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The Last Temptation ofChristians
A Defense of the Faith
by Kenneth
L
Gentry, Jr.
[Editor's note- In the following
material the re.ader will find the first
letters in an exchange between
Counsel
o
Chalcedon
contributing editor, Dr.
Kenneth
L.
Gentry, Jr., and a man who
refers to himself as a "Rev." and who
has a Th.D. degree. This man, who we
shall refer to under the psel).donym "Mr,
Gray," wrote a letter to the editor of a
newspaper, in which
he
castigated those
who would prevent the showing
of
the
film,
The
Last
Temptation
o hrist
Ken Gentry responded with his own
letter to the editor, and, after that, Dr.
Gentry and Mr. Gray" continued corre
sponding with each other personally
through the mail.
I believe many of our readers will
benefit from
this
exchange. "Mr. Gray"
is not an untypical person in our socie
ty. While most
of
his views are as
l i b ~ r l
as
you can get from one claim
ing to be a Christian, nevertheless he is
fairly typical of ministers and laymen
in most of the large mainline denomina
tions, be they Presbyterian, Methodist,
Episcopal or whatever.
It
is
interesting to note, as one reads
through these letters, that as "Mr.
Gray" responds to Ken's remarks, he in
variably reveals additional false views
in each letter, so that, as time goes by,
R.en has more and more faulty doctrine
with which he must deal, in seeking to
straighten out "Mr. Gray's" views in
relation
to
the teaching of the Bible.
In these letters the reader will find
discussions of the nature
of
sin, the
nature
of
true knowledge and the
authority
of
Jesus Christ, as well as
much on textual criticism and the de-
Ken Gentry
is
~ a s t o r
of fhe
Reedy River
Prestiyterian
Church (PCA)
in
Greenville, SC
and author of a
number of fine
books.
pendability
of
Scripture.
Some
readers
may find some
of
this discussion too
technical or too academic for their lik
ing or enjoyment. That is to be expect
ed in a magazine which goes to such a
wide range of people as does
The Coun-
sel o Chalcedon
But many readers will
appreciate the care and precision, not
to
mention
the
charitable attitude, with
which Ken Gentry deals with these
many issues, as he seeks, genuinely,
to
press the claims
of
Christ on Mr.
Gray." Ken acquits himself brilliantly,
to say
the
least
This exchange may lead many
of
our
readers to the conclusion I have drawn
for myself, that we need to be better
informed regarding the views of those
who oppose sound biblical doctrine
if
we
are to be able to lead them to true
faith in the living Christ. Ken's treat
ment
of
these subjects has convinced
me of something I have formerly ques
tioned, namely the necessity
of
study
ing,
at
least to some degree, non-Chris
tian philosophers, the liberal German
theologians, and the whole area
of
tex
tual criticism, linguistic analysis, etc.
This exchange
of
letters
is
quite
lengthy. We will include as much as we
can here and continue in one
or
more
future issues as necessary. Here we
begin with the letter from "Mr. Gray"
to the newspaper.]
Editor:
As the fundamentalist Christian com
munity has certainly had its very full
sa
y in recent weeks concerning the film
"The Last Temptation
of
Christ," per
hap
s
it
is time for the First Amendment
folks to be able to say something.
I must begin by saying that I have
not
seen the film
and
apparently shall
be
p r e v e n t ~ d from doing so, at least in
[my area], by my fundamentalist breth
ren). But,
of
course, they haven't seen it
either I did, however, read Kazantzakis'
fine novel when it
came
out, and have
read a great many summaries of the
film.
In view of the very one-sided picture
of
this issue that is being presented tp
the public, I think it important that
some things be said.
To
begin with, the Gospels were
"heard" in Aramaic, a very ancient lan
guage that has utterly disappeared, and
were then (how many years after the
"hearings?"--
one really doesn't know)
written down in Hebrew and Hebraic
dialects; then translated to "koine" or
common everyday Greek (not the more
precise literary Greek), then translated
again to man-in-the-street Latin (not the
more denotative literary Latin), and,
finally, went through any number
of
"Englishings" over the last 5 years.
