All Doves:
I had no intent on responding to my liberal nemesis, however, all of his responses, twisting my words, nit pick absence of quotes, or distort in one way or another the true facts of the Apocrypha. It is interesting to note that the "Pre-Wrath-Rapture-Babble" site will post almost immediately on Sunday morning as soon as Jon posts the Doves' letters, up goes the Jovial's re-posts on the "Pre-Wrath-Rapture-Babble" site. I actually read his posts over at the "Pre-Wrath-Rapture-Babble" site before coming back to Five Doves. He made statements to the effect I lied about specific facts. The "Pre-Wrath-Rapture-Babble" site had three of Jovial's posts from this morning Five Doves posted on their site, figuring they can discredit my posting by using the straw man arguments by Jovial.
I am not sure why Jovial is so insistent that the spurious books of the Apocrypha are all that important in the life of the believer. It brings nothing to the table of serious dialogue and interchange of though pertaining to the Truth of God's Word but only serves to confuse others about the non-Canonical books, for which conservative theologians blatantly reject as being God-inspired. He was pushing them a good while back, long before I exposed their Catholic roots and the Jesuit's drive behind the move to hype these frauds being passed of as so-called legitimate works. Why would anyone want to push the Apocrypha when you already have the Word of God in the KJV Bible, and for the sake of acceptability, any of the other English translations contain the Biblical message in various readable ways. I'm not arguing about what flavor of tea you drink is better. I am stating the evidence is there and exists in such quantity, that I chose to use the KJV Bible for myself, rather than to be distracted by some new (resurrected) fad, in this case a repackaging of the bogus writings that were long ago rejected by Protestant scholars. You can go to Amazon.com today and you will find over 500 books on the topic of the Apocrypha, almost all of them published in the last 15 to 20 years. The religious publishing business is all about profits and what is hot this year might be collecting dust tomorrow. In the late 1990's, because of Y2K it was prophecy books, like the 'Left Behind' series of novels, etc. that were hot for Christian book stores.
I definitively disagree that the Apocrypha is quoted by either Old Testament or New Testament writers. Textual critics and experts in the field of extra-Biblical writings long ago dismissed this nonsense. Every allusion but one of the so-called quotes of Apocrypha writings in the Bible were rejected as bogus. I have studied under numerous theologians, and even have had a course on the Apocrypha and many courses on specific books of the Old Testament and lots more on the New Testament and never have I heard a conservative Bible scholar ever once give even passive credence to the Apocrypha. It is a liberal publishing fad, but even more important it is being fueled by the Jesuit "mystics" that are playing a major role in the forthcoming plan to produce a universal Catholic New World Religion Bible. This is how they pump the religious book market. They stoke the fire by having people call religious book stores and have them ask what do you carry in the way of the Apocrypha. When a religious book store gets repeated phone calls asking about a specific product, the manager notes such requests and he then asks jobbers, distributors, sales reps. and publishing companies what is available on books about the Apocrypha. They in turn begin to recognize there must be a market for something like that which they don't carry as a rule. Then literary agents scout potential authors for this booming fad. Check out Amazon.com and note the many titles on the Apocrypha and Bibles with the Apocrypha, many that have been deep-discounted because of this trick to generate a market for something that doesn't really exist. Amazon.com lists over 500 titles on the subject, or Bibles with the Apocryphal books, different versions of such books.
I always find myself facing a predicament, and that is how much to include as to sources or how little to include. I hesitate to guess how much or how little readers want to hear and thus I choose to go lightly on the footnotes, after all, you are not taking a home study correspondence program on this site. I assume that if you the reader want to know more about a topic then you will ask for directions as to where to begin. When I donated my personal library, I chose to keep about 400 hundred of the 6,200 books that I considered useful and likely to be important despite the fact that I was retired. Some I treasured too much to part with.
