RICHARD LINDAMOOD 2700 G!,.ENWAV AVE.

C•NClNN l 4, OHlO

The FundaIIlentals

A Testimony

Volume II

Compliments of Two Christian Laymen

l

I.

"To the Law and to the Testimony" /1aiaJ, 8: 20

The Fundamentals

A Testimony to the Truth

Volume II

Compliments of Two Christian Laymeft

TESTIMONY PUBLISHING COMPANY · (Not Inc.)

808 La . Salle Ave. , Chicago, Ill., U. S. A.

r

FOREWORD

This book is the sec ond of a series which will

be published and sent to every pastor, evangel ist,

missionary, theological professor, theological stu- j

dent, Sunday school superintendent, Y. M. C. A. 1 and Y. W. C. A. secretary in the ,Eng lish s·peaking

world, so far as the addresses of all these can be

obtained.

Two intelligent, consecrated Christian laymen

bear the expense, because they believe that the

time has come when a new statement of the funda­

mentals of Christianity should be made.

Their earnest desire is that you will carefully

read it and pass its truth on to others.

(See P ublishers ' Notice, Pa ge 127.)

CONTENTS

CHAP Tl~ PAO!

l. THB TESTIMONY OF THB MONUMENTS TO THE

TRUTH OF THE SCRIPTURES.. . . . . . • • . • . . . • 7 By Prof. George Frederick Wright, D. D.t LL. D.,

Oberlin College.

11. THI RECENT TESTIMONY OF ARCHAEOLOGY TO

THB SCRIPTURtS. . . . . . . . . • . . . . . . . . . . . . • . . 29 By M. G. Kyle, D. D., LL. D., Egyptologist.

Professor of Biblical Archaeology, Xenia Theological Seminary. Consulting Editor of the Records of the Past, Washington, D. C.

III. FALLACIES OF THH HIGHER CRITICISM. • • • • • • • • • • 48 By Franklin Johnson, D. D., LL. D.

IV. CHRIST AND CRITICISM. . • • • . • • • • • • • • • • • .. • • • • • • • 69 By Sir Robert Anderson, K. C. B., LL. D.

Author of "The Bible and Modern Criticism;• Etc., Etc., London, England.

V. MODERN PHILOSOPHY. . . . • • • • . . • • . . . . • • • • • • • • • • 8S By Philip Mauro, Counsellor-At-Law, New York City.

VI. ' JUSTIFICATION By FAITH, .•...•..•..•• · •••••••• 106

By H. C. G. Maule, D. D., Bishop of Durham, England.

VII. TRIBUTES TO CHRIST AND THB BIBLB J3Y BRAINY

MEN NOT KNOWN AS ACTIVE CHR ISTIANS... 120

' •

•

• •

OLUME II. •

• •

•

CHAPTER I • • •

THE TESTIMONY OF THE MONUMENTS TO THE . · T,RUTH OF THE , SCRIPTURES ,. ·

•

BY PROF '. GEORGE FREDERICK WR IGHT, D. D. LL . D.,

OB,ERL IN COLLEGE. .

All history is fra.gme11tary. Each parti cular fact ·is the cen· ter of an infinite comple x of circumstance s. No man h,as in ... tel1igence enough to insert ,a s,uppo sititiou s fac 't into cir ,cum­s,tances not be,J,onging t,o it and mak 1e :it exactly fit. This 011ly

infinite intelligence could do. A successful forgery, therefore, is impos sib1e ,if only we ha ve a sufficient nttmber Of the orig­inal circumstances with which to compare it. 'It is this prin .. cipie which gives sucl1 importance to the cros -e~atfiination of

~ . - . witnesses. ,If the witnes s 1s truth ful, the more he ts que s-tioned . th .e more perfectly will his testimony be seen to accord ·with the framewo ,r,k of ci14 c,ull1.stances1 int 10 which it is fitted~

1 If false, the more will his fal sehood becom'e apparent ..

•

Remarkable opportunities for cross-examining the Old Te s­tament Scriptures have been afforded by the recent uncover­ing of long-buried monuments in Bible lands and ·by decipher­ing th'e inscriptions upon them. It . is the objeot of this essay to give the results of a sufficient portion of this cross-examina -•

tion to afford a reasonable test of. the competence and honesty o,f' the hist 1oriatts of th ,e Old T1estament, and of the faith£ ulne ,ss with 'Which their record has been transmitted to us. B1ut the prescribed lin1its will 11ot per1nit the hR-lf to be told ; while room

7 •

•

• I

•

,

'

'

•

•

8 The F undament9l,s.

is left for an entire essay on the discoveries of the last five years to be treated b,y another hand, specially . competent for

•

the, task. Passing by the mon .umental evidence which has removed

•

ob,jections to the historical statements of the New Testament, as less needing support, . attentio ,n will be given first to one of the Old Testament narratives, which is nearest t.o us in time, and against which the harshest judgments o,f modern critics have been burled. We ref er to the statements in the Boo,k of

•

Daniel concerning the personality and fate of Belshazzar.

TH ,E IDENTIFI 1CATI0 1N 10F BELSHAZZAR • .,

In the fifth ch.aper of Daniel Belsl1azzar is called the ''son of Nebuchadnezzar,'' and is said to have been ''king'' of Baby­lon and to have been slain on the night in which the city was taken. But according to the other historians he was the son of N abonidus, , who was then king, and who is known to, have • been out of the city when it was captured, and to have lived some time af t1erwar 1ds. · · . •

Here, certainly, tl1ere is about as glaring an apparent dis-crepancy as could be imagined. Indeed, · there would seem to he a flat contradiction between profane and sacred historians. · But in 1854 Sir Henry Rawlinson fou.nd, while excavating in the ru .ins of Mugheir ( identified as the site of the city of Ur,

•

from which Abraham emigrated), inscriptions which stated that when N abonidus was near the end of his reign he asso .­ciated with him on the ·throne his eldest sont Bil-shar-uzzur, and allowed him the roya] title, thus making it per£ ectiy credi ­ble 'that Belshazzar shou]d have beeri in Baby lon, as he is said to have been in the Bible, and that he should have been called king, and that he shou]d have perished in the city while Na­bonidus survived outside. That h.e should have been called king while his father was still living is no more strange than that Jehoram should have been ap,pointed by his father, Je­hoshaphat, king of Judah; seven years before his f'ather's death

•

•

•

M onument.s to fhe Truth of the S cripturcs. 9

( see 2 Kings 1 : 17 and 8 : 16), or that J otham should have been made king before his father, Uzziah, died of leprosy, though Uzziah is still called king in some of the references to him.

That Belshazzar should have been called son of Nebuchad­nezzar is readily accounted for on the supposition that he was his grandson, and there are many things to indicate that Nabo­nidus married Nebuchadnezzar's daughter, while there is noth­ing known to the contrary. But if thfa theory is rejected, there is the natural supposition that in the loose use of terms of re­lationship common among Oriental people "son" might be ap­plied' to one who was simply a successor. In the inscriptions on the monuments of Shalmaneser II., referred to below, Jehu, the extirpator of the house of Omri, is called the "son of Omri."

The status of Belshazzar implied in this explanation is confirmed incidentally by the fact that Daniel is promised in verse 6 the "third" place in the kingdon1, and in verse 29 is given that place, all of which implies that Belshazzar was sec ... ond only.

Thus, what was formerly thought to be an insuperable objection to the · historical accuracy of the Book of Daniel pro\tes to be, in all reasonable probability, a mark of accuracy. The coincidences are all the more remarkable for being so evidently undesigned.

THE BLACK OBELISK OF SHALMANESER.

From various inscriptions in widely separated places we are now able to trace the movements of Shalmaneser II. through nearly all of his career. In B. C. 842 he crossed the Euphrates for the sixteenth time and carried ,his conquests to the shores of the Mediterranean. Being opposed by Hazael of Damascus, he overthrew the Syrian army., and pursued it to the royal city and shut it up there, while he devastated the territory surrounding. But while there is no mention of his fighting with the Tyrians, Sidonians, and Israelites, he is said

;

..

• •

•

•

•

t·o ha.ve recei ·ve1d trib 1ut 1e fr 1om them and 1''from Jehu,. the son of Omri.'' Thi ,s inscription occu·rs ,on the cel,ebrated B'lack Obelisk 1di,seovered ·many years ag·o 'b.Y Sir Hen~y .Rawlins .on

...

in the ruins of Ni.mtoud~ On it are represented string!., of captives with evident Jewi sh feature s, in the act of bringing their tribute to the Assyrian king. Now, though there is no men·tion in the sacred records of any defeat of Jehu by the Assyrians, nor of the paying of tribute by him) it is most natura .l tha ·t t·ribute shou.ld ha v,e been paid under t·h1e circum­stanc1es ; f1or· in the p1eriod sub.seq·u,ent t10 the: ba·ttle of Karkar, Damascus ha ·d turn 1ed again st Is :rael, s.o that J,sr·ael's :mos.t likely method of getting even with Ha:zael would have been to make terms wit'h his· ene1ny, and pay t·ribute, .as ,sh1e is sa·id to · ha, 1e do,ne, to Shalma .11ese.r.

•

0 z.'. 'h II dli II

I II t• ne 101 : t .e mo1st tmport ,an·t 1scovett 1es, giving rea 1ty t 10 10ld Testam ,ent history, , is that o·f the Moa:bi·te Stone, di .scov­ered at Dibon, east of the Jordan, in 1868, which was set up · by King Me 'sha ( about 850 B. C.) to signalize his deliverance from the yoke of Omri, king of Israel. The inscription is valuablej among other things, for its wit.ness to the civilized condition of the Moabites at that time and to the 1Close si.mi-•

larity of their language to , that of the Hebrews. From this inserip ,tion we learn that Omri, king 0£ Israel, was compelled by the rebellion of Me sha to resubjugate Moab; and that after, doing so, he and his son occupied . the cities of Moab fof a period of forty years, but that, after a series of battles, it was restored to Moab in the days of Mesha. Whereupon the cities a.nd fo.rt ·resses, reta ·ke'n w 1ere st ·rengthene 1d, an1d the country re-populated, whi le the methods of warfare were sifflilar t-0 those practiced by Israel. On comparing this :with 2 Kings 3 :4-27, we find a parallel account which dovetai ls in with this

'

i 111. a tno1st rema.rkable manner, though ·naturally the bib'lieal nar~ rative tr-eats lightly of the reconquest by lY;lesha, simply stating

•

•

•

Monuments to the truth of the Script.u-res. 11

that, on account of the horror created by the idolatrous sacri­fice of his eldest son upon the walls before them, the Israelites departed from the land and returned to their own country ..

THE EXPEDITION OF SHISHAK.

In the iourteenth chapter of 1 Kings we have a brief ac• count of an expedition of Shishak, king of Egypt, against Je­rusalem in the fifth year of Rehoboam. To the humiliation of Judah, it is told that Shishak succeeded in taking away the treas~res of the house of Jehovah and of the king's house, among them the shields of gold which Solomon had made; so that Rehoboam made shields of brass in their stead. To this simple, unadorned account there is given a wonderful air of reality as one gazes on the southern wall of the court of the temple of Amen at Karnak and beholds the great expanse of sculptures and hieroglyphics which are there inscribed to rep ... resent this campaign of Shishak. One hundred and fifty-six places are enumerated among those which were captured, the northernmost being Megiddo. Among the places are Gaza, Adullam, Beth-Horon; Aijalon, Gibeon, and Juda-Malech, in which Dr. Birch is probably correct in recognizing the sacr·ed city of J erusalem,-M alee Ii being the word for royalty.

ISRAEL IN EGYPT.

The city of Tahpanhes, in Egypt, mentioned by Jeremiah as the place to which the refugees fled to escape from Nebu• chadnezzar, was discovered in 1886 in the 1nound known as Tel Defennch, in the northeastern portion of the delta, where Mr. Flinders Petrie found not on1y evidences of the destruc­tion of the palace caused by Nebuchadnezzar, but apparently the very "brick work or pavement'' spoken of in Jer. 43 :8: "Then came the word of the Lord unto ] eremiah in Tahpanhes, saying, Take great stones in thine hand, and hide them in mor­tar in the btickwork, which is at the entry of Pharaoh's house in Tahpanhes, in the sight of the men of Judah," adding that

•

12 The .Fund'a,1nentats. · • . ~

Nebuchadnezz ,ar· woul 1d ''set his t.hrone upon thes,e stones,.'i and ·''spread his royal pavilion 1over them.'' .

A bri 1ck pl.atf orm in partial ·ruins, correspo11ding to this de.­scrip ·tion, w·as fo.un·d by Mr. Petri ,e adjoining ·the fort ''upon the north ·w·est.'' In every respect the arrangement corre- · sponded to that i·ndicated in the Book of Jeremiah .

•

•

Farther to the nortl1, not a gre ·at way from Tahpanhes, . on •

the Tanitic branch of the Nile, at . the modern village of San, excavations revealed the ancient Egyptian capital Tanis, which went under the earlier name of Z,oan, where the Pharaoh of tl1e oppression f requent1y made his headquarters. According to the Psalmist, it was in. the field of ''Zoan'' that Moses and

•

A.airon wrought thieir wonders before haraoh .i and, a 1ccording to th 1e Book of Numbers, ''Hebron'' was built on·ty seven years

·before .Zoan.. As Hebron w.as a. p1a,ce of importance before , Ab1raham's time, it is la matter of m·u.ch si.gnificance that Zoaa appears to have been an ancient c~t.y which was a favorite dwelling~place, of the Hyk sos, or . She·pherd Kings, w·ho pre­ceded the pe·riod of the Exodus, and w 1ere likely to b1e f 1rie·ndly to the Hebrews, thus giving greater cr·edib·il·ity to the ~precise statements made in Numbers, and to the wh·ole narrative of

• •

the reception 0£ the patriarchs in Egyp t. The Pharaoh of the Oppression, ''who knew not Joseph,''

is generally supposed to be Ran1eses II.,, the third king of the •

nineteenth dynasty, k.nqwn among the Greeks as S,esostrisl, one of the grea .test of the Egyptian monarchs. Among his most . important exl}editions was one dire~ted against the · tribes of

•

Pal 1estine an 1d Syria, where, at the b1attl 1e of Kadesh, east of •

the Leba·non Mountain s,, he encounte :red. the Hittit 1es. The , en~ •

counter ended practically in a drawn battle, after which a treaty of peace was n1ade. But the whole state of things! revealed

•

by this · campaign and subsequent eve·nts shows that Palestine w,as in sub1stantiaJly the same condition . of· affairs which was found by the children . of Israe :1 when they occupied it shortly after, thus confir111ing the Scripture ac 1count.

Monuments to the Truth of the Scriptures. 13

This Rameses during his reign of sixty-seven years was among the greate st builders of the Egyptian n1onarchs. It j

estimated that nearly half of the extant temple s were built in his reign, among which are tho se at Karnak, Luxor, Abydo ,

., Memphis, and Bubastis. The great Rames seum at Thebes is also his work, and his name is found carved on ahnost every monument in Egypt. His oppression of the children of Israel was but an incident in his rema rkable career. While ·engaged in his A iatic campaigns he naturally made his headquarter at Bubastis, ·in the land of Goshen, near where the old canal and the pre sent railroad turn off from the delta toward the

· Bitter Lakes and the Gulf of Suez. Here the ruins of the temple referred to are of immense extent and include the frag­ments of innumerable statues and monuments which bear th impress of the great oppressor. At length, also, his mummy has been identified; so that now we have a photograph of it which illustrates in all its lineaments the strong feature ~ of his character.

l'HE STORE CITIES OF PITHOM AND RAMESES. ,

But most interesting of all, in 1883, there were uncovered, a short distance east of Bubastis, the remains of vast vaults which had evidently served as receptacles for storing grain pre­paratory to supplying military and other expeditions setting out for Palestine and the far East. Unwittingly, the engineers of the railroad had named the station Rameses. But · from the inscriptions that were found it is seen that its original name Was Pithom, and its founder was none other than Rameses II., and it proves to be the very place where it is said in the Bible that the children of Israel "built for Pharaoh store-cities Pithom and Raamses" ( Ex. 1 : 11), when the Egyptians "made their liv,es bitter with hard bondage, in mortar and in brick." It was in connection with the building of these cities that the oppression of the children of Israel reached · its ~limax, when they were compelled (after the straw with which · the brick

•

•

t

14

were ; h,eld together failed) to gatl1er f:1or ·t]1e,1nselves stubbl ,e whic .h should se,rv1e tl1e purpo ,se, 1of straw, · and finally, when , ev·en the stub1ble failed,! to n1ak1e brick witl1out. straw 1(Ex .. 5).

Now, ·as th 1ese store pits at Pi.tl101m ·w·ere unt:.ov 1e,r·e1d by Mra., Petri e, they w,ere f 10Un1d ( u11.like anything else in. Egy ·pt) to be 'built .with mo·rtar. Moreover, ·the 1,ow,e1·· ,Jay1er ·~ were bu 'ilt of brick which contai1.1,ed stra .w, I while tl1e middle layers w·e·r·e made of b'rick in ·w·hich stub .hie, i11stead of stra ,w, h.ad be,e·n

•

use,1d in their £01 ... mation, ,a11d the upper la,y1ers w1er,e of bri.rck ma ,de 'Without str ,aw·,. A more perf ,ect cir ,cumstantial . confinna­tio1n of 'the Bi.bl1e ac.cou.nt could not be imagine id. Every .poin 't in the confir1nati 1on c,ons,i,s.ts of unexp 1ec.te:d discoveries . The use of · mo ,rtar js e:lsewh,ere unknown · i.n Ancie .nt Egypt, as isr the peculiar S1ucces:sio1n in the quality of the brick used 'in tl1,e c:onsit,ruction of· ·tl1e walls.

Thus 1 l1ave all Egyp ,tian explo,ration ,s, shown that the writ 1er .

of the Pentateuch had .such f,amiliarity with t'he country, t,h1e civilization, and th 1e his 'tory of Egyp ,t as coul1d have , been 1ob­tain1ed only by intimate, persona.I exper ,ie:n,ce. The le,af 1

, which '

is here given i,s ,in its right place. It ·co1uld not have 'bee,n. in-serte d except by a participant in. tl1,e events, or by . direct Di'"" vine :rev1elation.

T :tIE HIT·TITESa.

In J os.11ua 1 :4, tl1e CO·Ull try . between Lebanon , and the Eu­pbra te,s is cal]e ,d the , land of tl1e Hittites ., In 2 Sam. 214 :6 .. accor 1d_i11g :to the · r,eading 0 1£ tl1e S1ep1tuagint, t,he limit ,of · J oah's c,onquests was that of 'i'tl1e I-Iitti ·te.s. 1of Kades 1h,,'"' which is in

-· - I itf •t, -· •

Coe,Je Syria, som.e d1sta11ce north of the pr 1esent Baalbeck .. Solomon is a1s10 said t 10 have im.p.orted horses fr .om ''th ,e kings

I. of the Hittite ,s''1

; and wh,en the :.S1yria ·ns were besie :ging Samaria, acco,rding to 2 Ki ,ngs, 7 :6, they ,were , ,alarme 1d f riom f 1ear that

•

· th ,e1 king of Israel had hired against t11.e:m '' 'th,e kings of the Hittites ·.'' These re ,f·erences imply the e,xisi"t·ence 10 1f ·a strong , nation wi1de]y spr 1e·ad over the northe ·rn pa ,rt of Syria and 1the regi,ons 'beyo~nd. At the. s,ame time frequent mention is ·m,ad1e

•

•

•

•

•

•

" •

• M onu,,111ents ,to the Trutli of tlie Scriptu -re~"· •

of Hittite families in Pale .sti,ne itself. It was of a Hittite ( Gen. 23 :10) that Abral1am boug 'ht his burying -place at He .. bron. Bathsheba, the mother ,of Solomon, had been the wife of Uriah t' .. 1e Hittite, and Esau h,ad two H ·ittit 1e wives. Hittite ~

1a1·e also men ·tioned as dwelling with tl11e Jebusites ,and . orites in th.e mo·unt ,ain regi 1on of Canaa11.

Until tl1e d1ecip1herment of , the inscrip ,tions 011 the monu­inents , of E,gypt and Assyri ra, t,l1e· numero ,us re ,£ er ,ences in the Bible to this myst ,eri ,ous people were unconfirme ,,d by any other historical authorities, so that . many regarded the bib]ical state­ments as mythical, and an indication of the general untrust­worthiness of biblical history. A promin~nt English biblical critic declared not many years ago that an alliance between Egypt and th,e Hittites was as improbable as would be 10n 1e at th.re presen ·t time hetwee ·n Engla11d and the Cboct 1aws. B,ut, alas, for the 1over-confi 1de,nt criti 1c, recent investig·a·tions have 1

l1own, not only that s,t1ch an allianc 1e was natura ,l, but that it a,ctually occurred.

From tl1e mo11uments of Egypt we .learn that Thothmes III. I of tl1e eighteenth dynasty, [ in 1470 B. C., marched to the banks

of the Euphrates and received tribute fro ,m ''the Greater Hit­tites'' to t·he amount of 3,2001 pounds of silver and a ''great

•

piece of crystal .. '' Seven years later tribute was again sent f ro 1m '~tl1e king , of the Gr,eate,1· Hittite land.,' '' Later, Ame-nophi .s III. and IV. are said, in the Te 1l el-Amarna tablets, to have been constantly ca,lled up 1011 'to aid in re,p·elling the at­

. tacks of the Hittite king, who ca1ne down from the no 1rt~1

and intrigued . witl1 the dis1affected Canaanitish tribes , in Pale .s-tine; while in B. C. 1343, Rameses the Great attempted to capture the Hittite capital at Kadesh, bttt was unsucces 1sfu1, and

•

came near losing his life in the attempt, extricating himself from an ambuscade only by most heroic deeds of valor~ Four

· year .s later a treaty of peace was signed between the Hittites a'nd the Egyptians, and a daughter of· the Hittite king was given " " 111 1narr1age· to Ram1es,es. ·

•

•

•

• •

•

•

•

r

•

•

•

16 • •

'

The A .ss,yrian monu1nents also bear a·bundant · testimony to . the p 1rominence of · tl1e I-Iitti ·tes north and west of the Euphr ·ates, of which the mo 1st pron1inent ,state w .as tl1.at witl1 ·it .s capital ·a.t. Carchemis :11, in tl1.e time 0 1f Tiglath -pile ser I., # about 1100 B. C.. In .8.54 B. C, Sh,al.m.aneser II .. i11clt1d1ed the kings of Is­rael, of A1nmon,. and of the Arabs, amon ,g tl11e ''Hittite ·''' pri11ces wl1om l1e had subdu 1ed, thus bea1~ing n1,os1t emphat .ic testimo~y to the prominence which they assumed in his estimation. ~ . The C'ttneiform inscrip ·ti.1on.s of Armenia also spea .k of mu• merous wars with the Hittit 1es, and descri 'be ''the land of the Hittites ,'' · as , extending far westward fro ,m the · b,anks of ' the Eupl1ra 'tes1. · ·

Hittite sculptures and i11scriptions are now traced in abuD­,dance from Kadesh, in Coele Sy ria , we .stward . to Lyd:i.a, in Asia .. Minor, and nortl1ward to the Black Sea bey,011d Marsova.n. Indeed, the exten .siv·e r'uins, of Boghaz-I(eui, ·,sev,enty-·fiye miles southwest 10£ Marsov lan, see1n to mark tl1e principa ·t capita.I of the Hittites. Here partial excavations l1ave alrCady re­vealed sculptures of high artistic order, representing deities, warr ·iors and amazons, together with many hiero .1glyphs which have not yet been translated. The inscriptions are written in both directio 111s, from ·t,eft to ·r·ig'ht, and -'then below back ·from right to left. Similar inscriptions are found in numer­ous other places. No clue to their meaning has ye.t been found, and even the cl:a.ss of Iangu .ages t:o whi ,ch ·they belo1ng has not been disco ·ver 1ed. But e·nough isl known ·to1 show that , the Hit- · tites exerted considerable in·fluence upon the later ,civi'lizatio·n which sprung Up in Greece and on the western coasts of Asia Minor. It was through them that the emblem of the winge(l horse made its way into E ,urope. The mural crown carved upon the head of some of the godde sses at Boghaz-Keui also passed into Grecian sculpture ; while the remarkable lions s,culp­tured over the gate at Mycenae are thought to represent Hittite,

"

rather than B,aby loni ,an a1·t~ · It is impo ssible to overestimate the value of this testin1ony ,

' • • -

•

.. •

•

in confirmation of the correctness of biblical historJ. It shows •

conclusively that the silence of profane historians regarding facts stated by the biblical writers is of small account, in face of ditect statements made by tl1e biblical historians. All the doubts entertained in former times concerning the accuracy of the numerous biblical statements concerning the Hittites is now seen to be due to our ignorance. It w,as pu1·e ignorance, not

•

su,per.ior knowledge, which led so 1nany to dis1credit t·t1ese rep-resentations. w ·he·n shall we lea·rn the inco1nclusiveness of neg-. ' ative testimony ?

,

THE TEL EL-AMARNA TABL .ETS, • • .

In 1887 s10.me Ar ,abs dis1covered a wond.erf til C'ollec·tion 1of tablets at Tel el-Amarna, an obscure settlem .ent on the east hank of the Nile, about two hundred miles above Cairo and a~ut as far below Thebes. These tablets were of clay~ which had been written over with cuneiform inscriptions, such as are

•

found in Babylonia, and th,en burnt, . ,so as t 10 · be indestructi-ble. When at length the inscriptions were deciphered, it ap. peared that they were a collection of official letters, which had been sent shortly before 1300 B. C. to the last kings .of the

1 eigh·teenth dynasty., .

• There ·were in all about th·re,e hundred letters, most of which

were from officers of the Egyptian army scattered over Pales-tine to . maintairi the Egyptian rule which · had been established by the preceding kings, most prominent of whom was Tahu­times III., who flourished about one ht1ndred years ea:rlier. But many of the letters were from the kings alld prince~ of Babylonia. · What surprised the world most, however, was that

, this correspondence was carried on,. not in the hieroglyphic . script of Egypt, but in the cuneiform script of Babylonia.

All this was par ·tly explained when more became known about the character of the Egyptian king to whom the letters

•

were addressed. His original title , was Amenho ,tep IV., in-dicating that he was a priest of the sun god who is, wot$hiped

•

•

•

•

-

•

•

.. "'

18 ...

.

at ~ebes. But in his anxiety to introduce a reli~ous reform he changed his name to Aken -Aten, Aten being the name of the deity wor shipe1d at Heliopoli s, near Cairo, where Joseph got his wife. The effort s of Aken-Aten to transform the re-. ligious worship of Egypt were Prodigious. The more· perf e.ctly to accomplish it, he removed his capital from Thebes to Tel el­Amarna, and there collected literary men and artists and archi­tects in great number s and erected temples and palaces, which,

•

after being buried in the sand with all their treasures for more th.an three thousand year s,. were discovered by some wander­in.g A.rab,s twenty-tw ,o ,ye.ar .s ago ..

1 A number of the longest and mo,st interesting of the let-ters are those which passed between the courts of Egypt and tho se of Babylonia. It appear s that not only did Aken-Aten marry a daughter of the Babylonian king, but his mother and grandmother were me_mbers of the roya.1 .family in Babylonia, and also that one of the daughter s of the king of Egypt had been sent to Babylonia to become the wife of the king. All this comes out in the letters that passed b,ack and forth relat~ ing to the dowry to be bestowed upon these daughters and relating to their health and welfare .

•

From these letters we learn that, although the king of Baby-lon had sent his sister to be the wife of the king Of Egypt, that was not sufficient. The king of Egypt requested also the daughter of the king of Babylon. This led the king of Ea.bylon tO say that he did 11ot know how his sister was treated ; in fact,. he. did not know whether she was alive, fer he tould not tell whether or not to, believe the evidence which came J to hitt.L In response,. the ki11g of Egypt. wrote : ''Why don't

I

you send some o~e who knows your sister, and whom you can trust ?~' Whereupon the royal co,rrespondents break off into .

discussions concerning the gifts which are to pass between the two in consideration of their friendship , and inti1nate re,lations.

Syria a:nd Palestine were at this time also, as at the pres­ent day, infested by robbers, and the messengers passing be~

- •

•

• •

•

•

Monuments to the Truth of the Scriptures. 19

tween. these royal , ho~s ,es were occasionally waylaid. Where.• upon the one who suffered loss w.ould claim da1nages ftrom the other if it was in his territory, because he had not properly pro­tected the road. An intere sting thing in connection with one of ·these robberies is that it took place at ''Hannathon,'' one of the border towns mentioned in Josh. 19 :14, but of which noth,­ing else was ever known until it appeared in this unexpected manner. ·

Most of t'he Tel el-Amarna letters, however, consist of those which were addressed to the king of Egypt (Amenhot ,ep IV.) by his officers who were attempting to hold the E ,gyptian for­tr,esses in Syria ,and Palestine against various enemies who were pr.essing hard upon them. Among tl1ese were the Hit­tites, of whom we hear so much in later times, ana who, com­ing down from the far north, were gradually extending their colonies into Palestine and usurping 1control over the northe1tt1 part 1of the c.ountry.

About sixty of the letters are from an officer narned Rib­addi, who is most prof use in his expressions of humility anti loyalty, addressiqg the king as ''his lord'' and ''sun,'' and call· ing himself the ''footstool of the king's feet,'· and saying th~t l1e ''prostrat ,es himself seven times seven times at his feet.'' He compJ.ains, however, that he is not properly supported in atis efferts to def end the provinces of the king, and is constantly

•

wanting more saldiers, more cavalry, more money, mane pr.~ visions, more everything. So frequent a.re his importunities that the king finally tells him that if he will write less and fight mere he, would be better pleased, and that there w1ould be more hopes of his maintaining his power. But RitJ.;addi says that he is being IJetrayed by the ''curs'' that are su:r.rounding him, who represent the other cot1ntries that pretend to be friendly to Egypt, but are no,t.

F. am this correspondenee, and from letters friom the h of Pales ,tine, it ·is made plain that the Egypti .an power was fast losing its hold of the country, tlius preparing ffie way for

•

•

•

•

•

•

• .... •

20 The Fu1idamentals . •

the 1Condition 0 1f things which prevailed a century o.r two later, when J oshNa took possession of the promised lan 1d, and found no resistance 1except from a number of disorganiz .ed tribes then • • 1n possession. .

In this varied correspondence a la.rge number of places are mentioned with which we are familiar in J3ible history, among t.hem Da~as icus, Sidon., Lachi sh, Ashkelon ., Gaza, Joppa, ,a·nd. J erusalern" Indeed, several of the 1ett·ers are written £ ro·m J e­ru~alem b1y one Abd-hiba ., who complains that so1me one is slan ­dering him to the king, cha .rging that he was in r·evolt against hisl lord ,. This, he says, the king ought to know is ap1surd, from the fact that ''11either my father nor my mother appointed me to ·this place·. The strong arm of the king inaugurated me in my father's territory . . Why should I commit an offense against my lord, the king?'' The a·rgumen ·t being that, , a,s. 'h,i.s, office is not hereditary, but one which is held by the king's favor and app 1ointm ,ent, his loyalty sh 1ould b~ ~hove q·u1estion.