It
is extraordinarily unlikely -- and
this will be confirmed by linguistic
scholars andby professional translators -
- that
we
have a fully reliable record
of
what
Jesus said, and
what it
was said
that
he
did. We probably have anywhere
from 2nd-to-10th-hand reports, and, of
themselves, summaries or synopses.
Christians who are intellectually honest
know that we have a somewhat hazy
and many times redacted idea of Jesus's
life and times.
But
the
more
central issue is that
Jesus was, indeed, a natural man in co
essense with his divinity, his pre
existence with the
Father
and the Holy
Spirit, and his divinely ordained and
faith-confirmed place as Redeemer and
Messiah. Christian theology has always
taught that for our savior
to
perform a
redemptive act for humankind,
he
would
by definition have to be human.
Similarly,
it ought
rather urgently to
be said that fantasies and hallucinations
are no more than temptations if that
much), and moral theologians since St.
Augustine have taught consistently that
"ten thousand temptations
do
not make
a
sin." That Jesus hallucinatedsexual in
tercourse with Mary Magdalene should
not present any sort
of
problem
to
any
one
who has a normal, balanced view
of
the
body and its functions, not to men
tion the workings
of
the subconscious
mind.
A consistent teaching in moral theo
logy has been that three elements must
The Counsel of Chalcedon, January, 1989
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be clearly present for the commission
of sin: The matter must be serious; the.
sinner
must be
fully aware
of
its
seriousness; and the sinner must give
full
consent of
his will
in
commission
of the action. Fantasies and hallucina
tions rise from the wellsprings of the
subconscious mind. "Full consent
of
the will is in no way present
The
furor
over this
fl lm
is, to me,
embarrassing, ill-informed, and largely
tasteless. I cannot iinagine what
our
Jewish and agnostic friends must make
of
this
Stubborn refusal to savor the
humanity
of
the
"Word Become Flesh."
Fat
the record; I
am
a believing,
church-going Christian whO has a vi
brant faith that my Redeemer liveth,
and that faith is reinforced constantly by
the knowledge that "The Ineffable
Word" condescended
to
take
on
human
flesh in order to redeem our foolishness.
I shall
no
doubt be prevented from
viewing what is by reports
of
serious
film critics a fascinating and worth
while film since area theater managers
seem
to be completely cowed by the
clout of
the local fundamentalist clergy.
Perhaps all of
us
ought
to
remind our
more conservative brothers and sisters
that we live in
a pluralistic society,
in
which strict separation of church. and
state was so wisely ordained from
our
society's inception.
Mr. Gray
(a pseudonym)
Editor:
I write .
n
response to the letter
by
Mr.
Gray regarding the fllm "The Last
Temptation of Christ." I feel
it
im
perative to correct a few errors both of
approach and analysis in Mr. Gray's
missive.
Due
to pressures
of
space I
will respond only briefly to the issues
in
the
order he
raised them.
1. His
fust
paragraph implied that
only the "fundamentalist" comniunity
is upset with the film. I
am not
a funda
mentalist; I
am of
staunchly Calvinistic
and reformed persuasion. AndI
am
deep
ly disturbed by the film in question.
2.
In
the flrst and last paragraphs he
implies that "fundamentalist"
com
plaints are contrary to First Amendment
protections. Would he deny orthodox
Cluistians the right to express their
dismay and objection?
Do we
not have
a right to boycott? What happens to his
First Amendment concern when ortho
dox Christians are concerned?
But
more importantly, is Mr. Gray
ignorant of the fact that when
the
Con
stitution
and
Bill
of
Rights were adop
ted that every colony
had
civil and
criminal laws against public blasphemy
and continued so for many years? The
Constitution ends with the statement:
Done in the year of our Lord. . . . ,"
no t . "done in . the year of a lustful,
fallible mystic. All early colonial
charters made devout reference to Christ
and God, The ftrst and prototypical
civil
code in America was the 1644 Massa
chusetts Bay Civil Code, which imple
mented Scriptural law-including laws
against public blasphemy. Was this
cultural and legal backdrop contradicted
by the Constitution? Did
the
Constitu
tion
come
out of the void,
or
out
of
the
Christian-influenced culture
of
the era?
It is an anti-historical reinterpretation of
the Constitution to appeal to
it
in de
fense of
public blasphemy of the holy
name
of Christ
3.
