Catholic apologist Art Sippo is asking that I apologize to Gary Michuta for my recent blog entry on the book of Sirach. Sippo says,
“The ever overbearing and ill informed James Swan has been making ignorant rumblings about Gary’s book. I guess the Death Eaters are feeling intimidated by real scholarship so they have to nit-pick without any real understanding of the topic.”
“I think that Mr. Swan owes Mr. Michuta an apology for his misrepresentation of Gary’s book. Furthermore he owes the rest of us an apology for his crass attempt at deceit.”
Art posted a snippet from my recent blog entry, while totally ignoring the entirety of it. I went through Gary’s argumentation, and tried to interact with all of it. Sippo says “Mr. Swan does not know the difference between a canon being formed and having ‘fixed and certain’ contents.” Indeed Art, I do recognize this distinction, and know that it is an unproven assumption on both your and Mr. Michuta’s part.
Sippo then says, “There is no doubt that by the time of Christ, the OT was formed into 3 sections: Torah, Prophets, and Psalms (or Writings). While the content of the Torah has never been in question, there were significant questions about the content of the Prophets and Writings.” Yet Michuta argues in his new book (and also previously in his debate with Dr. White) that Psalms does not mean “the Writings,” it simply means Psalms. Michuta argues this phraseology appears no earlier than the mid-second century, thus trying to prove Luke 24:44 cannot be used to prove a three-fold canon division. It would be helpful if Sippo, who claims to have Michuta’s book, could at least check in with Gary to get his facts straight.
I saved a copy of this particular Envoy thread, because I have a feeling when Art reads this, his tune will change. Michuta chimed in and said, “Art did such a good job responding to Swan that I don’t know if I can (or should) add anymore.” But these guys are saying two different things. Of course, I would love to post this over at Envoy and directly ask Mr. Michuta how Sippo did such a great job, when he completely contradicts a major point in the new book.
