The letter of Mr. Scherer to Dr. M. d'Aubigne having been communicated to me by a third person who desired to have my opinion of it, I answered with all freedom, without meditating any future publicity. I spoke severely in several places, because I judged severely that which I criticized. The Christian's faith is something too precious not to oppose clearly that which ruins it. And one will find all the imperfections in this letter necessarily connected with a composition of this kind. Perhaps it ought to have been corrected before being given to the public, but it has not been. The end in view in printing was to communicate it to a few friends, who desired to read it, for want of time to make copies.
Another word. The blame that rests on Mr. Scherer's letter cannot fail in a certain sense to reflect upon the author. But I desire ardently that the reader and Mr. S. himself, if this should fall into his hands, may distinguish as I have done myself as much as possible between Mr. S. and his letter. I doubt not that Mr. S., spite of his grave errors, has excellent qualities, and I like to appreciate them impartially, judging his doctrine without thinking of himself.
When I say that I could distinguish between Mr. S. and his letter, I do not mean that he does not deserve blame, for it is clear he is responsible for what he has done. But this is what I mean: the flesh in a Christian is not better, alas! than in a man of the world, and I cherish the thought that Mr. S. is a Christian, whatever may be the gravity of his position; I hope that this circumstance may be a blessing to him. While judging his actions according to their merits for the love of souls, I hope that he himself will judge this "lust of the mind," as my answer does, and, separating himself from them, escape the condemnation they merit.
If then I have said that to treat a subject so serious in such a light and superficial way is the act of a vulgar mind, I believe I have expressed a sound judgment upon the act of Mr. S.; but I sincerely desire that he may not feel hurt. But I do not desire the reader to esteem Mr. S. as a vulgar mind, but rather that he will join with me in hoping that after reflection, Mr. S. judging himself will shew that the words by which I condemn him apply to his acts and not to himself.
In order to treat the subject thoroughly it would need a volume and this is only a letter; you must not expect therefore more than a familiar and hastily-written letter can give.
M -- -- -,
I have seen nothing worse than this letter. It is a sign of a vulgar spirit to speak so lightly, so superficially, and with so much vanity and self-confidence, on subjects so serious. In the background (for I see no reason to accuse him of it) I see a bad faith, which betrays the presence and action of an evil spirit, of a demon. For my part I cannot reduce the question to that of a degree of inspiration, literal or otherwise -- an interesting question for those who believe in a revelation. That which is contended for here is not at all a certain degree of inspiration (such an intention is denied), but all written revelation, and also all revelation made by the mouth of man. There are truths, but they are not a communication from God, unless they are communicated from the Person of Christ to the soul, if that even can be according to his principles. The letter denies the existence of all word from God, of whatever nature it be, except so far that Christ bears this title, for which, after all, from his system one has no authority. This might be a mistake of John's, or a rabbinical tradition, or rabbino-platonist; and indeed the expression is found in works of this character.
The question then which we have specially before us is, whether there exists a written revelation from God, which consequently bears His authority.
We shall not, therefore, at present discuss the character and degree of inspiration which we claim for the scriptures. We shall not enter upon the discussion of verbal inspiration, interesting as that question is to those who believe in a revelation from God. Neither is it our present object to defend the facts and doctrines of Christianity. These truths are not denied by some who deny their immediate communication to us by God. The existence of a written revelation from God, bearing His authority as His word, is that which we would now discuss. It is important to keep this clearly before us; for that which is denied is, that we have any communication of divine truth which possesses divine authority.
Now for us, according to the author of this letter, there is no inspiration from God, there is no divine truth; because a truth which is not communicated with divine certainty is not to us a divine truth. Or, to speak more accurately, an existing fact which cannot be naturally known to man, because not relating to this creation, cannot be a truth to my soul, if it be not communicated with divine certainty. In order to this, there might be an immediate revelation to each individual in each case; or there must be an inspired communication through others, either written or by the word of mouth. I speak not of truth previously revealed being applied to the conscience by the Holy Ghost, but of the way in which we arrive at the divine certainty of the truth by knowing that it came from God. A doctrine cannot have more authority as truth than the means employed for its communication. A man, without being inspired, may be the channel through which truth, already existing as a revelation from God, is imparted; and the truth, thus communicated, may act through the Spirit's power on the heart and conscience; for there is no basis for faith; but such an uninspired medium of communication -- a preacher, for instance, or a tract -- does not constitute a divine basis for faith in him who hears. That basis must exist beforehand in the fact of God having vouchsafed an inspired communication; and the effect now produced by God in the soul is, that the hearer is led to recognize this. Otherwise, though he may say, "I believe this or that," if I ask him, "Why do you believe it?" he has no answer; he can give no satisfactory reason for his faith.
Let us remember then, that when authority is spoken of, and it is said there is no authority in matters of faith, the words "divine certainty" may be substituted for authority; and that the doctrine now opposed is, that there is no divine certainty in the things of faith. That is, there is no warrant for faith at all. John the Baptist describes faith in these words -- "He that hath received his testimony hath set to [affixed] his seal that God is true. For he whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God." But this reception of divine testimony has no existence in the system which denies inspiration. The testimony of God is excluded, and there is no place for faith. This may be called an a priori argument. But no! I only present the question in its true light; and this is often enough to convince a sincere person. For example; if any one disputed the interpretation of a text, and I could shew that his mode of looking at it -- the effect of his reasoning upon it -- was to make it appear that Christ was wicked, or to prove that He was not the Son of God; to state the real question would be, in fact, to decide it in the mind of one who knew Christ.
Besides, there are two kinds of a priori arguments, which it is important to distinguish; as they differ totally from each other, and are morally opposed to each other. Let us suppose that some one tried to prove God a liar. I answer, "That cannot be. A priori, I condemn your reasoning as false." In that case my judgment is sound (perfectly logical and philosophical, if you like to take that ground), because it is much more sure, nay, it is infallibly sure, that God cannot lie; whilst it is very possible that your reasoning is false, even though I were unable to detect the fallacy. How many things there are as to which the judgment of a wayfaring man is right, although he may be wanting in the capacity for reasoning rightly! And this is the safeguard which God has given to the simple-minded, namely, a divine conviction as to the truth with respect to things which are beyond their reach -- beyond the reach of man; while the philosopher, who undertakes to explain them, sinks in the mire.
To say, "God ought not to be or to do so-and-so," is also what is called a priori reasoning; but it is of an entirely different kind. In the former case I measure the folly of man by the certainty of what God is; in the latter I measure what God ought to be or to do by the standard of human thought, which is necessarily false. "Thou thoughtest," said God, "that I was altogether such an one as thyself; but I will reprove thee, and set before thee things which thou hast done." In the first case I say, "God is true; therefore your argument, which denies it, must be false." In the second, I say, "This is my thought; and God must be, or must act, according to my thoughts." To measure man by the certainty of what God is, and to measure God by man, are two very different things. The former may be termed a priori reasoning. It presumes, I allow, that there is the knowledge of God; and it is possible that Mr. Scherer does not admit the force of such reasoning; and all men have not this knowledge. "He hideth these things from the wise and prudent, and revealeth them unto babes."
Now I do not exaggerate in saying that this system takes away all divine certainty in things concerning faith, and, according to him, one ceases totally and absolutely to set to his seal that God is true. That is, as to the testimony, God is excluded: the author's words prove it. "Otherwise," says he, "why is an historical certainty coupled with a moral evidence not sufficient for the Christian in things concerning faith?" The object then is to substitute a purely human belief in place of a divine testimony, in fact, to exclude God.
There are other striking examples of this want to exclude God in the letter. But to return to the subject: it is evident that, whatever may be the competency of witnesses, from their own faithfulness, and from the important fact of their knowledge of the circumstances which they relate, yet to deny direct inspiration, and to put in its stead the competency of witnesses, is to substitute merely human testimony for divine testimony. The aim of such a system is to exclude God. It asserts (for without this it would be open infidelity) that revelation is allowed, although not inspiration; that is, that the apostles, or others employed to communicate truth, had a divine basis for their faith, but that other believers have not: this is plainly the effect of the supposition. According to this system truth has been revealed from heaven, that is, has been divinely communicated to the apostles and others; but since that time there has been nothing to rest on but human testimony -- credible it may be, but only human. This system allows of no divine basis, which, on God's part,+ could shield the church from error. Now the mere statement of this doctrine is almost its refutation; besides which it is formally contradicted in the word itself. "But God," says the apostle, who carefully states the opposite of the notion of Mr. Scherer, "hath revealed them unto us++ by his Spirit."
+On God's part, I say, because no one disputes the possibility of man's falling into error through his own folly or negligence.
++What is true in this respect of one apostle, or sacred writer, is no doubt true of the rest. No one would venture to assert that the communications made through Paul were of a different character, or of another nature, from those given through Peter, or John, or any other prophet.
The reason which the apostle gives for this revelation is very striking. "For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God, that we might know the things that are given to us of God." I was going to dwell upon this argument, forgetting that the apostle had used it; I will now only insist on the force of his statement: "Without a divine communication there can be no faith." That which belongs to man -- that which is within the limits of his intelligence -- may be known through the senses, through reasoning, or through the testimony of man; but it is not so in the things of faith, as to divine thoughts and truths. God alone knows them, and God alone can make them known; consequently man must be entirely ignorant of them, unless God reveals them. But He makes them known by His Spirit, that is, by revelation; giving the Holy Ghost Himself, who reveals them to the mind.
I speak of the apostolic work. The question then stands within very narrow limits. It is this: the apostles having received the knowledge of these things in a divine manner, did they communicate them to us in a divine manner, or in a manner, excellent indeed, but not inspired? God had revealed them to the apostles by His Spirit; how did they communicate them? Was their inspiration what is termed "simply religious inspiration"? Was it only that operation of the Spirit which is found in a spiritual preacher, and which leaves him still liable to error? Nothing can be more precise than the testimony of the apostle on this point. Continuing the passage already quoted, he says, "which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth." Could the idea of inspiration be embodied in a form of words more absolutely definite than the expression, "words which the Holy Ghost teacheth"? Here then there is nothing equivocal. When the apostle set forth the truths which the Holy Ghost had taught him, he used words which the Holy Ghost had also taught him. This unfortunate Mr. Scherer, betrayed by his vanity, can, with a revolting lightness (which, if one does not consider as such, is a blasphemy), call this a "cabalistic ventriloquy," but that which he designates thus is clear and certain.
And notice here, it is not said that it is not inspiration, but a cabalistic ventriloquy; that is, supposing inspiration to be true, that he designates thus, in contrast with the noble accents of human voice; that is, it was God Himself speaking through the mouth of man. This he designates with these insulting and blasphemous words.
As to the idea of reducing all inspiration to "religious inspiration," it is overturned by the fact, that inspiration is asserted in cases where "religious inspiration" was impossible, as in that of Balaam, when "he took up his parable," and spoke, having "heard the words of God." Besides, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and many others of the scripture writers, who have said to us, "Thus saith the Lord"; "The word of the Lord came unto me, saying," etc., are all properly so-called examples of positive inspiration. The reasonings of the author's letter apply to all. Still there is no equivoque here. The prophets boldly proclaim their inspiration, and we have the results of it in a written form. In regard to this I accuse the letter of a mean and evil faith. Be it remembered moreover, that the arguments which deny inspiration must, if applied at all, be applied universally. The Old and New Testaments stand or fall together. In examining this subject, the Old Testament cannot honestly be left out, because the arguments (except, perhaps, those which relate to the canon) apply to both -- to the Old as to the New; with the addition that the inspiration of the Old has the positive attestation of the Lord and the apostles, supposing only the authenticity and correctness of the New.
But has the Old Testament authority, and has the New Testament none? Is the Old Testament the word of God, and not the New? It may be very convenient to our opponents, in reasoning upon a subject, to leave out that part of which the proofs are incontestable. For if the Old Testament be inspired, inspiration is a reality, and we possess the absolute authority of God's own word. The prophets have affirmed it; the Lord has recognized it; that is, He has recognized the inspiration of the Old Testament as it stands; and He has declared that nothing can invalidate its authority. The apostle also has declared that these scriptures were "given by inspiration of God," and are capable of making us "wise unto salvation." The principle of inspiration and of authority then is established. The words of Mr. Scherer are but blasphemous words, and for him it is reduced to this -- the New Testament is not inspired; but he has not the faith to recognize that the Old Testament leaves no foundation to his arguments.
This should be thoroughly understood. The inspiration of the word of God is certain -- its divine authority incontestable. This then alone remains: whether according to the author of the letter, the New Testament is part of it? His principles are false. It must only be known if the judgments of a man who evades irrefragable proofs are worth anything, when this judgment is based upon these false, and even blasphemous principles. There are those who tell us that it is not -- that it is a mere human record of what the writers knew, either by their senses or by personal revelations to themselves, but which they were not inspired to write. Let us remember, however, that inspiration itself is denied. But he who denies inspiration denies that which the Lord and the apostles maintain; for they maintain the inspiration of the Old Testament. Such an one therefore forfeits all my confidence; and I cannot allow any weight to his judgment, when he tells me that the New Testament has not the authority of inspiration.
I will not multiply quotations to prove that the prophets assert the inspiration of their prophecies; because it recurs at the beginning of almost every separate prophecy, but I will point out the passages in the New Testament which recognize the scriptures of the Old as having this authority. "All things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning me," Luke 24: 44. Jesus here recognizes the body of writings called the Old Testament in its three parts -- still thus entitled in the modern Hebrew Bibles. The Lord gives them equal authority in verse 27 -- "And, beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself." "Search the scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life; and they are they which testify of me," John 5: 39. "And the scripture cannot be broken," John 10: 35. These passages demonstrate that the scriptures of the Old Testament were a body of writings recognized by the Lord; and that in the detail of its present divisions it was recognized as having absolute authority. But to have these writings -- to have truths communicated in this form -- is something more than to have the truth spoken by word of mouth, even though it were by the mouth of the Lord Himself. "If ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?" John 5: 47.
The writings then were the object of faith, and consequently had the authority of the word of God. "They have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them." "If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead," Luke 16: 29-31. When the apostle preached the truth at Berea, the Jews, his hearers, "searched the scriptures daily whether those things were so"; that is to say, they made use of the scriptures as an authority by which they judged the teaching even of an apostle; and they are commended for so doing; Acts 17: 11. The inspiration then of the Old Testament is demonstrated, its authority is recognized by the Lord, and the whole -- as we possess it -- is declared to be authentic and to be clothed with an authority which nothing can invalidate.
"The scriptures," as a whole, are owned of God as a distinct class of writings, having a certain authority, namely, that of HIS WORD. As it is written in Proverbs 30: 5, 6 -- "Every word of God is pure: he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him. Add thou not to his words, lest he reprove thee, and thou be found a liar." Finally, the apostle Paul (2 Timothy 3: 16) gives a remarkable testimony to the same effect -- a testimony which clearly designates this class of writings: "All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness; that the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works." We have only, therefore, to learn whether the New Testament forms part of "the scriptures," or whether the church is without a divine communication specially given to herself, and possesses only the Old Testament.
Here I would notice the folly of a principle set forth by the letter -- that the claim to inspiration is necessarily limited to the book which makes the claim, or at least to the writings of the same author. This assertion is futile. Why could not an inspired author, or the Lord, declare all the other books, or some amongst them, to be inspired? And, on the other hand, there is no necessity that the other writings of an author should be inspired because one of them is so. The Lord sets His seal to the entire Old Testament, and Paul declares that all scripture is given by inspiration of God. Does this only prove the inspiration of the Epistle to Timothy, in which the assertion is found? A man who seeks to overthrow the foundations of truth by such arguments as these deserves reproof rather than refutation.
In 2 Peter 1: 19-21 we find the prophetic word, that is all the prophecies of scripture, and that from men who spoke being moved by the Holy Ghost. I know that Mr. Scherer rejects this Epistle, but why should we accept this authority? The character of this epistle is not that of the work of an impostor. However, if it is not the work of Peter, it is certainly that of an impostor, for he calls himself an apostle, and this Epistle the second.
But I leave this point. That which Mr. Scherer says about the canon is also entirely without force. He maintains that we cannot avail ourselves of the New Testament till the canon is settled. Why not? Let us suppose that a wilding is found in my garden: can I therefore make no use of the good trees which are in it? Supposing the second Epistle of Peter were spurious, and if the Revelation merits all the reproaches which the letter's insolent pretension gives it, what has that to do with the epistles of John or of Paul? I might admit that one Epistle was questionable -- which, however, I do not admit -- without in the least questioning the others.
But I return to direct proofs. We have seen the inspiration, the authority, the canon even, of the Old Testament, fully proved, and the principles of the letter, which deny inspiration itself, utterly overthrown. But we have seen more than this. Paul received "by revelation" the truths he taught, and he communicated them in "words which the Holy Ghost teacheth," that is, by inspiration. Consequently it is certain that the early disciples had the truth communicated to them by inspiration, as the foundation of their faith. Now the argument of Mr. Scherer, if true, would only prove that God had changed His mode of acting, and left the succeeding ages without this foundation -- without a divine basis for their faith: a change incredible indeed! But when Paul says, "which things we speak," does he mean those things which he spoke only by word of mouth? And has he taught nothing by writing? We well know that he has taught by writing that which had been revealed to him; that is, that his writings for this purpose were inspired. He even says so, which would not have been necessary after the passage we have quoted from Corinthians. But God has favoured us with this additional proof. "How," he says, "by revelation he made known unto me the mystery, as I wrote afore in few words, whereby when ye read ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ." Should any say, "It may be so when fundamental truths are concerned, but not otherwise," even this refuge is denied by scripture.
In giving details for the inward regulation of a church (1 Corinthians 14: 36, 37), the apostle says, "Came the word of God out from you? or came it unto you only? If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord. But if any man be ignorant, let him be ignorant." The communications then of the Spirit to the church or to the world were the "word of God," and that which was written by the apostle to direct the saints was "the commandment of the Lord." "For this cause," said the apostle to the Thessalonians (1 Thessalonians 2: 13), "we thank God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth THE WORD OF GOD, which effectually worketh also in you that believe." Thus we see that the apostle puts his writings on the footing of "commandments of the Lord," with the sorrowful consolation for those who cannot discern it, "if any man be ignorant, LET HIM BE IGNORANT." Now will anyone say that the apostle, acting in the self-same character, and addressing himself in the same manner, in virtue of his apostolic sanction and authority, to the Romans or to the Galatians, is less inspired than when he addresses the Corinthians? Such an argument deserves no other refutation than "if any man be ignorant, let him be ignorant." To say God has willed that the faith of the Ephesians and Corinthians should rest upon divine inspiration, and that of the Romans and Galatians on a human basis, deserves no serious answer.
We have a particular class of writings, and this class of writings is inspired and is called "the scriptures." Romans 16: 26 defines this principle very clearly. "But is now made manifest [that is, the mystery], and by prophetic writings [see Greek], according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith." This passage again points out that class of writings which we call "the scriptures," writings which have the authority of a revelation -- of an oracle from God: they are "prophetic writings." In short, to sum up this part of the testimonies which we possess, Peter, in his Second Epistle, recognizing these writings as the scriptures, tells us, when speaking of Paul's Epistles, that those who are "unlearned and unstable wrest them, as they do the other scriptures"; hereby proving that Paul's Epistles form a part of "the scriptures," a term very well understood, and having the same meaning then as now, as the Lord's own words demonstrate. I know, indeed, that Mr. Scherer rejects this Epistle, but I do not accept his dictum as an authority.
The existence then of prophetic scriptures -- of the scriptures of the New Testament, which have the authority of "the word of God" -- of "the commandments of the Lord," is most clearly proved. He who finds more authority in the words of the Lord's apostle than in those of the author of the letter -- he who reveres the word of God and the revelations of God -- will have no doubt on the subject. But if there exist writings of John or Peter, making the same claim, addressing Christians in the same manner, and that in perfect accordance with the same divine ministry committed to these apostles (as, for instance, the Epistles of Peter to the circumcision), could a Christian say, "the writings of one apostle are inspired, but those of another are not," although entirely of the same nature, and although the writer speaks expressly in the name of his apostolate, and as exercising the authority of his mission? I assume now their-authenticity, and that they are really the writings they claim to be. We need not look for the words, "I am inspired." We find in them the unequivocal expression of authority. The faith of Christians consequently clothes them with this authority. The authors announce the truth, as having a right to impose their thoughts upon the acceptance of Christians, and in fact they do so impose them.
Take the First Epistle of Peter. Does he not speak with full authority as an apostle? And when Paul said, "If any obey not our word by this epistle, note that man, and have no company with him"; had not that written word apostolic authority? When John said, "We are of God: he that knoweth God heareth us; he that is not of God heareth not us" (1 John 4: 6), exercising thus divine authority over the conscience, do you think he meant that these words, pronounced so solemnly, had not the same authority? Such a conclusion would involve a palpable contradiction; for if they rejected his words, they did not hear him. One cannot attribute authority to his words spoken elsewhere, without attributing it to the words which claim that authority. If I say, "I command you to obey me," the command which I give, and the authority of that which I have already commanded, stand or fall together. I cannot believe the authority of Peter to be less than that of John or of Paul. He was sent forth with the same authority by the Lord.
What then have we proved? That there is a class of writings called the "scriptures" -- which are inspired -- which possess absolute authority as the word of God -- which are recognized as such by the Lord and His apostles, and are constantly referred to by them with the greatest solemnity. We have found, that a very large portion of the New Testament is spoken of as forming part of these scriptures; that there is a body of writings attached to the apostolic work, "prophetic scriptures," employed by the command of God, and having the authority of the word of God. The question then is narrowed into very small dimensions. The assertion that there is no inspiration, no divine authority for "the word," has been proved entirely false. It is in flagrant opposition to the authority of the Lord and the apostles, and it seeks to overthrow that which they maintain. The only question then is this, Does such or such a book form a part of this inspired collection? A very important question, but one which, by the very fact of its being asked, pre-supposes the existence and the authority of the word of God, and seeks only not to confound human pretensions with the divine authority which it reveres, and of which it seeks to preserve the full value untouched and without alloy.
It is not our present object to bring forward detailed proofs of the authenticity of each book of the New Testament; to do so would be to write an introduction to the New Testament. Lower down I will indicate a few general principles of God's ways as regards this. The great question is decided. The object of the letter which you have sent me is not to prove whether such or such a book be genuine, admitting the inspiration of the rest, but to deny inspiration. Now this has been proved: inspiration does exist. The truth revealed has been communicated in words taught by the Holy Ghost. If this be so (mark it well), the letter bears the character, not only of a false principle, but of a principle hostile to God and to His goodness; it is subversive of the truth which He has condescended to make known to us, and destroys the very foundations of our faith. It is very important to have a right judgment as to the source and the character of that which presents itself as truth. "Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God; for many false prophets are gone out into the world." Following this injunction of the apostle's -- of the Holy Ghost's -- I solemnly judge that the principle of the letter proceeds from Satan. Here is not the place to examine to what point the principles of those to whom the author is opposed have furnished the occasion of this irruption of the enemy. Whatever saps the foundations of faith, in opposition to the express declarations of the Spirit of God, comes from the enemy; and I have always found that to deal with that which is of the enemy, openly and publicly as from the enemy, is the wisdom of God, and is accompanied by His strength and His blessing. Thus I deal with Mr. Scherer's letter.
The final appeal to the "written word," as to a recognized authority, which we find continually in the scriptures, is another proof of its authority. It is used there as an authority which no one, except a professed unbeliever, would think of disputing. Open the New Testament at almost what page you like, you will find a proof of this. "It is written -- it is written," settled every question, decided every controversy. It is not the scriptures which have to be proved; they themselves serve for an absolute and final proof. This is the strongest testimony we can have. If I say, in canvassing some proof of human conduct, the law says this and the law says that, as settling the question; it takes for granted the existence of the law, and its sovereign authority over all disputed points -- an authority which no one can gainsay. Thus it is in the use of scripture. If it is the word of authority (as says the letter), and not the authority of the word, and thus I believe it with an entire faith, that word even submits, in the most absolute manner, to the authority of the word. Examine the scriptures to know if things are thus. "These things were done that the scripture might be fulfilled." -- "Jesus, that the scripture might be fulfilled, saith, I thirst." -- "Well spake the Holy Ghost by Esaias the prophet unto our fathers." -- "Promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures." -- "Christ died for our sins, according to the scriptures," and was buried, and rose again the third day, according to the scriptures. -- "And the scripture foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith." -- "And the scripture cannot be broken." -- "Give place unto wrath, for it is written." -- "That by patience and comfort of the scriptures we might have hope."
It was the highest of all the Jewish privileges that the "oracles of God" were committed to them. "For what saith the scripture?" -- "The scriptures are able to make us wise unto salvation." The Jews made "the word of God of none effect through their traditions." -- "Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures; and said unto them, Thus it is written." Is it in accommodating Himself to man, as the adversaries of inspiration pretend He did, in appealing amongst the Jews to the written word, that the Lord opens the understanding, that they may understand things which have not divine authority? No; the scriptures are treated by the apostles, by the Lord Himself, as having an incontestable and divine authority as the oracles of God, as the word of God. This is so entirely true, that when, in fulfilling His divine mission, it behoved the Lord to undergo the temptation of the enemy, the scripture was the weapon which He used, as being divinely tempered, against which Satan had no power, and his devices no possible success. It sufficed to say, "It is written." The tempter would have betrayed himself if he had questioned the absolute authority of the quotation: his best resource was to quote scripture his own way; but it does not fail under this trial. The second Adam still replies, "It is also written."
One may, without blame, prefer the perfect wisdom of our divine Saviour to the self-sufficiency and unbelief of human wisdom. And observe here the importance of this use of the word of God, the holy scriptures, the oracles of God, by the apostles and by the Lord. People say," But there are various readings, bad translations, statements which the increase of knowledge has proved impossible, so that scripture cannot be used as an authority." The Lord, then, was mistaken! There were various readings, bad translations (especially that of the Septuagint, indicated in the letter), and supposed inconsistencies, at the very time when the Lord said, "The scripture cannot be broken." When, in His controversy with Satan, He employed the scriptures, Satan, lest he should appear to be Satan undisguised, durst not question their authority. These things existed too when the apostle called them "the oracles of God." But none of these things prevented the Lord's recognizing their absolute authority on every occasion. "The foolishness of God is wiser than men."
As to proofs which may be given of the authority of the word, it carries its own proof with it, as does every testimony from God. This is a fundamental principle. It does not require proof; it furnishes its own proofs of everything to the soul. We do not bring a light to the sun in order to discern it; it enlightens us. The word of God is not judged; it judges. If God speaks, woe unto him that hears what is spoken, and knows not that it is God who speaks. There are those assuredly who will not own that it is He. If this refusal to believe be final, they are lost -- sentence has already been passed upon them; the light is come, and the darkness comprehends it not. "The word of God is sharper than a two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of the soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." The word of God, whether spoken or written, has to be received as the word of God, and he who rejects it is lost. If any remain in ignorance of some of its details -- if any are mistaken as to some book -- they lose just so much of it through their pride. "The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple ... moreover by them is thy servant warned." -- "The entrance of thy word giveth light, it giveth understanding unto the simple." Read the whole of Psalm 119.
This conviction that the word is its own evidence is all-important; this alone maintains the true character of the word of God. Like Jesus, "it receiveth not testimony from man." He who believes not in the Son of God will be condemned. He that believes not the record that God gave of His Son has made God a liar, and has not life. Now, according to the Lord's own words, the scriptures testify of Him. The fundamental principle is this -- the word of God must be received by faith; and the reasonings of man cannot be the foundation of faith; if they were, it would not be faith in God, nor faith in His word. "He believed God," -- "They shall be all taught of God." -- "Every man therefore, that hath heard and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me."
Having established this principle, I would enter into some details respecting the ways of God in this matter. We have seen how the Lord while on earth set His seal to the scriptures; but observe, in so doing He set His seal to the faith of those who had previously believed in them. It was not because He had already done so that those faithful ones believed. Their heart, their faith, had been previously tested. They had faith, because they had received the testimony of the scriptures (before they were thus sanctioned), when presented to their faith on the ground of their own authority. When Jeremiah spoke, it does not follow that all received his testimony; there were some who had not "ears to hear," but who listened to false prophets. When God is to be owned, it becomes a moral question; but in all ages believers have owned God by receiving His testimony. And unbelievers have not acknowledged God in the testimony. It is so now. God gives in His word sufficient moral evidence to commend it to the conscience. When He has established anything new, He has added a sufficiency of extraordinary evidences. But with this comes the moral responsibility of him who hears, which God never sets aside; and also the grace which acts in giving and establishing faith.
