Cunningly Devised Fables
The King James Version of the Bible never uses the word
"myth," but most modern versions do. Where the modern versions use the
word "myth," the King James Version uses the word "fable."
Paul used the Greek muthois four of the five times it appears in
the New Testament. Is it significant that all the appearances are in letters to
two
young preachers—Timothy and Titus? Please listen to those four verses. Paul urges Timothy:
"Neither give heed to fables and endless
genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in
faith" (1 Tim. 1:4). Paul exhorted Timothy: "But refuse profane and old
wives' fables, and exercise yourself rather unto godliness" (1 Tim. 4:7). Paul
knew the dangers preachers—especially young preachers—faced in every generation. Faithful gospel preachers have to beware of
false teachers who are determined to lead Christians away from the truth by
turning them
to fables (2 Tim. 4:4). Paul encouraged Titus to rebuke sharply those who were teaching error. The
goal of rebuking them was to help them be sound in the faith. He did not want Titus
and others to give "heed to Jewish fables, and commandments of men, that turn from
the truth" (Tit. 1:14). These warnings are just as badly needed in modern times as they
were when Paul wrote his letters to Timothy and Titus.
The only other time the word "fable" or
"myth" is used is in the apostle Peter's second letter. Peter affirmed: "For we have not
followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty" (2
Pet. 1:16). The English Standard Version renders that verse: "We did not follow
cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty." Charles Williams translates
the verse: "For it was not mere stories of fancy that we followed
when we told you of the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we had been
eyewitnesses of his majesty." The King James Version uses the word "fable."
Charles Williams says they were "not mere stories of fancy." Most
other versions
use the word "myth." The Greek word is muthos from
which our English word "myth" is derived. The word "fable"
is a translation of the Greek, but the word "myth" is a
transliteration of the Greek. So far as I have been able to determine, there really is no
fundamental difference in the words.
The term, "cunningly devised," or
"cleverly devised," comes from the Greek sophizo—a word
used in this verse and in one other passage (2 Tim. 3:15) where it is translated "to
make wise." The background of the word should be helpful. Among the Greeks there were
men who were known as "Sophists." The word "Sophist" comes
from the Greek word sophia. The
New Testament always translates the Greek sophia
by
the English word "wisdom." The Sophists did not accept divine
revelation. They depended solely on their own sensations and experiences. Dr. Carl
F. H. Henry's book, Christian
Personal Ethics (Grand Rapids: Win. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1957),
says: "The Sophist denied even the very existence of law and gave room
only to custom or convention."
They believed that right and wrong were artificial and subjective distinctions
(p. 25). They used arguments to deceive others or to show how really smart they
were. Paul no doubt would have said about the Sophists as he did others who depended on human wisdom:
"Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools" (Rom. 1:22).
The apostle Peter probably did not have the Sophists in
mind when he wrote the following, but his words apply to all who exalt
their own wisdom above God's wisdom.
False teachers "shall receive the reward of unrighteousness, as they who
count it pleasure to riot in the day time. Spots they are and blemishes,
sporting themselves with their own
deceivings while they feast on you; having eyes full of adultery, and that
cannot cease from sin; beguiling unstable souls: an heart they have exercised
with covetous practices; cursed children.....For when they speak great swelling
words of vanity, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness, those who were clean escaped from them
who live in error. While they promise
them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption: for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought into
bondage. For if after they have escaped
the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ, they are again entangled therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse
with them than the beginning" (2 Pet. 2:13-14, 18-20).
If the Bible writers were attempting to deceive their
readers about the events they discuss, they would not have included so many
historical, geographical and scientific details, most of which can be checked. I could
give you dozens of examples of how radical critics have accused the Bible of
supporting myths or fables, but I shall take time to discuss only one—the ancient
Hittites. The Old Testament mentions the Hittites forty-six times. Genesis
15:20 lists the Hittites along with the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the
Rephaims, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites and the Jebusites. Fifteen of
the Old Testament books provide some information about the Hittites. You get
the impression from these Old Testament authors that the Hittites were a
powerful, violent and cruel people. The truth is that the land of promise included a
substantial portion of the land of the Hittites. Please listen to Joshua's description of the
Hittite land God would give the Israelites as their possession. "Every
place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, that I have given unto you,
as I said
unto Moses. From the wilderness and this Lebanon even unto the great river, the
river
Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, and unto the great sea toward the
going down of the sun shall be your coast' (Josh. 1:3-4).
