THE DESTRUCTIVE CHARACTER OF MODERN BIBLE CRITICISM

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§ 1. Clashing Views on Bible Criticism.

Such, then, is an outline of the state of apologetics on the subject of Miracles in general, and of those connected with the central doctrines of the Church in particular. Nothing could be more unsatisfactory, nothing more calculated to arouse suspicion of the Faith; and now, if we turn our attention to the “Higher Criticism,” and to the apologetics it has called forth, we shall find these suspicions still further strengthened. On the one hand a considerable proportion of these criticisms are accepted by the more enlightened divines, and, on the other hand, those who refuse to accept any of them urge that they undermine Christianity.

The Dean of Canterbury, Dr. Wace, is one of the latter class. Speaking at a men’s service (at St. Mary Bredin’s Church, Canterbury, on December 4th, 1904), he justly twits the critics for describing a considerable part of the Bible, and particularly the early part, as “not historical,” when “what they mean is that it is not true.” No subtle theories are required to support Dr. Wace’s belief in Christianity, for even the first chapter of Genesis is, in his opinion, a “substantially accurate” account of “that which happened on earth before there were any men upon it,” and “is the best proof that the Bible proceeded from God.” He remains among the dwindling number of those who, in these days of Christian storm and stress, still cling to the old ideas about the Bible. His reasons for doing so are apparently similar to those given by “Roger” in a little pamphlet entitled Roger’s Reasons (by John Urquhart), where it is sought to reconcile the Bible and Science at the expense of accuracy, logic, and common sense. For the obscurantist, belief is made easy, and the apologies for the Faith can be comparatively straightforward. For the “enlightened” the conditions are reversed.

An example of the advanced views of a Church of England divine, and of the objections to these views of a strictly orthodox Churchman, may prove instructive. Reviewing the Bishop of Winchester’s book, On Holy Scripture and Criticism, the Church Times (of February 10th, 1905) pertinently observes: “Attacks upon the Gospel narratives of the Virgin Birth and the Resurrection, made with such persistence from within the Church, are ugly developments which were not anticipated in 1890. Yet, strange to say, there is no recognition of the new situation in the Bishop of Winchester’s book.”

This silence regarding points especially requiring explanation is, I fear, a common feature in religious apologetics. Look again at the reviewer’s next remark: “The Bishop forgets that the truth of the message is intimately connected with the authenticity of the record, and a critical theory which assails the one assails the other.” Here, then, we have an elementary truth frankly recognised; and, in plain English, it means that, if the Bishop’s criticisms be true, Christianity is untrue. Entering into more detail, the writer goes on to say: “For example, the Bible record of the Fall and the truth of our Lord’s ‘atoning death on the Cross’ are closely connected with each other. Modern criticism discards the former as a myth, and indications abound on every side that the denial of the Fall leads to a denial of the Atonement. It is not too much to say that the new method of interpreting the Bible has helped to overthrow belief in Christ as a Divine Redeemer. His redemptive work and mediatorial office have been thrust into the background.”

The situation could not be put more lucidly. There is no hair-splitting or glozing here. The reviewer characterises this silence on crucial points as “grave omissions,” and he might have added that such omissions are calculated to arouse suspicions of the Faith. He continues: “Again the Bishop says:—

Think of the use made of the Hebrew Scriptures by the Apostles in the Acts, or by St. Paul in his Epistles. It is ever the spiritual and moral lesson.

It is by no means ‘ever’ the spiritual and moral lesson only. Both in the Book of the Acts and St. Paul’s Epistles the historical and predictive portions of the Jewish Scriptures are constantly appealed to, and used as the basis of argument. The suggestion that the Apostles attached little importance to the latter is far from being borne out by the evidence. One of the chief things in which they differ from writers of the modern school is their use of Old Testament history and prediction. Compare the place which prophecy occupies in the Epistle to the Romans with the place it holds in the Bishop of Winchester’s book, where no more than sixteen lines in 187 pages are allotted to it.