The reception of the word, and afterwards the understanding this word, are things presented to the responsibility of man. Grace alone can enable him to receive and to understand it; but nothing can set aside this responsibility, and nothing take away the necessity of this grace, or destroy its efficacy. The positive authority of the apostolic testimony, claiming submission as it does in the most peremptory manner, cannot alter this. "If any man think himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord. But if any man be ignorant, let him be ignorant." An apostle cannot go beyond that. For the things which are communicated in words taught by the Spirit are spiritually discerned. It was thus in the days of all the prophets. "Hear ye, and give ear," said Jeremiah; "be not proud: for the Lord hath spoken. But if ye will not hear it, my soul shall weep in secret places for your pride.
Now the condition which brings judgment upon the house of God is marked by this feature -- the word loses its authority, excepting over the remnant preserved by Him. "And the vision of all is come unto you, as the words of a book that is sealed, which men deliver to one that is learned, saying, Read this, I pray thee: and he saith, I cannot, for it is sealed. And the book is delivered to him that is not learned, saying, Read this, I pray thee: and he saith, I am not learned. Wherefore the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men. Therefore behold," etc.
Such was the condition of the people of Israel, and the cause of the judgment which befell them. It was then the Lord said, "Bind up the testimony, seal the law, among my disciples ... . To the law and to the testimony." Thus also in the New Testament we are told, "In the last days perilous times shall come." What is then the resource of the faithful? "But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them, and that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation, through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God." The resource in "the last days" is reverence for the holy scriptures, and the assurance of their sufficiency. "All scripture is given by inspiration of God." Therefore, whether it be amongst the Jews or in the church, the resource in evil days is confidence in the divine inspiration of the holy scriptures. The Lord has pointed it out and sanctioned it; but this confidence in the authority of the word existed before He had given it His sanction. And it is this faith, without any other sanction than the word itself which He has sanctioned. Precious testimony for latter days, since the same sanction applies to them also! The apostle, in warning us of perilous times, directs our thoughts beforehand to the same means of establishing the soul. Those who had faith in the scriptures, before the Saviour's testimony to their authority, were enabled through grace to discern what was God's word, and were approved by Him. Those who do so now have this same approval. They have the same responsibility as to what they receive. But although this responsibility exists, God does not cease to use means.
There is another principle which should be noticed here, as Mr. Scherer's letter seems to want us to add absurd and even foolish books, such as the epistle of Barnabas, to the word of God. "The oracles of God" are committed to His people. This does not entitle the church to impose her authority upon us; but she is undoubtedly responsible for preserving that which has been committed to her. In this trust Rome has shewn her unfaithfulness by adding apocryphal books. Now, although the church may in detail fail in her responsibility, it is impossible, in anything essential to it, that God should fail towards His church, or that Christ should cease to nourish and cherish it. God watches over all this -- not to keep the learned from stumbling, but that believers may have food from Him, and an unerring rule of life. It is not the babe and the wayfaring man who find difficulties: God has given them the word, and preserved it for them; and their conscience bears them witness in the Holy Ghost that God works in them by this word. The Holy Ghost enables them, according to the measure of their spirituality, to use and understand it. A heart full of peace and joy, because taught of God, discerns and acknowledges that it is indeed the word of God. It is read, perhaps in a bad translation, and doubtless something is lost thereby; but God has taken care that enough should remain to teach the heart with certainty His truth and His ways. The word is "the sword of the Spirit." It carries conviction with it, when the Spirit uses it in the power of His grace. It leaves man under the responsibility of having rejected it, whenever it has been presented to his conscience.
A man of little information, but taught of God, is much more able to apprehend the whole truth, even through the medium of an indifferent translation, than the learned man, who, though a stranger to Christ, thinks he can judge of the whole canon. This is easily accounted for. The church puts the New Testament into our hands, for the oracles of God are committed to the church. This does not, indeed, impart faith, but it is the means which God uses for this end. The church presents us with the divine oracles, not with authority, as having power to judge the word, but as the faithful guardian of that which has been committed to her. This is done through parents, friends, ministers; and there is a general belief in the professing church that these oracles are the word of God. The simple-minded do not set themselves to judge of the whole canon of the New Testament before reading it. They read it, and the word produces faith.
A man receives by the teaching of God first one truth, and then another. The word has judged him -- the word has revealed Jesus to him. To such an one the history of Jesus is all divine; it communicates to his soul what he receives with divine knowledge, for these things are spiritually discerned. The epistles unfold to him divine truth, and he receives it with a divine certainty that God has spoken to him. He makes use of every book in the New Testament, without knowing what the term "canon" means. And if some scholar would deprive him of his treasure -- of that divinely inspired word which he knows to be of God -- this word is "the sword of the Spirit" in his hands to shew him the folly of human wisdom. He pities the learned man who is a stranger to all that which he himself is enjoying.
He who has eaten bread knows what bread is, although he may not understand the art of baking. If, through grace, the believer grows in divine knowledge, he sees the harmony of the whole -- the adaptation of the several parts. He has not only "the full assurance of faith," but "the full assurance of understanding" also. He perceives the divine wisdom of the Bible, not merely the divine truth which it contains. He finds perhaps a text spoiled by a bad translation; it does not harmonize with what he knows to be the truth of God. Under such circumstances he will say, "I do not understand that passage." I am supposing a person deprived of all spiritual help, which, according to the ways of God in His church, is very seldom the case. Humble in heart, he will attribute to his own ignorance his inability to understand the passage. "The wisdom of this world" reasons about the canon, and will form its judgment before it reads, and in consequence it receives nothing. The mind of man cannot create for itself the things of God. Nor can human reason pronounce upon the authority of the word of God. It may be said, "This is trusting to feelings"; but no! it is trusting to God. They shall be all "taught of God." The authority of the word can only be really known by believing in it.
He who has only man's thoughts will say, "But I must know that it is the word of God before I can believe in it." I reply, "You cannot." It is true, happily true, that we receive the New Testament as the word of God, on the faith of our parents or of our education; but it is never really received as such till it is "mixed with faith" in those that read it. For my part I receive the New Testament with full assurance in its present form, as it has been adopted by the universal church. Circumstances having called me to it, I have examined the external evidences and found them satisfactory; but that does not produce faith. It may be useful to obviate the objections made by those who do not live upon the word and cannot judge of it. The authority of God is not subject to human intelligence. I know that some of the epistles were questioned in the early ages, at least in certain places; but I doubt not that, in receiving as inspired those books which form the New Testament, the church was guided by God. The means by which God's word may be communicated are to be distinguished from that word itself as an authoritative rule; but these means may nevertheless be used according to the certainty of that rule.
A mother instructs her child in the truth, but she is not the rule or standard of truth. Thus the unlettered Christian receives the New Testament in the form in which it is distributed. It may be that he cannot demonstrate its authenticity, but he happily profits by the fact that the church receives it. It comes thus into his possession, and, when he reads it, he finds it divine. God thus uses means to spread the truth, and the book which contains it. The multitude. of believers profit by it. It is God who acts thus. If any answer must be given to unbelievers who dispute the authority of the word, it may be that only a few amongst those who receive and enjoy it are able to convince gainsayers; but that does not hinder God from using the scriptures, and giving faith to those who receive them; then the folly of gainsayers, and of those who are nourished with incredulity, appears to all.
He whose heart and mind are exercised in the word according to God finds not only the proof of its divinity, in the application of passage after passage to his conscience, but he gains the deepest conviction of its perfection as a whole, through the knowledge thus obtained of the fulness of Christ. I will take an instance out of Mr. Scherer's letter. He says the Spirit of God cannot make us feel the value of a genealogy. Such a remark only betrays ignorance of the word of God and of Christ Himself. To set forth the varied glory of Jesus, according to the counsels of God respecting Him, it is needful to present the different characters which He bears. This is the substance of God's revelation. Now His connection with Abraham and David, and His connection with Adam, are leading points in this revelation; and the genealogies of the New Testament set this before us. But this is not all. They correspond exactly with the character of the Gospels in which we find them.
The Gospel by Matthew, in which the genealogy is traced from Abraham and David, treats especially of the Messiah, of the relation of Christ to the Jews, of the fulfilment of prophecy in Him, and at the same time of His rejection as Messiah, and the transition to a new dispensation. Luke sets before us the great features of grace brought in by "the second Adam," and the great moral principles connected with this grace; so that in the body of this Gospel events are not arranged in chronological order, but according to their moral bearing. This is true even in the history of the temptation. In this Gospel the genealogy is traced up to Adam. John, on the contrary, gives us the Person of the Saviour, who is above all the dispensational dealings of God in the earth, the Jews being throughout set aside as rejected, and therefore no genealogy is given. "The Word was God." John's Gospel begins before Genesis, and at the close we find neither the agony in Gethsemane, nor the being forsaken on the cross; but other things are mentioned which are not found in Matthew or in Luke. Thus the different glories of Christ are manifested, and by degrees the admirable perfection of the word shines forth in all its splendour. The criticisms of man fade away, like the stars before the sun, which makes them disappear with the darkness that allowed them to be seen. The Bible presents us with a perfection, both in its details and as a whole, which leaves no doubt in the mind of one who has tasted it that, as a complete whole, it is divine.
I have hitherto spoken of the divinity of the word in its separate parts, as the sword of the Spirit which causes its power to be felt in the soul, while judging it, and revealing Christ to it; but I speak now of the word as a whole -- of what is called the canon of scripture. If Matthew were wanting, we should not have the Messiah, Son of David, and Son of Abraham. If Mark were wanting, we should not have the Servant made in the likeness of man -- a prophet on the earth; if Luke, we should not have the Son of man; if John, we should lose the Son of God.
In the Acts of the Apostles we have the foundation of the church, by the power of the Spirit of God; the commencement and development of the church in Jerusalem, through the instrumentality of the twelve; then the Gentiles grafted into the good olive-tree by Peter, the apostle of the circumcision; and, when Jerusalem had rejected the testimony, the church fully revealed and called by the ministry of Paul, the apostle of the Gentiles.
The Epistle to the Romans furnishes the eternal principle of God's relationship with man, the way in which, by means of Christ, dead and risen, the believer is established in blessing, and the reconciling of these things with the speciality of the promises made to the Jews by Him whose gifts and calling are without repentance. In the Corinthians are found details respecting the internal regulation of a church; its walk, its order, its restoration when it had gone astray -- the patience and the energy of grace; the whole being sketched by the Spirit of God, acting through an apostle, and declaring the divine authority of His commands. In Galatians we find the contrast between law and promise, as well as the source of ministry; in a word, the condemnation of Judaism even in its very roots. Ephesians presents to us the relationship of the believer with the Father and with Christ, and the fulness of the church's privileges as the body of Christ, her connection with Him, and "the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations," in which all the counsels of God for His own glory are unfolded. In Colossians the fulness which dwells in the Head for the body is set forth, and the solemn warning is given not to separate practically from this union with the Head, through allowing a show of humility to glide into the bosom of the church. In Philippians we have the apostle's experience of what Christ is to the Christian, as sufficient for all things, whatever his position may be -- His immediate sufficiency, even when the Christian should be deprived of apostolic support; and the walk of the church in the unity of grace -- in unity maintained by grace, when the spiritual energy of her human leaders should be wanting. It is a precious epistle in this point of view. 1 and 2 Thessalonians give us the hope of the church in the freshness of her affections; and the mystery of iniquity ending in the manifestation of the man of sin -- a mystery notwithstanding which the church is called to maintain this hope, and to cherish these affections.
Timothy and Titus exhibit what may be termed ecclesiastical care for the maintenance whether of truth or of order: 1 Timothy, the normal order of the church; 2 Timothy, the path of the individual when it is in disorder, and there is general false profession of Christianity. All these present salvation and life. In the Epistle to the Ephesians the church is seen seated as a body in the heavenly places. In the Epistle to the Hebrews the faithful are viewed as journeying in weakness upon the earth, and Christ is consequently seen apart, as appearing for them in the presence of God in heaven. This is in contrast with the earthly figures given to Israel. This gives rise to a glorious unfolding of the Person of our Lord, as God the Creator, as man, and as the Son over His own house, the Creator of all things, and lastly as High Priest. His priesthood is very largely set forth. It is after the order of Melchisedec, as to His personal rights; after the likeness of Aaron, or rather in contrast with Aaron, as to its present exercise. This leads to the unfolding of the life of faith (the faith common to all saints), and to the final separation of the believing Jews from the camp of earthly religion, as having "come to the heavenly Jerusalem."
James sets before us that girdle of practical righteousness which restrains the natural tendency of the heart to abuse grace; faith must be real or living faith; and the last dealings of God with the twelve tribes (as in Jonah with the Gentiles), when the light and perfection of a new order of things eclipsed that old order, to which those tribes had proved unfaithful.
Peter gives us the government of God: in the First Epistle in blessing to saints as far as was applied; in the Second, in reference to the wicked.
In the First Epistle of Peter we find the Christian a pilgrim on the earth, placed in this position by the power of Christ's resurrection, according to an election which is not that of an earthly people, but unto eternal life. This epistle was addressed to the Jews of the dispersion (Peter being the apostle of circumcision), and was particularly adapted to them, through grace setting them free from the idea of an earthly establishment to be pilgrims on the earth in view of an incorruptible inheritance.
The Second Epistle of Peter is written in the prospect of his departure, and of the flowing in of evil. It exhorts them to press forward. On the one hand it gives the picture and the assurance of the glory of the coming kingdom in its heavenly aspect, but manifested on the earth; on the other, the corruption which would degrade and swallow up Christianity, and the consequences of this in judgment. Peter never represents the church as one body in heaven, as Paul does; he views her, or rather her members, as on the earth, and as pilgrims there. The exact correspondence of every detail with this point of view, even in the manner of presenting the glory (2 Peter 1), manifests a perfection which proves its divine origin.
Jude admirably unfolds all the moral features of the apostasy+ -- its beginnings and its results; recording the solemn prophecy of Enoch, which we should otherwise have lost, and thus proving how clear, even before the flood, was the testimony of God, who is unchangeable in purpose from the beginning to the end.
John presents us with all the features of the divine nature, and that as life first of all, as manifested in Jesus, and then as characteristic of the whole family. The epistle is thus a safeguard against every pretension, which, wanting in these features, would seek to pervert the faithful. It is the means also of strengthening and establishing Christians, by the development of those qualities which belong to the nature of God, with whom, if light be in them, they have communion, as to the Father and the Son, and in whom, if love be in them, they dwell. This is true of every believer in Jesus. This love was manifested in Christ coming down here, accomplished in giving us the full joy with Him in His position above.
Philemon, and the two lesser Epistles of John, shew us that, if the mystery of God is revealed to us by one apostle, and the nature of God set evidently before us by another; if they lift us up to the height of His counsels and of His being, they can also be occupied with the interests of a runaway slave and his master, and with the anxieties and practical difficulties of an excellent lady, who was to reject those who did not bring the truth; and with a kind and worthy brother, as to receiving persons to whom Christian love would open the door, insisting on the truth, but refuting the jealousy of a local selfish person who desired to have things in his own hands. They shew us that that love which dwells in God, which is the very nature of God, which is manifested in the glorious work of Christ -- that wisdom which ordains all mysteries for His eternal glory, disdains not to provide with perfect delicacy for the difficult relationships between a master and his slave; nor to manifest the tenderest solicitude with respect to the details of life. This love, in the perfection of wisdom and grace, links the fulness and perfection of God with every emotion of the human heart, with every circumstance of our life in this world. It sanctifies, by the revelation of what God is, a people who are to dwell with Him, and fits them for His presence by creating pure affections -- by making a holy love the spring of their whole life.
+Where there is similarity between Jude and Peter, there is a profound moral difference: Peter speaks of wickedness in connection with government; Jude, of apostasy from a first estate.
In the Apocalypse the Spirit of God gives at the outset, in an admirable review of the state of seven Asiatic churches, the elements of a perfect judgment with respect to every state in which the professing church would be found, so as to guide any one connected with the church in these circumstances. He at the same time encourages the faithfulness of those who have ears to hear by promises of blessing from above specially suited to the difficulties of these several conditions. He declares that these blessings are prepared for "him that overcometh" in the conflict into which he is brought by the declension of the church. This declension had already commenced in the days of the apostle in their leaving their first love; it will end in compelling Christ to spue out of His mouth those who bear His name. Such is the substance of that which the Spirit of God gives us in the earlier chapters of this book.
Having thus furnished the Christian with all that he needs in the midst of the difficulties presented by the state of the professing church; and having revealed the judgment of Christ, with a perfection and a circumstantial adaptation which are most admirable, the Holy Ghost then lifts the veil to shew how all this will end in the judgment of the world. He reveals chastenings, first of all in outward things; then more directly upon man himself; afterwards, He discloses all the features of man's dreadful apostasy, the diabolical organization of his forces against Christ, and, at length, the judgment which will break forth at the coming of Christ Himself, the King of kings, and Lord of lords. This judgment is to make way for an administration of blessing and happiness (Satan being bound), which will only be interrupted by his being loosed from his prison, to test those who have enjoyed this happiness, and thus to bring on the final judgment of the dead and the eternal state in which God will be "all in all." This is the methodical and complete development of that which Jude, 2 Peter, and 2 Thessalonians had made known to the church in its moral elements.
At the close of the book we have more particularly unfolded to us the connection of the church with Christ in heaven, and with the times of blessing enjoyed under His reign.
There is another striking feature of the perfection of the Apocalypse, which may be noticed here, that is, its moral unity. The standing of the church is indeed defined in the opening and concluding paragraphs by the expression of her own sentiments; but throughout the book there is not one thought connected with the living communication of grace from the Head to the members. It is a prophetic book of judgment treating, first, of all that relates to the church, as seen in its responsibility upon the earth. In this portion of it there is promise, threatening, warning, judgment of its condition, revelation of the characters of the Son of man, everything connected with responsibility. But the Head, the source of life and knowledge to the body, is not mentioned as such. After the judgment of the church comes that of the world -- the church being seen on high -- a judgment increasing in severity up to the destruction of the wicked one. In this part of the book is found all that the faithful need, in order to understand the ways of God, and to discern the path which He has marked out for them in these perilous times; but Christ as the living source of grace is never referred to. Everything is in its right place, for it is the work of God.
The New Testament then, commencing with the manifestation of the Man Christ in humiliation on the earth, and carrying us forward to the eternal state when God will be "all in all," presents us with the full development of all the ways of God, and of what He is in Himself, in order that man may joy in Him, know Him, and glorify Him -- that the believer may be kept through all the difficulties and dangers of the way by the wisdom and admonitions of God -- and that he may understand His wisdom and His love. Man could not have composed this as a whole -- could not have foreseen the necessity for each part. One feels in it the energetic spontaneity of life, that is, of the Spirit of God. Take away one single part, now that we possess the whole, and the breach is immediately felt by one who has seen and appreciated its completeness.
Perfection marks the book of God as a whole, as it marks everything which God has made, from the insect which sports in the air, up to man himself, created in the image of God, with a body of exquisite workmanship united to a mind capable of enjoying God, of communion with Him, and even, through grace, of expressing something of His character and His ways. The word is not a shapeless mass; it is the complete body of the revealed thoughts of God more perfect even than man, to whom it is addressed, because more immediately divine. Man, who would be wise, does not understand this body of divine communications, but judges this or that part of it according to the little pitiful history of ecclesiastical weaknesses and contentions. Things of the Spirit are spiritually discerned. For him who is spiritual divine perfection shines forth in every page; and the unity of the whole, the perfect connection of its several parts, the relation of these parts to each other and to all the ways of God, to the Person of Christ, to the Old Testament, to the heart of the renewed man, to the necessities of sinful man, to the dangers and difficulties which have sprung up in the church -- all combine to crown with divine glory the demonstration of the origin and the authorship of the book which contains these things.
Its author is so much the more evidently God from the human instruments having been many and diverse. But its unity -- and above all, the intimate union of its different parts -- demonstrates a complete and perfect body. If but one joint of a finger were wanting to a man, he is not a man such as God made him; he may have life, but he is imperfect, and his imperfection is perceptible. So take away a book from the New Testament, the remainder is divine undoubtedly, but it is no longer the New Testament in its divine perfection. As in a noble tree, the inward energy, the freedom of the sovereign vital power, produces a variety of forms, in which the details of human order may appear to be wanting, but in which there is a beauty that no human art can imitate. Cut off one of its branches, and the void is obvious; the minute connection of the remainder is destroyed; the gap which is made in the intertwining of its tender leaves proves that the devastating hand of man has been there.
This then is the way in which the Christian uses the word; each part of it acts divinely in him, and, in proportion to the progress he makes, it unfolds itself as a whole to the eyes of his faith with a divine evidence which unites itself with every element of his faith, with the varied glories of the Person of Christ, and with the universal perfection of the ways of God; a perfection of which the Christian has not judged a priori, but which he has learnt in the word itself.
When I see a man, do I need to be told that his form is complete? The more I know of anatomy, the more I shall admire its structure; but it is the sight of the man himself which makes me apprehend his perfectness. Thus it is with all the works of God; only His word requires, even as it produces, spiritual discernment. If any one be "a prophet or spiritual," let him acknowledge it. And how does the word dispose of those who do not acknowledge it? "If any be ignorant, let him be ignorant." It is humbling, no doubt, to have all one's learning treated thus; but between God and man this is as it should be. Outward evidences, as I have remarked, confirm the spiritual judgment. The learned man, who creates doubts for himself, needs evidences to remove them. The simple Christian feeds on that which is divine, and knows nothing of the difficulties which man's poor learning creates.
I will now examine some of the arguments used in the letter in order to shew their futility. It is a melancholy task, after having had one's thoughts directed towards the perfection of the Bible.
The first thing which strikes one is, that the arguments themselves are all extrinsic to the scriptures. We are told, for instance, that at the time of the Reformation one authority was substituted for another. But observe, it is not through anything found in the Bible itself that Mr. Scherer judges of its authority. No divine operation in the soul reveals itself in the letter. Since this is so, it is not astonishing that man's voice be openly preferred to God's which is treated as ventriloquy. One speaks of openness. Let the manner in which the Spirit of God has been unacknowledged have given place to this deviation as to the word -- I understand that; but to belch out impertinent blasphemies is not openness for me, though it be done very openly.
Besides, the letter would have faith rest upon historical certainty and external moral evidence. I do not judge the author, I know not if he has faith or no; but after this phrase one would say that he ignores entirely what faith is, that he has never had divine conviction: he feels not the need of divine faith, and knows not its nature; for no such historical or moral certainty can be faith. Faith comes from God, and receives a testimony whereupon it sets to its seal that God is true. He speaks of the economy of the letter. But the application of the word by the Spirit is not the economy of the letter. Paul where he speaks of it reasons on the word. The rationalist, who has not the Spirit, can only see in scripture the testimony of the man who wrote it. This is easy to be understood. He gives up the Spirit and the word together, and falls back upon his own reason.
Mr. Scherer's letter insists on the imperfection of the text of the New Testament, on its being written in a dead language, on its being read in translations; and, finally, says that its authors followed the opinions of the day in which they lived. This last objection is itself but a judgment founded upon the opinions of the present day, and is not worth a refutation. It is an accusation, not a proof: and the accusation is but a calumny. In fact, if it were well founded, the same should be said of the Lord's own discourses, or the whole history should be rejected as false. (See John 3: 33, 34; chapter 8: 47.) As to the other objections, I have a divine certainty of their futility; because, as I have already shewn, the Lord has set His seal to the Old Testament scriptures in spite of the same difficulties.
Notwithstanding I would add a few words. The author confounds the rule of faith with the means by which it is made known; in the latter, the imperfection of the instrument is felt. No one would assert that a translation was divine; but, through human diligence, we profit by a divine work. The deposit, the rule of faith, remains in its original purity.
If clouds, formed by exhalations from the earth, obscure the light of the sun, they only prove, by thus veiling it, the power of that light, which, although not seen in all its brightness, still suffices for all human purposes. This objection then only tells us that, when God gives blessing, we profit by the blessing according to our diligence.
But this is not all. It is said that we do not even possess the original in its purity. This objection is in the main the same in principle as that we have just touched on. All that God gives He puts into the hands of men for their use; and they never know how to keep it as they ought. The revelation of God has been placed in the hands of men -- of the church. Man has not preserved it in its absolute perfection: be it so.
God allows man to learn what he himself is; but faith knows that, behind all human failure, there is the faithfulness of God who watches over the church, and that Christ nourishes and cherishes it. Experience teaches, and the day of judgment will make manifest, that faith in God is always in the right. Thus the believer supposes it possible, that, through human carelessness, some defects may have crept into what was committed to man; but he has full confidence in the faithfulness of God. His experience, as we have seen, confirms his faith, for he finds the word divine. The judgment of God will decide that question for the unbeliever, which divine faith has already decided for the believer.
The examination of the text by learned men has indeed shewn the rashness of infidel knowledge; but it has left no serious doubts, except as to an extremely small number of texts or rather of words. It has not left a shade of obscurity upon any passage of the slightest importance as to the truth. One thus learns God's grace in caring for the word, as well as His original bestowal of it, although apparently He left all to the responsibility of man.
To say that the meaning of a passage is doubtful, in order to deny its inspiration, as if the doubt about its meaning proved it, is too absurd an argument to be repeated. It is saying that the ignorance and incapacity of man are a proof that God has not acted in anything which man does not understand. There is a superficiality in such reasoning as this, which reveals the true value of mere human wisdom. The meaning is doubtful. Doubtful to whom? To him who refuses to be taught of God.
The letter says that the writers of the New Testament implicitly followed the translation of the Seventy. The contrary is the fact. When the Septuagint gives the sense, they used it. Half their quotations are faithfully rendered from the Hebrew; and if there are passages which differ from the present Hebrew text, the researches of the learned have proved that they are borne out by the testimony of the oldest translations. In many instances the meaning is given without confining themselves to the exact words. Conscientious research on this point strongly confirms the divine inspiration of the authors of the New Testament.
Mr. Scherer tells us that there are inaccuracies, errors, and contradictions. I deny these contradictions and these inaccuracies. Let us remember that the certainty of the objector's knowledge must be first ascertained. I have no confidence in it. I have known many cases in which man would prune away the fruit of the spontaneous actings of the Spirit, and carve the beautiful tree into a round or a square. For my part I behold divine perfection in the form it bears. All is divinely adapted to the object which the Holy Ghost had in view. We have seen that John does not mention the prayer of Jesus in Gethsemane; Matthew and Luke omit what John relates. What does this prove to me? That John was not there? Not so; but that the Holy Ghost is the author of the two accounts, and not John and Matthew. They were but the penmen of the Holy Ghost. Man would have related what man had seen. The Holy Ghost sets before me in the one Gospel, the man and the Messiah suffering; in the other, the divine Person who offered up Himself, and whose life no man took from Him. I see divine perfection where human wisdom sees blemishes. In the history of our Lord's temptation Luke puts the offer of the kingdoms of the earth before the temptation on the pinnacle of the temple, and, in consequence, omits, "Get thee hence, Satan!" "This is wrong!" cries the worldly scholar. "What perfection!" says the Christian. Matthew gives the historical order; Luke the moral order; for the spiritual temptation, through the written word, was of a deeper character than that of the offer of the whole world. The Man -- the Messiah, Son of man -- the Holy One relying on the promises, duly succeed each other. Now this moral order is characteristic of the whole of Luke's Gospel, excepting where the historical order is necessary to the truth of the recital. It is the Holy Ghost who writes.
I have myself found difficulties in the word. This has not surprised me, ignorant as I am; but I have found these difficulties, one after another, to be but the means of entering more fully into the perfection, the wisdom, and the divine beauty of the revelation of my God. If I still find more of these difficulties, and I do so, I wait upon Him to solve them for me; I do not say, "The meaning is doubtful," but "The meaning is doubtful to me." I do not say, "There is inaccuracy, and I am accurate enough to judge it without divine light"; but "I am ignorant, and God will enlighten me in due time."