I'm not sure this post is going to be relevant given the time frame that we may have left. However, in the event that God has other plans and September 24-26 comes and goes and we are still here, you might want to know what some of the scholars have to say about the KJV Bible. Here are a few titles that are good starters without getting bogged down into textual criticism and issues that will not help you learn the important things that matter. These are written at various levels of academic style and rigor, but none are overly difficult to understand. There are others that I could refer to from the three seminary libraries about 50-60 miles in different directions from where I currently live and use occasionally for reference work. Academic theological books are often two or three times the price these days of helpful books like I name below. All of the listed can be obtained for under $30, should you really want to be Bereans and prove me right or wrong.
1. 'Final Authority: A Christian's Guide to the King James Bible' by Dr. William P. Grady
2. 'Defending the King James Bible' by Dr. D. A. Waite
3. 'Gipp's Understandable History of the Bible' by Dr. Samuel C. Gipp
4. 'In Awe of the Word' by G.A. Riplinger
All of my references, specifics, and facts were drawn from one or more of these four books and my personal resources and not from any non-published sources. I do not need to use or quote unauthored works by the non-academics as I rely on trained respected scholars and theologians that are well recognized authorities in their discipline and lines of expertise. The fact that someone as adamant as Jovial is about the spurious books of the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha writings causes me some concern to believe Jovial is something more than just a curious student of ancient writings.
All four of these named titles/authors are exalted as true scholars, and highly respected by their peers. All but one has an earned Ph.D and Th.D, and the fourth most likely has her Ph.D. by now. When she wrote 'In Awe of the Word', Gail A. Riplinger was doing her doctoral work at Harvard. Two of the gentlemen listed above actually have two earned doctorates. I do not know whether the reader realizes the demands that a Ph.D. or Th.D program entails. The typical doctorate program is 3 to 5 years of grueling research, writing, peer review, etc. Since the Low Information folks at the "Pre-Wrath-Rapture-Babble" site denigrate and ridicule theological education, you really have to wonder about their epistemological understanding of how one defines the difference between truth and falsehood. Are they a priori or a posteriori?
I went back and reviewed my post on the "Spurious Apocrypha Disinformation", and, it can be said that most Catholics, and even some SDA's would disagree with my comments; and unfortunately the writings of Catholic scholars, in particular, the Jesuits, would resist my posting; however, and this disagreement goes back centuries to Clement if not earlier. I had a former Old Testament professor take a look at Jovial's posts and my former professor simply called it Catholic propaganda.
I would simply reiterate my closing remarks of my post that the sudden resurrecting the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha writings are part of a Roman Catholic agenda to bring about support for inclusion of the Apocrypha into a coming universal Bible for the One World Church. Jovial certainly exhibits a common bond with the "Pre-Wrath-Rapture-Babble" folks. Based on his issues he wants to debate over or nit pick and split hairs over, it seems to me that life is too short to be debating minor points and issues that have long been established as being spurious non-Canonical or non-inspired writings. Ephesians 5:11 states that we are "And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them" (i.e. expose them). While there is an element of cultural history related to the times of their writing, they have proven to be spurious. There are other more helpful books on culture and customs of Biblical times and peoples.
Something that I did forgot to note in my post on this issue was the role Cardinal Newman played in getting the Critical Greek Text of Wescott & Hort adopted by the Church of England. John Henry Newman was an Anglican priest that persuaded others to accept the corrupt Critical Greek Text of Wescott & Hort, and not long after that he converted to Roman Catholicism, taking several hundred priests with him and defecting to Rome. For that achievement in getting the corrupted Critical Greek Text of Wescott & Hort accepted by the Church of England, he was later made a Cardinal. The previous pope, Benedict XVI, beatified Cardinal Newman as a saint back in 2010.