A single one of these Jerusalem . Je,tters may suffic,e for a? illustration :, ·

''To :My Lord the King: Abd-hiba, your servant . At the •

feet of my .lord the king, seven and seven times I fall. Behol1d t~e deed which Milki-il and Suardata have done ,against the land of my .Jord the king they have hire ·d the soldiers of ~Gazri, of Gimti and of Kilti, and have taken the territory of Rubuti . The territory of the king is. lost to Habiri. And now, indeed, a ci,ty of the territ 1ory of J1erusa ,]em, called Bit-Ninib, one of the cities of the king, has been lost t~ the p1eople of Kilti ,. Le 1t the king listen to Abd .-hiba, his servant, and send troops that

•

I may bring back the king's land to the king. For if there ar 1e no troops, the J,and of the king will b1e lost to the Habiri. This is the deed of Suardata and Milki-il * * * [defective], and let 1the ki'ng take ,care ,of his land.'' ' . .

The discovery of these Tel el-Amarna letters came like a flash ,of lightning , upo 1n the si1cho]arly wo ·r .ld~ J,n this case the overturning of a few ,spadefuls of earth let in a flood of~light

I

•

' ..

M onumetits to tlie Trittli of the Scriptures. 21

upon the darke st por tion of ancient l1istory, and in eve,ry way co 1nfirmed the Bible story.

· As an official letter -writer, Rib -ad di has had few equals', and he wrote on ma terial which the n1ore it was burned the longer it lasted. Those who think that a history of Israel could not l1ave been written in Moses' ti1ne, and that, if. written • it ·could not have been preserve .d, a1·e reasoning witho ut due kn.owledge of the fact s. Cons i.dering tl1e habits of the time., it would have . been well nigh a miracl 1e if Moses and his b.and 10£ as,.sociat.e,s, co.nting out of Egypt had not l,ef t it,pon imperish a-

. 'hie 1clay tablets , a record of the striking events 1 through which th 1ey passe,d. .

• • •

ACCURACY OF GE,QiGRAPHICAL , DETAILS.

Many persons doubtles s wonder w·hy it is that the Bible . . so abounds in ''uninteresting'' lists of nameS both of perso ns and places which seem to have no relation to modern times or •

current events .. Such, however, will cease to wonder when the.y come to see the relation which the·se lists sustain · to our confidence in th ·e trustwo 1rthiness of the records ,containing them. The ,y are li.ke the water-mar ,ks in paper, which bear in­delibl,e evidence of the time .and place o·f manufactu ,re., If, f urthe·111more.'1 one · should contemplate pers ,9nal explorations in Egypt, Canaan ., or Babylonia , he would find tha .t for his pur-

. poises the most interesting and imp,ortant portions of the Bible , • •

•

Would be these very li.sts of the n.an1e·.s of persons 1an1d places which seeined to encumber the histori ,cal books of the Ol 1d Tes .. tam 1ent.

•

" One of the most striking peculiaritiCs of the Bible is the ·'tong l~k'' · toward the permanent · wants of mankind Which is e·verywhere manifeste ,d in its pr :eparation; so that it circulat ·e5 best in · its entirety. No man knows enough to abridge the Bible without impairing lts usefulnes s. The parts which the

' -reviser would cut out as sup.erfluous are sure, very soon, to be found to be ''the · more necessary.'' If we find that we have not any use for any po1rtion of the Bible, the reason do11btless

• • •

•

•

•

•

•

•

• •

•

•

22 The Fundamentals. •

(

is that we have n1ot lived long enough, or have not had suffi-ciently wide ex .perience to test its merits in all particulars 1

•

· Gezer w·as an important place ·in Joshua's tirne, b1ut it aft ,er·­ward became a heap of ruins, and its Jocation was unknown 11ntil 18,70., when M. Cler1nont-Ganneau disco 1vered the site in Tel J ezer, and, on excavating it, found three inscriptions, which on int.erpreta.tio:n read ''Boundary of Gezer.'' -

Among the places conquere ,d by Joshua one of the 1no,st im­portant and difficult to capture was Lachish (Josh. 10 :31). ·This , has but recently b1e·en identifie,d in Tel el-Hes.y, about eighteen miles nort heast of Gaza. Extensive excavations, first in 1890 by Dr. Flind 1ers Petr ie, and finally by Dr. Bliss, found a lsucces,siori 0 1f· ruins, one belo1w the othe ,r, ·the lowet founda­tions of which extended back to about 1700 B. C., some time be-

. f or 1e th .e p1erio 1d of . conquest, showing at that time a walled city of great strength. In tl1e deb,ris somewhat high1er tha11

· this there was found a tablet with cuneiform inscriptions cor­r1esponding t,o the Tel el-A1narna tabl 1ets 1

, wh.ich are known ·to have been sent to Egypt from this region about 1400 B. C. At a later .period, in t·he time 10£ S·ennacherib, Lachish was !1:s­saulted and take ,n by the Assyrian army, and the account of th,e siege form s one ,of the m,ost conspicuous scenes on the walls 1of· Sennacherib's palace in Ninevel1. These sculptu.,res

'

»are now in the British Mu seum . ng th ie p·laces menti ,0111ed in the Tel el-Amar n,a corre-

.spondence from which letters were sent to Egypt about l'+I B. ·C., are Gebal, Beirut, Tyre, Accho (Acre), Hazor, Jop ·pha, Ashkelon, Makkad .ah, .Lachis,h, Gezer, J1erusalem; while men-

, tion is also made of Rabbah, Sarepta, Ashtaroth, Gaza, Gat]1, Bethsh ,e:ine sh, al] o,f whi 1ch are familiar names, showing that the Palestine of J oshtta is the Palestine known to Egypt in the preceding century. Tw10 hundred years before this, (about '1600 B ~ C.) also, Thothmes III. 1Conque·re,1d Pales .tine, and giv,es in an inscription the names of more than fifty towns which can be confidently i,d,entified with those in 'the Book of Jo,shua .

• •

•

• •

•

M o,iu,ments to ,the Truth of the Scriptures. . 23

Finally, the forty-two stations named in N uin. 33 as camp­ing places for the children of Israel on their way to Palestine, while they cannot all of them be identified, can be determined in ufficient number s to show tl1at it is not a fictitious 1ist, nor a mere pilgrim's diary, since t'he scenes of greatest interest, like the region immediately about Mount Sinai, are specially adapted to the great tran sactions which a1 .. 1e re·corded as taking · p'lace. Besides, it is, incredi 'ble tl1at a writer of fiction should have encumbered his pages with such a barre ,n cata lo,gue of place s. But as part of t'he great histo'r'ical movem 1ent they are perfectly ~pprop ,,riate.

This , conformity of ' newly di scove1--ed facts to tl1e n.arrative o,f Sacr 1ed Scripture ,confirm s our confidence in the 1nain tes­timony ;. just as the consistency of a witne ss in a cros s~exami:na­ti 1011 up,on mino1· and incidental p1oi11ts estah lis,hes confidence in his g·eneral t 1es,timo11y. T 'he lat 1e S1ir Walt 1er Bes 1ant, in addi­tion to his other lit1erary and philanthropic lab,ors, was for 111any years secreta .ry· of the Palestine Exploration Fund . In reply to the inquiry whether the work of the sttrvey un 1d.er his direction si1,st1aine,d the h.i.storica l character of the Old Testa­ment, he says,: ''To my mi11d, absolute truth in local details, a t.hing which cann iot possibly he invented, when it is spread

' . over a history covering many centuries, is proof almost ah· solute as to the truth ,of the things related.'' Stich proof we have for every part of the Bible .

•

THE FOURTEENTH OF GENESIS. ' .

The fourteenth chap ·ter of Genesis ·relates that ''In :toe days of Amraphel, kin.g of Sl1inar, Arioch, king of Ellasar,

. Chedorlaomer, king of Ela 1n, and Tidal, king of Goiim ( na­tions), they made war with Bera, Icing of Sodo111, and with Ber sha, king of Gomorrah , and Shinab, ki11g of Admah, and Shemeber, king of Zeboim , and the king of Bela ( the same i~ Zoar).'' The Babylonian king s were successful and ·the region about the D1ead Sea wa s subject to, tl1em f'or twelve years, ,\rl1en

• •

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

24 The F ie1·idamentals. •

a rebellion was instigated and in the · f 9llowing year C!,1edor­laomer and tl1e kings that were wit l1 l1im ap1peared 011 the scene an 1d, aft e:r capturi ng nume1-ou,s su1,.rounding cit,ies, joined battl .e with the rebellious allies in the vale of Sidd im, which was full of slime pits. T 'he vic ·to1·y of Chedo 1~taon1er ,was co1mplete , a11d after capturin .g Lot and his goods in Sodom he started ho1ne­ward by way of D·amascus, near whicl1 place Abra l1am ove1·­too1k him, and by a suc1cessful s.trat .agem sca tter ,ed his f,orces by night and recovered Lot and l1is goods. This sto14 y, told with so many deta ils tl1at its, ref uta ,tion w,ould be easy if it we1·1e no.t true t,o the facts a.nd i.f there \\'ere co11temporary records with which to con1pare it, has been a special butt for the ridicule of the Higher C1·itics of t1ae Wellhausen school , Professo .r Nol­deice confidently declaring as lat e as 1869 that critici sm had forever disproved it s claim to be historical. But he ·re again th 1e inscriptio11s on the mon11n1cnts ,of Babylonia have C1ome to tl1e rescue of the sacred historian, if , indeed, he were in

•

need of rescue ·. (For . where gene :ral i.gnorance · was so pr 10-

found as it was resp 1ec.ting that period forty years ago, true modesty should have , suggested caution in the express ·ion of posi,tive 0 1p·i·nions in contradi 1ction to sucl1 ,a 1detailed historical .

.

statement as this is.) . . Fro1n the , inscriptions already dis1covered and deciph 1er 1ed

i~ thie Va,lley of the Euphrates, it is now shown beyo1nd rea­sonab1e dottbt that the four king s menti 1oned in the B.ible

•

as, j1oini11g in tl1is expedition are n1ot, as was f reeiy said, ''etyn10-JogicaJ inventions,'' but real hist,orical p1ersons. . raphel is identified as the Hammurabi w·hose marvelous code of laws was so recently dis 1covered b,y De Morg ,an at Susa. The ''H'~

~ .

in the latter word simpl,y expre sses the rough breathing so well known in Hebr 1ew. Tl1.e ·''p' 1

' in the biblical name has , take ·n the . place of ''b'' by a well .-recognized law of phonetic change. ''Amrap'' is equivalent to ''Ha.mrab .'' The addition of ' 1'il' 1

' in the b1iblical name is P'robably the suffix of the di­vine nam .e, like '' 1el'' in Israel. . ; • •

• • •

•

• • •

•

\

• •

M o,numents to the T1'uth of tlte Scriptu1"es. 25

· Hammt1rabi is now k11own to have l1ad ~1is capital at Baby­lon at the time of Abraham. Until recent1y this chronolgy was dispu ted, so tl1at the editors and contributors of the New Schaff-Herz 0g Cyclopedi .a dog1natically asserted tl1at as Abra­ham lived nearly 300 year - late r than Han1murabi, the bib­lical story mttst be unhistorical. I-Iarclly had these statements been printed, however, when Dr. Kina of the British Museum discovered indi spt1tab,le evidence th~t two of the dynasties which . formerly had bee11 reckoned as co,nsecutive were, in fact, contemporaneou , thus maki11g it easy to brin .g Hammu-rabi's time down ei actly to that of bral1am. .

Chedorlaomer is pretty certainly id 1entified as Kudur-Laga­mar ( serv a.nt of ,Lagan1ar, one oft .he principal Elamite gods) ,. Kudt1r-Lagamar was king of Elan1, and was eitl1er the father

•

or the brother of Kudur-lVI~bug, whose son, Eri-Aku ( Ari-,och), ,reig11ed over Larsa and Ur, and o,ther citi,es of soutl1ern Babylonia. H ,e speaks of Kudur-~abug ''as the father of tl1e 1and of the Amorites,' '' i. e., of Palestine and Syria.

Tidal, ''king of nati ,ons,'' was sup,po·sed by Dr. Pinches to1

be referred to on a .late tablet in co1nnection with Chedor­laomer and Arioch under the 11ame T11dghula, who a1·e said, together, to have ''attacked and spoiled Babylon.'' · ·

However much doltbt ·there may be about the identifica­tio·n of some of tl1ese names, tl1e main points are established, revealing a condition of things just such as is implied by the . biblical narrative. Arioch styles himself king of Shumer aqd Accad, which embraced BabylonJ where Amraphel (Ham­murabi) w.as in his early years subject to him. This . furnishes a reason £or the associatio ,n of Chedorl ,aomer and Amraphel in a campaign against the reb 1eliious sub,jects in Palestine. Aga,i·n,, Ku .dur-Mabug, the father of Ari,och, st.y]es himself ''Prince of the land of Amurru,'' i. e., of Palestine and Syria . Moreover, for a long period befo1·e, kings from Babylonia had claimed 'possession of th,e wl1ole eastern sl1ore of the Mediterranean, including the Sinaitic Peninsula .

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

'

•

In light o,f these well -atte sted facts, one read s with aston­ishment the fol lowing word s of W ellhau sen, written no longer ago tl1an 1889 : '' That f 10L11- king s f r,om tl1e Persian Gulf should,, 'in the time ,of Abr·,aham,' have 1nade an incur sio,n int,e the Sinaitic P 1eninsula, that they should on this oc1casio11 have attacked five kinglet s on the Dead Sea Littoral and have car­ried them off pri sone rs,, and finally that Abraham shottld have set OU't in pur suit of the retreatin g, victor ,s, accompanied by 318 men s,ervants, and have fo 1rced , them to disgorge tl1eir prey, ,all the se incidents are sheer impo ssibilities which gain 11othing in credibility from the fact tl1at they are placed in a world which had passed away." .

And we c,an, have littl e r,e,,spect for tl11e ]o,g,ic of a lat,er scho 1lar ('George Adam S1nith), wh o can write the following:

•

''We must admit that while archreology has richly illustrated the possibility of the 1nain outl .ines of the Boo,k of G·e11esis from Abraha1n .to Josepl1, it ha,s not one whit of p1roof to 1

o,ff er £or· the personal exis:te:11ce 0 1r the character 1s o·f t'h,e patri­~rchs, themselves. This is the whole change archreo·tog)' has wrot1ght; it has given us a background and an atmosphere for the stories of Genesis; it is t1nable to recall or certify theiri ) '' 1eroes,.

•

But 'tl1e · name, Abrahatn does appear in tablets ,of the ag~ of Hammurabi . ( See Professor George Barton in Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 28, 1909, page 153.) It is true that

, thi s evidently is ,not 'the Abra 'h,am of the Bible, b·u,t that of a small farme ,r who l1a,d rent ed land of a well-to-do I.and owner. The p 1r,e,servation of l1is na1ne is due to the fact that the most of the tabl 1ets pre served ,contain contracts relating to the business of the time s. There is little reason to expect that we should find a definite reference : to the , Abraham who in early ]if e migrated f ro 1m his native I.and. But · it is of a good deal of

j • - - •

s·tgntficance that his name appears to have b~en a con11non one in the time and ·place of his na tivity.

In considering 'the arguments , i,n tl1,e caseJ it isl important to -

•

' • •

•

•

•

; •

• • • •

keep in mind that where so few facts are known, and general • ignorance is so great, negative evidence is 10£ .small account, wh ile every scrap of po,sitive evidence has great weight. The burden of proof in such cases falls upon tho se who dispute the positive evidence. For example, in the article above re­ferred to, Profes sor Barton argues that it is not ''quite cer­tain'' that Arioch (Eri-Agu) was a real Babylonian king. But he admits that our ignorance is such that we must admit its ''possibility.'' Dr. Barton further argues that ''we have as .· yet no 1evi,dence from the inscriptions that Arad-Si ·n, ev·en if he were caIIe.d Iri -Agu , ever l1ad anything to do with Ham- , . tnurabi.'' .Bu·t., he adds, '''0 1f co,urse, it is posl,sible that h,e may · have had, as their reigns must have overlapped, but that re-

. b d '' mains to e1 prove . All such reasoni11g ( ,and there is any atno,u~t of it ·in ·the

critics of the preval 1ent scl10,ol) reveals ,a ]amen .table lack in tl1ei,r l.ogi1c.al training. When we have a rep·utable do1cument . containing positive histo 1rical state1nents which are s'hown by cir,cumsta11tia1 evidence to be possibl .e, that is all W·e need to accept them as true. When, further, we fin.d la gr1eat amo·unt of circutnsta11tial evidenc ,e p 1ositiv,ely showing that . the sta te­ments conform to the co11ditions o,f time and place, s,O· fa,r a.s we know ·them, this ad 1ds imme1nsely to· the weight of the tes­titno ,ny. We . never can fill in . all the background of any his­torical fact. But if the statement of it fits into, the background so far as we can fi]J it in, we ,sh,ould ,a1ccept th ,e fact until posi~ tive contrary evidence is pro ,c.Iuced. No supposition can be tnore extravagant than that which Profess ,or Bar ton .seems to accept 1

( which i,s that of the 1Ge1rman critic, Meyer ·) that a Jew, tnore than l, 1000 years after the ·event, obtained in B,abylon the

•

amount ·Of exact inf o·rma ,t.io11 concerning the conditions in Babylonia in Abraham's time, found in the fourteenth chapter of Genesis, and ip.terpolated the sto,ry of Chedor]aomer's ex- . pedition ·into the , b.ackground thus furnish ·ed, To entertain such

•

•

\

•

•

• •

•

I

..

28 The F un,damentals. •

a supposition discredits the prevalent critical scholarship, rather than the Sacred Scriptures.

But present space ·for bids further e11umeration of particit­lars. J,t is sufficient to say th ,at while n1any more positiv 1e con­firmations of the ,seemingly i1nprobabie statem ,ent ,s of the sa­cred historians · can h,e adduced, there have been no dis~overies which ne ,cessat·il ,y contravene tl1eir statem ,ents. The cases al­ready l1ere enumerated relate to such widely separated time s an 1d ,places ,, and iurni s1l1 explanatio ,ns so unexpect ,ed, y 1et na ,tu- ,

ral, t 10 difficultie s that have been tho11ght insuperable, th,at their testimony can11ot be ignored or rejected. That this history s,hould be co,nfirmed in so many cas 1es and . in such a remarka- . ble manner by monuments uncovered 3,000 years after their ere~,tion, can be nothing else tl1an providential. Su ,rely, God has seen to1 it that the failing faith of these later days should not be left to 1 grope in 1darkness. When tl1e faith of many wa:s wanin .g and many heralds of truth we1·e tempted to speak with uncertain sound, the very stones have cried out wjth a

•

voi 1ce th,at only the deaf · could fail to he ,ar. Bo ,th in the writ-ing and in the preservation of the Bibl,e we behold the l1andi-Work of God. · .

• •

• •

• • •

•

•

•

• •

• •

•

• .. •

• •

• •

• •

• .. •

• t

• • • • •

-•

I •

•

• • • •

•

• • •

• •

• CHAPTER II. , •

• •

TfIE RECENT 'T'ES 1TIM ,QNY OF ARCHAE 10LOGY TO THE SCRIPTURES. ·

• •

BY M ,. G. KYLE, D. D., LL. D., . •

• • EGYPTOLOGIST •

• •

• PROFESSOR 10F BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGY, XENIA

,S.EMINARY ,.

THEOLOGICAL

'CONSULTING .EDITOR OF 'THE RECORDS : OF THE PAST, WASH-'

• • • INGTON, D. C • '

· (The n·umber 's in parenthese .s tl1r,ough ,out this article refer t,o the notes at the end of the article.) ·

• •

•

• INTRODUCTI .ON •

''Recent'' ' is a dangerousl ,y capacious Word to intro.st to an - .

archaeologist. Anything this side of the Day of P 'entec_o,st is ''re ,c,ent'' ·in ·bib:(.i,ica:l a.rch,aieology. For this review, ho,wever, , anything ,since 1904 is accepted to be, in a general wa,y, the meaning of the , word ''rec ,ent.'' · · ·

''R 1ecent. test ,imony of arc ,ha 1eologyt' may be either the testi­rnon,y of recent discoveries o~ recent testimony of form~r dis­c,overi1es: ·· ~ new 'interpr ,etation, if it· be established t :0 1 be a true interpr ,etation, i,s a ,discovery. For to · uncover is not al­ways, to discover; indeed, the real value of · a di.scovery is not its emergence, but its significance, and the discovery · of its rea1 .significance is the re,al disc9very. · ' ·

The most i1nportant testimony to the Scriptures of this five,­year arch ,aeolo 1gical period admits of sonte clas,sification : ·

. .

I~ THE HISTORICAL S,ETTING Q,F THE P'ATRIAR,CHAL1 RE-, CEPTION IN EGYPT.

The ,reception in Egypt accord 1ed to Abraham and to J'acoh and bis sons<1 , and tl1e elevation of Joseph the~re<2, per-

• • 29

•

l

•

• •

•

•

30 The Fu1idame'1,itals. •

emptori]y demand ,either the acknowledgment of a mythical element in the stories, 0 1r the belief in a suitable historica 'l set­ting therefor. Obscure, insignificant, p,rivate citizens are not accorded such recognition . at a foreign and unfrien ,dly c,ourt .. While so1me have be,en conceding a mythical el,ement .in the stories cs>, archae ,ology has uncovered to view such appropriate historical setting that the patriarchs . are seen no.t to hav ·e been obscure, insignificant, private citizens, nor Zoan a foreign and unfriendly court.

The , presence ,of the Sem:i.tic tongue in Hyksos' territory •

has lo,ng been known<"); from still earlier than p,at .riarchal times until much later, the Phoenicians, first cousins of the He-

•

brews, di,d the forei ,gn b1usiness of the ,_ _ --ptians( 5>, as the I

English, t·h1e Germans, and t.he F ·rench do the foreign business

•

'

of the Chinese of today; and some familiarity, even sympa· th,y, with · Semiti ,c religion has · been strongl ,y suspected from the interview of 'the Hy'kso,s kings with the patriarchs< 1>; but the discovery in 1906'7', by Petrie, 0£ the great fortified camp at Tel-el-Yehudiyeh set at rest, in the, main, the biblical. question of the relation between the patriarchs and the Hyksos. The abundance of Hyks ,os scarabs and the almost total ab­senc.e of all others mark the camp as certairily a a:yksos · ca1np<8>; the original charact ,er of the fo·rtifications, be,for-e the Hyksos learned the builders' craft from the Egyptians, shows them to have ,depended upon the bow for def en.se<0> ;

and, finally, the name Hyksos, in the Egyptian :Haq Shashu' 10·i

''Be ,douin princes,'' brings out, sharp and cl,ear, ~the harmonious pie.tare of which we have had . glimpses for a long time, of the Hyksos as · wandering tribe·s of the desert, of ''Upper and Lower Rutben''< 11 >; i.e., Syria and Pal 1estine, northern and western Ar.abia,J ''Bow pe,ople''( 12> ,, a.s the E , tians called them, their traditional enemies as fa·r back as pyramid

· times<13 ).

Why, then, shoul.d not the, pa,triarchs have b.ad a roy.al re-• •

ceptien in Egypt? They were tl1emselves also the heads of •

"

•

•

I

• •

•

Recent Testim.ony of A ·rchaeo.lo,gy to t,he Scriptures. 31 •

wandering tribes of ''Upper and Lower Ruthen,'' in the tongue of the ptians, Haq S11asl1u, ''Bedouin princes'' '; and ,among princes, a prince i,s a prince, however small his principality. So Abraham, the Bedouin princ 1e, was accorded princely con- · si,deration at the Bedouin court in Egypt ; Joseph, the Bed.ouin

, ,s]a,ve,, became ag,ai:n the Be1douin prin 1c,e,· whe11 tl1e. wis,dom of God with him and his rank by birtlt became kno1wn. And

I Ja ,c1ob1 ,and his other so11s were welcome, with all their follow-ers and their wealth, as a valuable acquisition to the court

i party, a,Jways harasse ,d by the re sti,ve ,and rebe llious native , · Egyptians. This does not prove racial identirf between. the 1 Hykso .s an.d the patriarchs, but very close tribal reliati~nship ..

And thus every suspicion of · a 1nythical element in the na~-. rative of the reception accorded the patriarchs in Egypt dis­appears when archaeology has testified to tl1e true hi.storica1

•

setting.

II. THE HITTITE VINDICATION.

A second recent testimony of arcliaeology giv,e·s us tlie' gr't!lit Hittite vindic,ation. The Hittites have been, in one respect, the Trojans of Bible his,to·ry· ; i111dee·d, the inha ,bitants . of old · Troy were scarcely more in need of a Schliemann to vindica~e their claim to reality than the Hittites of a Winckle,r.. .

In 1904 one o,f the foremost archaeologists of Europe saitl to me: i,I do not believe there eve,r wer ,e s,uch people as .tne

· ~ittites, and I do not believe 'Kheta~ in the Egyptian inscrip­tions was meant for the ·name Hittites ,,.'' We will allow th.at

. archaeologist to be nameless now. But the ruins o,f Troy vin­dicated th,e right of her people to a place in real history, and the ruins of Boghatz-KOi bid fair to afford a more striking 'lindication of the Bible representation of the Hittites.

Only the preliminary announcement of ' Winckler' 's ~eat treasury of documents from Boghatz-Koi has yet been · · tnade<:1'>. T11e, complete unfo ilding 10£ a I1ong-ec]ipsed gr·eat

~

national history is still awaited impatiently. But -enough has

•

•

J

, • •

• • • • •

•

32 • The F'utidamentals. ,

•

.. •

been publishe 1d to redeem , this people completely from their half-mythical plight, ,and give them a firm place in sober history greater than i.magination ha 1d ever fancied for th,em under the stimulus of a~Y hint contained in the Bible .

•

There has, been . brougl1.t ·to li.ght a Hittite empire<15 > in •

Asia Mino 1r, with central power and vassal 1dependencies round about and with tr 1eaty rights on equal te :rms with the greatest

•

nations of antiquity, thus making t ·t1e Hittite power a third great p1owe,r with. Ba.b1yl.011i,a a·nd Egyp 1t, as, ·was, i.ndee'.1d,, f 1ore­shado,ved in the great treaty of the Hittites with Rame ,ses II _., inscribed on . 'the pro ,j'ecting wi11g of ·the south wall of the

•

Temple of Amon at Karnak< 10 >, though Rameses l tried s.o hard to obscure the fact. 1The ruins , at the village of Boghatz-K9i

•

are shown also to mark the location ,of the Hittite capital< 11 >,

and the unknown language on the cunei f orin tablets recov ,ered the1·e to be the Hittit ,e tonguec 1s>, while the cuneifor1n met,hod of writing, as already upon the Amarna ta 'bI1ets<11 >, so still mo.re clear .ly here, is seen to have been the diplomatic script, and in good measure th 1e Babylonian to have been the diplomatic Ian· gu~ge of the , Orient in that age.<10 >. And the large admixtu ,re

•

of Babylonian words and f o,1·rns in these Hittite inscriptioqs I

,open.s the way for the, r·eal d1ecipherment o( the Hittite lan--guage<21>., and imagination can scarcely promise too much to our hopes for the light which s1ttch a decipherment will th·row' upon tl1e historical and cultural backgr ·ound of the Bjble.

10 'nly one important point remains to be cleared up, the relation between the Hittite language of these cuneifo1·1n tab~ lets and the language o,f' the Hittit ·e hieroglyp ,bic inscrip­tion<·22). That these were identical is probable; that the , hiero­glyphic inscriptions rep·r,esent an older f'orm of tl1e language, a kind of '' .Hieratic," i,s possible ; th.at it was e.ssentially dif­f,erent from the language of thes 1e tablets is improba 'bl,e. There has bee1n the Hittite vin,dication ; the compleite illurni.n.ation o,f Hittite history is not likely to be long delay 1ed~

I

•

ri:r1

Recent Testimo ny of Archaeology to the Scriptur es. 33

III. THE PALESTI NIAN CIVILIZATION.

Other recent testimo ny of ar~haeology brings befor e us the Palesti nian civilizatio n of the conquest period. Palestinian explorations within the last few years have yielded a start­ling array of "finds" illustrating things 1nentioned in the Bible, finds of the same things, finds of like things, and finds in har­tnony with thing s <23 >. Individual mention of them all is here neither possible nor desirable. Of incomparably greater impor­tance than the se individually intere sting relics of Canaanite antiquity is the answer afforded by recent research to two questions:

1. First in order, Does the Canaanite culture as revealed by the excavations accord with the story of Israel at the con­quest as related in the Bible? How much of a break in culture 1s required by the Bible account, and how much is revealed by the excavations? For answer, we mu t find a standpoint somewhere between that of the dilettante traveler in the land of the microscopic scientist thousands of miles away. The careful excavator in the field occupies that sane and safe mid­dle point of view. Petrie<24>, Bliss<25>, Macalister<26 >, Schu­tnackerczn and Sellin <28>-the se are the men with whom to Stand. And for light on the early civilization of Palestine, the treat work of Macalister at Gezer stand s easily first.

HISTORICAL VALU E OF POT TERY.

In determining this question of culture, too much impor­tance has been allowed to that e timate of time and chrono­logical order which is gained exclu sively from the study of Pottery. The pottery remain s are not to be undervalued, and neither are they to be overvalued. Time is only one thing that shows itself in similarit y or dissimilarity in pottery. Dif­ferent stages of civilization at different places at the same titne, and adaptation to an end either at the same tin1e or at 'Nidely different times, show them selves in pottery, and render \tery uncertain any chronological deducti on. And , still more,

•

•

34 • TJie Fundame11tals .

•

available material may result in the production of similar pot-tet}7 in two very diff e1·en·i: civilizations arising one thousand )·ears or more apart. This civilization of pots, as a deciding criterion, is not quite adequate, and is safe as a criterion at all only wl1en carefully compared witl1 the testimony of loca­tion, intertribal relations, governmental domination, and liter­ary attainments.

These are the things, i11 addition to the pots, which help to dete1·1ninc' indeed, which do determine ho\v mucl1 of a break in culture is required by the Bible account of the Co11-quest, and l1ow much is shown by excavations. Since the Israelites occupied the cities and towns and vineyards and olive orchards of the Canaanites, and their ''houses full of all good thing£''<29 >, had the same materials and in the main the same purposes for pottery and would adopt methods of cooking suited to tl1e cot111t1·y, spoke the ''language of Ca­naan''<30>, and were of the sa111e race as 1nany of the people of Canaan, intermarried, thougl1 against their law<31 >, with the people of the land, and were continually chided for lapses into the idolatry and sttper titious practices of the Canaan­ites<32>, and, in short, ,vere greatly different from them only in religion, it is evident that tl1e onl)' n1arked, immediate change to be expected at the Conqttest is a change in religion, and that any othe1· break in c11lture occasioned by the devastation of ,var will be only a b1·eak in continuance of the same kind of culture, evirlence of demolition poliation, and reconstruc , tion. Exactly such change in religion and interr11ption in cttl· tttre at the Conquest period excavations sho\\ r.