We have seen that when the author said that Paul spoke not of his inspiration, this is an ignorance or a disregard of its contents, which, especially on such a subject, renders the arguments of those who could assert it unworthy of the attention of a serious man. The apostle asserts the exact contrary in the most clear and absolute manner. Notice that the letter sees but reasons and motives: all divine action is excluded. It owns, when one insists, the work in the conscience, but to limit it to the extent of his author's judgment. We have already seen how the scriptures claim for themselves the authority of inspiration. I need not return to it. I have already exposed the folly of the argument, that inspiration is limited to the passage which asserts it. I say it is folly; for why could not a text say, "All these writings are inspired"? The fact is, that the passages which assert inspiration limit it, neither to the book which contains them, nor to the writings of the same author. They establish a principle, or allude to the writings of another, to invest them with the authority of scripture. They establish the existence of a class of writings which have divine authority; they ascribe this authority to the entire Old Testament. The letter betrays here the lightness of its author.
The church, it is also said, may have made mistakes. Be it so; but is there no God? Would He allow us to be deceived on so essential a point? The author answers that He might, and boldly pronounces about books which have edified the church for centuries. But what is his opinion worth? That must be settled, before we allow it to invalidate the book to which it refers. I by no means admit the authority of the church; but I recognize her duty to preserve the deposit committed to her; and I believe in the faithfulness of God.
In a certain sense everything is necessarily referred to individual judgment; that is, each one is under its responsibility for himself. A Socinian claims a right to deny the divinity of Christ and the atonement. Were I the pope, I could not hinder his thinking so; but, being a Christian, I know that he is lost if he remain in this state. I cannot make another believe the inspiration of the New Testament: each one must judge for himself. But if Mr. Scherer rejects the word of God, the word will reject him. He is bolder than man should dare to be; but he will not be stronger than God. Salvation does not depend on faith in the inspiration of the New Testament. A man may be saved, though ignorant of its existence, for the truth which it contains may reach his heart through the lips of another. To reject the word of God, when it is made known to us, is quite another thing.
I admit that there is a difference between the inspiration of the New Testament and that of the Old -- not as to authority, but as to character. The prophets of old said, "Thus saith Jehovah"; and they announced the thoughts of God, in His own words, on a particular subject, at the moment when His word was addressed to them. But the Holy Ghost -- come down, as the Comforter, to lead into all truth -- is different from the Spirit of prophecy, although the same Spirit. (See 1 Peter 1: 11, 12.) "He searcheth all things, even the deep things of God." "Ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things." Christ being glorified, the Holy Ghost dwells in His disciples, and can open all the treasures of the glory of the Lord, all the tenderness of His love, of His relations, as man, with His own. The Word was made flesh, and God the Holy Ghost dwells in the church, and thus, if I may so speak, humanizes Himself, or at least the expression of His thoughts, while not ceasing to be God. He expresses Himself in grace and blessing in all the details and circumstances of human life; He helps our infirmities. "He that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to God."
The inspiration of the New Testament partakes of this character. It unfolds itself in the unity of the church in feelings and affections, and ministers to her need by telling of the love and the ways of God manifest in the flesh in a world of sinners. But if the Holy Ghost has thus acted in the church united to the Head whom He glorifies, what He spoke, and what He caused to be written, was none the less the word of God -- the thoughts of God communicated in words of His own teaching. As Christ did not cease to be God because he was made man, so he that received the testimony of Christ set to his seal that God is true. We must not give up (alas! that so many have done so) that presence of the Holy Ghost in the church, which produces religious inspiration, as says Mr. Scherer's letter, that is, the energy which acts in Christians in power and blessing, without making them an authority; neither must we give up the authority of that which has been communicated, whether orally, had we been present to profit by it, or by writings inspired by the Holy Ghost. Neither must we give up things which are the Lord's commandments.
Observe also, that it is not apostolic authority only which is the question, but the authority of the word of God. A prophet, who spoke by inspiration, and who could say, "The Holy Ghost saith, Separate me Barnabas and Saul," had as much authority in that instance as Paul or Barnabas. He was but the mouthpiece of God, just as that which Paul and Barnabas spoke by the same inspiration was the word of God. That which is said of the Gospels in Mr. Scherer's letter, namely, that the Gospels were not written by apostles, is idle. If an apostle had written without being inspired, his writing would only have had the value of that of a godly man. If one of the least in the church has been used by the Holy Ghost, his writing has the authority of the word of God. The infinite value of scripture proceeds from its one divine Author, and not, in any instance, from the character of its subordinate human authors.
The two Gospels which are not written by apostles are not on that account the less perfect in their presentation of God manifest in the flesh, according to that peculiar aspect in which the Holy Ghost would present Him in each. The instrument used in giving us the history of our Saviour is of no importance: the only essential point is, "Is Christ faithfully presented to us as God would present Him?"
The letter says that three of the Gospels are narratives on Christianity, rather than the productions of its religious genius. What a style to speak of the manifestation of God on the earth! It was not Christianity; at least it was Christ. It was God who was there. Is it not then the religious genius of Christianity to occupy oneself with one's God, God manifest in flesh? This philosophy is icy and contemptible. What incapacity to seize the true character of a thing when it has to do with God! To it man's voice is noble. When it hears God's voice, it is ventriloquy.
Let us see what Mr. Scherer says about 2 Peter, of Jude, and of the Apocalypse. "The church has erred in admitting the so-called Epistle of Peter; Jude uses fables and apocryphal books. The Apocalypse has seen its predictions contradicted by facts." It is easily said, The church has erred. Only one can just as well believe that he who utters this judgment is subject to err. No reason whatever is given to us.
In the Second Epistle of Peter I find the assertion that it was written by himself. It has a tone of deep and spiritual holiness, a dignified confidence, most remote from imposture; yet imposture it must be, if it were not written by the apostle Peter. I find in it minute allusions to things which happened to himself, and are related elsewhere, which would never have occurred to an impostor. There is not the smallest deviation from divine truth. There is a solemnity and an authority nowhere found except in inspired writings; and a direct application to the soul, as from God, of the authority of its contents, which is one characteristic of inspiration. The manner in which it deals with the word, as well as with the events of the life of Christ, has a divine character. We see in it a knowledge and a use of the grand principles of divine truth, which are unquestionably original, and which possess at the same time that divine force which belongs to the whole Bible. There is an absence of amplification only to be found in the Bible, and which is the result of that consciousness of authority, with which an inspired man would speak, or rather which was the natural consequence of his divine authority.
Those who have read the Epistle of Barnabas, which some would compare with that of Peter, will be able to judge of the difference between them, and of the discernment of those who could put it on a level with that of the apostle. It is scarcely doubtful that this so-called Epistle of Barnabas is a fabrication, though of his time; but one has only to read any of the Epistles of the Fathers (called apostolic) to see that God has guarded the testimony of His word, by the counter-proof of the futility of the writings even of the Apostle's companions. One would scarcely find so much nonsense in these days, even in religious books written for children. There is an epistle by Clement -- kind and amiable enough -- written to make peace at Corinth, but it is the only passable one; and even this is as inferior to the New Testament as, doubtless, the humility of the author would have admitted it to be.
Jude, says the letter, makes use of fables and apocryphal books in his Epistle; who told him so? The Epistle, on the whole, contains deep and wonderful instruction as to the features of the apostasy, which is foretold in other parts of the word; supplying elements which, although linking themselves with the whole of scripture, are found nowhere else. It contains deep principles of eternal and divine truth; and it sketches, with surprising distinctness in a few words, the moral progressive steps of man's apostasy, as well as its historical beginnings in the church -- beginnings confirmed doctrinally, and by allusions to other parts of the New Testament. It bears the same marks of inspiration and divine authority which I have pointed out in Peter, and the same contrast with what we know to be of man.
But, it is said, there are fables in it. Which are they? Is the fall of the angels a fable? The Lord Himself tells us that Satan is a fallen being. We learn from Peter that there are angels reserved for judgment. The temerity of human knowledge calls everything which is beyond its reach a fable. I believed Jude and Peter, borne out if that were needful by other passages, more than Mr. Scherer's letter. All Revelation is a fable to him who believes not. Perhaps it is the mention of Michael contending with the devil. But this conflict with evil angels is, as a scriptural truth, recognized, not only in the Apocalypse and 2 Peter, but also in the book of Daniel (chapter 10: 20, 21) quoted by the Lord Himself. That passage shews that Michael especially interests himself in Israel: he is there called their "prince." We find the same thing in Daniel 12: 1 -- a chapter, one part of which is especially pointed out as worthy of attention by the Lord Jesus. It proves that Michael is used of the Lord in behalf of Israel. One can easily understand the use which the Israelites would have made of the body of Moses, as we know what they did for centuries with the brazen serpent. We know also that the Lord buried him, carefully concealing the place of his interment. Does He not use the angels in His service for these things, and Michael especially, for Israel, and against Satan, who opposed his service to that people?
So there is not an element contained in Jude's statement that is not borne out in principle by the general testimony of the word of God. That Jude should have been commissioned to add to all this the record of another and similar fact is no difficulty to one whose mind is imbued with the word of God. On the contrary, there is much solemnity in the instruction. It has none of those curious and idle details, which we find in the fables of the apocryphal books; but it throws much light on that invisible world of Providence, the existence of which is proved by a multitude of passages, and which will be unveiled to us, when we shall know even as we are known. If I reason thus, it is not that I question the inspiration of Jude: no, for his whole Epistle is stamped with the love, the holiness, and the authority of God; and it has its own manifest place in the series of the books of the New Testament. I am not proving the truth of what Jude spoke by inspiration, but the superficial character of what Mr. Scherer said about him.
As to the accusation of borrowing from the Apocrypha, where is it proved? I conclude the prophecy of Enoch is alluded to, as it is found in an apocryphal book, bearing the name of Enoch, which was published in England some years ago, and which exists in the Ethiopian language. But there is no shadow of a proof that Jude borrowed it from this Ethiopian book. There would be nothing extraordinary in the supposition that the author of the so-called "Book of Enoch" may have been acquainted with this prophecy. The prophecy itself is confirmed by a multitude of passages in the Old and New Testaments. Its divine truth is proved by innumerable texts of all kinds. Is the relating of that which is certainly true, and nothing more, a proof of not being directed by God, because he who composes a book, known to be an imposture, adds to it a mass of crudities? Is it not rather a proof to the contrary, if proof were needed? Jude gives us a true prophecy. Another avails himself of the truth of this prophecy, which had come to his knowledge, to accredit a mass of errors. And this is brought forward as a proof that the former was not under the direction of God, and that he must have quoted the true prophecy from him who made so bad a use of it! And this is called reasoning, and wisdom, and knowledge!
To a Christian, on the contrary, the preservation of this prophecy has an affecting interest. In adding, to a truth taught elsewhere, the fact of its having been prophesied by Enoch, we have a testimony that, even before the flood, the man of God -- who "walked with God" and was taken from the world, as the church will one day be -- had already at that early period announced the judgment of the world he was leaving. "Known unto God are all his works, from the beginning of the world." All His purposes are fixed beforehand, whatever may be His patience and His dealings in long-suffering and in righteousness with man, ere those purposes be accomplished.
In short, to say that this passage has been taken from an apocryphal book is an assertion destitute of proof. The date of the apocryphal book of Enoch is controverted. Yet this must be settled before there can be any foundation whatever for alleging that the passage in Jude was taken from it. My own examination of the question has thoroughly convinced me that it was not.
We have now to consider the Apocalypse. This book is only rejected because not understood. Ignorance assumes the office of judge, and decides with the temerity natural to it. To one not familiar with the word, it is indeed obscure in its style; and it is so in its matter, because it treats of subjects which naturally tend to make it so. Nothing is difficult for Mr. Scherer. In vain a number of pious men have occupied themselves with the interpretation of this book, each, with many errors perhaps, adding their part of light to the light which grew by their united efforts. In vain has the great ignorance of all been manifested. Mr. Scherer perfectly understands this book; he knows precisely what the prophecy said, and according to him, "it has been contradicted by facts." What a pity that he has not furnished us with his interpretation so certain that it leaves no doubt! It is sure that, if he can say it has been contradicted by facts, he ought to know what it signifies. What trouble he would have saved the church! This is not the first time that ignorance has determined questions where true knowledge has discovered its ignorance and confessed it. To such a temerity, to a dogmatism so superficial, an answer is scarcely necessary. I only add that there is no book in the New Testament, of which the date and the author are established by more precise, more ancient, and more competent evidences; not one which has acted in a more holy and solemn manner on the conscience of true Christians; not one which links itself more admirably with the whole structure of the New Testament, as completing the whole edifice; not one, the absence of which in this respect would be more sensibly felt. There is not one that connects itself so much with the Old Testament, by borrowing the imagery of the prophets to unfold its revelations, while so far altering that imagery as to adapt it to the New Testament.
This mode of using the Old Testament forms the most perfect connection between heavenly and earthly things, a connection which is fully established in the New Testament. It also makes the symbolic language of the Revelation more easy to be understood, and the object of the book more apparent. There is scarcely a subject onwards from Genesis 1 with which the Apocalypse does not link itself, without effort, and in a manner which is altogether beyond human art. This book has the impress, the lofty range, the perfection of the mind of God, precisely in those representations and symbols from which man has endeavoured to borrow something, in order to give a more exalted character to the idolatrous creations of his own mind. Creation -- the Jew -- man -- his power in the world -- the work of Satan -- that of Christ in its results of glory to Himself and to the earth -- the church -- the condition of the saints in relation to God and to the earth -- the government and the long-suffering of God -- the angels -- all these subjects are in this wondrous book treated of and set in their relations to each other and to God. Nor is it deficient as to any one doctrine revealed in the word. It does not rehearse these doctrines; but it expresses them in new forms, and under altogether new circumstances, which throw fresh light upon their former associations and receive it from them in return.
How could there have been so suited a close to such a volume as the Bible? The Bible sets forth all the ways of God, from the creation to the return of that creation (long fallen, rebellious, and miserable, but now redeemed) into the order and blessing in which it is securely set by the fulness of God's grace; nothing being excluded save that which is incompatible with the blessing itself. It reveals the eternal Son of God acting in the midst of this whole scene, glorifying His Father, and bringing everything into a more beautiful order than had been lost. One can understand that a book like this would not close without taking up again all the threads of this wondrous, divine process, and exhibiting those results which, when the work of the Son is perfected, and all things subdued, will bring in the full and perfect dominion of the eternal God: the blessing of that God, who has made Himself known in Jesus. This is what the Apocalypse sets before us.
To enter into some details of another part of this book, who is it that in choosing seven churches (a number which, in itself, suggests the idea of a complete whole), could give us, in two short chapters, every moral position in which the church (and even every individual who has ears to hear) could be found, from the beginning to the end of its career? Who could, with this, give us the most precious revelation of heavenly blessings, adapted as special encouragement to the difficulties of each of these respective conditions? Who is it that could, at the same time, furnish the richest revelations of the divine and varied glory of the Person of the Son of God, a glory which beams with all-pervading brightness over every part of the subject, and that too, in such details as are calculated to strengthen those who may be placed in the circumstances described? This is what we find in chapters 2 and 3 of the Apocalypse.
One can understand, moreover, that when the inspired communications made to the church were about to be closed; when those who were commissioned by God to superintend were being removed; when evil, as the word everywhere testifies, was coming in like a flood; one can understand, I say, that the Spirit of God should have thus left to the church -- to the faithful who need it -- a moral summary, which could meet their need in the darkness gathering round them. Such a summary these chapters of Revelation afford us: a summary, which, if God arouses those who are His, explains to them the course and result of events which have taken place during the darkness, and makes manifest, even though the church may have slumbered, that nothing has happened without God; a summary, which gives warning also of the judgment which will fall upon the professing church, as the result of her unfaithfulness to God and to the light which He has dispensed, and makes room for His dealing with the world. This terrific judgment is the consequence of man's rejection and corruption of God's last and most gracious manifestation of Himself. The consummated iniquity of that which professes to be the church leaves room for nothing but judgment; and, when this judgment is executed, this closing book of scripture tells us that righteousness will be established in the world by divine power.
We can understand that such a book as this should close the revelations of God! Mr. Scherer sees nothing in it but historic speculations which have been contradicted -- a view worthy of such a system. That it should contain things hard to be understood is not to be wondered at. Its language, it is true, is figurative, but it is full of moral instruction to the spiritual. God intended it to be a light to His people, for a peculiar blessing is attached to the observance of it; chapter 1: 3. It is only in proportion as the church awakens, takes her place in humbling herself, and apprehends her true relationship to God, that she will be able also to acquire a divine understanding of this rich treasury of all which throws light upon her outward position, and to comprehend the way in which God will resume the government of the world, to place it in the hands of the First-begotten to whom every knee shall bow.
The author of the letter prefers man to God, or, at least, would rather listen to him, and this is in reality preferring him. This will be charged as calumny. I shall be glad of it, for such sensitiveness will at least shew that conscience feels it is a horrible thing if true; and that a system which adopts such a principle as its basis condemns itself. Well then, I repeat it, he prefers man to God, and avows that he does so. For the rationalist the Bible is no longer the word of God. Human reason pronounces upon it, upon its verity, upon its moral worth; but it is self-evident that, were it recognized as the word of God, this could not -- dare not be done. It is equally certain, that the rationalist does thus judge the Bible, and chooses rather to rely on his own reason than to acknowledge divine authority, be it in what book it may. He says, "the Bible is no longer the word of God; and I know not what detriment it will be to the cause of piety to exchange a written code for the living productions of apostolic individuality, authority for history, and, to speak plainly, a cabalistic ventriloquy for the noble accents of the human voice." If this be not preferring the word of a man to the word of God, what is it? Inspiration, which makes man the mouth and the voice of God, is "a cabalistic ventriloquy!!"
The author prefers the voice of man; he thinks it a nobler voice. Poor rationalists! self-admirers, to whom the voice of God, too clearly heard, is a deadly alarm -- an unknown sound, which too plainly tells them what they are! Yet hearken to it, ye wise men, who are tempted of Satan to search into good and evil, relying solely upon yourselves. Hearken to it: you will find it, if it convict you, a voice of grace, which can restore you, and cover your moral nakedness with the perfection and the glory of the second Adam -- of the Son of God.
Mr. Scherer pretends that one of the shapes which error has taken of late years is to assert, that the rejection of the inspiration of the Bible and of its authority over believers, allows the Holy Ghost to resume His rightful place. I fully allow that the church has grievously forgotten the presence and authority of the Holy Ghost dwelling in her. But I cannot understand how rejecting the authority of what the Holy Ghost has already spoken can enhance His authority. It appears to me to be rather opening the door to human pretensions and the devices of Satan. I have seen the latter effect -- a door opened for Satan's devices -- produced by the same cause; and in this letter we are completely given over to human pretensions under the specious guise of greater spirituality. The language of the author already quoted is: "Instead of the authority of the word, we shall have the word of authority; instead of referring the poor proselyte to the article of a code, to the ritual of a dogmatist" [which I would no more do, than the author of the letter], "or to the pages of I know not what mysterious oracles, we will refer him to all the great prophets of all ages, to the living instructions of the church, to the word of God personified in His servants, to the Spirit and to His manifestations, in a word, to the immediate contact of the heart with truth." How my heart would be brought into more immediate contact with truth, by listening to the voice of man, rather than by listening to "the words which the Holy Ghost teacheth," it is difficult to conceive.
I accept "the manifestation of the Spirit," if thereby is only meant the exercise of spiritual gifts for the edification of the church, and the energy of the Spirit manifested in these gifts; but I warn the believer to be carefully on his guard against all false claims to these "spiritual manifestations." I have witnessed such, and have had evidence, which to me plainly identified them with the active energy of Satan. It is not every spirit which is the Spirit of God; and Satan can disguise himself as an angel of light. Such "manifestations," when accompanied by the rejection of the word of God and of its direct authority over the soul, such as that which is found in Mr. Scherer's letter, proceed from the enemy of souls. This is the case with the Irvingites, and others. It is probable that this movement of the author of the letter is something after this, that the enemy is preparing bolder attempts of this kind, if the Lord hinder him not. The church in general does not sufficiently own the Holy Ghost to have real strength against such pretensions. But it is not in giving up the word, which the Spirit has given us, that we shall find this strength.
Observe, we are asked to renounce that which is here styled "I know not what mysterious oracles," but which Stephen calls "the lively oracles," and Paul, "the oracles of God" (and remark, "the lively oracles" were the letter of scripture), and to give ourselves up to "all the great prophets of all ages," that is, to all the vagaries of the human mind, apart from God, perhaps under the influence of Satan, to be tossed about on a restless ocean of uncertainty without chart and without compass. For there is no word of God, only "the noble accents of the human voice," and a "word of authority"! that is, whether it be an individual or a body which assumes this authority, we are to resign ourselves to the guidance of man -- not of God!
I recognize the existence of the evil which Mr. Scherer professes to assail. It is one of the commonest devices of the enemy to attack a corruption when it grows old and loses its power over the mind of man, in order to set up some other evil more in accordance with the state of men's minds. Thus the heathen mythology was assailed by the scoffs of infidelity, as soon as it had been shaken by Christianity. This is what the letter does; it attacks that lifeless dogmatic theology, which makes use of the name of God in order to put restraint, not on man, but on the Holy Ghost. But while doing this, instead of bringing us back to the authority of God, it sets up that of man; instead of restoring the liberty and the rights of the Spirit of God, it gives us up to the spirit of man, publishing its unbelief as to the word, and undermining, as far as it can, all that is certainly of God. When this is once taken away -- when there is no more authority of God thus, says the letter (which alone secures true liberty to man) -- when there is no other authority than that of him who speaks or of the church, who will then be free?
Mr. Scherer speaks of the Person of the Saviour. Doubtless this is the centre and the strength of Christianity: but what faith would there be, or in what Saviour, if the word of God were taken from us?
Mr. Scherer speaks of the Holy Ghost, but he speaks in such an ambiguous manner that, to say no more, one does not know what he means by this title. This Spirit, says he, "which has made the apostles, which has given in them a form to the Christian conscience, to the doctrine, to the life, and operated in every sense the rich cheerfulness of the principle contained in their faith, -- this Spirit will exercise in us a faith equally free and spiritual." Now, I own most fully the way in which the Comforter, sent down from heaven, has been grieved and forgotten; but I find here something vague and mystical, which in no wise answers to that which the inspiration, that Mr. Scherer disdains, said of the Comforter. It is a principle which engenders a kind of communism, and not the revealer of Christ, and the power of a divine Person in the church.
The Holy Ghost is the source of strength, of power, and of understanding in the church, and in the Christian. But if you separate the idea of the Holy Ghost from the inspiration and the authority of the written word, you give yourself up to the imaginations of the mind or to an authority which is merely human, whatever may be its pretensions or the ecclesiastical form it may assume; it is authority, and not truth, that is established. The word of God is the authority of the truth and of Him who reveals it.
What is the meaning of "this Spirit will exercise in us a faith?" But I find nothing in the way in which it is spoken of the Holy Ghost which leads me to think that it is an expression that negligence has allowed to pass. All is spoken in the same vague manner.
But I close my letter, already too long. I have been obliged to write it by snatches and half-pages. But when such a document is presented to me, I will not let it pass without exposing its character.
Had I had the thought of writing so long a letter, I should not have dared to address it to you, but here it is such as it is. I feel that, if it was not Mr. Scherer's letter, one would have been able to have taken up in a more decisive manner the pretension and the doctrines; but my business was with the Bible and with souls.
I still hope he is a Christian, though after his letter several will not believe it, for his philosophy has made it fall very low. I sincerely and heartily pray God to reveal it, but I denounce his doctrine and his system as being of Satan.
As Mr. S. has published his letter of resignation as Professor of the School of Theology at Geneva, I am now free to give entire publicity to my letter on the Divine Inspiration of the Holy Scriptures.
There is an important point which I have not yet brought forward, and on which I would add a few words; that is, the authority of the word, independently of the effect it produces on the heart. I may be led to recognize the authority of the word of God, through the effect which it has produced in my soul; but evidently, it is not this effect which gives it its authority. If the word produces this effect, it is because it possessed the authority which I recognize, before I yielded to it. I recognize it, because it exists. If Christ pronounced the words of God, His words had authority, notwithstanding the unbelief of His hearers; that is, they possessed intrinsic authority. Nor have they lost it, by being written. The Lord speaks (John 5) of "writings" being the highest order of means of communication. If the apostle has made the will of God known to us in "words which the Holy Ghost teacheth," the revelations he received and thus communicated have a divine authority over the conscience, even though they should be rejected by man. The authority of the word does not depend upon its being received by him who hears. It is not he who is to judge it, except at his own peril. "The words that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day." Here is what is called possessing an authority independent of him who pretends to judge of it.
We are not now discussing the authenticity of the testimony, but its authority, allowing it to be authentic. Wherein lies this authority? Suppose two persons read a portion of the Bible: the heart of one is touched and convinced of the divine authority of what he reads; the other remains in his unbelief. Does the authority of the word depend on the faith of one who believes, or is it the same for both, although unrecognized by him who believes not? It is evident that either he who believed was mistaken, or, if not, that the authority of the book, although unrecognized by the unbeliever, is as great for him as for the one who bowed to it. The authority lies then in the word itself, independently of the effect produced by it, or of the opinion man forms of it. It possesses intrinsic authority. The judgment of the last day will prove it. "The words that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day." It could not be otherwise with the word of God; but it is important clearly to establish this principle. The word of God cannot be useful if it is not received, but it has no less all authority because it is the word of God. Unless to deny the existence of all divine communication one cannot doubt this principle. To deny all communication is unbelief. We do not want to reason on what the church possesses in the scriptures, but to convince the unbeliever. And more, unbelief does not destroy the authority of the word, for the rebellion of man destroys not the authority of God.
The word itself establishes this. "And thou shalt speak my words unto them, whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear; for they are most rebellious," Ezekiel 2: 7; compare 1 John 3: 11-27. "He that believeth hath the witness in himself": this is the inward power of the testimony. "He that believeth not God hath made him a liar": here is the guilt of him who believes not. Thus the authority of testimony from God is independent of the judgment which man may pronounce upon it. The testimony will itself judge man.
Other passages which are derived from this principle apply it to scripture as a body of writings. "And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus," 2 Timothy 3: 15. Here the sacred letter, or scripture, has an authority over man from his childhood, still rendering the man of God perfect. Then it is not the judgment that the man of God had of the scripture that marked their value. He who knew their value, as rendering the man of God perfect, acknowledged their authority over him when he must have been thoroughly incapable of judging. That is, they had a full and absolute authority over him independent of his capacity to receive them, a divine and intrinsic authority. The most advanced man of God is happy to receive them in the same spirit; 1 Peter 2: 1. 2. The apostle formally states the principle of authority in the same passage: "stand fast in the things which thou hast learnt, and which have been entrusted to thee, knowing from whom thou hast learnt them." It is the authority of him who had taught them which was the reason for holding them fast.
The intrinsic authority, then, of the testimony of scripture is clearly established. It is an authority independent of the reception of the testimony by the hearer; so entirely independent, that the word will judge him who is not obedient to it. This proves to us that God has endued it with moral evidence, powerful enough to bring in as guilty the man who does not receive the testimony, and who thereby treats God as a liar. Nevertheless it is only the grace of God which can overcome the moral resistance of man's heart, unbelieving as it is by nature and by will as to the things of God, though full of credulity as to the things of man.
There is another point which I have only glanced at, and which I desire to put forward a little more plainly. Many circumstances testify, that the narratives of the evangelists were written not merely by man, but by the Holy Ghost. For instance, John was one of the three apostles who were with Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, an attendant upon the scene of His agony. He says nothing about it. Nothing could be more affecting and more solemn. John most certainly had not forgotten it, for he relates many other of the circumstances which are not to be found in the other Gospels; for instance, that those who came to take Jesus "went backward and fell to the ground," and yet respecting the Saviour's agony he makes not the slightest mention. John accompanied Jesus also to the cross; yet he says not a word of His having been forsaken of God, although he relates a multitude of other circumstances, which prove that the Saviour was as calm there as when he describes Him to us in the garden. A man who had written the history of the sufferings of the Saviour would not have failed to relate things so deeply interesting, and of which he had himself been an eye-witness. Matthew also would have related the remarkable incident which occurred in the garden of Gethsemane, of which he was an eye-witness, namely, that they all fell to the ground; but he does not mention it, whilst he gives an account of the agony of Jesus and His prayer, although he was not one of three who accompanied Him at that time.
