Expose of Dr. Bruce Metzger
Chris Olson
Expose of BRUCE METZGER
By David W. Cloud
Editor of O Timothy; Director of Way of Life Literature
(See this article in its entirety at:
http://www2.bitstream.net/~thebible/FBNS211.html)
Another of the editors of the United Bible Societies' Greek New Testament is
BRUCE M. METZGER (1914- ). Metzger is George L. Collord Professor of New
Testament Language and Literature, Princeton Theological Seminary, and he
serves on the board of the American Bible Society. Metzger is the head of
the continuing RSV translation committee of the apostate National Council of
Churches in the U.S.A. The Revised Standard Version was soundly condemned
for its modernism when it first appeared in 1952. Today its chief editor
sometimes is invited to speak at Evangelical forums. The RSV hasn't changed,
but Evangelicalism certainly has!
Metzger was the chairman for the READER'S DIGEST CONDENSED BIBLE and wrote
the introductions to each book in this butchered version of the Scriptures.
The Preface claims that "Dr. Metzger was actively involved at every stage of
the work, from the initial studies on each of the sixty-six books through
all the subsequent editorial reviews. The finished condensation has received
his full approval." The Condensed Bible removed 40% of the Bible text,
including the warning of Revelation 22:18-19! In the introductions to the
books of the Reader's Digest Bible, Metzger questions the authorship,
traditional date, and supernatural inspiration of books penned by Moses,
Daniel, and Peter, and in many other ways reveals his liberal, unbelieving
heart. Consider some examples:
Genesis: "Nearly all modern scholars agree that, like the other books of the
Pentateuch, [Genesis] is a composite of several sources, embodying
traditions that go back in some cases to Moses."
Exodus: "As with Genesis, several strands of literary tradition, some very
ancient, some as late as the sixth century B.C., were combined in the makeup
of the books" (Introduction to Exodus).
Deuteronomy: "It's compilation is generally assigned to the seventh century
B.C., though it rests upon much older tradition, some of it from Moses' time."
Daniel: "Most scholars hold that the book was compiled during the
persecutions (168-165 B.C.) of the Jewish people by Antiochus Epiphanes."
John: "Whether the book was written directly by John, or indirectly (his
teachings may have been edited by another), the church has accepted it as an
authoritative supplement to the story of Jesus' ministry given by the other
evangelists."
1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus: "Judging by differences in style and vocabulary
from Paul's other letters, many modern scholars think that the Pastorals
were not written by Paul."
James: "Tradition ascribes the letter to James, the Lord's brother, writing
about A.D. 45, but modern opinion is uncertain, and differs widely on both
origin and date."
2 Peter: "Because the author refers to the letters of Paul as 'scripture,' a
term apparently not applied to them until long after Paul's death, most
modern scholars think that this letter was drawn up in Peter's name sometime
between A.D. 100 and 150."
Metzger's modernism was also made plain in the notes to THE NEW OXFORD
ANNOTATED BIBLE RSV (1973). Metzger co-edited this volume with Herbert May.
It first appeared in 1962 as the Oxford Annotated Bible and was the first
Protestant annotated edition of the Bible to be approved by a Roman
authority. It was given an imprimatur in 1966 by Cardinal Cushing,
Archbishop of Boston, Massachusetts. Metzger wrote many of the rationalistic
notes in this volume and put his editorial stamp of approval on the rest.
Consider some excerpts from the notes:
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT: "The Old Testament may be described as
the literary expression of the religious life of ancient Israel. ... The
Israelites were more history-conscious than any other people in the ancient
world. Probably as early as the time of David and Solomon, out of a matrix
of myth, legend, and history, there had appeared the earliest written form
of the story of the saving acts of God from Creation to the conquest of the
Promised Land, an account which later in modified form became a part of
Scripture. But it was to be a long time before the idea of Scripture arose
and the Old Testament took its present form. ... The process by which the
Jews became 'the people of the Book' was gradual, and the development is
shrouded in the mists of history and tradition. ... The date of the final
compilation of the Pentateuch or Law, which was the first corpus or larger
body of literature that came to be regarded by the Jews as authoritative
Scripture, is uncertain, although some have conservatively dated it at the
time of the Exile in the sixth century. ... Before the adoption of the
Pentateuch as the Law of Moses, there had been compiled and edited in the
spirit and diction of the Deuteronomic 'school' the group of books
consisting of Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings, in much their
present form. ... Thus the Pentateuch took shape over a long period of time."
