Apologist J.P. Holding of Tekton Apologetics Ministry has awarded one his coveted Screwball of the Month Awards to a site I write for, GotQuestions.org. The disputed page reads thus:

The amillennial view comes from interpreting unfulfilled prophecy differently than how non-prophetic Scripture and fulfilled prophecy are interpreted. Non-prophetic Scripture and fulfilled prophecy are interpreted literally or normally. But according to the amillennialist, unfulfilled prophecy is to be interpreted allegorically, or non-literally. This is called using a dual hermeneutic. Hermeneutics is the study of the principles of interpretation. The amillennialist assumes that all unfulfilled prophecy is written in symbolic or figurative language. Therefore, the amillennialist will assign different meanings to those parts of Scripture than the normal, contextual meanings of those words.

     The problem with interpreting unfulfilled prophecy allegorically is that this allows for a wide range of meanings. Unless you interpret Scripture in the normal sense of how written language is interpreted, there won’t be One meaning. Yet God, the ultimate author of all of Scripture, did have One specific meaning when he gave Scripture to be written to the human authors. Though there may be many applications to life from a passage of Scripture, there is only one meaning, and that meaning is what God intended it to mean. Also, the fact that fulfilled prophecy was fulfilled literally is the best reason of all for assuming that unfulfilled prophecy will also be literally fulfilled. The prophecies concerning Christ’s first coming were fulfilled literally. Therefore, prophecies concerning Christ’s second coming should also be expected to be fulfilled literally. For these reasons, an allegorical interpretation of unfulfilled prophecy should be rejected and a literal or normal interpretation of unfulfilled prophecy should be adopted. [source]

Well, I can’t say that I agree with the passage’s argument. I believe that prophetic visions, such as Revelation, are allegorical symbols with keys in other Scriptures. The writers are arguing for the Tim LaHaye school of thought, which, ironically, does utilize the double hermeneutic. For example, we ascribe a meaning of one year to a day in the vision of Daniel’s seventy weeks. However, when discussing the Antichrist’s rule in Revelation, the same idea of forty-two months is described as forty-two literal months.

Why the double hermeneutic? Revelation is clearly using the same symbolic language of Daniel. Isn’t it infinitely more likely that we’re talking about a reign of forty-two prophetic months, or 1,260 years? This is also applied to the creatures of Revelation: the Beast is a man, but the demon-locusts are literal demon locusts. Again, why the double hermeneutic? Either we’re talking about a great hulking beast and demon-locusts, or we’re talking about a man and an earthly army described by the symbols on the locusts.

But, I digress. I had always hoped to steer clear of the dubious Screwball Award, however indirectly I may have earned one. In this case, a flub in someone else’s eschatology posted on a ministry I associate with.

Obviously, we both can’t be right. I can only humble myself before God and pray that He shows which one of us is in error, swiftly, so that we (as teachers and defenders of His word) do not lead others astray.

But, I am proud to say, that Jerry from I Talk to God won a website award, and that I nominated him for it!  So this month, I actually contributed to both sides of the Screwball Awards.  Isn’t that a happy day?

This is great stuff! It brings me great joy to see God working in this world, and to know that He still uses us sinful creatures for His purposes.

A while back, I blogged on the Blasphemy Challenge, which is a disservice being done to the community by the oxymoronic Rational Response Squad. The challenge is to declare, on a YouTube video, that you deny the existence of the Holy Spirit. I’ve covered this in the past, but it bears repeating: the Unforgivable Sin is a sin of action, not of words. In committing this sin, you are continuously denying God by your lifestyle, thoughts, choices, actions, and condition of heart; not by making a one-time verbal declaration. Obviously, this isn’t what the folks who have taken the so-called challenge are actually doing–they are making the declaration, but we don’t know what they really believe or how they live their lives.

Well, now a series of websites has risen up to answer the Blasphemy Challenge. I love what they are doing in the name of Jesus, and so I provide their sites here.

• Challenge the Blasphemy: praying for all the folks who have accepted the Blasphemy Challenge.
• Challenge Blasphemy: collecting testimonies of former atheists. I can’t endorse the prophecy links on this site.
• The Christian Challenge: have you read the Bible?

Bruce Metzger, professor emeritus of Princeton Theological Seminary, board member of the American Bible Society, and a prolific scholar of Greek, Old Testament, and New Testament studies, died February 13 of natural causes.

Metzger’s contribution to manuscript studies cannot be underestimated. He will be sorely missed by everyone who followed New Testament textual criticism–including me.

Metzger’s work includes The Text Of The New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, And Restoration, New Testament: Its Background, Growth and Content, his autobiography Reminiscences of an Octogenarian, The Canon of the New Testament: Its Origin, Development, and Significance, Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, The Oxford Companion to the Bible, and Lexical Aids for Students of New Testament Greek.

Metzger was also the chair for the translation of the New Revised Standard Edition of the Bible.

The only dark mark against him is that he held the idea that a book could be inspired but not canonical, which earned him criticism from peers who believed that this played havoc with the concept of biblical inerrancy. But this should hardly even cast a shadow over a career that lasted over 40 years, culminating in him becoming one of the most respected New Testament scholars of our time.

As one blog commenter put it, Metzger showed us what it means to “love God with all of your mind.” Now he has gone to his reward, and may his example live on so that we can better love God with our minds.