“Each of the Synoptic Gospels describes the scene at the Transfiguration, when Moses and Elias talked with our Lord in the sight of three of His disciples. St. Luke mentions that they talked about His approaching death. In the face of that narrative, those who say that our Lord knew no more of Moses than any Jew of the period are bound to explain how they reconcile the statement with the Evangelists’ account of the Transfiguration. No Jewish scribe of the first century a.d. could pretend to have seen or conversed with either Elijah or Moses. Bishop Ryle says of our Lord:—

In His incidental references to Moses, He adopts the language of the Scribes.... He never displayed knowledge of facts which could not be possessed by those of his own time.... To His intellectual powers in His humanity there seem to have been assigned the natural barriers of the time in which he lived.

“The Bishop does not perceive apparently that these arguments cut both ways, so that they tell against our Lord’s claim to foreknow the future quite as much as against His knowledge of the past. And we are entitled to ask how they can possibly be made to agree with the express testimony of the Evangelists that Moses and Elijah were seen in Christ’s company, and ‘spake of the decease which He should accomplish at Jerusalem.’”

I have quoted these apposite remarks at length because they will come with more force from the mouth of an orthodox believer than from anyone in doubt like myself. One cannot help wondering what the Bishop could have to urge in reply; for the ground is cut from under him by his own acceptance of so much of modern criticism. As he is a high dignitary of the Church, it is all the more puzzling. Referring to the remarks concerning Moses, it may be mentioned that, according to the critics, Moses is not a historical personage.1 Whether the Bishop accepts this or not it is difficult to say; but apparently he does, from his desire to explain that, “in His references to Moses,” Christ “adopts the language of the Scribes.”

Dr. Driver’s new book on Genesis has also called forth some adverse criticisms from the less advanced. For example, Dr. Lock, the Warden of Keble, enumerates several considerations in support of the general trustworthiness of the patriarchal narratives, and observes that the fact of inspiration, once admitted on the higher level of a moral and spiritual tone, may “well carry its influence over into details of fact, and turn the balance when otherwise uncertain.” Personally, I very much doubt whether the general public, once informed of the truth, will ever be induced to look at facts through Dr. Lock’s spiritual spectacles. Dr. Driver, it should be added, informs us that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph were presumably monotheists, though their monotheism is rudimentary, and the terms in which they express themselves “suggest much riper spiritual capacities and experiences,” being, “in some cases, borrowed evidently from the phraseology of a much later age.” Can we depend upon such narrators to furnish us with true history? Commenting on Dr. Driver’s “impossible interpretations” of the words, “it shall bruise thy head,” and of “the story of the Fall,” his reviewer in the Church Times asks: “Was it, or was it not, a promise made by God? This is the plain question which Dr. Driver’s readers are forced to ask.” Sceptical truthseekers, also, are asking the same question. When will they receive a “straight” answer?

§ 2. A Summary of the Results of Bible Criticism.

The general public know little or nothing of the results of Bible criticism. Why should they? Not only do they deem it a dull subject, but those who attend church are being informed from the pulpit that “the Gospels have been battered by years of criticism, but have come out of it stronger than ever.”2 It is easy enough to make statements of this kind, and, doubtless, they serve temporarily to quiet the fears of a congregation who know very little of the subject, and are only too glad to believe what they are told so authoritatively; but, unfortunately, such statements are, to put it mildly, misleading. The ordinary man is wofully ignorant of the “Higher Criticism.” His ideas of Bible difficulties are mostly confined to common sense. He knows, perhaps, that scoffers of the London parks freethinking type gibe at Holy Writ, and he may himself have made fun of some passages that appear absurd; but here his knowledge of Bible criticism ceases. He is not aware that the critics are a body of the most erudite experts in theology, whose only motive for offering their opinion is to give to the world the result of their arduous research—the motives, in fact, of a Bruno, a Darwin, or a Pasteur.

In view of this widespread ignorance, I propose to enumerate briefly a few of the results of modern criticism, and, in giving these results, I shall omit those arising from a study of comparative mythology and of evolution, as I have devoted separate chapters to that purpose.

A work has been issued lately which sums up the conclusions of Bible criticism—higher,3 lower or textual, and historical. It is called the EncyclopÆdia Biblica. Its four massive volumes set forth the new views, and support them by a mass of learning which deserves our serious consideration.4 Space permits of my giving only a few notes of its conclusions, and but meagre details of the wealth of evidence in support of them.