NOTES ON GENESIS: "[Genesis] 2.4b-3.24 ... is a different tradition from
that in 1.1-2,4a, as evidenced by the flowing style and the different order
of events, e.g. man is created before vegetation, animals, and woman. ...
7:16b: The Lord shut him in, a note from the early tradition, which delights
in anthropomorphic touches. 7:18-20: The waters covered all the high
mountains, thus threatening a confluence of the upper and lower waters
(1.6). Archaeological evidence suggests that traditions of a prehistoric
flood covering the whole earth are heightened versions of local inundations,
e.g. in the Tigris-Euphrates basin."
NOTES ON JOB: "The ancient folktale of a patient Job (1.1-2.13; 42.7-17;
Jas. 5.11) circulated orally among oriental sages in the second millennium
B.C. and was probably written down in Hebrew at the time of David and
Solomon or a century later (about 1000-800 B.C.)."
NOTES ON PSALM 22: "22:12-13: ... the meaning of the third line [they have
pierced my hands and feet] is obscure." [Editor: No, it is not obscure; it
is a prophecy of Christ's crucifixion!]
NOTES ON ISAIAH: "Only chs. 1-39 can be assigned to Isaiah's time; it is
generally accepted that chs. 40-66 come from the time of Cyrus of Persia
(539 B.C.) and later, as shown by the differences in historical background,
literary style, and theological emphases. ... The contents of this section
[chs. 56-66] (sometimes called Third Isaiah) suggest a date between 530 and
510 B.C., perhaps contemporary with Haggai and Zechariah (520-518); chapters
60-62 may be later."
NOTES ON JONAH: "The book is didactic narrative which has taken older
material from the realm of popular legend and put it to a new, more
consequential use."
INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW TESTAMENT: "Jesus himself left no literary remains;
information regarding his words and works comes from his immediate followers
(the apostles) and their disciples. At first this information was circulated
orally. As far as we know today, the first attempt to produce a written
Gospel was made by John Mark, who according to tradition was a disciple of
the Apostle Peter. This Gospel, along with a collection of sayings of Jesus
and several other special sources, formed the basis of the Gospels
attributed to Matthew and Luke." [Editor: The Gospels, like every part of
the New Testament, were written by direct inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
This nonsense of trying to find 'the original source' for the Gospels is
unbelieving heresy.]
NOTES ON 2 PETER: "The tradition that this letter is the work of the apostle
Peter was questioned in early times, and internal indications are almost
decisive against it. ... Most scholars therefore regard the letter as the
work of one who was deeply indebted to Peter and who published it under his
master's name early in the second century." [Editor: Those who believe this
nonsense must think the early Christians were fools and the Holy Spirit was
on a vacation.]
NOTES FROM "HOW TO READ THE BIBLE WITH UNDERSTANDING": "The opening chapters
of the Old Testament deal with human origins. They are not to be read as
history ... These chapters are followed by the stories of the patriarchs,
which preserve ancient traditions now known to reflect the conditions of the
times of which they tell, though they cannot be treated as strictly
historical. ... it is not for history but for religion that they are
preserved ... When we come to the books of Samuel and Kings ... Not all in
these books is of the same historical value, and especially in the stories
of Elijah and Elisha there are legendary elements. ... We should always
remember the variety of literary forms found in the Bible, and should read a
passage in the light of its own particular literary character. Legend should
be read as legend, and poetry as poetry, and not with a dull prosaic and
literalistic mind."
