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Rachel Miller's malice against Pastor Doug Wilson...

[Note added by TB on May 25, 2016: Here's how Rachel Miller's feminist supporters have just summarized Son Joseph's blog post below: "the Bayly Blog post that accused Rachel Miller of countless sins — albeit without evidence." Well, read on for the non-evidence.]

When Rachel Miller took over the Aquila Report, longtime readers noted a decline in the site's Biblical commitments. Ms. Miller pushed the edge of the doctrinal envelope in a number of places, yet it was possible to think it was simply her attempt to liven up the site.

But then there was sex. This is the place where Satan is focussing his attack on God's law today, and it became apparent that Ms. Miller's editorial leadership was most toxic here. She showed her feminism on the Aquila Report, but Ms. Miller kept the worst parts of her sexual rebellion for publication on her own website titled A Daughter of the Reformation.

Feminists who want to hold onto conservative Christian credentials claim they submit to their husbands at home, in private. Occasionally they trot their husbands out online to testify to their submissiveness at home. But in their online attacks on men, these women take no prisoners. You can see it on all the Reformed sites: women condemn pastors and elders without a hint of modesty or shame.

No one suffers from these attacks more than Pastor Doug Wilson. Some of their attacks are focussed on...


Scientific journals and Divine attribution...

Open access scientific journal PLOS ONE made a big boo-boo. They published a paper that attributed the design of the human hand to the "Creator." Hell hath no fury to equal biologists finding the word 'Creator'. After receiving complaints, PLOS ONE's editors responded:

A number of readers have concerns about sentences in the article that make references to a ‘Creator’. The PLOS ONE editors apologize that this language was not addressed internally or by the Academic Editor during the evaluation of the manuscript. We are looking into the concerns raised about the article with priority and will take steps to correct the published record.

It's plagiarism when a scientist fails to attribute the design of the object of his study to God, but now we know why he never does so. Among Scientism's priesthood, giving proper attribution to God is the most serious heresy and will not pass unpunished. Someone should take them to court for their...


Justice Primer; is this really a scandal?

Canon Press has pulled their recent book, Justice Primer, from their list, issuing an apology for some few sentences which were unattributed to their original authors. Doug Wilsons' co-author, Randy Booth, has acknowledged he is the guilty party, and the father-rule haters are gleeful at their success in humiliating Doug.

Yet here in the calm, solely by the grace of God, there are a couple things that need to be said about pastors and books.

Most pastors, to a greater or lesser degree, use manuscripts in the pulpit, and therefore write from 2,500 to 10,000 words each week, just for their preaching. As we write those manuscripts, we have first read and read other men's preaching and teaching, so when it comes to writing our manuscript, we pull in direct quotes from others' work and face the decision whether to cite that work in our manuscript, itself; but also, whether to cite that work in our preaching on Lord's Day. It's similar to the work of a prof lecturing. If we had a way to record profs' lectures and run them through a search site that included all copyrighted works, it's long been my conviction that a large percentage of academics' lectures would be found to contain plagiarism. But is it really that simple?

We can all see the difference between preaching and lecturing, on the one hand, and blogging and writing articles and books, on the other hand...


Copyright and Christian publishing, today...


If technology is behind many evils, although I wouldn't put it at the top of the list, the aggressive lobbying of publishers for expansion of their copyrights would be way up there. You know a recurrent theme here is the click we all are forced to perform before new software installations and updates: "Yes, I've read and agree with your 10,000 words of legalese here binding me to give notice to Apple if I ever put on a pair of socks again without explicit permission from Apple's in-house socks permissions department. And no, I will never, ever eat an apple again without paying you a user fee. Promise and cross my heart." You know the routines and the lies it's made pervasive.

But this is almost the least toxic part of the abuse of copyright, today. We have Christians threatening lawsuits against those who copy works in the public domain when those works are not and cannot be covered by copyright, so their threat is a lie. We have Bibles copyrighted when the Holy Spirit inspired every word, and Moses, Kings David and Solomon, and the Apostle Paul did the work and have been dead for many centuries. We have Mickey Mouse getting an extension of royalties for Disney simply because he has well-paid lawyers and lobbyists buying legislators who think making the Disney corporation filthy richer is fine because Disney is next to apple pie and motherhood.

It's a mess and we all need to remind ourselves that there's another way for believers...