RELIGIO 1\. ... :rn CULTURE.

(a ) Tl1e rubbish at Gezer sho, v l1istory in distinct layers j and the layers themsel\·es are in distinct groups< 33 >. At tl1e bottom are layers Canaanite not Semitic; above these, layer s Semitic, orite giving place to Jewish; and higher still, lay­er s of Jewish cultt1re of the monarchy and later ti1nes.

•

Rece1it Testiniony of A1,cJ1a.eology to t·lie Scriptitres. 35

• (b) The closing up of tl1e great tunnel to tl1e spring with-

111 the fortifications at Gezer is placed by the layers of his-tory in the rubbish heap at the period of the Conquest< 34 ~ But when a great fortification is so ruined and the power it represents so destroyed that it loses sight of its water-st1pply, surely the culture of the tin1e l1as had an interruption, thougl1 • it be not much changed. Then this tunnel, as a great engineer-• tng feat, is remarkable te 'timony to the advanced state of ci,,ilization at the time of its con truction; but the more ren1arkable the civilization it represents, the more terrible must have been the disturbance of the ct1lture v.rhich caused it to be lost and forgotten< 35>.

( c) Again, tl1ere is appa1·ent a11 enlargement of tl1e popu­lated area of the city of Gezer by encroaching upon the Temple area at the period of the Conquest <36 >, showing at once tl1e crowding into the city of the Israelites without the destruction of tl1e Canaanites, as stated in the Bible, and a corresponding decline in reverence for the saered inclosure of the High Place. While, at a time corresponding to the early period of the Mon­arcl1y<37>, there is a sudden decrease , of the populated area co1·re ponding to the destruction of the Canaanites in the city b)' the father of Solomon's Egyptian wife<38 >.

( d) Of startling significance, the hypothetical Musri Eg)11)t in N cr th Arabia concerning which it has been said <39 >

the pat1·iarcl1s descended thereto, the Israelites escaped tl1ere­f rom, and a princess the1·eof Solomo11 mar1·ied, l1as been final­ly a11d definitely di scredited. For Gezer was a marriage do\,yer of tl1at prince ss ,vhotn Solomon marr·ied <40 >, a por­tion of her father's dominion, and so a part of the supposed Mttsri, if it ever existed, and if so, at Gezer, then, we shot1ld fi11d so1ne evidence of this people and their civilizatio11. Of St1cl1 there is not a trace. But, instead, we find from very early times, but especially at this time, Egyptian remains in great abundance<41 >.

( e) Indeed, even Egyptia11 refinement and luxuries were

•

•

•

36 Tlze Fundanic1ztals.

not incongruous in the Palestine of the Conquest period. The great rock-hewn, and rock-buiit cisterns at Taa11nek<42 >, the remarkable engineering on the tunnel at Gezer< 43 >, the great forty-£ oot city wall in an Egyptian pictt1re of Canaanite war<4•>, the list of ricl1est Canaa 11ite booty given by Thoth1nes

•

III. <45 >, the fine ceramic and bronze ute.:.1silS and weapons recovered from nearly ever y Palestinia11 e_~cavation<16 >, and the literary revelations of the marna tablet sc47

, together with the reign of law seen by a comparison of the sc riptura l account with the Code of Hammurabi, sl1ow<49

> Ca11aa11ite civilization of that period to be f t1lly equal to that of Egypt .

( f) Then the Bible glimpses of Canaanite practices and the produets of Canaanite religion no\V uncovered e;~actly agree. The mystery of the High Place of the Bible narrative, with its sacred cave s, lies bare at Gezer and Taan11ek. 1""'11c sacrifice of infants, probably first-born, and the foundati on

. and other sacrifices of children, either inf ant or partly grow 11, •

appear .in all their ghastliness in various places at Gezer ancl ''practicaily all over the hill'' at Taannel(C 49 >.

(g) But the most ren1arkable te stimony of archaeol ogy of this period is to the Scripture representations of the spirit, ual monotheism of Is1·ael in its co11flict with tl1e horrible idola-­trous polythei sm of the Ca11aanites, the final overthro\V of tl1e latter and the ultimate triumph of the former. The historf of that conflict is as plai11ly written at Gezer in the gradt1al decline of the High Place and giving way of the revolting sac' rifice of children to the bowl and lamp deposit as it is in tl1e inspired account of Joshua, Judges and Samuel. And the line that marks off the territory of divine revelation in religioJl

•

from tl1e impinging heatheni sm round about is as disti11.ct a -that line off the coast of Ne\vfoundland where the cold ,vaters of the North "beat against the warm life-giving flow of the Gt1lf

Strean1. The revelation of the pade in Palestine is making to tand out every day more clearly tl1e revelation that God made­

Tl1ere is no evidence of a purer religion growing up ottt of •

•

•

· I?ecent Testiniony of Archaeology to the Scriptures. .37 • • •

tl1at vile culture, but rather of a purer religion coming down and overwhelming it.

2. Another and still more important question concerning Palestine civilization is, Wha t was the source and course of the dominant civilization and especially the religious culture re­flected in the Bible accou11t of the .millennium preceding and tl1e millennium succeeding the birth of .Abraham? Was it from without toward Canaan or from Canaan outward? Did Pal-

•

estine in her civilization and culture of those days, in much or in all, but I'eflect Babylonia, or was sl1e a luminary ?

•

PALESTINE AND BABYLONIA. •

The revision oi views concerning Palestinian civilization forced by recent excavations at once puts a bold interrogation point to the opinion long accepted by many of the source and course of re]igious influence during this f,ormative period of patriarchal history, and the time of the working out of the principles of Israel's religion into the practices of Israel's life. If the Palestinian civilization during this per iod was equal to that of Egypt, and so certainly not inferior to that of Baby­lonia, ,then the opinion t11at the flow of religious influence was then from Babylonia to Pa lestine must stand for its defense. Here arises the newest probletn of biblical archaeology.

And one of the most expert cuneiform scholars of the day, Albert T. Clay<3<>>, has essayed this problem and anno,unces a revolutionary solution of it by a new interpretation of well­known material as well as the interpretation of newly acqttired material. ~fhe solut ion is nothing less, indeed, than that in­~tead of the source of religious influence being Babylonia, and its early course from Babylonia into Palestine, exactly the ~everse is true. i'That the Semitic Baby lonian religion is an importation from Syria and Palestine (Amurru), that the crea­tion, <!eluge, ante-diluvian patriarchs, etc., of tl1e Bab,ylonian came .from . urru, instead of the Hebraic stories having come from Babylonia, as held by nearly all Semitic scholars.''

'

•

•

•

,

38 • T lze F it1ida1nc1itals .

This is startling and far reaching in its consequences, Clay's ,vork must be put to tl1e te t; and so it will be, before it can be finally accepted. It has, ho,vever, this initial advantage, that it is in accord with the apparent self-consciousness of the Scripture writers and, as ,ve have seen, exactly in the direction i11 ,vhich recent discoveries in Palestinian civilization point.

IV. PALESTINE A ,.D EGYPT.

Again archaeology has of late fitr1iished illuminatioti of certai1i special qitestions of bot/1, Old atid New Testa1ne1it

• • • criticism. 1. ''Light from Babylonia'' by L. W. King<51 > of the

British Museum on the chronology of the first three dynasties l1elps to deter·1nine the date of Harrunu .rabi, and so of Abra­I1am' s call and of the Exodtts, and, indeed, has introduced a corrective element into the chronology of all subsequent his-­tory down to the time of David and exerts a far-reaching influence upon many critical questions i~ which the chron-­ological element is vital.

SACRIFICE IN EGYPT.

2. Tl1e entire absence from the offerjngs of old Egyptian religion of any of the great Pentateuchal ideas of sacrifice, . ubstitution, atonement dedication, fellow hip, and, indeed, of almost every essential idea of real sacrifice, as clearly estab­lished by recent ,~ery exhaustive examination of the offering scenes <52 >, makes for the element of revelation in the Mosaic ystem by delimiting the field of rationalistic speculation on the

Egyptian side. Egypt gave nothing to that system, for she 11ad nothing to give. .

THE F UTURE LIFE I _ T H E PE TATEUCH.

3. Then the grossly materiali tic character of the E -tian conception of the other ,vorld and of the future life, and the fact, every day becoming clearer, that the so-called and

•

•

•

Recetit Testimony of Archaeology to the Scriptiires. 39

.~ s?-much-talked-about resurrection in tl1e belief of the Egyp­, i tians was not a resurrection at all, but a resuscitation to the ,e: sa~e old life on ''oxen, geese, bread, wine, beer, and al! good

Pentateuchal documents. For, whether they came from Mose s when he bad just come from Egypt or are by some later author !attributed to Mo 1ses, ,when 11,e had just come from Egypt, the problem is the same : Why is tl1e idea of tl1e resurrection so

tion the 1de,a of · the resurrection at tl1at time, be£ 01 .. ,e tl1e ,growth of s,piritual j,,deas of Go 1d ~nd of worship here, of the

11 other world and the future life the~e, and before tl1e people

r,

tJ under th 1e influence of these new ideas had outgrown their r ~gyptian training, wo,uld have carried over into Israel's relig~

1ous thinking all the low, degrading materialism of Egyptian S' belief on this subject. The Mosaic system made no use of

1 hiy it usable, and it kept away £1·om open presentation of the subject altogether, because that was the only way to get the peopi]e away from Egypt's concep 1tion of the subject ..

•

WELLHAUSEN' ,S MISTAKE. ~ .

,I 4. Tl1e discovery of the Aramaic papyri at Syenec53>

1i tnade possible a new chapter in Old Testament criticism, raised .

l' portant points. Tolerable, though not perfect, identifications are made out .for Bagoas, Governor of the Jews; of Josephus and Diodorus; Sanballat, . of Nehemiah and Josephus; and Jochanan, of Nehemiah and Josephus. But more important than all thes 1e identifications is the information th ,at the Jews had, at that period, built a temple and o,ffered sacrifice far

I •

..

•

•

•

\

•

•

•

'

•

40 The F utidame1ttals.

of the foundation of his Pentateuchal criticism in these words: ''The returning exiles ,vere thoroughly imbued with the ideas of Josiah's reformation and had no thought of worshiping except in Jerusalem. It cost them no sacrifice of their feel­ings to leave the ruined High Places unbt1ilt. From this date, all Jews understood, as a matter of course, that the one God l1ad only one sanctuary." So much We 'llhausen. But here is this petition of the J e,vs at Syene in the year 407 B. C. after Nehemiah's return declaring that they had built a temple there and established a system of ,vorship and of sacrifices, and evi­dencing also that they expected the approval of the Jews at Jerusalem in rebuilding tl1at temple and re-establishing that sacrificial ~"orship, and, what is more, received from the gov­ernor of the Jews permission so to do, a thing which, had it been opposed by the Jews at Jerusalem \\1as utterly incon­sistent with the Jewish policy of the Persian Empire in the days of Nehemiah.

NEW TESTAME T GREEK.

5. Then the redating of the Hermetic writings< 6~> whereby they are thrown back from the Christian era to 500-300 B. C. opens up a completely new source of critical mate­rial for tracing the ri se and progress of theological terms in the Alexandrian Greek of the New Testament. In a recent letter from Petrie, who has written a little book on the sub­ject, he sums up the whole case, as he sees it, in these words: '11y position simply is that the current religious phrases and ideas of the B. C. age must be grasped in or(jer to under­stand the usages of religious language in which the New Tes­tament is written. And we can never kno\v the real motive of .. r e,v Testament ,vritings untii we kno\v how much is new thought and ho,v mucn is cu rrent theology in terms of which the E1t-angelos is expressed." Whether or not all the new dates for the \vritings sha ll be permitted to stand, and ~etrie's point of view be justified, a discussion of the dates and a criti-

' •

• 1

• •

Recent Testimony of Archaeology to the Scriptures. 41 . •

cal examination of the Hermetic writings from the standpoint of their corrected dates alone can determine ; but it is certain that the products of the exa·mination cannot but be far­reaching in their influence and in the il.lumination of the teach­ings of Christ and the Apo stles.

V. IDEN 'TIFICAT 'IONS ; •

Last and more gener .ally, of recent testimony from arch­aeology to Scripture we mttst consider the identification .of pl,aces, p1eop 1les, and evients of the Bibl·e n.arrative.

For many years archaeologists looked up helplessly at the pinho ,]es in the pediment o,f the Parthenon, vainly speculating about what might have been the important announcement in· bronze once fastened at those pinhole s. At last an ingenious young erican student ca·ref ull.Y copied the· pinholes, and from -a study of the collocation divined at last the whole im-perial Roman decree once fastened there. So, isolated identi­fication of peoples, places, and events in the Bible may not mea.n so much; however startling tl1.eir char.a1cter., they ·may be., after all, only pinholes in the mosaic of Bible historyt but the collocation of these identificatiotis, when many of them have been found, indicates at last the whole pattern of the mosaic.

Now the progress of important identifications has of late been very rapid. It will suffice oniy to mention those which we have already studied for their intrinsic importance togeth­er with the long list of others within recent years. In 1874, Cle1111ont-Ganneau discovered one of the boundary stones of Gezer<1141

), at which place now for six. years Mr. R. A. Stew ... art Macalister has been uncovering the treasures of history of that Levitical city<57 >; in 1906, Winckler discovered the Hit­tites at their capital city; in 1904-5, Schumacker explored Megiddo; in 1900-02, Sellin, Taannek; Jericho has now been a~c1:1,rately located . by Sellin and the foundations of her walls laid bare; the Edotnites, long denied existence in patriarchal times, have been given historical place in the time of Meremp ..

•

•

• • •

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

42 '

Tlie F·z,ndame1itals. •

tah by tl1e papyrus Anasta sia ( j S) ; 11oab, for some time past in dispute, I identified beyond further controversy at Luxor i11

1908, in an inscription of Rameses II., before the time of tl1e Exodus <39

) ; while Hilprecht at I ippur <60 ) , Glaser in Arabia <01 >, Petrie at Maghereh and along the route of the Exodus (6 2 ) , and Reisner at Samaria have been adding a multitude of geograph­ical, ethnographical and historical identifications.

The completion of tl1e whole list of identifications i rap­idly approaching, and the collocation of these identifications has given us anew, from entirely independent testimony of archaeology, the ,vhole outline of the biblical narrative and its surroundings, at once the necessary material for the his­torical imagination and the sure st foundation of apologetics .. Fa11cy for a moment that the peoples, places and events of the wanderings of Ulys ses should be identified : all the strange route of travel followed; ·the remarkable lands visited and de­scribed, the curious creatures, half human and half monstrot1 s, and even unmistakable traces of strange events, found, all jttst as the poet imagined, what a tra11sf ormation in our views of Homer 's great epic mu st take place! Henceforth that romance ,vould be history. Let us reverse the process and fancy that the peoples, places, and events of the Bible story were as lit­tle kno\vn from independent sources as the wanderings of Uly sses; the intellectual temper of this age would unhesitat­ingly put the Bible story in the same mythical ategory in which have always been the romance s of Homer. If it ,vere po ssible to blot out biblical geography, biblical ethnology, a11d biblical history from the realm of exact knowledge, so would w·e fUt out the eyes of faith, hence£ orth our religion would be blind, stone blind.

Thus the value of the rapid progress of · identificatio ns appear s. It is the identificat ions which differentiate hi sto1·)r from myth, geography from the ' 'land of nowhere," the rec­ord of event s from tale s of '' never ,vas," Scripture from folk­

lore, and the Gospel of the Saviour of the world from the de-•

•

•

Recent Testimony of Arcliaeology to the Scriptures. 43

lus·i1ons of hope. Ev,ery i 1dentificati ,o·n limits by slo ·much the • field of historical criticism. When t.he progress of identifica­tion shall reach comple 'tion, the wo,rk of historical criticism will be finished. ·

CONCLUSION. The present status of the tes.timony from archaeology to

Scrip 1tt1re, as t·hese latest discoveries mak 1e it to be, may be point,ed out in a f 1e·w w,ords.

,.

N'OT E1VOLUTION.

1. T 'he hi.story of civilizati ,on as everywhere illuminated is fou11d to be only partially that of the evolutionary theory of ,early Israelite history, but very exactly tl1at of the biblical

•

narrative; that is to say, this history, like all history sacred or profane, , shows at times, f 1or even a century or two, st.eady P·t ·ogress,1 b,ut the regular, orderly progress f r,om tl1e most pritnitive state of society toward the highest degree of civiliza­tion, which the evolutionary theory imperatively demands, if

: it fulfill its intended 1nissio11, fails utterly. The best ancient . work at Taannek is the earliest. From the cave dwell ·ers to

the city builders at Gezer is no long, gentle evolution; the , early Amorite civilization leaps with rapid strides to the great ~ engine,ering · feats on the de,£ ens.es and the water-works. I Wherever it has been possible to institute comparison between

Palestine and Egypt, the Canaanite civilization in handicraft, art, en.gineering, architecture, . and education has been found to suffer only by that which climate, materials and location

r impose; in ·genius and in practical execution it is equal to that of Egypt, and only eclipsed, before Graeco-Roman times, by

: the brief glory of the Solomonic period. . r.

;

• HARMON~Y WITH SCRIPTURE. •

21

• When w 1e come to loo'k more narrowly a.t the ,de·tails, of archaeological testimony, the historical setting thus afforded · for ·the events of the Bib1e narrative is seen to be exactly in

•

•

•

•

t

•

•

•

, harmony with the narrative. This is very significant of th« · final 1out ,come of res,ea1-.~h in early Bib,l1e hi,story. Be,cau · .

views of Scripture n1ust fina lly s.quare with the results o archaeo logy; that is to say, with contemporaneous history, and the archaeological testi1nony of these past five, years ,well in~ dica,tes the present trend toward the final conclusion. The;

. Bible narrative ·plainly interp ,r,et,ed at its f la~e value is e,very" where being sustaine ,d, while, of the gr ,eat critical theories pr<Y; po1sing to take Scripture recording events of that ag1e at ,oth,e than the face value, as the illi.'te1 .. a,cy of early Weste ,rn Se·mitic people, the rude nomadic barbarity of Palestin ,e and the De sert in tl1,e patriarchal age, the patri ,archs not individual ,s bu't per~

J sonifications, the Desert ''Egypt," the gra~ual invasion of Pal-­estine, the naturalist ,ic origin of Is 1rael's reli,gion,. the, incon· sequence of Moses as a law-giver, t'l1,e late authors ,hip 10£· tt1e Pe ntateuch, and a dozen others, not a single one is being defi.­nitely supported b1y t.he results of arcl1aeological re,search. In• deed, reconstructing criticism hardly finds it worth while, fot th 1e m,ost part, to look to archaeology fo :r support. ·

. The recent testimony of archaeology to Scripture, like 311 such testimony that has gone before, is d,efinitely an 1d unifontl' ly f,avo,r·able. to th ,e, Scriptures at their face ·,value, and not to the Scriptures as recon structed by criticism,

•

AUTHORIT IES REFERRED 'TO ABOVE . • •

ABBREVI ATIONS US ,ED IN REFERENCES. ,

0. L. Z. Orientalistis ,chen Litterat11r-Zeitu ,ng. Q. S. _ uarterly Stat ement o,f the Palestine Explora tion Sod., ·

(.1) (2) (3)

ety, . . REFERENCES.

Gep. 12 :10-20; 13 :1; 47 :1-12. Gen. 41 : 14-46.

•

Orr, ''Tl 1e Problem of the Old Testa1nent,'' p,p. 57-58, quoting Schu ltz, Weilhausen, Kuenen, W, R. Smith, G. B. Gray, I-I. P .. Smith, F. H. Woods , .

• •

•

• • f

•

' •

,. . Recent Testimony of "41~cJiaeology to tlie Scr·iptjii,re.s. 45

Brugsch, ''Egypt un ,der the tio,11, Chap. VI.

Pharaol1s '' Broderick edi-. , •

Ibid . •

•

Gen. 41 :25-39. ' Petrie ,, '''Hyks os and Israel ite Cities.,"

Ibid, pp. 3 and 110, Plate I X. . Ibid, pp. 5-9. Plates I I, III, I,V.

(4)

(5) (6) (7) (8) (9) ( 10) (11)

Budge, ''History . of Egypt,'' Vol . III, pp. 137-138. · Kyle, Recueil d,e T ,rava ,ux, Vo l. · XXX, '' 1G,eogra,phic

and Ethnic Li sts of Ram ,eses II." ( 12) MUiler,' ''Asie11 und Europa ." ztes Kapitel. (13) Ibid. ( 14) Winckler, 0. L. Z., December 15, 1906. ( 15) Ibid. . .

•

( 16) Bouriant, Recuei] de T ravaux, Vol. XIII, pp. 15 ff.: Budge, ''Hi story of Egypt, 1

' Vol~ V, pp. 48 ff.; Good­win, ''Record s of the Past,'' 1st S,eries, Vol.J IV, pp. ·. 25 ff .

( 17) Mitteil ungen der Vorderasiatischen Ges selschaf t: 1902, ·p. 5. Muller, Recueil de Tr ,avaux, V 0 11. VIII, 126 ff. Budge, ''Histo ry of Egypt,'' V, 30 ff . . _

( 18) Winckler, 0. L . Z., Decemb ,er 15, 1906. ( Sonderabzug, p, 15.) . .

(19) Ibid . . (Sonderahzug, p. 22.) (20) Conder. ''Tel Amarna Tablet .'' Bud ge, ' 'History of

Egyp t,' ' Vo 'l. IV, pp. 184-241. (21) Winckler, 0. L. Z., December 15, 1906. Sonderabzug. {22) Mes ser smi dt, Mitteilungen der Vorderasiatischen Ges-

selchaft; Corpus, Unscrip. Het. 1902. (23) Vincent, ''Canaan.'' · (24) Petrie, ''Lachi sh .. '' (25) Bliss, ''A Mound of Many Citie s.'' (26) .Macalister, ''Bible Side Ligh ts from tl1e Mo und · of

· Gezer.'' (27) Schumacker, ''Excavations at :rviegiddo.'' •

•

I

•

a

•

•

•

46 The Fundamental 's. •

(28) Sellin, T 1el-Taannek, t'Denkschriften der Kaiserlicber, Akademie in Wien.''

(29) Deut. 6 :10-11; Josh. 24 :13 ;· Neh. 9 :25. (30) I,sa. 19:18,. ( 31) E2ek. 16 :44-46; Det1t. 7 :3. . ( 32) Judges 2 :11-15; 3 :7; 8 :33-35; 1.8 :30-31~ (33) Macalis 1ter, Q. S., 1903, pp. 8-9, 49. (34) Macalister,Q. S., 1908,,, p~, 17. ( 35) Vincent, in Q. S., 1908, p. 228. ( 36) Macali lster, Q. s ... , 1903, p 1

• 49. ( 37) Ibid. ( 38) I. Kings 9 :16.

•

•

I

•

( 39) Winckler, Orientalistische Forsch ungen, Series I, pp .. 2:4-41.

( 40) I. Kings 9 :1,6. ( 41) Macali5te·r, Q. S., 1903,, P-. . 309. ( 42) Sellin., ''Tel-Ta ,annek,'' p. 92. ( 43,) Macalister, Q. S., 1908, Jan.-Apr. ( 44) Petri 1e, ''Deshasha,'' Plate I\ T. . (45) Birch, ''Records of the Past," 1st Series, Vol. IJ, PI>•

35-52, ''B ,att1e of Megid 1do ,.'' Also Lep .sius, ''Denk ... maier.'' Abth. III. Bl. 32, 31st, 30th, 30B, ''Aus wahl,'' XII, L. 42-45. ·

( 46) Macalister-Vincent, Q. S., 1898-08. · ( 47) Budg ,e, '''Hist ,ory of Egypt,'' Vol. IV, pp •. 184-241 .• (48) Gen. 21-38. Ki11g, ''Code of Hammurabi_,, , ( 49) Macalister, Q. S., 1903, ff., and ''Bible Side Lights g,

Cl1ap. III. Also Sellin, ''Tel-Taannek,'' pp. 96-97. ( 50) Clay, '' Amurru, 'Th ,e Ho1ne ,of the N or ·thern Semites.'' (51) King, ''Chronology of the First Three Babylonian Dy

nasties .. '' ( 52

1

)1 Kyle, Recueil de Travaux, ''Egyptian Sacrifices~'' Vol . . XXVII, ''Furth ,er Observations,'' Vol. XXXI. Bibli&-theca Sacra, Apr., 190,5, pp. 3123-3316. .

•

( 53) Margoliouth, ''Expository Times,'' December, 1907. - ] <r

(54) (55)

(56) (57) (5,8) (59)

(60) (61)

(62)

•

•

•

•

. ,

•

f

• I

sephu ,s, '"Ant,iquiti)es,'' 11 :7; D11e,adorns Siculus. Se 1c. 3; 17-35. Neh. 13:28; 12:2,2; 2 Es dra s ,5:14.

Welll1ausen, Ency. Bri t., Vol. 18, p. 5091

~

Petri 1e, ''Person .al Religi1on in Egyp ·t Be£ ore Chr .isti,an ity. '' .

Clermont -Ganneau in ''Bible S.ide Lights," pil 22. Macalister, ''Bible Side Light s.' Also Q. S., 1902-09. MiiI]e,r, ''Asien un 1d Europa."

•

Kyle, Recueil de . Travaux, \ T1ol. XXX~ ''Ethnic and Geographical Lists of Ra1nese s II."

Hilp ·rech ,t, ' 'Exploratio 1ns i11 B,,abylonia." Weber, Forschungsre ,isen Edo11ard Glaser; also ''Stu­

dien zur · Siidarabiscl1en Altertun1 skunde,' '' Webe,r·. Petrie, ''R 1esearch.es. in Sinai.' ''

•

•

•

•

•

•

' •

•

•

• •

• •

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

• •

•

•

•

• •

I

,. •

•

' •

• •

•

·CHAPT ER III, • •

•

FALLA ,CIES OF TiqE HI GHER CRITICISM. •

•

BY FR . .t\.NKLIN JOHNSON, D. D.), LL. D~ •

]

The 1erro~s of the high ,er criticism of which I shall wri,te 1 pertain to its very substance. Those of a secondary charactet 1 the limits of my space forbid me · to consider. My discussion <

might be greatly expanded by ,additional masses l of illustra- 1

tive n1at1erial, and henc 1e I close it W'ith . a list of bool{s whic h t

I recommend to persons who may wish to pursue the subject < •

· further. · i •

r

DEFINITION OF ''THE I-IIGHER CRITICIS11.'' C:

,(

As an introdu 1ction to the fundamental fallacie s of the •

higl1er criticism, let me state what the higher criticism is, and then what the higher critics tel1 us , they have, a 1chieved.

The name ''the higher criticism'' was coined by Eichhorn, j

who lived .from 1752 to 1827. Zenos,* after careful co11' ~ sideration, adopts the definition of the name given by its t author: ''The discovery and verification of the facts regard' 1 in.g the origin, form and value o.f literary production s upon s the basis of their inter11al characters.'' Tl1e higher critics ,are c not blind to some other sources of argument. Th.ey ref er to r histo ,ry where they can gain any polemic advantage by do,ing i so,. The background of the entire picture which they bring a to us is the assumptio 1n tha ·t the hypothesis 1of evolution is i' true. But after all their chief appeal is to the supposed evi~ l dence of the documents themselves. I

Other na ,1nes fot· the ,movement have been sought. It has f been calle 1d the ''historic view," o,n tl1e as,sumption that it rep"' f

· resents the real hi,st1ory 1of the Hebrew peopl 1e as it m11st have , unfolded its ,elf by the order1y proce ,sses of l1un1an evolutiot1,,

*''The Elements of the Higher 1Crjticism~''

48 •

•

•

d t

•

•

•

•

Fallacies of tlie Hig1her Criticism. •

49 •

•

But, as the higher critics con tradict tl1e testim ony 0£ all the He brew historic documents which profess to be early, their theory might better be called the ''u11historic view.'' The high-er criticism has sometimes been called the ''documentary l1y­pothesis." But as all schoo,ls of criti.cism and all doctrin,es of

e inspiration · are equally h.ospitable to the sqpposition that tl1e t biblical writers may have consulted documents, and may have ~ quoted them, the higher c·riticism has no special right to thi s • title. We must fall back, therefore, upon the name ''the high-1 er criticism'' as the very best at our disposal, and upon the t definition of it as chiefly an inspectio ,n of literary productions

in order to ascertain their dates, . their authors, and their value, as they tl1emselves,. inte rpr eted in the light of the hypothesis

, of evolution, may yield the evidence. iJ

I ''ASSURED RESULTS" OF THE HIGHER CRITICISM.

I turn 110w to ask what the higher critics p,rof ess to have 1

found out by this method of study . The ''assured resuits'' on ' which they congratulate tl1emselves are stated variously. In

· radical than that given the m in Germany, though sufficiently J startling and destructive to arouse vigorous protest and a vig-, ' orous demand for the evidences, which, as we shall see, have ' not been produced and cannot he produ ·ced. Tl1e less star tling ~ form of the ''assured results'' usually announced in England

' tty in these countries. Yet it should be noticed that there are · higher critics in this country and England who go beyond the . principal "German representatives of the school in their zeal ' for the dethronement of the Old Testament and the New, in so · far as the se holy books are presented to the world as the very · : Word of God, as a special revelation from heaven. ' · The following statement from Zenos* may ser-ve to intro­

duce us to the more moderate form of the ''assuied results'' *Page 205. . L

•

•

•

•

•

50 The Fundam entals.

reached by the higher critics. It is concerning the analysi of the Pentateuch, or rather of the Hexateuch, the Book of Joshua being included in the survey. "The Hexateuch is a composite work whose origin and history may be traced in four distinct stages : ( 1) A writer designated a J. J ahvist, or J ehovist, or J udean prophetic historian, composed a history of the people of Israel about 800 B. C. (2) A writer designated as E. Elo­hist, or Ephraemi te prophetic historian, wrote a similar work some fifty years later, or about 750 B. C. These two were used separately for a time, but were fused together into JE by a redactor [ an editor], at the end of the seventh century. ( 3) A writer of different character wrote a book constituting the main portion of our pre sent Deuteronomy during the reign of Josiah, or a short time before 621 B. C. This writer is designated as D. To his work were added an introduction and an appendix, and with these accretions it was united with JE by a second redactor, constituting JED. ( 4) Contemporane­ously with Ezekiel the ritual law began to be reduced to writ­ing. It first appeared in three ·parallel forms. These were codified by Ezra not very much earlier than 444 B. C., and between that date and 280 B. C. it was joined with JED by a final redactor. Thus no less than nine or ten men were . engaged in the production of the Hexateuch in its present form, and each one can be distinguished from the rest by his vocabulary and style and his religious point of view."