The Creation Story a Myth.—The story of the Creation as given in Genesis originated in a stock of primitive myths common to the Semitic races. Its coincidences with the Babylonian myth are so numerous that it is impossible to doubt the existence of a real historical connection between them. Many indications show that not till after the Exile in the sixth century B.C. did the story take its present shape.

The Patriarchs Unhistorical Figures.—Then, again, all the stories of the Patriarchs are legendary; they may contain some truth, though how much will probably never be known; to suppose them entirely true is to throw historical criticism altogether overboard. Dr. Peters is the Episcopal rector of a large parish in New York, who has done good service in the past, both as Professor of Biblical Literature in the Episcopal Seminary at Philadelphia and as the first leader of the expedition to Babylonia sent out in 1888 by the University of Pennsylvania. He has lately written a book called The Early Hebrew Story: Its Historical Background. Canon Cheyne, reviewing this book in the Hibbert Journal for January, 1905, remarks: “It will be granted that Dr. Peters’s view of the origination of the stories of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and, to some extent, of Joseph, in myths, legends, and traditions of sanctuaries, is a sound one.”

Book of Genesis Legendary.—The book of Genesis is a composite narrative based on older records long since lost. It appears to have been compiled in the seventh century b.c., and to have been added to again later. The story of the Deluge is a Hebrew version of the Babylonian epic.

Book of Exodus Legendary.—The book of Exodus, too, is another composite legend which has long been mistaken for history. Sober history gives no warrant for supposing that the signs and wonders wrought by Moses ever occurred, that the first-born of Egypt were ever slain, or that Pharaoh was ever drowned in the Red Sea.

Moses a Legendary Character.—The historical character of Moses has not been established, and it is doubtful whether the name is that of an individual or that of a clan. The alleged origin of the Ten Commandments is purely legendary; it is probable that they were framed not earlier than the time of Amos. It is admitted even by conservative critics that the original worship of the Israelites was not of an ethical character.

One of the first suspicions that ever crossed my mind was with regard to the sudden and complete disappearance of the “two tables of testimony, tables of stone written with the finger of God.”5 Later on, when I knew of the Moabite stone6 and the Rosetta stone,7 and especially when I learnt that there were inscriptions on bricks and cylinders of a far earlier date than that ascribed to the giving of the Ten Commandments, the old perplexity returned with added force. I remember, too, the same feeling of dissatisfaction and suspicion as I gazed on the clearly-cut Pali inscriptions in the Buddhist caves near Poona, and thought of those lost tables said to have been inscribed by the finger of God. I once put the question to a well-read clerical friend of mine: “How can these tables, written by the finger of God or by His direct inspiration, have been lost? How is it that they have simply disappeared without a word of explanatory comment in the Bible? It is inconceivably strange. What a witness would they not have been to the truth of the Old Testament account, and to the Divine authority for the Commandments!” His reply was: “It would never have done for these stones to have been preserved, for they would have become objects of worship.” Granted that they might have become objects of adoration, which is worse—to worship faked relics such as the water in which Joseph of Arimathea washed the blood-stained body of Jesus, portions of wood from the true Cross, bits from the crown of thorns, and thousands of odd pieces of bone from the anatomy of the Saints; or to venerate stones that would at least have had the merit of being genuine? Why are we left without any reliable evidences of God’s miraculous revelation of Himself to men, while we have abundant evidence for occurrences of trifling importance to mankind that happened thousands of years before the alleged revelation? Hammurabi (a Babylonian monarch who flourished two thousand years or more before the Christian era) inscribed a very excellent, if somewhat drastic, code of laws upon a pillar of black diorite, and we have now got the stone and read the inscriptions; but the stone inscribed by God is lost!

The Book of Deuteronomy.—Evidence of every kind concurs to prove that in its original form it was a product of the seventh, not of the fifteenth, century B.C. In its present form, Deuteronomy is a composite and considerably modified version of the older work. Originally it may have consisted merely of the long speech attributed to Moses, and this may have been the book which was “found” in the temple in the reign of Josiah, the rest of the work being added shortly afterwards.

As it is difficult to believe that such a work would have remained in the temple undiscovered for eight hundred years, is it not reasonable to conclude that the book was placed there by men who thought the time ripe for religious reforms—in fact, that a “pious fraud” was perpetrated?