Now if you examine these Gospels, you will find that this peculiarity -- inexplicable as it would be if they were not inspired -- becomes quite intelligible, when we recognize their inspiration. One and the same author wrote them all. The Holy Ghost, whose office it is to take of the things of Christ and to shew them unto us, furnishes us in John with those circumstances of the history of Jesus, which would bring out the glory of His Person as Son of God -- the glory of Him "who offered Himself to God" for us. In Matthew He gives us that which is needed to make known the suffering Messiah. The result is, not only harmony between the parts of each Gospel, but also between all the Gospels; producing a perfect whole -- exhibiting the design and the workmanship of one and the same author. This principle is applicable to the entire contents of the four Gospels. I have only called the reader's attention to the garden of Gethsemane and to the cross, as striking instances. One who is well versed in the Gospels, and who has spiritual discernment, would know by the manner in which a subject is presented in which Gospel it is to be found. Compare the connection between the end of Matthew 21 and the parable in the beginning of chapter 22: also the way in which the corresponding parable in Luke 16: 16 is introduced, with that of the husbandmen in Luke 20, and you will perceive that the substance, the form, and the diversities of these parables are in perfect harmony with the design of each Gospel. In Matthew, we have the rejection of Christ in connection with the relation of the Messiah to the Jews; in Luke, the moral order of the events, the acts and ways of the God of grace, founded on the broader, more moral, and less official basis of the character of the Son of man. The same thing may be observed in comparing Matthew 24 and Luke 21.
There is another testimony to the truth of inspiration, the peculiar character of which deserves the reader's attention. It applies specially to the Old Testament, but it brings out very clearly the difference between the inspiration of the Old and that of the New. It is that the prophets did not understand their own prophecies, but studied them as we might do. We read in 1 Peter 1: 11, "Searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow. Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves but unto us they did minister," etc. The prophets searched into that which the Holy Ghost had spoken through themselves. Their inspiration was so absolute, and so independent of the workings of their own minds, that they inquired into the meaning of that which they uttered, as any of us might do. This is not precisely the character of the inspiration of the New Testament; but it is not, therefore, the less real. Its character is declared in the succeeding word -- "reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven."
"The Holy Ghost sent down from heaven" leads into all truth; and thus inspiration acts in the understanding and by the understanding; but it is not on that account the less inspiration. On the contrary, the apostle Paul preferred the inspiration which acts by the understanding to that which is apparently more independent of it. 1 Corinthians 14: 14-19: "If I pray in a tongue, my spirit prayeth; but my understanding is unfruitful." Daniel 12: 8, gives us an example of that which Peter describes -- "And I heard, but understood not; then said I, O my Lord, what shall be the end of these things? And he said, Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end."
The reader will remember that the passage I have quoted is the one to which the Lord Himself referred the disciples, in order that they might understand it. Now if the prophet did not understand the revelation he gave, if the prophets searched into the signification of their own prophecies, it is most evident that those prophecies were given through direct and positive inspiration.
I desire to add a thought which tends to confirm the truth I seek to maintain, and which applies to the whole of the Bible. Our attention is called to the fact that the Bible is not one book, but a collection of writings by different authors. It is precisely on this fact that I ground my argument, adding also that they were written at periods very remote from each other. In spite of this great diversity of times and of authors there is a perfect unity of design and of doctrine: a unity, the separate parts of which are so linked with each other, and so entirely adapted to each other, that the whole work is evidently that of one and the same Spirit, one and the same mind, with one purpose carried on from the beginning to the end, whatever might be the date of each separate book; and this, not at all by means of mere uniformity of idea, for the promises are quite distinct from the law; and the gospel of grace is distinct from them both. Nevertheless, its parts are so correlative and form so harmonious a whole, that, with the least attention, one cannot fail to perceive, that it is the production of one mind. Now there is but One, who lived through all the ages during which the various books of the Bible were written, and that One is the Holy Ghost.
Look at Genesis: you will find in it doctrines, promises, types, which are in perfect harmony with that which is more fully developed in the New Testament; but in this book they are related in the way of narrative with the greatest simplicity, yet in such a manner as to give the most perfect picture of things, which should happen in after ages. Feelings natural to piety (speaking historically) are so related as to possess a meaning, which, when we have the key to it, throws light upon the most precious doctrines of the New Testament, and the most remarkable events of prophecy.
Look at Exodus, and you will find the same thing. Every thing is made according to the pattern seen by Moses in the mount, and furnishes us with the clearest exposition we possess of the ways of God in Christ. At the same time the law is given -- and yet the law is not imitated in the gospel, which does not so much as contain a copy of it. Nevertheless, the law is linked with the gospel in a manner which makes it impossible to separate them, and which gives to the authority of this revelation a divine and absolute character. Were it not so, Christ would have died to suffer the consequences of a partially human institution; for He bore the curse of the law. Observe this carefully: it was "the curse of the law" revealed to man, and of which He said, that not one jot or tittle should pass away till all were fulfilled. And moreover, it was not when reasoning with the Jews, upon their own ground, that Christ said this, but when teaching His disciples, according to His own perfect wisdom, and solemnly setting before them the principles of His kingdom.
Take Leviticus: the details of its sacrifices furnish a light, which throws upon the work of Christ rays so bright that nothing could replace them; supplying a key to all the workings of the human heart, and an answer to all its need, such as it is found even among the heathen. These details prefigure every aspect of the work of Christ, as doctrinally unfolded in the New Testament, whether by Himself or by His apostles; yet, to their inspired writer, they were only Jewish ordinances.
Take Numbers -- the history of the journeyings of God's people through the wilderness. "These things," says the apostle, "happened to them for examples [types], and they are written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the world are come." Who was it that wrote them for us? Certainly not Moses (although he was the human instrument), but He who knoweth the end from the beginning, and who orders all things according to His good pleasure.
All the circumstances of Christian life are found treasured up in these oracles, in so complete a manner, that the apostle could say, "They are able to make us wise unto salvation through faith in Jesus Christ." On the other hand, the New Testament is equally far from merely repeating the substance of the Old, or from making void its authority. It brings in an altogether new light -- a light which (while setting aside a multitude of things as fulfilled) throws upon the Old Testament a radiance which alone gives its contents their true bearing. All this applies to the moral and to the ceremonial law; to the history of the patriarchs; to the royalties of David and of Solomon; to the sentiments expressed in the Psalms, as well as to other subjects. Is it not one mind which has done all this? Was it the mind of Moses or of Paul? Assuredly not.
Observe also, that all this refers to Christ, and to all the various glories of Christ -- glories which God alone knew so as to reveal them beforehand, and to give, in the history and ordinances of His people, and even in that which is related of the world, precisely that which would serve for the development of all that was to be manifested in His Son Jesus. Accordingly, what says Peter? (Acts 2.) "Men and brethren, let me freely speak unto you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his sepulchre is with us unto this day. Therefore, being a prophet, and seeing this before, he spake of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh did see corruption."
I do not go through other books of the Bible to furnish proofs of this unity of design, which is manifested in a work wrought by such various instruments, and at periods so remote from each other -- a unity realised in such a manner as precludes all idea of its having been intended by the persons who executed it. I only use the fact here in confirmation of the principle which I maintain; but to one who has any knowledge of the word of God, it is an incontestable proof.
I add but one word. In judging of inspiration by the precision of the account, a mistake is often committed as to what should be sought for. The Holy Ghost does not aim at that accuracy which would be needful to prove the truthfulness of man. The Holy Ghost has always a moral or spiritual object -- the revelation of some eternal principle of truth and grace. Every circumstance which has no bearing upon His object is omitted. He regards not accuracy in that respect. But the moral accuracy is all the greater on this account, and the picture presented to the conscience much more complete. The introduction of something needful to human accuracy, would spoil the perfection of the whole as God's testimony. God does not seek to amuse the mind of man by stories to no purpose, but to instruct his heart by truth. This might sometimes make it rather difficult to balance the whole as a mere narrative; but there are two ways of explaining the cause of a difficulty -- the ignorance of him who feels the difficulty, or the impossibility of the thing which has perplexed him. And man willingly attributes to the latter cause that which proceeds from the former. He who understands the designs of the Holy Ghost in what He says seizes the perfection of the word, where the mind of man is perplexed by a thousand difficulties.
Mr. Scherer has added a second letter to that already known and has just published them together. His aim is to shew that faith can abide intact spite of the denial of the inspiration of the scriptures; but this second letter is already the full proof of the contrary. The doctrine it contains is simply, in very fair phrases, the denial of the expiation of Christ and of the doctrine of justification by faith which flows from it.
The system of Mr. Scherer, who has not even the merit of originality, is only a diluted Irvingism. Besides it is the adoration of man, coloured with a certain mystic tint. Under the pretext of glorifying the Person of Christ, mysticism denies the efficacy of His work. Further, without the doctrine of expiation (such is the deceitfulness of the heart), admiration of the Person of Christ and of His life may be self-admiration. Christ was a man; and, by deifying man in Him, people put on themselves the crown of His glory under the pretext of the duty and capability of being like Him internally.
This system pretends to something more real, more intimate, more personal in religion. Poor heart of man! When will it learn that nothing so humbles it (and this is what is wanted), that nothing operates in it so strongly, in the way needed, as the knowledge that all has been done outside itself? Glorying in one's humility, and being indeed humble, are two very different things. It is not by thinking of oneself, in order to imitate humility, that one becomes humble; it is by being debtor for all to the grace of Him who has saved us. Pharisaism does not consist in attributing everything to oneself, but in blessing God for what one is, instead of blessing Him for what He is, Himself.
I do not pretend to handle this question thoroughly, but only to examine some points in Mr. Scherer's letter.
There is no novelty in his system, except that he excludes, as uninspired, what the mystics confine themselves to letting alone, namely, all the Holy Ghost's teaching by the apostles. See pages 33 and 34, where the thing is plainly stated. "You ask me," says he, "what remains of Christianity, when the dogma of inspiration is thrown out? 'Jesus Christ remains.' What remains of scripture? 'The history of Jesus Christ.'"
+Translated from the French of J.N.D.: Geneva, G. Kaufmann: Paris, Cherbuliez, 1850.
We find in this second letter the same levity as in the first in assertions about serious matters, and in cases when the smallest examination would have shewn how destitute of foundation those assertions are. There is the same inflation of style, serving to veil capital vices in the reasoning, and to conceal unbelief and the desire of exalting man. "Have you not found," says he, "salvation and life in Jesus Christ? and if it is so, how can you fear, lest any fact whatever should weaken this fact of immediate certainty?" (Page 28.) But it is not the fact of my possessing eternal life that this foolish doctrine weakens; it is the certainty of the truths that God uses as the means to communicate and maintain life. To deny inspiration is to deny the certain communication of truth on the part of God.
"Very far" (the author tells us) "from being incompatible with criticism, faith carries a critical force in itself." (Page 29,) This contradicts the sufficiency of moral certitude, and the historical proofs of which he speaks in his first letter. But, passing over that, there is little but words in this phrase. How does the fact that faith possesses a critical force shew that something else has that force? So far as there is any force in the reasoning, the reasoning itself precisely shews the contrary of what Mr. Scherer pretends to establish; for, if faith carries a critical force in itself, faith, having made its own criticism, excludes thereby the possibility of questioning its judgment: otherwise, its judgment is null. It pronounces, because it discerns. If I say, the tongue has in itself the capacity to discern the taste of what touches it, by attributing this faculty to the tongue, I exclude all judgment pronounced on the decision of the tongue; if not, I deny what I have just affirmed. The tongue says that honey is sweet. Who disputes its decision? Who disputes the power of the tongue -- the very thing one has just been affirming? And this is owing to a special connection between the quality of an object, and the capacity to discern this quality. Thus, faith is faith, because it receives and understands the things of God, which are in connection with a capacity proper to faith; that is, the critical force which it has in itself implies the incompatibility of all other criticisms. This is so much the more true, because the quality recognized by faith excludes by this very fact all other criticism; for faith recognizes the authority of God in that which it receives; it believes God; otherwise it is not faith. Who will criticize God and His words? But, until one has received a communication as being such, faith is not in activity.
This manner of expressing oneself is, however, very imperfect, because it takes in only the fact of the existence of faith in man. The word of God, as is always the case, gives us much more light than the best reasonings. "The spiritual man," it tells us, "judgeth [discerneth] all things, yet he himself is judged [discerned] of no man," 1 Corinthians 2: 15. There is the criticism with which all other criticism is incompatible. And what is the force of this expression? It is, that God is there introduced, and that the Spirit of God is in the spiritual man, directing him and conducting him. He discerns all things because he is spiritual.
Now, mark well too the effect of this truth. The Holy Ghost, working in man, does not exclude the responsibility of man; on the contrary, it gives him the right feeling of his relationship with God, and judges all that is inconsistent with that relationship. He does not act independently of the Lord, because He subjects man to God, and to what God has said. This was true in the case of Christ, and perfectly true in Him only. In us "the flesh lusteth against the Spirit," tending always to produce imperfection in discernment and conduct. And again the Holy Ghost, working in man, does not exclude the faculties of man; He uses them; He is not judged by them. He uses them, so that it is human intelligence employed on all the subjects with which the Holy Ghost can occupy it, but employed by Him, enlightened by Him, receiving a capacity, in a certain sense, divine, without ceasing at the same time to be human. Man is thus delivered from the dominion of his corrupt nature. Reason neither judges nor governs; for if it does, it is only the will of man aspiring to independence, that is, excluding God, and always wrong by the very fact of this exclusion. When God is not already supreme, and His authority absolute in the eyes of a man, the man is altogether in a lie, because he is not in his moral place. But, while employing and in a divine way enlarging the capacity of man, the Holy Ghost submits him necessarily to God, makes God known to him, makes him receive what is of God -- the word -- because it is the perfect expression of the judgment of God. It is true that the flesh "lusteth against the Spirit," so that imperfection is there. The result is not one of absolute perfection. It is only in as much as he is spiritual, as I have already said, that a man discerns all things.
The Spirit not only makes man subject to God, places him thus morally in what is true, and renders him capable of morally discerning; but He delivers him from the influence of the carnal motives which constantly vitiated his judgment. The Spirit presents to the affections of man, God in Christ, as well as a development of the truth, in all the relationships of man with God, as sinner and as saint, and that according to the height of the Person and work of Christ, and it is His work alone which gives us the true estimate of sin. Christ always estimated sin according to God; but, as to us sinners, it is only in the cross that we perfectly estimate it, because we there see it outside ourselves, in whom all is darkened by sin. It is there that the hatred of man against God, and the love of God for man, have met in one and the same act; and it is there that the moral state of man and the perfect revelation of God have been completely brought into evidence. That act is, at the same time, righteousness and salvation, death and judgment, as they were never manifested before, and never will be; and in that act they have been manifested as salvation and as life, the means which God has opened for His sovereign love and the salvation of the believer.
The insulting spear, which struck the Saviour when already dead, only brought forth the water and the blood which atone for and cleanse the sin which made them flow.
Man, morally, his affections, his judgment, are thus purified by that Jesus whom the Holy Ghost presents to him, -- that he may possess Him in his heart. Sweet and sanctifying proof of the Father's love! The Holy Ghost in man is a real and divine power; but He also works morally, and in the intelligence of him in whom He dwells. The spiritual man discerneth all things. All means are at his disposal. He judges all things, he takes knowledge of all things if needful, according to the Spirit and by His direction. It is not his reason which judges; he judges spiritually of all things. He judges himself instead of pretending to judge God, as if he had a capacity independent of Him. It is this that is incompatible with faith; this is that criticism which is incompatible with faith, because faith acknowledges God, and judges that proud criticism, which, in its folly, would judge God.
If then one would speak of faith, it is because it has a sovereign power of criticism, because it is incompatible with criticism. That which criticizes supremely cannot be criticized, it would be a flagrant contradiction. "The spiritual man," says Paul (for faith is an abstraction), "judgeth [discerneth] all things, and he himself is judged [discerned] of no man," 1 Corinthians 2: 15.
What is this "transformation" of faith or of truth? It purifies itself, you say, rejecting every foreign substance. Well and good; but what is that movement in which "the constitutive elements of truth are found to be carried away"? Is not the truth of God stable, immutable, and eternal, transforming man by its power and by grace, but remaining ever itself, and ever the same?
Mr. Scherer -- and this is convenient -- wishes one to have the courage to set aside the dogmatic notion of inspiration, and place oneself, with the appearance of faith, on the free ground of the historical point of view, etc. It is clear that if I do that, all is done. "The assurance of faith," say you? In what? Founded on what? On Jesus Christ, will you tell me? But how should I have a divine history of Him, without there being a divine capacity to write it? It is a book that I read, it is not Himself that I see. Mr. Scherer will tell me that what I read is evidently divine. Agreed. But you must fully bear in mind that you have not Jesus personally. You have only what is written: it is that which must be divine, if the Jesus whom I know is divine. Is it man that does what is divine?
Mr. Scherer acknowledges fully that, in order to invent Jesus Christ, one must have been Christ himself. In effect, it is morally impossible to form a just idea of such a character, without having in one the moral elements of that character -- without being oneself what He is. I add, that we have this security further than the fact of invention -- for this fact would have been the denial of that character, so that we must necessarily have the thing itself. Now, this is what we have by writing: who is capable of it? Man, or the men who wrote it? Then they are all Jesuses -- they are all inspired! This is so much the more evident, because, in order to have this perfect and adorable being, more men than one were employed. This history is not their own act; it is a whole which reproduces Him of whom they speak. Finally, if a man who has faith rids himself of the scriptures which serve as a foundation to faith, the question is not to know if he loses his own faith, but if he has not destroyed the foundations on which the faith of others may rest, and level the faithfulness of God, if he has not destroyed the very foundations of his own. For, if God has not spoken, on what is faith founded? If God has spoken by a man, then the man is inspired.
Mr. S. wishes us to "believe in the truth."+ "You believe in Jesus Christ: believe also in the truth." This is all very fine; but what does it mean? Truth is an abstraction. It must subsist somewhere. There is such a thing as the truth -- moral perfection in relationship with the Supreme Being, or, at least, a just estimate of those relationships -- a life and a position which expresses that estimate. A man who tells me things just as they are tells me the truth; but to tell of things just as they are in connection with God is to say a great deal. If everything in these relationships is in its normal state, it is moral perfection.++ In a state of sin the truth does not exist. All is a lie. I said, in the relationship with the Supreme Being; because, in the case of the creature, to exclude God is falsehood itself. It is what Jesus says of the adversary -- "He abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him," John 8: 44.
One cannot say, God is the truth, because God is perfect in Himself, and again, no relationship is obligatory for Him. To say that a thing is the truth, there must be a point of comparison by which I can judge of the conformity of what is expressed to that which ought to be expressed. But this is not the case with respect to God. Viewed in His essential existence, God does not express Himself. He is what He is. He cannot be compared with anything; He, as the word expresses it, "Dwelleth in the light which no man can approach unto," 1 Timothy 6: 16. How then is one to have the truth?
The truth is in Christ Himself. He is moral perfection in the relationship which can subsist with God, and in the most perfect way -- the expression of God in His relationship with man. His life is also a life which is the just estimate of these relationships, amidst the evil where man is fallen. "He is the way, the truth, and the life."
+This thought is borrowed from Mr. Vinet.
++I speak of intelligent and responsible beings; as to other creatures, it would be merely material perfection.
This is what Mr. Scherer says (it may be objected). "Can one," he says, "truly believe in one without believing in the other?" But mark it well, for Mr. Scherer there is one and the other; and as to that other thing, the truth, where does it subsist -- out of Christ? Where is it realized or possessed? Realized out of Christ? No one would dare to pretend such a thing and call himself a Christian. There would be another Christ. But possessed? Well, possessed out of Christ -- where? There would still be another Christ; for to be this in thought, as we agreed, we ought to be this in point of fact. The man who possesses the truth outside of Christ does not want Him; he is himself the thing that he seeks. What then would be this truth which would be something besides Christ? When I know Christ, I know I possess the truth. I am certain that that truth will be glorified, because it glorifies God, and gives to each thing its own proper place. Although I might abstract, my confidence is not in an abstraction; it is in a living being, in Christ, and in God who glorifies Him.
Why distinguish confidence in the truth from confidence in Christ? Because the first is confidence in man -- confidence in oneself.
You have no confidence in the force of the truth as to a tree or an animal, and you are right. Why? Because they lack the necessary capacity to receive it, and they can neither taste nor appreciate it. The force of the truth is then in the moral capacity of the one who receives it; that is to say, your confidence is in the moral state of man. It is true that the truth in Christ is adapted to the conscience of every man, whose rebel will rejects it. Under the influence of grace the soul tastes its truth. As to the natural man, "the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not," John 1: 5. For the rest, it is certain that truth came by Jesus Christ. What has been outside grace -- its force in the heart of man? It is this, that the history of our precious Saviour can teach us. Does Mr. Scherer believe that Christ is the truth? Was Christ received? Had the truth in its perfection that force which compels one to receive it? What then does that expression mean -- "believe in the truth"? that is to say, believe in its intrinsic force to make itself received? It is but the adoration of man, in face of his conduct towards Christ. Would Mr. Scherer produce a truth more perfect than Christ, or believe in the efficacy of something less perfect? If one distinguishes between the truth and Christ, to believe in the truth is but unbelief with respect to Christ. You confide in your attachment to the truth, which without that attachment is nothing. Man as a sinner, man obeying his lusts, is not attached to the truth; the truth has no influence on him.
But one may tell me that the man who possesses the truth, who loves it, who tastes it, has confidence in it, as well as in Christ. Is it a living being, and outside of Christ? Where does it exist? In the mind of him who has confidence in it.
But by what means will it have the force which inspires confidence? It is either by the power of God, and then it is faith by the power of grace; or else it is by the acceptation of him who approves of it -- that is to say, by man. Now God is here left outside. The work of God is faith in Christ. In the other case, it is confidence in man, confidence in oneself.
It is at the bottom that which Mr. Scherer acknowledges. For him "faith in Christ is a sacrifice of self; confidence in the truth is a sacrifice of our timidity, of our prejudices, of our party spirit." Who is it that thus overcomes himself? It is man. The man who is true in his heart, in his motives, but outside of Christ; for if it is Christ as power, as motive, and as object, it is faith in Christ, and it is not to believe also in the truth. This new God (for in order for us to confide in Him, He must be God) this new God, I say, is only man after all.+
Truth is of all importance. One of the most important characters of the church is to be "the pillar and ground of the truth," 1 Timothy 3: 15.
We are going to see if Mr: Scherer upholds it.
He tells us that "Revelation supposes ... the knowledge of God and the conscience of sin." Is that truth? The Saviour said, and Mr. Scherer reminds us of it, "they that are sick need a physician." No doubt; but He did not say, those who know themselves to be sick. But as to the knowledge of God, what does it reveal? The apostle said, that "by the law is the knowledge of sin" (Romans 3: 20), and that without law he would not have known sin; Romans 7: 7. The Lord Himself says that the Holy Ghost would reprove the world of sin, because they did not believe in Jesus; John 16: 7, 9. If Mr. Scherer only means to say that every man has a conscience, I do not dispute it. But to say that the gospel supposes and does not create the sense of sin, and that the revelation of Jesus as light does not produce by grace, in the heart of man, the consciousness of what he is, this is to be as far off as possible from the truth. Mr. Scherer's own words shew us the true consequence of this idea, that the gospel supposes the knowledge of sin; and they prove that I do not exaggerate, in supposing that he means to say that the gospel is not given to produce it. He says, "the gospel is not for everybody; it addresses itself very directly to some, whilst with others it has not one point of contact." (Page 32.) Every Christian knows the contrary, and the word of God has a language entirely opposed to this. And if one has the consciousness of sin, without a revelation, why, as Mr. Scherer will have it, is it faith which supposes a revelation that weeps and is prostrate in the dust; or which, like that of the woman which was a sinner, covers the Master's feet with her tears of repentance and stifled sobs? (Page 32.) If one has the sense of sin, without a revelation, and thus without faith, how is there but one faith, that of the publican prostrate in the dust, or that which shed the tears of repentance -- that is to say, which has a true sense of sin? And, besides, is that indeed the only faith? "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, and peace," Galatians 5: 22. We have "not received the spirit of bondage again to fear," but we "have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God," Romans 8: 15, 16. Is that a false faith which says, He "loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father" (Revelation 1: 5, 6); and which also says, "in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory"? (1 Peter 1: 8).
+I shall hardly be accused of upholding theology and dogmatism; I hold them in horror. I think that Mr. Scherer says something very true about them. For the greater part of those who occupy themselves with it, theology is like a surgeon who would dissect his friend instead of loving him. But truth which is not Christ is nothing else but dogma.
Is all that tears, prostration, or stifled sobs; or else did the apostles, notwithstanding, "religious inspiration" that Mr. Scherer attributes to them, describe a false faith? Is it that I despise these precious movements of a renewed heart and conscience? God preserve me from it! But, with the habitual pretension of sentimental spirituality, Mr. Scherer confounds the first movements of the quickening Spirit in the heart with the simplicity of peace, with the calm of spirit and rest which are the portion of him who knows Christ. If there is no other faith than that which sighs and covers the Master's feet with its stifled sobs, what was the faith of this very same woman, when she went away in peace, because her sins were forgiven, and when she knew, from the lips of Jesus Himself, that this faith had saved her? But, if one would tell me that in the gospel faith receives an answer which removes the sobs and the tears, it is in that case nonsense to allege there is but the faith which weeps. Here is faith in the gospel of the grace of God, which gives peace and joy, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us; Romans 5: 5.
Sentimental people love their own sobs, not the grace which produced them. The Christian, feeble as he may be, loves God, because God loved him first. He thinks not of his repentance, but of Him who vouchsafed it to Him, who gave him access to Himself by the blood of the Lamb, and who made him joint-heir with Christ His Son, according to His ineffable love. This ignorance of the gospel explains itself by things still more serious, that we meet with farther on in this letter. But before pointing this out I shall say a few words on another matter which, according to Mr. Scherer, the gospel supposes, namely, "the knowledge of God."
What vagueness! what a superficial way of treating serious questions! What is the knowledge of God? One asks oneself if the man who affirms that the gospel "supposes" this knowledge of God has himself the knowledge of God. "He who loveth not, knoweth not God," says the apostle John; 1 John 4: 8. "When ye knew not God," says another apostle, "but now ye have known God" (Galatians 4: 8, 9); and elsewhere, "the Gentiles who knew not God," 1 Thessalonians 4: 5. "The light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not," John 1: 5. Because the natural conscience tells a man that he is guilty, and that there is a God of judgment, does that man know God? He who speaks of a distinct motion in the soul, as if it was the knowledge of God, ought not to cry out against dogmatism and intellectualism, as evils of a religious life.
I come to things more serious still than the vagueness which reigns in these pages. All the gospel, Mr. Scherer tells us, centres in Jesus Christ ... . "If one cuts off the dogma of inspiration, there remains Jesus Christ ... . What remains to faith? The Person of Jesus Christ. He is the beginning and the end, the centre and the whole." Not a word of His work, mark it well. After having cut off the dogma of inspiration, what remains of scripture? "The history of Jesus Christ." A history, mark it well, imperfect as the men who wrote it; for, not having been kept by inspiration, their writings are but fallible accounts like those of other men. But is there nothing but the history of Jesus Christ, nothing of the witness of the Spirit as to the efficacy of His work? Does there remain nothing of it, even if it were not inspired? Did the religious inspiration of the apostles occupy itself with things of no value, when enlarging on the value of the work of Christ? No, according to Mr. Scherer, there remains nothing but the history of Jesus Christ, the Person of Jesus Christ. "It is the beginning and the end, the centre and the whole." For him the work of Christ is a nullity, and he declares himself that it is the suppression of the dogma of inspiration which does this.