Such is the analysis of the Pentateuch as usually stated in this country. But in Germany and Holland its chief represen­tatives carry the division of labor much further. Wellhausen distributes the total task among twenty-two writers, and Kuen­en among eighteen. Many others resolve each individual writer into a school of writers, and thus multiply the numbers enor-­mously. There is no agreement among the higher critics con­cerning thi s analy sis and therefore the cautious learner may well wait till those who represent the theory tell him just what it is they desire him to learn.

•

•

• • •

Fal.la.cie.s of tlie Higher Criticism. 51

While some of the "assured results'' are · tl1us in doubt, ccrw tain things are matters of general agreement. Moses wrote lit- . tie or nothing, if he ever existecl. A large part of the Hexa­teuch consists of · unhi storical legends. We may grant that

~ Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Ishmael and Esau existed, or we may deny this. In either cas~, what is recorded of them is chiefly mytl1. These deni ,als of the trutl1 of the \Vritten records fol­low as matters of cour se from the late dating of tl1e books, and the assumption that the writers could set down only th! national tradition. They may l1ave worked in part as collec ~ tors of written stories to be found here and there; but, if so, these written stories were not ancient, and they were diluted by stories transmitted orally. The se fragments, whether writ­ten or oral, must have followed the general law of national tra-ditions, and have presented a mixture of legendary chaff, witl1 here and there a grain of historic truth to be sifted out by care­ful winnowing. , Thus far of the Hexateuch.

The Psalms are so full of r1efere111ces to the Hexateuch tl1at they must have been written after it, and hence after' the captivity, perhaps beginning about 400 B. C. David may pos-: sibly have written one or two of them, but probably he wrote none, and the strong conviction of the Hebrew people that he was their greatest hymn-writer was a total mistake.

These revolutionary processes are carried into the New Testament, and that also is found to be largely untrustworthy as history, as do~trine, and as ethics~ though a very good book,

~ ,. since it gives expression to higl1 ideals, and thus ministers to the spiritual life. It may well have influence, but it can have 110 divine authority. The Christian reader should consider carefully this invasion of the New Testament by the higher criticism. So Jong as the movement was confined to the Old Testament tnany good Illen looked on with indifference, not reflecting that the Bible, tho ,ttgh containing ''many parts'' by many writers, and though recording a progressive revelation ,

• •

I

•

• •

I

•

I

•

52 • #

TJze Fundamentals.

is, after all, one book. But the limits of the Old Testament have long since been overpassed by the higher critics, and it is demanded of us that we abandon the in1memorial teaching of the church concerning the entire volume. The picture of Christ which tl1e New Testa1nent sets before us is in many respects mistaken. The doctrines of primitive Christianity wl1ich it states and def e11ds were ,vell enougl1 for the time, but have no value for us today except as they commend themselves to our independent judgment. Its moral precepts are fallible, and v.re should accept them or reject them freely, in accordance with the greater light of the twentieth century .

•

Even Christ could err concerning ethical qttestions, and neitl1er His commandments nor His example need constrain us. ·

The foregoing 1nay serve as an introductory sketch, all too brief, of the higher criticism, and as a basis of the discussion of its fallacies, now immediately to fallow.

FIRST FALLACY: THE ANALYSIS OF THE PEITTATEUCH . •

I. The first fallacy that I shall bring forward is its analy-sis of the Pentateuch. ·

1. We cannot fail to observe that these various documents and their various authors and editors are only imagined. As Green* has said, ''There is no evidence of the existence of these documents and redactors, and no pretense of any, apart from the critical tests wl1ich l1ave determined the analysis. All tradition and all historical · testimony as to the origin of tl1e Pentateuch are against them. 'fhe burden of proof is wholly upon tl1e critics. And this proof should be clear and convinc­il}.g in proportion to the gravity and the revolutionary char­acter of the consequences ,vhich it is proposed to base upon it.''

2. Moreover, \ve kno\v ,vl1at can be done, or ratl1er what cannot be done, in the analysis of composite literary produc­tions. Some of the pla)1S of Shakespeare are called his ''mi~ed plays,'' because it is kno,vn that he collaborated with another

*''Moses and His Recent Critics,'' pages 104, 105.

I

• • Fallacies of the I l igher C·r·iticism. .

author in their pro 1dt1ction . Th e vei ·)r keenest critic s have sought to separa te his pa1·t in the se plays fro m the rest, b11t tl1ey co,n fess that the resul t is uncertainty and dissat is fact ion. Coleridge pro fessed to distingu ish the passages cont ributed by Shake spea re by a pro cess of feeling , but Macaulay pro nounced this claim to be nonsense, a11d the entire effort, whether ma de by the analysis of phraseology and style, or by esthetic percep~ tions; is an ad n1it ted fa ilure. And t11is in spite of the fact that the style ,of Shal<espeare is one of the most peculiar and inimitable. The Anglican Prayer Boole is anothet cotnposi te production which the higher critics have often been invited to analyze and dist.ribute to its various so·ttrces. Some 0 1f the authors of these sources lived centuries .apart. They are now Wei.I known fr ,om t.he stt1dies of historians. , But the P raye·r Book itself does not reveal one of them, though its various vocabularies and styles have been carefully interrogated. Now if the analysis Of the Pentateuch can lead to such certaintie s, why should not the analysi s of Shakespeare and the Prayer

· Book do as much? How can men accomplish in a foreign lan­~age what ·they cannot accomplish in th,eir own? How can · they accomplish in a dead language what they cannot accom-

. plish in a living language? How can they distinguish ten or eighteen or twenty-two Collaborators in a small literary produc ­tion, when . they cannot distingui sh t,vo? These questions have been asked many times, but the higher critics have given no an,swer wh.at 1eve-r, pref ierring the ~afety of a learne,d s.ilence;

''The oracles are dumb.'' 3. Much has been made of differences of vocabulary in the

Pentateuch, and elaborate lists of words have been assigned to each of the supposed authors. But these distinctions fade away when subjected to careful scrutiny, and Driver admits that ''the phraseoiogical criteria * * * are slight.'' Orr,* who quotes tI1is testimony, adds, ''They are slight, in fact, to a degree of tenuity ' that of ten makes the recital of them .app,ear like tri-fling.'' . .

•

•

•

•

54 The Fitndamentals. '

•

SEC'OND F ALLA,CY: Tl-IE T'HE0 1RY OF EV0 1LUTION AP­PLIED TO LITERAT 'URE AND RELIGION.

II. A second f undamen ·tal fallacy of the higher criticism is its dependence on the theory of evolution as the explanat .ion of the history of literature and of religion. The progress of tl1e higher cri ticism towards its present state has been rapid and assured since \T atke 1 discovered in tl1e Hegelian ph.ilosophf of evolut .io,n a means. of bib1lical critic .ism. T·J1e· Spenceriail philosophy of evolution, aided and reinforced by Darwin­ism, has add 1ed greatly to the confidence of the higher critics, As Vatke, one of the earlier members of the school, made the hypothesis of evolution the .guiding presupposition of his crit­ical work, so today does Professor Jordan, 2 th 1e· very latest rep­resentative o,f the higher criticism. ''The nineteenth century/' he declares, ''has applied to the history of the doct1ments of th1e Hebr ,ew pe·opl,e it.s 0 1Wll magic w·ord, ev1olution~ T'he. thought represented by that popular word has been found to have a r,eal meaning in 1our investigations regardi11g, the relig~ ious life and the theological beliefs of Israel,'' Thus, were the·re :no hypothesis of evo,lution, there ·would be no hig·het criticis ,m. The ''assured resttlts'' of the high.er criticism hav'e been gained, after all, not b,y an inductive study of the biblical . books to ascertain if they present a great variety of styles and vocabula ·ri1es and religiott.s points of view. They have beell attained by assuming that the l1yp,otl1esis of evolution . is true ·, · and that t

1l1e religion ,of ' Israel must have unfolded itself ·by a process of natural evolution. Tl1ey have been attained b)' ·an intere st1ed cross-examination of the· biblical books to con4f strain tl1em to admit tl1e hypothesi s of evolution. Tl1e imag· ination has played a large part in the process, and tl1e so-called evide·nces. u.pon w'hich the ''assured results'' re,st are 1argel1 .. .

• t~agina ·ry. . But the hypothesis o·f evolution, when applied to the his-

1''Die Biblische The ,ologie Wissenschaftlich Dargestellt. 1, ,

2''Bib 'lical Critici sn1 and Modern Tl1,ought,'' T .. and 'T. Cla,rk,, 1909, ,I

.. •

•

•

•

•

I

• • •

•

• Fallacies of ,the Highe¥ Criticism . 55

tory of literature, is a falla ,cy~ leaving us utterly unable to account for Homer, or Da ,ate, or Shakespeare, the greatest ~oef~ of the world, yet all o,f '. them writi~g in the dawn of tne great literatures · of the world. It is a fallacy wlien ap.P.lied to the history of religion, leaving us utterly unable to account tor Abraham and Moses and Christ, and requiring us to dr.ny tliat tHe}t c0uld have been such men as the Bible declares them to . h.a-v:e been. The hypothesis is a f allaCy when applied te tile history of ·the human race in general. Our race has made p~og-. -

ress under the influence of supernatural revelation; but prog-Fess under the influ,ence of supernatural revelation is one thing, and evolution is another. . Buckle* undertook to account · for ,.

history by a thorough-going application of the hyp().thesis of evolution to its problems; but no historian today believes that he succeeded in his effort, and his work is universally :regarded as a br,i,l,liant euriosity. 'fh ,e types of ' evol,tition advocated by different liigher critics ate widely different from one another~ varyin,g f r,om the pure natt1rralism. of W e,1,lhausen to th,e tecog­nition of some f eeDle r:ays Of supernatural revelation; but the hypothesis of evolution in any form, when applied tc;> human history, blinds us anG renders us incapable of beli0lding the glory of God in its more signal ma.nifestations. . ·

THlRD FALLACY: THE BIBLE A NATURAL BOOK

III. A thir-d fallacy of the higher critics is the doctrine · concerning the Scriptures which they tea 1ch. If a co1nsistent

hypothesis of evolution · is made the basis of our :religious thinking, the Bible will be regarded as only a pFoduct of huma~ nature working in the field of religious literature. It will he merely a natural book. If there are higher critics who recoil from this application of the hypothesis of evolution and who seek to ·modify it by recognizing some special evidences 0£ the divine in the Bible, the inspiration of which they speak rises but little hig·her than the providential guidance of the w.Mters .

.. *'~H1· st f c· "l' · · E 1 d '' ory o 1,v1 1zat101n 111 ng an -. ·

•

• •

•

•

•

I

. 56 •

•

'Tl1e church doctri11e of the f11ll ins,piration of the Bible is almost never held by the higher critics of ·any class, even of the more bel.ieving. Here an 1d there we may discover one ,a·nd ano ·ther who try to save so1ne fragments of the church doc-

. trine, but they are few and far between, and the salvage to which they cling is so small and poor that it is scarcely worth while. Througl1out their ranl<s the stor m of opposition to the

· sttperna tural in all its forms is so fierce as to leave little place for the faith of the church that the Bible is the very Word of Go1d to tnan. , But the fallacy of this denial is e,v.ident to every believer who r,eads the Bible with an open min1d. He kno ,ws by an immediate consciousness that it is the prod ·uct of the Holy Spirit. As the sheep know the voice of tI1e shep~ herd, so the matur ·e Christian knows that the Bible speaks with a divine voic.e~ On this ground eve1·y Chr ,istian can test the value of the higher criticism for himself. The Bible manifests itself to the spiritual perception of the Christian as in t.he fL1II~ est sense human, and in the fullest sense divine. This is tr t1e o,f the Old Te ·stament, as well as of the New.

FOURTH FALLACY: THE MIRACLES DENIED.

IV. Yet another fallacy 0 1£ th ,e higher critics i.s f,ound in their teaching·s concerning the biblical miracles. If the hy­pothesis of evolution . is appli 1ed to the Scriptures C·onsistently, it w·ill. lea,d us to deny, all the miracles which they rec,ord. But if applied timidly and waveringly, as it is by some of the Eng­lish and American higher critics, it will lead us to deny a large part c,.£ the miracles, and to inject as much 10£ the nat­ural a.s is any w,ay po 1ssible into tl1e rest .. We s,halI st·rai11 ou·t as mt1ch of the gn .at of the supe rnatu1·al as we can, and swallow as much of the camel of evoltttion , as 1 we can. vVe shall probably reject all the miracl .es of tl1e Old Testa1nent, explaining some of then1 as popt1lar legends , and otl1er a co,i11ciden1ces. In the New Testame11t we sha ll pick and ch,oose a11d no two of us will agree concerning those to be rejected

•

• •

1¥al/acies of the I-lighcr Criticism . 57 •

•

and those to be accepted. If the higher criticism shall be ,adopted as the doctrine rof the church, believers] wil.l be left in a ·

•

distressing state of doubt and uncertainty concerning the narra-tive s of the four Gospels, and unbelievers will scoff and mock. A theory which leads to such wanderings of thought regard ­ing the supernatural in the Scriptures must be fallacious. God • is no,t a God of co,nf usio11.

Among the higher critics who accept some of the miracles there is a notable desire to discredit the virgin birth of our Lord, and their treatment of this event presents a good exam­ple of tl1e fallacies of reasoning by means of which they would abolish many of the other miracles. One feature of their argu­ment may suffice a,s .an exhibition of all. It is the search for ~arallels in tl1e pagan mythologies. There are many instances 'tn the pagan stories of the birth of men from ·human mothers and divine fathers, and the higl1er critics would create the •

impression that the writers who reco ,rd the birth of Cnrist i

were influenced by these fables to emulate th.em, and thus to secure for Him the honor of a celestial paternity. It turns out, however, that these pagan fables do not in any case pre ­sent to us a virgin mother; the cl1ild is alwa,ys the product of commerce with a god who assumes a ht1man form for the purposle.

1The d1espair , of the higl1er· criti .cs in t'his hunt for

events of the same kind is well illus ,trated by Ch 1e,yne, * who cites tl1e record of the Babylonian king Sargon, about 3,800 B. C. This monarch represe11ts himself as having ''been born of a poor mother in secret, and as not knowing his father." There have been many millions of such instances, but we do · not think of the mother ~ as virgins. Nor does the BaDy­lo,nian story affirm that the mother of Sargon was a virgi11, · Oir ~ven that his fath 1er was a, g1od. It is plain that Sargon did not intend to claim a supernatural origin, for, after say­ing that he ''did . not know his father, ·'' he adds that ''the brother of his f.ather Jived in the rt11ountains.'' It was a case

*''Bible Problems,'' p.a,ge 86 .. •

•

•

•

•

•

•

1

•

•

,r

58

like n1uttitudes 1 of others in "vhich childrer1, early orpl1an,ed, have not known their fathers, bttt hav 1e known tl1e relation9 of tl1eir fathers. This statement of Sargon I quote f1·om a tran slation of it n1ade by Cheyne himself in the ''Encycle:r pedia Biblica.'' He continue s, ''There is reas.o·n to , suspect that something similar was originally sa id by the Israelites of Mose s.' ' To substantiate this he add , ''Se ·e Encyclopedia Bib­lica, 'Moses,.' section 3 with note 4 .. " On turni11g to this ref.­erence t~e reader fi11ds. t'hat the .article was written by Cheyne himself, , and that it contain s 110 evidence whatever. ,

FIFTH FALLA 1CY: THE TESTIM 10NY 10F ARCHAE 10LOGY DENIED.

V. The limitation of the field of research as far as pos" sible to the biblical book as literary productions l1as retl" dered many of the higher critics reluctant t10 admit the new light derived from archaeolo gy. This is granted by Cheyne." ''I have no wish to deny,'' he says,, ''that the so-called ~highet critics' · in the past were as a rule suspicious of Assyriology as a young, and, as they thought, too self-assertive . science, and th.at many of tho se. who no,w recognize its con.tribt1tion,s to knowledge are somewhat too mechanical in the use of it, a11d too skeptical as to the influence of Babylonian culture in reta~ tively early time s in Syria, Palestine an ,d even Arabiaj'' ThiS grudging recognition 10f tl1e te stimo ny of archaeology may ~ · observed in several detail s.

1. It was said that tl1e Hexateuch must have been fo1·111ed chiefly 'by the gathering up of oral traditions, because it i not to , be suppo sed that the early Hebrews pos sessed the art of writing and of keeping records. But the entire progress of

•

archaeological study refutes tl1is. n pa1·ticular the discover>' of the Tel el-Amarna tablet s has sho wn that writing in cunei· for1n c11a1·acte1·.s an,d. i·n th,e Assyrio-Baby]onian language ·wa comn1on to tl1e e11tire biblical wor ld long before the exodt1

•

*''Bible Prob letns,'' pao-e 142 .

•

- -----=--~ -- -- ------ - - - - - --- -

•

•

·Fallac,ies of tlte HigJie1' Criticisnt. 59

The discovery was tnade by Egyptian peasants in 1887. There a1"e more than three hundr 1ed tab lets, which came from vari­ot1s lands,, including Babylonia and P1al.estine . Q,th,er find .s l1ave added tl1eir testimony to tl e fact that writing and the p1·eservati.on of reco1·ds wer 1e tl1e peculiar pas ,sions of ·the an-­c-iient civiliz 1ed World, Under the , co,nstraint of the overwhelm ­ing evidences, Professor Jordan writes as follows: ''The question as to tl1e age of writing never played a great part in the discussion.'' He falls back on the supposition that the

' nomadic life of the early Hebrews w 1oul 1d prevent . them from acquiring the art of writing. He treats us to such reasoning as the following: ''If the fact that writing is very old is such ., po iwerfu1 argument when taken alo,ne, it mig h·t enab1e you to prove th ,at Alfr ,ed the Gt·e,at w1 .. ote Shakespeare's p1ays,."

2. It wa s easy to treat Abraham as a mythical figure ,vl1en the early records of Baby lonia were but little known. The entire coloring of those chapters of Genesis which ref er to Mesopotamia could be regarded as the product of the imag­ination. Tl1is is no longer the case. Thus . Clay,* writing of Genesis 14, says : ' 'The tl1eory of tl1e late origin of all the

. Hebrew Scriptures prompted the Critics to declare this narra- · II

·ttv·e to 'be a pure i11vention of a later H 1ebrew writer. * * * The patriarchs were relegated to the . reg io,n of myth and legend. Abraham \vas made a fictitious father 10£ the Hebrews.

. * * * Even the po litical situatio1 1 was declared to be incon­sisten t with fact. * * * Weighing carefully the position taken by the critics in the light of what has been revealed thro ,ugh the decipl1erment of the cuneiform inscriptions, we find that the very foundations upon which their theories rest, with reference to the point s that could be tested, totally dis­apip,ear. T 'he trutl1 is, tl1at wl1e1·,ever a11y 1ight l1as 'been tl1rown upon the subje .ct throu .gl1 excav,ations1, their l1yp otheses have . . - . . 1nvar1ably been found wanting.'' Bttt the higl1er er1tics are

*1

''Light on the Old Test ame11t from Bab,et.•• 1907. C'la~ is Assistant P ·rofessor an,d Ass ,istant Curator iof the Baby lonia11 Section, Depart­•11er1t of ArchaeoloJUt, in the Univers ity ,of ' Pennsylvania .

•

•

•

I

•

• •

•

•

•

• •

still reluctant to admit this 11ew light. Tht1 s Kent 1 says, 'Tl1e pri tnary value of tl1ese storie s is didactic and reli gious, ratt-1er than historical .''

3. T'l1e books ,of Jo shua and J t1dge s hav e been re ·garde 1d by the higher critic s as unh istorical on the grou1td th at their por .. -

· traiture of the political, religious, and social condition of P'al-•

estine in the. thirteenth centu1 ·y B. C. is incredible. This can ... not be said any long er, for the recent excavations in Palestine have shown us a land exactly like tl1at of these boolcs. The

· portraiture is so precise, and is drawn out in so many rnin11te lin 1eaments, that it cannot be the product of oral tradition floating down thr ough a thousand years. In w11at details tl1e accuracy of the biblical picture of early Palestine is exhibit ed may be seen perhaps best in the excavation s by Macalister 2 a.t Ge.zer. Here again there are absolutely no discrepancies between the Land and the Book, for tl1e Land lifts up a tl1ou ... sand voices to testify that the Bo,ok is history and not legend.

...

4. It was held by the higher critics that the · legi slation which we cal .I. Mosaic could n.ot have been p1r '0 1duce 1d b,y Moses, since his age was too early for such codes. This reasoning was ·completely negatived by the discovery of the Code of Hammurabi, the Amraphe1 8 of Genesis 14. This code is vet~ differ 1ent f :ro 11n tl1.at of Mos 1es; it is more sys1tematic; and it i.s at least seven hundred years earlier than the Mosaic legisla--ti,on. ·

In short, from the origin of the h igher criticism till tl1i!, present tiQte the discoveries in the field of archaeology have given it a successioti. of serio us blows. The l1igber critics w re shocked when the passion of the ancient world for writing and the preservation of docume nts was discovered. Th ~ y were shocked when primitive Babylonia appeared as the land of

•

•

Abraham. They were shocked when early Palestine appeared as the land of Joshua and. the Judges. They were shocked whefl

1Biblica,l World, Dec., 1906. 2''Bible Side-Lights from the i i ound ,of G,ezer~•t ' a()n this matter see any dictionary 0 1£ the Bible ·, art~ ~, Amraph el~.'

I I

•

•

•

•

•

• Fallacies of the Higher Criticism • 61 •

Amraphel came back from tl1e g1·ave as a real historical charac­te.r,, beari ·ng, l1is code of laws. They were sho 1cke.d wl1en the .stele of the Pharaoh of the eX.Od·us was read, a11d it was proved that he knew a people called Israel, that they had no settled place of abode, that t]1ey were ''without · grain'' for food, and that in these particulars they were quite as they are represented by the S,criptures to l1ave been wl1en tl1ey had fled from Egypt into the wilderness.* Tl1e embarrassment created by these discoveries 'is manifest in many o.f the recent writings of the higher critics, in which, however, tl1ey still cling heroically to their analysis and their late dating of the Pentateuch and their confidence, in the hypo ,t'hes.is of ' evolution as tl1e key of al

1l history. .

SIXTH FALLACY: THE PSALMS WRITTEN AFTER THE EXILE.

• • •

VI. The Psalms a.re usually dated by the higher critics after the exile. The great majority of the higher critics are agreed here, and tell us th ,at thes ,e varied a,nd touching and magnificent lyrics of religious experience all come to us from a period l,ater than 450 B. C. A few of the 1critic ,s · admit an earlier origin of three or f o•ur of tl1em, but they do this waV­eringly, grudgingly, and against the general consensus of opi11-ion among their fellows. In the Bible a very large number of the Psalms are ascribed to David, and these, with a few insignificant and doubtful exceptions, are denied to him and brought down, like the rest, to the age of the second temple. This leads me to the following observations:

*The higher critics usually . slttr over this remar1-cab1e inscription, and give u,s neither an accurate translation nor a natural interpreta­!ion of it. I have ,, therefore, sipec.ial pleasure in quoting th,e follow-1ng £'r1om D,r,iver, ''Authority and Archaeology,'' page 61 : "'Whereas the other places named in the inscription all have the determinative for 'country,' Ysiraal has the d,eterminative for 'men': it follows that the referenc ,e is not to the land . of Isra ,el, but to Israel as a tribe or P:ople, whether migratory, or on the march~', Thus tbis distinguished higher critic sanctions the view of tI1e reeord which I have adoptedo ,He represents Maspero a11d Naville ,as doing the same .

• •

•

•

•

.,

62 •

• ,, .. •

1. Who 1 wrote the Psal111s? Here the higl1e14 critics have no answer. Of the peri o,d fro111 400 to 175 B,. ,c. ·we are ill al111os1t total igno 1rance~ J o,se·pht1s kn.ows, .almo 1st n.othing about it, nor has any other writer told us more. Yet, according to the theory, it was precisely in these centuries of silence, whell tlrie Jews had no gre,a.t writ 1ers, that they pro 1dt1ced th,is mag­nifice11t outburst of sacre ,d song .

2. This is the more remarkab ,le when we consider the well known men to whom the tl1eory deni 1es the autl1orship , of a11,y of the Psal111s.. The list i:ncludes such names as Mo,ses,, David, San1uel, Nathan, Solomon, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and the long list of preexilic prophets. We are asked to believe that th ,ese men co1np10.sed no P .sa1ms., and that the en tir 1e ,collec,tio1n was conll! tributed by men so obscure that th,ey have left no single na1ne by which we can identify them with their work .

. 3. Thi s, will appear still more extr .a,ordina1-y if we co11· sider the times in which, it is said, no Psalms were produced, and contrast them with the times in which all of tl1em were produced ,. The times in which no,ne were produced were the g ,reat tim 1es, ·the times of growtl1, of mental ferment., of ,co11-quest, of imperial expansion, of disast ,er, arid of recovery. Tl1e times in whicl1 none were produced were tl1e times of the splen,djd temple o,f Solomon, . with its s.ple:ndi,d worship. 'TI1e tin1es in which none were prod .uced were the heroic ti1nes of Elijah and Elisha, when the people of Jehovah struggled for their existence against the abominations of the pagan gods, On the other h,and, t'he times whicl1 ac.tually produced th,e111 were the times . 0£ growing legalism, of obscurity, and of infer­ior abilitie s. All this is incredible. We could believe it only if we first came to believe that the Psalms are works o,f slight literary and religious value. This is actually done by Well· hausen, who says,,* ''They certainly are to the sm .allest e tent original ., a 'nd , are for 'the most part imit1ations which illttstrate the saying abot1t much writing.', The Psal1ns are not all 10f atl

l)Quoted by Orrt ''The Problem o,f t]1e Old Testament,~, page 43,5 ..

r

•

•

•

Fallacies of the Higher c, ,itici.sm .. 63

equally high degree of excellence, and there are a few of them which might give some faint color of justice to this deprecia­tio,n of th1e enti·re collection.. But as a whol 1e they are exactly the reverse of this picture. Furthermore, they contain abso­lutely no legalism; but are as free from it as are the Sermon on the Mot1nt and the Pauline epistles. Yet further, the writ:­ers stand out as personalities, and they must have left a deep impression upon their fellows. Finally, they were full of the fire of genius kindled by the Holy Spirit. It is impossible for us to attribute the Psa.lms to the unknown m,ediocri·ties of tl1e period which followed the restoration.

4. Very many of the Psalms plainly appear to be ancient. They sing of early events, and have no trace of alltt-

• s1on to the age which is said to have produced them.

5. The large number of Psalms attributed to David l1ave attracted the special attention of the higher critics. They are denied to him on various ground s. He was a wicked man, and hence incapable of writing these praises to the God of righte- . ousness. -He was an iron warrio,r and statesman,, and hence not gif'ted with the emotions found in th1es,e producti1o·ns., Ile wa,,s so busy with the cares of conquest and administration ·that he had no leisure for literary work. Finally, his conception of God was utterly different from that which moved the psalmists~ ··

The larger part of this catalogue of inabilities is mani­f est1y erroneous. David, with some glaring faults, and with a single enormous crime, for which he was profoundly penitent, w.as one of ·the nobles,t o,£ m1en. He w1as in1dee,d an iron. war­rior and statesman, but also one of the inost emotional of all great historic characters. He was busy, bttt busy men not seldom find relief in literary occupations, as Washington, dur­ing the Revolutionary War, poured forth a .continual tide of letters, and as Cresar, Marcus Aurelius, and Gladstone, while burdened with the cares of empire, composed immortal bool<:s. The conception of God with which David began his ca.reer was indeed narrow (1. Sam. 26 :19). But did he learn nothing

•

-~ - --

• •

•

• •

•

T.lie Fu1idamentals. • •

•

in all his I.ater experiences, a.nd his ass,ociati ·ons with: nol pr:iests and prophets? He was certainly teac ·hable: did G f Ml to make use of him in further revealing Himself to Hi peo_ple 1 1:o deny these Psalms to David on the giound of h'.i limited vieWs of God ill his early life, is this not te deny th.a God ma.de sucaessive revelations of Himself wher.e~er He found suitable channels?- If., further, we consider the unq.ues­tioned skill of E>avid in -tl1e, music of his, nation and nis age ( I. Sam. 16 : 14-2 5), this will consti tuie a Presupposition in favor of his interest in sacred song. If, finally, we consider his personal career of danger and deli\'erance, this will appear a~. the natural means of awakening in hill:} the spirit of varied religious poetry, FI.is. times were much like the Elizabethan ~ried, which ministerecl unexampled stimulus to the English min&

From all thi~ we may; turn to the singµIar \i!eri'dict of Pro­fessor ~orel:an: ''if ' a man says he cannot see why D,avid could not ha¥e written Psalms 51 and 139, ·you are compe)le·d to r~ly as politely as possible that if he did write tnem: then any man ,can w·rite anything.'' So ·also w:e may say, ''as politely as po-s­siale,'' tnat it Shakespeare, witn his ''sm:tll Latin · and les.s Greek,'' did write ]·1is · incomparaole dran1as, ''then any man can write anything' ' ; that if Bickens, witn his mere elemen­tary education, did write his great nove,Is, '' ·then any man can w1·ite anything''; ,and tnat if Linooln, ·who had no early school· ing, did write his Ciettysburg address, ''then any rµan can wnite anything.''

•

SEVENTif F'ALLACY: DEUTERONOMY N0 1:F WR1TTEN B~ MOSES.

¥!:I. One 0£ the fixed p@ints of tl1e higher criticism is 'i.ts theory of th.e ori ,gin of lleuteronomy. Jln I., Kings 22 we Dave tile hist0ry of the fi~d.ing of the book o:£ the law in the temple, which was being repaired. Now the higher c~itics pi-esent th,is finding, not ~s the discovery of ' an ancient docu•

•

I

• •

Fallacies of the Higher Criticism. 65

ment, but as the finding of an entirely new document, which had been concealed in the temple in order that it might be found, might be accepted as the production of Moses, and might produce an effect by its assumed authorship. It is not supposed for a moment that the writer innocently chose the fictitious dress of Mosaic authorship for merely literary pur­poses. On the contrary, it is steadfastly maintained that he intended to deceive, and that others were with him in the plot to deceive. This s~tement of the case leads me to the following reflections:

1. According to the theory, this was an instance of piou fraud. And the fraud 1nust have been prepared deliberately. The manuscript must have been soiled and frayed by special care, for it was at once admitted to be ancient. This supposi­tion of deceit must always repel the Christian believer.

2. Our Lord draws from the Book of Deuteronomy all the three texts with which He foils the tempter, Matt. 4 :1-11, Luke 4 :1-14. It must always shock the devout student that his Saviour should select His weapons from an armory founded on deceit.

3. This may be called an appeal to ignorant piety, rather than to scholarly criticism. But surely the moral argument should have some weight in scholarly criticism. In the sphere of religion moral impossibilities are as insuperable as physical and mental.

4. If we turn to consideration of a literary kind it is to be observed that the higher criticism runs counter here to the statement of the book itself that Moses was its author.

5. It runs counter to the narrative of the finding of the book, and turns the finding of an ancient book into the forgery 9£ a· new book.

