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Commentary on "The Authority of the Prophets"
Day 5: Wednesday, February 18, 2009
The lesson for today moves to the next way of transmitting God’s word, through the preaching of it. Initially the gospel circulated in oral form; only later it was embodied in written form. The Adventist church benefited greatly when they accepted the authority of the spoken word by deciding to reform their organization when Ellen White urged them to make drastic changes in the running of the church.
Problems
“The Word of God, whether spoken or written, has a double function.”
This statement is establishing the fact that there is one single Word of God behind both the oral messages of the prophets and their writings. Ellen White is brought as an example of the oral communication of God’s Word. These statements do not present a problem for the Wednesday’s section of the lesson, but when the next day’s statement (Thursday) about Ellen White’s writings as not carrying “the kind of authority found in the Bible” is taken seriously, it creates an internal contradiction in the current lesson.
On one hand, the author of the present study, Gerhard Pfandle, presents Ellen White’s authority as being of a different kind than the authority of the Bible; but on the other hand he presents her authority in the lesson for today as being the authority of the spoken Word. The immediate question is: how can the authority of the spoken Word can be less than the authority of the written Word? How one kind of transmission (oral) carries less authority than another kind of transmission (written)? Is it not the same Word of God, whether spoken of written”?
According to Pfandle, there is no difference between the function of the written word and the spoken word. What is true about one is true about the other. If the spoken word is a two-edged sword, so it is the written word. There is no difference between them, beside the form that they take, the essence remains the same, also the effects
“The Word of God, whether spoken or written, has a double function. It is like a two-edged sword, says Paul, “piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart” (Heb. 4:12, NKJV). In the context of what Paul is saying, the word refers to the messages that were preached both to ancient Israel and to Christians (Heb. 4:2).”
Summary
- In the light of these established premises, how can there be a different kind of authority between the assumed spoken Word gave by God through Ellen White and the written Word of God found in the Bible? This dilemma is at the root of the present crisis and division in the Adventist church, and the current lesson does little to offer a pertinent solution to it.
Copyright 2009 BibleStudiesForAdventists.com. All rights reserved. Revised February 14, 2009. This website is published by Life Assurance Ministries, Glendale, Arizona, USA, the publisher of Proclamation! Magazine. Contact email: BibleStudiesForAdventists@gmail.com.
The Sabbath School Bible Study Guide and the corresponding E.G. White Notes are published by Pacific Press Publishing Association, which is owned and operated by the Seventh-day Adventist church. The current quarter's editions are pictured above.
Official Adventist Resources
Standard Edition Study Guide Week 8
Teacher's Edition Study Guide Week 8
Easy Reading Edition Study Guide Week 8
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