But there is something more definite still, and it is with deep sorrow that I revert to some lines of the author, which are simply the denial of the doctrines which are essential to true Christianity. However, it is a mercy of God to have permitted that the effect of the rejection of inspiration should be at once stated by the very man who rejects it, stated immediately, so that the weakest Christian, the very moment he hears such words, should be warned of their bearing. I accept the truth that the Person of the Lord is the great object of faith; but there is, on this point, something very ambiguous in the idealism of the author, for I can no longer call it his faith. "Something supreme," says he, "pierces through His perfection, which is so really human. Sincerely man like us, He has however the consciousness of being above man. Humanity in Him rises up to divinity. He alone knew the Father, with whom He was in a relationship which was unique. He who has seen Him has seen God. All things have been put into His hands -- He abides with His own unto the end of the world. The church worships Him, and prays to Him; it - acknowledges that its Saviour reigns in the heaven and on the earth, and that the reconciliation is accomplished by Him, because it is accomplished in Him, namely, in the very union of the God and man." (Pages 35, 36.) Is He God, the Lord Jesus? Was He God before He became man? What pains, what subterfuges to avoid saying this word! "Humanity in Him rises up to divinity ... . He who has seen Him has seen God." The Lord said: "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father" (John 14: 9), and yet He was not the Father. "Reconciliation was accomplished in him, namely, in the very union of the God and man." Why of the God? Was He God? The last phrase which I have just quoted is perhaps the clearest on the subject of the divinity of Jesus; but the union of God and man leaves after all, as to the Person of Christ, and as to the true divinity of Jesus, a vagueness which nothing elsewhere can destroy. The word of God has nothing like this. "The Word," it says, "was with God, and the Word was God." "All things were made by him," and "the Word was made flesh," John 1. It is not humanity which in Him rises up to divinity, a sort of divine moral quality ... . It is God -- God, before being man -- God who had made the heaven and the earth. "All things were created" by the Son, and for the Son, as the apostle tells us in the Epistle to the Colossians; Colossians 1: 16. "Thou, Lord, in the beginning, hast laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the works of thine hands," Hebrews 1: 10. One must not deceive oneself as to the meaning of words, and speak to us about dogmas. Was then Jesus the true God? He who, before becoming man, created the heavens and the earth -- is He the Creator? "To raise humanity to divinity ... a union of God and man." These are things that may be agreeable to man, they exalt ideal man; but was Jesus GOD outside man? Was He the Creator?
Mr. Scherer leaves us on that point in a painful uncertainty. Now, it is important for a serious man to know if his Saviour is GOD or not, and not to worship one knows not what.
On this capital point of reconciliation Mr. Scherer is by no means obscure. He denies the truth in the clearest manner. "Reconciliation was accomplished by Him, because it was accomplished in Him, namely, in the very union of God and man." Of sinful man! Is it that the reconciliation of sinful man (of a nature in which, according to the apostle, there is no good) has been effected by the union of this sinful nature with God? And what was this nature which needed to be reconciled? Was it not a sinful nature, and precisely because it was sinful? Is it that which was united to God, or to the God who united Himself to man in Jesus? And further, is it by the union of God and man that reconciliation is accomplished? "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them," 2 Corinthians 5: 19, 20. I quote the passage the nearest to Mr. Scherer's idea, inasmuch as this passage speaks of that which preceded the death of Christ; but this passage shews the complete falseness of Mr. Scherer's doctrine. For if God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, and not imputing their trespasses unto them, humanity was not reconciled by its union with God. God in the man Christ was occupied with this work of love in the midst of men still sinners. Alas! men would not have it, and something else was necessary. It is that which is found at the end, in verse 20, precisely what Mr. Scherer rejects, namely, an accomplished work to which the Holy Spirit gives testimony by the apostles. "He hath committed unto us,"+ says the apostle, "the word of reconciliation." We beseech men to be reconciled to God, for He hath made sin for us Him who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.
+In reading this passage in Greek, which treats of the chief point of Mr. Scherer's system, and which teaches as being essentially the gospel precisely what Mr. Scherer denies, the light becomes still more striking. Three participles are dependent on the words, "God was in Christ," and point out three things which flow from this, of which the last is ministry of the Spirit confided to the apostles, to render testimony to the work of Christ as means of reconciliation, by the truth of God, after Christ had been rejected as living on the earth "God was in Christ" reconciling, not imputing sins, and committing to us the ministry of reconciliation. But this ministry was founded on the fact -- become a dogma, in the ministry which spoke of it -- that Christ has been made sin for us. Reconciliation is not then the reconciliation of man, or of humanity united to God in Christ, but reconciliation performed by Christ -- made sin for him who was separated from God.
Such is reconciliation, according to God: not the reconciliation of humanity towards God in Christ, (which is nonsense, because in Christ humanity was without sin, and it was the sinner that needed to be reconciled) but the reconciliation of men as sinners, of us poor miserable ones, estranged from God, and that by a testimony of love, founded no doubt on the Person of Christ, but which is founded on His work; not that He mingled humanity in holiness to Himself, but in that He who was holy and who knew not sin was made sin for us.
It is good to put the truth solidly and simply, without equivocation, in face of the extravagant dreams of man, who would make use of the perfection of the Person of the Christ-man in order to exalt himself under the name of humanity. Christ was made sin because we were sinners. This is the truth we have need of. Call it a dogma if you like; no matter. It is a dogma which, received into the heart, gives peace according to God. Other passages are quite as clear. "Having made peace by the blood of his cross." And you, it follows, "He hath reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy, unblameable, and unreprovable in his sight," Colossians 1: 20, 22. We may notice, in reading what precedes, that the work of Christ is distinct from His Person.
"But now in Christ Jesus, ye who sometimes were afar off are made nigh by the blood of Christ," Ephesians 2: 13. The reader can examine the verses which follow: they fully confirm that the doctrine of reconciliation is by the death of Jesus, and not by the "union of God and man."
But Mr. Scherer makes his opposition to the truth still clearer.
"The work of Christ is His Person in action, as the Person of Christ is His work in power. His death is the culminating point of this work. The sufferings of Golgotha formed besides the historical condition of the struggle of the just with the world, and of the Holy One with evil ... . But there is here more than a simple law of history. The work of Christ is a work of salvation. Jesus saves us by His partaking of humanity, by His realization of holiness, and by the manifestation in Him of the love and of the pardon of God. In fact, if all men have been made sinners by the disobedience of the first Adam, the power of sin has been broken thus for all by the obedience of the Second." (Pages 37, 38.)
Would one wish for anything clearer to erase expiation from the Christian doctrine? Alas! it will be found.
"Heaven is too much considered as a dwelling-place which one may enter by pardon as one enters through a door, and where one is admitted as the consequence of an entirely judicial sentence, which is justification, in virtue of an altogether outward condition, which is the substitution of Christ, and of another condition quite arbitrary, which is faith in this institution: gross notions, which confound with the internal nature of things an imperfect symbol borrowed from the customs of men." (Page 49.)
Mr. Scherer does not believe in reconciliation by the union of God and man. The substitution of Christ is a death of Christ; it is accomplished in Him by the gross notion! His work does not even find a place in the enumeration that Mr. Scherer makes of that which, he says, people call the truths of Christianity.
"The church," he says, "would suffice to propagate what is called the truths of Christianity, original sin, the Trinity, the divinity of Christ, the resurrection of the dead, and the final judgment." (Page 41.)
Need I recall to the reader what a place the death and work of the Saviour holds in all the Bible, from the sacrifice of Abel and the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah up to the song of the apostle and church in the Revelation? We have seen the apostles attribute reconciliation to His death, to the death of Him who suffered "the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God." He "came to give his life a ransom for many," Matthew 20: 23. "Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many," Hebrews 9: 28. "Who, his own self, bare our sins in his own body on the tree," 1 Peter 2: 24. "He is the propitiation for our sins," 1 John 2: 2. "Who was delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justification," Romans 4: 25. It is, I think, useless to multiply passages, if the words of Isaiah, of Jesus, of John, of Peter, and of Paul are not enough. As to Paul, we have the declaration that it is of this truth, founded on the Person of Christ, that he has been ordained preacher. "For there is one God and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time, whereunto I am ordained a preacher," 1 Timothy 2: 5, 6, 7. Now it is not here only a question of inspiration. The ministry of reconciliation was confided to the apostles.
One of two things: either the apostle was mistaken in supposing that the ministry of reconciliation was committed to him, and was also mistaken with respect to the means of this reconciliation and the subject of this ministry ... or the doctrine of Mr. Scherer denies Christianity.
Yes, it does deny Christianity.
I admit that the Person of Christ is the object of faith. I admit that, in all those who possess it really, this is living faith. But the reconciliation of which you, reader, and myself have need, which is our great business, the whole of our eternal blessing, the apostle attributes to one thing and Mr. Scherer to another, yea, rejecting as a gross notion the apostolic doctrine!
"The work of Christ," Mr. Scherer still tells us, "is His Person in action." (Page 37.) Did He not suffer? What was His activity when He was forsaken of God? "Jesus saves us by His partaking of humanity and His realization of holiness." (Pages 37, 38.) But "without shedding of blood there is no remission," Hebrews 9: 22. "A propitiation through faith in his blood," Romans 3: 25. It is a sacrifice offered once for all to God, which replaced all the offerings presented under the law. He has "offered one sacrifice for sins," Hebrews 10: 12. In a word, the gospel of Mr. Scherer is another gospel, which is not one at all.
If the apostles preached the true gospel, Mr. Scherer does not possess it; if the Christianity which the apostles taught, which Jesus Himself taught, is the true gospel, that of Mr. Scherer is not; it is on the contrary the denial of it. Mr. Scherer may pretend to be more spiritual, to be fond of more living doctrine. It may be that the theology and the sterile dogmatism of schools have disgusted him: he cannot have a worse opinion of them than myself. Nothing more than theological pedantry extinguishes life, vitiates spiritual judgment, and feeds the flame of pride. The Person of Christ, the perfection of His humanity, has an importance that no one can exaggerate; but that alters nothing. It is none the less true that, betrayed by the workings of the intelligence on these points, Mr. Scherer denies Christianity on the principal point of the reconciliation of man with God. Mr. Scherer teaches a false gospel. If he believes from the heart that Christ is the true God, and that He has been it from eternity -- if he believes that the Word which created the world became man, he gives himself at least a great deal of trouble not to say so, or to say it in such a way as to satisfy those who do not believe it, and not to appear to share the faith of those who do believe it. Now, it is of importance to know if it is the Creator God who is my Saviour; or if I adore one who is not really so. Let people cease speaking of the Person of Christ, if they are not sure that Christ is God. A sterile admiration of a beau ideal is not faith in the Son of God.
The doctrine of Mr. Scherer is but a vague and equivocal doctrine on the Person of Christ, a complete and formal denial of the gospel preached by the apostles, and of the teaching of the Holy Spirit on the subject of the work of Christ.
I will but add one instance of the same contempt, or the same negligence of what the Saviour said, which I have pointed out as characterizing these letters.
To deny inspiration yet more, Mr. Scherer tells us, "We find (in the biblical accounts), preserved by an authentic tradition, deep traces that Jesus had left in the memory of those who surrounded him." (Page 41.) Very satisfactory. means, it must be owned, when it is a question of possessing the words of Him of whom it is said, "He whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God," John 3: 34. Happily we have received from the very mouth of Jesus the assurance that what we possess is not "profound traces preserved by tradition." "The Comforter, who is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you," John 14: 26. But be it the apostles or the Saviour Himself, it matters not to Mr. Scherer, provided he hears the "noble accents of the human voice," and that it is not God who speaks to him.
If human subtilty was to attack divine inspiration, one has but to bless God after all that this attempt has been so soon followed by a denial of the work accomplished by the Saviour to reconcile the sinner to God. The believer will understand that it is a question of the foundation of all his hopes, of his salvation, as well as of the glory of his Saviour. He will understand, that to deny inspiration is to deny the teaching of the Holy Ghost on the work of Christ and on salvation; that it is to reject all this as "gross notions," and reduce his knowledge of a living Christ to "profound traces preserved by authentic traditions!" He will understand that the scheme is another Christianity which is not one, a Christianity which takes the place of the Bible, and that all that remains to him of the volume which he possessed is only, according to Mr. Scherer, some treatises containing traditional remembrances, which teach us to do without the doctrine of the apostles; a God known without a single revelation, and traditions in order to know Him better; a beau ideal of humanity, which raises itself up to divinity; but no more propitiation for the sins which made us guilty before God. Fine inheritance! instead of the certain truth of our God, and of an accomplished salvation, which glorifies at the same time perfectly both the Person and the work of the Saviour, which gives perfect peace to a heart fully reconciled, and which introduces one as a child into the communion of a God of love.
Faith in the work of Christ does not prevent us from living by Him. It is he who eats His flesh and drinks His blood who dwells in Christ, and Christ dwells in him.
Allow me to draw your attention to a recent publication which professes to give grounds for harmonizing Christianity and modern progress. Such a production ought to produce pain and sorrow, and be dealt with in the spirit which such sorrow will, through grace, engender.
Still I feel, as it has been brought under my eye, that I ought not to pass it over.
No one, of course, is strictly responsible for it but the author; still, as it is an address from the Chair of the Congregational Union of England and Wales at its annual meeting, it acquires a weight which a mere individual discourse would not have. It shews the tone of the dissenting mind -- what finds utterance from the lips of those whom it sets in its high places and in the chief seats of its teachers. It shews us to what point the dissenting body is come in the conflict now going on between faith and unbelief; how completely the high and holy ground of possession of the truth by divine revelation is abandoned, to look for tolerance from the infidel reason of man without God in the world. It is, in fact, a humble supplication to the infidel to be allowed to have share in the inheritance of truth, admitting that they have it in their sphere, and craving the admission that the Christian has it in his.
The infidel reasoners are far enough from troubling their heads about the petitioners; as Dr. Raleigh admits, they turn up their noses with contempt at the evidences of Christianity. The air, he tells us, is weary with their repetitions of scorn at Christian creeds. But Dr. Raleigh begs for quarter. If they have scientific facts, Christianity has historic facts.
No doubt Christianity has facts far better proved than any other facts of history, as every sober mind admits. Science has no such facts really. What are called the facts of science are merely the general laws deduced from phenomena or appearances; many, of course, I admit, adequately proved; but these, when of importance to our subject, are not really facts. Nobody unless some rare German, for I have known such, doubts of the astronomical system, demonstrated by the laws of a principle we call gravity. It is admitted because it accounts for the phenomena. I admit, if you please, as a fact, that the earth goes round the sun. Hence, when these laws are known, calculations can be made as to what will happen if all goes on as usual. In a word, appearances, accounted for by general laws, enable man's mind to draw mental consequences, that is, to calculate the ordinary succession of phenomena.
In natural science facts have another place. They are observed in their present existence, and what is observed, and that only, is a fact. These facts are then generalized. Not into laws, such as the law of gravity, but into general principles of causes, or rather similarity and succession of forms. Be it that all animal being is reduced to cellular atoms: I have nothing against it. I leave science in possession of its facts, and the gradual development of theories connected with them. The uniformity of succession of facts may be adequately ascertained. Harvey may find that nothing had living being which was not previously in an egg, and sufficient instances may be found in various forms of being to justify a general conclusion. It may or may not be adequately investigated to justify the conclusion that the fact is universal. In these cases I dare say it is. Still the conclusion is not a fact. It is sufficient to make a science for classification, and for man to act on and to learn by.
So in geology, though facts are much less accurately ascertained, still we may say a general succession of formation in a certain order is pretty well ascertained, sufficiently so to classify, though with defects and difficulties, and to form a science. Now no Christian has the slightest interest in combating these facts, nor, if done honestly and simply, scientific generalizations from them. But man's conclusions are not facts. Sir C. Lyell finds a skull or some evidence of human existence in the delta of the Mississippi, begins to calculate the silt deposited by the river, and says man must have lived 100,000 years. This I read in his second edition. I gave it away and got afterwards the third, and here he admits he was wrongly informed as to the data, and it must have been 50,000 years. Now, when I find such leaps as this, to say nothing of other questions, can I speak of facts? The fact is that there was a skull in the delta. All the rest is calculation or supposition.
We get some human remains in the Floridas. It must have taken 10,000 years for the coral insects to make the coral. But all this assumes depth of water, and rate of increase of the growth of coral, which are not facts: the only fact is that some human remains are in Florida. The case of cutting through what the Tine torrent has brought down has been insisted upon -- Roman remains, bronze remains, and then those of the stone period, and then a skull (one thus thousands of years old). I was assured by a member of the Antiquarian Society, referred to in the account, that they all thought this a mistake, and that the skull was clearly stained with bronze on one side. Now I am not a geologist like Sir C. Lyell; but when we have got the facts, others are, or may be, as competent to reason. We have to remember that "is" represents a fact; "must be" is always man's reasoning: a very different thing from facts. It is a fact that there is a layer of sandstone of many feet thickness. It is a reasoning, not a fact, that it must have taken 20,000 years to have formed it. When I come to reasoning, and to probable calculations, and probable causes, I come to the uncertainty of man's reasonings, and to speculation as to how things came about, in which a thousand possibilities come in to make the "must be" uncertain. My experience of scientific investigation of causes and calculations has led me to conclude that they are extremely uncertain, and little to be relied on. Astronomy, being a question of mathematical calculation for the most part, is of course not liable to the same uncertainty. In general we may say, science is not a system of facts, but of conclusions from phenomena; and conclusions, however interesting and often adequately proved for common life, are never facts.
But on what different ground matters stand, as Dr. R. puts it, is soon seen when the real question is stated.
Those who take this suppliant ground with the infidel admit that, if the man of science has his facts, all must give way. "When so proved," he tells us, "we have but one thing to do -- accept it." "No matter what they may seem to involve or bring after them. No matter what cosmogonies, ethnologies, chronologies, the facts may seem to favour or frown upon." Now I am perfectly assured that God's work and God's word cannot contradict each other. But this is not the real question here, but the means of certainty of knowledge, our knowledge. And Dr. R. says, "if they are facts, professed and declared such by the whole scientific world," etc. Now turn the case. Scripture affirms plainly and positively something, in the clearest way, as a fact. It upsets the theory of the scientific world. Will Dr. R. say, Well, if scripture professes and declares it, it is to be accepted, no matter what scientific conclusion it favours or frowns on? If not, he has accepted the authority of science as a means of certain knowledge, and rejected the title of revelation to be such. It is a question of authority, and certainty of knowledge.
I admit that science is not the object of scripture in any way. Of course it is not. It deals with the relationships of man with God. Material facts are before men, and left to men. Scripture speaks on ordinary subjects the ordinary language of men, that man may understand it. It says the sun rises; it does not speak of the sun's rays being, by the revolution of the earth, a tangent at the point forming the horizon to the eye of the spectator. But there are cases where scientific conclusions, not facts, come across the domain of scripture: say, such as the unity of the human race, involving the race in the ruin and effects of the guilt of the first parents of that race -- cases, consequently, where it is a question of means of certainty. Which am I to trust, man or God? Thus, there are blacks: that is a fact. Many of these new philosophers conclude that there were originally more races than one. That is a conclusion, not a fact. I read, "by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned"; and that God "hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth." Now I am not discussing here the point in itself of races of men, but what authority is the word of God to have? Which am I to trust, man's conclusions, or the statement of scripture, because it is a revelation?
I find men differing. Mr. Agassiz may tell me (he is a naturalist), that it is not Darwinian development, that this is utterly unfounded, but that there are many races, that the types of animal forms are different in different quarters of the globe, and that man in each partakes of this typical and characteristic form. Dr. Darwin and followers may insist that the gorilla of Africa, of one quarter of the globe, is the original type of the whole human race everywhere, his own ancestors, as the gorilla is the development of some less perfect form still, and that a stupid penguin may, in a sufficient number of ages, be formed into a clever man by natural selection, let alone gorillas. The ethnologist assures me that negro faces are found in Egyptian monuments in the times of the Osirtasens and Rameses in the earliest records we have of man, and that there must be two races.
Pictet, by accurate investigations of Zend and Sanscrit, assures me that no data of pre-historic man goes beyond some 3,000 years before Christ, as a limit. Now the only fact in all this is that there are figures of negroes on Egyptian monuments, and, if you please, different kinds of pigeons; the causes of which difference of typical form no one has yet adequately explained. But scientific facts, Dr. R. tells us, we are to accept, no matter what cosmogonies or ethnologies they seem to favour or frown on. If they set aside Moses' account, so much the worse for Moses; or Paul's declarations, so much the worse for his ignorance. "It is just as certain (Dr. R. tells us) that there are errors and mistakes in the Bible, considered as a human book ... as it is certain that fallible men wrote the several parts of it, distinguished and selected them one by one from other contemporary writings," etc.
Now I will give all possible credit to Dr. R. The gap I have left out contains this salvo ... "which, however, do not affect the substance of its inspiration, or impair the certainty we have of the complete communication of the divine meaning in it." What is the substance of its inspiration? Who is to put the limits? For instance, is the unity of the human race involving all in sin? The real question is that of the authority when scripture has spoken.
Critical examination of copies or translations are the careful ascertainment of what is scripture, the oracles of God having been committed to man, though secured to us by God in grace and providential care. The authority of what is ascertained to be so is another question. As to this, we have Dr. R.'s assertion, "It is just as certain that there are errors and mistakes in the Bible, as it is certain that fallible men wrote the several parts of it." What then is inspiration? What the authority of the scriptures? We find in the word that in the perilous days of the last times we are referred to the scriptures; and it is declared that every scripture is given by inspiration of God, and that what the apostle taught, having received it by revelation, he communicated not by words which man's wisdom taught, but which the Holy Ghost taught; 1 Corinthians 2. And Peter says, holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. I need not recall how the Lord Himself puts His seal on the authority of the scriptures, and uses them as of divine authority against Satan, and in reference to Himself. The facts of Christianity, Dr. R. tells us, are adequately proved by history, and this is sufficient.
Proved by what? "They stand on the highest ground of historic credibility." No doubt they do, so as to prove the folly of infidels. But what has this to do with the authority of the word of God -- our one security, according to the apostle, in the last days? But still, if all rests on historic credibility, there may be mistakes; and where is the authority of the word? "But here is our case" (says Dr. R.), "that out of this book, as history, and out of other books as histories contemporary and subsequent, there arise up to our view, first dimly in type and shadow, then clearly in personal life, the great facts which stand at the heart of Christianity," etc. Now here the scriptures, Old and New Testaments, I suppose, and other books, are heaped together to prove facts historically. One book may be more exact than another; they are all histories written by fallible men. And all this is to curry favour with, to get a little allowance from, those who care not for them, and will not have, save as an historical document (such as others are for ethnology), their book nor their Christianity at all at any price.
What shall we say to such pandering to infidelity? "For his princes were at Zoan, and his ambassadors came to Hanes. They were all ashamed of a people that could not profit them, nor be an help nor a profit, but a shame and also a reproach." If the church rests on the authority of God and of His word, they have a place which that authority will sanction and give honour to. "He that believeth not, hath made God a liar." "He that is of God heareth us." If they relinquish this to try and put themselves on a level with men, if they try and drag in Christianity after them, they have lost all their vantage ground, divine authority over the heart and conscience; and the infidel, to use an oriental expression, will make them eat dirt, and will not be bothered with their Christianity. And this is the ground leading dissenters have now taken. This is what it is important to notice in what is passing around us. They are giving up the only solid ground of truth. We must know now-a-days who is to be trusted. Christians must be Christ's and on the ground He has laid for it in the revelation He has given. God's word must have authority over men; or it is not His word, and it, and they who should have wielded it as the sword of the Spirit, have lost their place and title and true greatness.
And now see what a singular and strange blindness this treachery to the authority of God's word, this pandering to infidels, brings in. It is perfectly incredible that an intelligent man should have fallen into such utter darkness, if it were not that unfaithfulness to God ever brings in blindness and confusion in man. Men, Dr. R. tells us, were to be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it. Man "was made," he tells us, "for this world" (the italics are his), "as we may say, an earthly man in the higher sense -- reproductive, progressive through the ages, industrial, scientific, artistic, conquering, lordly." Is this Adam in paradise, or out of it? How wholly is the fall ignored here! But to pursue. "But this is not all: the first chapters of Genesis are full of art and science. Poetry, music, metal working, husbandry, architecture; a whole city is built almost before Eden had time to wither. So far is it from being true that natural knowledge is the natural enemy of revealed religion, we see them here in their cradle, and they are twin sisters." Who would have thought that all here referred to sprung up under the hand of Cain and his family, after he had killed Abel, the accepted one of God and because he was so, and when God had driven him out from His presence because he had thus filled up the measure of sin, and had chased him as a vagabond (Nod) from before His face, from which Cain declares he was now hid -- that Cain had now built the city and embellished it, invented the music and the metal working, to get on as happily as he could without God, and that the result of all was the flood? "This they willingly are ignorant of," even how the world that then was perished -- the result of the mixture of the sons of God with the daughters of men.
Let us see the account from which the statement is drawn: -- "And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand. When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth. And Cain said unto Jehovah, My punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth; and from thy face shall I be hid and I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth; and it shall come to pass, that every one that findeth me shall slay me. And Jehovah said unto him, Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And Jehovah set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him. And Cain went out from the presence of Jehovah, and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the east of Eden. And Cain knew his wife; and she conceived, and bare Enoch: and he builded a city, and called the name of the city after the name of his son, Enoch. And unto Enoch was born Irad: and Irad begat Mehujael: and Mehujael begat Methusael: and Methusael begat Lamech. And Lamech took unto him two wives: the name of the one was Adah, and the name of the other Zillah. And Adah bare Jabal: he was the father of such as dwell in tents, and of such as have cattle. And his brother's name was Jubal: he was the father of all such as handle the harp and organ. And Zillah, she also bare Tubal-cain, an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron: and the sister of Tubal-cain was Naamah," Genesis 4: 11-22.
And then Abel and Cain and his city of progress are twin sisters in the same cradle! Is it possible to conceive a greater degree of infatuation than that to which this pitiable servility to infidelity has reduced the writer of the address? Cain, driven out from the presence of Jehovah, hid from His face, a mark set on him by God, establishing a city where God had made him a vagabond and embellishing it with arts and sciences to make it pleasant without God -- for God he certainly had not -- and which ended in result in the judgment of God in the flood: this is our pattern, this is the twin sister whose embraces we are to court! We are to learn by it, we are told, that there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all.+ Is it possible for infatuation to be more complete? But such is the ground taken by dissent now; and, while reading that the friendship is enmity against God, pandering to the world, that the world may, in some small degree, admit it to its company and its career of progress.
And what is the grand point of agreement? "The need is just this -- that each party (if we may speak of parties in the matter) shall accept frankly the facts which are universally accepted by the other." Can anything be more absurd? Why, as to facts, am I to accept all that are accepted by another party? Why are infidels to trust the facts the Christian party accepts? It is merely trusting the competent investigation of the party, they would say their prejudices, a book or fifty books full of errors and mistakes, according to Dr. R. Why should I accept the facts other people accept, without knowing their infallibility or competency as conclusive, or investigating for myself? I take facts on adequate testimony, not on other people's accepting them. Nothing can be more absurd. A treaty of peace with those who reject the truth of God on such ground as this: because indeed my party believes it, they are to do so too, and I am to be bound by their facts as they choose to state them! And where is God in all this, where a revelation? Where a word sharper than any two-edged sword? Men's opinions (for the acceptance of facts is only that) are to be trusted, and trusted on both sides without examination, by an agreement between Christians and infidels; and this is to be the ground of faith and common progress: a ground impossible, I do not say to a Christian, who would be abhorrent from the whole scheme, but to an honest man.
+Spoken wholly and exclusively of spiritual gifts.
But my object is not now to discuss the scheme, which seems to me the shallowest thing imaginable, and base in its servile pandering to infidel men of science; but in these days, when everyone sees that all is breaking up (and dissenters know it as well as anybody else, and this discourse is the proof of it, and the betrayal of their fears), we need to know what we can trust, and whom; and while I doubt not that there are many beloved brethren amongst dissenters, saints who believe in and trust the word of God as I do myself, such a testimony from such a place is a witness and a proof that we cannot trust for a moment the ground on which dissenters have placed themselves, nor the dissenting body as standing on the sure ground of divine truth. I urge, and such statements should only press upon the soul the need of doing so, every humble soul to hold fast the word of God and its authority, its divine authority.