6. It runs counter to the judg1nent of all the intelligent tnen of the time who learned of the discovery. They judged the book to have come down fron1 the Mosaic age. and to be from the pen of Moses. vVe hear of no dissent whatever.

•

'

•

•

•

•

• •

I 'I' lie F undamental ,s. •

, •

7. It . seeks support in a variety of reas~ns, such as style, l historical discrepancies, and legal contradi~tions, all of · which c p·rove of little sub,stance when examine ii fairly. (

. 1 J EIGHTH FALLACY: THE PRlESTLY LEGISLATION NO i

. . EN ACTED UNTIL THE EXILE. I

vrn :. :Another case of ' fargery is found in the ori.gin of tile priestly legislation, if we are to believe the higher .ctitics, 1

This legislation is c0ntained ~n a large number of passageS 1 •

·scattered through Exodus, Leviticus, and Number~. It has 1 do chiefly with the ta:bernacle and its worship, with the duties;

...

of the priests and Levites, and with the relaitions of the peo-, ple to the inst~_tutions of religion. It is attributed ta Moses in l

•

scores of places. It ~as a strong coloring of the Mosaic ag' l and of the wilderness life. ·1t affirms the existenCe of the ta!b-1

ernacle, with an or 1derly a 1dministr.ation of the ritual serviees, : But this is all imagined, for .the legislation .is a late produotioo, Before the . exile there were temple services and a priesthood, 1

with cer:tain re . ations concerning them, either or,t or Writ" • • •

ten, and use w:as made of this tradition ; but as a w:hole the leg .. 1

islation was enacted by such men as Ezekiel and Ezra during : ~ .

and immediately after the e:XileJ or about 444 B. C. T.he name ..

of Moses, ~he fiction of a tabernacle, and the general coloiing of the Mosaic age, were given it in order to render it authori" tative 3":nd to secure the ready obedience of the nation. · ~ut

now: 1. The moral objection .here is insupevable. The supposi"

tio ·n of f~rgery, and of forgery so cunning, sO elaborate, an~ so min-ute~ is abhorrent. It the forgery hacl been invented and execute~ by .wicked men to promote so1ne scheme of selfish" ness, it would have been less Odious. But when it is presented to us as the expedient of holy me11, for the advancement of the religion of . the God of righteousness, which af terwarclS blossomed out into Christianity, we must ·vevolt.

2. The theory gives us a portraiture of such men •

• •

•

•

• •

Falla1cies of the Higher Criticism. 67

of B . . ·0 . i .

aal or of Chemosh ; 1t was certai nly not worthy of the ~rophets of Jehovah and we dishonor them when . w1e attribute

! 1t to - ' -. them and place tl1em upon a Jow plane oii craft and cun-

•

' never be£ ore heard of. ~

• ,

n irksome 1n the extreme, and 1t would not have been lightly

0 not hear of any revolt, or even of any criticis1n. ·

1 ed them in their more moderate forms, that they may be

. een and weighed without the re1narkable extravagances which

at1 I . • • •

r1st1an faith. .

. B ,. . NO MIDDLE GROUN.D. . . u~ lll1ght we 11ot accept a part of this system of thought lt . .

arm and little good .

• •

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

• •

•

•

• Tlie Fundame1 ,itals • ' •

2. The majority of those who struggle to stand here find · it iippo ,ssible to do so, and give themselves up to the current . There is intellectual consistency in the ]o,f ty church doctri11e of inspiration. There may _he intellectual consistency in the doctrine that all things have had a natural origin and history, unde1· the general providence of God, as distinguished froill His supernatural revelation of Hi1nself through ,holy men, ~ and especially througl1 His co~equal S )n, so that the Bible is

•

• as little supe1·natural as the ''Imitation of Cl1rist'' or the ''PiJ .. grim's Progress.'' But there is no position of intellectµal con" ( sistency between these two, and the great mass of those who l try to pause at · various points along the descent are swept 1 down with the current. The natural vie,v of the Scriptures , is a sea which has been ri sing higl1er for three-quarters of a ( century. Many Christians bid it ,velcome to pour lightly over 1 the walls which the faith of tl1e ehurch has always set up 1

against it, in the expectation that it wi11 prove a health£ ul ane!l 1 helpful stream. It is already a catarac ~ uprooting, destroying, (

and slaying. • •

•

APPEND ·IX. I

•

Those who wish to study these fallacies further are advised 1

to read the following books , : •

ORR. "The Problem of the Old Testament ,'' a:JJd · ''The Bible Und ,er Fire '' - . '''Ar,e the Critics Ri.g11t ?'' It.

• MOLLER. SCHMAUK.

•

'·'The · Negative Cr:ticis111 and the · 01d T ,est3" ment.' ''

•

CROSLEGH. · ''The Bible in tl1e Light of Today." V AR10U'S AUTHQ ,RS,. ''Lex Mosaica .. ''' GREEN. "The Higher Criticism of the Pentat euch.'' CHAMBERS . ''Moses and His Recent Critics.'' BLO~IFIELD. "The o ,td Testanient and the New Criticisn1,'

1

RAVEN. · '''0 1'ld Testament I 11trodu.ction.1'

S YCE. "The Earlv History of the Hebrews.,, ,

•

•

• •

I •

•

•

•

•

CHAPTER IV.

CHRIST A D CRITICISM • •

BY SIR ROBERT A DERSO , . C. B., LL. D.

c\UTHOR OF ''THE BIBLE AND MODERN CRITICISM,'' ETC., ETC.,

LONDO · , E GLA D. ,

In his ''Founders of Old Testa1nent Critici ,sm'' Professor Cheyne of Oxford gives the foremost place to Eicl1horn. Iie hails him, in fact, as the founder of the cult. And according to this same authority, wl1at Jed Eichhorn to enter on his task Was ''his hope to contribute to the winning back of tlie edtt­cated classes to religion.'' The rationalism of Ge1·1nany at the close of the eighteenth century would accept the Bible ?nly oa the terms of bringing it down to tl1e level of a human book, and the problem which had to be solved was to get rid of the element of miracJe which pervades it. Working on the labors o~ his predecessors, Eichhorn achieved this to hjs own satisfaction by appealing to the oriental habit of thought, wliiCh

• e1zes upon ultimate causes and ignores intermediate processe .

l'hi commended itself on two grounds. It had an undoubted element of truth, and it was consistent with reverence for Holy Scripture. For of tl1e founder of the ''Higher Criticism'' it

faith in that Which is holy, even in the miracles of the Bible, . Was never shattered by Eichhorn in any youthful mind.''

In the view of his succes ors, however, Eichhorn's hypothe-• . . . Sts was open to the fatal objection that it was altogether tn· adequate. So the next generation of critics adopted the more drastic theory that the Mosaic books were ''mosaic'' in the sense that they were literary forgeries of a late date, composed of materials supplied by ancient documents and the myths and legends of the Hebrew race. A11d tho11gh this theory has been

69

•

•

•

•

,

70 The Fundamentals.

modified from time to time during the last century, it remains substantia lly the "critical" view of the Pentateuch. But it is open to two main objections, either of which would be fatal. a It is inconsistent with the evidence. And it directly challenges l the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ as a teacher; for one b of the few undisputed facts in t~is controversy is that our ti Lord accredited the books of Moses as having divine authority. 1

THE TRUE AND THE COUNTERFEIT.

It may be well to deal first with the least important of these ci objections. And here we must distinguish between the true \\ Higher Criticistn and its counterfeit. The rationalistic f "Higher Criticism," when putting the Pentateuch upon its trial, tl began with the verdict and then cast about to find the evidence; · c1

whereas, true criticism enters upon its inquiries with an open o mind and pursue& them without prejudice. The differenc.e p may be aptly illustrated by the position assutned by a typical q French judge and by an ideal Eng lish judge in a criminal trial. f The one aims at convicting the accused, the other at elucidating f the truth. "-The proper functi~n of the Higher Criticism is p to determine the origin, date, and literary structure of an an­cient writing." This is Professor Driver's description of true criticism. But the aim of the counterfeit is to disprove the

0 genuineness of the ancient writings. The justice of this state- q ment is established by the fact that Hebraists and theologians f of the highest eminence, whose investigation of the Penta- a teuch problem has convinced them of the genuineness of the a books, are not recognized at all. s

In Britain, at least-and I am not competent to speak of tJ

Germany or Amer ica-no theologian of the first rank has 1

adopted their "assured results." But the judgment of such C n1en as Pusey, Lightfoot and Salmon, not to speak of 1nen who

are still with us, they contemptuously ignore; for the ration- ,~ alistic I-Iigher Critic is not one who investigates the evidence, 11

but one wqo accepts the verdict. Y

ins : is tal.

Christ and Criticism. 71

THE PHILOLOGICAL INQUIRY.

If, as its apostles sometimes urge, the Higher Criticism is a purely philological inquiry, two obvious conclusions follow· l'he first is that its verdict 111ust be in favor of the Mosaic books; for each of the books contains peculiar words suited to the time and circumstances to which it is traditionally assigned.

ty. l'his is admitted, and the critics attribute the presence of such \Vords to the J esuitical kill of the priestly forgers. But this Only lends weight to the further conclusion that Higher Criti­

!se tism is wholly incompetent to deal with the main issue on Which it claims to adjudicate. For the genuineness of the ~entateuch must be decided on the same principles on which

.al, the genuinene ss of ancient document s is dealt with in our :e ; tourts of ju stice. And the language of the documents is only ,en one part of the needed evidence, and not the most important ic.e Part. And fitness for dealing with evidence depends upon cal qualities to which I-Iebraists, as uch, • have no special clain1 . . al. lndeed, their writings afford signal proofs of their unfitness n.g for inquiries ,vhich they insist on regarding as their special

15 Preserve.

·ue .tic

Ln- Take, for example, Professor Driver's grave assertion that the presence of two Greek words in Daniel ( they are the names of musical instruments) demand a date for the book subse­

te-quent to the Greek conquest. It has been established by Pro­

(llS

·ue :he

ta- fessor Sayce and others that the intercour se between Babylon :he and Greece in, and before, the days of Nebuchadnezzar would

amply account for the presence in the Chaldean capital of mu­of sical instrument s with Greek names. And Colo.net Conder, tas tnoreover,-a very high authority-c,onsiders the words to be ch Akkadian, and not Greek at all! But apart from all this, we ho can imagine the reception that would be given to such a state­,n- ~ent by any competent tribunal. The story bears repeating-it .

ts a record of facts-that at a church bazaar in Lincoln some· :e, Years ago, the alarm was raised that pickpockets were at work, .

,

•

•

•

•

• •

•

•

72 The Fundamentals . •

and two ladies had lost their purses. The empty purses were afterwards found in the pocket of the Bishop o,f the Diocese!

'

On tl1e evidence. of the two purses the Bishop, should be con­victed as a thi ef, and 10n the evid.ence of the two words the book of Daniel sho,uld b1e co,nvicte 1d as .a forgery!

HIST ,OR.ICAL BL,UNDE R.

. Here is another typical item in the Critics' indictment of Danie l. The book opens by recot·ding Nebuchadnezzar's sie·ge of Jerusalem in the · third year of Je11oiakim, a statement the corr 1ectness of which is confirmed by history, sacred and secu~ Jar. Berosu.s, the 1Cl1ald.e:an his t 1orian, , tells us that 1during this expedition Nebuchadnezzar received tidings of · his father's death, and that, committing to oth~rs the care of his army and of his Jewish and other prison 1ers, ''h 1e himself hastened home across the desert.'' Bu t the German skeptics, having decided that Daniel wa.s a forgery, had to find evidence to support their · verdict. And so they made the brilliant discovery that Berosus was here ref 1erring to the exp 1edi·tion of th ,e following year, when Nebuchadnezzar won the battle of ·carchemisb against the army of tl1e king of Egypt, and that he had · not at that time invaded Judea at all. But 1Ca,rchem,ish is on th,e Euphrates, and the idea of ''hastening home'' from there to Babylon across the desert is worthy of a schoo lboy 's essay! That he crossed the desert is proof that he set out from Judea; and . his Jewish captives were, of course, Daniel and his cont·

/ panion princes. . His invasion of Judea took place before hiS accession, in Jehoiakam's t.liird year, whereas the battle of Car" chemish was fought after his accession, in the king of Judah'~ fourth year, as the biblical books record. But this grotesqtJe blunder ' of ' Bertholdt' 's ''Book of · Daniel' '' in the be,ginni,og i>f the nineteenth century is gravely reproduced in Pro f essof Driver's ''Book of Daniel'' at the beginning of the twentietb

•

cen·tury. •

•

•

•

• 73 • Chris,t and Criticism., .

CRITICAL 1 PROFANI 'T . • • •

But to return to Mose s. According to '' the critical hypoth­esis,'' tl1e books of the Pentateuch are literary forgeries of the Exi lic Era, the work of the Jerusalem priests o:f those evil days. From the Book of · Jeremiah we know that those men were profane apostates ; and if ''the critical hypothesis'' be true,

1 they were infinitely worse than even the prophet's inspired de­' nunciations of them indicate. For no eighteenth century athe­

ist ever sank to a lower depth of profanity than is displayed by their use of the Sacred Name. In the preface to his ''Dark­ness and Dawn," Dean Farrar claims that he ''never touches

•

'

•

the early preachers of Christianity with the finger of fiction.'' When his story makes Apostles speak, he has ''confined their words to the words of a revelation." But ex. hyp., the authors of the J?entateuch ''touched with the finger of fiction'' not only the holy men of the ancient days, but their Jehovah God. ''Je- . hovah spake unto Moses, say ing." This and . kindred formulas are repeated times without number in the Mosaic books. If

•

this be romance, a lower type of profanity is inconceivafile, unless it be that of the man who fails to be shocked and re-

volted by it. But no; facts prove that this judgment is unjust. For men

of unfeigned piety and deep reverence for divine thi11gs can be so blinded by the superstitions of ''religion'' that the im­primatur of the church enables them to regard these discred, ited books as Holy Scripture. As critics they brand the Pen .. tateuch as a tissue of myth and legend and fraud, but as re- · ligionists they assure us that this ''imp lies no denial of its in ..

it • d. f . t t ''* sp1rat1on or 1sparagement o 1 s con ents . •

ERRORS REFUTED BY FACTS.

In controversy it is of the greatest importance to allow op .. ponents to state their position in their own words ; and here

*"The Higher Criticism : Three Papers,'' by Professors Driver and Kirkpatrick. .

•

•

•

• •

•

•

74 •

is Professor Driver's state1nent of the case against the Books · of Moses:

'

'"We 1can only argue on grounds of pr 1o'bability deriv ,ed fro111 our view of the progress of the art of writing, or of literary composition, o,r of tl1e rise .and growtl1 of the prophetic to11e and f ee.li:ng in ancie ·nt Israel, or of th.e perio ,d. at wh·ich the , traditions co,ntained in the narratives might have taken shape, or of the probability that they would have been written down before the impetus given to culture by the monarchy ha1d taken effect, and similar considerati ,011s, for estimating n10,st of whi1cl1,. tho ,ugh plausible argun1ents on one si,de or the other may be a,dvanced, a standard on which we can confidently rely scarcely admits of being fixed.'' ( ' 'Introduction, '' 6th ed,., page 123.)

This n10,dest r·ef1erence to ' ''literary c101np1os.it.io1n'' and '''tll)e art of writing'' is characteri sti,c. It is intended to gloss over the abandonment of one of the chief points in the origina l attack. H ,ad '''D1·iver's Int1 .. oducti ,on'' appeared twenty years earlier, the assump 1tion tl1at su.ch a litera .ture · as the Penta ,te,uch could be·long to the age of l\tloses would doubtless have been branded as an anachron .ism. For one of the main grounds on which the book,s w 1ere ,as.signed t,o the latter ,da,ys 10,f ' the mon­archy was that tl1e Hebrews of ' six ce11turies earlier wer ,e, an illiter ,ate people. And aft 1er that error had been refuted by

•

a1·cl1a.elogical dis,c1overies, it was s·till maint .ained that a code . ,of laws so adv.anced, and so elaborate, as that of Moses could not have originated in such an age. This figment, however, was in its turn exploded, when the ,sp1ade of the expl.orer broug 'ht to light ' th.e 110w fa,m,ous C,ode of' Khammt1 'r,abi, the ~mraphel of Genesis, who was king of Babylon in the time of Abraham. .

Instead, howeve1·, of donni11g the white sheet . wl1en con­fron ·ted by this new witness, the critics, with great effro 1ntery, pointed to the newly-found Code as the original of the laws o,f Sin.ai. Such .a conclusion is natural 011 the part 0 1f tnen wl10

tr ·ea·t the P 1entateuch as merely h·u1n,an., But the critic .s canno ·t •

l1ave it both ways. T'he Moses wl101 copied Kham111t1rabi mt1st

•

•

•

•

•

Christ an.d· C riticis11i . 75 •

have bee11 the real Moses of the Exodus, and not tl1e mythical Moses of the Exile, who wrote long centuries after Khammu-rabi had been f org,otte11 ! ·

•

AN INCREDIBLE THEORY. •

•

The evidence of the Khammurabi Code refutes an impor-•

ta11t co,unt in tl1e critics' indictment of the P'entate ·uch; b·ut we can call .ano1ther witness wllos 1e testimony den1olishcs their wl1ole case. The Pentateuch, as we all know, and t'he Pen­tateu ·ch alo ,ne, constit ·utes the Bible of the ·Samaritans~ Who, then, were the Samaritans ?' And how· and when di1d they obtain the Pentateuch ? Here again th·e critics s·hall speak f o·r themse ,lves. Among the distinguished men. who ha V'e cham­pioned their crusade in Britain t·here 'has been none more es­teemed, non 1e more scholarly, ·than the late ·Professor Robert­son Smith; and here is an extract from his ''Samaritans'' ar­ticle in the ''Encyclopedia B1"ita11n·i,ca'':

''They ( ·the Samarita11s) 1·ega1·d themselves as Israelites, de­scendants of the ten tribes, and claim ·to possess the O'r.thodox . religion of Moses * * * The pri 1estly la·w, which is throughout based 011 the p1~actice of the pri 1es1ts in J er·usalem before the Captivity, was r,educed to f o·rm after the Exile, and was pu 'blished by Ezra as the law 10£ the rebuil·t temple of Zion. The Samaritans must, tl1erefore, have derived th 1eir Pentate ,uch

•

from the Je ·ws after Ezra' 's reforms.'1

' And in the same ·para-•

grapl1 he says that, according to the c,ontenti ,on of the Samari-tans, ''no ,t only t'he temple of Zion, but the earlie·r t,emple O'f Shilo1h and the· pri 1es·thood of Eli, were S1chismatical.'' . And yet, ,as he goes on to say, 1''the Samari ,tan r'eligion was built on the Pentateuch alone.'' ·

·No,w marlc what this implies. We know something of ra­cia1 bitterness. We know more, unfortunately, of the fierce 'bitterness of religious strif ·e. And both these elements com­bined to alienate the Samaritans from the Jews. But more than this, in the post-exilic period distrust and dislike were

•

'

•

•

• •

, •

• The F ·undamentals . •

turned to intense hatred S±S ''abl1orrence'' is Robertson Smith's · word by the sternnt-ss and contempt with which the Jews spurne 1d their proffered . help in the w1ork of reconstruction ,at Jerusalem, and refused to acknowledge them in any way. And ye:·t we a.re aske4 to believe t:ha t, at t.his very time a.nd in these very circumstances, the Samaritans, while hatin .g the Jews much as Orangemen hate the Jesuits, and denouncing the whole Jewish cult as schismatical, not only accepted these Jewish books 1 relating to tha t cult as tl1e ''service books'' of their own ritual, but adopted them as theilr ''Bib 1le,'' to the ex­clusion even of the writings of their own Israelite prophets, and the venerated and sacr ,ed books wl1ich record the history of their · king . In the whole range of controversy, religious or .s1ecular, was there ever propound ,ed a theory more utterly incredible and pr 1eposterous ! .

• '

ANOTHER PREPOS 1TEROu ·s p ,osITION. .

N 10 less preposterous are the grounds on which this conc1u-•

sion is commended to us. Here is a statement of them, quoted from the standa rd textbook of the cult, Hasting's ''Bible Dic-tionary'' : ·

• •

''There is at least one valid ground for the conclusion -that the Fentateucl1 was first a,ccepted by the Samaritans ,after the Exile. Why was . their request to be allowed to take part in the building· of ·t·he: second temple refused by the heads of the Jerus ,alem communi ·ty? Very pr 1obably b.ei,cause: th 1e Jews were

• •

.a wa,re that , t.he S1a.m.aritans 1 di1d no1t as yet p1ossess th1e Law-Book11 .It is hard to suppose tha.t otherwise they w 1ou],1d have met with this refusal. Further, anyon 1e wl10, like the preslent writer, regards the m,odern criticisn1 of tl1e Pentateuch as es­sentially correct, has a second decisive reason for adopting

· the above view.' '' ( Professor · Konig's article, ''Samaritan Pen­tateuc .h,'' page 68.)

• •

Here are two ''decisive reasons'' for holding that ''the Pen~ tateuch was · first acc1epted by th 1e Samaritans after th 1e Exile .. " First, be-cause ''very prol?1ably'' it was belc,aitse tl1ey had not

• •

•

• •

Christ a1id C1,.iticis1n . . . i7 •

those forged books that the Jews spurned their-help ; and so they .went home and adopted the forged books as their Bible I And, secondly, because criticism has proved that the · books Were 11ot i11 existence till then. To characterize the writings of these scl1olars as they deser, ,e is n1ot a grateful task b1ut the tin1e has come to throw off reserve, when such d.rivel as tl1is is gravely put forward to induce us to tear from ou,r Bible the Roly Scriptures on wl1ich our Divine Lord based His claims to Messiahship. , .

THE , IDEA OF SACRIFICE REVELATION.

The refut .ation 10£ the 'Higl1,er Criticisn1, does not" prove that •

tl1e Pe,ntateuc11 is inspired of God. The writer who ~ould set himself t,o establish such a thesis as tl1at withi11 the limits of a Review Article migl1t well be admired for his enthusiasm and daring, but certainly not for his modesty or discretion. Neither does it decide questions which lie within the legitimate . province o·f the true Highe1· Criticis111, as e.1:. gr., the author­ship of Genesis . It is incredible that for the , thousands of years that elapsed before the days of Moses, God left His · people on earth without a revelation. It is plain, moreover,

•

that many of the ordinances divinely entrusted to Moses were but a renewal of an earlier revelation. TJ1e teligion of Baby­lon is clear evidence of such a p1·i1neval revelation. Ho\v else

I

ca11 the universa lity of sacrifice be accounted for? Could s11ch a practice have originated in a humaa brain?

If some demented ereatu ·re co11ceived the idea ·that killing: a beast before his enemy's door would propitiate him, his neigh­bors would no doubt have suppressed l1im. And if he evolved the belief that his god would be appeased by such an offensive practice, he must have supposed his god to be as mad as him~ self. The fact that sacrifice prevailed among all races ca11

be explained only by a primeval revelation. And the Bible tudent will recognize that God thus ought to impress on

men that death was the penalty of in, and to lead ~them to

•

•

I

1 j

•

•

'

•

78 Tlie Fu1ida:mentals. -

look f o:rward to a great blood shedding that would bring life . and blessing to mankind. But Babylon was to the ancient

world what Rome has been to Christendom. It corrupted eVery d·ivine ordinance and truth, . and perpetuated them as thus corrupted ,. And in the Pen ,tatettch we hav 1e· the 1divine re-iss,ue Of the true cult. The figment that the deba sed and corrupt version was the original may satisfy some profe ssors of 11:e· brew, but no one who has any practical know ledge of human natt1re wou]d entertain it. ·

INSUFFICIE ,NT EVIDENCE. ~

At thisv stage, however, what concerns us is not the divine authority of the book s; but the hum .an error and f o11y of the critical attack upon them. The only historicaJ basis of that at·

. tack is the fact that in the revival ttnder Josiah, ''the book of the law' ' was found in the temple by Hilkiah, the high prie st, . to . whom tl1e young king entrusted the duty of cleansing and renovating the long negl,ecte1d shri ne. A :most natural discov­ery it was, seeing that Moses had in express terms commanded that it should be kept there (2 Kings 22 :8; Deut. 31 :26). But

•

~ accordiµg to the critics, the whole busiQ1ess1 was a detestab 1le trick of the priests. For they it was who forged the books and invented the command, an .d then hid the product of their infam0us wo~k where they knew it wot11d be fo 1und.

And apart from this, the only foundation for ''the assured re sults of modern critici sm," as they themselves acknowledge, consists of ''grounds of probability'' and ''plausible arguments" I In no civilized country w,ould an hab 1itu ,al criminal he conv,icteid of petty larceny on such evidence as this ; and yet it is 011 tl1ese grounds t~at w·e a ,re called up ,on 'to gf ve 'ttp , 'the s,a,cr 1ed books which o,t1r Divi ,ne L1ord acc·r'e1dited as ''tl1e Wor 1d of God'' and 1

n1ad.e tl1e bas,is, of His do,c·triria,1 teacl1in,g. · •

• •

CHRIST OR ,CRITICISM? •

• • •

And this brings us to the second, and incomparably the

•

•

Christ ,and Cri,ticis1n .. , 79 •

•

g1·aver, objection to, '' tl1e assured 1~es11lts ,of modern criti,cism,.' That the Lord Jesu s Cl1rist i,dentifi ed Hin1se lf with .the He­brew Scriptures, and in a very special way with the Boole of Mo1ses,. no one di sput ,es. A11d tl1is being' so, we mu st make cl1oice between Christ a11d Criticism. .For if ''the .crit ical hy" Pothesis'' of the Pe~tateuch .be sustained, the conclusion is ,Seemingly inevitable, eitl1er that H ,e was no ,t divine , or that the 1,.ecords of His teaching at"e unt1·ttstworthy.

Which a]ternative sha11 we adopt? If . the second, t'hen ,ever}r claim ·to 1 in,spiration .must be abandoned, and ,agno,sticism

.

tnu st supplant faith in the case , of every fearles s thi .nker . In -spiration is f·ar too great a qttestion for incidental treatment here ;I bttt two remarks with re spe ct to it may not be ·in·o.ppor ­tune. Behind the f ra·u,ds of Spiritualis1n there lies tl1e f,act, at­tested by men of high character, some of W'horn are eminent as scientis ,ts and ,s,cholars, that definite communications are re­ceiv,ed in precise words from the worl9- of spirits. ,* And this being so, to deny that the Spirit of God could thu s communi­cate trttth to me·n, or, in other wo1~ds, to 1·eject verba] inspira­tion on a priori gr ,ounds, betr ,ays the stupidity of sys,tematized ll~belief. And, se,co,ndly, it is a·111azing that any one· who re-

•

gards the comin ,g of Chri st as. God's supreme , revelation of Him .self can ima ,gine t·hat ( to pttt it on no higher ground t·han · ''P roviden ,ce'') , the Divine ,Sp·irit could fail to ensure that man-k,ind shquld have a trustworthy a,nd t·r,ue recor 1d of His mis-

• •

sion and His teaching. . •

A ~IORE HOPELESS DILEMMA.

But if the Go sp,el narr ,ative be authenti ,c, we are drive ,n back upon the alternativ ·e tl1at He of wh 1om they sp1eak cou ld not be divine. ''No ·t so,'' ' the critics protest, ''for did He not Him­self conf ,ess His ignor ,ance ? And is not this explained h,y the ~postle's statement that in I-Iis humiliation He empti ,ed Him ­self of His Deity?'' ' And tl1e inference , drawn from 'this (to

' *The fact that,. as the Christian believes,, th,ese spirits are demons

\Vho personate the dead , does not affect the argi11nent.

•

•

'

•

•

•

\

80 The Fundamentals. •

quote the standard text-book of tl1e cult) is that the Lord of Glory ''held the current Jewish n1otions re·specting the divine attthority and revelati 1on of the Old Te.stament.'' But even if this conclusion--as portentotts ,as it is prof a11e could be es tab·' lished, instea 1d of affor 1ding an ·escape from the di:lemma i11

which th·e Higher Critici .s.m involve ,s i.ts ·votaries, [ it would 01ily ser·ve1 to ma.ke tha ·t dilemma in,or,e 110,peless and m.ore t 1errlble. Fo ,r what chiefly concerns us is not that, e:r. hyp., the Lord's doctrinal teaching was fal se, but that in u11equivocal terms, a11d with extreme solemnity, He declared again and again that His teaching was not His . own but His Father's, and that the very words i11 which He conveyed it were God-given.

· A few years ago tl1e devout were distressed by the pro-cee1dings of a certain Chicago ''prophet,'' who claime,d divine authority for his lucubration ,s. I{indly 1disposed peopie, reject­i·n·g a severer estimate of the man and his, platform uttera .nces,

•

regarded h.:im merely a.s a profane f·ool. Sha·11 thie criti.c.s, be-tra ,y u,s, int 10 f orm ,in,g a si1nila1·l.y ind·ulgent e,stima·te of My pe11 refuses to con1plete the sentence! . ·

And will it b.e believe·d that th 1e on:ly ,scriptural basis offe1·ed us for this ast ·ounding position is a verse in on,e of the Gospels . and a word in one of the Epistles ! Passing strange it is that 1ne11 who handle I1oly Scripture with sttch freedom when it

· conflicts with their ''assured results'' should attach such e11or~ mous importance to an isolated verse or a single wor.d, when

•

it can be misused to support them. The verse is Mark 13 :32, where tl1e Lord says, with ·1·ef1erence to His coming a.gain: ''Of ·tl1at day and hou ·r knowetl1 no one ; no,, n,ot th 1e angels which are in heaven, 11either th ,e S 1on, but the Fa ther.'' ' B·ut this fol­lows in1mediately upon the, ·words: ''Heaven , and earth sha l1l pass away, bt1t I1Iy words shall n1ot p,ass away.' '' I

THE WORDS OF GOD.

Th e Lor ,d's words were not ''in spired''; they were the words of God in a still higher s.ense.. ''The peop le were astonished

•

•

•

Christ and Criticism. • 81

•

at His . teaching,'' we are told, ''f 1or I-Ie taught them as .one having exousia." The word occurs again in Acts 1 :7, where lie says that times and seasons "the Father hath put in His own exousia.'' And this . is explained by Phil. 2 :6, 7 : ''1-Ie counted it not a prize ( or a thing to be gr ,asped) to be on an equality with God, but emptied f imself'' the word on which the kenosis theory of the critics depends. And He not only stripped Himself of His glory as God; . He gave up His liberty as a man. For He never spoke His own words, but

1

only the words which the Father gave Him to speak. And this was the limitation of His ''authority''; so t.hat, beyond what ·the Father gave Him to speak, He knew nothing and was silent.

