WM 119: Sanctified Mind Podcast: Text and Time is posted to sermonaudio.com (listen here).
In WM 119 I
want to share a recent podcast by a group of three young men (Beau, Ryan, and
Daniel—A RB and two Reformed Presbyterians) who live in the Atlanta, Georgia
area.
The name of
their podcast is The Sanctified Mind. The
episode I want to share is episode 004, posted on 3.1.19. The podcast looks to
be a reading discussion group. Each month or so they choose a different book to
read and discuss together. The first book they reviewed was Machen’s What is Faith? I like that they are
doing some older books and not just new ones.
In this most
recent episode they are discussing Edward H. Hills, Text
and Time: A Reformed Approach to NT Textual Criticism. If that title
does not ring a bell for you, it is because this is a new kindle edition of
Hills’ classic and influential work The
King James Version Defended (Christian Research Press, May 25, 2018). The
editor listed as Mary E. Hills Mueller. I assume this is Dr. Hills’ daughter.
I think it
was, indeed, a great idea to release this work under a new title and in a
digital format. As the men point out in the discussion, the book’s old title
led to confusion with Hills’s view and KJV-Onlyism. They also make the point
that Hills’ original editions of this work in the 1950s came before the
avalanche of modern English translations.
As with WM
118 when I shared the podcast from Agros Church, I am encouraged by this
podcast because it is yet another illustration of young Reformed men who are
reconsidering the whole question of text (the “Young, Text-less, and Reformed”).
They are seeing the difference between a presuppositional approach to text
versus an empirical approach; a confessional versus a modern critical approach;
a restorationist versus a providential preservationist approach.
At least one
of the brothers notes that he is still working through the issues. I can
respect that.
They also
are aware of the ecclesiological issues. Toward the end, someone say something
like, “We wouldn’t let unbelievers come into our church lead a Bible study, why
would we let unbelieving scholars edit and control the texts of our Bible?”
Great question.
There are
some technical issues in the podcast. There are some long gaps at point, and
they apparently could not always hear each other in real time and so sometimes
talk over each other, but I think this podcast is still worth a listen. So,
enjoy….
JTR
3 comments:
Yes, Mary Mueller is Dr. Hills daughter. Also, "Text and Time: Textual Criticism from a Reformed Point of View" is the original title of Dr. Hills book. However, when Evangelical publishers refused to publish his book (because they were pressured by Hills' opponents), he ended up self-publishing the book and changed the title to "KJV Defended" (upon the suggestion of his wife) in order to appeal to a more popular level audience. And yes, at the time he first published the book in the 1950s, I believe the only "modern" English version available was the RSV (which came out like 2-3 years beforehand).
Dr. Ted Letis discussed this history in his book, "Edward Freer Hills' Contribution to the Revival of the Ecclesiastical Text" (which I believe was originally Dr. Letis' Master's thesis. Btw, that work is included in Volume 12 of the Journal of Christian Reconstruction (1989), which is available currently as a reprint from www.chalcedon.edu
WS, thanks for your comment. Yes, I had not realized this was the original title. Though I have a copy and did read Letis's thesis, I did not remember that detail. Very interesting. I like the new "old" title!
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