised, when, on two tables of stone, the ten words of the Holy Moral Law were engraven by the immediate finger of God. The text does plainly testify to the Word of God being written, but observe, to that result being attained by what is called inspiration. It is God-breathed. That, what is written in the Bible is the Word of God, results from the inspiration by God of men employed by Him to write it. The Word in Holy Scripture results from that miraculous operation of the Spirit of God, whereby He did so communicate Himself to the writers of these Scriptures for the revelation of His will to man, as to secure the infallible truth and Divine authority of what is written in the Bible. Of the manner of that miraculous operation of the Spirit of God we know nothing.


III.
To what extent is the Bible inspired?–All Scripture is given by inspiration of God. It is thus that the Divine Author of the book Himself declares to what extent it is inspired. In whatever manner the Divine influence that gave the Word worked–by whatever means, by means of however many varied manuscripts, as by many different compilers–the result we have in this Bible is throughout Divinely inspired.


IV.
With what design has it been given by inspiration of God? It was given to be profitable, in order that the man of God may be thoroughly furnished unto all good works, and for that end profitable in a way manifold and many-sided.

1. The Bible is profitable for doctrine. By its revelation of truth as an objective reality, it really gives man truth to love. It thus stands in the boldest contrast to the utterly unsatisfying vanity of modern rationalism, which gives you nothing but the question whether there be revealed truth at all.

2. The Bible is profitable, too, for reproof. By its deep and searching spirituality the Bible deals with mans state as a sinner before God. It reveals the truth as to man lost. It reaches the deepest needs of his condition. It thus utterly dispels all the delusive fancies of modern rationalism, whereby man is tempted to think well of himself; and so to count that a gain to him which, if ever lie be saved, he must be content to count as loss for Christ.

3. The Bible is profitable, besides, for correction of every such groundless hope in man. By the revelation of grace to us as fallen, and of deliverance from the guilt and power of our sin by the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus, the Bible gives a Divine contradiction to every rationalistic theory of human progress, by which redemption is attempted to be explained without the cross and the sacrifice of the Redeemer.

4. The Bible is profitable, finally, for instruction (or discipline) in the life and walk of righteousness. In direct opposition to the wild ravings of modern rationalism about emancipation from the external law of revealed truth–for the solemn rebuke of that delusive licence which is sought in following the light within us, rather than the Word of God without us–the Bible plainly asserts that, under the law to Christ, this is the love of the new life in Christ, that we keep His commandments–a life of obedience of the law of liberty–even as Christ Himself kept His Fathers commandments and abode in His love. (R. H. Muir.)

On the Scriptures


I.
Human ability has been inadequate to the production of anything which would justify us in attributing to it the production of the scriptures.


II.
God having graciously resolved to recover the human race from the state into which they had fallen, and to this end having spoke in times long past to the fathers by the prophets, and in the latter days to the world, by His Son, it is reasonable to suppose that, for the benefit of the generations to come for ever, He would cause a record to be made of the communications of His will.


III.
The connection and agreement of the several parts of the sacred volume, intimate strongly its divine inspiration.


IV.
Tradition has accompanied the holy volume in all ages and places of its being, testifying its claim to be considered as the word of god.


V.
The providential care of god over the holy scriptures may well lead us to believe that they are his offspring.


VI.
The completeness of the sacred writings, whereby I mean their sufficiency and perfection as a rule of faith and conduct; their adequateness to our necessities in this present state.

1. This we may clearly deduce from what has already been established. Being given by inspiration of God, the Scriptures must be perfect for the purpose whereunto He sends them; and if they are finished, so that no further addition to them is to be expected, they must be perfect in all generations for ever, for the use of the children of men.

2. And this, if we now advert to the sacred writings, will be found to be really the case. Upon every subject of a religious or moral nature, concerning which mankind have been inquisitive, we may here find ample information. And concerning the conduct which is proper, in every situation in which mankind may be placed, we may here find explicit instruction.

3. But, it may be objected, if the Scriptures are thus complete, whence is it that so many to whom they are sent, are brought by them neither to right faith nor to right practice?

4. And this brings me to observe in illustration of the completeness of the sacred volume, that if any who have access to it are deficient in knowledge or virtue, the cause of the deficiency is altogether in themselves. The Law of the Lord is perfect; and His Spirit is ready to render His Word efficacious to every attentive and humble mind. But we must approach it with docility. It is owing to mens lusts and passions, to the pride of their minds, to the perverseness of their hearts, to the carnality and viciousness of their lives, that they do not all perceive the excellence and perfection of the Word of God, and find it a savour of life unto life to their souls.


VII.
We find ourselves in possession of a volume, wonderfully adapted to the necessities of our nature, and given by inspiration of God. It becomes us to inquire, what is the object for which it is given?

1. And let me observe that it is for no purpose of benefit to the Almighty that the volume of His Word is given to our world. Neither our faith nor our obedience can profit the Most High.

2. I must also premise that whether any other beings than ourselves are interested in them, and whether their contents will be of utility to us in the other world, are questions which need not be discussed as essential to the inquiry we are about to consider. It is enough, in order to raise our estimation of them, to be assured that into the mysteries revealed to us the angels desire to look, and that by the dispensations of God to the Church on earth His manifold wisdom is made known to higher orders of beings. From the nature of things we may also be certain that those general principles of duty and virtue which have not respect to mutable stations and relations are the principles by which the conduct of perfect beings is regulated in all worlds.

3. But what I am now principally concerned to consider is the end or uses of the sacred volume to men, to whom it is given, in the present world. And this is nothing less than our recovery from the state of ignorance, sinfulness, and misery into which we are fallen, and our exaltation to the hope of eternal life. That I may more distinctly set before you the gracious design of the Almighty in giving us the volume of His Word, allow me more particularly to observe that it is the efficacious means of all those changes and graces by which the Christian character is formed and perfected. We are told, you know, that we must be born again in order to the knowledge and enjoyment of the kingdom of God. It is through the instrumentality of the Scriptures that this regeneration is accomplished. They are the seed of this new birth. Again: it is necessary that we should be sanctified and made holy in heart and life before we can enter into the kingdom of heaven. And the Holy Scriptures are the means by which the Spirit of God accomplishes this important part of our salvation. Further: it is required of us to grow in grace; and we have need to be constantly nourished in all goodness, if we would not relapse into our vile state, but advance to perfection in knowledge and virtue. The sacred writings are the granary from which this daily sustenance of our souls is to be obtained. They reveal the truths, they contain the virtues, they give efficacy to the ordinances, by which we are nourished into eternal life. Finally: it is necessary to our comfort, and to the full accomplishment of our deliverance from the miseries of our natural state, that we should have joy and peace in believing. And the reservoir of all spiritual joy is the Word of God–the gospel of our salvation.


VIII.
From these truths there are several inferences of a very serious nature and great practical importance to which I must now ask your attentive consideration.

1. And from the views we have taken of the sacred volume we may perceive its claim to our highest estimation.

2. But if we value the Scriptures we shall also study them. The consequences of not reading the Holy Scriptures are of a more serious nature and greater in extent than you may suppose. It is to this, I apprehend, that we are to attribute, in a great measure, the total ignorance of religion in some and the decay of it in others. It is in this that we are to look for the cause of the instability of Christians. Here we may find the reason why error prevails. Here we may discover the source of fanaticism and of superstition. To this it is owing that the best seem unconscious of the degree of holiness to which they are called; and that all rest easy under imperfections of knowledge and deficiencies of virtue which a thorough acquaintance with the Scriptures would both reprove and correct.

3. In the course of our observations upon the Holy Scriptures, we have shown that God hath a merciful purpose in conferring them upon us, even to recover us from our ignorance, sinfulness, and misery, and exalt us to the hope of everlasting life. It behoves us, therefore, to inquire how far His desire and gracious intention have been accomplished in us? And this inquiry you will most safely answer, not by adverting to your occasional feelings and transient fervours, but by looking to your principles and your lives. Are you brought to a clear knowledge of the only true God, and of Jesus Christ whom He hath sent? Are those traits of excellence which are distinctly exemplified in the lives of the Scripture worthies, and which are all combined and perfected in the example of our blessed Lord, imitated by you in the several conditions and relations in which the Most High hath placed you? If, at the day of judgment, we shall be found, notwithstanding cur advantages, to have remained unchanged and unrenewed, the very heathens will rise up in judgment and condemn us.

4. On this solemn account I cannot forbear adding what is powerfully enforced by our subject, the importance of bringing to the oracles of truth, whenever we recur to them, becoming dispositions and conduct. Endeavour, if possible, to make it the standard by which you would regulate all your thoughts and actions.

5. The character of the sacred writings, and your privilege in possessing them, impose on you an obligation to extend the knowledge of them as far as you are able, and especially to make them the source from which you furnish your children with the principles and rules of life. (Bp. Dehon.)

The true teachings of the Bible

Every Scripture inspired of God, is the declaration, is profitable. Profitable for what? Well, for teaching, for reproof, for correction. It is a good teaching-book. It is a good book out of which to get instruction, provided you seek the right sort of instruction–instruction in righteousness. What is righteousness? Right living. In the Old Testament and the New the ideal pattern is that of a man living right in himself, in his social and civic relations, in his whole orb of self. A man must have some ideal pattern before him, and he must live according to it. The Bible is said to be inspired–that part of it which is inspired. Every Scripture inspired of God is also profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. For what purpose? Why, that the man of God may be complete, furnished completely unto every good work. There are two radical views of the function of sacred Scripture. First, it is held that it is a book proceeding directly from the mind of God, in the same sense in which Miltons poems proceeded from his mind, or in which Newtons discoveries proceeded from his mind, or in which any legislation proceeds from the minds of the legislators, and that it contains a substantial revelation of Gods moral government, both in this life and in the other world. In part, it is such a book; but that is not the genius of the Bible. Such is not the grand end of this book. The second view is the Scriptural theory. It is contained in the text. The Bible is a book that under takes to teach men how to live so that they shall live hereafter; and in regard to that aim and design of the Bible there is no divergence of opinion. All Scripture, then, is not inspired. Why should we suppose that the genealogies, and the land laws, or the laws of property, among the Jews, needed to be either inspired or revealed? Was it to supersede the natural operation of human reason that the Bible was given? If the division of property sprang up in the Hebrew commonwealth, and if there were many minute economies, all of which were of a nature such as that they could be born out of the human mind, and it was perfectly within the power of the human mind to write them down, what inspiration was needed for that purpose? No inspiration is necessary to record things that common human intelligence cannot miss, and cannot very well fail of recording. Proverbs and national songs, manners and customs, of the Hebrew commonwealth–all lay within the natural function of human reason; and when it is said, All Scripture that is inspired, doubtless it was with the conception that many of these things were natural and not supernatural. The existence of God; a belief in the moral order of the universe, or supervising Divine Providence; conscience, or the knowledge of what is right and what is wrong, and sensibility to that which is right as well as reaction from that which is wrong; the nature of things that are right and the nature of things that are wrong; sanctions for virtue, and sanctions also, penal, for vice, selfishness, wickedness, cruelty–all these things are constitutional, if I may say so, in the Bible. Here, then, is the life that you must not live, and here is the life that you must live. Was there ever a man that wanted to take anything away from that? The whole Bible is aa attempt to correct a man, and take him away from this under-passionate life of which we have been hearing the registration, and to persuade him to come out of it into the higher and spiritual life. The genius of the Bible is to lift men to righteousness, and to show the things to be avoided, and the things to be taken on. It is a book of instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be thoroughly furnished to every good work; and here are the work and the qualities. Now, I should like to know if there is any infidel in this world on that subject, or can be. A great many do not believe that God can exist in three persons; but is there anybody that ever doubted that love was beautiful, was true, was desirable? A great many men have had theories of the Atonement of Jesus Christ; there are some fifteen or twenty different theories or modifications on that subject; but did men ever have any difference of opinion as to love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness, or any of these other qualities? About them there is absolute unity. (H. W. Beecher.)

The Divine authority and perfection of the Scriptures


I.
That the scriptures are given by inspiration of God.

1. In order to judge whether persons are inspired, we must carefully inquire into their moral character; into their doctrine or message; and into the credentials or proofs of their mission.

2. The other external proof of an inspired person is the fulfilment of prophecy.


II.
The perfection or sufficiency of the Scriptures.

1. They are profitable for doctrine to acquaint us with our lost and miserable condition by the entrance of sin into the world, and the train of fatal consequences that attended it; with our recovery by Christ; the covenants of redemption and grace; the offices of Father, Son, and Spirit in the work of our redemption, and with all those other mysteries which were kept secret since the world began, but are now made manifest by the Holy Scriptures for the obedience of faith (Rom 16:26).

2. For reproof, or the discovery of our pernicious errors in doctrine and practice.

3. The Scriptures are profitable for correction of vice and wickedness. Wherewithal, says the Psalmist, should a young man cleanse his way but by taking heed thereto according to the Word of God? There we have a collection of all Christian graces and duties, with their opposite vices. The fruits of the spirit and of the flesh are distinguished with the greatest propriety; and the most engaging motives to the practice of the one, and awful threatenings against the other, are represented with the greatest strength and advantage.

4. For instruction in righteousness. That is, either in the righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all that believe, or in the practice of moral righteousness, the nature and excellency of which is better explained and illustrated in the sermons of our blessed Saviour than in all the writings of the ancient philosophers.


III.
The clearness and perspicuity of the Scriptures.

1. They were written in the vulgar language, and therefore designed for the use of the common people.

2. Our Saviour, in His sermons to the people, appeals to the Scriptures, and exhorts His countrymen, the Jews, to search them. The Bereans are commended for this practice (Act 17:11), and Timothy appears to have been acquainted with them from his childhood. If, then, it be proper to teach our children the Scriptures, and if it be the duty of grown persons to search them, it must follow that they are sufficiently clear in all points necessary to salvation.

Lessons:

1. Hence we may learn that the religion of a Christian should be his Bible, because it contains the whole revealed will of God, and is a perfect rule of faith and practice.

2. Let us be thankful that we have the Scriptures in the vulgar language.

3. Let Christians of all ranks and capacities revive this neglected duty of reading the Scriptures in their families and closets: it is both a delightful and useful employment.

4. When we read the Scriptures, let us consider them, not as the words of men, but as in deed and truth the Word of God.

5. In judging of controversies among Christians, let us not be carried away by the authority of great names or the numbers of them that are on one side, but keep close to the Scriptures.

6. When we read the Scriptures, let us pray for the instructions and teachings of the Holy Spirit, whose office it is to remove the prejudices and enlighten the understandings of those who are truly sincere. (Daniel Neal.)

The inspiration of the Scriptures


I.
The nature of the inspiration. Inspiration means that which is breathed into the human mind of God. In the same way as Christ breathed upon the apostles, and said, Receive ye the Holy Ghost, so inspired men receive that influence and power which enlightens, and purifies, and sustains their judgment and their capacity whilst they are writing it. Exactly in the same way as a musician, out of an instrument, by the touch of his fingers, will evoke such sounds, such harmonies, as his own skill, his own will, or his own pleasure may design, the writers of the Holy Scriptures are the instruments out of which the Holy Ghost evokes the melodies of truth–the harmonies of heavenly and Divine doctrine–that which makes us happy in time, and prepares us for the happiness of eternity. There is a slight distinction to be made between inspiration and dictation. Dictation addresses itself to the ear, and goes through the ear into the understanding and the heart; inspiration is more that which is within a man–it is a power dwelling in the interior of his soul, and influencing his thoughts and expressions accordingly.

1. There is inspiration in matters historical–that which relates to the histories and biographies contained in the Bible.

2. We come to the inspiration which is doctrinal, or which has to do with abstract truth, such truth as the human faculties could never elicit, invent, or evolve; such truth as, if known at all by man, must be made known by God.

3. I advert to that inspiration which I denominate legislative–that which is associated with the giving of law and the enunciation of commandments.

4. There is the inspiration which is devotional.

5. I shall mention but one other form: that is, the form of prophecy–the inspiration which relates to the prophetic Word. I take this to be the fullest, most perfect, and unmingled of all the inspirations, because to man in no case is there vouchsafed any foresight.


II.
Some of the leading evidences, the more striking proofs, that the Bible does come from that sacred and celestial source to which we ascribe it.

1. First it claims to be so; it says of itself that it is so. Moses did as the Lord commanded him. Again and again we read, the Lord spake unto Moses; and every prophet came with this annunciation, Thus saith the Lord. We find Paul saying, I command; yet not I, but the Lord; The Spirit speaketh expressly; Ye have received the Word of God.

2. There is another evidence which arises from the nature of its contents–from the original, exalted, enlightened, amazing principles, which it contains. I hold it as an axiom that God only can reveal God–that God is never known but by His own teaching and by His own inspiration. Here is God revealed.

3. There is also an argument arising from the self-evidencing power of truth. Light is self-evidencing. When a child sees light, it does not want any logical argument to say that it is light. When mind flashes, when intellect sparkles, when genius coruscates, you say, this is mind; you want no other evidence–the thing demonstrates itself. So does the truth in the book of God. Read out the doctrine, make known the precept, let us see the history; why, it is of God; it carries its own evidence.

4. Then there is the harmony of all its parts.

5. I must add the evidence of its holiness. The Bible, received in the heart and mind, makes a man pure, gentle, and Christlike; received into a family, it makes a scene of peace and unity; received into a nation, it purifies and elevates; and the world, did it receive the Bible and act upon its principles, would be paradisaical; almost all the miseries of it would be gone at a stroke; whatever is peaceful and felicitous for the glory of God and for the happiness of man would multiply, prosper, and abound.

6. There is one other argument, that arising from prophecy, in connection with the total want of human foresight, and the vastness and extent of this proof: We have a more sure word of prophecy, whereunto we do well to take heed, as to a light shining in a dark place.


III.
The use and purpose: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. You note the expression, man of God. I take it to be a very noble and magnificent thing to be a man; I glorify God every day of my life that I am a man; I mean, that I have the capacities, the mind, the thinking powers, the will of a man. Then it is said, man of God. There are the faculties consecrated, the grace and light, the emanation and power of Deity beaming upon the man, making him a man of God. (James Stratten.)

The inspiration of Scripture

We can form no more distinct conception of what inspiration is in itself than that implied in the word–the breathing of God upon, or into, the minds of His servants. He imparted to them an extraordinary degree of influence, whereby they were instructed what and how to speak and write. This special Divine influence distinguishes them from all other teachers, and their writings from all other books. The manner of inspiration is beyond our knowledge; indeed, the working and influence of the Divine Being anywhere are to us a profound mystery. Motion, life, and growth, the fruitfulness of the earth, and the order and harmony of all things must be traced to Him; but how they are produced we know not. In Him we live and move and have our being; He besets us behind and before, and lays His hand upon us; but His manner of doing this is too wonderful for us to understand. We are bound to recognise His influence in the mental power, wisdom, and goodness of men; but how He comes into contact with the mind it is impossible to explain. So also of the prophets and apostles. They were inspired of God; He breathed into their minds, and endued them with a supernatural power of seeing and teaching spiritual truth–this we know; but beyond this point we cannot pass. Observe a threefold effect of inspiration–the revelation of truth, intensity of feeling, and abiding power in the words.


I.
First, the inspired man was a seer; the veil was turned aside, and he was permitted to look into the sanctuary of truth. Think of the Hebrew prophets to whose writings the text refers. The unity, personality, and spirituality of God were revealed to them. They beheld His glory as others did not, and therefore spoke of it in sublime and incomparable language. The teaching of the Bible should be judged of by this: Do the prophets and apostles reveal spiritual truths in a clearer light than the ancient philosophers did? To this a thoughtful man can only return one answer–they do. Read, for instance, the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius, and then turn to the Epistles of St. Paul, and I think you will be obliged to acknowledge that moral and spiritual truth shines in the verses of the apostle with a brilliancy and strength not to be found in the words, wise and beautiful though they are, of the imperial Stoic. Seeing, then, that the prophets and apostles speak with such deep spiritual insight, the question is, How this came to pass? They were not philosophers, scholars, and orators, as the great and learned men of Greece and Rome were. The true explanation is, holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.


II.
Their mental illumination was accompanied by deep and intense feeling. Their spirits were moved–they felt the burden of the word of the Lord–the truth was in their heart as a burning fire. Therefore speech became a necessity, for by speaking they lightened the burden that oppressed them and gave out the fire that burned in their bosoms. When they had messages of peace and good tidings to deliver, their doctrine dropped as the rain, their speech distilled as the dew, and as the small rain upon the tender herb. But when the sins of the nation and the judgments of heaven were their themes, they cried aloud, and their language was as terrible as a midnight alarm. To speak as the prophets spoke we also must be enlightened and moved by the Holy Ghost.


III.
The abiding power in the words. They are instinct with the love, the pity, the sympathy, and the power of the Divine mind. They are spirit, and they are life. The ancient sacred fire that descended from heaven continues to burn on the altar of the Bible. (T. Jones.)

