How we got the Bible part 1
Teachers
Lesson Summary
Dan Owen's class examined the foundational question: What is the Bible, and what does it claim about itself? Owen began by describing how the ancient Jews organized Scripture as individual scrolls stored in synagogue cabinets, referencing Luke 4:16 where Jesus retrieved the Isaiah scroll from such a cabinet. He established that the scrolls—plural—were recognized as authoritative Scripture even in Daniel's time (Daniel 9:2). The teacher then contrasted competing views of Scripture's nature: some scholars treat the Bible as merely human literature shaped by oral tradition and editorial compilation (form and redaction criticism), while others see it as containing or witnessing to God's Word. Owen presented the traditional Church of Christ position: the Bible is God's Word in its entirety. He critiqued the scholarly approach outlined in 'God's Holy Fire,' which suggests the Gospels were not eyewitness accounts but rather stories shaped by the church's needs over time. Owen countered this directly with John 21:24, where the disciple whom Jesus loved claims direct witness and authorship. The class demonstrated that biblical texts themselves assert their divine origin and reliability, challenging contemporary skepticism about Scripture's authenticity and authority.
Key Scriptures
Daniel understood by the books in some translations, by the scriptures in other translations. But if you really get into the text, it's by the scrolls, plural.
Jesus went, as was his custom, into the synagogue at Nazareth. And the synagogue attended, handed him the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. He went to that cabinet and he got in the right cubby hole and pulled out that scroll of the prophet Isaiah and handed it to Jesus.