Many liberal theologians in the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries dogmatically affirmed that the Hittites never actually existed. The
Bible writers such as Moses, Joshua and Samuel simply invented them. There is a
very serious problem with the empty rantings and ravings of the modernistic
theologians. They were as wrong as they could be. There is an enormous amount
of evidence in modern times that the Bible writers were right all along. When I
took a course in ancient history at Andrews University in Berrien Springs,
Michigan, we spent at least two weeks examining the findings of
archaeologists. We know the names of the first dynasty of Hittite rulers. We know much about
their social, political, religious and military history.
An archaeology textbook I taught in college many years
ago has the title, Archaeology and the Bible by Dr. Joseph Free
(Wheaton: Van Kampen Press, 1950). Dr. Free says concerning the Hittites:
"Discoveries during the twentieth century...left no doubts concerning the
Hittites. In 1906, Hugo Winckler of Berlin went to the site known as Boghaz-koi,
in Central Turkey, and there examined the remains of what proved to be the
capital of the Hittite Empire." Dr.
Free quotes Dr. Millar Burrows of Yale as saying that the Hittites were hardly
more than a name to us until the excavations at Boghaz-koi (pp. 126-127).
The spade of the archaeologist has wreaked havoc with
most of the criticisms of liberal preachers and theologians. The modernistic
professors accuse the Bible writers of mythmaking when they are the ones guilty
of inventing theories designed to prove the Bible wrong. I think it is appropriate
to ask liberals two questions. Why in the name of scholarship and honesty do they not
wait until all the evidence is in before they make groundless accusations
against the word of God? And when their theories are literally destroyed by
evidence from archaeology or from biology or from history, why do they never
apologize for their presumptuousness?
Liberal writers should review the literary masterpieces
of Dr. Robert Dick Wilson, for many years a professor of Old Testament languages at
Princeton Theological
Seminary. In his book, Is Higher
Criticism Scholarly? (Philadelphia: The Sunday School Times Company, 1922),
Dr. Wilson affirms: "No man knows enough to assail the truthfulness of the Old
Testament." He explains: "When a man says to me, I don't believe
the Old Testament, he makes no impression on me. When
he points
out something he doesn't believe, he makes no
impression on me. But when he comes to me and says, “I've got the evidence here to
show that the Old Testament is wrong at this or that point'—then that's where my works
begins. I'm ready for him....Criticism,' says Dr. Wilson," is not a matter
of brains, but a matter of knowledge'" (pp. 10-11). In his outstanding
book, A Scientific Investigation of the Old Testament (New York: Harper
& Brothers, Publishers, 1929), Dr. Wilson argues: It cannot be
"shown that there are geographical or archaeological references in the Law
of Moses that are unsuitable to the age of Moses" (p. 27).
Radical critics describe virtually every miracle in the
Old Testament and in the New as being mythological, although they do not always
use the word "myth" of the great biblical miracles. Incidentally, that
is true of many who call themselves "Evangelicals," as well as most
modernistic theologians. I have time to give you one example. The late Dr.
William Barclay, a distinguished Scottish theologian, wrote a book in 1975 which
he called, And He Had Compassion: The Healing
Miracles of Jesus (Valley Forge: Judson Press). So far as I
recall from reading Dr. Barclay's book more than twenty years ago, he never uses
the word "myth" of the great miracles of Jesus, but he does
not accept them as being genuine. Dr. Barclay says his purpose in the book is to
explain—not to explain away—the miracles of Jesus (p. 1 of the Preface). Yet he
explains away every single miracle he discusses. Please listen to these disturbing
words. "With our modern knowledge, we may regard belief in demons and
demon-possession as primitive superstitions; but they were real to the Jews of Jesus' day....Did
Jesus believe in demons? It may well be said Jesus did. He did not
come into this world to give men medical knowledge and there is no reason to
think that his medical knowledge would be any more advanced than that of the
people of his day....Whatever else
may be true, Jesus had to treat the existence of demons as real or he could not
even have begun to try to cure the people who were suffering from them" (p. 27).
This brief excerpt from Dr. Barclay's book raises a
number of vital questions. Is there any real difference between believing in a myth or
a fable and in accepting "primitive superstitions?" Dr. Barclay is
speaking of the one who claimed to be "the way, the truth and the life"
(John 14:6). If Christ's belief in demons was simply "primitive
superstitions," maybe his other teachings were also "primitive superstitions."
How shall we respond to these words from Jesus Christ? "Father, the hour is come;
glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee: as thou hast given him
power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast
given him.
And this is eternal life, that they might know thee the only
true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast
sent" (John 17:1-4).