The Bible

I speak of the Bible first as the great teacher of mankind, because it must ever continue to be of the supremest importance to the race of mankind. It contains the record of Gods special revelations to one chosen people, and of that final all-inclusive revelation, wherein He has spoken and is speaking to us by His Son. The Bible is not by any means Gods only revelation. It always has been an evil when it has been so considered. It contains, however, some of the clearest and directest lessons which God has ever spoken to man through the mind and utterance of his brother man. Take but one illustration of its unique supremacy. After all these thousands of years of the worlds existence, after all splendours of literature in all the nations and in all ages, there is no book in the whole world which can supersede the Bible as an instrument for the education of the young. After all these millenniums it remains the most uniquely glorious book which the world has ever known. Its light, says Cardinal Newman, is like the beauty of heaven in all its clearness, its vastness like the bosom of the sea, its variety like the scenes of nature. Perhaps testimony from a religious teacher might be regarded as purely official. Let me, then, quote the testimony of an eminent living man of science; the testimony of a man like Professor Huxley on this subject will, at least, not be suspected. I have been seriously perplexed to know, he says, how the religious feeling which is the essential basis of conduct can be kept up without the use of the Bible. The pagan moralists lacked fire, and life, and colour, and even the noble Stoic, Marcus Aurelius, is too high and refined for an ordinary child. For three centuries this book has been woven into the life of all that is best and noblest in English history. It forbids the veriest hind who never left his village to be ignorant of the existence of other countries and other civilisations, and of the great past stretching back to the furthest limit of the oldest nations of the world. By the study of what other book could children be so much humanised or made to feel that each figure in that vast historical procession fills, like themselves, but a momentary inter-space between two eternities, and earns the blessings or the curses of this end of all time, according to his efforts to do good and to hate evil, even as they also are earning their payment for their daily work? Unhappily, however, the Bible in age after age has been liable to such boundless misinterpretation, that it is not possible or honourable to speak of it as the most blessed among the teachers of mankind, without admitting, as St. Peter did eighteen hundred years ago, that it may very easily be wrested to our own destruction. Century after century men, misled by their religious teachers, have failed altogether to see what the Bible is; they have made a fetish of it, and under the plea of its sacredness have taken advantage of its many-sidedness to get rid of its most central and essential teaching; they have made it like the faineant monarchs who have been surrounded with splendid state and almost Divine reverence, while care was taken that their real voice should never be heard, and their real wishes never known. Men have used the Bible to find an excuse for hating and cursing and burning one another, they have torn it into shreds and turned each shred of it into a fluttering ignoble ray of some party pennon; they have dislocated its phrases and built false theologies on the perversions of its texts But having eliminated these errors, we may dwell without stint on the priceless value of Scripture as a whole–of Scripture in its best and final teaching to the heart of man. The Talmud and the Koran, and even the writings of the Indian and the Buddhist, have stolen its precious gems. It has exercised the toil of men like Origen and Jerome, and fired the eloquence of Chrysostom and Augustine. It dictates the supreme and immortal songs of Dante and of Milton. It has inspired the pictures of Fra Angelico and Raphael, the music of Handel and Mozart. There is scarcely any noble part of knowledge worthy of the mind of man, but from Scripture it may have some direction and light the hundred best books, the hundred best pictures, the hundred best pieces of music, are ten times over involved in it. The sun never sets upon its gleaming page. What a book, exclaimed the sceptical poet Heine, after a day spent in the unwonted task of reading it. Vast and wide as the world, rooted in the abysses of creation and towering up beyond the blue secrets of heaven; sunrise and sunset, promise and fulfilment, birth and death, the whole drama of humanity, are all in this book. In this book, said Ewald, the foremost of modern critics, when Dean Stanley visited him, and the New Testament, which was lying on the table, fell accidentally to the ground–in this book, he said, as he stooped to pick it up, is all the wisdom of the world.


II.
Test it once more by the immeasurable comfort and blessing which it, and which it alone, has brought and ever can bring to dying men. Millions have loved it passionately who have cared nothing for any other literature, and it alone has been sufficient to lead them through life as with an archangels hand. Into Thy hands I commend my spirit; in age after age Polycarp, Augustine, John Huss, Jerome of Prague, St. Bernard, Luther, Melane then, Columbus, Francis Xavier, and I know not how many thousands more, have died with these words upon their lips. That book, sir, said Andrew Jackson, President of the United States, pointing to the family Bible upon the table, as he lay upon his death-bed, that book, sir, is the rock on which our Republic rests. I have only one book now, said the poet Collins, but that is the best. Bring me the book, sir, said Sir Walter Scott to Lockhart on his death-bed. What book? asked Lockhart. The book, the Bible, said Sir Walter, there is only one. Every shallow and ignorant freethinker thinks he can demolish the Bible; he might am well try to demolish the Himalayas. The greatest men have esteemed it most. Infidels babble about the contradictions between Scripture and science. I have quoted the testimony of one of the most eminent living men of science; let me quote one of the most illustrious dead. Once, when the famous Faraday was lying ill, his physician, Dr. Latham, found him in tears with his arm resting upon a table on which lay the open book. I fear you are worse, said Dr. Latham. It is not that, said Faraday, with a sob; but why will people go astray when they have this blessed book to guide them? Its words speak to the ear and to the heart as no other music will, even after wild and sinful lives. Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me, Thy rod and Thy staff comfort me. Those words were written by his physician to Daniel Webster on his death-bed, and the great man, the despised, broken idol of a great nation, who had cast the destiny of all his life on one throw of ambition and had lost the cast–the great man faltered out, That is what I want–Thy rod, Thy rod, Thy staff, Thy staff, and they were the last words he said.


III.
I would then urge you all to a constant and reverent, but at the same time a wise and spiritual, study of this book. If we be ignorant, said the translators of 1611, the Scriptures will instruct us; if out of the way, they will bring us home; if out of order, they will reform us; if in heaviness, comfort us; if dull, quicken us; if cold, inflame us. Tolle lege, Tolle lege; take them and read, take them and read. Only beware how you read. Read as a scoffer read as a pharisee, and it will be useless. Read rightly, and then the Bible will be a light unto your feet, and a lamp unto your path. Read teachably, read devotiouably. The saving knowledge of Scripture is a science, not of the intellect, but of the heart. Read, above all, as Christ taught us to read, not to entangle yourselves in the controversial or the dubious, but go to the very heart of the central significance. (Archdeacon Farrar.)

The Holy Scriptures


I.
The Bible is the most ancient book in the world, and yet it is not antiquated, but always fresh and fragrant, as the beauty of the morning, and the breath of spring. Like the angel of the resurrection, the spirit of the Bible is clothed and crowned with immortal youth, and rejoices in the possession of undecaying strength.


II.
The Bible is the most expansive book in the world. It was the saying of Malebranche, the great philosopher, that if he had all truth, be would let forth only a ray at a time, lest it should blind the world. And this seems to be the principle which underlies the whole revelation in the Word of God. The truth is unveiled to men according as they are able to bear it.


III.
The Bible is the most inspiring book in the world. We may hold certain mechanical views of inspiration, but the question for each one of us is to ask, Does the Bible really inspire us? The Bible is inspired because it is inspiring, and if it fails of this effect, then the mere theoretical knowledge of the inspiration will be of little value. And yet if we derive no inspiration from Scripture, we must not therefore lay the blame upon the Bible, and conclude that it has failed to stand the test. There are certain qualities of mind and heart which we must bring to the interpretation of all things. Nature herself will not inspire us if we have no eye to see her beauty, or heart to understand her charm. It is the poet who sees in nature a glow and glory which may be hidden from others, because he is possessed with a certain sympathy. So it is in regard to the Bible. We must bring to its study an innocent eye and a pure heart, a longing desire for truth, and a purpose to obey it; and then we shall feel inspired by the revelations which it makes known to us.


IV.
The Bible is the only perfect book in the world. Perfection is the sign and signature of all Gods works. If you put under the microscope a bees sting and an ordinary sewing needle, you will at once see the difference between mans handiwork and Gods. They are both very like each other when examined by the naked eye; but when brought beveath the lens we perceive the mighty difference. The needle is rough and rugged, full of bulges and bends, like the undressed bough of a tree, whereas the sting of the bee retains its arrowy point and perfection under the closest scrutiny. And so it is with all Gods works in contrast with mans. The Bible is the only perfect book, because it is the work of God. The law of the Lord is perfect, says the Psalmist, the sun rules in the heavens, and divides the day from the night. And so with the Word of God. The light which shines through it rules the mind and will and heart of man, and divides the darkness from the light. But the Word of God is not only perfect, but it is designed to make man perfect–that the man of God may be perfect–fully furnished unto every good work. (J. Coats Shanks.)

The incidental advantages of study of the Bible

It is common to urge upon men a study of the Bible as a matter of duty–a part of the thou shalt of God; and also as a matter of worship–the other part of prayer and praise. While it is fortunate that we have a book which can lay the claim of duty upon us, and still more fortunate that we have a book worthy to be incorporated into our worship, there are other aspects in which the Bible offers itself, which might be called its advantages. Set aside now the fact that it is a religious book, and all religious considerations, and regard it simply as a book to be studied, and there is no book the study of which brings so many advantages as the Bible, because there is no other one book that embraces so many departments of truth and knowledge or treats them in so wise a way.


I.
Look at it as a book of history. The Bible begins with the creation out of chaos, and ends with humanity lifted into the heavens, and the whole mighty sweep is history. But the great advantage of studying history through the Bible is that we thus follow the main current of human progress in all the ages; we are tracing an idea, a principle, a force, and that the greatest the world has ever felt.


II.
Look at it as a book of political science. A study of the Hebrew Commonwealth is valuable because it shows how close and real is the relation of the nation to God, and how vital is righteousness and fidelity to God. We have in the Bible the finest illustration of patriotism to be found in all history. There was no individualism, there was no communism, but a happy balance between man as an individual and as a member of the race, such as we find in nature. We are individuals; we are also members of the race, and both exist in God. A true nation is a true expression of this threefold fact. Nowhere is it so clearly set forth as in the Hebrew Commonwealth. Its institutions, also, are well worth studying. The details of life are treated sacredly. A Divine emphasis is laid upon trivial matters of well-being. Filth and contagious diseases are an abomination in the sight of God. Health is well pleasing to God. Family, property, personal rights, sex are guarded by Divine sanctions.


III.
Look at it as a book of biography. The proper study of mankind is man. The Bible is permanently a book of biographies. It is a book of religious history, but the history is always turning on a man. It is a book of religion, but the religion is that of real life, and of separate men. When men of great natures move through great scenes, and do great deeds, or when they unfold qualities and traits that are fine and rare and strong, then we have the materials for biography. By such a standard the Bible is most rich in this material for study.


IV.
Look at it as a book of literature. Dr. Johnson once read the Book of Ruth to a company of literary infidels. What a charming idyl! they said. Where did you find it? There are four fields of literature in which the Bible rises higher than all other books–ethics, religious poetry, religious vision, and the drama in its high sense as a discussion of human life. The Proverbs and Book of Ecclesiastes are the wisest, aptest, most varied, and best expressed maxims of practical life ever made, and outweigh in value all others taken together. The Psalms, considered simply as expressions of religious feeling, find no rival. They touch every mood, sink to all depths, rise to all heights; they are as free and natural as the winds, and cover human nature as it weeps and struggles and hopes and rejoices. The prophetic utterances are not only unique, but are fuller of passion, sublimer in expression, bolder in imagery, loftier in conception, than anything to be found in profane literature. And they have this unique quality: they are the products of an actual experience, and not mere creations of the imagination. They have also this transcendent value–one that should make them dear to every thoughtful man: they are expressions of patriotism, and contain the philosophy of national life as existing in God.


V.
Look at it as a book full of undeveloped forces and truths. I mean the opposite of the common assertion that it is an exhausted book. I mean it in a sense that excludes it from being classed with other books called sacred. I admit that there are a few books which seem to hold within themselves truths capable of infinite expansion, and to touch truths not yet realised. Such are some of the great philosophies and poems and essays; but, after studying them awhile, the sense of finiteness begins to gather about them; we come to limitations, to boundaries; there is a solid firmament above, and the truths run round the world and not into endless heavens; we detect faults; we feel the weakness of a human personality; we say, Thou hast seen far, but not the end, nor the whole. It is not so when we read the Bible. One reason why some men reject it or pass it by is that it so quickly carries them beyond their depth and outruns their conception. And one reason why other men delight in it, and write books upon books about it, is that it brings the infinite and the mysterious within reach, enkindling their imaginations and stirring their spirits by the outlooks thus gained. I spoke of the Bible as a book of undeveloped spiritual forces. I mean that we find in it those facts and laws and truths which are working out the destiny of man. They are spread out in a ]ire; they are uttered in words. The parables of Christ–if we but knew it–contain the history of the world and of mankind for all eternity. The Sermon on the Mount states the laws by which human society progresses, and will reach its goal of perfection. The acts of Christs life illustrate or reveal how this material world is immersed in the real world of the spirit, where the miraculous becomes natural. The whole life of Christ is simply a true life–perfectly obedient to God, wholly sacrificed for man, duty itself, love itself, lost and so found, Divine and human, and claiming a oneness for humanity with itself in God. I anticipate the day when the Bible will stand higher in the estimate of men than ever before. It will not be blindly worshipped as in the past, but it will be more intelligently read. It is not a book of the past, but of the future. As we move up toward it we shall find that it reflects the world on its pages, and that it contains the true order of human life. Meanwhile, it is not amiss for us to study the Decalogue for social guidance; the Beautitudes for guides in daily life; and Christ, in all the light and mystery of His being and character, as the Way, the Truth, and the Life–the way through this tangled world, the truth in this world of perplexity, the life in this world where all things else perish and pass away. (T. T. Munger, D. D.)

What is the Bible?

The first thing I want to say to you is this: You are not to look in the Bible for a complete and comprehensive presentation of Divine truth. You are not to look in it for a revelation or disclosure of science of any kind, physical or metaphysical, natural or supernatural. It is not at all a scientific treatise. It does not aim or purport so to be. Nor are you to regard the Bible as an infallible book of equal value and equal authority in all its utterances and all its parts; as a book without any intermixture of error. An infallible book would require, first of all, that the writers should be infallibly informed as to the truth; in the second place, that they should be able to utter it infallibly; in the third place, that they should have a language for the communication of their ideas which was an infallible vehicle of thought; in the fourth place, that, if they died, the manuscripts in which their thoughts were contained should be infallibly preserved, without any intermixture of error, through the ages after their death; fifthly, that, if the language in which they wrote were changed, the translators should be themselves capable of giving an infallible translation; sixthly, that, if the book were to be infallibly applied to the actual conditions of life, men who interpreted and applied these principles should be infallible interpreters. And, finally, it would require that the men who received should be able in fallibly to apprehend what was given. The treasure of truth in the Bible is not a minted treasure with the stamp of the Divine image upon it. It is like the gold hid in the bosom of the mountain. It must be mined, dug out with the alloy with which it is intermixed, washed, burned in the furnace, and the stamp must be put upon it before it is ready for currency. But as soon as this is done, the process begins over again. The Bible yields its treasure only to him who digs for it as for a hid treasure; the promise of the Bible is only to him who seeks and knocks. No age can do this seeking, this knocking, for another. The structure and the history of the Bible alike demonstrate that what God has given us here is not a substitute for thought, but an incentive to thinking. Lessing said, If God were to offer me in one hand Truth and in the other Search for Truth, I would accept Search for Truth. What God gives us in the Bible is Search for Truth. What, then, is the Bible? It is a selection of literature evolved out of eighteen centuries of human life, comprising all various literary forms, written by men of all various types and temperaments, without concord, without mutual understanding, without knowing that they were making a book that was to last for all time. It is a collection of the most spiritual utterances, of the most spiritual men, of the most spiritual race, of past time. You are to come to it as such a collection. It is as such that you are to study and take advantage of it–as such a record of spiritual experiences.


I.
In the first place, then, in view of this generic statement, I urge on you to have your Bible–not merely a Bible, but Your Bible. Mr. Shearman has a copy of the Bible which Mr. Beecher carried for something like forty years–perhaps more–with his marking scattered through it. It is more than a Bible–it is Mr. Beechers Bible; and the pencil-marks in it tell the story of his own spiritual experience, while they emphasize the spiritual experiences of the ages that are past. So, have your own Bible, into which your life shall be woven, around which your spiritual associations shall cluster, and which shall become sacred to you, not so much for the voice that spake to Abraham, to Moses, to David, to Isaiah, or Paul, so many centuries ago, but for the voice that has spoken to you–through Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah, or Paul–in your own life-experience.


II.
Use your Bible. The Bible that is to lay hold on you is a Bible that you must lay hold upon. Familiarise yourself with the Bible. It is a coy acquaintance. It does not let every one into its heart, or disclose to the chance acquaintance the secret of its power. You must love it. If you are to love it you must acquaint yourself with it. You must take it with you into your experience. You must make it the man of your counsel in your perplexity; you must go to it for comfort in your sorrow; you must find in it inspiration when the deadening process of life has brought you earthward; you must seek in it those experiences for which your own heart and soul hunger.


III.
You must, in your use of the Bible look behind the book to the truth which is in the book, and which really constitutes the book. Studying Biblical criticism is not studying the Bible. Behind all form and structure is the truth which makes the Bible. What is the Bible? This thing that I hold in my hand? Not at all. Were it in Greek, it would still be the Bible. Not the book–the truths that lie behind the book, they make the Bible. Such truths as these: the man is immortal–not that he is going to live a thousand or a hundred thousand years after death, but that he has in him a spirit that death cannot and does not touch; that he is under other laws than those that are physical, that he is under the great moral laws of right and wrong; that there is a God who knows, thinks, feels, loves; and that there is a helping hand reached down out of heaven to lay hold of and to give help to every struggling man seeking, working, praying, wrestling toward a nobler manhood; an immortal spirit, a personal God, a forgiveness of sins–that is the Bible. Go to the Bible, not for an infallible philosophy of human life, but for unveilings and disclosures of infinite, helpful, inspiring truth.


IV.
But behind this truth there is something further to be sought. For life is more than truth, and experience is more than philosophy. The Bible is the most human of books. It is the record of human life, and of the noblest and divinest experiences in human life. It is because it is a human book that it appeals to humanity. It is because it is a human book that humanity finds light and life and power in it. Writers of the Bible are not like lead pipes that take water from a distance and bring it a long way and deposit it for you, without the trouble of your drawing. Writers of the Bible are like the mountain-side, saturated with water which pours from its side in springs when we ask to drink. The Bible writers were saturated with Divine truth; then out of that saturation the truth sprang forth into utterance. In the Bible you come into association and fellowship with men who are living in the spiritual realm; you come in contact with men who are struggling, not for art, not for wealth, not for culture, not for refinement, but for walking with God. They blunder; they do not know; they have dim visions, oftentimes, of God–they see Him as that blind man saw the trees as men walking. Their notion is intermingled with the notion of their time; but in it all, throughout it all, inspiring it all, is that hunger and thirst after righteousness that shall be filled. To come into the Bible is to come, not into words graven on stone, however true, but into living experiences of love, of faith, or hope, wrought in imperfect lives, but glorifying them by the glory of an indwelling God.


V.
And behind the truth and behind the experience you are to look for something still more than either–You are to look for God himself. Back of all Bible truth is the human experience of the Divine. Back of all human experience of the Divine is the God that inspires, irradiates, and creates it. Do I value the locket less because I know it is a human handiwork? It is not the locket I care for. It is the picture of the beloved that is in the locket. It is not the frame and form and structure of the book, but it is the God who dwells in the book that makes it dear to me. Kaulbachs famous cartoon of the Reformation presents Luther holding aloft an open Bible, while grouped around and before him are the inventors, the discoverers, the thinkers, the writers of genius, that were nurtured in the cradle of the Reformation. It is a true picture. Where that open Bible has not gone, there to-day is darkness illimitable. Where that Bible has gone, partly opened and partly closed, there is a dawning of the day. And where it is an open Bible with a free page and a well-read one, there is the illumination of civilisation. (Lyman Abbott, D. D.)

What use do we make of the Scriptures?

All our practical knowledge of God is comprised in the Bible. The Bible then ought to be to us that which the chart and the compass are to the mariner on a stormy ocean; we have absolutely no other guide, no other directory to our course. In what light, then, do we practically regard the Bible? Is it enough to possess the Scriptures, to have been instructed out of the Scriptures in infancy, to hear them read in public worship, to have a general approbation of their contents? Would it be satisfactory to the mariner merely to possess a compass on board his vessel; to have received information as to its use in infancy, to admire its utility, or to discourse sometimes publicly of its merits; meanwhile he is driving on, it may be, to rocks, to shoals, to sands, or quite away from his course? But how many an individual lives in this precise manner, as to his use of the Scriptures! Day passes after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, and God marks not his anxious eye pondering over this chart of life. Politics, science, poetry, history, it may be lighter productions–these can arrest his attention and interest his mind; but the Bible which notifies the waymarks to eternity–this excites no interest. And yet such a person perhaps expects Gods favour–expects to reach the harbour of endless peace, and never even dreams of the probability of intervening shipwreck! Mournful and inconsistent expectations! Many, however, are to be found who are by no means chargeable with this entire neglect of the Scriptures. Some have, from infancy, acquired regular habits of reading the Bible, and peruse, as a daily or at least as a weekly task, their allotted chapters. But they do this oftentimes without anxiety, and without progress in religious knowledge. The fact of reading is to them more important than the contents which they read. They manifest no submission of the heart to Gods teaching–no godly diligence to lay up in the soul His statutes and promises. Eternity fastens not upon their thoughts–the wonders of redeeming love attract not their affections. They read with coldness, and languor, and unconcern. There is no scrutiny as to the effect of their knowledge–as to the conformity of their views, and sentiments, and habits, with the decisions and intentions of God! The heart makes no progress in its voyage–it is no nearer to God–no nearer to the dispositions of Heaven than it was many years ago. Think again of the mariner–his eye glances daily upon his compass–or once a week he fixes his look upon the needle; but he uses not the helm–he brings not the vessel into the prescribed course I As well then might the compass be cast into the depths of the sea I Now, it is evident that this is not the use of the Scriptures which God demands–this is not to possess any anxiety as to the knowledge of Gods will. Those who thus neglect, or thus imperfectly respect the Scriptures, are not among those who work out their salvation with fear and trembling. (Christian World Pulpit.)