In
paragraph 4
he
enters into a
pointless and erroneous discussion
in
the area of Biblical Introduction, re
garding the autographs of Scripture and
their transmission history. Though
Jesus spoke Aramaic, to assert that "the
Gospels" (apparently all four) were
originally produced in Aramaic
is
wholly without any scientific evidence.
All the evidence points to their original
composition in the common dialect
of
the eastern Roman Empire; Koine
Greek.
Two
Gospels were written
by
disciples
of
Cluist who lived with him
for 3 years aiid the two others by their
associates. Despite his complaint,
Kaine Greek is
an
extremely precise
language, although differing from Clas
sical Greek (so what?).
Gray's worst error
of
fact is his
implication that the translation history-
from "Aramaic" to Greek
to
Latin to
English--has so separated us from the
original that the intended meaning is
hopelessly lost.
oes he
think that
modern textual and translational scho
lars work from translations of transla-
age16----------------------------------
tions? Absurd All competent English
translations
of
Scripture go back to the
original Greek--the matter
of
Latin,
etc., is an irrelevant smokescreen.
It should be noted that the text of the
New Testament is history's best attested
ancient document, having over 5000 an
cient Greek manuscripts available for
comparison and collation. Some of
them that we have in hand date as far
back as A.D. 5 (Mark) and A.D. 117
(John). Competent textual critics have
declared the text of the New Testament
to have a textual certainty
of
98.33%.
Contrary to Gray we have an extremely
reliable witness to the original teach.:
ings of bur Savior.
But
behind such facts lies the inter
pretive philosophy
of
fact. The Chris
tian apologetic is demonstrative of the
divine inspiration
of
Scripture, which
attributes to its teaching inerrant author
ity II Tim. 3:16-17; Jn. 17:17). The
God
of Scripture, Whom Gray claims
to
believe, is a sovereign Lord capable
of bringing His Word into history with
out error and for the good of man.
Thus, on
the basis
of
these two is
sues--one scientific, the other philoso-
phical--it is not at
all
''extraordinarily
unlikely. . . . that we have a fully re
liable record of what Jesus said."
To
use
Mr
. Gray's own words against him. his
discussion of the matter is "embarras
sing'' and "ill-informed." I believe the
New Testament dates further back and is
in
a better position to give us an ac
count
of
the character of Jesus 'than
either Kazantzakis's atrocious novel
or
the perverted ftlm . based on it. How
many ancient manuscripts
of
these can
Gray find? And did
Ka Zantzakis
write in
"literary Greek" ?
4. Now to the matter of blasphemy
in the film. Although Cluis t was fully
man, He was also fully God--and "with
out sin" though "tested in all points"
(Heb. 4:15; I Pet. 1:19). Christianity
has
not
only taught that Christ "would
by definition have to be human" (per
Gray)
but
also would have to be divine
and sinlessly perfect (Heb. 7:26-28).
Contrary to Gray, had Jesus "halluci
nated sexual intercourse"
He
would not
be
a "normal, balanced" man, but a sin
ner. (And since when does Christianity
The Counsel of Chalcedon, January, 1989
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8/12/2019 1989 Issue 1 - The Last Temptation of Christians - Counsel of Chalcedon
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consider sin "balanced"?) Jesus Himself
taught that lust was sin (Matt. 5:28).
Gray substitutes a moralistic for a
biblical conception of sin when he
claims: (1)
It
must be "serious" (contra.
James 2:10), (2) the sinner "must be
fully aware of it" (contra. Lev. 4:27-
28),
and
(3) the sinner
must
give full
consent
of
his will in commission"
(contra. Rom. 7:15-21). Actually sin
involves the deontological, teleological,
and dispositional elements
of
ethics.
That is, sin is
defmed by
breach
of
God's objective Law (I Jn. 3:4), is
contrary to the glory of God (I
Cor
.
10:31), and is unmotivated by faith in
God (Rom. 14:23).
5. Gray says: "I cannot imagine what
our
Jewish and agnostic friends must
make
of
this stubborn refusal to savor
the humanity of " Christ So what?