In a point that I stated previous concerning the mathematical validation of what is God-inspired, and what is not God-inspired, that of the "Heptadic" Structural Design, no one can disprove its existence. It is the "Divine" Signature of the Creator and no man has been able to unseat that fact. I have documented the works of several mathematicians that have done serious research on this matter, and to this day, none of the competing Codex's contains the God-inspired mathematical design of the "Heptadic" Structural Design, (the exception being the Beza Codex). The spurious books are just and none of them have been found to contain the integral "Heptadic" Structural Design pattern that include the Apocrypha and the Pseudepigrapha writings. To this day, I have often wondered why I bothered to take a course on the Apocrypa and Pseudepigrapha writings when I went to seminary since it was not a required subject. That should have been a tip off about how little value the subject is relative to the Christian believer. For me there is more than enough God-inspired writings in the 66 books of the KJV Bible to feast upon and grow on. There is much more that can be gleaned from the Bible, more than I have time to devote to its study, let alone to take time away from it to read books and ancient writings that have yielded little, other than to glorify Rome. Jovial's passion for these writings along with the Low Information folks at the "Pre-Wrath-Rapture-Babble" lead me to think Jovial is one or more of the following below:
1. A SDA cult member
2. A present or former seminary student
3. A Roman Catholic or Catholic sympathizer
4. A Jesuit Coadjutor or Jesuit sympathizer
As for me, I have told you that I am a former United Methodist Pastor, holding to a non-denominational Bible-believing Christian position; holding to a Dispensational Hermeneutic of the Word of God. I have stated that I am a graduate of a Covenant/Reform Christian college, and that I graduated from two Covenant/Reformed theological seminaries. I have stated that I was a Covenant/Reformed theology pastor for the first 25 years of my ministry and subsequently repented of that belief system in my ministry and for the next 26 years I have held a Dispensational theology position, which makes far better sense than the Covenant/Reformed approach. The "Pre-Wrath-Rapture-Babble" site posts people's theological postings and most of them have no theological education on such subjects. This is like saying, come fly with me because I just purchased a new Cessna 172 airplane. If you want me to fly with you, (buy into your way of thinking) then you better back it up with some credentials and experience under your belt to prove you are a competent pilot. The "Pre-Wrath-Rapture-Babble" site post videos such as Robert Ferrell on the Apocrypha writings, and he states absolutely zip, zilch, nada, nothing about his qualifications. We see so much of this on the Internet, like John Little of 'The Omega Shock Letter'. I don't need to repeat his great qualifications, I have noted them enough you could quote me.
From other religious and theological contacts around the world, I am confident that my premise and closing remarks on my original post will be validated in time, when the new Roman Catholic Universal One-World-Religion Bible hits the stands in a few years. You can count on Rome having its way, and it will contain the spurious Apocrypha. Unfortunately, when it comes to the Bible, and, unlike the medical, dental, and the legal professions, where you can't simply put out your shingle without proper credentials and open for business, a novice can start his own church without any training or start a web page. I tied two Jehovah Witnesses up Saturday for nearly two hours showing them how they had been deceived and under bondage and fear. I was surprised to learn they now use the Kindle to show their video presentation. We had a real nice conversation, and I wasn't quite sure whether it was the comfort of my house air-conditioning or whether it was the fact they were in 'Catholic' town that they decided to stay a while. It was 93-degrees outside and every yard in my little town has a cement statue of Mary planted in their front yard.
A few days ago Pope Francis tweeted, that "Christians that don't believe Mary as their mother are orphans". So if anyone thinks that I am too dogmatic, then they better get ready for the pope's new evangelization program to convert the "lost brethren".
While I don't know much about Jovial, his leanings are evident, sufficiently so that I have my suspicions, but you can't get away from the evidence of his posts that he supports traditional Roman Catholic propaganda concerning the Apocrypha and other Pseudepigraphal writings. There is the outside possibility that even he has been deceived by the advocates of the spurious Apocrypha writings. They have the Jesuits and the Vatican as their chief advocates and salesmen of this trash. We represent two different schools of thinking, and I have no compulsion to fly with Jovial. To be gracious about this I see no worthwhile reason to belabor the readers and posters on Five Doves with further discussion on this ancient but futile argument. Both of us have stated our views. The seriously interested now at least know that are there are clearly two traditional points of view: the Roman Catholic and the Bible Believing Christian.
Blessings this week as we await the "Blessed Hope",
Pastor Bob