Scripture manifold yet one

The Bible is, to use the language of Prof. Westcott, a book manifold by the variety of times and circumstances in which its several parts had their rise, else by the inspiring presence of the same spiritual life. It may be compared to a cathedral whose parts have been built at different successive ages: the traces of these ages are easily seen in the architectural style, but all are knit together in one holy temple of God. Closer investigation of this cathedral shows that the historical range of its growth is greater and wider than was at first supposed. The stones which have been built in, it seems, were drawn from widely scattered quarries; here are marbles which must have been imported from distant lands; here are great blocks of stone which must have been conveyed from unthought-of hills; here are richly-carved capitals which show some foreign skill: but all these have found their fitting place. Each stone, each ornament, drops into the spot prepared for it; arch, pillar, buttress, mullion and pinnacle, whatever their greater or their lesser antiquity, are lending support or beauty, and fulfilling their functions as parts of one vast sanctuary, whose purpose is not lost or altered because antiquarians have made its stories doubly interesting and doubly dear by enlarging the bounds of its history and adding new elements to the story of its growth. (Bp. W. B. Carpenter.)

Profitable for doctrine, etc.

The uses of the Scriptures

The Scriptures give Divine, and therefore infallible, direction for doctrine–the didactic teaching of the truth concerning God; for reproof–the refutation by proof of error concerning God; for correction–the setting right or rectifying the wrong principles of practical ethics; for instruction in righteousnsss–the positive nurture of the soul in experimental knowledge of the way in which a sinner may be accounted righteous before God. And this, it will be perceived on a little reflection, is a marvellously logical classification of their uses; and it is exhaustive, as covering all the possible wants that man can desire to have met by a revelation. As a being endowed with reason, and capable of believing only what he conceives to he truth, his religion must embrace a doctrine of God and his relations to God. As a creature liable to be deceived, by error and unbelief concerning God and his relations to God, his religion must have a guide to warn against and expose the wiles of error, that are ever tampering with his evil heart of unbelief. As a being whose passions are ever blinding his conscience in reference to duty toward God and man, his religion must supply him with a rule of right, by which to correct his crooked judgments and amend his crooked ways. As a being capable of a birth to a new and everlasting life, his religion must supply him with a nurture under the new law of righteousness which the faith that is unto salvation teaches him. So that it may be affirmed with truth, that no want of the human soul can be conceived, which is not provided for under one or other of these four heads. (S. Robinson, D. D.)

The profitableness of Scripture

The Scriptures are profitable for reproof. The word here means conviction. The teaching has reference to the ignorance of men the conviction refers to their errors and prejudices. The mental state presupposed here may be thus expressed: First, there is ignorance; secondly, error, wrong thoughts and beliefs; thirdly, prejudice in favour of the errors that are present, and against the truth that is absent. The declaration of the apostle is that the Word of God has power to convince those who are in this state; that it will destroy their errors and remove their prejudice. One great reason why there is so much prejudice in many minds with regard to religion is, that they do not study the sacred Scriptures. They read all sorts of books concerning the Bible, but the Divine book itself is neglected. They prefer the water that is brought to them through pipes and curious contrivances of men to the fountain of living water, pure, clear as crystal, which springs up from the primeval rocks close to their own door. They gaze upon the cold and spiritless engraving rather than examine the grand original picture. The honest and earnest study of the Bible would produce a mighty revolution in the minds and hearts of thousands, both Christians and others. Akin to this there is another thought that follows. The Scriptures are profitable for correction. Some read to criticise. They cannot admire the great opening poem of the Book of Genesis, in which the inspired muse sings the creative power of the Almighty in notes harmonious with the morning stars, because it does not speak with scientific precision. It is quite right to point out whatever inaccuracies may be discovered in the history of the deliverance from Egypt and the sojourn in the Wilderness, but one cannot help remarking that that is a peculiar state of mind in which a man can read through the wonderful story without being once struck with its spirit, its grandeur, and its awfulness. Others turn the sacred pages to find supports for the systems they have formed. This is the same as if a man constructed a theory of nature, and afterwards went in search of the facts whereby its truth must be proved. Others, again, read for comfort. They have been disappointed by the world in which they placed too much trust; or death has broken in upon their charmed circle and filled their hearts with sorrow; or their health is failing, and there are indications that the end is not distant; or their sin has been a burden from which they seek rest. Well, let them read for comfort, for the Bible is the book for sorrowful people. Its deep expressions of Divine love, sympathy, and tenderness have in them a power to heal the broken heart. But we should also know that the Scriptures are given for our correction. He is the wise reader of Gods Word who tries his opinions, beliefs, principles, life, and character by the Divine standard, and is willing to have them corrected. This brings us to the high purpose for which the Scriptures were given to us, namely, to impart instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect–right in every respect, in thought, feeling, character, and therefore right in state and condition–right in himself, right in his relations to his fellows, and right before God. The aim of the husbandman in the plants he cultivates is to have fruit; but Nature is as careful of the blossoms and the foliage as of the fruit, for her purpose is a perfect tree. Men cultivate parts of their nature. Some educate and develop their physical nature, and not much else. Others pay attention to the sensuous soul–they love music, art, eloquence, and light literature. There are persons who are mere thinkers; the cultivation of the intellectual powers is the one important thing in their estimation. Some spend their lives in small activities–things that are good in themselves, but which become harmful when done to the neglect of more important duties. There is good in all of these; but none of them aim high enough. The Divine purpose is not physical perfection, nor intellectual strength, nor refinement of taste, not even morality and devotion, but the full development of the whole nature, that the man of God may be perfect. (T. Jones.)

The proper way to test the Bible

You see a recipe for making bread. What is the way to test that recipe, but to put the materials together according to its direction? If the bread is good, the recipe is good, is it not? If it is good, I do not care where it came from–I do not care if King Pharaoh wrote it; and if it is not good, I would not care any more for it if it came from the angel Gabriel. It is the thing that proves the thing, The effect proves what is the nature of the cause. And if there are prescriptions in Gods Word to heal pride, and selfishness, and all forms of sin and diseases, and on trial the prescriptions are found to do what they profess to be able to do, the effect justifies the cause. Now, the Bible does not profess to be a book of theories or philosophies. It professes to be profitable for doctrine, for reproof–it is the best book in this world for all sorts of reproof addressed to the weaknesses and wants of human life–for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. Where a man wants to be a good man, where a man wants to be thoroughly furnished, and he goes to the Bible, he will have the best evidence that any man can have that it is a Divine book; for it will furnish him with those things which his experience shows him he needs. Here is a roll of charts of a difficult harbour. They were drawn, it may be, by Robert Small. They are handed by him to Admiral Dupont. The Admiral, the moment he sees them, laughs right out, and says, Do you call this a chart? It was made with a burnt stick. Robert Small, you know, was a slave; and he had to get his knowledge as other slaves get theirs. He was a pilot in Charleston harbour, however, and he knows where the shallow places are, where the deep places are, where the obstructions are, and where it is clear sailing; and he makes a rough sketch of the whole vicinity, and puts it into Admiral Duponts hand; and the Admiral says, Do you suppose I am going to steer my ships by a chart that a nigger made? Or he says, When did you make this? On what kind of a table did you make it? What did you use to make it with? Does he say this? Under such circumstances what would Admiral Dupont do, who is a sensible man, and who has so much sense that he knows how to employ negroes, and take the advantage of their aid? He would say to those under him, Take a cutter, man it, and go out, and sound, and see if the chart is correct; and they would find the shoals and channels to be just as they were represented to be; and after they had put the chart to proof, and found it to correspond to the fact, they would report to him, and he would say, That is a good chart, if a black man did make it. It is true, and that is the reason why it is good. Now, the Bible is a chart. It teaches men how to steer where that sandbank of temptation is; where that reck of danger is; where that whirling vortex of passion is. The Bible is a chart of salvation; and if a man only knows his course by this, he will go through life, with all its storms, and come safely into the port of heaven. The way to test the Bible is not to criticise it, and compare its rude marking with the more modern ways of making charts: the way to test the Bible is to put your sounding lines into the channel, and try it, and see if it is not true. But that is the test men do not employ. (H. W. Beecher.)

Scripture teaches a religion of grandeur and joy

I do not wonder that the men nowadays who do not believe the Bible are so very sad, when they are in earnest. A writer in one of our Reviews tells that he was studying the poems of Matthew Arnold, who believes not in a living God, but in a something or other, which somehow or other, at some time or other makes for righteousness. The sad and hopeless spirit of the poet passed for the time into the reviewer, and he felt most miserable. He went out for a walk. It was a bleak wintry day, and he was then at Brodick in Arran. The hills were in a winding-sheet of snow, above which arose a ghastly array of clouds. The sky was of a leaden hue, and the sea was making its melancholy moan amid the jagged, dripping rocks. The gloom without joined the gloom within, and made him very wretched. He came upon some boys shouting merrily at play. Are you at the school? he asked. Yes, was the reply. And what are you learning? I learn, said one, what is the chief end of man. And what is it? the reviewer asked. The boy replied, Mans chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy Him for ever. He at once felt that the boy was taught a religion of grandeur and joy, while the poets was a religion of darkness and despair. (J. Wells, M. A.)

All Scripture profitable

In the plainest text there is a world of holiness and spirituality: and if we, in prayer and dependence upon God, sit down and study it, we shall behold much more than appears to us. It may be, at once reading or looking, we see little or nothing; as Elijahs servant went once and saw nothing, therefore he was commanded to look seven times. What now? says the prophet. I see a cloud rising like a mans hand, and by and by the whole surface of heaven was covered with clouds (1Ki 18:44). (J. Caryl.)

Scripture to be used in daily life

A good husband having received a bag of money, locketh, it up safe, that none may rob him of it, and as occasion is he fetcheth it down and layeth it out, some of it for food, some for clothes, some for rent, some for servants wages, some for this thing, and some for that, as his necessities require; so, friend, do thou lay up the precious treasure of the Word safe in the cabinet of thine heart, and bring it out as occasion calls for it, in thy daily life. (G. Swinnock.)

Adaptation of the Bible

The eyes of a good portrait follow the spectator wherever he stands, to look him exactly in the face; and so, whoever a man may be, and whatever his case, the Bible confronts him with its warning if he be doing ill, its warranty if he be doing well, and its wisdom under any, and for all, circumstances.

Apology for the Bible

King George III. on first hearing of Bishop Watsons Apology for the Bible, said, Apology for the Bible! I did not know that the Bible wanted any apology.

The pulpit and the reading-desk

John Wesley said to one of his followers, who urged upon him the deficiencies of some of the clergy, as a cause of separation, If you have nothing but chaff from the pulpit, you are abundantly fed with the finest of the wheat from the desk.

Scripture its own evidence

It has been for thirty years the deep conviction of my soul that no book can be written on behalf of the Bible like the Bible itself. Mans defences are mans word the Bible is Gods Word, and by it the Holy Ghost, who first spoke it, still speaks to the soul that closeth itself not against it. (E. B. Pusey, D. D.)

Revelation and conscience

If we admit the agreement of revelation with conscience to be an evidence of Divinity in the Bible, do we thereby make conscience the criterion of what is Divine in it? Some say so and make this the door to Rationalism. But it is surely possible to make conscience a witness, without exalting it into a judge. (J. Ker, D. D.)

The Bible penetrative

In the Bible there is more that finds me than I have experienced in all other books put together; the words of the Bible find me at greater depths of my being; and whatever finds me brings with it an irresistible evidence of its having proceeded from the Holy Spirit. (S. T. Coleridge.)

Scripture profitable

A threefold account.

1. For their dignity and authority.

2. For their utility.

3. For their perfection.

(1) They are profitable for doctrine and instruction: they teach men what to know and believe, they instruct us in all truth necessary to salvation, viz., concerning God, man, Christ, law, gospel, heaven, hell. He first begins with doctrine, which in order must go before all the rest; for it is in vain to reprove or exhort unless we first teach a man and inform him of his duty.

(2) For reproof of error and confutation of false doctrine. We need not run to general councils or send for ancient fathers to determine controversies or confute errors; we have the Holy Scriptures that enable the man of God, and furnish him richly for that purpose.

(3) For correction of sin and evil manners, which is done by admonition and reproof denouncing Gods judgments against them, that those which go astray may be brought into the way by repentance.

(4) The Scripture teacheth us how to lead a holy and righteous life according to the will of God, and so is profitable for instruction in righteousness and good works, it being the most perfect rule of righteousness.

(5) The Scripture allures us to piety by the sweet promises of the gospel, and so is profitable for consolation (Rom 15:4). This God hath ordained as a lamp for our feet, that we miscarry not amidst those many by-paths that are in the world. Let us, then, make use of it in the course of our lives. If a carpenter have a rule or line, if he tie it to his back and never use it, his work must needs be crooked; so if we have Bibles and never read them, nor meditate on them to practise them, our lives must needs be irregular. They are, then, to be reproved who set up false rules to walk by, as–

1. Antiquity.

2. Custom.

3. Fathers.

4. The Church.

5. Reason.

6. Universality.

7. Enthusiams. (T. Hall, B. D.)

Profiting in Scripture to appear

Let us imitate the sheep, which boast not how much they have eaten, but show it actually by their fat, fleece, and young. (T. Hall, B. D.)

How to profit by Scripture

Observe, such as meddle with Gods Word must profit by it. We abuse the Word when we read or hear it only for speculation, novelty, and curiosity, but not for practice, that we may know, love, and fear God, and so be happy for ever. God gave them for this end, that we might profit by them, Those ministers, then, are to be blamed that play with Scripture and feed their people with the chaff of airy notions, frivolous questions, idle distinctions, and foolish controversies, seeking their own ends and praise, and not the benefit of Gods people. Let such remember that the Scripture was given to profit us, but not play withal. (T. Hall, B. D.)

Perfection of Scripture should win regard

This perfection of the Scripture should stir up our love to it. As imperfect things are slighted by us, so complete and perfect things are highly esteemed by all the sons of wisdom. No book to be compared to this for perfection, and therefore no book should be so loved, read, studied, and prized by us. Heres nothing vain or superfluous, but all things full of life and spirit; whatever good the soul can desire, tis here to be had. Here is food for the hungry, water for the thirsty, wine for the wearied, bread for the weak, raiment for the naked, gold for the poor, eye-salve for the blind, and physic for the sick. If thy heart be dead, this will quicken thee; if hard, this will soften it; if dull, revive it. In all our temptations, this is a Davids harp that helpeth to still them (Act 15:31). We should therefore with joy draw water out of these wells of salvation (Isa 12:3). We see how worldlings delight to view their bills and bonds, their leases and indentures, by which they hold their lands and livings; and shall not we delight to study the Scripture, which assureth us of never-fading riches? (T. Hall, B. D.)

Plainness of Scripture

A lady of suspected chastity, and who was tinctured with infidel principles, conversing with a minister of the gospel, objected to the Scriptures on account of their obscurity and the great difficulty of understanding them. The minister wisely and smartly replied, Why, madam, what can be easier to understand than the Seventh Commandment–Thou shalt not commit adultery? (C. Buck.)

The Bible a guide

The Bible is not a puzzle to wise heads, but a lamp for the wayfaring man. (Daniel Moore.)

The Bible a guide

No; I say, destroy the Bible, and still everything remains the same–except that you have lost your guide. If a party of voyagers who are passing through a dangerous channel were to say, Away with the chart! it is such a worry to be always looking at it; and it expects one to be so very careful, too; away with it; its a nuisance! you might easily get rid of your chart, but the rocks and shoals and sunken reefs and all the perils of the channel would remain there lust the same. Suppose a community were to say, Banish your doctors. Lets have no medical books here, no treatises on disease. Throw physic to the dogs. Well none of it! They could do that, of course, if they liked. But the laws and conditions of health and disease, of life and death, would remain precisely where they were before. And it is conceivable that men might get rid of the Bible. Practically, many do get rid of the Bible; but what do they gain? Only the loss of a guide. The facts of the universe, the facts about man and about God, the facts about the mutual relation of the one to the other, remain precisely the same. (G. Calthrop, M. A.)

Restraining power of the Bible

The Rev. Charles Vince, of Birmingham, told the following incident at a meeting of the Bible Society in 1863:–The Hill-top Auxiliary in the Black Country determined to send round two or three Christian men every Saturday evening, with packages of Bibles, to visit the public-houses and persuade the miners and puddlers of the district, while they had their money, to spend some part of it in buying the Word of God. While they were carrying out this plan a miner said, Wouldnt it be a good thing for us to have a copy to read down in the pit at dinner-time? The proposition met with general approval, and they agreed to buy a copy for this purpose. Of the first copy handed to them the landlord said the print was too small to read down in the pit, and offered to give a shilling towards the cost of a better type. This was bought, and one of the men said with great simplicity, If we have the Bible at dinner-time, we mustnt have any swearing. This, too, was carried, and a fine imposed upon the man that should break the rule. Is there any other book in the world that you could carry into the company of men and make them say, If we open this, and begin to look at it, we must begin to put away some of our sins? (Family Treasury.)

The Bible instructive

A Hindoo paper, published in Bengal, speaks as follows of the excellence of the Bible:–It is the best and most excellent of all English books, and there is not its like in the English language. As every joint of the sugar-cane, from the root to the top, is full of sweetness, so every page of the Bible is fraught with the most precious instruction. A portion of this book would yield to you more of sound morality than a thousand other treatises on the same subject. In short, if anybody studies the English language with a view to gaining wisdom, there is not another book which is more worthy of being read than the Bible. (Sword and Trowel.)

Faradays testimony to the value of Scripture

One of the best and greatest Fellows of the Royal Society in the present century was ill, and sitting in his room, when one of the best of my profession that ever lived in this country, Dr. Latham, went in to him and found this great man in tears, sitting by his fireside. Latham told me this story himself. He said, My good friend, I fear you feel more ill to-day; what is it? No, he said, not that; I was thinking what a sorrow it is that the world will go astray when it has this blessed book to guide it. This man was Faraday, and I need not say that the book on his table was the Bible. (Sir H. W. Acland, M. D.)

The poor widows treasure

Did ye ask me if I had a Bible? said a poor old widow in London; Did ye ask me if I had a Bible? Thank God I have a Bible. What should I do without my Bible? It was the guido of my youth, and it is the staff of my age; it wounded me, and it healed me; it condemned me, and it acquitted me; it showed me I was a sinner, and it led me to the Saviour; it has given me comfort through life, and I trust it will give me hope in death.

The principles of Scripture to be applied

Professor Newman complained, some years ago, against our Bible, because it does not tell every father to what business or profession he should put his sons. For such infinite particulars and detailed advices we should require, not a portable manual, but a British Museum. Far wiser and truer is the principle enunciated by the orator Burke, when he says, Reading, and much reading, is good. But the power of diversifying the matter infinitely in your own mind, and of applying it to every occasion that arises, is far better; so dont suppress the living force. (J. Clifford, D. D.)

The Bible a lighthouse

A light house looks like a tall pillar rising out of the sea, or built upon some high bluff. The top is a large lantern, where a bright light is kept burning all night, which is seen far out at sea; and it says to all ships and sailors sailing by, Take care! take care! One is built on a ledge of rocks; its warning light says, Give wide berth to these sunken rocks. Another says, Steer clear of this dangerous reef. Another, Keep clear of this dangerous headland. If you come here, you are lost. There are a great many lighthouses on the coast: how does a sailor know which is which? He sees a light gleaming through the darkness and the storm; but where is it? He has a chart in the ship, and that tells. A chart is a map of the coast, with all its rocks and sandbanks and lighthouses put down, and everything that a sailor ought to know in order to steer his ship safely across the ocean. If he faithfully consults it, and keeps a good look out, he is likely to ride out the storm and come safely into port.

That the man of God may be perfect.–

Character

The superiority of man is everywhere manifested on earth. True greatness is measured by character.


I.
To perfect the character of man is the aim of Christian truth.


II.
In developed character is to be found the great moral riches of the world.


III.
In it we have a striking proof of mans immortality.


IV.
It supplies a test by which to measure the value of the services of the sanctuary, the value of the Bible, of all things–its ability to develop true manhood. Have we grown in Christian character? Have the Church services proven barren or fruitful to us? (R. S. Storrs, D. D.)