We all know translations are man's work, and of course in a measure partake of his imperfection. All may know from the word of God that the oracles of God were committed to men to keep. But they are prophetic or inspired writings which were so. Their authority is a matter of faith. And though man's failure in faithfulness may affect details, as in the work of his own salvation, they are given, according to the wisdom and will of God to be His word, and are their own evidence, as the sun in the firmament. Man may, in one sense, labour for his own salvation; he may diligently seek to have the word of God pure; but the soul taught of God knows God has given both, and will have both owned as His and appreciated as His. It is God's will that man should use diligence thus; but the humble soul taught of God knows on whom it leans with confidence, and from whom it has received alike eternal life and the word by which it has been engendered in him. He may make mistakes in his path, in his interpretation of the word, but he is, for all that, led and guided of God in both, and attributes his mistakes to man in both, and faithfulness and truth to God. He says, "Let God be true, and every man a liar," and he knows God has not left him in darkness, but that God has given him a revelation from Himself, a revelation of grace and truth come by Jesus Christ, and of all His preliminary dealings, so important to the full understanding of that, and that the scriptures are able to make men wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus -- able to make the man of God perfect, and that the entering of God's word gives light and understanding to the simple. The Christian is one who, by divine teaching, knows the truth and authority and power of the divine word. He accepts it in the largeness and fulness in which it is given, thankful if learned inquirers, as hewers of wood and drawers of water, can give it to him as free from all human imperfections as possible, if they labour that no earthly particles of mud be in the water; but the water he knows to be water, and drinks it and lives.
It is impossible to treat the author of this book as a Christian. I do not say this as forming any judgment of his personal state in any way; I speak of the public profession of a religion he belongs to -- Christianity, as contrasted with heathenism, Mahometanism, Judaism, or Buddhism. Dr. Colenso states that "our belief in the living God remains as sure as ever, though not the Pentateuch only, but the whole Bible, were removed. It is written on our hearts by God's own finger as surely as by the hand of the apostle in the Bible, that 'God is, and is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.' It is written there also as plainly as in the Bible, that 'God is not mocked, that whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap,' and that 'he that soweth to the flesh, shall of the flesh reap corruption."' (Pages 53, 54.) That is, with the Bible, or without the Bible, Dr. C. believes in the existence of God and His rewarding them that seek Him, and in natural conscience. In other words (as far as his book goes, which he puts forth as a manifesto), he is a profound Deist. Even with the Bible he only believes so much as his heart and conscience recognize, and that the latter is to be preferred to the Bible as the means of knowing God: "that He Himself, the living God, our Father and Friend, is nearer and closer to us than any book can be; that His voice within the heart may be heard continually by the obedient child that listens for it, and that shall be our teacher and guide in the path of duty, which is the path of life, when all other helpers -- even the words of the best of books -- may fail us." (Page 54.)
Now it is clear that neither believing that God is, nor natural conscience, is believing in the special facts of Christianity -- the incarnation, atonement, resurrection, redemption, being born again, the exaltation of a Man to God's right hand, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. In a word, no special truth or fact of Christianity is "written on our hearts by God's own finger," or can be possessed by mere natural conscience or belief in God. All intervention of God is left out. But it is in this, and the statement of what led to its necessity, that revealed religion consists. There is a conscience in every man: the word of God acts on it. I do not doubt that there is an instinctive knowledge of a God and of judgment. This is all Dr. C. owns, with or without the Bible. Revealed religion is a series of divine and marvellous facts and truths, unfolding an intervention of God in grace with sinful man. He sets this aside; his relationship with God is not founded on it. He prefers, as teaching, what he has without it; that is, he wholly and professedly sets aside Christianity. He goes farther; he recognizes "the voice of God's Spirit ... not in the Bible only, but out of the Bible; not to us Christians only, but to our fellow-men of all climes and countries, ages and religions, the same gracious Teacher is revealing, in different measures, according to His own good pleasure, the hidden things of God." (Page 222.)
Dr. C. has, in substance, solemnly declared that this is not so (see Article 18 of the Thirty-nine Articles); yet I suppose this is no matter with rationalists. But his statement amounts to this: -- Christians and heathens have all their particular religions; but, besides and within all this, all have a communication in their own hearts of the hidden things of God. The knowledge of God is not in the religion; for heathens and Christians have it more or less, whatever their religion, in their hearts. He confirms this by quotations from Cicero, Sikhs, and Hindoos. Cicero's statement (I suppose Dr. C. did not find it out) is merely asserting natural conscience, with the addition of a denial of the foundation-fact of revelation that man is a sinner driven out from God. "Whoever will not obey this law," says Cicero, "will be flying from himself, and having treated with contempt his human nature, will, in that very fact, pay the greatest penalty, even if he shall have escaped other punishments, as they are commonly considered." Now this makes human nature the measure of good, as indeed Cicero everywhere does. And just see the result, which neither Dr. C. nor Lactantius, from whom he quotes, seem to have noticed. This law, or right reason, "to the good never commands or forbids in vain, never influences the wicked either by commanding or forbidding." Could grace be more fully denied? Could the effect of law or conscience be more entirely mis-stated? There are good or wicked already-God knows how; and this law, or right reason, changes nothing -- always succeeds with one, and leaves the other where he is. This is, we are told, "a voice almost divine." "The same divine Teacher revealed also to the Sikh Gurus (teachers) such great truths as these." (Page 233.)
He then quotes statements of the unity of God, but what is Pantheism, that is, that God is in everything; statements which recognize Mahomets, Brahmas, Vishnus, Sivas -- of course not Christ: and that is a revelation of God for Dr. C.! He then quotes from Hindoo writings "the following words, which were written by one who had no Pentateuch nor Bible to teach him, but who surely learned such living truths as these by the direct teaching of the Spirit of God." (Page 224.) In these words God is celebrated, and there is a good deal of moralizing, such as may be found anywhere, but in which we find, "He that partaketh of but one grain of the love of God shall be released from the sinfulness of all his doubts and actions" -- a comfortable quietus. "I take for my spiritual food the water and the leaf of Ram." "God dwelleth in the mind, and none other but God."
Dr. Colenso admires what is the avowed doctrine of these same teachers, without finding out that it is the grossest folly of Pantheism. "God is the gift of charity, God is the offering, God is the fire of the altar, by God the sacrifice is performed, and God is to be obtained by him who makes God alone the object of his work." Everything being but a development or expansion of God, we are too, and of course, so far as we realize God in it, become God in a superior degree. But all is God; and it is true of all things, man among the rest. This last sentence, as Dr. C. approvingly quotes, was by "one who had experienced somewhat of what Job had experienced." (Page 223.) All this is but extracting Deism from Christianity and heathenism alike, and making conscience the judge of what is to be received from each; only, unfortunately, Dr. C.'s conscience accepts the very grossest Pantheism, without so much as finding it out.
But there is more than that. This book does not believe as much of Christ as Mahomet did. Dr. C. openly professes to know much better than Christ upon the subject of the divine authority of revelation. Mahomet held Christ to be a prophet, and that He will judge the world. On the last point the book does not declare itself, if it be not an intimation borrowed from Cicero. Here is Dr. C.'s estimate of Christ's authority in what He declared: "We are expressly told in Luke 2: 52 that Jesus increased in wisdom as well as in stature. It is not supposed that in His human nature He was acquainted more than any educated Jew of the age with the mysteries of all modern sciences, nor, with St. Luke's expression before us, can it be seriously maintained that, as an infant or young child, He possessed a knowledge surpassing that of the most pious and learned adults of his nation upon the subject of the authority and age of the different portions of the Pentateuch. At what period, then, of His life upon earth is it to be supposed that He had granted to Him, as the Son of man, supernaturally, full and accurate information on these points, so that He should be expected to speak about the Pentateuch in any other terms than any other devout Jew of that day would have employed? Why should it be thought that He would speak with certain divine knowledge on this matter more than upon any other matters of ordinary science or history?" (Page 32.) That is, when Christ, the blessed One, spoke of the authority of the word of God -- spoke authoritatively of the scriptures and of Moses -- He merely followed the ignorance and prejudice of the pious rabbis of His nation.
Dr. C. has more knowledge, and is freed from the prejudices, and in consequence can tell us positively that Christ was wrong! He has found out that it is impossible that such things as are found in the Pentateuch could come from our loving Father. This, if we are to believe Dr. C., Christ had not moral discernment enough to find out, and took for granted all was right, so as to believe that what Moses wrote came from God. Now Christ says, "We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen," for He was of and in heaven; and the question is (not how He learned what He knew, but), when He taught positively, did He teach perfectly, or only under the influence of national prejudice? Dr. C. quotes the following passages of Christ's words: -- "Had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me, for he wrote of me; but if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?" But it seems this appeal was all beside the mark, for Moses never wrote it at all. Hence, of course, they were not called upon to believe Christ's words either. "Now that the dead are raised, even Moses shewed at the bush." This too was quite a mistake. "They have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them." "If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead."
But all this solemn appeal of Christ to Moses, as of equal authority and weight with His own words and resurrection, as a proof of truth, is a mistake, the prejudice of pious rabbis of His nation! Dr. C. is freed from them, and can prove he knows much better than Christ did. And this man is what is called "Bishop of Natal"! I may be asked, "Has he not declared his belief in all the canonical scriptures, and bound himself in this office to require it of those he ordains?" He has. What then does he do with his conscience? He tells us that too: it is governed by the Court of Arches. It is a mercy for upright men that modern rationalists so plainly shew themselves morally. I do not think I ever read anything so morally base as the reasons for signing the articles in the "Essays and Reviews." Old infidels broke with Christianity: it was sad enough; but modern ones keep their places, and only give up their faith.
The boldness of Dr. C.'s assertions, and the excessive carelessness of his statements and conclusions, are alike remarkable. He tells us that he does not believe in the deluge, because he does in geology. He has studied it in the Zulu country, and he now knows for certain (for Sir C. Lyell is infallible, if scripture and the Lord Christ be not) that a universal deluge could not possibly have taken place. Now Sir C. Lyell is unquestionably an able geologist, as well as the constant resort and refuge of infidels; but he has a system, and a system which geologists, less speculative and at the very least as able as he, entirely reject. Nor does he deny that the science is in its infancy. The ablest inquirers believe in a universal deluge; the latest researches tend to prove it. I say "tend," because no certain conclusions can yet be made from geology as to dates. I do not hesitate to affirm (and I am supported by the ablest geologists), that geological dates and periods stand on the most uncertain and unsatisfactory footing. Sir C. Lyell's system is utterly unsatisfactory -- irreconcileable with the evident facts of the upheaval theory, which is generally admitted. Dr. C. assures us that a partial deluge is no better; so that in spite of universal tradition, scripture, the authority of Christ, who refers specifically to the deluge as true (Matthew 24: 37-39), and much geological research, we are to have no deluge at all. I do not know that I should ever have noticed this point, as it is impossible to follow it out here, but as affording a proof of Dr. C.'s manner of reasoning. It was not partial, he says, because a flood that should cover Ararat must in due time sweep over the Puy de Dome, because water finds its own level! -- that is to say, water 16,000 or 17,000 feet deep in a narrow locality must have been some 5,000 feet deep at thousands of miles distance, when it had spread that distance in every direction! And a man who reasons thus is to call in question the accuracy of scripture!
But Dr. C. assures us the scriptures never affirm their own infallibility. Abstractedly "infallibility" belongs to a person, not to what has been already said. But they affirm that they are inspired by God, and that they have His authority. The Lord says, "the scripture cannot be broken" -- appeals to it, as we have seen, as of equal authority with His own words -- refers to them as testifying of Him -- expounds them after His resurrection in what they taught concerning Himself -- declares all that they said must be fulfilled -- opens His disciples' understanding to understand them -- declares that His rising from the dead would be useless to convince those by whom they were not believed. They are quoted by Him as absolutely conclusive authority. Facts here questioned, or borne with, because they may be "fairly disposed of," are referred to by Christ as undoubted history. So the apostles write whole epistles, in which their entire teaching is based upon the truth and inspired authority of scripture. Paul speaks of the scriptures "foreseeing"; so completely does he identify them with God. "But what saith the scripture?" is conclusive; not only so, they declare them to be by inspiration. They are called "the oracles of God," and the possession of them is counted to be the main privilege of God's people; so the law is called "the living oracles." Peter says, "No prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation, but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." I dare say Dr. C. will call the authenticity of this in question. Take then the first epistle (though I am perfectly satisfied of the authenticity of the second): there he states that the prophets searched as men into their own prophecies, as given by the Spirit of Christ which was in them. Paul declares that "every scripture is given by inspiration of God," the security of the saint in the perilous times of the last days; 2 Timothy 3: 16. He calls the scriptures "prophetic scriptures," scriptures of the prophets; Romans 16: 26. I have no doubt this refers to the New Testament; but, if it be the Old, it is saying they are inspired. So his own teaching he declares to be by "words which the Holy Ghost teacheth." The prophets were infamous impostors, if what they said were not the direct testimony of God Himself, for they say, "Thus saith the Lord." As to Christ, it is said, "He whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God, for God giveth not the Spirit by measure [unto him]." Thus, as Son of man, what He spoke, He spoke -- to refer to Dr. C.'s question -- "supernaturally," and His words were "the words of God." I am aware that Dr. C. says that on such subjects He was no wiser than other pious Jews, and that he thinks himself wiser than Christ and the apostles on such; but does he expect every one to have the same opinion of him that he has of himself? Does he think that many even will respect the judgment of one called a bishop who persuades us that Christ was prejudiced, and he is not? Poor human nature!
Allow me to ask you, Dr. Colenso, do you believe in the resurrection? Do you believe in this stupendous exercise of divine power, so suited to man subject to death? -- I mean the resurrection of Him who was "delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justification." Is it not something, this coming in of God to take out of death, and from among the dead, His own Son given for our sins? Do you find this without a revelation? Does Cicero furnish you with this, or do Sikh Gurus, or Pantheistic Brahmins? They may say fine things about God and patience, and do the same things (as Paul says) as the rest: can they tell of the deliverance of sinful man? I can conceive no greater proof of imbecility and wilful ignorance of facts than to compare the revelation first of the whole history of man under God's dealings with his responsibility, and then of atonement, and the intervention of God in deliverance, with the fine sayings of some heathen -- one too who shews men to be incapable of knowing God, as Cicero does, or with the moralizing of Pantheists.
But I close. I am not writing a book on these things, but penning an ephemeral article on the poorest piece of infidelity I ever met with; and I turn to the objections to run over them rapidly. Let my reader only remember that the object of scripture is not to meet objections, or give history, but, on the part of God, what is divinely instructive to man; that, if the Old Testament gave the perfection of the New, it would prove it was not true, for the true light did not shine till Christ came; that meeting objections does not give the force of the positive proofs. It seems candid to quote Kurtz and Hengstenberg (men who, however respectable, know little, as I judge, of the power of scripture). But in merely giving answers to objections all the positive proofs are of course left out. If no answer could be given to an objection, and yet there were positive proof of that against which the objection was brought, this would only prove the solution of the difficulty was not known. The positive proofs of the truth of scripture are such, that the denial of their being, as they are called, "the oracles of God," is an evidence only of the moral darkness of the rejecter of them. It is quite true I cannot explain light to a blind man; but every one who sees knows he is blind.
Above all, let my reader remember that the Lord Himself treats the scriptures as absolutely inspired and authoritative, quotes them as we now have them, and declares that all written of Him must be fulfilled -- that "not a jot or tittle can pass from the law till all be fulfilled," the law which Dr. C. pronounces he could not attribute to God, save as he selects bits according to his own fancy, for he has of course a perfect judgment -- a man who sees nothing in the minutiae of the law, which (while a yoke in the letter), as a shadow of good things to come, is full of the deepest instruction; let him remember that Dr. C. presents himself as wiser and better informed than Christ, and, if he have faith to do it, pray for one who can think so, and publish a book to tell the world he does.
Such views, they tell us, will unite all pious people in one mother church; and if such questions should disturb men's minds (and a serious person would ponder and weigh them before doing so), he has only to remember that Dr. C. has such a sense of the petty importance of his own position, that he cannot have leisure (so he tells us) to ponder awhile before he gives forth, pretending to be wiser than Christ, opinions which contradict what Christ says.
The first objection is that in Genesis 46. Hezron and Hamul are stated to have gone down to Egypt, and consequently to have been born in Canaan; but that this is impossible if the ages of Judah and Joseph be considered. It is contended that Judah was forty-two when Jacob went down into Egypt, inasmuch as Joseph was thirty-nine. Genesis 30: 24-26; chapter 31: 41, are cited to prove that Joseph was born in the seventh, Judah in the fourth, year "of Jacob's double marriage." The impossibility of Hezron and Hamul's going down to Egypt arises from this, that Judah was twenty when Joseph went down into Egypt, and that Hezron and Hamul, who rank in point of time with Judah's great-grandchildren, though his own grandchildren by Tamar, could not have been born when he was forty-two, that is, twenty-two years afterwards. On the other hand, it is insisted that the narrative of Jacob's going down makes sixty-six souls go with him, and there are not sixty-six without Hezron and Hamul.
There is no ground for the objection at all. I do not insist on the uncertainty of the exact difference between the ages of Judah and Joseph, as what might be added, even if just, would hardly clear up the point; though, bringing it perhaps within the limits of possibility, it is sufficient to throw doubt on Dr. C.'s assertions. But Genesis 46 is simply to record the immediate descendants of Jacob who were associated with himself in Egypt to give his family. Thus Er and Onan are noticed; only, it is added, they died in Canaan. It is then added, "and the sons of Pharez were Hezron and Hamul." This twelfth verse is distinctly genealogy, not that all went down into Egypt who are named in it; for Er and Onan are named because they are sons, while it is expressly stated they did not go down at all.+
In verse 12 the introduction of "were" is emphatic, and the phrase, I apprehend, clearly intended to be supplementary. It is not "Er, and Onan, and Shelah, and Pharez, and Zarah, and the sons of Pharez, Hezron and Hamul," which would clearly have been the case if they had been goers down into Egypt. But the historian stops at Zarah, and adds supplementary information: Er and Onan were on the list of sons, but they did not go down -- they died before -- and Pharez's sons were Hezron and Hamul. They are looked at as filling up the breach, but the latter half of the verse is (in contrast with going down) an explanation of the history of that family. As if he had said, These were Judah's sons, but I must add this explanation to the statement: Er and Onan never got down, for they died, and Pharez had two sons, who are counted in to supply their place. For though the leading thought be the going down of the family into Egypt, yet in order to this he gives the whole family; and that this is so is evident, for he introduces Joseph's sons, adding, that they were born in Egypt. Indeed I think it very questionable whether all Benjamin's sons were born when he came into Egypt.
+The computation in the passage is not very clear. If we count in Er and Onan, we have thirty-three sons and grandsons. If we leave them out, we must count Jacob among the souls of his own sons and daughters. However, I am disposed to include Dinah and Jacob, and leave out Er and Onan, and read thus: "These he the sons of Leah which she bare unto Jacob in Padan-Aram, with his daughter Dinah, all the souls of his sons and daughters; thirty and three." As if he had said, This makes thirty and three. If not, we must count in Er and Onan, and make it mere genealogical computation of sons, and verse 26 would be general, the computation already given excluding Jacob, and Joseph and his sons.
It was after Joseph's birth that Jacob agreed with Laban to stay longer, and stayed six years. He then journeyed to Palestine, when Joseph must have been seven years old. He was sold into Egypt at seventeen. Hence Jacob had been only ten years in Canaan when Joseph went there. Jacob had settled first at Succoth, then near Shechem, and Dinah, who was probably nearly of Joseph's age, was old enough to be ill-treated by Hamor before Benjamin was born. For Jacob went off to Bethel after the destruction of the men of Shechem, and after leaving Bethel Benjamin was born and Rachel died. He does not appear either in the history. Joseph is a boy, the son of Jacob's old age. Benjamin could only have been two or three years old when Joseph went down; for if Dinah were seven or eight years old when she came to Canaan (say she was fifteen or sixteen when Hamor wronged her), seven or eight years had elapsed in Canaan before Benjamin was born, and two or three years more elapsed before Joseph went down. We must add twenty-two for the interval between Joseph's and Jacob's going down. Benjamin was thus at the utmost twenty-four or twenty-five. So he is called a "lad" (nahar) in chapter 43: 3, and a "little one" (katan) in chapter 44: 20, and (nahar) again in verse 31. This being so, and giving the fullest possible age of twenty-five, which, with the three terms, is very improbable, it is very little likely he had ten sons born to him. I doubt even whether Reuben's sons were all born, as he says, "slay my two sons."
On the whole, I think it is evident that this is a genealogical list without reference to the place of birth -- the statement of the whole family, as a family, who went down. The manner of giving a genealogy complete, and a general fact which is not accurately true as to each individual in it, though it characterizes the subject of recital, we have other examples of. Thus, to go no farther than chapter 35, all Jacob's sons are given, including Benjamin immediately after the account of Benjamin's birth in Canaan; and it is added, "these are the sons of Jacob which were born to him in Padan-Aram."
The exact genealogy was the important thing, and it is given accurately. The main fact which characterized the family was their birth away from the land of promise, in the country where Jacob served for a wife. It was no object to except Benjamin in the statement; it was to give the accurate history of his birth. I doubt not for a moment he is a special type of Christ in connection with Israel; the son of his mother's affliction, but of his father's right-hand. But it could be no mistake; for the writer, or compiler, or whatever he was, had given all the details of his birth immediately before, and speaks in the passage itself of Jacob's being in that land. But, Benjamin being born, the time was come to give the whole family. The subjects are given with divine purpose, in view of after dealings of God which He foreknew, not as mere histories to amuse; and hence we get distinct subjects without arrangements of dates.
Dr. C. states that Judah's misconduct was after Joseph's going down to Egypt, because it is said, "at that time." Now Judah's genealogy and ways were all-important, because our Lord was to spring out of Judah. But after this history of Judah, which lasts some twenty years at any rate, the history of Joseph's going down into Egypt is resumed where it left off. Judah's history is introduced as a separate subject parenthetically. The last verse of chapter 37, and the first verse of chapter 39 are connected, and the history of Judah comes in between as a whole of twenty years by itself. "At that time" is only the general epoch, and the whole history is given together. This is exceedingly common in scripture. But as Joseph was a remarkable type of Christ, so Judah was His progenitor according to the flesh. And this Pharez and his son Hezron were so. I must add that the relative ages of Judah and Joseph are anything but clearly proved. The relative dates of Joseph's birth and his going down into Egypt, and of each to other events, are far more distinctly given.
On the whole the purpose of the statement in Genesis 46 is clearly to give Jacob's family; and hence some are noticed who did not go down to Egypt, and Hezron and Hamul are specially introduced into the verse, not with the list of sons but as associated with them. The saying, "Thy fathers went down into Egypt with three-score and ten persons, and now Jehovah thy God hath made thee as the stars of heaven for multitude," takes up the general fact to shew the marvellous increase. The same is the case in the New Testament, especially in Luke.
Dr. C. in fact admits the whole case, where he says, "wishing to sum up the seventy souls under one category, he uses (inaccurately, as he himself admits) the same expression, 'came into Egypt.'" Now this settles the whole question. He gives a category of persons, that category being Jacob's family, with the general fact of that family's leaving Canaan and going into Egypt. But he introduces some who did not literally go down, though they were there. If this be so (and it is perfectly evident), Dr. C.'s argument is simply worth nothing at all. When he says, "all the souls which came into Egypt were three-score and ten," we have the demonstration that some at least who were born in Egypt, provided they were of the family that came, are accounted as coming. The case of Hezron and Hamul is much clearer, because there is only an accessory statement in the genealogy, "and the sons of Pharez were Hezron and Hamul." And we have no need to say again with Dr. C., "the description is of course literally incorrect, but the writer's meaning is obvious enough," for it is literally correct, and the meaning obvious too. But I may add Dr. C.'s own remark, which shews the utter wilfulness and equal absurdity of his objection: "He wishes to specify all those out of the sons of Jacob who were living at the time of the commencement of the sojourn of the Israelites in Egypt, and from whom such a multitude had sprung at the time of the Exodus." How soon Hezron and Hamul were born, we cannot say. They are brought into the list in connection with the loss of two of the sons of Judah, with whose history they were connected, one of them being ancestor of David and of the Christ.
The next objection is really almost too absurd to notice, but worthy of the futility of rationalist arguments. Dr. C. makes a computation of how far files of men, as many in number as could stand in front of the breadth of the tabernacle, would reach! Does he think the writer did not know, as well as Dr. C., that all the congregation could not have stood in the court? But he was not so morally dull as to think of it. Supposing the riot-act read to a crowd of a hundred thousand persons; and I say the riot-act was read to the multitude who stood before the magistrate, and I computed how far a hundred thousand men would reach, standing in a file directly before the magistrate; what would any one think of the sense of the person who made the remark? Or are the crowd not responsible because they cannot hear it? Away with such childish trifling. But the fact is, there is no ground for the remark at all. "Before the door of the tabernacle of the congregation" has a most important meaning in these ordinances. Within the tabernacle and holiest of all was the place of Jehovah's communing directly with Moses; outside, yet in connection with the tabernacle, the place of meeting the people, of God's going out, not in the revelation of Himself, but in communications from Himself to the people, and of the access of the people to Him.
All the court of the tabernacle of the congregation was held to have this character of "before the door of the tabernacle," and all done there and communicated thence was done "before the door of the tabernacle of the congregation." All brought up to the court was before the door. Thus, if all the people had been outside the court, and Moses had stood in the doorway of the court, they would have been "before the door of the tabernacle of the congregation." It was the general expression for coming up to the court or entering it, though not going near the tabernacle where the door literally was. "The women," we read, "assembled themselves in troops at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation." They did not come, when the tabernacle was set up in order, in troops between the laver and the holy place. But we have the matter definitely stated. In Exodus 40: 29 we find, "he put the altar of the burnt-offering by the door of the tabernacle of the congregation ... and he set the laver between the tent of the congregation and the altar." Thus the altar of burnt-offering, the first thing met with on entering the court, was by the door of the tabernacle. Now this was the place where God was to meet the children of Israel, as contrasted with meeting Moses within the veil.
Exodus 29: 42 -- "a continual burnt-offering ... at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation before Jehovah, where I will meet you to speak there unto thee. And there I will meet with the children of Israel." Thus Moses, standing under the hangings of the court and speaking to the crowd without, was speaking to them gathered before the door of the tabernacle. Had they been inside the court, he would have turned his back to them. So, when a person offered a burnt-offering, he offered it at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation before Jehovah: he killed the bullock before Jehovah, and the blood was sprinkled upon the altar that is by the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. They came up to Jehovah there, instead of offering it where they pleased, away from Him. And this was carefully secured by ordinance as a guard against idolatry. They had to bring all the beasts they slew up before Jehovah; Leviticus 17: 4. The gathering of the congregation to the door of the tabernacle was bringing them up to the court, so that Moses, standing there, might address them. And the place specifically pointed out for this was not at the door, but where the altar was, that is, next the entrance of the court where the people were to come up with their sacrifices, and Jehovah met with them.
Such objections as these are child's play, proving only entire ignorance of God's ways with Israel and of the purport of the ordinances, carelessness of research into them with the pretension (the common accompaniment of ignorance) to see clearer than others, and the desire to make difficulties in presence of all the divine light which is found in what is objected to. Dr. C. seeks to prove his candour and care by shewing that the elders of Israel were not all the congregation. He might have spared himself the trouble. And he has gone through sums of arithmetic to prove the size of the court! I really have not examined whether his multiplication is correct; I can suppose it.
His next objection is as to how Moses and Joshua addressed all Israel; and he wisely informs us that the crying of the children, whose mothers must be supposed to have pushed to the first place, would hinder all but those close by from hearing. Was ever anything more childish? Supposing all did not hear, which may very well be believed, they were all put under the responsibility of what was addressed to them, of which those who were in earnest could easily put themselves in possession. Supposing the elders or heads of tribes were nearest, as is probable, they would have both informed and led the others according to what was said.