What would the
world
think
of
a spine
less Christianity that refused
to
stand
up
for the glory
of
Him in Whom they
trust for eternal life? Further, Gray says
he is a "believing. . . Christian" who
knows "my Redeemer liveth." Given
his view
of
the hopeless errancy
of
Scripture, what does he "believe"? And
how does he ''know"? And just as im
portantly: Why? He needs to build
his
life on the self-attesting Christ and His
Word
as
a Rock (Matt. 7:24ff).
Kenneth
L
Gentry, Jr.
[Editor's note- At this point Mr.
Gray" began corresponding direcdy with
Dr.
Gentry.]
Dear Pastor Gentry,
I should like, if I may, to take
up
a
couple of points in regard to your re
sponses
to
my letter in the [newspaper].
You are of course correct in saying
that I ought not
to
have singled out the
"fundamentalist Christian community,"
and I ought not
to
have implied (if in
deed I did) that
they
were the only ob
jectors to the film "The Last Tempta
tion
of
Christ" I
ought
to have re
marked that the fundamentalist commun
ity has seemed to make the most noise
over the matter.
Taking up the
third
paragraph
of
your
letter, I'm afraid we are ho th "wholly
without evidence." As the Gospels were
The Counsel
of
Chalcedon, January, 1989
spoken/heard in Aramaic, it seems
to
me
a
;ario.d.
likely
that
their first
inscriptions were also in that language.
Of course, I have no
proof
one way or
the other; nor o you
You write that "two Gospels were
written
by
disciples
of
Christ who lived
with
him for two years"; there
is
really
no good evidence for this. None of us
have reliable ideas as
to
who the final
inscribers ("redactors,"
to
use the clum-
sy Germanic word) may have
been.
It is
practically proverbial that scripture
scholars have been at considerable odds
in
this matter. Raymond Brown's recent
translation of
th
J ohannine Gospel
(Anchor Bible, Doubleday,
N.Y.--
and
his extensive notes) has caused a furor
in
scripture studies for this very reason,
raising as it did a great
many
questions
as to w o ~ wrote John.
Internal literary evidence can suggest
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quite a number
of
things to us, but
"suggestion"
and proof'
are very
dif-
ferentanimals .indeed
Finally, I wish .you
had
read more
carefully
my
discussion
of
the condi-
tions
that
need to
be
present for the
commission
of
sin, among them,
fWl
consent
Qf
M l.
Hallucinations
arise
from
the
subconscious mind; consent
of
the
will
is
in no way
present.
"Lust" is
the cooscioos and deliberate entertaining
of
sexual day-dreams. Hallucinations
are
neither
willful
nor conscious. I
do
not
of course have
the faintest
idea
whether
Our Saviour may
or
may
not
have
a l l u ~
cinated intercourse with Mary Magda
lene
-- that's Mr. Scorcese's notion -
-
but in any case
hallucinations are
not
conscious acts
and
cannot possibly be
considered sinful.lfyou
hallucinate
that
you
have
stolen
$10,000
or
killed
your
wife, you have not
D.e or
e v e n ~
lQ Q
these things. Sins are
deliberate
~
Should you care to discuss this
fur-
ther, I am
at
your ~ r v i c e
Believe me, your brother in Christ.
Faithfully,
Rev. Gray, Th.D.
(I
write
in
friendship
and
asking
God's blessing
on
your
w o r l c ~
and
asking
for your
prayer
for me
and for
my
family.)
Dear Rev. Gray:
It
was
good
to receive your recent
letter. I very much appreciate the gra
ciousness of your response. I trust you
will receive
my
letter as sen t in a spirit
of
Christian concern. As you might
imagine,
we very much
disagree over
both the facts and the philosophy
of
the
facts.
Regarding the evidence for the origi
nal autographa
of
the canonical
New
Testament writings:
Of
course, no
one
claims that we
have
the original auto
graphs in hand. And
i f
"evidence" re
quires access to the very originals; then
there is
no proof
(as far as we know).
Nevertheless,please consider the follow
ing:
1) My
observation as to
the
of their original compositional
language is
based on the fact that
there
has
been
found any copies
of
any
of the Gospels in Aramaic. Never; f
the
Gospels were originally writ:tert
in
Aramaic, and originally circulated
among Jewish Christians, why are there
no
surviving manuscripts?