The Bible the book for the man of God

Jerome was versed in the polite literature of his day and in the works of classic writers. He tells us that in a dream he once thought himself arraigned before the judgment seat of Christ, where he was asked the nature of his profession. He answered, I am a Christian. Thou art not! said the Judge; thou art a Ciceronian, for the works of that author possess thy heart. The Judge then gave order that he should be scourged by angels. Although it was only a dream, his chastisement never was forgotten; it changed the direction of his thoughts. From that time, he says, I gave myself to the reading of Divine things with greater diligence and attention than I had ever read the other authors. To give undue attention to secular reading, to the neglect of sacred literature, is a temptation peculiar to the cultivated believer, and it is a real temptation; for one may be as sordid in the acquisition of knowledge as in the pursuit of wealth.

The man of Gods equipment:


I.
The man of God is instructed–

1. Concerning God.

2. Concerning man.

3. Concerning duty.

4. Concerning responsibility.


II.
The man of God is disciplined.

1. Joy in prosperity.

2. Hope in adversity.

3. A cheerful submission to the will of God at all times.


III.
The man of God is inspired.

1. The mind is illumined.

2. The affections are sanctified.

3. The whole life is made the reflex of revelation. (Weekly Pulpit.)

Development of character

An English barrister who was accustomed to train students for the practice of law, and who was not himself a religious man, was once asked why he put students, from the very first, to the study and analysis of the most difficult parts of the Sacred Scriptures? Because, said he, there is nothing else like it, in any language, for the development of mind and character.

The Bible the text-book of character

Professor Matthew Arnold represents modern literature, and is often regarded as one of the severest critics of the current Christianity; yet he says, As well imagine a man with a sense for sculpture not cultivating it by the help of the remains of Greek art, or a man with a sense for poetry not cultivating it by the help of Homer and Shakespeare, as a man with a sense for conduct not cultivating it by the help of the Bible. Professor Huxley represents modern science, and is the bete noire of controversial theologians; yet he says, I have been perplexed to know by what practical measures the religious feeling, which is the essential basis of conduct, was to be kept up without the use of the Bible.


Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 16. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God] This sentence is not well translated; the original , . . . should be rendered: Every writing Divinely inspired is profitable for doctrine, c. The particle , and, is omitted by almost all the versions and many of the fathers, and certainly does not agree well with the text. The apostle is here, beyond all controversy, speaking of the writings of the Old Testament, which, because they came by Divine inspiration, he terms the Holy Scriptures, 2Ti 3:15 and it is of them alone that this passage is to be understood; and although all the New Testament came by as direct an inspiration as the Old, yet, as it was not collected at that time, not indeed complete, the apostle could have no reference to it.

The doctrine of the inspiration of the sacred writings has been a subject of much discussion, and even controversy, among Christians. There are two principal opinions on the subject:

1. That every thought and word were inspired by God, and that the writer did nothing but merely write as the Spirit dictated.

2. That God gave the whole matter, leaving the inspired writers to their own language; and hence the great variety of style and different modes of expression.

But as I have treated this subject at large in my Introduction to the Four Gospels and Acts of the Apostles, I must refer the reader to that work.

Is profitable for doctrine] To teach the will of God, and to point out Jesus Christ till he should come.

For reproof] To convince men of the truth; and to confound those who should deny it, particularly the Jews.

For correction] . For restoring things to their proper uses and places, correcting false notions and mistaken views.

Instruction in righteousness] . For communicating all initiatory religious knowledge; for schooling mankind. All this is perfectly true of the Jewish Scriptures; and let faith in Christ Jesus be added, see 2Ti 3:15, and then all that is spoken in the following verse will be literally accomplished.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

All Scripture is given by inspiration of God: Scripture signifies no more than writing; some therefore translate this text thus: All Scripture which is inspired of God; not all writings, but all the books of the Old Testament, is . This is expounded by Peter, 2Pe 1:21; For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man; but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. And is profitable for doctrine; and it is profitable to instruct us in all propositions of truth which we need believe in order to salvation.

For reproof; elegcon, to convince us either of any truth, that we may believe it without any hesitation, or of any sin, that we may be humbled for it, without any extenuation.

For correction; for reproof, or correction, or reformation, to reprove us in what we are to be reproved, to correct us in any error, to show us the way to bring us to rights and to reform us.

For instruction in righteousness; to instruct us in the true righteousness, in which we must appear before God; for in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith, Rom 1:17.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

16. All scriptureGreek,“Every Scripture,” that is, Scripture in its every part.However, English Version is sustained, though the Greekarticle be wanting, by the technical use of the term “Scripture”being so well known as not to need the article (compare Greek,Eph 3:15; Eph 2:21).The Greek is never used of writings in general, butonly of the sacred Scriptures. The position of the two Greekadjectives closely united by “and,” forbids our taking theone as an epithet, the other as predicated and translated as ALFORDand ELLICOTT. “EveryScripture given by inspiration of God is also profitable.”Vulgate and the best manuscripts, favor English Version.Clearly the adjectives are so closely connected that as surely as oneis a predicate, the other must be so too. ALFORDadmits his translation to be harsh, though legitimate. It is betterwith English Version to take it in a construction legitimate,and at the same time not harsh. The Greek,“God-inspired,” is found nowhere else. Most of the NewTestament books were written when Paul wrote this his latest Epistle:so he includes in the clause “All Scripture is God-inspired,”not only the Old Testament, in which alone Timothy was taughtwhen a child (2Ti 3:15), butthe New Testament books according as they were recognized in thechurches which had men gifted with “discerning of spirits,”and so able to distinguish really inspired utterances, persons, andso their writings from spurious. Paul means, “All Scripture isGod-inspired and therefore useful”; because we seeno utility in any words or portion of it, it does not follow it isnot God-inspired. It is useful, because God-inspired;not God-inspired, because useful. One reason for the articlenot being before the Greek, “Scripture,” may bethat, if it had, it might be supposed that it limited thesense to the hiera grammata, “Holy Scriptures” (2Ti3:15) of the Old Testament, whereas here the assertion ismore general: “all Scripture” (compare Greek,2Pe 1:20). The translation,”all Scripture that is God-inspired is also useful,” wouldimply that there is some Scripture which is not God-inspired.But this would exclude the appropriated sense of the word”Scripture”; and who would need to be told that “alldivine Scripture is useful (‘profitable’)?” Heb4:13 would, in ALFORD’Sview, have to be rendered, “All naked things are alsoopen to the eyes of Him,” c.: so also 1Ti4:4, which would be absurd [TREGELLES,Remarks on the Prophetic Visions of the Book of Daniel]. Knappwell defines inspiration, “An extraordinary divine agency uponteachers while giving instruction, whether oral or written, by whichthey were taught how and what they should speak or write”(compare 2Sa 23:1 Act 4:25;2Pe 1:21). The inspirationgives the divine sanction to all the words of Scripture,though those words be the utterances of the individual writer, andonly in special cases revealed directly by God (1Co2:13). Inspiration is here predicated of the writings,“all Scripture,” not of the persons. The question is nothow God has done it; it is as to the word, not the menwho wrote it. What we must believe is that He has done it, andthat all the sacred writings are every where inspired, though not allalike matter of special revelation: and that even the verywords are stamped with divine sanction, as Jesus used them(for example in the temptation and Joh 10:34;Joh 10:35), for deciding allquestions of doctrine and practice. There are degrees of revelationin Scripture, but not of inspiration. The sacred writers didnot even always know the full significancy of their own God-inspiredwords (1Pe 1:10; 1Pe 1:11;1Pe 1:12). Verbal inspirationdoes not mean mechanical dictation, but all “Scripture is (so)inspired by God,” that everything in it, its narratives,prophecies, citations, the wholeideas, phrases, and wordsaresuch as He saw fit to be there. The present condition of thetext is no ground for concluding against the original textbeing inspired, but is a reason why we should use all criticaldiligence to restore the original inspired text. Again, inspirationmay be accompanied by revelation or not, but it is as much needed forwriting known doctrines or facts authoritatively, as forcommunicating new truths [TREGELLES].The omission here of the substantive verb is,’ I think, designed tomark that, not only the Scripture then existing, but what wasstill to be written till the canon should be completed, isincluded as God-inspired. The Old Testament law was theschoolmaster to bring us to Christ; so it is appropriately said to be”able to make wise unto salvation through faith in JesusChrist”: the term wisdom being appropriated to aknowledge of the relations between the Old and New Testaments, andopposed to the pretended wisdom of the false teachers (1Ti 1:7;1Ti 1:8).

doctrineGreek,“teaching,” that is, teaching the ignorant dogmatictruths which they cannot otherwise know. He so uses the OldTestament, Ro 1:17.

reproof“refutation,”convicting the erring of their error. Including polemicaldivinity. As an example of this use of the Old Testament, compareGal 3:6; Gal 3:13;Gal 3:16. “Doctrine andreproof” comprehend the speculative parts of divinity.Next follow the practical: Scripture is profitable for: (1)correction (Greek, “setting one right”;compare an example, 1Co10:1-10) and instruction (Greek, “disciplining,”as a father does his child, see on 2Ti2:25; Eph 6:4; Heb 12:5;Heb 12:11, or “training”by instruction, warning, example, kindnesses, promises, andchastisements; compare an example, 1Co5:13). Thus the whole science of theology is complete inScripture. Since Paul is speaking of Scripture in general and in thenotion of it, the only general reason why, in order toperfecting the godly (2Ti3:17), it should extend to every department of revealedtruth, must be that it was intended to be the complete andsufficient rule in all things touching perfection. See ArticleVI, Common Prayer Book.

inGreek,“instruction which is in righteousness,” ascontrasted with the “instruction” in worldly rudiments(Col 2:20; Col 2:22).

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

All Scripture is given by inspiration of God,…. That is, all holy Scripture; for of that only the apostle is speaking; and he means the whole of it; not only the books of the Old Testament, but of the New, the greatest part of which was now written; for this second epistle to Timothy is by some thought to be the last of Paul’s epistles; and this also will hold good of what was to be written; for all is inspired by God, or breathed by him: the Scriptures are the breath of God, the word of God and not men; they are “written by the Spirit”, as the Syriac version renders it; or “by the Spirit of God”, as the Ethiopic version. The Scriptures are here commended, from the divine authority of them; and which is attested and confirmed by various arguments; as the majesty and loftiness of their style, which in many places is inimitable by men; the sublimity of the matter contained in them, which transcends all human understanding and capacity ever to have attained unto and discovered; as the trinity of persons in the Godhead, the incarnation of Christ, the resurrection of the dead, c. The purity and holiness of them before observed, show them to be the word of him that is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity as also their harmony and agreement, though wrote by different persons, in different places, and ages, and at sundry times, and in divers manners; what seeming inconsistencies are observed in them may, with labour and industry, by divine assistance, be reconciled. The predictions of future events in them, as particularly concerning Josiah and Cyrus, by name, long before they were born, and especially concerning Jesus Christ, and which have had their accomplishment, and many others in the New Testament both by Christ and his apostles, are a proof that they could not be the writings of men, but must have the omniscient God for their author; the impartiality of the writers of them, in not concealing the mean extract of some of them, the sins of others before conversion, and even their sins and failings afterwards, as well as those of their nearest relations and dearest friends, strengthens the proof of their divine authority; to which may be added, the wonderful preservation of them, through all the changes and declensions of the Jewish church and state, to whom the books of the Old Testament were committed; and notwithstanding the violence and malice of Heathen persecutors, particularly Dioclesian, who sought to destroy every copy of the Scriptures, and published an edict for that purpose, and notwithstanding the numbers of heretics, and who have been in power, as also the apostasy of the church of Rome; and yet these writings have been preserved, and kept pure and incorrupt, which is not the case of other writings; nor are there any of such antiquity as the oldest of these: to which may be subjoined the testimony of God himself; his outward testimony by miracles, wrought by Moses and the prophets, concerned in the writings of the Old Testament, and by the apostles in the New; and his internal testimony, which is the efficacy of these Scriptures on the hearts of men; the reading and hearing of which, having been owned for the conversion, comfort and edification of thousands and thousands, and ten thousand times ten thousand: and

is profitable for doctrine; for the discovering, illustrating, and confirming any doctrine concerning God, the being, persons, and perfections of God; concerning the creation and fall of man; concerning the person and offices of Christ, redemption by him, justification by his righteousness, pardon by his blood, reconciliation and atonement by his sacrifice, and eternal life through him, with many others. The Scripture is profitable for ministers to fetch doctrine from, and establish it by; and for hearers to try and prove it by:

for reproof; of errors and heresies; this is the sword of the Spirit, which cuts all down. There never was, nor is, nor can be any error or heresy broached in the world, but there is a sufficient refutation of it in the Scriptures; which may be profitably used for that purpose, as it often has been by Christ and his apostles, and others since in all ages:

for correction; of vice; there being no sin, but the evil nature of it is shown, its wicked tendency is exposed, and the sad effects and consequences of it are pointed out in these writings: for instruction in righteousness; in every branch of duty incumbent upon men; whether with respect to God, or one another; for there is no duty men are obliged unto, but the nature, use, and excellency of it, are here shown: the Scriptures are a perfect rule of faith and practice; and thus they are commended from the usefulness and profitableness of them.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

Every scripture inspired of God is also profitable ( ). There are two matters of doubt in this clause. One is the absence of the article before , whether that makes it mean “every scripture” or “all scripture” as of necessity if present. Unfortunately, there are examples both ways with both and . Twice we find in the singular without the article and yet definite (1Pet 2:6; 2Pet 1:20). We have (Ro 11:26) for all Israel (Robertson, Grammar, p. 772). So far as the grammatical usage goes, one can render here either “all scripture” or “every scripture.” There is no copula () in the Greek and so one has to insert it either before the or after it. If before, as is more natural, then the meaning is: “All scripture (or every scripture) is inspired of God and profitable.” In this form there is a definite assertion of inspiration. That can be true also of the second way, making “inspired of God” descriptive of “every scripture,” and putting (is) after : “All scripture (or every scripture), inspired of God, is also profitable.”

Inspired of God (). “God-breathed.” Late word (Plutarch) here only in N.T. Perhaps in contrast to the commandments of men in Tit 1:14.

Profitable (). See 1Ti 4:8. See Ro 15:4. Four examples of (facing, with a view to, for): , teaching; , reproof, in LXX and here only in N.T.; , correction, old word, from , to set up straight in addition, here only in N.T., with which compare in Tit 1:5; , instruction, with which compare Eph 6:4.

Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament

All Scripture [ ] . Better, every Scripture, that is, every passage of Scripture. Scripture as a whole is as aiJ grafai or aiJ grafai agiai. Iera is never used with grafh. Grafh is the single passage, usually defined by this, or that, or the, or which saith. 143 Is given by inspiration of God [] . N. T. o. o LXX From qeov God and pnein to breathe. God – breathed. The word tells us nothing of the peculiar character or limits of inspiration beyond the fact that it proceeds from God. In construction omit is, and rend. as attributive of grafh every divinely – inspired Scripture.

And is profitable [ ] . According to A. V., kai and is merely the copula between two predicates of grafh. It is divinely inspired and is profitable. According to the interpretation given above, kai has the force of also. Every divinely – inspired Scripture is, besides being so inspired and for that reason, also profitable, etc. Wfelimov profitable, Past o. See on 1Ti 4:8.

For doctrine [ ] . Better, teaching. Comp. to make thee wise, ver. 15.

Reproof [] . Better, conviction. N. T. o. o Class. Comparatively frequent in LXX, mostly in the sense of rebuke : sometimes curse, punishment. See Ps. of Solomon. 10 1, but the reading is disputed with ejlegcw. See on the verb ejlegcein, Joh 3:20.

Correction [] . N. T. o. Twice in LXX Restoring to an upright state (ojrqov erect); setting right.

Instruction [] . Better, chastisement or discipline. See on Eph 6:4. In LXX mostly correction or discipline, sometimes admonition. Specially of God ‘s chastisement by means of sorrow and evil

Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament

1) “All scripture is given by inspiration of God” (pasa graphe theopneustos) “Every scripture (is) God-breathed, inspired;” This means every sacred writing which is inspired of God is also profitable; Sacred writings of false religions were neither inspired nor profitable; 2Pe 1:20-21.

2) “And is profitable for” (kai opelemos pros) “Even profitable for;” Rom 15:4; 1Co 10:11; Psa 119:9-10; Psa 119:105; Psa 119:130.

a) “Doctrine” (didaskalian) “Teaching,” Mat 28:20; Mat 24:35.

b) “For reproof” (pros elegmon) “For reproof,” chiding for wrong, Pro 10:17; Pro 29:15.

c) “For correction” (pros epanorthosin) “For correction,” making orthodox, true, or correct, Pro 3:11; Pro 22:15; Pro 23:13.

d) “For instruction in righteousness” (pros paideian ten en dikaosune) “For child-training in righteousness,” for disciplinary purposes, Heb 12:5; Pro 12:1; Pro 13:1; Pro 15:32-33.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

16 All Scripture; or, the whole of Scripture; though it makes little difference as to the meaning. He follows out that commendation which he had glanced at briefly. First, he commends the Scripture on account of its authority; and secondly, on account of the utility which springs from it. In order to uphold the authority of the Scripture, he declares that it is divinely inspired; for, if it be so, it is beyond all controversy that men ought to receive it with reverence. This is a principle which distinguishes our religion from all others, that we know that God hath spoken to us, and are fully convinced that the prophets did not speak at their own suggestion, but that, being organs of the Holy Spirit, they only uttered what they had been commissioned from heaven to declare. Whoever then wishes to profit in the Scriptures, let him first of all, lay down this as a settled point, that the Law and the Prophets are not a doctrine delivered according to the will and pleasure of men, but dictated by the Holy Spirit.

If it be objected, “How can this be known?” I answer, both to disciples and to teachers, God is made known to be the author of it by the revelation of the same Spirit. Moses and the prophets did not utter at random what we have received from their hand, but, speaking at the suggestion of God, they boldly and fearlessly testified, what was actually true, that it was the mouth of the Lord that spake. The same Spirit, therefore, who made Moses and the prophets certain of their calling, now also testifies to our hearts, that he has employed them as his servants to instruct us. Accordingly, we need not wonder if there are many who doubt as to the Author of the Scripture; for, although the majesty of God is displayed in it, yet none but those who have been enlightened by the Holy Spirit have eyes to perceive what ought, indeed, to have been visible to all, and yet is visible to the elect alone. This is the first clause, that we owe to the Scripture the same reverence which we owe to God; because it has proceeded from him alone, and has nothing belonging to man mixed with it.

And is profitable Now follows the second part of the commendation, that the Scripture contains a perfect rule of a good and happy life. When he says this, he means that it is corrupted by sinful abuse, when this usefulness is not sought. And thus he indirectly censures those unprincipled men who fed the people with vain speculations, as with wind. For this reason we may in the present day, condemn all who, disregarding edification, agitate questions which, though they are ingenious, are also useless. Whenever ingenious trifles of that kind are brought forward, they must be warded off by this shield, that “Scripture is profitable.” Hence it follows, that it is unlawful to treat it in an unprofitable manner; for the Lord, when he gave us the Scriptures, did not intend either to gratify our curiosity, or to encourage ostentation, or to give occasion for chatting and talking, but to do us good; and, therefore, the right use of Scripture must always tend to what is profitable. (192)

For instruction Here he enters into a detailed statement of the various and manifold advantages derived from the Scriptures. And, first of all, he mentions instruction, which ranks above all the rest; for it will be to no purpose that you exhort or reprove, if you have not previously instructed. But because “instruction,” taken by itself, is often of little avail, he adds reproof and correction

It would be too long to explain what we are to learn from the Scriptures; and, in the preceding verse, he has given a brief summary of them under the word faith. The most valuable knowledge, therefore, is “faith in Christ.” Next follows instruction for regulating the life, to which are added the excitements of exhortations and reproofs. Thus he who knows how to use the Scriptures properly, is in want of nothing for salvation, or for a Holy life. Reproof and correction differ little from each other, except that the latter proceeds from the former; for the beginning of repentance is the knowledge of our sinfulness, and a conviction of the judgment of God. Instruction in righteousness means the rule of a good and holy life.

(192) “Who is it that by nature will not desire his happiness and his salvation? And where could we find it but in the Holy Scripture, by which it is communicated to us? Woe to us if we will not listen to God when he speaks to us, seeing that he asks nothing but our advantage. He does not seek his own profit, for what need has he of it? We are likewise reminded not to read the Holy Scripture so as to gratify our fancies, or to draw from it useless questions. Why? Because it is profitable for salvation, says Paul. Thus, when I expound the Holy Scripture, I must be guided by this consideration, that those who hear me may receive profit from the doctrine which I teach, that they may be edified for salvation. If I have not that desire, and do not aim at the edification of those who hear me, I am a sacrilegious person, profaning the word of God. On the other hand, they who read the Scripture, or who come to the sermon to listen, if they are in search of some foolish speculation, if they come here to take their amusement, are guilty of having profaned a thing so holy.” — Fr. Ser.

