Straight To the Highest Authority Part IV

“If I do not know the meaning of the language… the speaker [shall be] a foreigner to me.”  (1 Corinthians 14:11)

 

The consequences that follow from the failure to consult the Hebrew are not limited, however, to adherents of the evangelical end of the investigational spectrum.  While my blog postings make clear my serious disagreements with my brothers and sisters in Christ who, relying on English translations, insist that the creation days of Genesis are 24-hour, others also commit this same error.  Certain scientists too (especially committed to naturalism), consistently dismiss the record of Genesis creation account for the very same reason as do Christian fundamentalists.  To be clear here, I am not suggesting these scientists personally believe the creation periods are that short.  I am saying they believe (wrongly) that that interpretation is what the Book of Genesis actually intends.

In his essay, “Genesis, Cosmology, and Evolution,” Rabbi Hillel Goldberg (obviously a Hebrew speaker!) challenges Charles Darwin’s attempted disproof of the Genesis account and his consequent assertion that he thereby logically disproved the God of the Bible.  In doing so he first of all states, “The only readers who take the Torah both literally and uni-dimensionally…are non-Hebrew readers. The simplicity ascribed to the Biblical account of creation within Western culture is not and never has been a part of the intellectual heritage of even the most Orthodox Jewish believers...For millennia, the [Hebrew] interpreter of the Torah has lived congenially with the multiple denotations and connotations of Hebrew words, phrases, and themes. Indeed, he has gloried in them, without, however, violating the plain sense of the text — without twisting its clear intent. If a reader lets Genesis be Genesis, not a translated stultification thereof, Genesis is scientifically accurate.”  And then, to the point, he concludes, “The Genesis that Darwin [attempted to disprove] does not exist, the English renderings he refuted do not, in critical details, reflect the Hebrew” (boldface mine).  See http://www.ou.org/publications/ja/5760summer/genesis.pdf. (boldface and ellipses are mine.            

Martin Luther himself placed great importance on a high level of awareness of the original biblical languages, especially for Christian preachers and teachers.  Looking back on the history of the church from his perspective, he writes, “Without the languages [the original Hebrew and Greek]we could not have received the Gospel we could not have received the Gospel…If we neglect [the same] we shall eventually lose the Gospel…In former times the fathers were frequently mistaken, because they were ignorant of the languages… although their doctrine is good, they have often erred in the real meaning of the sacred text; they are without arms against error, and I fear much that their faith will not remain pure.”  W. Carlos Martyn.  The Life and Times of martin Luther. (American Tract Society, 1866), p.474,475.  See also Luther’s extensive discussion of this matter in Walter Brandt, ed. Luther’s Works v.45. (Fortress, 1962), p.359f.