Evangelicalism has been leavened with theological liberalism and a multitude of other heresies since the fathers of New Evangelicalism renounced “separatism” in the 1950s. Evangelicalism today is the New Evangelicalism of the past. 

It should be noted that a large number of fundamental Baptists are morphing into evangelicalism. 

Consider the heresy of Form Criticism, a liberal view of the Gospels. 

The Lord Jesus Christ taught that the Spirit of God would lead the apostles and prophets in recording the Gospels. 

“But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you” (Joh. 14:26).

“Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will show you things to come. He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall show it unto you. All things that the Father hath are mine: therefore said I, that he shall take of mine, and shall show it unto you” (Joh. 16:13-15).

This means that the number of the Gospels was established by the Holy Spirit. The Canon of Scripture was settled by God, not by man! 

It means, also, that the words of the Gospels were given by the Holy Spirit. They might or might not have used secondary sources, but they certainly did not depend upon secondary sources or their own faulty memories.

The liberal, unbelieving approach to the Gospels is called “form criticism” or “redaction criticism.” Its major principles are as follows:

- The gospel writers supposedly used a common oral tradition that was passed around among the Christians for some time before anything was written down. Textual critics Alford (1849) and Westcott (1860) promoted this view.

- The gospel writers supposedly used other sources. One supposed source is the “Q” document. Though it does not exist, many believe that this mythical document was the source of some or all of the gospels. 

- The gospel writers supposedly copied from one another. One theory is that Matthew was first written and Mark and Luke were then based on Matthew. This was the view of textual critics Griesbach (1783) and Hug (1808). It is the official position of the Roman Catholic Church (promulgated by the Pontifical Biblical Commission, 1912). Another theory is that Mark was first written and that Matthew and Luke are based on Mark plus the mythical Q document. There are endless permeations of these theories. Each prominent critic strives to make a name for himself by inventing a new twist to this approach.

- The gospel writers supposedly modified things that Jesus did and said. They added to, subtracted from, contracted, and otherwise changed the record. 

It is not only out-and-out theological modernists who are entertaining unscriptural views of the Gospels. Many “evangelicals” have adopted these views. The following statement from The Jesus Crisis: The Inroads of Historical Criticism into Evangelical Scholarship by Robert L. Thomas and F. David Farnell (Kregel, 1998) reveals how deeply evangelicals have been infected with the modernistic thinking of form criticism: 

“Outspoken evangelical critics have engaged in the same type of dehistoricizing activity as the Jesus Seminar people with whom they differ. If they were to organize among themselves their own evangelical ‘Jesus Seminar,’ the following is a sampling of the issues they would vote on, most of which they would probably pass:

- The author of Matthew, not Jesus, created the Sermon on the Mount. 

- The commissioning of the Twelve in Matthew 10 is a group of instructions compiled and organized by the author of the first gospel, not spoken by Jesus on a single occasion.

- The parable accounts of Matthew 13 and Mark 4 are anthologies of parables that Jesus uttered on separate occasions.

- Jesus did not preach the Olivet Discourse in its entirety, as found in three of the gospel accounts.

- Jesus gave His teaching on divorce and remarriage without the exception clauses found in Matthew 5:32 and 19:9.

- In Matthew 19:16-17, the writer changed the words of Jesus and the rich man either to obtain a different emphasis or to avoid a theological problem involved in the wording of Mark’s and Luke’s accounts of the same event.

- The scribes and Pharisees were in reality decent people whom Matthew painted in an entirely negative light because of his personal bias against them.

- The genealogies of Jesus in Matthew 1 and Luke 3 are figures of speech and not accurate records of Jesus’ physical and/or legal lineage.

- The magi who, according to Matthew 2, visited the child Jesus after His birth are fictional, not real, characters.

- Jesus uttered only three or four of the eight or nine beatitudes in Matthew 5:3-12.

“Recognizably, the listed conclusions impinge upon the historical accuracy of the gospel records. Various evangelicals have opted for the stated unhistorical choice in each of the suggested instances. Granted, their reduction of historical precision in the Gospels is not the wholesale repudiation of historical data as is that of the original Jesus Seminar, but that it is a repudiation is undeniable. An acceptance of imprecision is even more noticeable in light of the fact that the above questions are only the tip of the iceberg. An exhaustive list would reach staggering proportions” (Robert L. Thomas and F. David Farnell, The Jesus Crisis, pp. 14-15).

Examples of evangelicals who have published works supporting form criticism are Daniel B. Wallace, Dallas Theological Seminary (The Synoptic Problem); Robert H. Stein, Southern Baptist Seminary, Louisville, Kentucky (The Synoptic Problem: An Introduction); and D.A. Carson, Douglas Moo, and Leon Morris (An Introduction to the New Testament, Zondervan, 1992).

We reject form criticism. The crux of the matter is divine inspiration. Either the Gospels are infallible Scripture as they claim to be, or they are the fallible work of men. There is no middle ground, and we have no hesitancy to reject all form criticism theories and accept the Bible’s testimony about itself in simple faith.

If form criticism were true, it would mean that there are errors in the Bible. Even the evangelicals themselves who are dabbling in form criticism reach this conclusion. And if there are errors in the Bible, Jesus was wrong when He stated that the Scripture cannot be broken (Joh. 10:35). 

Form criticism is of the devil. It is the devil who loves to cast doubt upon the Word of God. He has been doing this since his conversation with Eve in Eden (Ge. 3:1). He is doing it today through “evangelical” scholars who are trained at the feet of modernists (either directly or through their writings or through other evangelical scholars who sat under modernists). They are trying to adapt the scholarship of unbelievers to a position of faith, and it is an impossible task. Does God not warn that “evil communications corrupt good manners” (1 Co. 15:33)? Does God not warn the believer not to sit in the seat of the scornful (Ps. 1:1)? Does God not warn that the words of false teachers eat like a canker and increase ungodliness and overthrow faith (2 Ti. 2:16-18)? Does God not warn that the words of false teachers deceive hearts (Ro. 16:17-18)? The Bible says that two cannot walk together except they be agreed (Am. 3:3), yet today’s “evangelical” scholar is convinced that he can walk together for months and years on end with unbelievers and not be harmed spiritually. It is a delusion.

A refutation of form criticism can be found in The Doctrine Which Ye Have Learned, which is available at the Courses section of www.wayoflife.org.

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