It is true that Jesus "did not come into the world
to give men medical knowledge." But we are speaking of the One who made
man and knows exactly what is in man. He knows every system in the human body. He
knows how we think and behave. Christ is the Creator of the entire universe,
including man (John 1:1-3; Col. 1:15-17). It is erroneous to speak of Christ's
"belief concerning demons. He did not believe they existed; he knew they did. What
a grievous mistake it is to accuse Christ of believing in demons and pretending to cast
them out of people when demons were not real! If he did not know whether demons
were real, he is not God manifest in the flesh. If he knew they were not real and yet
pretended they were, he is not honest. He is a deceiver of the first rank.
Dr. Barclay asserts that Jesus "had to treat the
existence of demons as real or he could not even have begun to try to cure the
people who were suffering from them." There is one truth we must never
forget: There is no way the sinless Son of Almighty God could ever deceive
anyone. How could our Lord condemn hypocrisy if he himself were a hypocrite? I
wish time permitted a further examination of Dr. Barclay's very troubling book, but
I shall have to reserve that for another time.
Most of the leading liberal preachers and theologians
think the great fundamentals of the faith are mythical. They reject the incarnation, the
Lord's great miracles, his resurrection, his second coming and the final judgment.
They may still call themselves Christians, but they have rejected the Christian
system. How dare any man call himself a Christian when he denies the deity of
Christ and God's wonderful plan of salvation? It is like a man's calling himself an
American when he opposes our great constitution and fights against our nation.
Let us return now to what Peter had in mind when he
stated: "We have not followed cunningly devised fables (or myths)" (2
Pet. 1:16). The apostle Peter does not have a lengthy discussion of the
transfiguration, but he does provide some insight into the fact that it
was not a myth. He affirmed: "We were eyewitnesses of his majesty."
Matthew tells us that Christ took Peter, James and John to a high mountain. While they were on
the mountain, Christ appeared with Moses and Elijah. Christ was transfigured before
them. His face shone as the sun and his clothing was as white as the light. The
apostle Peter expressed great joy to be privileged to be present on this spectacular
occasion. He suggested building three tabernacles—one for Moses, one for Elijah and one
for Christ. While he was foolishly speaking, a bright cloud overshadowed them.
A voice out of the cloud said, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased;
hear him" (Mt. 17:1-5).
Peter boldly proclaimed: We were eyewitnesses and we
were ear-witnesses. We saw the events on the mount and we heard the voice out
of the cloud. We have three accounts of this great event—Matthew 17:1-5,
Mark 9:2-10 and Luke 9:28-36. While the
details of the accounts in Matthew, in Mark and in Luke differ slightly, the
overall message is the same. Did Matthew, Mark and Luke invent the
transfiguration? Was Peter reciting a
real event when he wrote of the transfiguration? How can we trust these men to teach the truth on any topic if they
made up the story of the transfiguration?
And did the four men conspire to deceive their readers?
Peter assures us: "We have a word of prophecy made
more sure; whereunto you do well that you take heed, as unto a light that
shines in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your
hearts: knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any
private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but
holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit" (2 Pet. 1:19-21). Is the
apostle Peter arguing that every word of scripture came from the very mind of
God? The answer could not be plainer. Yes, every word in the Bible came from God
almighty. Paul asked the Corinthians: "For what man knows the things of a man, save
the spirit of the man that is in him? Even so the things of God no man knows,
but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who
is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us by God. Which things
also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Holy
Spirit teaches, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words" (1 Cor. 2:11-13).
Philip Gulley and James Mulholland's book, If
Grace Is True: Why God Will Save Every Person (New York:
Harper-Collins Publishers, Inc., 2003), blatantly opposes many Bible teachings.
The authors say they used to believe the Bible was the ultimate authority,
but they no longer believe that (p. 25). They say they can examine certain biblical
passages and admit, "I don't believe that is true" (p. 200). Can you believe the
arrogance of ordinary human beings who seek to repudiate the teachings of God's
inspired, inerrant word?
You can depend on every word of scripture. It provides
God's revelation of his will. There is no other way of knowing who God is and
what he demands of us. If you are
outside of Christ, he commands you to believe in his Son, repent of your sins,
confess the name of Christ before men and be baptized in the name of Christ for
the remission of your sins. If you
are a Christian, he requires you to walk in the light as Jesus Christ is in the light that you may
continue to enjoy the remission of your sins.
Winford Claiborne
The International Gospel Hour
P.O. Box 118
Fayetteville, TN 37334