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

(16) All scripture is given by inspiration of God.Although this rendering is grammatically possible, the more strictly accurate translation, and the one adopted by nearly all the oldest and most trustworthy versions (for example, the Syriac and the Vulgate), and by a great many of the principal expositors in all ages (for instance, by such teachers as Origen, Theodoret, Grotius, Luther, Meyer, Ellicott, and Alford), runs as follows: Every scripture inspired by God is also profitable for doctrine, for reproof, &c.

The rendering followed by the English version, and which is certainly grammatically possible, by makingall Scripture the subject, and given by inspiration of God the predicate, declares positively the inspiration of all the Old Testament Scriptures, for this is what the Apostle must have referred to, if we understand this verse as we have it rendered in the English version above. The New Testament at this period was certainly not all written; for instance, St. Johns Gospel, St. Johns Epistles, the Epistle to the Hebrews, and the Apocalypse, with several of the Catholic Epistles, probably were composed at a later date than that assigned to this letter to Timothy. St. Paul, massing together an evidently well-known number of writings under the term , spoke of the Jewish Scriptures, the canon of which was then determined.

But such a declaration of the inspiration of these writings to Timothy and to those associated with him would seem unnecessary and uncalled for. Timothy and the trained Jew of the first century would never dream of doubting the divine origin of their most prized and sacred writings. There is nothing in the verses immediately preceding which would call out such a statement. It seems, therefore, on exegetical, as well as on grammatical, considerations best to follow the interpretation of those ancient and venerable witnesses the Syriac and Latin (Jeromes) versions, and to understand St. Pauls words here, as asserting that every inspired writing (this, it should be observed, does not exclude those recent sacred compositions whichGospels or Epistleshe had seen or written himself, and the divine origin of which he well knew) is profitable for doctrine, &c. Thus he exhorted Timothy to show himself a contrast to the false teachersever shifting their ground and waxing worse and worseby keeping steadily to the old teaching of doctrine and of life. He was not to change, not to advance, but was to remember that every inspired Scripture was profitable for doctrine and for life. It was by these writings, St. Paul would remind him, that he must test his teaching. On the way in which inspiration of God was understood in the Church of the first days, see Excursus at the end of this Epistle.

Inspiration of God.This thought, perhaps, rather than these words, is admirably paraphrased by St. Peter: Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost (2Pe. 1:21). The various uses of Holy Scripture in the training of the man of God are set forth in the enumeration which closes this verse. These sacred writings must, in all ages, St. Paul would urge, be the hand-book of the Christian teacher. From it he must prove the doctrines he professes; hence, too, he must draw his reproofs for the ignorant and erring. It must be the one source whence he derives those instructions which teach the Christian how to grow in grace.

EXCURSUS ON NOTES TO II. TIMOTHY.

ON THE WAY IN WHICH INSPIRATION OF GOD [2Ti. 3:16] WAS UNDERSTOOD IN THE EARLY CHRISTIAN CHURCH.

See and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls.

Jer. 6:16.

THE question of inspiration is one that in the present day often is the subject of debate. In the hot and often angry controversies on this subject among us, it will be useful and interesting to see what were the opinions held by those learned and devoted men living, many of them, in the times immediately succeeding the first age of the Faith, when those walked on earth who had seen and conversed with the Lord Jesus. We wilt give the words of a few of the more distinguished of the early fathers of the Faith, selecting them from different centres of Christianity.
ROME.Clement, Bishop of Rome, A.D. 70-96. Ad Cor Ep. i. 45. Ad Cor. Ep. i. 47.

Our quotations begin from the very days of the Apostles. Clement mentioned by St. Paul (Php. 4:3), who, as history tells us, was the second Bishop of Rome, exhorts his readers to look carefully into the Scriptures, which are the true utterances of the Holy Spirit; and in another place in the same writing he expressly refers to a well-known New Testament Epistle thus:Take up the Epistle of the blessed Paul the Apostle, what did he write to you in the beginning [that is, in the first days of the preaching] of the gospel? In truth, divinely inspired , divinitus inspiratus], he wrote to you Corinthians about himself, and Cephas, and Apollos, because just then factions [party spirit] existed among you.

ASIA MINOR.Polycarp of Smyrna, A.D. 108. Ep. to Philippians, cap. iii.

Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, a disciple of St. John, in the one letter we possess of his, tells us that neither he nor any like him is able to attain perfectly to the wisdom of the blessed and glorious Paul, who, when he was with you, before the men who were then living taught the word of truth perfectly and surely.

SYRIA.Ignatius of Antioch, A.D. 107. Ep. to Philad., cap. v. Ep. to Magn., cap. viii. Ep. to Romans, cap. iv.

Let us love the prophets (of the Old Testament), wrote Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, the pupil of St. John, to the congregations of Philadelphia, because they proclaimed the gospel, and believed in Christ, and waited for His coming, and through their faith in Him were saved. These most divine prophets lived according to Jesus Christ, he writes to the Church of Magnesia, being inspired by His grace. Again: I do not command you [Romans] like Peter and Paul: they were Apostles; I am a condemned man.

EGYPT.Barnabas of Alexandria, probably A.D. 140-160. Ep. Barnabas, ix. Ep. Barnabas, x. and v.

Barnabas (probably not the friend of St. Paul, but a teacher of Alexandria who lived some seventy or eighty years after St. Pauls martyrdom), in his well known letter, speaks there of the inspiration of the Old Testament writings. Writing of Ps. 17:45, The Lord saith in the prophet; and of Psa. 33:13, The Spirit of the Lord prophesieth; and in another place he tells us how the prophets received their gift from Christ and spoke of Him; also that Moses spake in the Spirit.

ROME & EPHESUS. Justin Martyr, A.D. 140-150. Cohortatio ad Gen tiles, 12. Apologia, i. 44. Apologia, i. 44, &c.; i. 40; i. 35. Apologia i. 36. Cohortatio ad Gentiles, 8.

This writer, several of whose works we still possess, was a scholar and thinker of no mean order. He wrote within half a century of St. Johns death. He in several places gives us his view of the inspiration of the divine writings. Referring to the Old Testament, he speaks of the history which Moses wrote by divine inspiration. while the Holy Spirit of Prophecy taught us through the instrumentality of Moses. Of David and of Isaiah he writes in similar terms (propheta Isaias divinitus afflatus a spiritu prophetico). His view, of the prophetic office is remarkable. We must not suppose, he writes, that the expressions go forth from the men who are inspired, but from the divine word which moves them. Speaking of the writers of the Old Testament, he calls them holy men who required no eloquence, no skill in argumentative speaking, but who only needed to present themselves pure for the Divine Spirit to act upon, in order that the divine plectrum [an instrument, usually of gold or ivory, used for striking the lyre], coming down from heaven, acting on just men as a plectrum on a lyre or harp, might reveal to us the knowledge of divine and heavenly things.

ATHENS.Athenagoras, A.D. 160-180. Leg. pro Christ. 9.

This Athenian philosopher, who, while studying the Holy Scriptures with a view of refuting Christianity, was converted by the very writings he was endeavouring to bring into disrepute, writes (using the same strange, powerful metaphor which we found in the above quotation from Justin): The prophets, while entranced . . . by the influence of the Divine Spirit, they gave utterance to what was wrought In themthe Spirit using them as instruments as a flute-player might blow a flute.

LYONS.Irenus, A.D. 180. Contra Hr, iii. 1. Contra Hr.iii. 5.

This famous writer and bishop of the early Church was connected in his early years with Polycarp, the pupil of St. John. He (to choose one out of many passages of his writings on this subject) thus writes of the Apostles:After that our Lord rose from the dead, and they [the Apostles] were clothed with the power of the Spirit from on high, they were filled with a perfect knowledge of all things. The Apostles, being the disciples of truth, are beyond all falsehood, though they speak according to the capacity of their hearers, talking blindly with the blind.

Contra Hr. ii. 28.

In another passage this Bishop of Lyons of the second century tells us, The Scriptures are perfect, inasmuch as they were uttered by the Word of God and His Spirit.

NORTH AFRICA: CARTHAGE.Tertullian, A.D. 200. Apologia xxxi.

Tertullian, perhaps the ablestand, had it not been for his unhappy choice in later life of a wild and perverted form of Christianity, the greatestof the Latin fathers, calls the Holy Scriptures the voices of God (voces Dei). In another place he writes that the four Gospels are built on the certain basis of apostolical authority, and so are inspired in a far different sense from the writings of the spiritual Christian. All the faithful, it is true, have the Spirit of God; but all are not Apostles.

EGYPT: ALEXANDRIA.Clement master of the Catechetical School of Alexandria, A.D. 199-200. pd. i. 11. Protr. i. 5

Clement of Alexandria was master of the catechetical school of the most learned city of the world at the end of the second century, only 100 years after the death of St. John; and taught in famous schoolas did well-nigh all the early fathers of Christianitythe doctrine of the plenary inspiration of Scripture. It was by the masters of Israel, wrote Clement, that God led men properly to the Messiahspeaking to them in the Law, the Psalms, and the Prophets . . . The word of God, disregarding the lifeless instruments, the lyre and the harp, reduces to harmony . . . man, and through that many-voiced instrument makes melody to God, and says to man, Thou art my harp, my flute, my temple: my harp, from the harmony [of many notes]; my flute, from the Spirit that breatheth through thee; my temple, from the word that dwelleth in thee. Truly of man the Lord wrought a glorious living instrument, after the fashion of His own imageone which might give every harmony of God tuneful and holy.

De Antichriitn 2. ROME.Hippolytus of Portus, A.D. 218. De antichristo, 2.

Hippolytus, Bishop of Portus (one of the suburban districts of Rome), a most learned and distinguished writer of the Italian Church of the early part of the third century, a pupil of Irenus of Lyons, in one of his treatises preserved to us, expresses himself very clearly and with singular force on this subject. Speaking of the Jewish prophets, he writes, These blessed men . . . spake not only of the past, but also of the present and future, that they might be shown to be heralds of things to come, not for a time merely, but for all generations. . . . For these fathers, having been perfected by the Spirit of Prophecy, and worthily honoured by the Word Himself, were brought to an inner harmony like instruments; and having the Word within them to strike the notes, by Him they were moved, and announced that which God wrote. For they did not speak of their own power, be well assured, nor proclaim that which they wished themselves, but first they were rightly endowed with wisdom by the Word, and afterwards well foretaught of the future by visions, and then, when thus assured, spake that which was revealed to them by God.

ALEXANDRIA.Origen, A.D. 230. De Principiis, lib. i. Promium, 4. De Principiis, i. Promium, i. Contr.Celsum, vii. 4 Hom. in Jer. xxi. 2.

The Church, while condemning the errors into which the greathearted Origen fell, still reads in every age with reverence and admiration his marvellous and brilliant teaching. It will be well to close this short paper on a great subject with two or three extracts from this famous Alexandrian master, on the subject of inspiration: The Holy Spirit inspired each of the Saints, Prophets, and Apostles. . . . The same Spirit was present in those of old times as in those who were inspired at the coming of Christ. Christ, the Word of God, was in Moses and the prophet and by His Spirit they sake and did all things. Again, in his work against Celsus, he writes the following wise and beautiful words:The true God acted on the prophets to enlighten and strengthen them, and not to cloud or to confuse their natural powers . . . . for the divine messengers, by the contact of the Holy Spirit with their soul, so to speak, gained a deeper and a clearer intuition of spiritual truth, and they then became more perfect men as well as wise seers. In one of his homilies Origen does not hesitate even to say that there is nothing, whether in the Law or in the Prophets, in the Evangelists or in the Apostles, which does not descend from the fulness of the divine majesty.

Hom. in Ex. xi. Hom. in Gen. xi. 3. De Principiis, iv. 16 Home. in Jos. xx.

This gifted teachers noble words on the way in which these God-inspired writings should be read deserve to be graven on the heart of every Christian believer: We must read them with pure hearts, for no one can listen to the word of God . . . unless he be holy in body and spirit: . . . no one can enter into this feast with soiled garments. He who is a student of Gods oracles must place himself under the teaching of God; such a one must seek their meaning by inquiry, discussion, examination, and, which is greatest, by prayer. . . . Prayer is the most necessary qualification for the understanding of divine things. . . . If, then, we read the Bible with patience, prayer, and faith; if we ever strive after a more perfect knowledge, and yet remain content in some things to know only in parteven as prophets and apostles, saints and angels, attain not to an understanding of all thingsour patience will be rewarded, our prayer answered, and our faith increased. So let us not be weary in reading the Scriptures which we do not understand, but let it be unto us according to our faith, by which we believe that all Scripture, being inspired by God, is profitable (Origen, quoted by Westcott).

[For many other early patristic references on this subject of the teaching of the Church of the first days on the subject of the Inspiration of the Scriptures, see the exhaustive paper of the Religious Professor of Divinity (Cambridge), Canon Westcott, in his Introduction to the Study of the Gospels, Appendix C, pp. 383-423, upon which this short Excursus is mainly based.]

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

16. The divine suitableness of Scripture to fit the minister for his work.

All Scripture The Greek word for Scripture, , simply signifies writing; hence in 2Ti 3:15 the adjective holy, and, perhaps, here the adjective God-breathed, (which is the literal Greek of the full phrase given by inspiration of God,) are used to qualify the word as meaning the sacred writings. Yet of the fifty times in which the Greek word , occurs, it does not once designate any thing else than the sacred canon. Scholars find two interpretations for this passage. One is clearly expressed in our English translation: All scripture is inspired and profitable, etc. But the verb for is, not being in the Greek, can be supplied at a different place; and the Greek for and can be emphatic, also. We, then, may have the rendering, All inspired scripture is also profitable, etc. In the former interpretation the inspiration of Scripture is affirmed, in the latter case assumed. Either interpretation is sustainable by the Greek. Ellicott, Alford, and Huther prefer the latter; in which they are sustained by Origen, Grotius, Erasmus, Whitby, and Hammond; also by the Syriac, Vulgate, and Luther’s version. The latter meaning lies most clearly in the train of thought.

That thought, and, perhaps, words, should be God-breathed into, or on, a human being, is a conception familiar to ancient pagan as well as Hebrew and Christian writers. Josephus says: “The prophets learned the highest and most ancient things by the inspiration (breathing on) that is from God.” Plutarch speaks of “the God-breathed dreams.” Cicero says, “No man was ever great without some divine afflatus, (breathing-on.) Either the thought might be imparted to the man, and then the thought was inspired; or the man might be elevated to a higher tone, and so, speaking spontaneously, his words would have something divine about them. 2Pe 1:21; Mat 22:43, seems to describe the latter inspiration.

Scripture, Paul tells Timothy, is profitable, positively for doctrine, or teaching positive truth; negatively for reproof, or rather, refutation of error; disciplinarily for correction of conduct; formatively as a whole for righteousness or rectitude of character.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

‘Every scripture, inspired of God (God breathed) is also profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction which is in righteousness.’

By stressing that Christ is central we do not by it diminish the value of the Scriptures. Rather we enhance it. For while it is Christ Jesus the risen Saviour Who is undoubtedly pre-eminent, the Scriptures are all important in pointing to Him. They are the means by which, through prayer, He can be made known to men and women. They are our source of the truth about Him and what He came to do. For the Scriptures are ‘breathed out by God’, they are the very words of God, and are profitable for teaching men, and reproving men, and correcting men, and for instructing them in righteousness. They are thus the means by which Christ and His teaching can be brought home to the heart as they are received in prayerful faith.

We should possibly note here that while it is mainly the Old Testament which is in mind in Paul’s words, by this time the traditions concerning Jesus had taken on a fixed form, even probably a written form (Luk 1:1), and were being equally seen as ‘Scripture’, as were Paul’s letters (2Pe 3:16).

Note also how the Scriptures are seen as meeting every spiritual need. They provide sound teaching. They reprove men for their sin. They correct men in their daily walk. They instruct men in righteousness.

One problem that arises here is as to whether we should translate as ‘every Scripture, being God-breathed, –’ or ‘all Scripture is God out-breathed –.’ Both are linguistically possible. In the first case the emphasis would be on each part of Scripture as being God out-breathed so that it can be used in order to speak to the heart, in the other the emphasis is on the Scriptures as a whole being God-outbreathed. But either way they are indicating that all Scripture is ‘God-outbreathed. To all who read Paul’s words in 1st century AD both would basically be saying the same thing. ‘Scripture is God-outbreathed and is in every part therefore profitable –.’ For no one in Paul’s day would have questioned the difference, nor have argued that only some of it was God outbreathed or profitable. Nor more importantly would Paul himself.

It is however, probable, that we should translate as ‘all Scripture is God-outbreathed’, for the contrast is not between different Scriptures, (this is not a dissertation on Scripture), but between the fact that the Scriptures are ‘God-outbreathed’ while the false teachers teach hot air, breath from their own mouth. They are ‘puffed up’ by their own breath (2Ti 3:4; 1Ti 6:4) and speak with vain babblings (2Ti 2:16). In contrast with that Timothy’s foundation in the Scriptures is sure, for that is ‘God-outbreathed’.

Other arguments that favour this translation are:

1) If it was not intended to be seen as a predicate theopneustos would come before graphe.

2) The habit of dropping the copula in the opening clause of the sentence was typical of the writer, compare especially the parallel construction in 1Ti 4:4. See also 1Ti 1:8; 1Ti 1:15 etc.

3) Early Greek fathers translated as ‘all Scripture is God-outbreathed’, and Greek was their native tongue.

All these arguments favour translating as ‘all Scripture is God-outbreathed’.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

2Ti 3:16. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, The scriptures with which Timothy had been acquainted from his infancy were evidently those of the Old Testament; for none of the books of the New Testament were then committed to writing. The same thing seems plainly to be intended here byall scripture, which, in the preceding verse, is called the sacred scripture, and which St. Paul asserts to be divinelyinspired. The Old Testament revelations were not final, but preparatory to the New Testament; and therefore the scriptures of the Old Testament are here represented as able to make Timothy wise unto salvation, through faith which is in Christ Jesus. There is, however, no reason to confine St. Paul’s assertion, that all scripture is given by inspiration of God, to the Old Testament. If in the Mosaic dispensation the written rule was given by inspiration of God, where the church was conducted in every step at first by divine oracular responses, and afterwards by a long series and continued succession of prophets; and all this under an extraordinary administration of Providence, such as might well seem to supersede the necessity of scriptural inspiration; how confidently may we conclude that the same divine goodness would give the infallible guide of an inspired scripture to the Christian church, where the miraculous influence of the Holy Spirit is supposed to have ceased with the apostolic ages? Nor can it be said, that what St. Paul predicates of scripture, must be confined to the law, and what is prefatory to it, since the largeness of his term, all scripture, extends to the whole canon of the Old Testament, as then received by the two churches. The canonical books of the Old Testament therefore being inspired, the reason of things directs us to expect the same quality in the New, if there were not a thousand unanswerable arguments besides. And as in the Old, among several occasional writings, there was the fundamental record, or the great charter of the Pentateuch; and in the volumes of the prophets, the oracular predictions of the future states of the church, to the first coming of the Messiah, and so indeed more obscurely to the second coming; so in the New, there is, besides the occasional Epistles, the authentic record or great charter of the Gospel-covenant; and in the Revelations of St. John, the same divine predictions continued, and more fully predicted, to the second coming of the Saviour of the world. We may therefore venture to say, that the general proposition which affirms that all scripture is given by inspiration of God, necessarily includes the scriptures in question; what it predicates of all scripture, taking in the New as well as the Old; as well that which was to be written, as that which was already collected into a canon. For the term scripture, as the context leads us to understand it, is general, and means a religious rule, perfect in its direction for the conduct of human life in belief and practice, it being under this idea that St. Paul recommends the scripture to Timothy. The assertion therefore is universal, and amounts to this, “That divine inspiration is an essential quality of every scripture, which constitutes the law or rule of a religion coming from God.” On the whole then we conclude, that all the scriptures of the New Testament were given by the inspiration of God; and accordingly these scriptures are fitted for doctrine, as laying down the most fundamental doctrines and rules of religion, and every necessary truth; for reproof or conviction, as guarding us from all pernicious errors, and shewing us the turpitude of vice; for correction, as affording the strongest arguments under the grace of God for amendment; and for instruction in righteousness, as not only recommending holiness of heart and life in general, but likewise exciting us to a continual progress in holy and virtuous habits.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

2Ti 3:16 . Reason given for the last thought.

. . .] , not: “the whole of Scripture” (Beza: tota scriptura, i. e. Canon Hebraeorum), but “every Scripture;” or, still better, “all Scripture.”

] . .; the explanation of this word, which also in classic Greek is applied to seers and poets, is specially aided by the passage in 2Pe 1:21 : .