Further thoughts on the NIV2011 MacArthur Study Bible...

NOTE FROM TB: I wrote the text below and was ready to post it this afternoon but other things intervened and I didn't get to it until late this evening. So I wrote this without having seen Phil Johnson's response to our previous posts, nor my brother David's response to Phil. Just an FYI.

* * *

Let me clarify my thoughts concerning the publication of the MacArthur Study Bible in the text of the New International Version 2011...


Appreciation for John MacArthur, warts and all...

(DB) In the 1980s I couldn't take John MacArthur. Every time his voice came on WMBI in Chicago, I turned it off. My mother would say to me that he was a better man than I thought. I didn't care. Something snide and self-assured seemed to emanate from from the radio when he was preaching.

And then in 1985-86, I spent a year in Fullerton, CA, as a pastoral intern under Paul Sailhamer at the Fullerton Evangelical Free Church while Chuck Swindoll was senior pastor there. As part of the year, Paul took the two interns to visit significant California churches. We did a trip to San Diego (on which Chuck accompanied us) and a northern trip to the Bay area.

We also went to visit Grace Community Church, where Paul, Dave Butler and I had breakfast with John MacArthur. 

During breakfast I asked John if he was willing to preach on abortion. I had a private interest in the question: I had been trying to convince friends at Fullerton that Chuck should preach on abortion, something he hadn't yet done (he did the following year). Fullerton was willing to have then-surgeon-general C. Everett Koop preach on abortion, but not Chuck. So I secretly scored a point when John answered emphatically, "Yes, I'm willing. I've already preached two series on it."


Large corporations are the real pirates...

I'm sure many readers of Baylyblog consider my opposition to Christian organizations and publishers' claiming copyright on works in the public domain as quixotic, tilting at windmills.

But it's not tilting at windmills--not at all. Rather, it's a serious case of theft and you can get a better understanding of this evil by reading this article showing that the real piracy today isn't your teenage son using Limewire to download a song or movie. That's shoplifting and it's sin, but the real piracy is done by the large corporations abusing copyright law for their own profits. And Christian publishers are not speaking out against these abuses. I have yet to see or hear of them taking a Christian stand against such theft.

If a reader can point me to a place where they have opposed it, please do so. (TB, w/thanks to Lucas)


Stop the sweetheart deal the wealthiest corporations are demanding of Congress...

Google:SOPADid you notice Google's protest today, shown to the right? I can't remember another time we've done this on Baylyblog but rich corporations' abuse of copyright has to stop. Join millions of others in registering your opposition to Senate 968 (PIPA) and HR 3261 (SOPA).

The corporate authors of this legislation are demanding the ability to take down any web site (including Craigslist, Wikipedia, or Google) that hurts their profits without prior judicial oversight or due process. You'll notice sites such as Wikipedia and Craigslist have joined Google in protest.

Register your opposition now. Stop this money grab by the likes of News Corp, TimeWarner, Comcast, Ralph Lauren, ABC, Juicy Couture, Chanel, Sony, Rolex, RIAA, and Nike.

And if you think SOPA solves a real problem, read this and this.

Odd allies of the protest include Nancy Pelosi and Ron Paul. The ACLU is right on this one.

(TB)


Legacy publishers' days are numbered...

Legacy publishers are in trouble and no tears needed. As with seminaries, colleges, denominations, parachurch organizations, missions, and certainly churches, wealth and power corrupt. So it's good to see fresh faces committed to God's truth using the new media that are taking the publishing world by storm. Although those losing money and power will bear false witness against it...


<i>NIV 2010</i> and postmodern sensitivities (I)...

(Tim, w/thanks to Andrew) Working for its employer, Biblica, the Committee on Bible Translation has just announced a new line of merchandise labelled the New International Version 2010. Aimed at postmoderns who are quite sensitive to the charges of sexism and anti-Semitism made against Scripture, News Corp's Zondervan has purchased exclusive rights to what is likely to be a highly profitable product line. (The latest year for which stats are available, Zondervan paid Biblica $6,000,000 in royalties.)

David and I have long opposed changing Scripture to make it less offensive. Where does it end? If we're going to avoid offending feminists, what about post-Holocaust Jews? And if we're going to avoid offending feminists and Jews, what about the slaves? And if we're going to avoid offending feminists and Jews and the slaves, what about the gay community? What about all of us who hate repentance--can't they tweak things so repentance isnt' so prominent?