, · B,ut when He spoke, ''He taught them as 0 1ne. who had authority, and not as their scribes.'' From their scribes they were used to ·rec 1eive defi·nite teaching, but it was teachin ,g based oti ''the law and the prophe ·ts.'' But here was One who 1Stood apart and taught them from a wholly different plane. ''For,'' He declared, ''I spake not from Myself ; but the Father which . sent Me, He hath given Me a commandment what I should say · and what I should speak. * * * The things ,, therefore, which I speak, even as the Father hath said unto Me, so I ,peak'' ' (Jo ,hn 12 :49, 50, R. V.).

And let us not forget th3.t it was not merely the substance of His teaching that was divine, but the very language in

, which it was conveyed. So that in His prayer on the night 0f the betrayal He could say, not only ''I .l1ave given them Thy W'ord,'' but ''I have given tl1em the words whic]1 Thou gavest Me.''* His words, therefore, about Moses and tlie Hebrew Scrip ·tures were not, as the critics, witl1 sucl1 daring and se1em­ing, profanity, maintain, the lucubratio 1ns of a superstitious and • ignorant Jew; they we ·re the words of God, an 1d conveyed truth that was divine and eternal. · -

When in the dark days of the Exile, God needed a prophet .. w iii

*Both the Joro\' and the P1J/Ja-ra 14: 10, 24,

•

John 17 :8~ 14; as again in Chap. •

•

• ,.

.. The P undamentals. 82

who would speak only as He gave l1im words, He struck Eze­kiel dumb. Two judgment s already rested on that people~ the seventy years ' Servitude to Babylo,n, and then the Captivity . and they were warned . that continued impenitence wou1d bring on the1n the still more terrible judgment of the seventy years' desolation s. And till that la9:t judgment fell, Ezekiel remained dumb (Ezek. 3 :26; 24 :27; 33 :22). But the Lord Jesus Christ needed no such discipline. He came to do the Father' s will, and no word s eve,r passed His lips save the words given Him · to speak .

In thi sl connection, mo1reover, . two fact ls wh.ich are strangely overlooked claim pr 1ominent notice. The first is, that in Mark 13 the antithe sis is not at all b,etween man and ,God , b1ut -be­tween the Son of God and the Father. And th 1e se,cond is tl1at. He had been r,e-inve sted with all that, according to Phi]. 2, He laid aside in c,oming into the world. ''All things have be.en delivered unto Me 0 1£ My ·F ath 1er,," He declar ·e,1d.; and

•

tl1is at ,a time when the proofs , th.at ' 'H e wa,s de .spise ·d and r1e-jected of men'' were pre ssing on Him. His reassuming the glory awaited His return to heaven , but here on earth the all thing s were alre ·ady His ( Matt. 11 :27) . · .

•

AFTER THE K E NOSIS • •

The fore going is surely an adequate reply ·to the kenosis figment of the critic s ; but if an.y should still doubt or cavil, there is another answer which is complete and crushing. Whatever may have been the limitation s under which He rested during His ministry on earth, He was released from them when He rose f ,rom th 1e dead. And it was in Hi s post -"r1esttrrecti .o~ teaching that He gave the fullest and cleare st testimony to the Hebr ,ew Scriptures. T ·hen it wa s that, ''beginning at M 0 1ses, and all the prophet s, He expoun 1ded ttnto them in all the Scrip· tt-tres the things concernin .g Himself.'' An4 aga.in, c.onfinning all His previous teaching about those Scriptures, ,iHe said unto them, The se .are the words wh·i1ch I' spake unto you while I w,as

•

•

•

Christ and c·r·it·icism . 83 •

Yet with· You, that all things must be fulfilled which were writ-ten in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning Me.''

And th 1e record adds: ''Then 10pened I-Ie their mind that I they might understand the Scriptures .. '' And the rest of the

New Testament is the fruit of that ministry, enlarged and un­folded by the }Ioly Spirit gi, 1en to lead them into all truth. And in every part of tl1e New Testament the Divine authority of the Hebrew Scriptures, and espec.ially ,of the Books of Moses, is either taught or assumed.

THE VITAL ISSUE.

Certain it is, then, that the vital i,ssue in this controversy is not the value of the Pentateuch, but the · Deity of Christ. And yet the present article ·does not pretend to deal with the truth of the Deity. Its humble aim is not even to establish the a11th1ority of the Script ,ur 1es, but m.erely to discredit the critical attack upon them by exposing its real character and its Utter fe,ebleness. The writer ·'s, method, therefore, has been ~-­tnainly destructive criticism, the critic .s' fav .orite weapon being thus turne .d against . themselves.

•

A DEMAND FOR CORRECT STATEMENT • •

One cannot but feel distress at having to ac.cord s,uch tr ,eat­tnent to certain distinguished men whose reverence for divine things is, beyond reproach. A like distress is felt at times by those who l1ave experience in dealing with sedition, or in sup­Pressing riots. But when men who, are entitled to consjdera­tion and respect thrust themselves into ''the line of fire,'' they tnust take the consequences. These distinguished men will llot fail to receive to the fttll the deference to which they are en-

•

titled, if ,o,nly th 1ey wi]l 1djssociate tl1emselves from the dishon-est claptrap of this crusade ( ''the assured results of modern criticism''; ''all scholars are with us''; and so a.n -bluster and falsehood by which the weak and ignorant are browbeaten or

• •

•

•

•

•

•

•

'

•

• • • ..

I

•

84 The F undame,ntala. •

. deeeived) and acknowledge that their 1''ass ,uried results'' ·are mere hypoth ,eses, repudiated by Hebraists and theologians as competent and, eminent as themselves .

• •

TH .IN 1GS TO FEAR. ,

The effects of this ''Highe ,r Criticism'' a,re extremel ,y grav ,e. For it has dethroned the Bible in 'the home, an ,d the good, old practice of ''family worship'' is rapidly dying out. And great national interests also are involved. For who can doubt that the prosperity and power of the Protestant nations of the world ar~ due to the influence of tl1e Bible up,on character and con ... ,duct? ' . Races of m 1en who for g,ene ,rations have been taught to think for themselv ,es in matters of ~h1e highest moment will naturally excel in every sphere of effort Or of enterpr.is ·e. And more than this, no one who is trained in the fear of God will

•

fail in his duty to his neighbor, but will prove himself a good citiz 1en. But 'the detl1ronem 1en·t 10£ tl1e Bible leads 1 pr ,ac,tically to the dethronement of God ; a111d in 1Ge,rmany and America ., ,and

•

. now in England, the effects of this are declaring the1nselves in ways, and to a:n extent, well fitted to cause anxiety for the

•

future. CBR .IST ' SUPREME •

•

If a personal word may be pardoned in conclusion, the writer would appeal to every book he has written in proof that he is no champion of a rigid, traditional ''orthodoxy.'' With a single limitation, he would advo 1cate full and free criti­cism of Holy Scripture. And t'hat one lim,itation , is tha ,t the wor ,ds of th ,e Lo ,rd Jesus Christ s,hall be, deeme 1d a, ba ,r to cri ,ti­cism and "'an end of coritrovers .y'' on every , subject exp 1ressly dealt with in His teaching. ''The Son of God is come'' ; and by Him ca1ne both grace and TRUTH. And from His hand it is that we have reeeived the Scriptures of the Old Testament.

'

I

• •

•

•

•

•

•

• •

•

CHAPTER. V ~ •

· MODERN p ·1-1ILOSOPHY.

BY PHILIP MAURO, C10UNS ,EL,L0 1R-AT-LAW, NEW YORK CITY • •

''Beware lest any man spo,il yo,u tl1r·ough philosophy and vain de­ceit aft ·e,r ( .according to) the tradition 0£ men, after the rudiments of the wor ·ld, and not after Christ. Fo,r in Him c.twelleth all the fuJ­ness of the Godhead bodily; ar·id ye a1·e co1nplet·e i1i Hi.,1i, who is the Head , of all principality and p,o,ver.'' Col. 2 ;8-10. ·

In the foregoing passage occurs tl1e only 1nention which · tl1e Scriptures make of philosophy. Nothing is more l1ighly esteemed among men than p_hilosophy. It is on all hands re­garded as tl1e supre1ne exercise and occupation of the human mind, and is, indeed . an occ11patio11 for which but very fe\V men l1ave the reqttisite intellectual eqt1ipment. ·A·s far back as . ~

the tradition of men goes, philosop,hy has held tl1is high place in bumat1 esti1nation; and it is, therefore, a fact of much sig:.. . nifica11ce tl1at, in all the Bible, philosophy is but once named.

Even in our day the deference paid to philosophy is such that there are no,t ·many teache1·s of the B1ibl 1e who would ven­ture to warn their fellow-men of its dangers ; for philosophers have managed to mai11tai11 ·in Ch·r·istendom th,e same em,inence

•

which they occupied in heathendoni. Indeed, a course in phi-losophy is now, and f Or some generations has been, considered an essential part o,f the education of a man who is preparing for the Chris ·tian ministry ; and this is not the only one of the ''rudime ,11ts of the world j' wl1i1ch llas found it,s way into our

.

tl1eological seminaries. It is, tl11e1,.efore, 11ot st1r,prising tl1at, in the teaching imparted by these sen1inary graduates, pl1iloso­pl1y holds a very different place fron1 that assigned to it by the Bib1e.

•

86

f

•

•

-•

86 Tlie Fundametz,taJs, . •

•

NOT A IIUMAN UTTERANCE.

We 1nay be very su re, then, tl1at the passage quoted above is not a httman tttterance. It does not express man's estimate of ph ilosophy far f ro111 it,. In p1·onouncing th.at wa1·ni11g, Paul is not repeat :ing what l1e learned wh·ile pursuing his course in philo-sopl1y at the school of Gam~liel. No 1nan would ever have coupled philo ·sopl1y with vain deceit, or chara ,cterized it as a dang ,erous p1roc,ess, agai11st which God's people shou ld be

•

,cautio ,ned, l~st the ,reby, they sl1ould be despoiled of their pos-sessions. No ma,i ever . defined philosophy as being according to human tradition and tpe basic p1~i11ciples of this evil world, and not accor ,ding to Chri st. This ,varning is, from Go1d Him­self; b11t, alas ,, like man ,y other ,o,f His solemn war 'nings, it has been despised and utterly disregarded. The thing agains ·t which thi8 ea14 nest warning was spoken has been welcomed with ,open arm s, and incorporated i,nto the th ,eolo,gica,l machinery o·f

•

our ec.clesiastic-al s.ysten1 s~ 'The ,con.5:.eq.uen,ces of thi.s c,on-t1emptuous disregard of God' .s wa1·ning are such as ·might have been expected.

'This word ''bewar ,e''' ( s.ometime ·s rendered ''take heed'' in ou,r vers ,,ion ), d1oes no 't 0 1ccur very O·f ten in the N e·w Testament, There are 11ot many thing s whereof believers are bidden to ''beware.,., Some of th ,es,e are ''the scribes,'' ''dogs,'' ''evil­worker s,'~ ' the co,ncision, '' and an ''evil hea .rt of unbelief'' (Ma ,rk 12 :38; Phil. 3 :,2; , Acts 13 :40; Heb. 3 :12). T 'he, war~~ ing of ou·r text is addr ,essed t 10 believers who have been in­structed as to their onenes s with Christ in His death ( at the l1~nds of tl1e ·wo 1rld), Hi ,s burial, and His resurrection. Addi­tiona l emp 1hasis is, ,given t,ot the \varning by the co:nnect ,io1n in which it ,occur s. The word r1ender 1ed ''spo ,il''

1

signifies li'terally to· niake a prey of!J a when one falls into the hands of robbers

•

a11d is stripped by violence ,of his , goods, or into tl1e han ,ds of •

sJDOoth-tongue,d .and plausible swind!ers wl10 gain his co1nfi-dence ,, and by ,means 10£ their arts fle,e,ce him 1of his valuab .]es. It is heavenly treasure that is in contemp lation l1ere, even the

•

I

•

•

M oder1i Pliilosophy. 8.7

be]iever's portion of the unsearchable riches of Christ. Hence empty deceit is cont rasted wit h th e fir,lness 9£ the Godhead wl1ich dw ells in Chri st ; and the despoiled condition of one who

. l1a~ been victimized tl1rough philos~pl1y is contrasted witl1 the enrichment of those wl10 have app ·rehended b 1y faith th.eir com ... P1lete,iess in Him who is, the I-lead of all principality and power.

But why, we may profi ta bly i11quire, is philosophy described as an instrument of spoliatio11 in the hands of ' art£ ul men ? And _why is it characte rized as being after ( i. e., according to) the rudiments, or basic principles, of the world? The word rendered ''rudiments'' occu rs four tin1es in Scripture. ln Col. 2 :20 it is again 1·endered ' 'ru diment s." In Gal. 4 :3 and 9 it is rendered ' 'element s." It seems to convey the idea of basic or foundation priflciple s of the world- system . The se elements are described in Gal. 4 :9 as ''weak and beggarly." They do not strengthen and e11rich, but weaken and impoverish those who re sort to them. ~

•

•

. P 1HILOSOPHY DEFINED •

. The reason jg perceived, in a ge11eraJ way at least, wh~n we ascertain wl1at philo sophy is, nam.ely, the occupatio11 of at­tempting to devise, by the exerc .ise of the human reason, an explanation of the universe. It is an interminable occupation for the reason that, if the explanation whicl1 philosophy is for­ever seeking were to b,e f ot1nd, that di scovery would be the end of philosophy. T he occupation of the philosopher would be gone. It is interminable for the stronger reason that t~e phi­losopher is bound, by t11e rules of hi s. profession, to employ in his quest only httman wisdom, a11d. it is written that the world, by its wisdom, does not come to the knowledge of God ( 1 Cot\ l : 19-21, 2 : 14) . Incidentally, a ]arge p,art of the time of the pl1ilosopher is occupied in criticising and demonstrating the un ... reasonableness or ab surd ·ity of all p11i]osophical syst 1ems except that espoused by himsel f. This, however, is merely the de .. structive part of his work , the co,nst1·uctive part being, , as has

•

•

• •

.. •

•

•

• ,.

• •

88 The Punda 'mentals. •

been said, the employment of his reasoning faculties i1JJ the · task of devising a system which will account, after a f asl1ion,

. for the existence and o:rigin of, and for tl1e changes whicl1 ap­pear to take place in, the visible universe. Having settled upon

•

such a syste1n1, th.e p1hiio.s,op1h1er· must thencef o·rth def end it from the attacks of philosophers of opposing ''Schools'' ( who will put forth weighty volumes demonstrating to their entire satis­faction that his philosophical system is a tissue of absurditie s), and .in replying to their many and :various objections and .

• • ii

cr1t1c1sms. •

''NOT ACCORDING TO CHRIST.'' ' •

We may thu s see at a glance tl1at philosophy is, in its, essen .­tial character, in accordance with human tradition and the fun­damental or primary principles of the world-system ; and that it is not according to Christ, who is I1ated by the world, and

. who has laid the axe at the root of all its principles. Promi­nent among the elen1ents o,f the world and of human traditi ion is the p,rinciple that the world reflects the grandeur of man, and that huma11 reason is tl1e highest and mightiest factor in it. In our day it has become a tenet of popular theology tl1a.t the hun1an reason is tl1e final court of app ,eal in all ma.tters ,

of 1doc·trine., In man's w1orld human . achiev1em1ent is 1e1:xalt1ed to .

the highest place, and no limit is set to what may be accoin-pli.shed by human ingen .uity. "Let us build us a city and a tower whose top n1ay reach unto l1eaven, and let us make us a name'' ( Gen. 11 :4), is tl1e progra1n of humanity~ as announced by those who established tl1e basic principles of the world .. In the gr ·eat world- ,sy,stem tl1at o,niy is valu 1ed and lat.t,ded which

•

is attained by the effort ,of ma11 and redounds to his credit. Philosophy adhere s str ictly to this tradition and to these prin- · ciples in that its various explanations, in order to receive recognitio ,n as, '' :p·hilosjophical," mt1st be ·purely the pr ,oducts of liuman reaso11, exercised upon the results of human inves­tigations1'

•

• •

•

• •

Modern P hilo.sophy. \

· P·HILOS0PH¥ VS. REVELATION.

It follows of necessity that philosophy and divine revela,• tion are utterly irreconcilable. The very existence of philos-ophy as, an occupation for the human mind depe·nds upon the rigid exclusion of every explanation of the universe which is not reached by a speculative process ,. If a philosophy admits the existence of ,a God (as , t11e philosiophies just now in favor <lo), it is a god who either is dumb, or else is not permitted to tell anything about himself, or how he made and sustains the universe ,. Should the philosopher's god break through these re .strictions, there would be straightway an end of his Phi1osopl1y. For it is not the pursuit of truth th.at makes . one a philosophe ·r. The pursuit of truth, in order to be philosoph­ical, must be condttcted in directions in which trt1th cannot pos­.sibly be fou1id. For the discovery of what philosophers pre ·­tend to be seeking would bring their philosophies t,o an end,

•

la,nd such a calamity must, of course, be avoid,ed. Therefore, the 1noment one· receives an explanation of the universe as

•

coming ff'om God who made it, he can have no further use for philosophy. One who has obtained the truth is no longer

.a seeke,r. The value of philosopl1y, therefore, lies, not in its results, for ther 1e are none, but so'lely in the employment which its unverifiable speculations affor ,d to thos 1e whose tastes and • intellectual endowmen .ts qt1a1i.fy them to engage in it •

•

PHILOSOPiiY VS. CHRIST.

Again, philoso 1pl1y is ''not according to Christ'' for the si1n­ple and sufficient reason that the testimony of Christ puts an end, for all who accept it, to all philosophical speculations con­cern1ng the relations of' l1umanity to God ,and to the universe. Christ set His seal to the truth and divine authority of the Old Test .ament Scriptures. He, moreov 1er, 1·evealed the Eather; and finally H ! promised furtl1er revelations o,f truth through ' His apostles under the immediate teaching of the Holy Spirit. These revelations are not on1y ,directly opposed to philosoph·

•

•

•

•

•

'

•

90 The Fundamentals. •

. ical spe,culations, but they cut th,e groun 1d £rom unde ,r theitJ, The testimony and teaching of Christ were not co,mmunicated to men for tl1e purp 1ose of ·inf arming thein ho'W man and the . -

. w161-I,d, can1e to be what 'th,ey are though tl1ey do, 1·eveal the truth as 'to that ·. The ·p,urp 1ose of the doctr ,ine of Cl1rist and of His pe1·sonal mis,sion to t'he world was to show to men their true condition, as und ,er the dominion of sin and d 1eath,, and to accomplish eternal re ,demption for all who believe the good tidings and a1ccept the gift of God's grace. The d·octrine of Christ no,t only instructs 1nen as to th,e way into the king,

•

dom of God, but also ,entitles those who· accept it to the imme· diate· possession and enjoyment of many a11d valuable rightS and privileges w·hich can be acqui1-ed in no otl1e1· lvay. I£, th 1erefore, ,you .are a beli 1eve,r ·in Christ Jesu ,s,. trus ,ting tl1e merit

•

of His S,acrifice f 1or your acceptance with , God, "b1ewa,r'e Ire.st a11y m.an despoil you ,of thes,e inestimable . r.ights a11d privi ,leges through philosophy and va,ir1 de1ceit, according , to 1 the principles of the world, and ~ot according to Chiist. For in Hill1, and not elsewhere, dwells the fttl ,ness of t'h.e 1Godl1ead ; an1d. in Hilll, and ·riot elsewhere, the believe,r n1ay be fi.lled 'to l1is utmost ca· pa 1city. Philosophy can strip men of · part of the inheritance of faith. It has, nothing to offer the111 i11 e4change .

• • • •

• FRUITS OF PHIL 10SOPHY • •

It would be quite possible, for one who l1ad the requisite leisure and curiosity, ,· to trace tl1e 1nain develo 1pments of phi-­loso,phy, ,and to exan1ine the many different '''Sch ,ools'' to whicb

•

it ha,s given rise dt1ring a period of several thousand years, Ha .v:i,ng done so, he would find that pl1i]o1sophy C10n,sists, as .already s,aid,r i.n th,e p1t1rstti,t of the unattaina .b1le, and that, amonlg all the varied fie·lds of hltman ac,tivity ther 1e i,s none wl1ich has

· witnessed such an absolutely futile and barren expenditure of '

· ,energy as the field of speculative philosophy. A philo,sopher of repute at the present time has declared tl1at ''philosophy bas been on a false scent ever since the days of Socrates and Plato.''

•

•

•

•

ll1 ode1"1i Philosophy. 91 •

The following of a fa lse scen t for n1ore than two thousan d Years is surely not a record to boast of; and yet it is trtte that, so far as res·itlts a,re concerned, philosophy has nothi.ng more encouraging than thi to offer as an inducement for engaging .. . 1n 1t.

·We do not, however, propose anything so stupendotts (~nd so unprofitable) as a review of the history of philo sophy, but tnerely a brief statement setting forth the status of philosophy at the present day. And this we undertake in order .that the . ll,on-philos6phical reader may be able to ascertain the charac­ter of the influence which philo sophy is exerting, in these times of change and mental ttnre st, upon the immediate problems Of humanity, and upon what is called ''the progres s of httman t·hought .. '' .

l

The great majority of men do no thinking beyond the n1at-ters which lie wit hin the little circle of their personal interest s. l'his unthinking majority take s its thoughts and ·opinions from an i~tellectua1 and cultttred few, or fr,om lead,ers, who ma.nage to gain tl1~ir confid,en,ce. It is important, therefore, to ascer- --.. tain what ideas are prevalent among those who are in a posi­tion to influence the opinions of the ma ss of mankind. This niay easily be done by sampli11g th e current philo sophical teach­ing at the great universities of the Eng lish-speaking countrie s .

• •

· THEISTIC AND ATI-IEISTIC ' PI,IILOSOPHY. •

• •

The various school s of philo sophy which have flourished thro ugh the ages may be div ided into two main classes, namely, thei.stic and ath eis tic. The for111er cl,ass embraces all philo­so,phic sys tems which assume a god of some sort as the origi­nator and sustainer of the univer se. It may be ren1arked in Passing that theistic philo sophies are more dangerous to hu­tnankind than the atheist·ic class, for tl1e reaso,n that tl1e former .. . are well calculated to e11snare those who, by nature 01· ·t1·a1n1!1g, have a repugnance to athei sm.. We need pay no attention to athei stic phi losophy, for the reaso11 that it is qttite 011t of favor

'

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

92 The Fundame1itals.

at the present day, and shows 110 sign of ever recoveri11g a respect ,able st ,atus , .

• DUAL ISM AND 1 PANTHEISM •

• •

Confining our attent ,ion, tl1eref ore, to tl1eistic pl1ilosophies, · we find several classes of tl1ese, namely, . "Dualistic'' and '' Pa11~

the,·istic.' 1 Dual 'ism is, tl1e na1ne ,vhic'h philosophers have 'been pleased to bestow upon those systen1s which maintain that God ( or the ''First Cause'') created tl1e universe as an act of 1-Iis will, and has an existence distinct and apart from it. TI1,ese systems are called ''dualistic' ' beeause tl1ey count God as 01ie

entity, and the universe or creation as anotlier entity, thus n1ak­ing two entities. The reader sl1ot1ld u11derstand clearly tl1at when a learned professor of philosopl1y speaks of ''dualism'' l1e has Chris ,ti,anity in min 1d. ·

MONIS!{ AND PLURALISM.

Pantheism, on t'he otl1e1· l1and, main ·tains that God and tl1e universe , are one be1i~11g. . Tl1ere are severa l varie ,ties 0£ p,an­theis .in whicl1 have followers among living philosophers, e. g., monism and plu,,,alism. Monism is that variety of ' p,an .theisnt which is m,ost in favor at the prese11t day. 'This systetn as,.

· sumes as the , basis of reality an ''ab solute'' 1or '' all-knower'' a monstrosity ,vhich comprehend s in its vast being all things . and all their relati ons a11d activities. Mo 1nism, therefor ·e, as-­serts that there is b,ttt one entity. God has n,o exis,tence apart , from the univer se, and never , I1ad. The latter is, theref ore, eternal, and there l1as,. bee11 no creation.

It is a remarkable and highly significant fact that the basic principle of this ruling philosophy o·f our day is also the basic principle of the rapidly rising religio-economic system of o~

•

cialism,~ f.,,or s,ocialism i,s ,gr 1ounded upon the propo 1siti,on tl1at man is Organically and essentially one with God and with the universe. From thi,s stran ,ge agr ,eement this 1 st,ran ,ge meeti11g of extremes far-reaching results may be expected .

•

•

•

Modern Philosophy. 93 •

•

THE PRESENT SITUATION • •

In order to obtain fo 1r our consideration a fair and accurate ' statement of the positi ,on of present -day pl1ilosophy, reference wili be made to the ''Hibbert Lectures'' of 1909, on ''The Pres­ent Situation in Philosopl1y," delivere ,d by Prof 1esso 1r William James, of Ha rvard Univ 1ersity, at Manchester College, Oxford. TI1ese lectures hav 1e been published in a volume entitled ''A Plu­ralistic Universe'' ·( Longmans, Green & Co.).

P 1rof essor J an1es is one of the very few philos .ophers . of note who reject the teach ing of monism. He advocates a theory styled ''Pluralism," of which a sufficient idea may be gained from the quotations to follow. It is, of first importance to us to learn from Professor James what is the present statu s of dualism, since, as we have seen, tl1at clas~ embraces old-fash ­ioned or Bible Christianit ,y. As to tl1is, he says:

''Dualistic theism is profess ed as firmly as ever at all Cath­olic seats of Ie.arning, wherea .s it l1as of -·1ate years te ·nded to disappear at our British and American Universities, and be replaced by a m 1onistic pantheism mo.re or · less open er dis­gttised'' (page 24).

Ac·cording to this comp ,etent authority, the Roman Catholic colleges are the only ones of any consequence wherein the state­ments of the Bible regarding the creation and government of

. the universe, the origin of living creatures, including man, the origin 0£ evil, etc., are even ''prof(!ssed.'' The great universi· ties o,£ England an 1d America, which were f ounde 1d for the pur­pose of maintaining the doctrines of Scriptures, and spreading knowledge of them as tl1e revelations of the living God, and as the foundations of all true learning , have been des·po,iled of all that made them ttseful for the nurtu ·re of young minds, and that made them vali1able to the communities wherein they l1ave flourished; and this 1noment .ous 1change h,a,s be1e11 accom-

- p1lsl1ed through the age11cy of philosophy and vain deceit, ac­cording to the ancient tradition of men, according to the rudi• ments of the world, and not according to Christ.

•

•

•

•

•

.. •

•

94 ,

• A STRANGE PHENO~IENON •

Herein, as it seems to the writer, we have an explanation for the strange phenomenon that Romanism is gaining ground rapidly in Protestant England and America, While steadily los­ing ,influence in those countries wh,ere it. has h,ad al111ost-exclu­sive s,wa,y over the 1C·onsciences of th 1e people. , The latter coun.; trie s have never enjoyed the privileges of the open Bible. They have never had any links attaching them to the Jiving Wo1·d of God. All they l1ave 11,ad is ''t he churcl1," and that they are now judgin ,g by its fruits.

But in England and America it is far otherwise. For many generation s, from father to son, the people have been knit by many strong and tender tie s and associations to the W or·d of · the living God. Its influence s upon the customs a11d life of the peop1e have been 1nany and pote ·nt. Only those whose mind s are blinded will deny the m,ighty influence which 'the Bible has exerted as a factor in the national prosperity of the English-s ,peaking · countries. The great univer ,sities have been the ,ir ,pride, and have 'been count ,ed amo,ng the national b'u]-

-warks; and th 1e Bible has b.e1en tl1e f oundatio 1n stone of the ·uni -. versities. But now a change has come so swiftly and so

stealthily tha 't we can sca rcely t 'ealize what ha ,s hap 1p,en,ed. The univers .ities hav 1e dis,car ·ded the teaching of tl1e, B,ible, and have repudiated its authority' as the divinely inspired teacher. Only at ''C.ath,olic, sea ts of le:a:rning'' is its teaching p,rof essed. Wha ,t wo·nder, then, , in a ti.me of general disintegration and unres ·t, that the chil .dren of Bible-loving a11ce,st1ors should be drawn by thousand s to a system which has the appearance of stability, where al], else is falling to piece.s,, and 'Which, with all its errors, do 1es proclaim tl1e infal ,lib,i]ity of the Holy Scripture s I Whoso is wise 'Will consider these thi11gs. ·

• • A SUDD 1EN CI.JANGE •

'

Prof esso1· James, in his lectures at Manchester, treats the teaching of the Bible as being 110w s,o utterly discredited and

•

•

•

•

Modern Philosophy. • 95 •

out of date as to call fo,r 0 1nly a brief, passing reference in ,a dis­cussion purporting to deal with ''the present situation in phi- ·

•

losophy,." He says : ''I shall leave cynical mate·rialism entire]y out o·f our dis,­

cussion as 11ot calling for treatmen ·t before this present audi­ence, and I sl1all ignore old-fashioned ditalistic theism for the sa·mf! reason'' (page 30). .

It is also important for ottr purpose to note the s1,ddenness o.f th,e, gre ·at change which has, taken pl.a.ce at our universities, whereby Christian doctrine has been relegat 1ed to a position of .obs 1curity so p,rofound that it calls, for no consideration in a_ discus sion of this , sort ·. The lectur ,er,. after rema.rking tha.t he

•

. had been tol ,d b1y Hindoos that ''the great obstacle to the spread of Cl1ristianity in their country was the puerility of our dogma of creation,' ', added: 1''Assuredly, most me·mbers of ·this aud ·i­ence are ready to side with I-Iinduism in this matter.'' ·And then he p.roceeded to say that ''those of us who are sexa-genarian ,s'' have witn ,ess.ed sttch changes as ,·,m,ake the thottght ,of a past ,generation see1n as foreign to its su,ccessor as if it were th ,e expres ,sion of a difjerent race of me1i,. The theo­logical 1nachinery that spoke so Iiving·ly to ottr anc1estors.,.

•

with its fini.te age o·f the worJd, its creation out of' nothi ·ng. i·ts, juridical morality a.nd eschatology, its trea .tment · o,f God. as an external contriver, an intelligent and moral governor,. sounds as odd to 1no,st .of its as if it ivere som,e outlandish savage rel·igion', (page 2'9).

ITS SIGNIFICANCE,

Let th.e reader n,ot fail to grasp the significance of the, state~ ment. For hundreds of years the instruction imparted to the youths of En .gJand and America has be,en grounded upo ,n th ,e S1criptures , as the oracles 0 1f God ; and, in f a,c.t,I th ,e work of teaching has been carried on mai·nly by ministers of the Wor ·d.

- The pos,itions whicl1 Engl .and and America have gain 1ed among the nations ,duri11g tho se centttries is known to every 0 1n,e. 1God has greatly blessed them with national prosperity and world-

• J

•

I •

-

•

•

• • •

l • •

· The Fundamental1.

wide dominion. But now I we ar 1e told ( and it is true), that 'Within a .ring1le gen.er1ation t.he fram 1ework of ,o,ur educati ,onal systems has been so changed that the language which expressed the abidin,g convictions of our 1ances1t.ors sounds as st·rang 1e in the atmospher 1e of our · great universities as the language of a ''difterent . race of men," uttering the formul .as of some ''out-

. landish savage religion.'' Whether the change is for the bet­ter or for t ·he w·orse is. not, for ·the moment, in question. What we wish to impres s upon our re·aders' minds . at tl1is point is simply the, f ac.t that a treme1idoits · 1cliange has taken pla 1ce, with amazi1ig sudden1icss, and in regard to , matters that are of vital .