In various old versions (Syr. Vulg.; so also in Clement, Origen, Tertullian, etc.) is wanting; and Luther did not express it in his translation; in that case . is clearly an attribute belonging to the subject; Luther: “all Scripture inspired by God is.” With the correct reading, however, . may be a predicate; so Bengel: est haec pars non subjecti (quam enim scripturam dicat Paulus, per se patet), sed praedicati; so, too, Matthies, de Wette, Wiesinger, van Oosterzee, and others. Other expositors, again, such as Grotius, Rosenmller, Heinrichs, Plitt, Hofmann, take as an attribute of the subject, even with this reading, and explain as “also.” This construction is the right one. On the one hand, it is ungrammatical to explain by “the whole of Scripture.” Wiesinger argues against this by appealing to Eph 2:21 and to Heb 3:3 ; see Meyer on the one passage and Delitzsch on the other, where, too, Lnemann translates: “every house.” [55] Wiesinger argues also that is regarded as a proper name, which he tries to prove by 2Pe 1:20 and Joh 7:15 ; but, though a substantive is used once without an article, it does not follow that it has the signification of a proper name (on Joh 7:15 , comp. Meyer). On the other hand, this sentence does not properly give a reason for the preceding thought (Wiesinger), but rather confirms it, and hence there was no reason for directing attention to the fact that the whole of Scripture is . There was no doubt on that point (viz. that the whole of Scripture and not a part of it was inspired by God), but on the point whether the Scriptures as are also ( serves to confirm) . There is no ground for asserting that, with this view, there could not have been an ellipse of (Wiesinger).

. . .] Heydenreich thinks that the apostle is not speaking here of the profitableness of Scripture in general and for all Christians, but of its utility to teachers of religion. So also Hofmann: “The sentence does not say of what service Holy Scripture is to him who reads it, but what use can be made of it by him who teaches.” This view, however, is wrong; neither in 2Ti 3:14 nor 2Ti 3:15 is there anything said regarding Timothy’s work in teaching; the apostle does not pass on to this point till the next chapter, 2Ti 3:17 notwithstanding.

.; Holy Scripture is profitable for teaching by advancing us in knowledge; (or ), by convincing us of sin and rebuking us on account of sin. Theodoret: . Chrysostom understands it only of the conviction of error; so, too, Bengel: convincit etiam in errore et praejudicio versantes; Heydenreich, too, refers it, like , only to what is theoretical. certainly does occur in this sense, Tit 1:9 ; Tit 1:13 , but it is more frequently used of what is practical, 1Ti 5:20 ; Tit 2:15 .

] by working amendment in us. Theodoret: ;

. ( . .) is synonymous with , 1Co 10:11 .

] by advancing us in the further development of the Christian life. Luther is not wrong in translating by “correction,” inasmuch as in N. T. usage it is applied to the education which not only developes the existing good, but also counteracts existing evil. : “the Christian life of piety.”

Theodoret: .

There is an obvious climax in the series of these thoughts.

[55] Not less inappropriate is van Oosterzee’s appeal to Eph 3:15 (comp. Meyer on the passage, and Winer, pp. 105 f. [E. T. pp. 137 f.]) and to 1Pe 1:15 .

Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary

DISCOURSE: 2257
THE EXCELLENCY OF THE SCRIPTURES

2Ti 3:16-17. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.

LITTLE do men in general think how much they are indebted to God for the possession of the Holy Scriptures. This was the exclusive privilege of the Jewish nation for fifteen hundred years: and it elevated them above all other people upon the face of the earth. Their chief advantage, as St. Paul tells us, was, that unto them were committed the Oracles of God. In the knowledge of these Timothy was early instructed; and by these he was made wise unto salvation. Doubtless the way of salvation was not so clearly marked in them, as in the Christian Scriptures: but still, to any one who reads the writings of Moses and the Prophets with humility and prayer, there was every needful instruction both in relation to faith and practice. The whole Mosaic dispensation taught him this great lesson, that he must be saved by a vicarious sacrifice; and all the prophets directed his views to that great sacrifice, which should, in due time, be offered by our Lord Jesus Christ. It is of these Scriptures that St. Paul speaks in my text; and in the commendation which he bestows upon them, we see,

I.

Their true origin

The Scriptures of the Old Testament were given by inspiration of God
[Of this there is abundant evidence, in the very nature of the things which they contain. What could Moses have known about the creation of the world, of the fall of man, and of the facts relating to the deluge, if they had not been revealed to him by God? What could he have known of the nature and perfections of God; or of the means by which fallen man was to be restored to his favour; or of the Prophet who should in due time be raised up from amongst his brethren, to be, like him. a Mediator, a Lawgiver, a Redeemer, a Governor? How could he have ever given so perfect a code of laws as those contained in the Ten Commandments; and so complicated a system of ceremonial laws, that should shadow forth, in every particular, the work and offices of the Messiah, together with the privileges and enjoyments of his redeemed people? Or if we suppose a finite creature endued with wisdom sufficient for such a work (which yet cannot for a moment be imagined), it cannot he conceived that he should impose his own inventions on the world as a revelation from God: for if he was a good man, he would never have attempted so impiously to deceive the world; nor, if he was wicked enough to execute so criminal a project, would he ever have given so holy a law, which condemned even the smallest approach to such impiety, and gave the perpetrator of it no hope of ever escaping the wrathful indignation of Almighty God. The miracles wrought by him are a farther confirmation of his divine mission, and of his being inspired of God to declare all which has been transmitted to us in his writings.
Respecting the prophets also, we may say, that their inspiration of God can admit of no doubt; since it was not possible for them, if uninspired, so minutely and harmoniously to foretell so many events, which all came to pass agreeably to their predictions.]
The same may be said in reference to the writers of the New Testament
[Whilst the Apostles and Evangelists always refer to the Old Testament as inspired of God, and declare, with one consent, that the writers of it delivered not mere sentiments of their own, but spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost [Note: 2Pe 1:19-21.], they profess to be themselves inspired by that same Spirit, in all that they declare; and they wrought miracles without number in confirmation of their word. In what they wrote indeed, they expressed themselves, each in his own peculiar style, as any other writers would have done: but in the matter of what they wrote, they were inspired of God; and in the manner of expressing it they were preserved by that same Spirit from any error or mistake. So that of the whole Scriptures, both of the Old and New Testament, we may affirm, that God is the Author of them, and that every part of them has been given by inspiration from him.]

The Apostle proceeds to declare,

II.

Their primary use

This is expressed in four different terms; which yet may properly be comprehended in two. The Scriptures are profitable,

1.

For the establishment of sound doctrine

[They declare all that is needful for us to know: and they lay down every doctrine of our holy religion with the utmost precision. At the same time, they enable us to reprove, or, as the word imports, to refute, by the most convincing mode of argumentation, every error, which ignorant or conceited men may labour to maintain. There is such a perfect unity in the system of revelation, that you cannot overthrow one part, without overturning the whole. Let the divinity of our Lord and Saviour be denied, and you entirely destroy the doctrine of the atonement also. Let the influences of the Holy Spirit be denied, and the transformation of the soul into the Divine image must fall with it. Let the merit of good works be maintained, and the whole covenant of grace is annihilated. There are indeed matters of less moment, which are less clearly revealed, and respecting which persons of equal piety may differ: but in every thing which is of fundamental importance, we find in the Scriptures the most abundant means of discovering truth, and of refuting error. To them we must on all occasions make our appeal, and by their testimony we must abide.]

2.

For the securing of a holy practice

[Innumerable evils obtain in the world: but every one of them is condemned in the inspired volume; whilst, at the same time, the ways of true piety are pointed out with clearness to all who desire to walk in them. There is not so much as a secret evil of the heart which does not find correction there, nor any attainment of true righteousness in relation to which we do not find the most explicit instruction. The works of the flesh, and the fruits of the Spirit, are set in contrast with each other, and are portrayed with such exactness, that there is no room left for ignorance to any one who will search the Scriptures, nor for mistake to any one that is truly upright before God.]
From these immediate uses we may easily discern,

III.

Their ultimate design

To render men perfect, is the great object of God, in all that he has revealed: and this the Scriptures are admirably calculated to effect; since they leave nothing wanting, either to ministers or others,

1.

For their instruction

[We cannot conceive of any good work which a person instructed out of the Holy Scriptures is not fitted to perform. Take him as a man of God, discharging the ministerial office: he may learn from the Scriptures how to demean himself in the Church of God so wisely and so profitably, that nothing shall be wanting to the edification of his flock. Or, take him as a private individual: take him in his secret walk with God: What needs he more than is there contained? What can any man add to the directions there given, or to the examples that are there set before us? or what further light can any creature in the universe desire? Take him in his conduct towards his fellow-creatures: What duty is there which is undefined? Let a person occupy any station, or sustain any relation of life, husband or wife, parent or child, master or servant, magistrate or subject, he will equally find such directions as shall leave him at no loss how to please God, or to approve himself to men.]

2.

For their encouragement

[There is not a motive capable of influencing the human mind which is not there suggested and enforced. Not only are the tremendous sanctions of heaven and hell set forth in order to work upon our hopes and fears, but all the wonders of redeeming love are there displayed in such majesty and splendour, that no person irradiated with their light can want any thing to increase their constraining influence. Besides, the promises of God contained in this blessed book are so rich, so free, so full, that nothing can be added to them: nor can a man be in any circumstances whatever, wherein suitable provision is not made for his encouragement and support; so that he is not only furnished for every good work, but assured of success in all that he attempts to execute: if he be called to act, he is able to do all things through Christ who strengtheneth him; or, if he be called to suffer, he is made more than conqueror through Him who loved him.]

Such then being the excellency of the Holy Scriptures, let every one of you set himself to discharge his duties in relation to them
1.

Refer every thing to them as your standard

[Rest not in the opinions of men, whoever those men may be: but bring every thing to the law and to the testimony: for, whoever they be, if they speak not according to this word, there is no light in them [Note: Isa 8:20.]. You cannot but know, that, both in relation to faith and practice, the most grievous errors abound. Bring therefore your sentiments and your conduct to this test. See whether your views of yourself, and of Christ, agree with those which the Scriptures exhibit; and see whether your life, spirit, and conduct, be such as those of the Apostles were. I charge you, before God, to try yourselves by this touchstone. It is not a superficial view of these matters that will suffice. You may easily deceive yourselves; but you can never deceive God: and it is not by any standard of yours that he will try you, but by the standard of his own word. Oh! search and try your ways: examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith: prove your own selves: so shall you have the testimony of a good conscience now, and attain acceptance with God in the eternal world.]

2.

Consult them in all things as your guide

[Difficulties will often arise; and if you go to man for counsel, you will most generally be led astray; since none but those who have imbibed the spirit of the Scriptures themselves, can declare the sublime principles which they inculcate. Study then the Holy Scriptures from day to day, and that too with a direct view to your conduct; so that on any emergency you may have readily occurring to your mind such passages as are fitted to regulate your judgment, and to direct your paths. Instructed by them, you will be wiser than your teachers [Note: Psa 119:99; Psa 119:130.], and will be enabled to walk wisely before God in a perfect way [Note: Psa 101:2.].]

3.

Beg of God, who has revealed them to the world, to reveal them also in your heart

[Plain as the Scriptures are, they are yet a sealed book to all whose eyes have not been enlightened by the Spirit of God. The natural man, how learned soever he may be, cannot enter into their spiritual import, because he has not a spiritual discernment [Note: 1Co 2:14.]. The Apostles themselves, after all the instruction which they had received, both in public and private, from their Divine Master for above three years, yet needed to have their understandings opened by him, that they might understand the Scriptures. So do ye need the teachings of Gods Spirit, without which you will be in darkness to the latest hour of your lives. Pray then to him, as David did; Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law! Then shall you be guided into all truth; and find the Scriptures fully adequate to all the gracious ends for which they have been revealed.]


Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)

16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

Ver. 16. All Scripture is given ] Gr. , breathed by God, both for matter and words. What frontless heretics then are our upstart anti-scripturists, that dare affirm that the Scriptures are not divine, but human invention, and that the penmen wrote as themselves conceived; they were the actions of their own spirit, &c. Also that the Scriptures are insufficient and uncertain, &c. Papists likewise speak and write basely of the Holy Scriptures, as Bishop Bonner’s chaplain, who called it “his little pretty God’s book.” Gifford and Raynolds say, the Bible contains something profane and apocryphal. A certain Italian bishop told Espencoeus that his countrymen were charged not to read the Scriptures, ne sic fierent haeretici, lest they should thereby be made heretics. (Epenc. in Tit 1:1-16 ) But Gregory calls the Bible Cor et animam Dei, the heart and soul of God; Augustine, a fortress against errors; Tertullian calleth it Nostra digesta, Our digests, from the lawyers; and others, Our pandects, from them also. Classicus hic locus est, saith Gerhard upon the text. This is a classic place to prove the perfection of the Scriptures against Papists, and whatsoever adversaries, who argue it of insufficiency, accounting traditions or revelations to be the touchstone of doctrine and foundation of faith. If the Scriptures be profitable for all these purposes, and able to make a minister perfect, &c., who can say less of it than that it is the soul’s food, , as Athanasius calleth it; the invariable rule of truth, , as Irenaeus: the touchstone of errors, the aphorisms of Christ, the library of the Holy Ghost, the circle of all divine arts, the wisdom of the cross, the cubit of the sanctuary.

And is profitable for instruction ] See my True Treasure, p. 40. And hereunto add, for consolation, according to Rom 15:4 , though this also is here comprehended in doctrine and instruction for righteousness. The same Greek word, , signifieth to exhort and to comfort.

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

16 .] The immense value to Timotheus of this early instruction is shewn by a declaration of the profit of Scripture in furthering the spiritual life. There is considerable doubt about the construction of this clause, . Is it to be taken, (1) (subject) (predicate) ( ), . , i.e. ‘ every Scripture (see below) is and :’ or (2) (subject) . ( ) (predicate), i.e. Every is also ? The former is followed by Chrys. ( ), Greg.-Nyss. ( ), Ath., Est. (‘duo affirmantur: omnem scripturam esse divinitus inspiratam, et eandem esse utilem,’ &c.), all., by Calv., Wolf, al.: by De W., Wiesinger, Conyb., &c., and the E. V. The latter by Orig. ( , in Jesu nave Hom. xx. 3, vol. ii.: repeated in the Philocal. c. 12, vol. xxv. p. 65, ed. Lomm.), Thdrt. ( ), al.: by Grot. (‘bene expressit sensum Syrus: omnis Scriptura qu a Deo inspirata est, etiam utilis,’ &c.), Erasm. (‘tota Scr. qu nobis non humano ingenio, &c., magnam habet utilitatem,’ &c.), Camerar., Whitby, Hammond, al.: by Rosenm., Heinr., Huther, &c. and the Syr. (above), Vulg. (‘omnis Scriptura divinitus inspirata utilis est,’ &c.), Luth. ( denn alle Schrift von Gott eingegeben ist ntze u. s. w. ), &c. In deciding between these two, the following considerations must be weighed: (a) the requirement of the context. The object of the present verse plainly is to set before Timotheus the value of his early instruction as a motive to his remaining faithful to it. It is then very possible, that the Apostle might wish to exalt the dignity of the Scripture by asserting of it that it was ( , and then out of this lofty predicate might unfold ., &c. its various uses in the spiritual life. On the other hand it may be urged, that thus the two epithets do not hang naturally together, the first consisting of the one word , and the other being expanded into a whole sentence: especially as in order at all to give symmetry to the whole, the . . . must be understood as the purposed result of the as well as the of the Scriptures, which is hardly natural: (b) the requirements of the grammatical construction of , which must on all grounds be retained as genuine. Can this be rendered ‘ also ,’ and attached to ? There seems no reason to question its legitimacy, thus taken. Such an expression as this, , , though a harsh sentence, would be a legitimate one. And constructions more or less approximating to this are found in the N. T. e.g., Luk 1:36 , : Act 26:26 , : Act 28:28 , : Rom 8:29 , : Gal 4:7 , . In all these, introduces the predicatory clause, calling special attention to the fact enounced in it. Cf. also such expressions as , Plato, Symp. p. 177 b, , , Aristoph. Eccl. 125, , Thuc. iv. 1.

I own on the whole the balance seems to me to incline on the side of (2), unobjectionable as it is in construction, and of the two, better suited to the context. I therefore follow it, hesitatingly, I confess, but feeling that it is not to be lightly overthrown. See on the whole, Ellicott, who takes the same view. Every Scripture (not ‘every writing:’ the word, with or without the art., never occurs in the N. T. except in the sense of ‘Scripture;’ and we have it, as we might expect in the later apostolic times, anarthrous in 2Pe 1:20 , . Where it occurs anarthrous in the Gospels, it signifies a passage of Scripture, ‘ a Scripture ’, as we say: e.g. Joh 19:37 . It is true, that might be numbered with those other apparent solcisms, , Eph 2:21 , , Mat 2:3 , where the subst. being used anarthrous, = : but, in the presence of such phrases as (John l. c.), it is safer to keep to the meaning, unobjectionable both grammatically and contextually, ‘every Scripture’ i.e. ‘every part of (= in the sense , ‘all’) Scripture’) given by inspiration of God (as answers to above, so to . De W. has well illustrated the word: “ ‘ divinitus inspirata ,’ Vulg., is an expression and idea connected with (properly breath ), the power of the divine Spirit being conceived of as a breath of life: the word thus amounts to ‘inspired,’ ‘breathed through,’ ‘full of the Spirit.’ It (the idea) is common to Jews, Greeks, and Romans. Jos. contra Apion. i. 7, . schyl. Suppl. 18; , and similarly Polyb. x. 2. 12. Plato, Republ. vi. 499 b, legg. v. 738 c: Phocyl. 121, : Plut. mor. p. 904, : Cic. pro Arch. 8, ‘poetam quasi divino quodam spiritu af-(l. in-) flari:’ de nat. deor. ii. 66, ‘nemo vir magnus sine aliquo afflatu divino unquam fuit:’ de div. i. 18, ‘oracula instinctu divino afflatuque funduntur.’ First of all, is found as a predicate of persons: Wetst. (from Marcus gyptius), cf. Jos. and Cic. in the two passages above, 2Pe 1:21 , : Mat 22:43 , : then it was also applied to things, cf. the last passage of Cicero, and Phocyl., Plutarch, above.” On the meaning of the word as applied to the Scriptures, see Prolegg. to Vol. I. ‘On the inspiration of the Gospels:’ and compare Ellicott’s note here. As applied to the prophets, it would not materially differ, except that we ever regard one speaking prophecy , strictly so called, as more immediately and thoroughly the mouthpiece of the Holy Spirit, seeing that the future is wholly hidden from men, and God does not in this case use or inspire human testimony to facts , but suggests the whole substance of what is said, direct from Himself) is also (besides this its quality of inspiration: on the construction, see above) profitable for (towards) teaching ( , Thdrt. This, the teaching of the person reading the Scriptures, not the making him a teacher , as Estius characteristically, is evidently the meaning. It is not Timotheus’s ability as a teacher, but his stability as a Christian, which is here in question), for conviction ( , Thdrt. The above remark applies here also), for correction ( , Thdrt. So Philo, Quod Deus immut. 37, vol. i. p. 299, : similarly Polyb. p. 50, 26 al. freq. in Raphel: so Epictetus, ib.), for discipline (ref. Eph. and note) in (if the construction is filled out, the is abstract, and the particularizes; discipline, viz. that which ) righteousness (which is versed in, as its element and condition, righteousness, and so disciplines a man to be holy, just, and true): that (result of the profitableness of Scripture: reasons why God has, having Himself inspired it, endowed it with this profitableness) the man of God (ref. 1 Tim. and note) may be perfect (ready at every point: ‘aptus in officio,’ Beng.), thoroughly made ready (see note on ref. Acts. It is blamed by the etymologists as an . Jos. Antt. iii. 2. 2, has ) to every good work (rather to be generally understood than officially: the man of God is not only a teacher, but any spiritual man: and the whole of the present passage regards the universal spiritual life. In ch. 2Ti 4:1 ff. he returns to the official duties of Timotheus: but here he is on that which is the common basis of all duty).

Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament

2Ti 3:16 . In the absence of any extant Greek MS. authority for the omission of before , we may assume that the early writers who ignored it did so from carelessness. The sentence then is best taken as a repetition and expansion of that which has just preceded; corresponding to , and , . . ., to , . . .: Every writing which is inspired by God is also profitable . of course has exclusive reference to the definite collection of writings which St. Paul usually designates as or ; but it is used here in a partitive, not in a collective sense. A parallel case is Joh 19:36-37 , . Hence the rendering writing or passage is less free from ambiguity than scripture (R.V.). The nearest parallel to this ascensive use of , as Ellicott terms it, is Gal 4:7 , , . See also Luk 1:36 , Act 26:26 ; Act 28:28 , Rom 8:29 .

: If there is any polemical force in this adj., it is in reference to heretical writings, the contents of which were merely intellectual, not edifying. In any case, the greatest stress is laid on . St. Paul would imply that the best test of a being would be its proved serviceableness for the moral and spiritual needs of man. See Rom 15:4 , 2Pe 1:20-21 . This, the R.V. explanation of the passage, is that given by Origen, Chrys., Thdrt., syrr., the Clementine Vulg., Omnis scriptura divinitus inspirata utilis est ad docendum etc . [The true Vulg. text, however, is insp. div. et utilis ad doc .] The other view (A.V., R.V.m.), which takes as a simple copula, Every Scripture is inspired and profitable , is open to the objection that neither in the antecedent nor in the following context is there any suggestion that the inspiration of Scripture was being called in question; the theme of the passage being the moral equipment of the man of God. For this view are cited Greg. Naz., Ath. It is to be added that it is possible to render , the whole of Scripture , on the analogy of Mat 2:3 , (Eph 2:21 cannot be safely adduced as a case in point); but it is unnecessary and unnatural.

