Presuppositions of Biblical Authority

[Christy (Christy Hemphill)]

@St.Roymond

Now the problem comes out: that is an element of a modern worldview that did not apply to the thinking of the ancient near east. Back then, if something came from a deity it had authority, and it was the authority that mattered, not the type of material. So if God inspired something, it made no difference if it was “literally” true or not because it came from God. The division was between things with divine authority and things lacking them.

Oooh, this is a very succinct and clear way of expressing it. As members of post-Gutenburg, literate societies we have a default expectation that authority is found in the text. But in the orality-dominant societies of the ANE and NT church, authority is found in the giver of the text.