This is the same type of rationalistic wickedness that appears in Metzger's
notes in the Reader's Digest Condensed Bible. This modernistic foolishness,
of course, is a lie. The Pentateuch was written by the hand of God and Moses
and completed during the 40 years of wilderness wandering hundreds of years
before Samuel and the kings. The Old Testament did not arise gradually from
a matrix of myth and history, but is inspired revelation delivered to holy
men of old by Almighty God. The Jews were a "people of the book" from the
beginning. The Jewish nation did not form the Bible; the Bible formed the
Jewish nation! In Metzger's "Introduction to the New Testament" in the New
Oxford Annotated Bible, he completely ignores the inspiration of the Holy
Spirit and claims that the Gospels are composed of material gathered from
oral tradition. The Bible says nothing about this, but Jesus Christ plainly
tells us that the Holy Spirit would guide the Apostles into all truth (John
16:7-15). The Gospels are the product of divine revelation, not some
happenstance editing of oral tradition.
Bruce Metzger is a Liberal. He piously claims on one hand that the Bible is
the inspired Word of God; but out of the other side of the mouth he claims
the Bible is filled with myth and lies. He denies the Bible's history, its
miracles, and its authorship, while, in true liberal style, declaring that
this denial does not do injustice to the Word of God, for the Bible is not
"written for history but for religion" and is not to be read "with a dull
prosaic and literalistic mind"!
Metzger has been called an Evangelical by some who should know better, but
upon the authority of the man's own writings, I declare that Bruce Metzger
is an unbeliever. He is a false teacher. He is apostate. He is a heretic.
Those are all Bible terms. Having studied many of the man's works, I am
convinced those are the terms which must be applied to him. One Baptist
writer partially defended Metzger to me with these words-"he did write a
superb pamphlet in 1953 refuting the Jehovah's Witnesses and defending the
full and absolute deity of Christ." Even the Pope of Rome defends the full
and absolute deity of Christ. A man can defend the deity of Christ and still
be a false teacher. A man who denies the written Word also denies the Living
Word. They stand or fall together. If the Bible contains error, Christ was a
liar. If Christ is perfect Truth, so is the Bible.
In The New Testament, Its Background, Growth, and Content, which appeared in
1965, Metzger claims that "the discipline of form criticism has enlarged our
understanding of the conditions which prevailed during the years when the
gospel materials circulated by word of mouth" (p. 86). Not so. Form
criticism is that unbelieving discipline which claims that the Gospels were
gradually fashioned out a matrix of tradition and myth. Form critics hold a
wide variety of views (reflecting the unsettled and relativistic nature of
the rationalism upon which they stand), but all of them deny that the
Gospels are the perfect, verbally-inspired, divinely-given,
absolutely-infallible Word of God. Metzger says, "What each evangelist has
preserved, therefore, is not a photographic reproduction of the words and
deeds of Jesus, but an interpretative portrait delineated in accord with the
special needs of the early church" (Ibid.). Metzger is wrong. The Gospel
writers have indeed given us, by divine revelation, a photographic
reproduction of the words and deeds of Jesus Christ. Praise God for it!
These, then, are the type of men who have led the charge for the critical
text. Join hands with them if you please, but I have determined to travel a
different path altogether.
If we wanted to take the time, we could travel on in this vein of thought to
fill many volumes. We could consider the apostasy, for example, of the Bible
societies and of the major Bible publishers today. I have written a book to
expose the wickedness and unregeneracy which abides in the United Bible
Societies. It is called Unholy Hands on God's Holy Word: A Report on the
United Bible Societies, and is available from Way of Life Literature. A look
at Thomas Nelson Publishers would fill another volume. We could mention
their Roman Catholic publishing division, for instance.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Taken from the Fundamental Baptist News Service:
http://www2.bitstream.net/~thebible/FBNS1.html
David Cloud's e-mail address: dcl...@whidbey.net