I. Preliminary Remarks
A. The question one needs to answer is as follows: How can faith in the
divine inspiration of Scripture be justified?
B. Integral Assumptions:
1. God exists (Theism)
2. God can intervene in the course of history to perform miracles
which can be identified as such by human beings
(Supernaturalism)
3. God is able to communicate verbally with huma beings
(revelation)
II. Methodology (Apologetic Epistemology)
Non-Evidentialist
1. These proofs minimize objective arguments and evidences
2. Chief among this group is presuppositionalism
a. Defended by Cornelius Van Til, Greg Bahnsen, John
Frame
b. According to this view, the truth and authority of
Scripture must be presupposed.
c. To argue rationally for the authority of Scripture is to
appeal to an authority that is inferior to that of
Scripture which, for the believer, is the highest
authority.
d. Rather than let human reason judge the authority of
Scripture, the presuppisionalist insists that Scripture
should judge human reason.
e. However, does this not confuse ontology with
epistemology?
3. Another option is Reformed Epistemology
a. Suggests that God offers compelling indication of
divine inspiration of the Bible by means of the internal
testimony of the Holy Spirit.
b. However, this only works for the person who has it (the
ITOTHS). Because of its subjective nature, it has little or
no apologetic value for non-recipients.
B. Evidentialism
1. Believes that God has in fact provided us with objective, public
evidence of the divine inspiration of the Bible
2. Chief among these is the inherent character approach:
a. Unity
b. Spiritual and Moral Affect
c. Perseverance
3. Another is the Christological Approach
a. We should accept the divine inspiration of the Bible
on the authoritative testimony of Jesus
B. Warfield, R. C. Sproul adhere to this argument
C. The argument has this structure:
1. The N.T. documents are historically
reliable
2. These docs accurately present Christ
3. Whatever Christ (who is God) teaches is
true
4. Christ taught that the OT is the written
Word of God and promised that this
disciples would write the NT
5. Therefore, the Bible is the written Word
of God.
D. The Critical version of this argument adds criteria of
authenticity for the reports of Jesus' life and
message:
1. The criterion of multiple attestation
2. The criterion of dissimilarity
3. The criterion of embarrassment
4. The criterion of Palestinian
environment
5. The criterion of coherence
III. A Case for Divine Inspiration
A. The Structure of the argument
1. Jesus taught that he is God incarnate
2. God authenticated Jesus' teaching by raising him from the
dead
3. Hence, Jesus is God incarnate
4. Jesus taught that the Old Testament is divinely inspired and he
promised the inspiration of the NT through his apostles
5. Therefore, the Bible (both OT and NT) is divinely inspired
B. Concerning Jesus' claim to be God:
1. Col. 2:9
2. Mark 14:62
3. Virgin birth as fulfillment of prophecy