The Psalms a Composite Book.—The fond delusion that all the Psalms were written by David (though why we should be anxious to ascribe what is really of much ethical value to a person confessedly immoral I never could understand) has been entirely dispelled. It is doubtful whether David wrote any of the Psalms.

Poetry and Prophetic Literature.—The book of Job is not a literary unity, nor was it written with any particular purpose; it is not a manufacture, but a growth.

Jonah is a Jewish midrash, or tradition, like the histories of Tobit and Susanna, and was certainly written after the Exile. Even orthodox clergymen now admit (in private) that the Jonah story is a fairy tale.

The great book of Isaiah is the work of several authors.

The book of Daniel was once assumed to be the most definitely prophetical of the Old Testament writings—a notion which is seriously discounted by the discovery that it was beyond question written in the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, after or during the happening of the events which were supposed to be foretold, and nearly 500 years after the time of its supposed author. It is questionable whether such a person as Daniel ever existed; but it is certain that his adventure in the den of lions, and that of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego in the fiery furnace, are as fabulous as any in the collection of Æsop.

“As a rule,” says Canon Cheyne, “the prophets directly connect the final restoration with the removal of the sins of their own age, and with the accomplishment of such a work of judgment as lies within their own horizon; to Isaiah the last troubles are those of the Assyrian invasion; to Jeremiah the restoration follows on the exile to Babylon; Daniel connects the future glory with the overthrow of the Greek monarchy.”8

Referring to non-Christian parallels to the belief in a Messiah, Canon Cheyne draws special attention to a Babylonian parallel, and concludes that “it is historically very conceivable that a Babylonian belief may be the real parent both of this and of all other Messianic beliefs within the sphere of Babylonian influence.”9

The manner in which these so-called prophets can be looked upon as foretelling is explained elsewhere10 as follows: “The prophets in the Old Testament, being inspired to interpret human needs, became unconscious prophets of the Christ.... It is quite true that prophecy explained in this way is no longer available for the truth of Christianity to the same extent that it once was—at any rate, for the convincing of unbelievers.”

New Testament Chronology.—We do not know exactly when or where11 Jesus was born, when He died, or how long He ministered. As to the birth of Jesus, the only account which claims to give indications of date rests on a series of mistakes. No census was possible under Herod, and none took place under “Cyrenius” until A.D. 7. The only results which have a high degree of probability are the date A.D. 30 for the death of Jesus, and the period of about one year—conservative opinion estimates it to be three years—for the length of His public ministry.

The Virgin Birth.—The Gospels themselves afford the amplest justification for a criticism of their narratives. Jesus Himself made no appeal to His supposed miraculous birth. The only two verses in the first chapter of St. Luke which clearly express the idea of a supernatural birth so disturb the connection that we are impelled to regard them as an interpolation. It is Joseph, and not Mary, whose descent is traced from the son of Jesse. The genealogy of Joseph, given in the first Gospel, is prior in date to the story of the Virgin Birth, and could have been drawn up only while he was regarded as the real father of Jesus. Also St. Paul’s statement that Jesus was born of the seed of David according to the flesh cannot be reconciled with the account of his having been born of a virgin. There is no recorded adoration of the Virgin by St. Paul, or, for the matter of that, by any of the Apostles or disciples.

Apologists point out that among the Jews, generally, the notion of supernatural birth did not attach to their conception of the Messiah. This is true; but in the school of thought of which Philo was head there were traditions that every child of promise was born of a virgin. Now Philo, the Hellenistic Jewish philosopher of Alexandria, was a contemporary of Christ, and the influence of his school is not disputed. Speaking of him in the article on Alexandria in his Dictionary of the Bible, Dr. Smith says: “It is impossible not to feel the important office which the mystic philosophy, of which Philo is the representative, fulfilled in preparing for the apprehension of the highest Christian truth.” In the next chapter we shall see that this “mystic philosophy” sprang from a heathen source, and that for the whole birth and childhood story of St. Matthew, in its every detail, it is possible to trace a pagan substratum.