2)
There
is
abundant manuscript evidence for their
Greek
originals.
(3) By
the very nature
of
the era. surely even you would
agree
that
Jesus and His disciples were at
least bilingual (Greek and Aramaic).
What
is
the
great difficulty
in
believing
that,
in
light of points 1
and
2, Jesus's
words were either spoken in Greek (on
occasion)
or
recorded
in
Greek?
Your subscription
to the
Tubingen
created redaction critical theory lies at
the heart of your difficulty
in
this area,
I believe. The various form, source,
redCJCtion,
etc., critical schools are so
varied, contradictory, and hypothetical
as to be
J)reposterous. You cite
the
Anchor Bible series as evidence
of
your
concern in this area. There are few Bible
conunentaries more liberal and anti
supernaturalistic, as well as extrava
gant. For instance,
my
doctoral disserta
tion dealt with the question of
the
date
of
the
writing of
Revelation. The most
extreme theory of composition history
for Revelation that I encountered in
the
modem
literature was J. Massyngberde
Ford's
Revelation
in
the Anchor Bible.
She avers that much
of
Revelation was
the
work of John the Baptist and his
disciples Even
as
liberal a scholar as
John
A.T. Robinson was surprised at
her
bold theory.
In
addition, the ques
tion as to who really wrote John is not
necessarily a redactional question--the
Gospel
of
John never expressly states
that the Apostle John wrote it. This is
an
interpretive matter,
not
a redactional
history matter.
Of
course,
I
believe the
evidence strongly suggests John the
Apostle wrote the Gospel, and that the
Apostle Matthew wrote "Matthew."
I am
very sorry that you felt
I
did
not
carefully read your comments on sin.
I
understand why
you
think
that;
it is a
reasonable conclusion based
on
the
letter
printed
in
the paper. Unfortunate
ly,
the redactional history
of my
own
letter (ha ) is the problem: the [news
paper} editor
cut my
letter almost
in
a g e l S ~ ~
half.
It
so happens .that one area
that
suffered was the matter
of
the nature of
sin.
I
believe
I
read and carefully con
sidered your statements. (Please see
enclosed copy
of my
tetter.)
You
will note that strive to derive
my
understanding
of
sin from Scripture
itself,
not
from any
modern
psychology
of n1an
view.
I think you
will find
carefully expressed
in my
letter why
I
believe your view of sin
is
faulty. The
necessity
of
deliberation, seriousness,
etc., have nothing to do
with the fact of
sirt. Please
not my
Scrfpture refer
ences; I very tnuch disagree with your
statements that "sins
are deliberate
acts"
and that they involve "full consent
of
the will." Your view confuses the onto
logical question (what is) with the
epistemological question whl,lt is
known).
It
substitutes a tnoralistic view
of sin with a bibtico-theological view.
Regarding the matter of hallucina
tions
it
should be noted that biblically
and theologically Jesus
had
no "sin
na-
ture" to feed his apparently uncontrolled
(in
your view) sub-conscious. As noted
also in
my
original letter,
I
would
rather suspect that the ancient Gospel
writers were nearer to Christ than Scor
cese, and therefore
in
a better position
to comment.
As
I
close,
I
want to ask with deep
conviction and concern: How
do
you
.knm. l your "Redeemer liveth"?
Do
you
not
fear
Albert
Schweitzer,
et
al.
may
have
been
right
in
suggesting that Jesus
never
existed at all?
f
the Biblical
record
is
so edited and faulty, how do
you
know your Redeemer lives? Are
you involved in a mere Kierkegaardian
leap-of-faith? Further, what is the na
ture
of
your Redeemer: is he the
Redeemer revealed in
Holy
Scripture
ot
a "Redeemer" created in the image of
the modem liberal theologian? Humbly
I suggest to
you
that based on your
own philosophy
of
life you
cannot
know
your Redeemer liveth.
Thanks for your letter. I
trust
that
mine
will
be received
in
the spirit
in
which
it
is sent: with genuine concern
and humility.
Sincerely,
Kenneth L.
Gentry,
Jr.
The Counsel of Chalcedon, January, 1989