Who is Johann Salomo Semler?
“Johann Salomo Semler (born December 18, 1725, Saalfeld, duchy of Saxe-Saalfeld [Germany]—died March 14, 1791, Halle, Brandenburg) German Lutheran theologian who was a major figure in the development of biblical textual criticism during his tenure (1753–91) as professor of theology at the University of Halle.”
Johann Salomo Semler | Biography, Theology, Biblical Criticism, Works, & Facts | Britannica
The purpose of me writing this article is NOT to provide all the information concerning Semler, (that would take too long). However, what I hope to do is this short article is to provoke enough interest in Semler to cause you the reader to look more into Semler himself.
If you are somewhat familiar with modern Biblical scholarship, then the names of Westcott and Hort are most likely also familiar to you. I completely agree that Westcott and Hort were not friends of our English Bible, but my purpose here is to show that while Westcott and Hort did translate the inferior Greek manuscripts (Codex Vaticanus and Sinaiticus) into their infamous Greek Text, they were not the first to reject the superior Majority Text. If you know who Westcott and Hort are, you also know that they lived in the later 1800’s. (Producing their text in 1881.) But, if you will also look above into the opening description of Johann Salomo Semler, you will notice that he lived in the 1700’s; nearly two generations prior to Westcott and Hort. Westcott and Hort used the rules of Textual Criticism to do their work in the 1800’s. But where did those rules come from; and who was it that wrote them?
This is why we must know who Johann Semler was. One of the men that wrote rules for Textual Criticism was Johann Jakob Griesbach.
“Johann Jakob Griesbach (born Jan. 4, 1745, Butzbach, Hesse [Germany]—died March 24, 1812, Jena, Thuringia) rationalist Protestant German theologian, the earliest biblical critic to subject the Gospels to systematic literary analysis.”
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Johann-Jakob-Griesbach
“When the manuscripts differ, how do scholars decide which words are the original ones? There is more to it than simply choosing the readings of the oldest available manuscripts. Here are three historically important sets of rules published by some influential scholars of textual criticism: Bengel, Griesbach, and Hort.”
https://bible-researcher.com/rules.html
As you can see, Griesbach wrote rules for Textual Criticism. The next question is, who influenced Semler to write such rules?
“He was born at Butzbach, a small town in the state of Hesse-Darmstadt, where his father, Konrad Kaspar (1705–1777), was pastor. Griesbach was educated at Frankfurt, and at the universities of Tübingen, Leipzig and Halle, where he became one of J. S. Semler’s most ardent disciples. It was Semler who induced him to turn his attention to the textual criticism of the New Testament.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Jakob_Griesbach
At this point most people would simply say; Okay, so Semler influenced Griesbach, (and the point is)?
The point is, this is why we must learn about who Semler was, and what is beliefs were concerning the Scriptures. Please allow me to “wet your whistle” with a few brief excerpts from the Brittanica Encyclopedia Online Edition: in reference to Johann Salomo Semler:
“He was the first to deny, and to offer substantial evidence supporting his denial, that the entirety of the text of Old and New Testaments was divinely inspired and fully correct.”
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Johann-Salomo-Semler
I want you to understand what is being said, and by whom it is being said. First, what is being said is that (in the writer’s opinion), Semler 1) denied “that the entirety of the text of Old and New Testaments was divinely inspired and fully correct.” In other words, Semler did NOT believe that either the Old, or the New Testament Bible was A) completely inspired by God, nor B) that the neither of the Old or New Testaments were without error.
Now please allow me to quickly interject a major historical point here. In the 1600’s the London Baptists published two Confessions, the latter of which was published in 1689. (I present this to show that in the year of 1689, what the belief of Biblical scholarship was.)
London Baptist Confession of 1689 Chapter 1, Paragraph 8:
“8. The Old Testament in Hebrew (which was the native language of the people of God of old), 14 and the New Testament in Greek (which at the time of the writing of it was most generally known to the nations), being immediately inspired by God, and by his singular care and providence kept pure in all ages, are therefore authentic; so as in all controversies of religion, the church is finally to appeal to them. 15 But because these original tongues are not known to all the people of God, who have a right unto, and interest in the Scriptures, and are commanded in the fear of God to read, 16 and search them, 17 therefore they are to be translated into the vulgar language of every nation unto which they come, 18 that the Word of God dwelling plentifully in all, they may worship him in an acceptable manner, and through patience and comfort of the Scriptures may have hope. 19” (The numbers 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, and 19 are references to the Scriptures supporting the statement.)
https://1689londonbaptistconfession.com/1
Notice the words, “being immediately inspired by God, and by his singular care and providence kept pure in all ages”. It is rather obvious that the writers of this Confession had a different view than Semler.
Secondly, we see the words, “and to offer substantial evidence supporting his denial”. We must keep in mind that the writers of this article (for Brittanica), believe what modern scholarship says, and therefore agree with Semler, rather than the writers of the London Baptist Confession.
The important point however that must be seen in that between the 1600’s when the London Baptist Confession was written, and the 1800’s when Westcott and Hort made their Greek Text, a major shift had taken place among many “Biblical” scholars. Hence, from that time forward, there have been two separate theological philosophies concerning the inspiration, preservation, and translation of Scripture; those agreeing with the London Baptists, and those agreeing with Semler. The question is, What is your theological philosophy?
