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podcast 137 – Daniel Whitby’s “Mystery and Revelation Inconsistent”

confused student - CC license, brigtened, croppedShould we defend what we think are biblical, yet unintelligible or seemingly incoherent claims as “mysteries“?

Anglican theologian Dr. Daniel Whitby (1638-1726) doesn’t think so.

Why? Because he’s a Protestant Christian, and he doesn’t find any example of this sort of excuse-making in the Bible. And he argues that it is unreasonable to attribute indistinct muttering or clumsy hinting to the Inspirer of the biblical books, when it comes to things people must believe in order to be saved.

At the end of a long life spent in ministry and theological and apologetic writing, Dr. Whitby wrote the essay presented in this episode, in which he argues against mystery-mongering, that it is ruled out by the sufficiency and clarity of scripture.

Does he make a strong case? Why or why not? [spp-tweet tweet=”Should we defend unintelligible or seemingly incoherent claims as ‘mysteries’?”]

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