(see notes on 1Ti 1:10 ) and represent respectively positive and negative teaching. Similarly and have relation respectively to “the raising up of them that fall,” and the disciplining the unruly; ad corrigendum, ad erudiendum (Vulg.).

: a which is exercised in righteousness . Compare the dissertation on the , Heb 12:5 sqq . in reff. is used in relation to children only.

Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson

All Scripture. Greek. pasagraphe (singular)

given by inspiration of God = God-inbreathed. Greek. theopneustos. Only here.

profitable. See 1Ti 4:8.

for. App-104.

reproof. Greek. elenchos. It means “proof” and so “conviction”. Only here and Heb 11:1. The texts read elegmos.

correction. Greek. epanorthosis. Only here.

instruction. Greek. paideia. See Eph 6:4.

righteousness. App-191. It will be noticed that in the earlier part of the verse the word “is “appears in italics, showing that there is no word for it in the Greek and it has therefore to be supplied. The Revised Version omits” is” in the first case and reads, “Every Scripture inspired of God is also profitable”, thus suggesting that some Scriptures are not inspired. There are eight other passages which present exactly the same construction, and not one of these has been altered by the Revisers. Had they done so in the same manner as they have done in this case, the result would have been as fol lows: Rom 7:12. The holy commandment is also just. 1Co 11:30. Many weak are also sickly. 2Co 10:10. His weighty letters are also powerful. Similarly with the other passages, which are 1Ti 1:15; 1Ti 2:3; 1Ti 4:4, 1Ti 4:9. Heb 4:13. It is true the Authorized Version rendering is given in the margin of the Revised Version, but it is difficult to see why that should be disturbed.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

16.] The immense value to Timotheus of this early instruction is shewn by a declaration of the profit of Scripture in furthering the spiritual life. There is considerable doubt about the construction of this clause, . Is it to be taken, (1) (subject) (predicate) (), ., i.e. every Scripture (see below) is and : or (2) (subject) . () (predicate), i.e. Every is also ? The former is followed by Chrys. ( ), Greg.-Nyss. ( ), Ath., Est. (duo affirmantur: omnem scripturam esse divinitus inspiratam, et eandem esse utilem, &c.), all., by Calv., Wolf, al.: by De W., Wiesinger, Conyb., &c., and the E. V. The latter by Orig. ( , in Jesu nave Hom. xx. 3, vol. ii.: repeated in the Philocal. c. 12, vol. xxv. p. 65, ed. Lomm.), Thdrt. ( ), al.: by Grot. (bene expressit sensum Syrus: omnis Scriptura qu a Deo inspirata est, etiam utilis, &c.), Erasm. (tota Scr. qu nobis non humano ingenio, &c., magnam habet utilitatem, &c.), Camerar., Whitby, Hammond, al.: by Rosenm., Heinr., Huther, &c. and the Syr. (above), Vulg. (omnis Scriptura divinitus inspirata utilis est, &c.), Luth. (denn alle Schrift von Gott eingegeben ist ntze u. s. w.), &c. In deciding between these two, the following considerations must be weighed: (a) the requirement of the context. The object of the present verse plainly is to set before Timotheus the value of his early instruction as a motive to his remaining faithful to it. It is then very possible, that the Apostle might wish to exalt the dignity of the Scripture by asserting of it that it was (, and then out of this lofty predicate might unfold ., &c.-its various uses in the spiritual life. On the other hand it may be urged, that thus the two epithets do not hang naturally together, the first consisting of the one word , and the other being expanded into a whole sentence: especially as in order at all to give symmetry to the whole, the … must be understood as the purposed result of the as well as the of the Scriptures, which is hardly natural: (b) the requirements of the grammatical construction of , which must on all grounds be retained as genuine. Can this be rendered also, and attached to ? There seems no reason to question its legitimacy, thus taken. Such an expression as this, , , though a harsh sentence, would be a legitimate one. And constructions more or less approximating to this are found in the N. T. e.g., Luk 1:36, : Act 26:26, : Act 28:28, : Rom 8:29, : Gal 4:7, . In all these, introduces the predicatory clause, calling special attention to the fact enounced in it. Cf. also such expressions as , Plato, Symp. p. 177 b,- , , Aristoph. Eccl. 125,- , Thuc. iv. 1.

I own on the whole the balance seems to me to incline on the side of (2), unobjectionable as it is in construction, and of the two, better suited to the context. I therefore follow it, hesitatingly, I confess, but feeling that it is not to be lightly overthrown. See on the whole, Ellicott, who takes the same view. Every Scripture (not every writing: the word, with or without the art., never occurs in the N. T. except in the sense of Scripture; and we have it, as we might expect in the later apostolic times, anarthrous in 2Pe 1:20, . Where it occurs anarthrous in the Gospels, it signifies a passage of Scripture, a Scripture, as we say: e.g. Joh 19:37. It is true, that might be numbered with those other apparent solcisms, , Eph 2:21, , Mat 2:3, where the subst. being used anarthrous, = : but, in the presence of such phrases as (John l. c.), it is safer to keep to the meaning, unobjectionable both grammatically and contextually, every Scripture-i.e. every part of (= in the sense, all) Scripture) given by inspiration of God (as answers to above, so to . De W. has well illustrated the word: divinitus inspirata, Vulg., is an expression and idea connected with (properly breath), the power of the divine Spirit being conceived of as a breath of life: the word thus amounts to inspired, breathed through, full of the Spirit. It (the idea) is common to Jews, Greeks, and Romans. Jos. contra Apion. i. 7, . schyl. Suppl. 18; , and similarly Polyb. x. 2. 12. Plato, Republ. vi. 499 b, legg. v. 738 c: Phocyl. 121, : Plut. mor. p. 904, : Cic. pro Arch. 8, poetam quasi divino quodam spiritu af-(l. in-) flari: de nat. deor. ii. 66, nemo vir magnus sine aliquo afflatu divino unquam fuit: de div. i. 18, oracula instinctu divino afflatuque funduntur. First of all, is found as a predicate of persons: Wetst. (from Marcus gyptius), cf. Jos. and Cic. in the two passages above,-2Pe 1:21, : Mat 22:43, : then it was also applied to things, cf. the last passage of Cicero, and Phocyl., Plutarch, above. On the meaning of the word as applied to the Scriptures, see Prolegg. to Vol. I. On the inspiration of the Gospels: and compare Ellicotts note here. As applied to the prophets, it would not materially differ, except that we ever regard one speaking prophecy, strictly so called, as more immediately and thoroughly the mouthpiece of the Holy Spirit, seeing that the future is wholly hidden from men, and God does not in this case use or inspire human testimony to facts, but suggests the whole substance of what is said, direct from Himself) is also (besides this its quality of inspiration: on the construction, see above) profitable for (towards) teaching ( , Thdrt. This, the teaching of the person reading the Scriptures, not the making him a teacher, as Estius characteristically, is evidently the meaning. It is not Timotheuss ability as a teacher, but his stability as a Christian, which is here in question), for conviction ( , Thdrt. The above remark applies here also), for correction ( , Thdrt. So Philo, Quod Deus immut. 37, vol. i. p. 299, : similarly Polyb. p. 50, 26 al. freq. in Raphel: so Epictetus, ib.), for discipline (ref. Eph. and note) in (if the construction is filled out, the is abstract, and the particularizes; discipline, viz. that which ) righteousness (which is versed in, as its element and condition, righteousness, and so disciplines a man to be holy, just, and true): that (result of the profitableness of Scripture: reasons why God has, having Himself inspired it, endowed it with this profitableness) the man of God (ref. 1 Tim. and note) may be perfect (ready at every point: aptus in officio, Beng.), thoroughly made ready (see note on ref. Acts. It is blamed by the etymologists as an . Jos. Antt. iii. 2. 2, has ) to every good work (rather to be generally understood than officially: the man of God is not only a teacher, but any spiritual man: and the whole of the present passage regards the universal spiritual life. In ch. 2Ti 4:1 ff. he returns to the official duties of Timotheus: but here he is on that which is the common basis of all duty).

Fuente: The Greek Testament

2Ti 3:16. , all Scripture) The sacred Scripture, in all its parts. All the latest epistles of Paul as much as possible recommend the Scripture.-, given by inspiration o God) This is a part, not of the subject (for what Scripture or class of writings [as Scripture means] Paul intends, is evident in itself, as elsewhere, so in this passage), but of the predicate. It was divinely inspired, not merely while it was written, God breathing through the writers; but also, whilst it is being read, God breathing through the Scripture, and the Scripture breathing Him [He being their very breath]. Hence it is so profitable.- , for doctrine) Doctrine instructs the ignorant; reproof convinces also those who are labouring under error and under prejudice; correction recalls a man from wrong (obliquity) to right (rectitude): training [eruditio, Engl. Vers. instruction] in righteousness positively instructs; ch. 2Ti 2:24; Sir 18:13.

Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament

2Ti 3:16

Every scripture inspired of God is also profitable-There have been doubts as to the proper translation of this sentence, but the translations-King James and the American Standard-make no material difference in the meaning. The two Versions give the point in the difference of translation. One says: All scripture (the Old Testament Scripture), referred to in verse 15, that had made Timothy wise unto salvation, is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable. The other says: Every scripture inspired of God is also profitable. They both declare the Scriptures of God that had gone before were profitable to the man of God-him who believed in Christ Jesus-for teaching. The same thing is in the following: Now these things happened unto them by way of example; and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages are come. (1Co 10:11.)

for teaching,-The man of God can find teaching and example, warning and instruction in Gods dealings with the Jewish people to help him in every temptation and trial through which he is called to pass.

for reproof,-For reproving mistakes and wrongs in ourselves and others.

for correction,-The Scripture is perceived as the rule of faith, convicting of error and guiding to truth.

for instruction which is in righteousness:-The Scripture trains by guiding and inspiring the soul in holiness and right living. These instructions are given as in accordance with the will of God as revealed through Christ Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary

righteousness

(See Scofield “1Jn 3:7”).

Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes

All: 2Sa 23:2, Mat 21:42, Mat 22:31, Mat 22:32, Mat 22:43, Mat 26:54, Mat 26:56, Mar 12:24, Mar 12:36, Joh 10:35, Act 1:16, Act 28:25, Rom 3:2, Rom 15:4, Gal 3:8, Heb 3:7, Heb 4:12, 2Pe 1:19-21

and is: Psa 19:7-11, Psa 119:97-104, Psa 119:130, Mic 2:7, Act 20:20, Act 20:27, 1Co 12:7, Eph 4:11-16

for doctrine: 2Ti 3:10

for reproof: 2Ti 4:2, Pro 6:23, Pro 15:10, Pro 15:31, Joh 3:20, Eph 5:11-13, Heb 11:1,*Gr.

for instruction: 2Ti 2:25, Deu 4:36, Neh 9:20, Psa 119:9, Psa 119:11, Mat 13:52, Act 18:25, Rom 2:20

Reciprocal: Deu 4:8 – General Deu 29:29 – revealed Job 32:8 – the inspiration Job 36:4 – perfect Psa 102:18 – This Psa 119:160 – Thy word is true from the beginning Zep 1:1 – word Act 16:1 – which Rom 4:23 – General Rom 12:2 – good 1Co 14:6 – doctrine Heb 5:13 – the word Jam 2:23 – the scripture 1Pe 2:6 – it 2Pe 1:21 – the prophecy

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

WHAT INSPIRATION IS NOT

All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.

2Ti 3:16

Can we believe the Bible? Such a question may sound childish, or something worse. But it has become necessary to discuss it.

I. The mode of inspiration is beyond human definition.For seventeen centuries, at least, the Church of Christ deliberately refrained from defining it. And she showed her wisdom in refraining. The attempts of later days to distinguish between the inspiration of superintendence, the inspiration of elevation, the inspiration of direct revelation etc., have ended as they deserved to endin failure. The truth is we are no more qualified to pronounce upon the mystery of Inspiration than we are upon the mystery of the Incarnation. In both the Divine and the human elements are blended.

II. But though, we cannot fully say what inspiration is, we may be able to remove some misconceptions if we make clear what it is not.

(a) When we affirm the inspiration of Holy Scripture, we have in view not existing documents, but the original manuscripts only.

(b) But while we say this, we do not mean (as some appear to think we must) that Scripture is written in scientific language. It could not be so written, for the scientific language of one age differs widely from that of the next.

(c) Nor are we to be understood to contend that all parts of Scripture are necessarily of equal value.

(d) Nor do we mean that every statement therein recorded or therein described has necessarily received Gods sanction or been authorised by Him.

(e) We do not mean to exclude, as some suppose, the human element in the Scriptures; that is to say, we do not mean by plenary inspiration what some have termed a mechanical inspiration, as if the writers of the Bible were mere machines.

III. But, while this is so, it remains true that the writings of Holy Scripture, however diverse their features, and whether directly inspired or selected under the superintendence of the Holy Spirit from existing documents, did all at length receive such an imprimatur of Divine authority, not only as regards their thoughts, but their language, as constituted them for us Gods Word written.

Rev. E. W. Moore.

Illustrations

(1) You have no idea, said a young man in a City office to me only a few months ago, what I have to go through. I am known to be a Christian, and I am the butt of the office, because I believe the Bible. What! they say, believe that old book! Why, it has been exploded long ago. No one believes the Bible nowadays. Who believes in Jonah and the whale, and all the rest of it? You must be a little weak, gone in the upper storey, etc. etc. That young man was fighting a hard battle, and there are hundreds of others like him. They need sympathy and they need support, and too often they fail to receive it.

(2) When Dr. J. P. Thompson visited Berlin in his early manhood he met the famous Lepsius in the library of the Royal University, and when the young man told the scholar that he hoped, at some future time, to write a little book on Moses, the German professor exploded. But, mein Gott, there never was a Moses. That was the fashion fifty years ago. But since the discovery of the Tel-el-Amarna tablets, which prove that the art of writing was practised a hundred years before Abraham, Moses has come back to stay.

(SECOND OUTLINE)

WHY WE BELIEVE IN INSPIRATION

If we believe in the inspiration of Holy Scripture we must be able to say why we believe it.

I. Because Scripture itself affirms it.Our first appeal, necessarily, must be to the Book itself, and the answer it gives us is decisive. All Scripture says St. Paul in his famous utterance (2Ti 3:16), is God-breathed. See such passages (among many others) as Act 1:16 (This Scripture must needs have been fulfilled which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake, etc.); Act 3:21 (Which God hath spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began); and again (where the names of writers are altogether omitted), Heb 3:7, the Holy Ghost saith, To-day (the quotation being from Psalms 95.); and Heb 10:15, The Holy Ghost is a witness to us (the quotation which follows being taken from the prophet Jeremiah, chapter Jer 31:33-34).

II. Because the condition of mankind requires it.Is it conceivable that a God of love should leave Himself without witness in the world that he has made? Is there to be no voice, nor any answer to His creatures cry? It is not so. God has spoken.

III. Because the consciousness of the seeking soul responds to it.I say of the seeking soul, for this book is an oracle, and does not reveal its secrets to every one. This book is a living book.

IV. Because the Jews, with whom the conservation and defence of their ancient writings was a passion, and who had far better opportunities than any twentieth-century scholars, however learned, can have of knowing what were and what were not canonical writings, received as Gods Word the very same books as those with which we are now familiar as the Scriptures of the Old Testament.

V. Because the Church militant here upon earth says so.The attack upon the truth of inspiration is comparatively of recent date. For centuries, from apostolic times downwards, the question was never raised.

VI. Because the Church triumphant in heaven says so.They have Moses and the prophets, said Abraham, to Dives, in the parable, let them hear them.

VII. We believe the Bible to be inspired because the Christ Whom it has revealed to us says it is.This, after all, is the kernel of the whole matter. You may rely upon it, it is impossible to maintain your faith in the infallibility of Christ if you lose your faith in the inspiration of His Word. Let it never be forgotten, this testimony of Christ to the Scripture was given not only during the period of His Kenosis as it has been termed; it was given on the day of His Resurrection, when sin, death, and hell were captives at his feet. It is in the walk to Emmaus (St. Luk 24:44) that He once more endorses the whole Jewish canon as it is known to us, and as it was known to Him. This, surely, is decisive as to the whole question, even if it stood alone.

Rev. E. W. Moore.

Illustration

It may be worth while to quote the well-known passage from Josephus in which this matter is referred to. It runs thus (Tract v. Apion, Bk. I. ch. 8): For we have not an innumerable multitude of books among us disagreeing from and contradicting each other (as the Greeks have), but only twenty-two books, which contain the record of all past times, which are justly believed to be Divine. And of them five belong to Moses, which contain his laws and the traditions of the origin of mankind until his death. This interval of time was little less than 3000 years. But as to the time from the death of Moses till the reign of Artaxerxes, King of Persia, who reigned after Xerxes, the prophets who were after Moses wrote down what was done in their time in thirteen books. The remaining four books contain hymns to God and precepts for the conduct of human life. How firmly we have given credit to these books of our own nation is evident by what we do; for during so many ages as have already elapsed no one hath been so bold as either to add anything to them, or take anything from them, or to make any change in them. But it becomes natural to all Jews, immediately and from their very birth, to esteem these books to contain Divine doctrines and to persist in them, and, if occasion be, willingly to die for them.

(THIRD OUTLINE)

THE HUMAN AND THE DIVINE

Granted that Scripture is inspired, what is inspiration? I answer that question by asking another: What is life? We know the difference between a living person and a dead body, and we know what the power and forces of life are, but that is all. And, in the same way, we may all know what inspiration is, by its influence upon ourselves and its influence upon others.

I. Nowhere in the whole of the New Testament is one word said about the nature of inspiration.It is merely the fact that is asserted, and its results. And what are the results of inspiration? They are these: first of all, that the Scriptures are able to make us wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus; and next, that they are profitable for the whole education of the Christian man.

II. It is this spiritual force and power of the Scriptures on which I desire especially to insist.It might have been supposed, starting with a theory, that God would have preserved His Word from all possibility of defect or error. It might have been supposed that He would have given us an infallible text, that He would not have left it uncertain what the original words are in which the revelation was conveyed. We might have expected that everything would have been made so clear, and plain, and easy, that even a child should understand it. But God has not so ordered His Word. It is not so delightfully simple and easy as some good people would have us believe. Neither is it perfect, in the sense in which men deem perfection. So long as the words of God are translated into any language, they must take a certain colouring from the translator. And therefore it is quite useless to insist on the inspiration of the very words of the Bible. Ought we not rather to rejoice in this than to be troubled by it? Ought it not to be a comfort for us to be able to rest assured that the translation we have is sufficient? We do not need to be Hebrew or Greek scholars, thank God, to read our Bibles with profit and edification, and to find in them food for our souls, to find them all that St. Paul declares them to be, as profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. In short, this theory of the absolute perfection of the Bible in every detaildoes it not rest upon an entire mistake?

III. God would have us learn that what we men deem perfection is no necessary evidence of a Divine work. Look at Nature. Nature is Gods work. Nature shows forth His glory. Am I to deny this? Am I to say that Nature is not Gods handiwork because I see on the face of Nature many traces of imperfection? Nature has her monstrous births, and imperfect growths, and her abnormal developments; everywhere side by side with perfect loveliness there is failure, blight, and imperfection. How can we reconcile these things with our ideas of Divine order and perfection? Is the world less Divine because there is so much in it, quite apart from the ravages of sin, which baffles and perplexes us? And if I find in Gods other and greater book, that book which does not merely display the glory of God, but which reveals to me the will of God, and opens to me the gates of eternal life, through the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lordif I find there traces of apparent incompleteness and imperfection, or of what men deem imperfection, am I then to say, I give it up altogether; it is merely a human work; God is not there? No; it is Gods book, but it is a book given to us through men. Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. It is Gods Word, it is Gods witness, but human hearts beat there, and human pens have conveyed the message, and on everything human there must rest in some measureor it would cease to be humanthe shadow of imperfection.

Bishop J. J. S. Perowne.

Illustration

I am more and more persuaded every day I live, that the defence of the Bible is constantly put upon a wrong footing. I am more and more convinced that the attempts which are made by zealous and well-meaning persons to make claims for the Bible which it nowhere makes for itself have been a fruitful source of unbelief. We find the plainest facts denied. We find explanations given in our commentaries of difficulties which we should be ashamed to put on similar difficulties in profane authors, and which would really almost justify the taunt of some of the divines of the Church of Rome, that Scripture is a nose of wax, that with Protestant licence you can bend and twist it, and give it any shape you please. These desperate shifts can never satisfy a candid mind.

(FOURTH OUTLINE)

WHY THE BIBLE WAS WRITTEN

I. The Bible is a library, a collection of books gathered together ages ago by those who were competent to do so, from a large number of writings which lay before them, which ranged over centuries of time, were written by persons of very different characters and nationalities, in many different tongues and in many different parts of the world. When we realise that this was a library of books, we see, what helps us very much in our own personal life, that God taught the writers that they may teach us. Gods revelation to us is so universal that it has been given in all sorts of places, by all sorts of men, and in all sorts of tongues.