• I

•

importance to the whol 1e world, and particularly to the Eng '~ lish-speaking p1eopJe,.

•

EFFECT UP©N PLASTIC MINDS 1•

The effect upon tl1e plastic minds of underg .raduates of sucn words as those l.ast quoted can easil,y be imagined. They art­f'ul]y convey the suggestio n that thes 1e yottng men are, in re-spect of their p,hilo sophi 1cal notions, vastly S1uperior · to th ie men · ·

10£ light and learning of past generatio11s, an 1d tl1at it is by the repudiation of Christianity and it .s ''lively oracles'' that they furnish convincing proof of their intellectual superiority. There are few minds amo~g men of th 1e a.g1e l1ere addresse 1d,1 or of any age except they he firmly grounded and 1estab ,lished i·n the truth wl1ich co·u.l.d res.ist the insidious . influe ,nce of such an appeal to the innate vanity of men.

Such being then the infl.ttences to 1 which the s.tude ,nts at our universities are now exposed, is there not urgent need of im­pres1sing upon Chris ·tian parents (ther ie are yet a few r1emain-• • p •

tng) the warning of our text, and exh 1ort1ng tl1em to beware lest ·the·ir children be despoiled through philosop 'hy and en1pty deceit? ·

• . A GREAT PERIL. ·

What does this sudden and stupe ,rido1Us change port ,en1d? Is not the very existence of Christianized civilization· (i. e,, the ·

•

•

•

•

1

•

M oder1i Philoso.phy. 97 ,

social syste1n w hi Ch has been reared under the influence and Protection of Christianity) imperiled by it? · Beyond all doubt it is. No,r is our reasonable apprel1e11sion in this regard in any

1 wise allayed by Professor James' statements tl1at tl1e principal factors of this change are ''scientific evolutionism'' and . ''tl1c rising tide of social de111oc1·atic icleals.'' Great is tl1e miscl1ief already accomplished by these mighty agencies of evil, and . we are as yet but at the ,beginning of their destru 1ctive career.

One n1ore wor ,d Professor James s,peaks on this point: ''An external cre .ator and his institutions may still be ver­

bally co1nf e,ssed at Church in flbr1nulas that linger by tl1e.ir 1ner,e inertia, b,ut tlie life, is out of tliem'' (page 34).

And with this agree t11e words of the risen Christ to t11e church in its Sardis stage, ''Thou hast a name that thou liv,est, and art dead. Be watchful, and strengthen the tliings that re­mai,i that are rea·dy t·o die'' (Rev. 3 :1, 2).

•

BUDDHA OR CHRIST ?

It is, now ·in order to inspect b11·iefly that system of p1hilos­ophy wl1ich, in its several forms, . has crowded out of our uni­\tersities the doctrine 0£ Cl1ris,·t 1

( and . which has inc 1identally ntade Him a liar). We have already state 1d that this r1eign­ing system, now holdi11g almost undisputed sway in '·'Chris­tian', England and America, is pantheism, which has Bourisned for thousands of years as the philosophical religious cult of In .di.a. We have seen how · Professor James defers to the Hin­doo estin1ate of the Bible doctrine of creation, and sides with it. If the test of a doctrine is the way it is r,egarded by the Iiindoos, it is quite logical to · go to them f 1or the inter.p,retation of the ttnivers ,e which is to be taught at our schools, and col-leges.. . · ·

The philosophers of today have, therefore, nothing to offer to us tha ·t our ancestors did not understand as well as ·they, and that they were not as free to choose as we are. Did our an­cestors then prefer the worse thing to the better when tl1ey

• •

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

98 Tlie Fitnaame1ttals.

chos~, and ·· founded great t1nive1·sities to preserve, th ,e doctrines · ta 1:1ght . by Jesus Christ and H is Apo stles, ratl1er than (as . they migl1t have done) the doctrines associated with the name of

•

Buddha? Our · present-day t,eacher s of pl1ilosophy appea ·r to say so. But if tl1ere remain s any judgment at all in tl1e twen­tieth- century man, he will remember, b,efore ligl1tly acquiescing in the removal of the .ancient fottndations, tl1at whatever there n1ay be of superiority in the social order of Christianized Eng­land and America ov,er that of panth .eistic 1·ndia is due to t'he choice Which. our forefathers made when they acc,epted the tea,ching of the Gospel of Christ, and to th ,e fact that every .subsequent generation u1,itil the present has ratified atid adhered firmly lo that choice. · · · · · ·

•

•

•

•• • •

. ,, . W I-IAT BEN EFI .T?

• •

•

What benefit, then, can any s.ane man expect as the re s,ult of ' th ·is .sudd ,en and ·who,les,ale rept1diation of teacl1ings which are vital to Christianity, and the acceptance in their stead of th e a11cient doctrines of heath ndom? Sure ly there never wa.s a generation of men so unwi se, so blinded by its own conceit, as thi~ foolish ge,n~ration, in t'hus casting away the guidanc e of that BOok which ha s put England and America at the head of the nation s;· and wl1icl1 has been the source of everyt hing tl1a:t is· commendable in so-ca lled ''civiliz ,ed s,ociety,'' and in ac· cepting ip. its place the brt;ttalizing and degrading doctrines of pantheism. · ·. : · . · · ·

'

In whatever ot1r eye s can re st upon with sati sfaction .in 011r past history or our p1·,esent institutio ns, our art, lite1·att11·e,

•

1ethic.s, sta·n·dards of f a111ily life and na,tionaI life,, e·tc., etc .. , we see the evidences of the influence of those teachings whi1cl1 have now been discarded by tl1e wise men of ou1· day as ' ''puer · ile'' in compar 'i.son with tho.se of heatl1en philosophy; How lo11g will it be before the righteot1s judgment of God overtakes the peoples w):io I1ave thus turned with contempt from t:be source 'of all their great11e·ss? · · ·

•

• •

• •

·rhe warning, theref 101·e sh,ould be sounded ottt, n,ot only· to the yot;tng men and women wl10 are lilcely to be the di1·el:t victims of the 'higher edt1cation' of the day, but to every tl\,relle1· in civilized la11ds, ·to beware lest a11y man make a prey of them through philoso 1pl1y and vain deceit. For tl1e matter we are considering vitally affect s the interest s 0 1£ evei··y 1civilizc<.l

• com1nun1 ty. •

•

•

•

NATION .-\L RESPONSIBILITY. ' • •

From tl1e B.ib.le a,nd fro1n secular l1istory we l.earn that Go.cl deals not only with individuals on the ground of privilege a11cl

.

respo ,nsibility, but with nations also. Because of the e,xtr .aor -dinary privileges granted to the Is1·a,elites, a heavier responsi- ~ bility rested upo :1 them than upon other nations, and they were \risited for their unfaithfulness with corresponding severity .

. And now we are living in that 1011g stretch of ce11turies known as ''the times of the Gentile s," 1dt1ri11g whi 1ch the n,atur.-a] branches of tl1e olive tree (Israel) are broken off, .an 1d the branches of the wild olive tree are grafted into tl1eir place; ·-~-n

that is t,o say, the period wherein ·th,e Gent·il,es a1·e occupying temporarily Israel's place of special privilege and responsibility. ~fhe· diminishing of them has · become tl1e riches of the -Gen-tiles. ( Rom. 11 : 11-25). , · : ·

In dealing with a nation God looks to · its ru]ers or leade1· a 1~1es,po,nsible for its actions. The justice of this is s,pecially evidc·nt in cot1ntries where the people · cl1oose th 1eir .own rulers and governot·s. In out· day, tlie peop1le are all-powerfu ·I . . Rt1l-1er a1·1e chos,e11 for the e press purpose of executi11g the pop11-lar will. Likewise also the time ha com·e 1,-vhen the people

•

11ot only e]ect their rulers, but also heap f ,o, tliemselves teacl1erJ~.

becai1se they will not endure soi1nd, doctrine ( 2 T.i,m. 4 :3, 4 ) . We may be sure, then, that tl1e perso ,ns we .find in tl1e p1·0-

f essional chairs of ,ou1Jm 1colle.ges ,are the ,re by t11e mandate of the peop1.e, who have tu1·ned away their e·ars fron1 t11e truth and give heed to fables wl1icl1 please their itching ears. _ ·

'

•

•

,

•

•

•

•

•

•

• •

i

•

• •

•

•

•

•

•

•

100

By tl1e very co11stitution of a democratic social oraer the •

teachers must teach wl1at tl1e people like to hear, or else give place to those who wi11~

•

· · will surely judge the privileged 11ations for this. Tl1e cl1ange has been great . and sudden. The judgment will be s,wi ft a11d severe. Until our day, whatever may have been the moral state of the· masses of people of England and America, gov"

· ernme11ts were established on the foundations ,of Christia11 doc~ trine; kings and other rulers were sworn to defend the faith; the Bible was taught iil the schools ; and no one was regarded as fit for a · position of public responsibili 'ty who was not a prof esse 1d follower of Jesus Christ. As for the teachers in our sch,ools and colleges, not one could have been found wl10 did no,t h,oid a'n.d teach a,s the unchanging tru ,th of God the doc ... tri .nes of Bib,le Christi ,anity.

• • •

• • •

Recognizing th 1ese facts, wh·ich all must admit , to be facts, l1owever much they may ,differ as, t 10 t.he significance: of them, it f oll.ows that we ,are living under 'the dark shado ,w of the greatesl nat10,fllll apostasy that has ever taken plate. 'During all the history . of mankind there has never been such a whole~ sale tum .ing away from the Source of national ·blessings, in order to take up with the gods of the heathen.

S0 1LEMN NONSENSE.

We have already stated that the regnant philo,sophy, i. e., pantheism, is expounded in OUr univ ,ersitieS in two f 0 1t-rns, known respectively as ''monism'' and ''pluralism." Professor James, :llthough a vigorous critic of monism, admits that the latter has almost complete possession of the field, and that bis own cult of ·''pluralism'' has very few adl1erents. These two species of ~ntheism are, however, alike in the essential ~at· ter that ''both identify human substance with divine substance.'' From a Christian sta11dpoint, th 1erefore, it is not very important

1

•

•

,, •

•

101

to distinguish between them. The principal difference is that :tnonism ( or "absolutism'') ''thinks that said substance be­comes fully divine only in the form of totality, and is not its real self in any form bttt the all-£ orm'' ; whereas pluralism ll1aintains ''that there may t.1ltimat1ely never lJe an al,l-form at all, that the substance of reality may never get totally collected * * * and that a distributive form of reality, tl1e each­f orm, iS logically as acceptable, and empirically as probable, as the all-form'' (page 34 ).

''Fo ,r monism the world is no collection, , but one great all-inc·lusive fact, O'Utsid,e o,f which there is nothing;'' ''And when the monism is idealistic, this all-enveloping fact is represented as an absolute mind that ma 'kes the partial facts by thinking them, just as we make objects in a dream by dreaming them, or personages in a story by imagin ,ing them.''

''The world and the all-thinker thus compenetrate and soak each other tip without residuum." ''The absolute makes us by thinking us.'' ''The absolute and the world are one fact.'' ''This is the ful 'l pantheistic scheme, the immanence of God in liis creation, a conception sublime from its tremendous unity! '

On the other hand, pluralism says that ''reality may exist in a distributive form in tl1e shape not of an all., but of a set of each,es.'' ''There is this in favor of the eaches, that they are at any rate real enough t 10 have made themselves at least ap­'/>ear to every one, whereas the absolute has as yet appeared immediately to only a few mystics, and indeed to them very ambiguously'' ( page 129·).

I have transcribed the foregoing specimens of this solemn nonsense in order that the reader may be informed of the choice which · our great universities now set before the thou­sands of eager and receptive minds that throng them in quest of knowledge. The rulers of these educational institutions vir­tually say to their students, You must accept a pantheistic con­ception of the universe, but you may choose between a monistic

• •

•

•

•

•

I

•

"

I

•

•

•

102 •

univer ,se a11d a. plu·ralis,tic universe , betw 1een a ·u·nivrerse ,v·11i1ch · con ,sists of ,a singl .e po11de·r'ot1s ' 1

' All, -'' or one compr .i.sing an in--. definit 1e n·u.n:ibe:r· of m:i,sce.llane,otts, '''Eacl1·es.'' ·

• • • •

CONFLICTING SCHOOLS. • •

\Whicheve:r of th1es,e 1''w 1eak a1;1d be.ggarly' '' c,once.pi'tions our young , st.udent ,adopts ,, he_ mus,t be pr.e·pared ·to h 1ear it assai l·ed b,y the . adher 1ent ,s of the 1~ival sc]1ool a~d critici~ed a,s high ly

· irra ,tio11al and ab1st1rd; and for tl1·is his · C1ou1·se i·n philos,ophy· pre ,p,ares r him, Thus tl1.e· .advocate ·,S of mo 1nism d~clare t,hat plu­rali .sn1 is ''i11f ected a.nd undermined by self--cont1~1a1diction.'"

.

On . the oth 1er · l1and, .P'rofessor .Jan1.es m,aint .a~11s th,at the ·''ab,-soiut ,e'' of t ·he 1nonist ''~nvolves · features 10£ irrationality pe,• culiar t io, its.elf .·'' 1-Ie points out ~h,at, upon the theory of .ab-

.

s,olttte idealism, the all,-l<no1w1er 1:11ust k~ow, an,d, be a'lways ~is-.

·tinctJy . cons .ciotis of ,I not . only eve1"y· fact, characteri rsti,c, and relati 1on of eve1·y obj_~ct in ·tl1e. ,vl1ole t1.11·ivers 1e, b'U,t. a.lso .all tl1at tl1e o,b1jec,t i.s not as that a '''table is. not a ch;air, not a rl1in~1-~e-ros, not . ra .logarit :lun,. not a m·ile away from the , door, n1ot wo·rtl1 five_· hundr .ed . poun 1d~ ster ·ting, no,t a tho·t1sa·nd centuri 1es o,ld,~,,

•

etc., ad i,ifi:nititm, ad' 1iau~eam. . •

•

''Fu ,rth,~rmo,re, ·i_f . it be a .fact · tl1at c~rtiain id:eas are . silly, the . a,b,s·olute l1as to hav 1e alre :ady th,ought the s1illy ideas- ta 1

esi'tab,]is'h the :m in s,il.liness,. Th ·e rttbbish in its1 min 1d woul 1d thu·s aJ)pear easily to Outweigh ill alllount t~e more desirable n1a,te,rial. ·0 1:ne would exp ,e,ct it f'air1y to- burst with such an ob,e·si.ty, pl1e'tho,ra,, and su.perf ,oeta ,t·ion of useless . infor1n ,atio ,n'' (page 128)1

• •

•

And how abo,u·t thing s that are crimin .al, vicious, and in1-pure ?~ Th ,es1

~ · are of necessity just a,s . ~uch ·the thougl1t--fo,rms of .tt1e abs.01lute as their · oppos i.tes. , · . . . .

•

•

• • ' -

A p ··=a ·ILOSOPHER's VE.RD1ICT •. •

'

• •

• • •

• •

•

Again, a,f ter_ ~1 1ent:ioning certa ,in difficultie·S of the· idealist • •

t'l1eory, Profess 1or ,J,am~s sp1eaks 1disparagingly of ''the oddi.ty of inv,ent .ing as a remedy f'c;,r the inc·onveni~nces res·ulting from

'

!Jlf odern Philosopli311

•

103,·

this situation a super1iu~erary co1iceptital object called an ~ab­solute,' into ,vhich you pack the self- an1e co11tradictions un-reduced'' (page 27·1). .

Once more we quote : . '''When I r1ead transce11de11talist literatu1·e * * ~ I get

~othing but a sort of marking of ti1ne, champing of jaws, paw-ing of the ground, and resettling into the same attitud ,e lik · a weary horse i11 a stall with an empty ~anger. It is but a turning over the san1e threadbare categorie s, b1·inging tl1e same objections, a11d · urging the ame answ 1ers an·d solutio11 With never a new fact or new horizon coming into ig·t t' (p.age 265). · . ~ : ·

This is what a philo sopher of the f rant ranks says of the ~uli11g philosophy of the day, whose speculations are being impressed upo .n the minds of out"' brightest college ·students. · One comment may be permitted , namely, that if a foolish ab~ solute did not create men by thinkin .g tl1em, certainly foolish n1en have created a11 absolute by thinking it; a,nd it isl ·difficu]t to conceive how the y could have employed their mind s mo1·e foolishly. ·

• • •

• A I !P ,OSSIBLE TASK • •

•

This is tl1e sitt1ation brougl1t abo11t, now tl1at Chri tia11it. · •

has been polit 1ely bowed ot1t of our cl1o·ols and se1ninaries in Orrder to make room for the irrational pl1ilosophy of Hindoo­ism I Very pertinent in tl1i connectioi;i are the words of the . prophet : ''The wise 1nen a1 .. e asl1amed ; tl1ey are dis~ayed a11d taken. Lo, they have ,#!ejected the W 01,.d of t!ie Lord, and what Wisdorr1 is in them? '' (Jer. 8 :9.) or tl1e occupation in which our philosophers ar ,e engaged is the impossible ~ask of trying to establish an explanation of the vi sible universe after having rejected the true account thereof received from it Creator. 1'h~ god of the ruling philosophy is one who is not permitted to speak or make hiinself lcnown in any way. Philo ophy . must needs put these restraints upo11 him for its own protec­tion; for, should he break throt1gh them, .the occupation of the

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

104 The Fttndamentals. •

•

philosopher w·ou]d be gone!' So he mttst remain in impenetra· ble obscurity, . speaking no word, a11d making no intelligible .sign · or motion, in or1der that pl1ilosophers may continue thei.r congenial b1usiness of n1aking ·bad guesses at what l1e is lik,e .

A WARNING • •

' It is not difficult for on,e 1,vho has come to the knowled ,ge

of the truth through receiving the W ·ord of God,, ''not as the word of men, but as it is in truth the W or ·d of ,Go,d'' ( 1 Thess .

.

2 :13) 1 to perceive the folly and futility of all this. But who shall deliver the ignorant, the innocent, and the unwacy frotn

. being victimize :d and e·ternally de ,spoiled by thes 1e · men who, professing themselves to be wise, have become f oo,ls? We can but sound the alarm and give warning, , espec~ally to tho ,se who .are r1esponsible for bringing up children, of the d,angers which infect the inte11ectt1alistic atmosphere of our ttniversi­ti,es, c.ollege·s and semina,ries .

• •

A REASON FOtt IT •

In closin .g , W 1e may· with. profit to , ou .r readers point out a profound reason why the enemy of Christ, and o.f the men whom He seeks to save, should be desirous of impre .ssing tt.po,n the mind.s of the latter the c.onc1ep·tion of p,antheis ,m. ·That doctrine wh.olly ex ,clt1des the idea that man is a sinner, and hence it put .s. redemption outside the pa]e of dis,cu.,ssion. Under 1 the influence 1of that doctrine man w·ould never di,s--cover his corrupt nature and his need of salvation, and hence, if not deliver 'e·d fr .om it, he would die in his, sins. An en·emy of ma ·n could de·vise against him no, greate~ mis~.h·ief· than t'his,

GOD MALIGNED. •

•

But the doctrine which the ph·ilosophy of our day has ·im­ported from India works not only destructio 1n to men, but

•

also dishono 1r to God. Herein may its, s.atanic character be clearly perc 1eive1d ·by all who have eyes to see. Its foundation

•

• •

•

•

•

•

I

•

105

. '-

p rin ci p 1 e is that God and man are truly one in substance and being, and that the character of God is revealed in the history of humanity • . This evil doctrine makes God the partner with tnan in all the manifold and grievous wickednesses of human­ltind. It makes Him particeps criminis in all the monstrous crimes, cruelties, uncleannesses and unn;a.mable abominations, that have stained the record of humanity. It makes Him really the prime actor in all sins and wickednesses, since the thought

' and impulses prompting them originate with Him. Thus God is charged with all the evil deed s which the Bible denounces, and against which the wrath of the God of the Bible is de-

clared. •

SATAN'S . PLEDGE.

It may be that, somewhere in the dark places 0£ this sinful World, there lurks a doctrine more monstrously wicked, more characteristically satanic than this, which is now installed in our seats of learning and there openly venerated as the last Word of matured human wisdom; but, if such .there be, the writer of these pages is not aware of its existence. That doc- -trine "is virtually the assurance ,, given under the seal of those Who occupy the eminences of human culture, learning and wis­dom, that the pledge of the serpent given . to the parents of the race of what would result if they would follow his track, bas at last been redeemed. · ''Ye shall become as God,'' he de­t.lared ; and now the leaders of the thought of the day unite in proclaiming that man and God are truly one substance and nature. Beware! Beware! This teaching is, indeed, ac­cording to human tradition .the most ancient of all human tra­ditions; · it is according to the basic principles of the world and of the god of this world, and not according to Christ. No greater danger menaces the younger men and women of the ~resent generation than the danger that some man, some smooth -tongued, learned and polished professor, may make a Prey of them by means of philosophy and vain deceit.

'

•

•

•

•

• ' •

•

• •

•

•

• •

• • I · CH .APTER VI. • • •

• •

JUSTIFICATION BY FAITH. ,

• I

•

• •

BY H. C. G~ MOULE, D. D .• ~ . •

•

BISI 'i OP 10F DURHAl\i, ENGLAND . •

• • •

''Justification by Faith"; tl1e pl1rase is weighty alik e witl1 Scripture and with history. 1 11 Holy cripture it is the main theme of two great dogmatic epistles, Romans and Galatia11s. In Christian history it was ·the pote11t watchword of the Ref­orrna tion movement in its aspect a .s a vast spiritual ttpheaval of the church. It is not by any means tl1e only great tn tth

•

1co11side·red in the two epis-tles; w.e should woefully mi.sread •

the1n if we allowed th ,eir m1essage abo1ut J ·u,stification by Faith .

to obscure their message ab,out the Holy Ghost, and the . strong • •

relation between the two messages. It was not the only great truth .which moved and ani1na·ted t11e sp1i1·itu,a·1 leade,r·s of the Reformation. Never ·theless, SU1Ch is the d1epth a~d dign·ity of this truth, : and . so central in some res ,pects is its reference to

• •

other t1·uths of our salvation, th .at we m.ay fairly say tl1at •

it was the message of St. Paul, and tJie truth tl1at lay at the heart of the distin ,ctive messages of tl1·e non -P 'auline · epistles too, and that it was the truth of the great Reformation of the

•

Western cht1rch. •

•

With reason, seeing things as he was led in a pi-ofoulld •

experience to see thetrt, did Luther say that Justification by Faith wals ''the ,articles of a standing 10r ,a falling churcl1." \i\!ith reas 1on· does · an iIIust1·io1us representative of t·he · older school of ''higher'" A11glicanisn1, a name to me ever bright and ven~.ra .ble, Edwar ·d H .arold B·1··owne, say that Justification by Faith is not only this, but also ''the article of a Standing or a falling so 1ul.''* ·

• • •

=:·''T\,Iessiah Foretold .and Expecte ·d,'' ' ad finem . j

• •

106 •

•

•

•

•

•

• Jitstification bJ, Faitlz • 1.07

•

• • IMPORT OF TlfE TE RM S • •

Let us apply ourselves first to a study of the 1neaning · of our terms. Here are two great terms before us, Justificatio11 and Faith. We shall, of course, consider in its place the word WI1icl1, in our title, link s them , and aslr how Justifi 1cation i · ''by'' Faith. But first, what is Ju stificatio11, a11d then, what i Paith? ·

By de1·ivatio11, 110 doubt, J r ·'1~1E"'ICATION n1eans to 111al<e . just, that is to say , to make confo rn1able to a true standard. It w6ttld seem thu s to 111ean a process by wh ich wrong is cor­rected, and b.ad is made go ,od, and good better, in the way . of actual improveme11t of the thing 01· pe rson ju st ified . I11

011e curious cas,e, and, so f a1--a I knovv, in tl1at case on ly tl1e . ' '

•

' ord ha s tl1is meaning in actual u e. ''Justification' ' is a te1·1n • •

of the pri11ter's art. The C:Otnpositor '' ju stifies'' a Piece of typework when l1e co1·1·ects, b1·ing · i11to perfect order, as to

•

!)aces bet\ vcen , 01 .. ds a11d lett ers, a11cl so on, . the ty1)es ,vl1ich he has ~et 11p. ·

B1ut thi s, · as I have sai,d, i .a solitary case. In the use of ~ -word s otherwise, u1Uve1·sally, Justification and Ju stify mean somethin g qttite diff~rent f ro1n i1npro, ,ement o,f .conditio11 .

•

They 111ean establishment of l)O iti,011 as before a judge or ju1·y, •

lite1·al oi'r figurative. They n1ea11 the winning of a favoi·able Verdict i11 .uch a presence, . or agai11 ( wl1at is the satne thing

• •

from. another sid1e) tl1e 11tterance o,f that verdict ,, the sen-tence of acquittal, 01 .. the e11tence of vindjcated right, as tl1e case may be. ·

. I -a1n thi-nking of · the word 11ot at all e.-elusively as1 a re­ligious word. Take it i11 its com1non, ev 1eryday 1employment; it is always thus. To ju stify a11 opinion, to ju stify a course of conduct, to jtistify a Statement , to ju stify a friend, what doe it 1nean? Not to readj 11 t and in1prove you1· thoughts, or your actions, or your words ; not to educate your friend to be wise1· or 1nore able. N·10, bt1t t,o win a verdict for thought , or ac-

•

..

•

• •

•

108 The F undamen .tals.

tio ,n, or word, or friend, at so,me bar 0 1£ jL1dgment, , as for ex­ample the bar 10£ public . opinion, ,or of common. cons 1cienc ,e. It is not t·o, improve , but to vin 1dicat e. .

Take a ready illt1stratio ,n to tl1e san1e 1effect from Scrip­ture, and from a pas sage not of doctrine, but of public Is:..·ae1-ite law: '~If ·there be a controver sy betw 1een men, and they come W1to judgment, that tl1e judges 1nay jt1dge them, thei1 they shall justify the rig~teo us and c1ondemn the wicked'' (Deut. 25 :1). Here it isl .ob·vious that the question is not on 1e 1oi · moral in1pr.ove,ment. T1he ju 1dges are , not to make t'h.e rig ,hteo ,us man better. Th ,ey are to vindicate his position as satisfactory to the law. ·

Non-theological pas .. sages, it may be observed, and generally non-theological c,onnections, are of the greatest use in determin­ing the true, native meaning of theolo ,gical terms. For with rare exc,eptions, which are for · the most part matter .s oi ope.n histocy, as in tl1e case o,f the H omousion, theological tertns are terms of common tho1ught, ·ada .pted to a special . us,c, b,ut in themselves unchanged. That is, they were thus used at firs,t, in the simplicity of origina l truth. Later ages may have de~ fleeted that simplicity. It was so as a fact with o.ur word Justification, as we sha1·1 see imme ,diately. But at first the word meant in religion precis ,e1y wha,t it meant out of it. It meant the winning ,, o,r tl1e· c:onsequent anno 1uncem,e·nt, of a fa ... vorable verdi ,ct. Not t:he word, b1ut th,e application w.as al­tered wh.en ,salvati 1on was in question . It was indeed a new and ,glorious appli ,cation. The verdict in questi 1on was the ver­dict not of a He;.brew 1court, nor of public opinion, but of the eternaJ Judge of all the earth. But that left the meaning of the wo,rd the same.

JUS ,TIF 'ICATION A ''FOR :ENSIC'' ' TERM • •

It is thus e·vident ·that the word Justificati ,on, alike in re1-

ligious and in 1common parlan 1ce, is a wo1rd co,nnected with Ja,w. It has. to do witl1 acquittal, vindication, acceptance before

•

•

' •

• •

,I'

.Justificati'on by Fait/,,, . 109

a judgment seat. To use a technical te1·111, it is a f orens·ic \Vord, a wot·d of the law -cout"ts ( which in old Rome. stood ·i11

the forum). In regard · ,of ''us men and our salvation't it stands related not so much, not so directly, to our need of spiritual revolution, amendment, pttrification, holiness, as t our need of getting, somehow in spite of our guilt, Oltr lia­bility, our debt, our dese1-ved conden1natio11 a sentence of acquittal," a sentence of acceptance, at the judgment seat of

• •

a holy God. Not that it h.as nothing to do with our inward spiritual

purification. It has inten se and vital re·tations that way. But •

they are not direct r 1elations. Tl1e direct concern of Justifi ___ --... =··

,cation is with man's need of a divine deliverance 1 not frotn •a•, -~

the power of his sin, but f r,om its guilt. - --=c. -"

• •

MISTAKEN INTERPRETAT I ONS.

He1··e we inust note accordingly two 1·ernarkable instance s o,f 111isuse of the word ·J ustifi 1cation in the history of Q1ris­tian thought. The first is found in the theology of the School ­men, the great th.inkers of tl1e Midd ,le Ages in Western Chris­tend,om Peter Lombard, Thomas Aquinas, and others.* To them Justification appears to have meant mu.ch the same as

•

regeneration, the great internal chan,ge in the state of our na-ture wrought by grace. The other instance appears in the sixteenth century, in the Decrees of the Council of Trent, a

•

highly authoritative statement of Romanist belief and teach.-ing. There Justification is descri 'bed (vi. c. 7) as ''not the mere remission of sins but also the sanctification and · renovation of the inner man.'' In this remarkable sentence the Roman - · ist theologians s1eem to co111bi·ne the true account of the word though imperfectly stated, wit 'h the view of the Schoolmen. It i? no,t too much to say that a careful review of th 1e facts su1n­marized above, as regard~ the secular use of the word Justi­ficatio1n, and the Scriptural use of it in the doct ,rine of salvia-

*S.ee T. B. Mozley, ''Baptismal Controversy,'' Chap. VII , •

•

•

•

• •

•

I

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

..