Where does it end?

But really, if we're going to sell Scripture short, let's skip all the secondary offenses and go straight to...


Liar, liar, pants on fire; nose is as long as a telephone wire...

(Tim) A notice on my screen tells me Firefox has an update I should install. I'm obedient and, after installation, restart Firefox. Immediately I'm presented a screen that says it's quite important I update to the latest version of Adobe Flash Player. I push another button and then another and another and another... Finally, I'm presented with a screen saying "This program will install Adobe Flash Player 10.1. Usage subject to the Flash Player Software License Agreement." Then there's a checkbox next to the statement "I have read and agree to the terms of the license agreement," and two buttons--"QUIT" and "INSTALL."

If you click "INSTALL" without checking the "I have read and agree to the terms of the license agreement" checkbox, you'll notice it's grayed out and won't be functional until you...


Why no free MP3s of the NASB, ESV, NLT, and HCSB?

(This post was quite different, originally, and I've changed it to

reflect what I found after more research. I'm sorry for my earlier

errors.)

(Tim) Evangelical publishers would do well to offer free digital MP3 files of their Bibles to facilitate memorization. Free MP3s of the KJV are widely available, while other Bible publishers are earning good royalties off these audio files that cost little to nothing to serve on the web, nor do they need to be printed or shipped. The NASB95 is about

the least expensive of contemporary versions at $20-30 for the

entire Bible in MP3...


Good comment posted...

(Tim) Because we no longer have a comment feed, you wouldn't know that a 2006 post has just had a comment posted. This is to inform those of you who might be interested.

The subject is Christian Bible software and the open source movement and you can find the comment here.


Legacy publishers on the ropes...

(Tim) The latest New Yorker has an article by Ken Auletta chronicling the death throes of bookstores and traditional book publishers. People are still buying books, but there's a hostile takeover of these legacy hard copy businesses being waged by authors and their strong allies: particularly the explosion of e-books and the pricing structure and self-publishing services of a number of companies; most especially, Amazon. 

It's been a long time coming and nothing but good that authors are regaining some authority over the marketing and distribution of their work.

Take, for instance, self-publishing. In the old days, traditional book publishers cultivated the notion that anything worth publishing would be recognized and put under contract by a reputable publisher. If you weren't able to interest the big name publishers and went the vanity press route, it was because you were vain and wouldn't listen to the simple truth acquisitions editors kindly sent you by letter--that your book had no market. So hardheaded authors who wouldn't take "no" for an answer went off to a vanity press and paid, rather than being paid, for their book to be published. They spent money out of their own pockets to purchase a few hundred copies they could pawn off on business associates or family members.

But no serious man with serious credentials and serious things to say would be caught dead going that route. That's what was meant when you heard the suits say "he went with a vanity press."

Of course those who live in the publishing world know how fallible acquisitions editors and publishers are. John Grisham had his first mystery turned down by twelve publishers and sixteen agents before he found someone willing to take him into print...


Logos 4...

(David) Several weeks ago Logos Software suddenly began advertising a new version (No. 4) of their Bible software. I've owned Logos for years and my frustration with their publishing practices has been expressed on this blog in the past. But beyond a business model which charges often-ridiculous prices for public domain books, and book sets which contain an inordinate amount of chaff, I have consistently found the intricacies of the software off-putting. Logos has never been easy to use. It's complex, counter-intuitive, challenging software. Consequently, I seldom use Logos for anything but simple Bible searches.

So an updated version promising greater speed and ease-of-use sounded attractive. How could things get worse? Any simplification would help, especially since I've found it hard to incorporate additional book collections I've purchased over the years into my work flow. So I ponied up $150 for the upgrade and here's what I found.


Copyright law used to deny God's Word to Portuguese believers...

Ho! Every one who thirsts, come to the waters; And you who have no money come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk Without money and without cost. (Isaiah 55:1)

(Tim) Under "Save your church money...," David Ker, a Bible translator and blogger of Mozambique, commented on the lockdown the Portuguese and Brazilian Bible Societies have put in place denying Portuguese Christians access to Portuguese digital versions of God's Word.

