The Book of Mormon prophet Nephi prophesied quite critically of a future time when “many of the Gentiles shall say: A Bible! A Bible! We have got a Bible, and there cannot be any more Bible. . . . Thou fool, that shall say: A Bible, we have got a Bible, and we need no more Bible” (2 Nephi 29:3, 6).

And, in fact, belief in the sole and complete sufficiency of written scripture—for Christians, the Bible—did become one of the core principles of Protestantism. That belief is neatly expressed in the first of what have come to be known by some as the “five solas”—a term referring to a quintet of Latin phrases that, taken together, summarize the core theological beliefs of the Protestant Reformation: “Sola Scriptura” (scripture alone), “Sola Fide” (faith alone), “Sola Gratia” (grace alone), “Solus Christus” (Christ alone), and “Soli Deo Gloria” (glory to God alone). These phrases assert the Protestant teaching that the Bible is the highest authority, that salvation comes through faith and grace in Jesus Christ, and that all glory belongs to God. 

During my mission, and even more often since then—I encountered relatively few serious Evangelical Protestants in German-speaking Switzerland—people seeking to refute the claims of the Restoration, and specifically to reject the Book of Mormon, have confronted me with 2 Timothy 3:15-17. They see the passage, traditionally ascribed to the apostle Paul, as refuting the need for, or even the possibility of, postbiblical scripture or modern revelation. Addressing his protégé Timothy, who was born to a Greek father and a Jewish mother, Paul comments on the young man’s religious upbringing:

“From a child,” he says, “thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.”

The argument that some Protestants make from these verses goes as follows: If written scripture is sufficient, on its own, to make us “wise unto salvation,” “thoroughly furnished unto all good works,” and even “perfect,” there seems no point in adding to it. Why add to perfection? If anything, wouldn’t any addition be likely to do damage? At best, it would be redundant.

But there seems to be a fundamental problem, for a Christian, at least, in the attempt to weaponize 2 Timothy against the emergence of new scripture or further revelation: Timothy was probably in his late teens or very early twenties when he first became associated with the apostle Paul, who later describes him as “my own son in the faith” (1 Timothy 1:2). He was, therefore, likely born somewhere between AD 17 and AD 30, during the mortal lifetime of Jesus and well before the composition of any book of Christian scripture. The only “scripture” that Timothy could have known in his youth would have been the Old Testament, probably in Greek translation.

The second epistle to Timothy is typically dated to approximately AD 65, give or take a year or two. But, while lists and specific dates will vary, many of the books of the New Testament itself appear to bear later dates than does 2 Timothy. The chronology that I’ve consulted for this column is typical and mainstream, and it puts the composition of the Gospel of Mark, the Gospel of Matthew, Hebrews, 1 Peter, 2 Peter, Jude, the Revelation of John, the Gospel of John, and the three epistles of John after the writing of 2 Timothy. In other words, according to this chronology—and while others may differ here and there, the variation won’t be enormous and won’t really neutralize my point—fully eleven of the New Testament’s twenty-seven books (including three of the four canonical Gospels) postdate the composition of a text that, supposedly, bars further revelation or additional scriptural books.

That means that, while a Jewish rabbi might be comfortable with this common Evangelical argument against further revelation or scripture, no Protestant Evangelical (and, for that matter, no believing Christian) should be.

Many missionaries and former missionaries will, of course, be familiar with yet another biblical passage, Revelation 22:18-19, which is often cited as a prohibition against postbiblical revelation or scripture:

“For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.”

Since these verses stand very near the end of the Revelation of John, which stands at the very end of the Bible itself—so the argument goes—they prohibit adding any further scriptural material to the Bible (and, of course, omitting anything from it).

But the book of Revelation hasn’t always been located at the end of the Bible; the specific order of New Testament books wasn’t fixed for several centuries. Historically, the book of Revelation was controversial, and it was the last New Testament book to achieve effective universal acceptance across Christendom. It wasn’t firmly established in the canon until the late fourth or even fifth century after Christ.

In fact, the books of the New Testament—including John’s Revelation—initially circulated independently as individual letters and Gospels that had been written (or copied) for specific communities. (Bound books were still over the horizon and, obviously, printed volumes were many centuries in the future.) The four now-canonical Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) were probably beginning to circulate together as a collection by a fairly early point in the second century after Christ, but that is obviously after the composition of John’s Revelation.

