Church seeks to expel bible college from premises, ASHAMED

Tuesday, January 26, 2010


By Zul Othman, TODAY | Posted: 26 January 2010 0836 hrs

SINGAPORE: The two organisations have co-existed on the same plot of land for 40 years. 

But now, the Life Bible Presbyterian Church is seeking to expel the Far Eastern Bible College (FEBC) from its Gilstead Road premises because of a split in ideologies. 

On Monday, the church took its case before the High Court, which is now in the unusual position of being asked, in effect, to decide on a matter of religious doctrine. 

The church's lawyers said Monday that the college's new doctrine is "alien" to FEBC and "therefore has altered the identity of the college and the nature and basis of the joint use of the church's premises". 

However, lawyers representing FEBC denied the college was part of the church; an agreement made in 1970 between the two parties clearly spell out the parties' respective rights and obligations in regard to the Gilstead Road land, they said. 

Relations between the two parties soured sometime in 2002 when Dr Jeffrey Khoo, who was then academic dean of FEBC, began to propagate and rally support for a new doctrine called the Verbal Plenary Preservation, which sought to limit the veracity of the Bible to certain Hebrew and Greek sources. 

In effect, this would exclude Chinese and Indonesian translations of the King James version of the Bible, for example, said the church, which rejected the new dogma "because there is no scriptural or other basis for the assertion". 

The church said it would cause "unnecessary division and confusion". 

The unresolved controversy eventually led to the FEBC leadership forming a breakaway group and another church, registered as the True Life Bible-Presbyterian Church. 

In his opening statement, FEBC lawyer Senior Counsel Ang Cheng Hock said his clients were entitled to stay at its current premises because it had previously solicited donations and redeveloped the plot of land for the benefit of both the church and the college. 

FEBC also maintained that it has, at all times, appointed its own board of directors independently of the church, kept its own accounts and was thus managed as a separate entity, in accordance with the college's constitution. 

If it were a ministry of the church, it would have been "completely unnecessary" for both parties to spell out the parties' respective rights and obligations in regard to the land in 1970, added Mr Ang. 

The trial continues.