•

. 110 . Tl1e F·itndam entals.

tion, i.s enough to µegative t:l1ese e·xplanations. They a1~e cur i~ otts ·and memo 1r·able examples of misinte ·rpretation of t e1-1·11s;

'

tl1at. mos t frµitful so·urce of ' fur ·th,e1·, wi.der ·and deepe :r er .rot . •

' •

JUSTIFICAT 'ION NOT TflE SAME AS PARDON .. • • • •

The probl em raised the n, in 1§eligio11, by the word J ttstifica­tion, is, How shall man be ju st be£ ore God? To use the wor 1ds of our Eleven ·th Article, it is, How shall we be ''accounted righteous bef or,e God?'' In other words, How ·shall we, l1av­.ing sinned, having brol <en the holy Law, having violated the will of God, be tr ·eated, as · to our acceptance before Him, as to our ''·peace with Him'' ( Rom. 5 : l ) , as if we had not done so? Its question is not, directly; How shall I a sinner become holy, , but, How shall I a s,inner be received by my God, whom I have grie ·ved, as if I h.a,d n~ot griev 1ed Him? ·

Here let us not 1e, what Will be clear on r,efle.ctio ,n, that J t1stifi1cation , me.ans properl y no less than this, the being re­ceived by Hir6 as ii we h~d not grieved Him. It is not only, the being ~f orgi ·ven . by Him. We do indeed 1as sinners mo ,st urgently ne:ed forgi veness, the . remission .of our . sins,, the put ­ti~g away : of ·'the holy vengeance of . Go1d ·upon our rebellion. Bt1t ,ve need more. We need tl11e voice wl1ich says, not mere-ly, )rou may go; you ar ,e -let off your penalty; but, · you may come; you are welcomed i11to My presence and fellowship. We shall see lat ,er how important . thi s diff~rence is · i·n the practical problems of our full salvation. But one thing · is, evident at first sight, namely , that tl1is · is impliad .. in the ve ry ,vord Justification. For lll:stification -, .in common speech, ne ,·-

.-

er 1n1eans pardon. I t mean s winnjng, o·r ,granting, a posit ion of . acceptance. '''Yott are justi -e· · 1n taking this co1urse of

'

action,'' ' doels not mean, y1ot1 wer e wro,ng, yet yo1.1 ar ·e fo1~-•

given; Jt, me,ans.,. ·.yott w1ere rig,ht, an,d in the cot1rt ,of .111y

0 1pinio ,n you have pr 1oved it. In 1·eligio1n accor,di:n.gl.y ,our ] 't1s-1

tification m1eans not . m,e1·ely a grant 0 1£' p·ardo,n, but a verdict •

in favor of our standi ng a.s sa tisfactory be·fore tl1e JL1dge~ •

•

•

•

, •

•

•

•

• . \.

•

111 •

•

THE SPECIA L PROBLE f OF O'ltr J US'f IFI C1\TIO ~ .

I ere in passing let us notice that ·of ·course the \Vord Ju s­tification does not of itself imply that the justified person is a sinner. To see · this as plainly as possible, recollect that God Himse lf ·is said to be justified, in Psa lm 51 :4, and Chri st l-Iimse1f, in 1 Tim. 3 :16. In a hu1n,an· court of 1:aw, as v,·e have seen above, it is the supreme d11ty of the judge to ''jus­ti fy the righteous'' (Deut. 25: 1), and the righteous only. In all such cases Justification bears its perfectly proper meaning unperplexed, crossed by no mystery or problem. But then , the moment we come to the concrete, practical q11estion, ho'-V shall we, be justified, an,d· before God) or ·, to bring , it clo er hoine, how sl1all I, I the sinne1,., be we1cotned by my offended Lord as if I were satisfactory, then the thought of Justifica­tion presents its 1elf to t1s in a new and most solemn aspect. The word keeps its meaning unshaken. Bu t how abottt its app]ication. Here am I, gt1ilty. To be justified i·s to be pro­t1ounced not guilty, to be vindicated and accepted by Lawgiver and Law. Is it possi ,ble ? . Is it not "impos ,sible? ·

J.ustification by Faith., in the actual case · of our s:ilva tion , is tht1s a ''short · phrase.' '' It 111eans,, i·n full, the acceptance of guilty sinners, before God ·, by aith. Great is the prob­lem o indic·ated. And great is the wonder and the glory of the solution given us by the grace of God. But to this so1Lt-tion ive must advance · by .so1ne furtl1er step s~ .

... • • • • •

•

• •

• • • • •

. We may now fitly approacl1 our second great term, Faitl1, and - ask ourselves, What does it mean? As with Justifica­tio11, so with Fa ith , we may best approach the answer by fir t

asking,, What does Faith mean in common life and speech? Take sucli phrases as to have faith in a policy, faith in a remedy, faith in a political l~ader, or a n1ilitaey Jeader, faith in a lawyer, faith in a phy ician. Here th e word Faith i used in a way obviously parallel to that in which, for exam~

•

•

•

•

•

•

112 The F itndamentals.

pie, our Lord uses it when He appeals to the Apostles, in the Gospels, to have faith in Him; as He did in the storm on the Lake. The use is parallel also to its habitual use in the epistle ; for example, in Roman s 4, where St. Paul makes so much of Abraham's faith, in close connection with the faith which he seeks to develop in us.

Now is it not plain that the word means, to all practical intents and purposes, tru st, reliance? Is not this obviou without comment when a sick man sends for the physician in whom he has faith, and when the soldier follows, perhap s literally in utter darknes s, the general in whom he has faith? Relian ~e upon thing or person supposed to be trustworthy , thi s is f aith.

P RACTICAL CONFIDENCE .

To note a further aspect of the word. Faith, in actual common use, tend s to mean a practical confidence. Rarely, if ever, do we use it of a mere opinion, however distinct, lying pa ssive in the mind. To have faith in a commander does not mean merely to entertain a conviction, a belief, however posi­tive, that he is skillful and competent. We may entertai n such a belief about the co1nmander of the enemy-with very unplea sant impressions on our minds in consequence. We may be confident that he is a great general in a sense the very oppo site to a personal confid ence in him. No, to have faith in a commander itnplie s a view of him in which we either actually do, or are quite read y to, tru st ourselves and our cause to his command. And ju st the same is true of faith in a divine Promise, faith in a divine Redeemer. It n1eaQs a reliance, genuine and _practical. I_t means a putting of our­selves and our needs, in p~r~a l reliance.-, int o His hand s.-

---- - -Here, in passing, we observe th at Faith accordingly al-

ways irnplies an element , more or less, of the dark, of the unk nown. Where everything is, so to speak , visible to the heart an d mind there scarcely can be Faith. I am <;>n a dan-

I

•

•

• Justificiation by Faitli. 113

•

get·ous piece of water, in a boat, with a sl<illed and experi­enced boatman. I cross it, not without tremor perhaps ., but with faith. Here faith is ex ,ercised on a trustworthy and known ·object, the boatn1an. Bt1t it is exercised regarding what are mo ,re or l 1ess, to me, uncertain cir,cums·tanc 1es, the amount of peril, a11d the way to handle the boat in it. Were there no uncertain circumstance s n1y opinion of the boatman would not be faith, but mere opinion; esti1n.ate, not relilance.

'

Our illustration suggests the remark that Faith, as con-cerned with o,ttr salvation, needs a certain and trustworthy Object, even Jesus Christ. Having Him, we have the right

•

condition for exercising Fai ·th, re ,Jiance in the dark, trust in His skill and power on our behalf in unknown or mysterious

• circumstance s. •

HEBREWS XI :I NOT A DEFINITION. •

It see111s well to remark here on that great sentence, Heb. 11 :1, sometimes quoted as a definition of Faith: ''~ow faith is certainty of things hoped for, proof of things not seen.'' If ·­this is a · definition, properly speaking, it mt1st negative tl1e simple definition of Faith which we have arrived at above, namely, reliance. For it leads us towards a totally different region of thought, and sugges ·ts, what many religious think­e,rs h.ave held, that Faitl1 is as it ·were a myst .eriou .s spiritual

•

sense, a subtle power' o,f touching anld feeling the unseen and eternal, a ''vision and a faculty divine," almost a ''second­sight" in the soul. We on the contrary maintain that it is always the same thing in itself, whe·th 1er con,ce,rned with co,m-111o·n o·r wi'th spiritual things, namely, reliance, reposed on a

trustworthy- object, and exercised · more or less in the dark. The othe .r view would . look 10n Faith (in things spiritual) r,ather as a fa,culty in itself than as an attitude towards an Object. The tho ,ught is thus more engaged with Faith ,'s own lratent power than with the po,wer and truth of a Promiser. Now on this I remark, first, that the words of Heb. 11 :1

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

,

114 The Funda1nentals.

_ scarcely read like a definition at all. For a definition is a description which fits the thing defined and it alone, so that the thing is fixed and settled by the description. But the words "certainty of things . hoped for, proof of things not seen," are not exclusively applicable to Faith. They would be equally fit to describe, for example, God's promi ses in their · power. .For they are able to make the hoped ... for certain and the un seen visible.

And this is just what we take the ·words to mean a~ a description of Faith. They do not define Fait h in itself; they describe it in its power. They are the sort of state1nent we make when we say, Knowledge is power. That is not a defi­nition of knowledge, by any means. It is a description of it in one of its g reat effects.

The whole chapter, He b. 11, illustrate s this, and, as it seems to me, confirms our simple definition of Faith. Noah, Abraham, Jo seph, 1V1oses-they all treated the hoped-for and the unsee1:1 as solid and certain because they all relied upon the faithful Pron1iser. Their victori es were mysteriously great, theit;" lives were related vitally to the Unseen. But the action to this end was on their part sublimely simple. It was reliance on the Promiser. It was taking God at His Word.

I remember a friend of 1nine, many years ~o , complain­ing of the . skeptical irr everence of a then lecturer at Oxford, who asked his class for a definition of Faith. Heb. 11 :1 was quoted as ~n answer, and he repli ed, "You . could not have . given me a worse definition." Now this teacher may have been really flippant. But I still think it .possible that he meant no contempt of the Scripture. He may merely have objected, though with needle ss roughne ss, to a false use of the Scrip­tun ~. He felt, I cannot but surmi se, that Heb. 11 :1 was really no definition at all.

DEF INITION AND EFFECT ,

It is all-important to remember alike this simplicjty of

•

•

defi·nition and tl1is gt"andeur of effect in the matter of Faith . •

It is all- ,important in the g·1·eat question of our sal·va·tion. Here 011 the one .side is1 an actio11 of the 111i11d and will, in_ itself

~ •

per£ ectly simple, capab 1le of the . ve1·y l1omeliest illustration. We all know what relia11ce ffieans.. vVell, Faith is reliance. .....,ut tl1en, when the r 1eliance is directed upon an Object i11fi-· 11itely great and good, when it reposes ttpon God in Christ,

· t1pon I-Iim in His pron1ise, I-Iis fidelity, His love, upon Hi

'

,

very Self, what is, not tl1is 1··elian 1c1e in its effects? It is tl1e creature laying hold upon the Creator. It is our recep .tion of God . Himself in His \V ord. So, i.t is the putting ourselves in .

.

the way of His own almighty action in · the fulfilment of His \i\T ord, in the keeping of . His promi e. ·"'

•

''T11e virtue of F'aith lies in the vi.1·tue of its O_bject. 1

' That -•

Object, i_n this . matter of Justification, s,o tl1e Scriptnre s a -·,ure tis abundantly and with the utmost clearness, is our: Lord

· Jesus Christ Himself, who died for tts and rose again. . Here the simplest relian 1c,e, so it be .sinc,ere; is ou r point

of contact with infinite res ,ou1·ces. When lately t~e vast , dam . ·­cf the Nile was co1npleted, ,yith all its giant sluices, there· 11eeded but the touch of a finger ort an electric btttton to swing 1naje st ically open the gates of the -barrier a11d so to let through tl1e Nile in all its mass and 'tnight. Th 1ere was the simples ,t

•

. possible contact~ But it was contact with forces and appli - . ances adequate to control or liberate at ple,asur ·e th,e great river. So F 'aith, in reliance of the soi1l, the soul perhaps o,f the child, perhaps of the peasant, perhaps of the outcast, is. only a reliant look, a reliant toucl1. But it sets up contact with JESUS CHRIST, · in all His greatness, in His grace, 111e·rit,

•

sa vi11g l)OW 1er·, eternal love. • .. •

. FAITH, 0 MERIT. •

• • • I

•

• •

One mo1nentous issue from this reflection is as follows: ,¥ e are here ,varned off f ro1n the temptation to erect Faith into a Saviour, to re t oi.11· reliance . upon our Faith, if I may

•

•

•

• •

116 the P undamentals.

put it so. That is a real temptation to many. Hearing, and fully thinking, that to be justified we must 1 have Faith, they, we, are soon occupied with an anxious analysis of our Faith. Do I tru st enough ? I s my reliance sat isfactory in kind and quantity? But if saving Faith is, in its essence, simply a reliant attitude, then the question of its effect and virtue is at once shifted to the question of the adequacy of its Object. The man then is drawn to ask, not, Do I rely enough? but, Is Jesus Christ great enough, and gracious enough, for me to rely upon? The intro spective microscope is laid down. Th~ soul's open eyes turn upward to the face of our Lord Jesus Christ; and Faith forget s itself in its own proper action. In other words, the man relies instinctively upon an Object seen to be so magnificently, so supremely, able to sustain him. His feet are on the Rock, and he knows it, not by feeling for his feet, but by feeling the Rock.

Here let us note that Faith, thus seen to be reliance, is obviously a thing as different as possible from merit. No one in common life thinks of a well-placed reliance as meri­torious. It is right, but not righteous. It does not make a man deserving of rescue when, being in imminent danger, he implicitly accepts the guidance of his rescuer. And the man who, discovering . himself, in the old-fashioned way (the way as old as David before Nathan, Isaiah in the vision, the pub­lican in the temple, the jailor at Philippi, Augustine at Milan), to be a guilty sinner, whose "mouth is shut" before God, relies upon Christ as his all for pardon and peace, certainly does not merit anything for closing with his own salvation. . He deserves nothing by the act of accepting all.

"God," says Richard Hooker, in that great "Discourse" of his on Justification, "doth justify the believing man, yet not for the worthiness of his belief but for the worthiness _of Him which is believed."* So it is not our attitude which we rely on. Our attitude is ju st our reliance. And reliance means the going out upon Another for repose.

*"A Discourse of Justification," · Chap. 33.

Ju,st ificatio n by Faith. 117

Once for all let us .remember that we may make the fal sest u e, even under the tru est definitions, of both ideas, Justifi ca­tion and Faith. We 1nay th ink of either of them as the object of our hope, the ultimate cause of our salvation. So thought of, they are phantom s, nay , th ey are idols. Seen t ruly, they are but expr essions for Je sus Christ our Lord as H e is given and take n. Ju stification is no Saviour, nor is F aith. Ju stification · by Fa ith- what is it? It is the accept ­ance of fhe guilty by reason of a T rusted Chri st.

"uy" DEFINED • .,.

So now we 111ay ta ke up the question of that middl e and connective word in our titl e, "by." Ju stification by Faith, what does it mean? Thi s divine welcome of the guilty as if they were not guilty, by relian ce upon Jesus Christ, what have we to think about this?

We have seen a moment ago that one meaning most cer­tainly cannot be borne by the word "by." It cannot mean ''o n account of," as if Faith were a valuable consideration which -entitled us to Justification. The surrendering rebel is not amnestied becau se of the · valuable consideration of his sur ­render, but becau se of the grace of the sovereign or s~t e which a1nnesties. On the other hand , his surrender is the necessary means to the an1nesty becoming actually his . . It is his only proper attitude ( in a supposed case of unlawful rebel ­lion) toward s the offended power. That power cannot, in the nature of things, make peace with a subject who is in a wrong attitude towards it. It wishes him well, or it would not provide amnesty. But it cannot make peace with him while he declines the provision. Surrender is accordingly not the price paid £or peace, but it is nevertheless the open hand necessary to appropriate the gift of it.

In a fair measure this illustrates our word "by" in the matter of Justification by Faith. Faith , reliance, is, from one side, ju st the sinful man' s "coming in" to accept the acred

T h.e F undam cntals. .

ainnesty of God in Christ, ta king at I-Iis \Vord his benignant I( in~.· It is the rebel's putting himself into right relation with his offended Lord in thi s grea t matter of forgi vene and acceptance. It is not a virtue, not a merit , but a proper mean s.

UNION WITH CHRIST .

The word "by," per, lends itself meantime to the expre -ion of another aspect of th e subject. One of the great prob-:

lems attaching to the mighty truth of Christ our Right eous­ness, our Merit, our Acceptance, is that of the nexus, the bond, which so draw s us and H im together that, not in fiction but in fact., our load can pass over to Him and His wealth t u . The New Testam ent largely teache s, what lies assure d!) in the -very nature of things, as it put s the facts of salvatio n before us, that we enter "into" Christ , we come to be "in ' Him, · we get part and lot in the life eternal, which is in Hitn alone, by . Faith. "He · gave power to become the sons of God, to them that believed on His Name." "Believing , we have life in His Name" (John 1:12; 20:31). Faith is our soul-contact with the Son of God, sett ing up ( upon our side ) that union with Him in His lif e of which Scripture is so full. And thus it is open to us, sure ly, to · say that Ju stification by Fai th means, from one mon1entous aspect, Ju stificat ion be­cause of ,the Chri st with whom thr ough Faith we are 111ade· myste riou sly but trul y one. Believing, we are one with H im, one in the ~ommon life with which the living member s live with th~ He ad ; by the power of His Spirit. · One with Hi1n in life, we are the refore, by no mere legal fiction but in vital fact , -capable of onene ss with Him in intere st also. ·

THE MARRIAGE -BO ND.

"F aith," says Bi hop Hopkins of Derry , ''i s the marriag e­bond between Chri st and a believer; and the ref ore all the debts of the . believer are chargeabl e upon Christ. and the

r

•

•

\ . t

•

• •

' •

• • ..

• • •

•

•

Justification by Faith. 119 • •

, ri1ghteousness of Christ is instated upon tl1e helieve1·., * * *

Indeed this union is a high and illSCrutable mystery, yet plain it is that there is such a clos,e, · spiri .tttal, ,and real union . .

~·

between Christ and a believer. ~~ * *· So Faith is the way and means of our Justification. By Faith we are united to Cl1rist. · By that union we truly have a righteousness ,. And upon that righteousness tl1e justice as well ·as merey of God is engag·ed t,o j·u,stify ,and acqt1it us.'~*

•

•

•

•

•

'

•

•

*'E,,, Hopkins, ''The D0ct,ri11e of the C1ove,nants.'' .

• • • •

• •

•

•

• • ••

•

•

• •

• • •

• •

• • • • •

• • •

•

• • • •

• • •

•

...

•

•

• •

•

•

•

I

• •

•

•

•

•

•

• • •

• •

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

• •

• •

• •

•

•

•

. " • •

•

•

•

•

• • • •

• • • •

• • • • •

•

•

• • • • ••

• •

•

• • •

• •

• • • •

.-

• • • • .. . • • I

• • • • •

• • • • •

•

- • • •

•

•

•

• •

•

•

•

•

•

CHAPTER vn.

TRIBUTES TO CHRIST AND THE BIBLE BY BRAINY MEN NOT KNOWN AS ACTIVE CHRISTIANS .

"Their rock is not as our Rock , even our enemies them­selves being judges. "-Deut . 32:3I.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN .

"Y oµng n1an, my advice to you is that you cultivate an acquaintance with and firn1 belief in the Holy Scciptures, for

this is your certain interest. I think Christ's system of moral and religion, as He left them with us, the best the world ever saw or is likely to see."

THOMAS JEFFERSON.

"I have said and always will say that the studious perusal of the sacred volume will make better citizens, better fathers, and better husband s."

DANIEL WEBSTER.

"If we abide by the principles taught in the Bible, our coun­try will go on prospering and to prosper; but, if we and our posterity neglect its instructions and authority, no man can tell how sudden a catastrophe may overwhelm us and bury all our glory in profound o·bscurity. The Bible is the book of all others for lawyers as well as divine s, and I pity the man who cannot find in it a rich supply of thought and rule of conduct. I believe Jesus Christ to be the Son of God. The miracle s which He wrought establi sh in my mind His personal authority and render it proper for me to believe what He assert s."

RALP H WALDO EMERSON .

"Jesu s is the most perfect of all tnen that have yet ap­p~red. "

120

Tributes to the Bible by Brainy Men. 121

NAPOLEON BONAPARTE.

" I know men, and I tell you Jesus Christ was not a man. Superficial minds see a resemblance between Christ and the founders of empires and the gods of other religions. That resemblance does not exist. There is between Christianity and other religions the distance of infinity. Alexander, Cresar, Charlemagne and myself founded empires. But on what did we rest the creations of our genius? Upon sheer force. Jesus Christ alone founded His empire upon love; and at this hour n1i1Jions of men witl die for Him. In every other existence but that of Christ how many imperfections! From the first day to the last He is the same; majestic and simple; infinitely firm and infinitely gentle. I-Ie proposes to our faith a series of mys­teries and commands with authority that we should believe them, giving no other reason than those tremendous words, 'I an1 God.'

"The Bible contains a complete series of acts and of his­torical men to explain time and eternity, such as no other relig- ·· ion has to ~ffer. If it is not the true religion, one is very excus­able in being deceived; for everything in it is grand and worthy of God. The more I consider the Gospel, the · more I am assured that there is nothing there which is not beyond the march of events and above the human mind. Even the impious the1nselves have never dared to deny the sublimity of the Gos­pel, which inspires them with a sort of compulsory veneration. What happiness that Book procures for those who believe it!"

GOETHE.

"It is a belief in the Bible which has served me as the guide of my moral and literary life. No criticism will be able to perplex the confidence which we have entertained of a writing whose contents have stirred up and given life to our vital energy by its own. The . farther the ages advance in civiliza- . , . tion the more wHI the Bible be used."

122 The Fundanienta.ls.

THOMAS CARLYLE.

"Jesus is our divinest symbol. Higher has the huma n thought not yet reached. A symbo l o.f quite perennial, infinite character: whose significance -will ever demand to be anew in· quired into and anew made manifest."

JAMES ANTHONY FROUDE.

"The most perfect being who has ever trod the ~oil of this planet was called the !1an . of Sorrows." ,

CHARLES DICKE NS IN HIS WILL.

"I commit my soul to the mercy of God, through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and exhort my dear children humbly to try to guide themselve s by the teachi~gs of the New Testa­ment."

SHAKESPEARE IN HIS WILL. . -

. "I commend · my soul into the hands of God, my Creator, hoping and assuredly believing , through the only . merit~ of Jesus .Christ my Saviour, to be made partaker of . life ever­lasting."

LORD BYRON .•

. "If ever man . was God, . or God man, Je sus Chri t was both.''

. MATT HE .W ARNOLD.

"T o the Bible men will return because they cannot do with­out it. The true God is and must be pre-e1ninently the God of the _Bible, the eternal who 1'!1akes for rig·hteousness, from whom Je sus came forth, ?'nd ,vho e spirit govern s the course o~ hu­manity.''

DIDEROT.

"No better lessons can I teach my child than _those of the Bible."

I •

•

•

•

•

• • •

• • •

Tributes to tlie Bible by Brainy kle1i. 123 I

• PROFESSOR HUXLEY. • • •

• • • . - . ''I have alway s b,een ,strongly in favor o,f secular eclucatlon

\Vi.thottt theolo ,gy, bt1t I mttst confess that I have been no less eriously perplexed to know by wl1at practical measures the

religious feeling, which is the essential basis of moral conduct , is to be kept up fn the present utterly chaotic state of opinion

. on tl1,ese matters withou ,t tl1e ttse 0 1f the Bible"'' · ' •

•

JOHN STUART MILL. •

"Wl10 among His disciple s, or among their .proselytes, was capable of inventing the sayings of Jesus, or imagining the life a,11d char .acter ascribed t10 I-Iim ? Ce,rtainl ,y not th.e fis1heimen 1of Galilee; as, certa ,inly not Sai ,nt Paul ., whose char iact.er and idi,os,yncr ·asi1es we,re of a tot ,all,y d·iff'erent ,sort; land s,till ,les,s the early ,Christian writers. Whe11 this pre -en1inent genius is ~orn­bined with the q·ualitie s of probably the greate st moral refo ,rmer and martyr t_o His mi~sion Who ever existed upo ,n eartl1, religion cannot ·be ~aid ._tO have , made a bad ch<?ice in pitching on this ·-

•

ma11 as the ideal representative and guide of humanity;: no,r eveµ now would it be eas,y, even for an unb,eliever, to find a better trans ,lation of ·the ru·1e of ·virttte from the ab ,strad : into tl1.e c.oncrete, th:an to endeavor S10 t.o live t:hat . Christ ~ould ,approve his lif .e." . · .

• • •

• •

• : ; • • •

• • • •

R.O,USSEAU • . ~ • • •

• • . '

• •

. . "Can it b1e p 1ossible tl1at the s.acred pe1-~.onag e .wl1ose history • •

tl1e Scriptu .res, c.ontain sho·uld ·be a mere r;nan? \Vl1ere is t'he. man, where tl1e p1hilosopher, who could so live and so die witl1-

•

out weakness and without . ostentation? When Plat 10 describe s . . .

his imaginary ri.g,hteou s m.an ,, loaded with a11 t11e pt1nis.h1nents of g11ilt, yet meriting the highest rewards 01f vi1·tu~., he exac ·tly d~s·cribes the character of Jesus Christ. What an infinite ~is .. propo ,rtion between the son of S01phroniscus and tl1e Son of l\11ary. Socrates dies with honor, surro ·unded by his . disciples

•

•

• • • \

,.

•

•

•

•

•

J

124 The Fundamentals.

listening to the most tender words-the easiest death that one · could wish to die. Jesus dies in pain, dishonor, mockery, the object of universal cursing-the most horrible death that one could fear. At the receipt of the cup of poison, Socrate s blesses him who could not give it to him without tears; Jesu s, while suffering the sharpest pains , prays for His most bitte r enemies. If Socrates lived and died like a philosopher, Jesu s lived and died like a god.

"Peru se the books of philosophers with all their pomp of diction. How meager, how contemptible are they when com­pared with the Scriptures! The majesty of the Scriptu res strikes me with admirat ion."

PECA UT.

"Christ's moral character ·rose beyond comparison above that of any other great man of antiquity. No one was ever so gentle, so hunible, so kind as He. In His spirit He lived in the house of His heavenly Father. His moral life is wholly pene ­trated by God. He was the master of all, because He was really their brother. ''

ERNEST RENAN.

"All history is incomprehensible without Hint. He created the object and fixed the starting point of the future faith of humanity. He is the incomparable man to whom the universal conscience has decreed the title of Son of God, and that with justice. In the first rank of this grand family of the true sons . of God we must place Jesus. The highest consciousness of God which ever existed in the · breast of humanity was · that of Jesus. Repose now in Thy glory, noble founder! Thy work is finished, Thy divinity established. Thou shalt become the corner- stone of humanity so entirely that to tear Thy name from thi s world would rend it to its foundations. Between Thee and God there will no longer be any distinction. Com­plet e Conqueror of death , take possession of Thy kingdom,

. (

•

'

•

•

•

• Trib ·utes to tlie Bible by Braitiy M e1i • 125 •

whither shall follo1w Thee,I by ·the, roy.al r,oad w]1ich T'h,ou hast traced , ages of adoring worshipers. Wha tever may be the sur­prises of the f utur ,e, .Je sus will neTver be surp .assed. His wor ·- · ship will grow yo ung without ceasing; His legend will call for th tears without end ; His suffer ing s will melt the nob1le,st hearts; a11d ,al.I a,ge·:s will ptoclain1 th .at amo1ng th e soi1s 1of men. ther ,e is non e born greater tl1an J es,us. Eve n Paul is. not Je sus. How far removed are w;e all from Thee, dear Ma ,ster .! Where is Thy mildness, Thy poetry? Thou to whom a floWer didst hring pleasure and ecstasy, dost Thou recognize as Thy disciples these wranglers, the se men. furi ous over their prerogatives, and ,desiring tha t everything should be given to them? They are men; Thou art a god.' 1

B,EN .J AMIN DISRAELI.

'' The wil.dest dreams of their rabbis have been far exceeded. Has n.ot J es·us, conquered E·u.rope and chan,ge1d its name to Christendom? All countries that refuse the cross wither, and the time will come, when the vast communities and c,ountl ,ess myria 1ds of Ame ·ric;i and Australia, looking up1on Elurope as) Europe now looks upon Gr 1eece, and wondering ho ,w so small a space ,could have achieved such gr1eat. deeds, will find music in th 1e· songs of Zio·n and. solace in th 1e 'parahl ,es of Galilee.' ''

•

PROFESSOR. HEGARD OF THE UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN.

''The experiences of life, jts sufferings and grief, h.ave . •

shaken my soul and 'have b,roken the ·foundation upon . which I foi·tnerly thought I could build. Full of f,aith in the suffi­ciency of Science, I thought to have found in it a su.re refuge from all the conting ,encies 0£ life. This illusion is vanished; wl1en the tempest came, which plunged me in sorrow, the moor­ing·s, the cable of scie·n1ce,. broke l.ike thread. Then I seized upon that hell) which many before me have laid h 1old Gf. I sought and found pe.ace in 1God.. Since then I hav 1e certai ,nly not abandoned science, but I h.ave assigned to it a·n.other place in mv life~', ·

•

•

' •

•

•

•

•

vVhen a 1nan of brains speaks well of the Bible and Christ J1e consciously or uncon sciously bears tribute to the inspira ­tion of the one and the deity of the other.

The Bible claim s to he a revelation from God, and its char­acter sustains its claim. "The Word of the Lord came ~xpress­ly to Ezekiel." (Ez ek. 1 : 13.) "The Lord said unto me/' exclaimed J ere1niah. (J er. 1 :7.) "Hear the Word of the Lord," says Isaiah. ( Isa. 1 :10.) "Thu s saith the Lord," ring s through the Old T esta111ent. And the ·New Testament put s the seal of inspira tion upon the Old. "The Holy Ghost spake by the 1nouth of David." ( Acts 1 : 16.} "All Scripture is given by inspirat ion of God." (2 Tim. 3 :16.) "The prophecy came not in old time by the will . of man , but holy men of God spake as they w·ere moved by the Hol y Ghost." (2 Pet. 1 :21.) .

If the men who wrote thi s Book were not inspired , they were liars, and · we have to exp'tain how the Book which con­tains the highest n1orality ever given to earth could be wri,tten by a set of liars. And these bad men at the same time wrote their own doom, for there is no vice more severely condemned in the Bible than deception. To claim that good men wrote the Bible, and deny its inspiration , is on a par with the claim that Christ was a good man, while He pretended to be what He was not.

PUBLISHERS' NOTICE

As stated in the "Foreword" (page 4), of FUNDAMENTALS,

Volume I, this series of books is being sent to every pastor, evan­

gelist, missionary, theological professor, theological student, Sun­

day school superintendent, Y. M. C. A. and Y. W. C. A. secre­

tary in the English-speaking world, so far as the addresses of all

these may be obtained. No expense attaches itself to. those who

receive the book.

It is quite probable that the addresses of some who are en­

gaged in the foregoing various lines of work have been over­

looked. And if so, as soon as our attention is called to the matter

with the full address accompanying and line of Christian work in

which the persqn is engaged, we will gladly place such address on .

the list for futur e issues.

There has been a demand for the book by the laity, and to

meet this demand each · volume will be furnished at a cost of fifteen cents per copy, eight copies for one dollar, or one hundred

copies for ten dollars.

Any change of address should be promptly reported in order

that there may be no delay in receiving succeeding volumes.

Write plainly both the old and new addresses in full.

TESTIMONY PUBLISHING COMPANY,

808 La Salle Ave., Chicago, Ill., U.S. A.