The argument as to how many rain forests might be saved if the blank sheet of paper dividing the Old from the New Testament in nearly all Bibles was removed probably has as much practical relevance as the medieval debate as to how many angels might fit on a pinhead.
What is beyond doubt, however, is the benefit that would be achieved if, by that simple action of excising the blank page, all who pick up and read the Bible could then be convinced it is one book and has an inner and self-evidencing unity from Genesis through to Revelation.
"The Old is in the New revealed; the New is in the Old concealed," we were taught in Sunday School and Psalm 16, to be read tomorrow, is par excellence a model of how words from centuries before, apparently grossly overstated in relation to a contemporary figure, dramatically became key motifs to understanding the life, death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth.
Psalm 16 is one of those serene psalms which affirms faith in the God who is a refuge, portion, counsellor and the giver of joyous life. Then suddenly the writer, held to be King David, goes through the roof of previous Old Testament understanding of life after death and claims in verses 9-11: "My heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest secure, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay.
"You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand."
In the first Christian sermon on the Day of Pentecost, quoting from these verses, St Peter latches on to a truth that had doubtless come into sharp focus during a lengthy 40-day Bible study by the apostles after Jesus's ascension. Of course, David could not have been referring to himself when he wrote those words. David had died, had been buried, and his tomb was still a tourist attraction in Jerusalem.
It was as a prophet, and not autobiographically, that David had written Psalm 16, in keeping with God's promise to him to place on his throne a very distinguished descendant. "He spoke of the resurrection of Christ," argues Peter (Acts 2: 29-32).
If that kind of deduction sounds strange in modern ears, keep in mind that all Scripture bears witness to Christ, especially to his death, resurrection and worldwide mission. Jesus himself said so both before and after his resurrection. In consequence, on foot of his post-resurrection teaching, his disciples came naturally to see Old Testament references to God's annointed king, or to David and his royal seed, as finding their fulfillment in Jesus.
Of course, once this foundation has been established, a Christian use of the Old Testament, such as Peter's use of Psalm 16, is "scrupulously logical and internally coherent" (Dom Jacques Dupont).
This gives us encouraging clues to guide us in our own personal Bible reading. Those sometimes veiled and abstruse prophecies we plough through in Isaiah, Jeremiah and their briefer companions such as Micah and Malachi, are nothing less than the writers standing, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, on high vantage points and for telling the coming of Christ.
The baseline has to be that Christ is, therefore, in all the Scriptures and the New Testament is the authoritative interpretation of the Old.
A glance through Acts 2 will reveal the full plot in terms of Peter's sermon. He links the risen "Holy One" of Psalm 16 with the "Lord" of Joel's prophecy in 2:28 and the coming of the Holy Spirit on that very day in Acts 2 and convincingly - after all, we're told 3,000 believed! - defines Jesus of Nazareth as the promised Saviour of his hearers' own Scriptures. The one they repudiated and crucified, God had made "both Lord and Christ" (2:36).
That piece of blank paper in our Bibles is a very weak and distracting link between the two parts.
It is God himself who has put the strongest link in place between Old and New Testaments and it will be part of our glad witness tomorrow that that link is the authentic Christ testified to by both prophets and apostles.
G.F.