"If private revelations agree with scripture, they are needless"

Pentecostals involved in theological discussion with other denoms will have or inevitably will encounter this cessationist quip, often attributed to John Owen and his critique of the Quakers, but actually from J.I. Packer's summary of John Owen's argument:

"... if their 'private revelations' agree with scripture, they are needless, and if they disagree, they are false." [1]

This quote and its simple(istic) argument is a go to, slam dunk reply by cessationists. I can almost smell their sense of victory whenever they use it. But being totally honest, it baffles me to no end how anyone can unironically accept such a non-sequitur.

And to be clear, the second half is obviously correct. The first half is the non-sequitur. Now, I haven't studied the Quakers and their claims of private revelation, so don't take me as critiquing John Owen's supposed argument necessarily, but its use today against Pentecostals and Charismatics.

With that understood here is my entire refutation:

"If private revelations agree with scripture, they are needless."

Why?

...

...

...

Okay I lied, my arguments are almost never shorter than a college essay. But that is the essence of my argument; why? On what basis? How does this follow?

I can only see this somewhat working if we happy clappies actually believed in revelation that revealed new doctrine; if scripture is needed to confirm this new doctrine, then it's not a new doctrine, but old doctrine with a new gift wrap. But we don't believe this, bar any fringe movements, which are irrelevant in critiques of a mainstream movement. This may well be a source of confusion by cessationists.

To us, prophecy clarifies direction and edifies the faithful. God comes to ordinary people and says "Do this" or "Fear not", among other things. No new doctrine is being presented, but new direction, or redirection, serves to correct the faithful's path.

So knowing this, then, how does the above argument follow at all? It doesn't, and it fails spectacularly. Private revelation is not needless if it agree with scripture because doctrinal needs are not the only needs.

But I love taking my opponent's assumptions for granted and turning it into their own defeater, so let's just cede their entire argument. Okay, if private revelations that agree with scripture are thus useless, then:

If 'divine revelations' from Yahweh agree with the Torah, they are needless.

Are Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, and all the other prophets consistent with the Torah? Of course they are! So I guess they're not needed then; out of the Canon they go! 

When is the Cessationist Refined Version coming into print? I wouldn't mind a thinner, easy to carry Bible.

~~~

[1] - J.I. Packer, A Quest for Godliness: The Puritan Vision of the Christian Life, 1994. P.g. 86.

Biblical languages ought to be learned, not dissected

As with most Bible students who pursued the Biblical languages, I learned Koine Greek and Classical Hebrew at my Bible college (aka seminary) through reading a fat textbook and brute memorizing paradigms. This is the normal method of learning the Biblical languages; they are codes to be cracked with algorithms and keys, rather than languages to be internalized and understood.

When I discussed this with one of my Classical Hebrew lecturers, he replied that the point of learning Biblical languages is to understand the complexities of grammar and syntax issues in order to best interpret the scriptures, not to speak them like a living language. I replied that one best understands the nuances of meaning in a language when they internalize, when they know it.

Consider this; you are a United Nations official searching for a Russian to English translator. Vladimir Putin is about to give a world changing speech, so proper and accurate translation is absolutely critical. You have two candidates for translator; a man who has studied advanced Russian grammar but cannot speak it or understand it by ear, or a man who has done decent Russian grammar study (though not as advanced as the former guy), but can speak and write fluent Russian and immediately understand any text and speech (including Russian idioms and cultural ideas).

Who do you hire? Who is in a better position to understand Putin?

I believe there are colossal implications for how the Biblical languages are taught. Imagine having entire Bible studies and sermons straight from the Greek/Hebrew/Aramaic text with minimal to know references to the English because everyone present knows the language(s). Imagine reading the source material, Biblical and extra-Biblical, as it was written and with its intended meaning.

Now imagine reading John 1:1; Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος, καὶ ὁ λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν θεόν, καὶ θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος.
After 'reading' it, the normal Bible student will head back to the beginning and say "Hmm okay, Ἐν means in, and ἀρχῇ means beginning. There is no definite article, but so it makes sense in English, I'll put in 'the', so, 'In the beginning'" and so on and so forth, taking maybe an hour+ to translate a chapter he could have read and understood in English in barely 3 minutes.
But then the student who knows Koine Greek will read this same passage and say "Okay, nice".

I think my point is clear enough; we should be learning Biblical languages as real languages. It is both more efficient and more immersive. And there is good news; material for this is already available, mainly for Koine Greek. I direct any and all interested persons to these sites; explore them yourself, and perhaps even start learning:

Biblical Language Center (https://www.biblicallanguagecenter.com/): Online courses and physical books are available right now here, and they teach Biblical Greek and Hebrew as living languages. They also host occasional webcam lessons where students learn to communicate with each other in the languages. I can vouch for their Living Koine Greek part 1 beta online course, which has improved my Greek reading ability by orders of magnitude. And a new, superior online Koine curriculum is in the works right now, so look out for that.

KoineGreek.com (https://www.koinegreek.com/): A website that works with the Biblical Language Center, but provides many other materials for internalising Koine Greek, such as many Greek scriptures read out in the language in audio recordings.