Artifacts of a Life Once Lived

DTS (and most NT Scholarship) certainly does take for granted that the TR is an "inferior text." It's blatantly obvious in Sproul's Knowing Scripture . Nonetheless, DTS cannot be criticized for not having alternative positions. Zane Hodges tried for many years at DTS to espouse his Majority Text position, which is very different in philosophy from the Critical Text position (UBS4 / NA27), as well as the TR position. The Majority Text (MT) position will practice textual criticism, but only within the MT or Byzantine Textual Tradition. The MT text position "counts" rather than "weighs" the manuscripts. The majority wins. Nonetheless, the Critical Text people take issue. Two prominent arguments are geneological and geographical solidarity. The Critical text argues that the MT only has limited geographical solidarity (Turkey) whereas the Critical Text enjoys much more geographical solidarity (Egypt, Turkey, Italy, Jerusalem, etc.) The critical text als...

The other day I was having a brief conversation with a young man who is typical of the eccentric "fundy" zealot. I try very hard to be friendly and encouraging with this guy so as to help him move along in his christian maturity. Sometimes this is very, very difficult. Our conversation stayed primarily at the level of cordial exchanges as is common to small talk. He proceeded to ask of my "studying". As a former zealot of the sort I knew exactly his intent. He wanted two things: first, to make sure that I was "in the word", and two, to share what he was studying and what "new" things he was "taught" in his bible reading. So I obliged as is tactful of christian brotherhood and told him of my studying in Matthew. At which point he stopped me and shared what God had "laid" on his heart. Somehow I get the feeling he just wanted to talk, but that is neither here nor there. God had burdened him with the people of Rochester. This is ...