All Christians believe that the Bible is the Word of God. However, there is a split as to how the Word was transmitted to man. Some Christians believe in a transmission process called the Dictation Theory. Others, the majority of Christians, believe that the Word was communicated through what’s called the Verbal Plenary Theory.

The Dictation Theory proposes that the Bible writers were inspired to be as stenographers are. The Bible writers were thought to be simply passive tools that recorded words dictated by God. It is believed that this somewhat mechanical method precluded human error and personality from interfering with the accuracy of the Word.

Dictation Theory believers arrive at and are convicted of their point of view because of some scriptural passages that do seem to suggest dictation by God:

Jeremiah 26: 2— “Tell them everything I command you; do not omit a word.”

Revelation 2: 1— “To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: ‘The words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks among the seven golden lampstands.’”

Revelation 2: 8— “And to the angel of the church in Smyrna write: ‘The words of the first and the last, who died and came to life.’”

The problem with the Dictation Theory is that if God dictated every word to passive writers, then the writing style and tone would be the same throughout the Bible without any personal interjections.

With the Verbal Plenary Theory – meaning all the words of Scripture were  inspired by God’s revelations, but were not dictated – we can get an understanding of how that process transpired from 2 Peter 1: 21.

 “For prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.”

That says to me that the Holy Spirit moved the Bible writers from knowledge to knowledge. The revelations were given to them in terms of concepts that we know to be God’s biblical tools fashioned for the people He uses. It’s His method-of-operation: insights, visions, dreams, prophecies, and remembrances.

None of what the Bible writers wrote originated from themselves. Instead, the writers were inspired to record what was seen and heard by writing (speaking from God), mostly in their own words, through the filters of their own thought patterns and personalities.

God loves variety and obviously deemed it an acceptable format for His Word. This is why, unlike the Dictation Theory, we find not only differing styles of writing and tones from author to author, but personal expressions of personality and desires too; such as, “Why then have You brought me out of the womb? Would that I had died and no eye had seen me!” (Job 10: 18) and “For God is my witness, how I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 1: 8).

Logic favors the Verbal Plenary Theory.