In a blog post titled, "Illegal sources of the Portuguese Bible in digital format," he writes:

While every other major world language has multiple versions of the

Bible represented online, Portuguese has not one. To paraphrase

Emerson, make the Bible illegal and we all become criminals*.

The spirits of John Wycliff and Brother Andrew

hover over this shameful situation compelling us to act. If the enemy

forces were a state religion like the Church of England or an

oppressive government like China or Iran we would think nothing of

risking our lives to bring the Bible to those who can’t access it

otherwise. But in this case because the bad guys have the words “Bible

Society” in their name we’re supposed to sit on our thumbs...


Copyrighting the Holy Spirit's words, then living off the profit...

But when her masters saw that their hope of profit was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the market place before the authorities... (Acts 16:19)

(Tim, w/thanks to Lucas) A Greek Bible web site used by lovers of God's Word around the world has been shut down by the German/United Bible Society. Why?

Because they are intent upon defending the stream of money they've lived off for many years, now, provided by the Greek text of God's Word they've assembled. They claim their text is the closest anyone can possibly get to the original autographs inspired by the Holy Spirit.

So think about this. The better they do their job, the closer they will be to claiming copyright for the very word of God. In an e-mail, my son-in-law, Lucas, put it this way:

I was trying to figure out what, exactly, the UBS was copyrighting when they produce their version of the Greek New Testament. My only guess is that when they produce a Greek New Testament, they are copyrighting their specific choice of words. In other words, their copyright is not so much on the words themselves, but on the precise sequence of Greek words in their version of the Greek New Testament.

Their ultimate goal, of course, is to produce a Greek New Testament that is *exactly* the same as the original. But here's the crazy part: If they succeed in their goal, they will have succeeded in copyrighting the *actual* text of the Greek New Testament--not a translation, but the real thing.

Is that not crazy? If I'm right, then you can state it another way: the goal of the UBS is to copyright the *original* text of Scripture.

The head spins...


The abuse of copyright law...

(Tim, w/thanks to James) David and I've long argued that the Bible ought not to be copyrighted by anyone except to guarantee the text's accuracy. The Word of God's Author is the Holy Spirit--not the International Bible Society, Tyndale House Publishers, the Lockman Foundation, Zondervan, or Crossway. But of course, Bibles are the cash-cows of Christian publishing and no one's withdrawing their copyright of the Bible, putting its text into the public domain.

But beyond the text of God's Word, we have other Christian publishers denying the works they sell are in the public domain. Instead, in direct contradiction to firmly established copyright law, they claim turning old hard copy theological works into digital text allows them to claim possession of that text and make a profit off it. Not so.

Of all those working to expand their profit making ability through copyright law, Disney has to be one of the worst. Which is why this movie is priceless--click on through to the next page...

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What you think you know about the copyright of old books that have been digitized, but don't...

(Tim) Here's a post that should be read by everyone who cares about getting old books written by fathers in the faith the broadest possible distribution around the world. To summarize: Christian corporations that claim copyright for old books in the public domain that they have digitized, formatted, and distributed electronically are making false claims. And if they threaten legal action against fellow believers who reproduce those digital copies, their threats have no legal merit; but more, their threats are contrary to Scripture:

Actually, then, it is already a defeat for you, that you have lawsuits with one another. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be defrauded? (1 Corinthians 6:7)

Yes, it's a long read (and don't miss the comments), but it's quite interesting to find out what copyright law really says about works in the public domain.

This is a crucial matter. The church around the world would be well-served by the free electronic distribution of works in the public domain that really are vastly superior in scholarship and doctrine than most of the stuff being churned out today by evangelical corporations owned by, for instance, Rupert Murdoch's News Corp (Zondervan).

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"Not I," said the pig...

Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of the LORD: Behold, the days are coming, when all that is in your house, and that which your fathers have stored up till this day, shall be carried to Babylon; nothing shall be left, says the LORD. And some of your own sons, who are born to you, shall be taken away; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.”

Then said Hezekiah to Isaiah, “The word of the LORD which you have spoken is good.” For he thought, “Why not, if there will be peace and security in my days?” (2 Kings 20:16-19)

(Tim) Recently, our eldest son, Joseph, and his excellent wife, Heidi, were rejected by an adoption agency when the home office came across an obscure sentence in the report of the home study social worker indicating Joseph and Heidi believe in corporal punishment...

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