The next objection is to the possibility, with so few priests, of having the bullock for a sin-offering burned without the camp. Now I admit fully that the great object here is doctrinal, not historical. There is no history at all. What is ordained was only to be done in the case of the priest's, or the whole congregation's, sinning; it ought never to have happened, and it may never have happened. And from the way they went on (for they never circumcised their children, and certainly fell into idolatry, if the case did arise), they probably neglected the prescribed sacrifice. If it did happen once or twice, such a provision was no difficulty. That once or twice in forty years, or even in one year, such a toilsome ceremony should mark their sin was most appropriate. Nor do I doubt a moment that, though the priest was responsible, and must have had and seen it done, the Levites, or younger priests, might share the manual toil. And this is implied in the form of the Hebrew verb, which is the Hiphil, "to cause to go forth," used, no doubt, consequently for "bringing forth," but which may be by another as by oneself (as it is used for causing an evil report to come on some one).+ For the rest, a walk of a mile and a half, or three miles, for their common bodily wants was nothing out of the way for a people who had nothing to do except to tend their cattle, which would in itself have taken them there. To suppose they used fuel as in London is simple nonsense. And they chose places where wells were, and God clave the rock when there was no water. It is really absurd bringing forward such objections. Had Dr. C. been a soldier, or lived in the dirt I have had to live in, he would have known that a walk of a mile and a half out of a city for the necessities of life was a very natural thing.
+Yatsa is to go forth, as Bo is to go in or to. And hence the causative is used for bringing forth; because one who does causes to go or come forth. But there is no ground at all for confining it to the personal act of the person causing it to come forth. Thus, not only in the case of an evil report, Hotze Dibba, cited in the text; Deuteronomy 16: 23, bringing forth the tithe; Leviticus 24: 14, bringing forth him that had cursed; Zechariah 4: 7; Genesis 34: 24, 25, bringing forth Tamar; Exodus 3: 10, Moses is to bring forth Israel from Egypt, that is, cause them to come out. So Exodus 14: 13, Hebrews 14, So in Ezra 1: 8 we have, "those did Cyrus bring forth by the hand of Mithredath," where he expressly uses another to have them brought out. In a word, there is no ground at all for Dr. C.'s remarks.
The fifth objection is, first, that the shekel is called the shekel of the sanctuary before there was a sanctuary; and that the money of which the silver sockets, etc., were made was the redemption-money; and that the census which ascertained the number of the people on which the redemption-money was paid was six months afterwards, by which time the number must have increased. This has no foundation whatever. As to the remark, that it was called the shekel of the sanctuary before the sanctuary was set up, the book is a history, and gives the sum taken according to the value of the money known when it was written. They paid at the time what was known when the book was written as the shekel of the sanctuary -- perhaps settled at the very time. As regards the numbering, it is clear the computation of the sum that was paid is made from the numbering itself, the result of which was known when the account of it was written. There is no continuing of the same number -- Exodus 38: 26; Numbers 1: 46; it is the number itself. I do not know what is the ground for saying "six months." The tabernacle was set up on the first day of the first month, the numbering took place a month after.
The sockets, chapiters, and filaments may have been made just before. They may perfectly well have given each man his money, and the actual numbering been made six weeks afterwards to verify it, and that number be given as the ascertained one, even if some few had attained the age of twenty in the short interval. The command to give the half shekel is given in chapter 30. But this was by no means all the silver, for many had offered willingly, but it was typically important that it should be understood that that on which the tabernacle of witness was founded was redemption; and what separated the service of God from the world was redemption. Hence the sockets of the boards of the tabernacle, and the hooks and chapiters on which the hangings of the court were fixed were of this silver. The actual numbering took place when the tabernacle was set up to verify the number redeemed, which had its own importance. If some shekels more were given, it was of no consequence whatever to notice them, as the direction for their use was given already. Some few might have died who had given their half shekel, some few reached twenty; but the sum when numbered is taken as the sum applied to the service. We know that the population in the wilderness was as nearly stationary as possible.
The next difficulty is, how they got tents on leaving Egypt, and carried them. I might fairly say I do not know. Some may have been badly off for want of them, have made them on the journeying, and while staying at Sinai for a year. As to carrying them, nothing is said; they had asses doubtless, perhaps camels, as well as oxen. The history says nothing about it. To say they could not have them is absurd; very likely they were at first greatly in want of them. All this is to the last degree idle; it is not the object of the history to give these details. Dr. C. then takes a very difficult Hebrew word to prove that, if it means "armed," there are difficulties in knowing how they got arms, or how they were afraid of Pharaoh if they had. It is really tedious to go through such absurdities. The word probably signifies that they went out "in array," not as poor hunted runaways; for God took them out with a high hand. "By strength of hand Jehovah brought us out of Egypt."
But it does not by any means follow, if their faith were not lively, that they would not be alarmed when attacked by trained soldiers. It is said in this same chapter (13), that God did not take them the short way lest the people should repent when they saw war, and return to Egypt. And they were so disposed. God suffered their faith to be tried for a moment, and they did repent when they saw war: only now it was but to make His deliverance the more conspicuous. Nor, where faith was not in exercise, was it very wonderful. Accustomed to be slaves, with all their women and children and cattle, the way of escape barred, no practice in war or even in any common military arrangements, they were in face of the most experienced warriors on earth with chariots and cavalry -- themselves a great mixed multitude. When Dr. C. says "a body of six hundred thousand warriors," he says what is false. They were not warriors. They were of an age fit for war, even if that were true of them; but they were poor brickmakers, though now roused by God's intervention to leave the house of bondage.
The next objection, as to the Passover, is founded on misstatement and carelessness. Dr. C. insists that it was impossible to notify it, and have all ready in time. He tells us, the first notice of any such feast to be kept is given in this very chapter, where we find it written, verse 12, "I will pass through the land of Egypt this night." Hence he argues it was impossible to have all Israel ready, and insists on this night, and on the use of the Hebrew word "hazeh." But "zeh" has not this kind of exactitude always. At any rate the chapter shews distinctly the falseness of the conclusion Dr. C. has drawn from it. The directions had been given at the beginning of the month, and the lamb had to be kept up three days: "This month shall be unto you the beginning of months, it shall be the first month of the year to you. Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying: on the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb ... and ye shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month."
Dr. C. says, this cannot mean that they had notice several days beforehand, because it says, "I will pass through the land of Egypt this night." This is very bad indeed. Moses is told to notify to all the people, to take a lamb on the tenth, and to keep it to the fourteenth; and this we are told cannot mean that they got notice beforehand, because the chapter says "this night," when it comes to killing and eating it! And what else can it mean? If the lamb was not kept up from the tenth to the fourteenth, the ordinance was not kept at all. All this objection does is to disclose the will of the objector. No doubt the momentous ordinance itself is what occupies the inspired writer; but the beginning of the chapter fully suffices to shew that the objection, drawn from want of time and notice, is as perverse as it is unfounded. The rest of the article does not deserve notice. In the first place kids would do, so that there was no danger of all the male lambs perishing. As to notice to start, they ate it, loins girded, and staff in hand, ready to go, and were prepared long before to be on the move, to sacrifice in the wilderness. Nor is there a word to shew there was any sudden notice, or that their move was caused by the urging of the Egyptians.
Dr. C. thinks that his own confusion, in fright from a false alarm, proves that there must have been hopeless confusion in Israel. But they had for a length of time been demanding to move with all their flocks, and were now with loins girt and staff in hand, so that we cannot doubt a moment that all was prepared and arranged. There is no hint of an order to start communicated suddenly. The Egyptians were urgent on them to go. They had already borrowed jewels from the Egyptians in anticipation of going. The whole theory of Dr. C. is simply inattention to the scriptural account. Because that account dwells chiefly on the great facts which have a moral import, he concludes there were none else, even when they are positively stated, and makes statements moreover, and statements upon which all his argument depends, which are not in the passage or actually contradict it. I may add that I do not even admit that the six hundred thousand were only men in the prime of age; they were all above twenty -- twenty and above -- that were men, besides children. This would make a considerable difference in the numbers.
As to how the herds were fed in the desert, it is certain they chose their encampment where there were springs. At Sinai God gave them water out of a rock. I may add that Dr. C. speaks of Mount Serbal as Sinai, which is more than doubtful, or confounds two opinions, applying statements as to one incorrectly to the other, ignorant that there was any difference; which, as to the character of the place of encampment, is important. Lipsius thought Serbal was Sinai, but more exact research has made it pretty clear it was not, and shewn where Israel encamped. The attempt to say, as Dr. C. says, that the wandering in the desert is not a necessary preliminary to all the history of Israel, is too barefaced -- does too much violence to the common sense of every man who has read scripture -- to call for an answer. Movements of whole nations in the deserts of Upper Asia have been frequent, when there was not the miraculous intervention of God to give water, which is stated in the history of Israel. Israel stayed mainly in the north of the desert on the borders of Mount Seir and the land of Canaan, where there were wells and pasture: though what is related in detail is what happened at Sinai at the beginning and at the close. When Dr. C. tells us that the scripture story says not a word about this long sojourn near Mount Seir and the Red Sea, he makes a blunder with his usual carelessness. The Israelites got through the desert of El Tyh+ (which is not the desert of Sinai, as Dr. C. says) by a rapid and short journey to the desert of Paran and Kadesh-Barnea, close to Canaan. There they were called on to go up the mountain of the Amorites, and take possession of the land. Instead of this they sent the spies, the Lord giving His sanction to it, but at their desire. Their faith failed, and they would not go up, and were condemned to wander the forty years, till the men, save Joshua and Caleb, died.
+El Tyh is a modern name (the wandering) for the desert district lying north of Sinai.
It was on their refusal to go up that they turned and went to the Red Sea (Numbers 14: 25); and then it was they compassed Mount Seir (Deuteronomy 1: 40), and were on the border of countries affording supplies. In one place where they had no water, they were given it again miraculously, went down finally outside the Wady Akaba to the Red Sea, returned to Mount Hor for Aaron's death, and then at last down to the Red Sea again, going up the eastern side of the mountains of Seir to Moab and Jordan. The statement of Dr. C. is merely the result of carelessness in searching scripture. The detail of these long years we have not, but we have of a stay of a year in Sinai, where water was given miraculously, a short journey across El Tyh, Jehovah Himself leading them, their arrival at the borders of the land, and their journeying about Mount Seir and to the Red Sea, water being given them miraculously when it failed. Let me remark how beautifully, at the moment they were sent back from the land through their unbelief (Numbers 14), God gives directions what to do in the land, shewing His promise and purpose as sure as His word and nature, in spite of man's folly and failure; Numbers 15.
The only account we have of the stations, between their reaching the borders of the land in the second year, and their reaching Jordan, is in Numbers 33; and the localities at which they stopped during this interval of time are unknown till we come to Moseroth. Thence their journey is clear to the Red Sea, back to Hor, back to the Red Sea, and round Seir to Edom. (Compare Numbers 21; Deuteronomy 10) But we know that from Kadesh to Zered was thirty-eight years; so that they reached Kadesh in the second year before the end of it, probably a good while before, because the wars against the Amorites and Og were after Zered and before Jordan. Now they did not leave Sinai till the end of the second month of the second year. They abode in Kadesh many days, certainly more than forty; so that we are sure that the journey from Sinai to the borders of Canaan was very short indeed. They were there on the edge of cultivated land. God turned them back, but they never left the neighbourhood of Canaan, Seir, and the Red Sea. And He who turned them back took care of them, giving them water at Meribah miraculously when needed.
Of all this Dr. C. is ignorant, telling us scripture says nothing about it, not having examined that which he is pretending to prove unhistorical. This is true that Jehovah gives us those parts of the journey in detail which have a moral bearing, and not how the cattle were provided for. But the book is all false if it be not historical. We have the name of each place where they stopped during the whole forty years. This must be history or forgery. I have noticed elsewhere that the statement in Deuteronomy 10 seems to contradict the list in Numbers, but becomes the strongest proof of the historical character of the book when closely examined; because we find, by careful comparison of facts and passages, that they traversed the same ground twice from Hor to the Red Sea, from the Red Sea to Hor, and then back to the Red Sea, and east of Edom. But men do not make these apparent contradictions, solved by collateral facts, and shewn to be unconsciously true, save in relating real history, which, as they know the facts, they have no need to combine and arrange.
Dr. C. makes difficulties as to there being wild beasts in Canaan with so large a population. His objections are futile. What is the population of India? How dense is well known, yet tigers and wild beasts abound. Modern European populations are no rule at all, nor even Port Natal, because they settled more in Canaan in towns and villages. Counting in the Canaanites besides Israel is only another instance of Dr. C.'s carelessness, for the supposition made is their total immediate destruction. My own conviction is that the number of Israelites is greatly exaggerated. The six hundred thousand are all males, not children -- all the grown men.
The whole of the reasoning in the next chapter to prove the firstborn more numerous than is stated seems to me an undoubted mistake. I cannot doubt that those only, and the same in Egypt, who were still members of their fathers' families, are counted. The captive in the dungeon, and Pharaoh himself, may have been firstborn, but it is not supposed as in question that they should die; it was the house. "There was not a house where there was not one dead." In each family which was together the firstborn was taken. I do not believe that a firstborn father and his firstborn son were both taken or numbered. The firstborn children of child-bearing mothers were counted; the firstborn of existing families at the time of the numbering. It clearly, I apprehend, did not include old men and grandfathers whose fathers were dead, or even heads of families married out, but firstborn of living mothers whose families were with them. Hence they were counted from a month old; those below were yet unclean. Remark here that the question must have presented itself to the mind of the writer. It is a proof that it is historical, that an evident difficulty is left unsolved. A forger does not put an evident difficulty in his account. Here we have an apparent and evident difficulty. The number of grown men is in the previous chapter; no explanation given. Why? Because the writer is stating facts, not inventing a story, and therefore states the fact without noticing the difficulty.
For myself, I can only say, when I never thought of a question in it, I never took the statement as to Egypt or Israel to refer to other than families at home, unmarried members of households. Indeed, in this particular case, it may be questioned whether it was not those only born after the destruction of the firstborn Egyptians to whom the ordinance here referred to was given. God says He sanctified then to Himself all the firstborn. It would perhaps suppose an unusual number in their first year of liberation, which would be nothing extraordinary. However, on this I do not insist, as those under a month must be subtracted, who in this case might be numerous. "All the males" does not refer to all of all ages, but all the males as contrasted with females. Indeed in verse 43 it is rather implied that all were not: "and all the firstborn males by the number of names, from a month old and upwards, of those that were numbered of them, were 22,273." But neither do I insist on this, as the Hebrew may, I apprehend, be taken as "in their numbering" the same as "in number."
As to the question of the increase of population during the sojourn of Israel in Egypt, it has been discussed and re-discussed a hundred times; and it must require overweening self-confidence in Dr. C. to bring it forward, as he does, as an argumentum crucis. He says the doubts he has "raised will be confirmed into a certain conviction, by its appearing plainly from the data of the Pentateuch that there could not have been any such population itself to come out of Egypt." (Page 148.) I suppose he must be ignorant of what has been said of it; if not, such language is simply overweening impertinence to men far better versed in such inquiries than himself. If the Israelites doubled in fifteen years, they would have been 1,146,880 in two hundred and fifteen years; in two hundred and thirty years, 2,293,760. But the statement of scripture is, that "the children of Israel were fruitful and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty, and the land was filled with them"; and the new king said, "Behold, the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we" ... and they persecuted them. Very probably they were all removed to Goshen, giving rise to Manetho's story of Avaris. "But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and grew"; so that their increase was not such as makes any difficulty. In England the increase in ten years was more than 23 per cent., where town and manufacturing habits largely impede; so that 35 per cent. in fifteen years is reached in the actual state of England. Thus doubling, in the circumstances of Israel, with extraordinary blessing in this respect was nothing incredible, though we have no proof of their numbers more than six hundred thousand males above twenty, and no proof that the majority of women were Egyptian or other strangers. If this fact be taken into account, the increase presents no kind of difficulty.
But the duration of the sojourn is a very obscure point; Josephus gives it both as two hundred and fifteen and as four hundred and thirty. The reader may see Fynes Clinton's investigation of the point, if he have access to it. He reckons two hundred and fifteen years, taking the shorter or Hebrew chronology. Many able chronologists doubt of this, as Hales. At first sight Galatians 3: 17 seems to decide the question, but when examined it does not, I think, necessarily do so. The apostle takes the time of promise as a general fact: "To Abraham were the promises made, and to his seed." Now the confirmation to the Seed does not come in for some forty years after the promise. It is of this confirmation the apostle speaks, if we take the letter of what he says. But his object was not the date, save as shewing the law coming long after the promise. He refers to Exodus 12: 40, which was sufficient for him and is ambiguous. He may refer to patriarchal times as those of promise, and take the Egyptian state as four hundred and thirty years. The length of the sojourn in Egypt is an unsettled question.
As to the Chronicles, it is, I judge, a blunder of Dr. C.'s, which I should not think much of, were not his book solely founded on affected accuracy of detail. 1 Chronicles 8: 20 presents difficulties. This is always hopeful ground for infidels. What is difficult to understand they can more easily turn to their own purpose, for others have not a positive answer ready. If we follow the statement simply, however, there is no great difficulty. The Chronicles, besides giving the history of Judah, not Israel, and especially of David's family, gather up all the fragments possible of ancient history and genealogy for the return of Israel from Babylon. Take the passage thus -- "The sons of Ephraim Shuthelah": his genealogy is followed down to a second Shuthelah, and there stops. Then the passage speaks of two other sons of Ephraim, Ezer, and Elead, who made a raid against Gath, and were killed; and then follows another son of Ephraim, which is quite natural, and his genealogy is given. His daughter Sherah is simply a descendant of his. Ammihud was fifth from Ephraim.
The objection to the numbers of the Danites and Levites (that of the former being large, though Dan had only one son, which to an unpractised eye may seem to present the greatest difficulty) is founded on want of attention to the reckonings of scripture, as if in every case those mentioned are all. The very comparison with Chronicles which Dr. C. institutes ought to have taught him it was not so, for there are persons mentioned there who are not in Exodus. The genealogies are given, as far as needed, to make out the moral history according to God's government of Israel, but no farther. Any number may be left out, even generations may, provided what is needed is given. Next, generations are taken by Dr. C. as if they were the same then as now. They lived one hundred and thirty, or one hundred and forty, years, and their families were often proportionate, and here God interfered expressly to multiply them. Thus, if we had not Genesis 25, all scripture would have led us to suppose that Ishmael and Isaac were all the sons Abraham had. Here we see he had six sons more when he was quite an old man, of whom nations sprung. Here for other purposes it was important to notice it. In other cases it was not. Next, the assumption that Israel remained only two hundred and fifteen years in Egypt is a questionable one.
The number of the generation following the twelve patriarchs is no way decided. To begin the computation one really ought to take, at any rate, one hundred and thirty-nine, not seventy; that is, take the females in. So the children of Dinah and Serah do not appear at all. The fact of a number of children in one generation says nothing as to the result. Benjamin had many; Reuben had many: neither were large tribes. Does Dr. C. suppose that a forger would have been insensible to this if he had been inventing? It is the strongest possible proof that the account is historical, drawn from facts, for no one would have laid himself open to the objection. There was no need whatever, but that the facts were so, to lend a handle to objectors. It was unnatural, if it were not true. Dr. C. states that Moses' children were only two: I doubt it much. They were only two by Zipporah, but he had married also an Ethiopian woman. It did not concern the scripture history to say anything of children by her. We see from the genealogies that families were reckoned all under one head, if they were not numerous, so as to make a distinct family (1 Chronicles 23: 10, 11); or they might come in as two, when properly the head should have been but one, as Ephraim and Manasseh. If Joseph had had a dozen sons afterwards, they would not have formed distinct families; Genesis 48: 6. They would have merged in the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh.+
+As to Dan, if the absence of others of the tribe not yet formed hindered the application of the rule laid down in the case of Zelophehad's daughters, the fact that he had only one son may have been removed in a few generations. Hushim may have had as many as Jair, who had thirty sons that rode on thirty asses' colts.
All these considerations, which lie at the basis of the whole system, are ignored by Dr. C. We have an instance how much the names are taken merely to represent families, and how many may be left out, in the very case Dr. C. mentions; who, in his usual careless and superficial way, does not notice or perceive it, being simply bent on his own object. "The Amramites (he tells us), numbered as Levites in the fourth (Eliezer's) generation, were, as above, only two, namely, the two sons of Moses -- the sons of Aaron being reckoned as priests. Hence the rest of the Kohathites of this generation must have been made up of the descendants of Ishar and Uzziel." (Pages 169, 170.) This is because Ishar and Uzziel are mentioned; Exodus 6: 21, 22. But this is simply that there was some special reason for mentioning them. Kohath had another son, Hebron, who may have had, for aught we know, ten times as many. In a word those are noticed in the genealogies as to whom some special motive existed, others not.
Dr. C. has not even found it out. All his calculation here is based, to say nothing of its general fallacy, upon his not noticing what was before his eyes in the text. But this fact, with a thousand other similar ones, involves a principle which makes the ground of all his calculations fundamentally false. Let the reader note this case, as it may clear his mind as to these statements of families. A genealogical succession is given, and only two sons out of four mentioned. One, it so happens, we can supply as far as it goes, because Moses and Aaron came from that stock; the absence of the other we cannot account for. In this case we are sure of it, because he is mentioned a few verses before. Now it is just as possible -- very likely indeed -- that Amram may have had a host of sons, besides Moses and Aaron, who are mentioned because of their importance. The names are given more to shew from whom people are descended who are known, than to tell all the descendants. All this Dr. C. has overlooked, and simply made mathematical calculations as if all were given. His whole system is false.
Dr. C.'s computations are merely neglect of all the principles of scriptural genealogies. Besides, I repeat, the numbers given are such as prove they are not fabricated; and the paucity of Levites, and the numbers of Dan, prove that the statements are drawn from history and facts (as the whole tenor of the statements bears on the face of them), and are such as no man on earth would have invented. Dr. C. says, It is incredible the Levite should not have increased more during the sojourn in the wilderness. The fact that Eliezer did not die proves nothing as to the Levites not coming under the judgment which fell on Israel for their murmurings when the spies returned. God was pleased to keep Israel at the same level in the wilderness. As to numbers that is clear. The Levites were no exception. God may have used providential means for this, as the privations of the wilderness, which affected the Levites as well as the rest. But there is no motive for thinking they were exempt from the judgment. But the truth is, the great change in relative numbers in the tribes shews all the reasoning as to the small increase of the Levites utterly valueless. Population may increase or decrease at such a rate, but that says nothing whatever for particular families. One increases, another becomes extinct. Thus Manasseh rose from 32,200 to 52,700. Ephraim had sunk from 40,500 to 32,500. Benjamin increased from 35,410 to 45,600. Dan was stationary, Asher had increased from 41,500 to 53,400. Judah had remained pretty stationary. Issachar largely increased. Simeon had fallen from 59,000 to 22,000. Thus the particular degree of the increase of the Levites, on which Dr. C. has bestowed so much labour, is of no import whatever. All Dr. C.'s remarks indicate a singular inattention to facts.
As regards the small number of priests making it impossible they could fulfil their services, unless in the case of the offering of birds, it is a mistake to think the priest had anything to do, save to receive the blood and arrange a burnt-offering on the altar. All the operations of slaying, flaying, cutting up, were done by the offerer. But let it be remembered we are speaking of history.
The doctrinal import (which is their real value) of the directions for the sacrifices is most precious, as these are known types of the sacrifice of Christ. No part of scripture is more important. This of course is lost on Dr. C.
Now as to history, we have no proof that a single offering was brought all the time they were in the wilderness. Burnt-offerings were always voluntary, and in the state of Israel, it is just as likely they never troubled their heads about it; for they sinned without compunction, and certainly had never circumcised their children, so that really they had no right to offer any sacrifice. That they did not offer a peace-offering is certain; for they murmured for meat, complaining of the manna, and got the quails in chastisement -- at any rate on the second occasion. Save Miriam, we do not hear of any one having the leprosy. There is no evidence of any historical difficulty whatever, but the contrary. Indeed Amos 5: 25 complains that they did not offer sacrifice to Jehovah, but took Moloch and Chium for their gods.
History, therefore, has nothing to do with the matter; the instruction as to priests and sacrifices is doctrinal, not historic. The details of Dr. C.'s reasonings are as trifling as usual. As scripture speaks often of doves in the wilderness, he assures us the psalmist was hardly thinking of the terrible deserts of Sinai -- of which he knows nothing. Was ever more egregious trifling?
As regards the Passover, Dr. C. says it was impossible the priests could suffice to kill the Passover, and sprinkle the blood. If, as it is evident they naturally would, they kept it as they had in Egypt, every house killed the lamb for itself. The whole difficulty is a soap-bubble, proving only Dr. C.'s will and foolishness. If Dr. C. had given himself the trouble of reading 2 Chronicles 30, which he quotes, he would have seen that the Levites (verse 17) killed the Passover, because many of the people had not sanctified themselves, and they did so only for those who were not clean. It rather appears that it was the blood of the burnt-offering which the priests sprinkled then. At any rate this, and Josiah's Passover, when the priest did sprinkle the blood of the paschal lamb, were special exceptional cases, and there were plenty of priests and Levites attending in their places. As far as the New Testament goes, it would seem each prepared it for himself.
It is really disgraceful for a person in Dr. C.'s position, or for any one, to make a formal attack on a book he has professed to believe in on grounds so futile, and with a carelessness which proves no honest research for himself, but that his will was father to his thought. He has, at any rate, proved himself, logarithms and all, to be an equally incompetent and pretentious man. Probably those by whom, nine years ago, he assures us, he was not thought unworthy of the position which he holds supposed that, in declaring he believed in all the canonical scriptures, he said the truth. Just think of a man taking the battle of Waterloo (and on the side of the victorious army, well knowing, as every one does, it is in pursuit most are slain) as a test of the numbers of Asiatic armies -- as to which a child who has read Rollin's History of Greece or Persia knows the difference!
Dr. C. complains of the destructive razzia against Midian. Midian had been the means of corrupting Israel, and leading them to idolatry, so as to lead to twenty-five thousand Israelites falling in the pestilence God sent; and that by the inexpressible wickedness of Balaam, who, when he could not curse Israel, recommended Balak to lead them into sin, and then God could not bless them. For this they were punished, and, as a settled nation there, destroyed. Dr. C. congratulates himself that he is not called on to believe it. But thus he must give up the entire Old Testament for his own notions; he must give up God's judging the world. God sent Abraham's seed down into Egypt because the iniquity of the Amorites was not yet full. The whole history is a history of the judicial extermination of these races for their wickedness. It is a question, not of history, but of the whole ways and dealings of God in judgment. He will find it in the Psalms; he will find it in the Revelation. God presents Himself as a moral governor, and in this special case used human instruments to carry out His judgments, as He did afterwards against Israel, as He had warned them by the prophets. The whole establishment of Israel was founded on the principle rejected by Dr. C. all God's judgments are.
Dr. C. does not like to believe in judgment. Be it so. But that is no way of judging of history. As to God's revelation of Himself, it is objected that the Old Testament character of God cannot be that of the true God. He did not reveal Himself in Judaism, He gave laws and promises; but He dwelt in thick darkness -- was avowedly hid behind the veil. The way into the holiest was not made manifest. He was patient in goodness and grace, but the system was one of public moral government. The sins of the fathers could be visited on their children, as we see still in providential government. There was a code of national laws of which Christ could say, "Moses for the hardness of your hearts gave you this commandment." In the national laws he did not set aside slavery. The law made nothing perfect. God took, as a people in the world, the people where they were; put checks on will; softened in many respects the manners of the age by His authority; and, what was an immense point, suffered nothing to be done without it -- an immense point, because arbitrary will was arrested.
But all this was not bringing souls to God, nor revealing God as He is to souls. He is light and love. He has been revealed in Christ -- a revelation Dr. C., it appears, is content to give up. He is so wise, so competent to know God and judge of what He ought to be, that he can give up all revelation of Him; and yet he is ignorant of the first principles of the revelation he is giving up, and publishes an empty book, if ever there was one, to prove it. He assumes (as his statements are conclusive) Moses and all the prophets are ignoramuses, Christ knows no better than the rabbis, but Dr. C. of course does. Christ attaches His sanction to the whole of the Old Testament, as having the authority of God. Now this does not merely affirm inspiration; it is the blessed Lord putting His seal to God's having been justly represented there as thus revealed. Dr. C. thinks differently; he would not have such a God -- is relieved in thinking it is not true. Christ felt no need of such relief. What shall we think of one who holds the nominal place of bishop of the Christian church, who counts himself the moral superior of the Lord? Who else will think so? Think of the vanity and character of the man who could! Did ever a man degrade himself to the same degree? For Christ did not see anything moral to make Him call in question its being a revelation of God; Dr. C. does. Christ could see that there were national laws given, as suited to the hardness of their hearts; that Dr. C. does not see. He is as ignorant of the relationship of the gospel to the law as a national code, as he is presumptuous and ill-founded in judging the law and slighting the gospel. For every man of sense the book will do good.