II. What brings these books all together?Why have they for centuries been always placed together as one library? Because they do all hang together in a very remarkable way. The great connecting link is thisGod, man, a Saviour. In some by anticipation, in others in poetry, in others in prophecy, in others in allusion, but always there is in the Bible something about God, about Gods views, which must be true views, concerning man, and about the need of some one to live and die for man to put man right with God. Why do we call them inspired, and what do we mean? We mean that we believe exactly what the books say about themselves.

III. Why was the Bible written?To teach us. Above everything else, the Bible was written to save souls. The acquisition of knowledge, the knowledge of a string of facts, is of little worth, in many cases is nothing worth, if character and conduct count for nothing. A human being stored with facts and full of energy, whose character and conduct have never been trained, is something very much like a curse to the community. What is the use, when we know we shall only live in this world for a very few years, of being stored with knowledge which is of no use beyond the edge of the grave? From the beginning to the end of the Bible we have the Blessed Saviour manifestedJesus, the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever; Jesus from beginning to end; Jesus the Way and the Truth and the Life.

Rev. Dr. Springett.

Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary

2Ti 3:16. All scripture. Having proceeded to include the faith in Christ in the general subject of divine law, the term scripture here means both the Old and New Testaments as to their divine source. Given by inspiration of God. All of these words are from the Greek term THEOPNEUSTOS, which Thayer defines, “inspired by God,” and which Robinson defines, “God-inspired, inbreathed of God.” When an author puts his ideas in a book, the volume is said to be inspired by the said author. That is true whether lie does the writing bodily himself, or dictates it and has some other person to do the writing. Likewise, God dictated (by means of the Holy Spirit) to the writers of the Bible what He wished to go into the Sacred Text, and for that reason it is said to be a volume inspired of God. Profitable means it is useful or serviceable for the following purposes. Doctrine is the same as teaching, stating what is the truth about the whole system of “the faith,” and instruction, in righteousness is the information that shows how to put the above doctrine into practice. All re-proof is correction, but not all correction is reproof; the difference is mainly in .the degree of intensity. If a man is in error through weakness or lack of information, he needs correction only. But if he is wrong when he knows better or could have known better, then he deserves to be reproved. (See Jud 1:22-23.)

Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary

2Ti 3:16. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God. The Greek sentence leaves the verb to be understood, and this leaves the sentence ambiguous. All Scripture God-inspired also profitable. According to the position which we assign to the omitted verb, we have(1) All Scripture is God-inspired, and is profitable, etc.; or (2) All Scripture God-inspired is also profit-able, etc. Of these two, the former has been more commonly adopted, probably on account of the doctrine as to inspiration which it was supposed to confirm. The latter has, however, been adopted by many commentators, appears in the Revised Version of the New Testament, and on internal grounds has most to commend it. We can hardly think that St. Paul found it necessary to impress the abstract doctrine on the mind of Timothy. What was necessary was to impress on him the practical end to which every inspired writing ought to minister. Every Scripture, so far as it is inspired, works for the completeness of the man of God, of the minister of Christ, and of his work.

For doctrine, i.e. as before, teachings in all its width. The words appear purposely chosen to describe the work of Scripture both on the individual character of the reader and on his pastoral work. It will be noticed that the points on which stress is laid are precisely those to which Timothy had been urged

the work of teaching (1Ti 1:3; 1Ti 4:11; 1Ti 4:13); of reforming (1Ti 5:21; 2Ti 2:15); of correcting (2Ti 2:25). It is as though he said, It is of small use acknowledging the inspiration of Scripture as a dogma, unless you use it for its appointed work.

Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament

Our apostle closes this chapter with an exhortation to Timothy to persevere in his study of the holy scriptues, by an argument drawn,

1. From the dignity and authority of the scriptures; 2. From their utility; 3. From their perfection.

1. From their dignity and authority,They are given by the inspiration of God: that is, they are not the contrivance of any man’s wit and fancy, but a revelation of the mind and will of God; and those that wrote them were excited to it, and assisted in it, by the Spirit of God; no part of scripture had either angels or men for its author, but every part of scripture is divinely inspired or breathed by God, both for matter and order, style and words.

A second argument is drawn from the utility and sufficiency of the holy scriptures; they are profitable for doctrine and instruction, teaching us what to know and believe in order to salvation, concerning God, and Christ, and ourselves, &c. for reproof of error, and confutation of false doctrines, for correction of sin and evil manners, for instruction in righteousness, directing us how to lead a holy and righteous life, according to the will of God.

A third argument is taken from the perfection of them; they are able to make the man of God perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works; that is, to make the ministers of Christ complete in knowledge, faith, and holiness, every way fitted for their work and duty, as Christians, and as ministers.

Observe here, 1. That the scriptures of the Old Testament, and not of the New, must be the scriptures here intended, they being the only scriptures which Timothy had known from a child; that was before the scriptures of the new Testament were written.

Observe, 2. That the apostle doth not say that these scriptures were of themselves sufficient to make Timothy wise unto salvation, but only that with faith in Christ Jesus they were sufficient for that end; much more then must the scriptures both of the Old and New Testament together, when accompanied with faith in Jesus Christ, be sufficent for that end.

Observe, 3. That the scriptures are a perfect, plain, and sufficient rule, in all things necessary to salvation.

1. They are a perfect rule; because the writers of them were inspired, and consequently their writings are infallible.

2. They are a plain rule; otherwise they would be no rule at all, of no more use to direct our faith and practice than a sun-dial in a dark room is to tell us the hour of the day. A rule that is not plain, whatever it may be in itself, is of no use to us till it is made plain.

3. They are a sufficient rule; they are able to make the man of God perfect, and wise to salvation. Here the church of Rome distinguishes, and says, the scriptures are sufficient to salvation, but not to instruction, to whom one of the martyrs replied, “If so, God send me the salvation and you the instruction.”

It is conceived by some that this was the last epistle that ever St. Paul wrote; if so, this is the last charge that ever he gave, and concerns us the more to attend to the solemnity of it. The chapter before us is St. Paul’s Cygnea Cantio, his last and sweetest song; by a spiritual sagacity he saw his end approaching, and the time of his martyrdom to be at hand; he therefore, like a dying man, adjures TImothy in a most awful and tremendous manner, to preach the word with all diligence and care, which he had so highly extolled in the foregoing chapter, as being able to make all persons wise unto salvation.

Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament

2Ti 3:16. All Scripture Or the whole Scripture, received by the Jewish Church, , is inspired of God Respecting the inspiration of the books of the Old Testament, I find two opinions, says Dr. Benson, on this passage: 1st, That the writers of the several books had all the thoughts, and even the very words, suggested to them by the Spirit of God: and that they were the penmen of the Spirit to commit to writing just what he dictated. 2d, Others think with more latitude; and allow, indeed, that Moses received the Law from God; and that the prophets were inspired by the Spirit to foretel future events, which lay out of the reach of human foresight; but that they were left to express themselves in their own words and phrases, in which they give a faithful account of what the Spirit dictated to them, 2Pe 1:20-21. But as to what was handed down by authentic tradition, or the facts with which they themselves were thoroughly acquainted, they could, as faithful historians, commit them to writing, and that without any extraordinary inspiration. And their account, as far as our present copies are exact, may be depended upon as satisfactory and authentic. He adds, If the Spirit presided, strengthened their memories, and preserved them from mistakes, this last opinion may not be much amiss. See Introduction to the New Testament, pp. 7, 8, where the subject of the divine inspiration of the Scriptures is more particularly considered. Is profitable for doctrine All the great and important doctrines of religion necessary to be known in order to salvation, are there taught, and that more clearly and fully than elsewhere; and with an authority and influence to be found in no other writings. For reproof Or conviction, as rather signifies; and that not only of error in judgment, but of sin in practice, and of condemnation and wrath due to us on account of sin; as also the depravity of our nature; of our weakness and inability to save ourselves, and of righteousness and salvation for us in Christ. For correction Or amendment, as may be properly rendered; showing us clearly, 1st, What evils in temper, word, or work, are to be avoided: 2d, What graces and virtues must be possessed and practised; furnishing us, at the same time, with all proper and needful motives to holiness of heart and life, showing us where our strength lies. For instruction Or training and building persons up, in righteousness Leading them on from one degree of piety and virtue to another, with a progress which will continually advance in proportion to the regard they pay to these divine writings. For the Spirit of God not only once inspired those who endited them, but continually inspires and supernaturally assists those that read them in humility, simplicity, and faith, with earnest prayer to the Father of lights for a right understanding of them, and for inclination and power to reduce their contents to practice. That the man of God Not only every Christian minister, or public teacher of religion, but every man devoted to the service of God; may be perfect May come to the measure of the stature of Christs fulness, Eph 4:13, &c., where see the note, and on Col 1:28; or may stand complete in the whole will of God; thoroughly furnished unto all good works Fitted for discharging every part of his duty. Thus we see that the apostles encomium on the Jewish Scriptures consists of two parts; their divine inspiration, and their usefulness for illustrating the gospel revelation; so that a Christian minister, who rightly understands them, is thereby fitted for every part of his work. Our Lord also, on various occasions, bare testimony to the Jewish Scriptures, and to their connection with the gospel. What then are we to think of those teachers who are at so much pains to disjoin the Christian revelation from the Jewish, as if the latter were not of divine original, and had no connection with the gospel; and, instead of illustrating and confirming the gospel, were rather an encumbrance to it?

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

“All scripture [is] given by inspiration of God, and [is] profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:”

Paul doesn’t leave it there – he further emphasizes the importance of Scripture for the believer – indeed, if we hath not a high regard for Scripture we will be deceived and go into that same evil as the evil men.

All Scripture: We generally apply this phrase to the entirety of the Word as we have it today and rightly so, however Timothy would have understood the phrase differently. He would have thought of the Old Testament specifically and possibly some of the early writings that he had probably seen, however I am not sure he would have recognized Paul’s writings as inspired Scripture. I suspect he would have thought of the Old Testament only as inspired at this point in time.

Can you imagine hearing this truth for the first time as Timothy did? The Jews held to the Bible being Gods word, but the specific thought of inspiration seems to be a new concept introduced by Paul and Peter.

This is of note to me in that Paul had a concept of the inspired Word of God long before the church set forth the Canon. He recognized God’s work in the setting down of the Old Testament for all of mankind to use in their lives if they only would.

Given by inspiration of God is a concept also pictured in 2Pe 1:21 For the prophecy came not at any time by the will of man but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. I am told that this term moved has the thought of being born along as something or someone in a ship. The word is used in Act 27:17 of Pauls ship being driven along by the storm. The thought of one in a boat being born along by the wind is the picture. As the writer wrote, he was born along by God. There are a number of thoughts on just what is meant by this idea of inspiration. I would like to just list some of these thoughts for your general knowledge.

1. DICTATION THEORY: When I consider this theory, I am reminded of the idea of padlocking someone’s mouth so that they can say nothing.

In this line of thinking, they tell us that the Holy Spirit took the message from God and imposed it upon the writer, and that the writer just recorded the words, much as a stenographer would record the words of an employer.

In short, man opened brain, and God poured it in. It then flowed out through the man’s hands. This thought is proven incorrect by the many styles of writing that we have in the Scriptures. The styles fit the life and times of the author. Not only are there different styles but there are different historical backgrounds involved in the scriptures.

If dictation were the method, then the texts that speak of the author’s great love, or remorse over sin would become phony and empty if the person penning the words weren’t involved (The Psalmist, Daniel in his prayers, etc.).

Fundamentalists are accused of holding to this mode of inspiration but most do not. Most hold to verbal, plenary inspiration. There may be a few very strong “sovereignty of God” men that hold to the dictation theory.

2. PARTIAL INSPIRATION THEORY: This theory allows my mind to imagine the Sunday school teacher getting up to teach the class and presenting an overlay of Scripture. He has marked only three verses in red and mentions that these are the only verses that are inspired in that portion of the Bible, and that is what will be studied for the day. A ridiculous thought I trust?

This theory originated in answer to the problem that many think that the Bible has errors of history and nature in it. They felt that they had to devise a theory that would allow for those errors. (Heaven forbid that they take the Bible by faith and prove the historian and scientist incorrect – which has been done in most if not all of those “error” passages.)

This position holds to two authors as we believe, however is limited to only the doctrinal parts of scripture, and not the other areas such as history and science.

If only the doctrinal parts are inspired then why carry all the uninspired around with us? Let’s just rip all that uninspired stuff out and have smaller Bibles.

The problem arises – which sections are doctrinal and which are not. When Christ turned water into wine – was this section doctrinal or historic? It could be teaching miracles thus doctrinal, or trying to explain science, and not inspired. Who is the judge?

This view and the concept view are held by New and Young evangelicals. These people are probably Christians, however they are far a field of fundamentalism, and in reading some of their writings they seem more political than spiritual in emphasis.

3. CONCEPTUAL THEORY: The concept that God wanted to communicate was given to the author and the author was then free to put the concept into his own words and record those words as the Scriptures. This position even allows for the author to make up a story to show the concept. This is the basis for the thought of some that Jonah is “just a story”.

This idea that God gave a concept and the man put it to words, is not a logical theory. How can one being communicate with another being without the words being important? They suggest that Jonah being in a fish, or not being in a fish is not the point. It was a story. It needn’t be true – only that the reader know that he was punished for his wrong doing.

The Jews killed after David’s sin of numbering the people is only to show the result of sin. It didn’t really happen. No one really died, they suggest.

Example: I want to communicate something to you. There was a man driving down the road and his car suddenly swerved out of control into a deep lake. The car began to sink. Luckily he was able to climb out of the window. What point was I trying to make? If you guessed that the building is on fire and you should climb out a window, you are right. Wouldn’t the phrase “FIRE” have communicated the facts more readily? This theory can only lead to great confusion.

4. INTUITION THEORY: The men that authored the scriptures were functioning only on insight which they had, and there is no divine author or interference.

Now, to put that into perspective, let’s assume that I have great insight into things, and indeed I feel that I do. In fact I think that I should author a book based on my great intellectual insight. Now, how many of you would like to base your eternal destiny on that book when it is written?

5. ILLUMINATION THEORY: The men were inspired and given much illumination and they recorded their own thoughts and words as they saw fit.

6. DYNAMIC THEORY: Some list this as the same as mystic, while others as verbal plenary, and some believe that both the men and words were inspired. God supernaturally inspired the man to write the words.

7. LIMITED INSPIRATION THEORY: This is the theory held by many Young Evangelicals. The Bible is inerrant in the matter of salvation, but it has errors in the historical and scientific areas. The next logical step is to question the Bible in the matters of salvation. If part is false then how can we determine which is true?

8. NEOORTHODOX THEORY: The Bible gives witness to God, however it has errors due to the infallibility of its writers.

9. NATURAL INSPIRATION THEORY: This view would have us believe that God sought out gifted men to write His message to man. Some men are great writers of poetry, some are great artists, some are great politicians and some are just great writers of things that inspire people to do things. The writers of scripture were only men gifted in this area.

If this theory be true then we can look to the great novels of man such as Giant, the Caine Mutiny or Hawaii for general guides for our lives.

Indeed, if this theory be true then there are no guides for our lives.

10. MYSTICAL INSPIRATION THEORY: This idea might be called the mystical zap theory as well. God mysteriously zapped the authors of Scripture and they wrote. God empowered the authors to write. This was some mystical empowerment to record God’s Word. I personally don’t feel comfortable using the results of a person’s “mystical high” to guide and pattern my life. Indeed, I do not want to trust my eternal destiny to such theories.

11. DEGREES OF INSPIRATION THEORY: Some parts are more inspired than others. When God spoke from the burning bush, or wrote the Ten Commandments – that’s really inspired! When Luke records the remembrances of Mary there was much less inspiration involved. If this be true then who is the judge of which is the “really inspired” and which is the “not so inspired? There would be no basis for truth if this theory were true. Can we sin a little if its not “really inspired” then sin lots when its not so inspired? If this theory was true I’d probably use the not so inspired part of the Scripture for devotions! I wouldnt get so convicted if using less inspired passages.

12. VERBAL PLENARY INSPIRATION: God in some manner moved the author along as he wrote. The author used his own style of writing, yet the Holy Spirit was moving him along so that the result is God’s Word – true and complete. There were a number of methods by which He communicated with man. We have discussed these but will mention them again. Verbal communication, Dreams, Visions, Trances, Theophanies and Written communications.

The doctrine of inspiration would seem to be directly related to that information which the writer put into writing from verbal communication, however Scripture would also bear out the fact that other forms of communication were also inspired, and were also God’s own message.

This is the only view that allows for differences of style and language. It is the only view that allows God to communicate with man in a logical, real manner. (MR. DS NOTES ON THEOLOGY; Salem, OR; 1992)

Inspiration simply means God breathed He moved the writers along as they wrote.

Profitable for doctrine: This is the usual word for doctrine or learning – that which is taught and learned. Any teaching is actually doctrine, and in the church situation Bible teaching is doctrine. You see doctrine is not a bad thing as some indicate – it is the natural result of the Scriptures.

Reproof: This is a proving of something – proving the wrong action of the one being reproved would be the thought of the word.

In church discipline you would want to reprove the one in the wrong – confront them with their wrong, with why it is wrong and with why they should abandon their wrong.

Naturally the use of Scripture in this process is a must – a required to make it right and correct.

Correction: This term has the thought of righting a tipped over item – setting back upright.

This runs along the lines of reproof, only probably not quite as strong. It might include items such as incorrect lifestyle or treatment of others.

Instruction in righteousness:” This instruction most likely works along with the previous items – the correcting of what is wrong via proper teaching of the Word.

Fuente: Mr. D’s Notes on Selected New Testament Books by Stanley Derickson

3:16 {5} All scripture [is] given by inspiration of God, and [is] profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

(5) The eighth admonition which is most precious: a pastor must be wise by the word of God alone: in which we have perfectly delivered to us, whatever pertains to discerning, knowing and establishing true opinions, and to prove which opinions are false: and furthermore, to correct evil manners, and to establish good.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

Paul wanted to reemphasize the importance of Scripture in Timothy’s present and future ministry. His emphasis in 2Ti 3:15 was on its importance in Timothy’s life in the past.

There is no reason to limit the universal force of "all" to matters of salvation. When the Greek word translated "all" or "every" (pas) occurs with a technical noun such as "Scripture," it is better to render it "all" rather than "every." [Note: H. Wayne House, "Biblical Inspiration in 2 Timothy 3:16," Bibliotheca Sacra 137:545 (January-March 1980):54-56; Mounce, p. 566; Towner, The Letters . . ., p. 587.] Furthermore, the context seems to suggest that Paul had Scripture as a whole in view. [Note: See Fee, p. 279.] Paul had been speaking of the Old Testament as a whole in 2Ti 3:15, and he undoubtedly carried that thought over into 2Ti 3:16. All Scripture is divinely inspired (Gr. theopneustos, lit. God-breathed, cf. 2Pe 1:21). This fact in itself should be adequate reason for proclaiming it. It does not merely contain the Word of God or become the Word of God under certain conditions. It is God’s Word, the expression of His person (heart, mind, will, etc.). This was the view of the Hebrew Bible that Jews in the first century commonly held. [Note: Kelly, p. 203. See also Louis Igou Hodges, "Evangelical Definitions of Inspiration: Critiques and a Suggested Definition," Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 37:1 (March 1994):99-114.] "Scripture" means sacred writing and applies to all divinely inspired writings (Old and New Testaments). The Greeks used the word graphe, translated "Scripture," to refer to any piece of writing, but the New Testament writers used it only of holy Scripture. When Paul made this statement the books of our Old Testament were the inspired writings he had in view primarily. However even in Paul’s day Christians recognized some New Testament books as inspired (cf. 2Pe 3:16).

"God’s activity of ’breathing’ and the human activity of writing are in some sense complementary (cf. 2Pe 1:21)." [Note: Towner, The Letters . . ., p. 589.]

Scripture is useful. Therefore Timothy should use it in his ministry. It is profitable for teaching (causing others to understand God’s truth) and reproof (bringing conviction of error when there has been deviation from God’s truth). It is helpful for correction (bringing restoration to the truth when there has been error) and training in righteousness (child-training type guidance in the ways of right living that God’s truth reveals). This is a selective rather than an exhaustive list of the ways in which the Scriptures are useful.

"They are profitable for doctrine (what is right), for reproof (what is not right), for correction (how to get right), and for instruction in righteousness (how to stay right)." [Note: Wiersbe, 2:253.]

Consequently the man (or woman) of God has all that is essential to fulfill his (or her) ministry (cf. 2Pe 1:3). The "man of God" refers to Timothy (1Ti 6:11) but also anyone who commits himself (or herself) to God, especially, in view of the context, those in positions of spiritual oversight. He is adequate (complete, filled out, equipped with all the essential tools he needs).

"The Christian minister has in his hands a God-given instrument designed to equip him completely for his work." [Note: Guthrie, p. 165.]

"Every good work" is the ultimate goal of our lives (Eph 2:10). The mastery and use of Scripture is only a means to an end, not an end in itself. God did not give us the Bible to satisfy our curiosity alone but to enable us to help other people spiritually.

"The divine inspiration of the Scriptures is stated in the Pastorals more forcefully than anywhere else in the NT." [Note: Ralph Earle, "1 Timothy," in Ephesians-Philemon, vol. 11 of The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, p. 345.]

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)