In the Abolition of Man C.S. Lewis utilized a common English textbook to explain the unacknowledged and self-contradictory philosophy undergirding much of the humanities departments in his day. I am no Jack Lewis. But perhaps this essay might prod one of my intellectual betters to take on a similar task for the field of introductory Biblical studies.

Recently I was having a conversation with a fellow minister who is pursuing an advanced degree at a college I am familiar with, and he was taking an Old Testament survey course. After reading his textbook which we will call “The Blue Book” he found himself needing to radically redefine most everything he had once believed about the Old Testament – no longer believing it to be a source of any historic truth but rather an ingenious yet fictitious construction of a national history by the Jews from the Hellenistic period.

Now, the irony is not lost on me that Lewis himself saw much of the Old Testament as “True Myth” until the historical records of the Davidic monarchy. And to be clear: I’m not here to argue for the historicity of the Hebrew Bible. My concern lies with the logic—and, frankly, the sleight of hand—by which books like the Blue Book make their case. Let’s turn to a passage of the book in question to illustrate.

“According to the biblical account, at Artaxerxes’s command Ezra proclaimed the Torah as divine law. This is often interpreted to mean that their local law was raised to the status of Persian Imperial law (Aram. dāt). This would have been unparalleled in the Persian empire. And given that Ezra 7 was clearly written from a Jerusalemite perspective, and presumably originates from the Hellenistic period, one ought to be cautious in drawing too many historical conclusions from this text.”

This excerpt, from the chapter on “The Persian Period,” typifies the Blue Book’s general approach. The argument goes something like this:

1. The Biblical account claims that Yahweh caused the Persian Empire to elevate the Torah to special status within the Persian Empire
2. This was not common practice of the Persian Empire we have no parallels in what records we have of the Persians
3. Therefore this did not happen. 

The Author of the Blue Book alongside most historical critical scholars employ a version of David Hume’s probability heuristic to analyze historical records and determine their veracity. This heuristic assesses the likelihood of an event based on whether it aligns with previously known occurrences. If an event has no historical parallel, scholars operating from this framework conclude that the event described is improbable or did not happen.

Here’s the problem. The central claim of the book of Ezra—and of much of the Old Testament—is that the God of the universe intervened supernaturally in history on behalf of His covenant people. But under this heuristic, such events are excluded from the outset. A student assigned the Blue Book is thus presented with what appears to be historical analysis, but in reality is a philosophical framework that automatically disqualifies the texts it claims to be evaluating from the outset. 

The result? Students are left with the impression that genuine scholarship can only lead to the conclusion that Ezra is fiction. Whether that conclusion is ultimately true is beside the point. What’s indisputably false is the claim that the conclusion is the product of neutral historical inquiry. It’s not. It’s circular reasoning. If your method precludes the exceptional, then of course you will dismiss any source that claims an exceptional event occurred. This isn’t history—it’s philosophical naturalism masquerading as historical critique. Materialist empiricism is smuggled in, carefully disguised in the robes of academic detachment.

Now, maybe that sort of reasoning could be forgiven when applied to well-documented eras—when primary and secondary sources abound and are cross-verifiable. But it’s almost laughable when applied to the ancient world, where such documentation is maddeningly scarce. Regarding the Persian Empire, we are largely dependent on Herodotus, the Hebrew Bible, and a smattering of inscriptions and cuneiform tablets. The notion that we possess a comprehensive enough historical picture of the Persian period to judge biblical claims against it with surgical precision is, frankly, absurd.

Moreover, even the few sources we do have are of questionable reliability. As leading Persian scholar Pierre Briant famously remarked at the beginning of his “History of Persia from Cyrus to Alexandar” with the line “ You have to believe ancient history even if it is not true.” 

Again, my point here is not to argue for my own position of substantive historical reliability. It is rather to critique the posture and method that lead so many to dismiss it out of hand—not through rigorous historical analysis, but through unacknowledged philosophical commitments. I grow weary of watching wave after wave of students abandon traditional views of biblical authority—not because of superior arguments, but because they were never told the rules of the game.

If historical-critical scholars insist on approaching history with materialist assumptions, that is their prerogative. But they should be honest about it. Students deserve to know that the writers of books like the Blue Book operate within a framework that precludes exceptional or unprecedented events. They deserve to know that the conclusions these scholars reach are not the inevitable results of objective inquiry, but the outworking of philosophical presuppositions that were never disclosed.

Such transparency would prevent the illusion that what’s being offered is pure “historical scholarship,” rather than a particular school of thought with its own assumptions and limitations.

So I end this essay with a plea—not a conclusion. A plea for someone more gifted than I am to take up this task. To write the Abolition of Man for the field of biblical studies. Until then, consider this my modest attempt to call attention to the emperor’s new clothes.