New Jane Anderson Website

[OBW]

Originally Posted by Evangelical

The doctrine of preservation in regard to Scripture means that the Lord has kept His Word intact as to its original meaning. Preservation simply means that we can trust the Scriptures because God has sovereignly overseen the process of transmission over the centuries.

While I might agree that there is something unsettling in the way that Jane has approached the problems with Bible translation, the "doctrine of preservation" that you quote goes too far when it declares that the "original meaning" is preserved. While I would agree that the original meaning is always there, it is not because it is preserved that we are able to find it. It is because good Spirit-filled people join to work at studying and understanding what is written to ferret out what is really there rather than what we want to be there.

And what we want to be there is a problem on all sides of any argument, whether it is about how to meet or what to do about women. What scripture means is not simply written down. It requires study. It is not simply there. But saying that does not mean that it is found when applying external overlays and biases of understanding.

The scripture is profitable for instruction in righteousness. And who should teach is not a matter of righteousness.