So what was the function of that stern warning in Revelation 22:18-19 against adding to or omitting from the text? Since the New Testament books—like other ancient texts—originally circulated in the form of rare hand-copied manuscripts, it would have been a simple matter for a careless or designing scribe to alter a document while passing it off as authentic and true to its original. Imagine, say, that J. R. R. Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” were circulating only in a relatively small number of hand-copied manuscripts, without legal protections and without convenient comparisons to other copies. It would be easy for a copyist who didn’t like the portrayal of Gollum to omit it altogether or to “improve” it to her own liking. A scribe with different motives might insert a scene in which Frodo and Sam pause to enjoy a refreshing Coca-Cola before beginning the fateful ascent of Mount Doom. And, of course, as compared to tinkering with Tolkien, theological disagreements provided powerful motives for “improving” scripture.

Accordingly, more than a few ancient documents, even beyond the Bible, invoked curses on those who created inaccurate copies. (Practically speaking, it was an author’s attempt to preserve the integrity of what he had written.) The “book” to which Revelation 22:18-19 forbids alterations is, almost certainly, the book of Revelation itself.

Another such warning actually occurs within the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible, at Deuteronomy 4:2: “Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you,” says the Lord, “neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you.”

The prohibition is plainly directed against adding false, uninspired, human material to what the Lord has revealed and against suppressing what the Lord has revealed by erasing it from the record. Plainly, this is a prohibition that Latter-day Saints endorse and follow. Like their fellow Christians, Latter-day Saints oppose the mingling of uninspired material with scripture. The question comes down to whether or not a purported new revelation is true, or whether a proposed additional text is genuinely inspired scripture. Merely being new or extrabiblical doesn’t, in and of itself, prove something spurious. Not, at least, according to the Bible—which nowhere announces an end to revelation or declares itself a closed and all-sufficient book.

Indeed, Latter-day Saints recognize that there is much more that we could learn from God and about his dealings with humankind. There are many things that we would like to know. John 21:25, which is the very last verse of the biblical gospel of John, acknowledges that the account that it provides is incomplete: “And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written.”

Is there any serious Christian who wouldn’t eagerly welcome more information about the life, ministry, and teachings of Jesus? Would any believer object if, somehow, several more authentic verses of John’s Gospel were found?

Interestingly, there exists a curious parallel to John 21:25 in the Qur’an, the holy book of Islam. Much like conservative Protestant Christians, most Muslims follow a “religion of the book.” Muhammad is regarded as the last of the prophets and, thus, with no living prophet, the written scripture of the Qur’an is the ultimate authority for the faithful. And yet the Qur’an itself directs Muhammad to say the following: “If the ocean were ink for the words of my Lord, the ocean would run out before the words of my Lord ran out, even if we brought the like of it again in ink” (Qur’an 18:109, my translation). According to the Qur’an, no finite book, no matter how great, can contain all of God’s word.

Nor is scripture self-interpreting, which seems to be a difficulty for those who claim it to be absolutely self-sufficient. A look at John 5:39 will shed some light on this matter. English-speaking Latter-day Saints are familiar with this verse as it is rendered in the King James Bible: “Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.” We often cite it as encouraging scripture study, which is definitely a good thing.

Consider, though, four other renderings of the passage:

“Examine the scriptures, since you think that in them you have eternal life. They also testify about me.” (Common English Bible, the CEB)

“You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me.” (New International Version, the NIV)

“You pore over the scriptures for you imagine that you will find eternal life in them. And all the time they give their testimony to me!” (J. B. Phillips)

“You search the scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness to me.” (Revised Standard Version, the RSV)

There is disagreement among scholars and translators about whether the Greek verb that the King James translators put into English as “search” is to be taken in the indicative mood (“you search”), as the NIV, Phillips, and RSV translations have it, or in the imperative or command mood (“search ye”), as it appears in the King James Version and the CEB. Both are defensible from the Greek.

In either case, the passage seems to represent Jesus as criticizing his Jewish audience’s misplaced confidence in its own diligent study of the scriptures—which at this time, of course, could only have been those of the Old Testament since, again, the New Testament plainly didn’t yet exist. And, he appears to be saying, salvation is not to be found in written scripture alone, no matter how diligently it is studied. Salvation is in Christ, and Christ was still speaking. Moreover, Latter-day Saints believe he is still speaking today.