But I will complete the question of detail as to the Midianites. (Numbers 31; compare chapter 21: 1 and chapter 28: 33-40.) The objection is, that time is not allowed for the destruction and other events before Moses addressed the people; Deuteronomy 1: 3. I have, as will be seen, no objection to the result at which Dr. C. arrives; but I will shew the levity of the proofs, and then the excessive carelessness of the author. There is no proof whatever of the time employed in the destruction of Arad's cities. It is very probable the prisoners alluded to had been taken thirty-eight years before, when they would go up the mountain (Numbers 14: 44, 45); they may or may not. Israel, then defeated, now avenge themselves. Five days may have very easily done the work. Further, it appears to have been carried into effect during the mourning for Aaron, for they left Mount Hor afterwards; Numbers 28: 41. Next, we are told that there was a fortnight for the serpents and healing, and then a month of journeyings. This is the usual inattention to the facts. They moved on from one station to another, and murmured because of the way, and the serpents were sent while on the journey. They had made four encampments of this journey before the serpents were sent; this is certain by comparing Numbers 21: 10 and chapter 33: 41-43. Thus the three months and a half become perhaps a month and a half, or two months.
Sihon was defeated -- it may have been in a day -- and the country fell to Israel. They marched thence up north, and Og came out with all his people and was defeated. For all this there may have been a month, possibly more. Thus three months, at the outside, would have sufficed for what Dr. C. takes six months for. Let it be three and a half. This much is certain, that, in the point where Dr. C. is precise, the serpents and supposed subsequent journey, he is precisely wrong by not consulting the text. Dr. C. then, for the remaining facts, gives "March forward to the plains of Moab." March forward from where? They were in Moab; the expeditions had started thence. But they were by Arnon, the border of Moab. They made then very short stages. They might have moved their headquarters, but they were in Moab, only they moved into the plain from Mount Abarim. Balak was alarmed, and sent for Balaam. This may have taken a week. We have thus some four months gone. Here Israel fell into sin with Moab, and thereupon Israel attacks the Midianites by divine command. My statements leave two months for this. I should be quite disposed to say with Dr. C. six weeks perhaps, and probably four, was ample, so as to allow a month more for the previous marches and wars. No one can pretend to say how much each took; there was time enough for all.
But this is not even necessary, though it sufficed to shew the arbitrariness, and even error, of Dr. C.'s calculations. More was spent in some parts; in others the text contradicts him. But what is curious enough is, that Dr. Colenso has made the passages he holds to be irreconcileable, so as to prove they are unhistoric, exactly coincide by his computation, and has not found it out! Moses's address in Deuteronomy 1: 3 is after defeating Sihon and Og, as it is expressly stated, verse 4. Dr. C. says, "Thus, then, from the first day of the fifth month, in which Aaron died, to the completion of the conquest of Og, king of Bashan, we cannot reckon less together than six months ... and are thus brought down to the first day of the eleventh month, the very day on which Moses is stated to have addressed the people in the plains of Moab, Deuteronomy 1: 3." Just so, accordingly, Deuteronomy 1: 4 states that it was after he had slain Og that he made the address. Dr. C. has managed to make a blunder in his proofs, but has tumbled by mistake into proving exactly historic what he attacks, and this is to set aside the Bible by unquestionable facts!
On the quotations from Cicero and the Hindoo author celebrating Ram I have spoken, and add no more here. A more pretentious and futile attempt to set aside the revelation of God it never came to my lot to examine.
It may be well just to add that the quotation from "Types of Mankind," which Dr. Colenso quotes, as he says, with entire sympathy, is from one of two works by Messrs. Gliddon and Nott, to prove that there are several races of mankind, as there are of animals, and following the analogy of the forms of these last, according to a theory of Agassiz; the object being to prove that the negroes are a distinct race, and formed and destined to be fit for slavery. I can hardly think, if he was so zealous with the Zulu for the honour of the true God as to condemn the Pentateuch, because it recognized slavery in Israel, that he can have read the book. It is very superficial, is wrong according to the best authorities as to America, particularly South America, and contradicts itself as to Africa; his only argument, to which he (Mr. Gliddon) constantly recurs, being the presence of negro figures on Egyptian monuments, of which, with Lipsius and others, he exaggerates the antiquity in a way which the monuments themselves clearly prove to be false, inasmuch as kings given as successive are proved by the monuments to be contemporary -- as many as eight at a time. Mr. Gliddon was Consul-General of the United States in Egypt. I quite admit Dr. C. does not quote the book in what it says of negroes; but the argument which meets his entire sympathy is used to get rid of the "prejudice," which believes with Paul that "God has made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth," in order to justify the reducing the blacks to slavery as a distinct race.
2 Timothy
Allow me to say a few words to you, in which there will be nothing very new, on a subject on which simplicity and decision are of the utmost importance in these days. The Second Epistle to Timothy presents to us, as long ago observed, the ruin of the church in its earthly standing, and the heart of the apostle deeply affected by it, as would be the case, under the working of the Spirit of God, with one who had been God's instrument for founding it. It individualizes the duty of the Christian -- a momentous principle in these days when the church (so-called, really the clergy) renews the pretension to govern the conscience.
This epistle does not give us the church according to the purpose of God, and its full character in heavenly places (as in the Ephesians), nor is it the order of the church on earth (as in 1 Timothy); but we have in it life and salvation, now fully revealed in Christ (chapter 1: 1, 9, 10), but a piety which could be found in Jews as such, and in which Paul could speak of his forefathers. The church, indeed, is not mentioned at all. Not that the fellowship of saints is not noticed; it is expressly, but of those in whom purity of heart is known to exist, the testing of which was not known in the first beginning. Then those who came were received: only the Lord took care of the purity of the assembly, and manifested His own, adding to the church daily such as should be saved. Now He knew them that were His, and the responsibility rested on every one that named the name of the Lord to depart from iniquity; and the believer is to follow the path of peace and grace with those that call on the name of the Lord out of a pure heart.
Two points are brought before the believer here to guide his feet: his individual conduct, including his conduct as to other individuals; and his relationship to the public profession of Christianity in the world.
As to the first, he is, as I have said, to depart from iniquity. Such is the nature of Christianity, it cannot associate in walk with evil. He purges himself -- for it is individual duty -- from vessels to dishonour, which, in a great house, he expects to find. He seeks fellowship with those who join to a profession of Christ a pure heart, from which profession flows. On this, chapter 2 is as clear as possible. It is his individual responsibility; and it is important to take in both parts.
If the first part only is taken up (the departing from iniquity and purging from vessels to dishonour), the conscience may be upright; but a spirit of judgment and of self-righteousness will be engendered. If the latter only (to seek to walk with those pure in heart), without the former, conscience will be loose, and faithfulness to Christ, and obedience, more or less lost. The heart must be engaged in the love of God's people and fellowship with them, and the conscience be pure and faithful, as having done with evil, when evil is all around and allowed.
As to the second great point, our relationship to the public profession of Christianity in the world, chapter 3 gives equally clear direction. The peril of the last days is found in a form of godliness, denying the power of it. The direction is as simple as it is positive: "from such turn away." Where form without power is, we are not to go, but, in a positive way, to turn away from it. But this would not, in itself, in the perilous times, be sufficient; for in the decay of practical piety and devotedness in the evangelical professing world many, whose principles are far more false, lead individually a life of great devotedness -- often, I allow, on false principles, yea, in themselves deadly principles -- but it is a sad snare when devotedness is found on the side of false doctrine, and worldliness with a greater degree of substantial truth. This is not the case, if the effect be taken as a whole; far from it; but individual cases, and the fire of first impressions, produce enough to make the devotedness of individuals a snare, leading men to receive false doctrine and to fall into Satan's hands (for so it really is), when the devotedness is founded on a real denial of grace and truth of the gospel, as Paul insists on it.
Another point therefore is brought out here: the authority with which our souls are directly in communion, on which our conduct rests, the rule by which it is guided, and the application to the individual soul of that authority and rule. Is this mediate or immediate? Is it by the intervention of the church, as an authority between me and God? or is it the direct and immediate connection of my soul with God, and immediate subjection to His authority in His word? It is the latter, not the former. This is no rejection of ministry. If another knows the word better than myself -- has more spiritual power, he can help me; and this is according to the mind and will of God. But he does not come between my soul and the word, but brings me more fully into acquaintance with what God says to me in it. My soul is only the more in immediate relationship with God by His word. This only is the rule and measure of my responsibility, the expression of the authority of God over me. Another may be the means of my being more completely so; but he puts me thereby in immediate relationship to God by the word, more fully and more in detail, but does not take me out of the relationship. It remains immediate, as before, and there can be no other; it is direct with God; and God's title is absolute, and embraces the whole of my being in obedience. He exercises His authority immediately by the word. This may sanction, and does, duties towards others; but these are acknowledged by the authority of, and in obedience to, the word -- to God in His word. I am to fulfil every relationship in which God has placed me, but by and according to the word. My first, immediate, and all-ruling relationship is with God by the word. It has precedence of all others, rules in all others, and claims absolute and immediate subjection. "We ought to obey" is the Christian's ensign; but "we ought to obey God rather than men" is the absolute claim of God, who has revealed Himself fully, and reveals Himself immediately to us by the word.
The church may have -- has -- to be judged; the individual has to take notice of it -- is called on to do so, so that it cannot have authority over him as the ultimate rule for his soul. He is bound to take the word of God as the ultimate rule and norm of truth and conduct, having authority immediately from God over his soul, with nothing else between him and God. It is evident we are not here speaking of the discipline of an assembly exercised according to the word. That word which ordains it recognizes its validity, but what in religious, and indeed, in all matters, is the ultimate rule and authority.
There is another question apparently, but which is not really one, namely, Is the soul immediately cognisant of the word, and is it responsible to God for itself according to that authority? -- or can anything else come in between with authority, so that a soul is not immediately responsible to God according to that word? The only question really is -- Is God's word immediately addressed to the conscience of man, so as to hold him responsible when so addressed? No one in his senses would deny that if God revealed anything to a man, he ought to give heed to it. Infidelity may contest the fact that there is a word of God -- a ground which, in controversy, Roman Catholics generally take under the form of the question, "How do I know it is so?" I assume here there is a word of God. I inquire, is its authority immediate over my soul? -- or is anything, now I have it, between it and my soul? Is the authority of the oracles of God absolute, immediate? Do they bring me under an obligation which allows nothing to come between them and my soul, or to limit or modify their authority? I would remark, in passing, that save three Epistles, the writings of the New Testament (and, as far as the principle goes, the Old also) were addressed, not to the clergy (if we are so to call them), but by the clergy to the people. The claim of the clergy to possess them as such is sheer folly; they were specifically addressed to the Christian people by those commissioned of God to do it. This is undeniable. In one, Paul specially charges it to be read to all the holy brethren, and they very young Christians; 1 Thessalonians 5: 27. If professing Christians are so ignorant now that they cannot understand it, this is the effect of centuries of the church's teaching, but is no longer the case where there is lowliness and where the grace of God is looked to. "The entrance of thy words giveth light; it giveth understanding to the simple." "I am wiser than all my teachers," says David, "for thy law do I love." "They shall be all taught of God" is the promise given to us.
But my present object is less general than this, important as this truth may be. I speak of the instructions given by the apostle in Epistles, which were addressed to one in whom he had the greatest confidence as a servant and man of God, who had worked with him in the gospel, as a son with a father, and to whom he could reveal his inmost feelings, and could tell what was needed for the church when the evil days should come in; when the form of godliness, where the power was denied, forced on the conscience as duty the judgment of the state of the church -- wherein the apostle has revealed to us Christ's judgment, and called upon us to bow to and act upon it -- an epistle, in a word, which gives, not general truth and precious instruction to the Christian, but special guidance in the dangerous evils of the last days. This, with all church history before us, when subjection to the church was so long maintained, and darkness by it, and when the church (as Christ has loved, sanctifies, and will present it to Himself without spot and wrinkle) was so diligently and long confounded with the building of wood and hay and stubble, which had grown up, as they themselves admitted, into a large mixed worldly body, and that the church was as bad or worse than the world -- this revelation of the judgment of the church is of all importance. Diligently was it insisted on, as by Cyprian and sundry others, that the Holy Ghost was and could be nowhere else; that all outside the external form were lost. And so sternly was this held, that while the former confesses that the state of the church was disastrous (just what the world was, bishops and all, so that the worst persecution was only a light-needed chastisement), yet they insist that when any left it, pressed in conscience by its state, they left salvation and eternal life absolutely; there was no grace elsewhere.+
+It is somewhat strange that he whom Cyprian always called his master did so leave it. It is one of the riddles of theologians now, to distinguish the writings of this church-father before and after his leaving the great outward body.
By this insisting on the privileges of an avowedly corrupt church too, souls who shrank from what was utter dishonour to Christ were left a prey to those who were really heretics or fanatics, when their consciences could no longer stand the moral state of the great outward body that held and claimed the place of the church of God. It is one of the sad parts of church history, the seeing how persons who left the public body when immorality and idolatry of the grossest kind were come in, often fell into the hands of, or were mixed up with, those whom Satan raised up to perplex and ruin the testimony of God. The primitive church never defended itself against the workings of heresy by the truth as they had it not (Irenaeus did so, perhaps a little), but by their own claims to possess all and their hereditary title to it: so even Irenaeus, Tertullian, Cyprian, and others. And those who made more allowance were themselves philosophers far from the truth, as Clemens Alexandrinus, and Origen. These did make a difference between some heretics and others; but, after that, schism or heresy were alike fatal:+ and if afterwards a difference was made, none was made in denying salvation to them, or in burning them, when that became the fashion of the church.
+It is a curious fact in church history, that what made Cyprian such a stickler for church unity, and no grace elsewhere, was finally given up and condemned by the church at large -- the mere validity of schismatical and heretical baptism. Cyprian certainly was never consistent.
Now, with such a history before us, how immensely important is it to see that the individual is bound to judge the state of the professing church! At all times they were called on to recognize Christ's judgment of the state of the church, and be guided by the word as to it. They would have learned not to confound the body of Christ with the professing body.+ But in 2 Timothy 3 we are expressly called on to turn away from such as deny the power of godliness, though maintaining the form. But, if I am individually called upon to recognize and act on -- whatever that action may be -- the judgment of Christ as to the state of the church, then the church has ceased to be an authority, and is judged by the word, to which I am expressly called to give heed in that judgment; its judgment as a public body cannot be an authority governing my spiritual judgment, in which I am bound to follow the word, where it is itself judged in its mind and state. Christ expressly calls us individually to hear what the Spirit says to the churches; not what the church says, but what is said to them. I am not now saying what the consequence may be -- on that 2 Timothy 2 and 3 are clear -- but that the individual is called on to take heed to what Christ says as to the state of the church. It is not a thing to be overlooked that this first takes place in respect of Ephesus, where such blessing and knowledge of privilege was. The vessel of the highest grace, she represents the church's departure from its first estate, and receives the threat of the removal of the candlestick. But all I say now is: the individual is called upon as such to listen to Christ, and take notice of the judgment He forms of it. The church is a judged object, not an authority. The individual is bound to receive immediately from Christ or the Spirit by the word, what He says to him independent of the church's authority, yea, about the church itself. Yea, it is the proof that he has ears to hear, to hear Christ, to hear what the Spirit says. What, then, is the rule, when in professing Christendom there should be the form of godliness without the power, as certainly the apostle tells us would be the case in the perilous times in the last days, when Christians have to turn away from the form of godliness? We have it in a double form.
+This Augustine did, but equally insisted that all were lost who were separated from the latter, and made the day of judgment the time of separation and a kind of purgatory.
The church, it cannot be; that has brought us into perilous times, and the case occurs in which I have to turn away from the common state of things -- men shall be so under the form of godliness without the power. There is no rule, no authority to retain me there. I am bound to recognize that state, and to turn away. First, the knowledge of the individual from whom I have learnt anything; secondly, the scriptures. The former is a simple, but very important rule. A tradition comes, no one can tell from whom: I am told that "the church has preserved it" is a sure ground of faith. Paul says, No; you must know from "whom you have learned it." It is said, "according to the fathers"; or "the consent of the fathers." But this gives me no authentic source. Timothy knew he had received it from Paul, a divinely-inspired and authorized teacher, and the thing was sure. No church-teaching, no tradition, however universal, can assure me the truth. I cannot say of whom (para tinos) I have learned it. I must have an individual of certain and inspired authority, to make me receive anything as the truth. I must know of whom I have received it. This applies to perilous times, when there is a form of godliness, when the church is in disorder -- for a form of godliness without the power is itself disorder -- and then a certain source of authority is of all importance. But if Paul, or Peter, or John have taught anything, I know of whom I have learned it, as Timothy did, and I am assured of it. If fathers, or no one can say who, have taught a thing, I have no divinely-given security.
The second authority referred to, which in part is the same, is the scriptures; but this has its special character. These are holy writings. God has provided that for His saints, which, with the key of faith in Christ Jesus, is a sure and certain guide -- a body of writings called by the apostle (that is, by divine authority) the holy scriptures, of which a child could be cognisant as such, guided by the piety of a mother -- and to be received as inspired and having divine authority, composed of a number of distinct writings, but forming a whole of which it could be said as a known whole, "the holy scriptures," and of each particular part, "every scripture," recognized in this way (in the most solemn manner by the Lord Himself, as well as by His apostle) as a whole, and as the inspired work of particular authors, and that as written documents, distinctively as such, and commanding faith as inspired. "Knowing this first," says Peter, "that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man, but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." "That it might be fulfilled," is the constant testimony of Matthew; or, more generally, "then was fulfilled." "The scripture cannot be broken," says the Lord; "it is written in the prophets, They shall be all taught of God." "If they believe not his writings, how shall they believe my words?" And in Gethsemane (Matthew 26: 56), contrasting their testimony "in the temple," but "that the scripture must be fulfilled." So "then opened he their understandings, that they might understand the scripture," saying, "Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer." And in that same journey, "Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory?" "And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself." It behoves, ought to be, since it was in the scripture. So Paul could say, "the scripture foreseeing ... preached," because the mind of God was in it. So, as often remarked, the Lord quotes the Old Testament as a recognized whole, as used among the Jews, "Moses and the prophets and the psalms." He used the scriptures, the written testimony, to silence the adversary, and referred to them, in rebuking the Jews, as one of a series of divine testimonies, which left them without excuse.
I do not here quote the numberless texts in which the authority of the scriptures is recognized by the blessed Lord and His apostles. If these, He assures, were not believed, one would rise from the dead in vain, that men might be persuaded. No testimony from the actuality of another world would avail, if these writings were not listened to. But we find not only the authority of particular scriptures affirmed, but, what is important to remark, its being there gave it authority. It was sufficient that it was scripture to give it divine authority. The scripture cannot be broken. It is not merely that truths may be found in it (that may be the case in any sermon, or in this tract), or that the word of God is in it, but that being in the scriptures was sufficient to give to what was there authority as the word of God. It is God's ordained method of authority, not merely of truth -- any one may be a means of communicating that -- but it is authority for the truth, is clothed with divine authority in what it states, and is recognized by Christ Himself as having it, as also by all the apostles. They were more noble that searched them to see if what an apostle stated was so. The scriptures have authority, and are addressed to God's people; not as such to the clergy or ministers of the word, but, save a very small portion, as we have seen, are addressed by those ministers to the people.
From all alike we can learn. We can learn from these addressed to his trusted fellow-servants by the apostle Paul, what the church was, what it ought to be, and what it would be. Let us see then the apostle's account of the value of these books, and the place they hold, in what he says to Timothy, and that especially when the church has lost its true character, has a form of piety, and denies the power of it. After having spoken of Timothy's having learnt the truth from himself, the apostle says, "and that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures." Here is the well-known book so entitled, which, as such, had authority. As a child, he had known it and learned its contents. And these scriptures, through faith in Christ Jesus (the great key to all), were able to make him wise to salvation. It is alleged that this is the Old Testament. No doubt what Timothy had known as a child was the Old Testament: but whatever has a claim to be called the holy scriptures comes under this title, and enjoys the privileges attached to that title. Paul claims this authority for what he wrote (1 Corinthians 14: 37), and makes the difference between his spiritual experience, however great it was, and what the Lord said, but the things he wrote were the commandments of the Lord. The end of Romans assures us that the mystery of the gospel, hidden from the prophetic and all previous ages, was made known in prophetic scriptures+ to all nations. And Peter puts Paul's Epistles on a level with the other scriptures. Scripture is a recognized title; whatever is that has authority, and by grace, enlightening power; it judges, and is not judged. This then is the divine, and divinely given resource for the Christian when the church is in an evil state -- the scriptures, and the scriptures as a child has known the book: and they are capable to make the individual wise to salvation through faith in Christ. It is not a slighting of ministry. Timothy did not slight Paul assuredly; but the gifted apostle referred him to this as the sure individual guide when the church was in confusion and evil.
+Not "the scriptures of the prophets": the passage is quite clear.
But scripture can do more; it can furnish the man of God perfectly. And here we get more than the knowledge from a child, or saving wisdom through faith. The passage refers to the man of God -- him who is for God in this world -- a large and comprehensive expression. In a certain sense, in service, he represents God, so far as he acts under His guidance and by His power -- "in all things behaving ourselves as the ministers of God." But he stands, at least, as serving God in the world. It is an expression borrowed from the Old Testament. And here we find not the book as a whole, but every part -- everything rightly called scripture is inspired, theopneustos. Evidently, it could not have the authority which the Lord and the apostles ascribe to it; we should not see the Lord (in the most solemn moments and in the most absolute way) using His divine power to enable His disciples to understand it, if it were not truly inspired. But there is more than this.
It is not all the truth that the scriptures contain the word of God, but everything that is scripture is inspired,+ and profitable for all needed to make the man of God perfect. Everyone who has to act for God in this world, to stand for Him before the world -- and (though some be specially called) all have more or less to do so -- finds all he wants to complete his state and competency for service, in the scripture. But it is not only this that it contains what is needed; but everything truly called scripture is inspired -- has the distinct name given by God Himself to that which He willed to be received as coming from Himself. We have, a child has (as to its authority which faith alone can make effectual) writings which claim for themselves the subjection of our souls, as being God's word immediately to ourselves, so that the intervention of any is interfering with His right -- His immediate right over the soul as belonging to Him. It is not that others cannot help me in apprehending what is there; but that He helps me to what is there, and none can interfere to hinder the direct claim of what is then on my soul, or he interferes with God's title, no matter whether it is an individual or the church which does so. And the higher the claim to do so, the greater the guilt.
I acknowledge the authority of all scripture as absolute and direct from God. I may surely be helped to know more of what is there to be profited by, to be enjoyed, or obeyed. I am specifically taught to go to the scriptures, to rely on them -- taught to do it individually, not as judging them, but as a direct claim of God over me when the church has become a form of godliness. Always true and enjoyed by all together when the church was right, in the Epistles received from the apostles, and the Gospels which we have given us of God, it became necessary truth -- truth to this effect by the apostle, when the church was gone wrong, and perilous times would come in the last days.
+I have no doubt that this is the right translation: but it does not alter the matter I am now upon. For every divinely-inspired writing equally and specifically ascribes inspiration to everything that has a title to that name, and then adds other characteristics.
Let us not forget, if the sense of the present state of things does not press upon us, that we know from scripture that those times were set in when John wrote and Paul wrote, and Peter and Jude. John could say, we know it is the last time: John could give the Lord's warning voice to the falling church in the seven churches of the Apocalypse; Peter could tell us that the time was come for judgment to begin at the house of God; Jude be forced to write to insist on the faith once delivered, because those had got into the church who will be the objects of Christ's judgment at the last day; Paul, that the mystery of iniquity already worked, and would do so till the lawless one was at last revealed after the falling away -- that already all sought their own, not the things of Jesus Christ. And he (though the wise architect to lay the foundation), when his departure was at hand, had to warn his beloved disciples, as he had the elders of Ephesus, of the evils at the door, and that evil men and seducers would wax worse and worse, and the church be a form of godliness without the power.
Then the individual comes out afresh (for we learn nothing of the church in 2 Timothy except its failure and ruin), and the man of God has to hold his ground against advancing evil; and then the scriptures get the place they were meant to hold -- a necessity not so felt when all flowed in the stream of divine power, receiving the care and leading of the apostles themselves, but brought cut for the days of evil and seduction with divine authority, divine inspiration, and divine sufficiency to instruct.
It is evident that "knowing from whom thou hast learned them" now resolves itself also into the scriptures.
The word of God, as the blessed Lord Himself, comes out from God, and is adapted to man. In this, with the living Word, it stands alone and is perfected in it.
Let me here engage my reader to realize in his own mind, and, if occasion call for it, insist with others on, the passage which connects itself closely with what we have considered -- I mean the passage in 1 John 2: 24, "Let that therefore abide in you which ye have heard from the beginning: if that which ye have heard from the beginning shall remain in you, ye also shall continue in the Son and in the Father." Nothing has secure authority for the believer but that which was from the beginning. This alone secures our continuing in the Father and the Son. There may be much respectable, much "reverend antiquity"; and the spirit of reverence, where the object is true, is a very important quality in the believer, but an amazing means of seduction when it is not. But, as a ground of faith, the Christian must have "what was from the beginning"; the authority for believing must be "that which existed from the beginning" -- must have been heard from the beginning. In the scriptures I have that certainty; I have the thing itself: nowhere else. Many may preach the truth and I profit by it; but by the word, specially here by the New Testament, I have the certainty of what was from the beginning, and I have it nowhere else. No agreement of Christians can give me this. If Rome and Greece and England were all one, their agreement would not give me what was from the beginning as a fact; the scriptures certainly do.
I may be told that it is very presumptuous for me to set my judgment against such authority. I have no judgment of mine to set; I believe in what Paul and John and Peter and the blessed Lord said: there is no presumption in that. I do as they bid me, I receive and hold fast to what "was in the beginning." If, indeed, any say that "it is not easy to understand," I ask, "Are they?" This is presumption -- to say they can teach the truth better than the apostles and the Lord, who spoke to the multitudes. At any rate I must have, not what the primitive church held, but "what was from the beginning." Hence the same apostle says, "He that is of God heareth us; he that is not of God heareth not us: hereby know we the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error."
Thanks for having sent me Mr. Scherer's letter to Dr. Merle d'Aubigne.APPENDIX
ON THE WORK OF CHRIST; OR, REMARKS ON THE SECOND LETTER OF MR. EDMOND SCHERER+
REMARKS ON "CHRISTIANITY AND MODERN PROGRESS" BY THE REVEREND A. RALEIGH, D.D.
DR. COLENSO AND THE PENTATEUCH
INTRODUCTION
THE FAMILY OF JUDAH
THE SIZE OF THE TABERNACLE-COURT
MOSES AND JOSHUA ADDRESSING ALL ISRAEL
THE EXTENT OF THE CAMP
THE NUMBERING OF ISRAEL
THE ISRAELITES DWELLING IN TENTS, AND ARMED
THE INSTITUTION OF THE PASSOVER
THE MARCH OUT OF EGYPT
THE FLOCKS AND HERDS IN THE DESERT
THE NUMEROUS ISRAELITES COMPARED WITH THE EXTENT OF CANAAN
THE FIRSTBORN COMPARED WITH THE ADULTS
THE SOJOURNING IN EGYPT, EXODUS, AND THEN NUMBERS
THE DANITES AND LEVITES, ETC.
THE PRIESTS AND THEIR DUTIES
THE PRIESTS AND THEIR DUTIES AT THE PASSOVER
THE WAR ON MIDIAN
CONCLUSION
SCRIPTURE: THE PLACE IT HAS IN THIS DAY