OVERUSE OF MODIFIERS

One of the most common faults of beginning writers is the overuse of modifiers (adjectives, adverbs). You must resist this tendency. Overmodification of your nouns and verbs weakens the force of your writing. Beginning writers frequently add modifiers thinking that these will make their text more vivid and powerful, but they don’t. Consider these two sentences:

(1) The beautiful Francesca lovingly spread a treasured quilt on the green grass beneath the stately oak.

(2) Francesca spread a quilt on the grass beneath the oak.

The second is better writing. In the first, each noun and verb has been modified in a vain attempt to make the text more vivid. The result is that the reader is asked to process too much; the modifiers get in the way. While each modifier may seem like a lovingly crafted detail to the author, they get annoying to the reader. If sentence after sentence is overmodified, he will stop reading.

Your writing will be much stronger if you avoid unnecessary modifiers. Remember: When it comes to modifiers, less is more. After you have written your rough draft, go through it and strike out every modifier that you possibly can. Only keep a modifier if, without it, the text will become unintelligible to the reader or the claim you are making will be false. Only modifiers needed to make something true or intelligible should be included by a beginning writer.

In particular, don’t put “good” and “loving” in front of words like “Father,” “mother,” or “teacher” unless you have to in order to be understood (which is almost never). These are among the most chronically over-used modifiers in contemporary apologetics texts. Other commonly overused words are “gracious” and “saving.”

For example, you don’t need to say “God is a good Father and so he lovingly provides for his children.” It is stronger to say “God is a Father and provides for his children” (note that we also got rid of “so he” in addition to “good”; this also makes it stronger writing). You don’t need to allude to the fact that bad fathers may not lovingly provide for their children. You don’t need to point out that God is good. Your reader can be expected to know that God is good at whatever he does, so if he is a Father, he will be a good one. The modifier “good” is unnecessary and weakens the writing.

JOHN 19--MARY ENTRUSTED TO JOHN
Do not replace the literal sense of the text with the spiritual. The literal sense of the text is that Jesus was entrusting his mother to John’s care so that she could be taken care of in his absence. Literally, the text is not about Mary’s spiritual motherhood; it is about her domestic situation. The use of this passage to show a figure of Mary’s spiritual motherhood of the Church and the individual believer is spiritual application, not the literal sense of the text.

BISHOPS AND APOSTLES
In describing apostolic succession, do not imply that bishops are simply modern apostles. They aren’t. The bishops are the successors of the apostles as the supreme leaders of the Church, but they are not the successors of the apostles in the office of apostle. A modern bishop is not simply an apostle by another name. All of the apostles had universal jurisdiction, could make infallible definitions, and work miracles. Modern bishops don’t fit that profile.

ACTS 1--MATTHIAS AS JUDAS’ REPLACEMENT
It is very difficult to use the text of Matthias’ election as Judas’ replacement to prove apostolic succession. What we are dealing with here is a very specialized succession that cannot easily be generalized. First, this is not a bishop succeeding an apostle. As we note elsewhere, bishop and apostle were different offices, despite the King James Version’s use of the term “bishoprick” (which makes the passage tempting for a Catholic apologist). Matthias was an apostle, not simply a bishop.

Further, this isn’t even a prooftext for apostles needing to succeed apostles, for it was not Jesus’ will that the office of the apostle continue beyond the first century. Instead, what we have happening here is a replacement of one of the Twelve, the group of Twelve that followed Jesus during his earthly ministry. This group, by nature, could not continue beyond the first century. A few years later when James was killed, he wasn’t replaced, though there were certainly candidates around (probably Justus was still alive).

It seems that the best interpretation of this passage is that, after the death of Judas, it was fitting that the Church age be started with twelve apostles at the helm, corresponding to Jesus’ original wish and to the twelve patriarchs of Israel at the founding of the nation. Once the Church age had been launched in this way, there was no need to maintain the twelve beyond that, so when James was martyred by Herod Agrippa, he was not replaced. Neither were the other apostles as they died. Furthermore, those apostles who were not part of the twelve—such as Paul, Barnabas, and James the Just—were never added to that number to make up the difference, so far as we can tell.