Jesus.—Professor A. B. Bruce,12 writer of the article on “Jesus,” points out that, while the Gospels may be regarded as, in the main, a trustworthy tradition, they are unreliable in many of their details. Those details turn out to be the all-important ones, for he goes on to show that: The Temptation is a symbolic representation of a spiritual experience; the story of the Crucifixion is not pure truth, but truth mixed with doubtful legend; the night trial, the mocking, the incident of Barabbas, the two thieves, and the preternatural concomitants of the death are picturesque accessories of doubtful authenticity; Christ’s conceptions of Messiahship were greatly influenced by the later Isaiah; while His spiritual intuitions are pure truth valid for all ages, His language concerning the Father shows limitation of vision; His acts of healing are considered to be real, though it does not follow that they were miraculous. Referring to the strange statement that Jesus declined to expound His parables to the people, lest they should be converted, we are assured that “it is not credible that Jesus would either cherish or avow such an inhuman intention, though it is possible that in His disappointment He may have expressed Himself in such a way as to be misunderstood.”

This is all very well; but, if this be granted, we are naturally anxious to know in how many more matters Jesus may not have been misunderstood. What is the use of a revelation which can be misunderstood in this way? What can be the motive of the Omnipotent Revealer in allowing Himself to be misunderstood? Were not His hearers who misunderstood Him His own selected expositors?

We even find suspicion thrown on the supposed early belief in the divinity of Jesus. For the writer points out that, while in the Gospel of St. Luke Jesus is called “the Lord” about a dozen times, the earlier Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Mark refer to Him simply as “Jesus”—“a fact which seems to indicate the gradual evolution of the belief in His divinity.”

The conclusions of Professor Schmiedel, D.D., of ZÜrich, one of the writers of the article on the Gospels, are still more destructive. He admits13 that his criticisms “may have sometimes raised a doubt whether any credible elements were to be found in the Gospels at all,” and that there are only nine passages which “might be called the foundation-pillars for a truly scientific life of Jesus.” He admits also “the meagreness of the historical testimony regarding Jesus,” as well “in canonical writings outside of the Gospels” as “in profane writers such as Josephus, Tacitus, Suetonius, and Pliny.”

The Resurrection.—The all-important subject of the “Resurrection” is treated by Professor Schmiedel, who tells us that the Gospel accounts “exhibit contradictions of the most glaring kind.” The actuality of the Resurrection depends for its establishment upon these very narratives, and in such a case unimpeachable witnesses are naturally demanded. Such witnesses do not exist. The reality of the appearances has ever been in dispute. The account of the watch at the sepulchre and the sealing of the tomb is now given up as unhistorical even by those who accept the story as a whole. “The statements as to the empty tomb are to be rejected.”14 The silence of St. Paul with regard to these details is unaccountable, if the story of the Resurrection be true. For him nothing less than the truth of Christianity rested on the actuality of the Resurrection of Jesus. During his visit to Jerusalem he had had opportunities of acquiring knowledge relating to it, and it may naturally be assumed that, when endeavouring to prove to the Corinthians the truth of the Resurrection, he would state fully and clearly all that he knew about it. It is admitted on all hands that the appearance recorded by him was in the nature of a vision—a purely subjective experience. And it is well known that St. Paul uses the same Greek word to describe both the appearance to himself and the appearances to the original disciples, thereby implying the possibility that the latter also were of a visionary or subjective character. An apologetic tendency is perceptible in the Gospel account, and this may help to explain the rise of unhistorical elements. It is probable that, in the absence of knowledge, conjectures were freely made, and many questions asked, the replies to which were afterwards assumed to be facts.

The Gospels.—The article on the Gospels by Dr. E. A. Abbott15 and Professor Schmiedel is crowded with damaging criticism. The view hitherto current that the four Gospels were written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and appeared thirty or forty years after the death of Jesus, can, it is stated, no longer be maintained. The four Gospels were compiled from earlier materials which have perished, and the dates when they first appeared in their present form are given as follows:—Mark, certainly after the destruction of Jerusalem in the year 7016; Matthew, about 119 A.D.; Luke, between 100 and 110; and John, between 132 and 140. But, even if we accept more conservative opinions which place the earliest Gospel about 65 A.D., that would not, of course, make any material difference, nor affect the conclusions of criticism as to their contents. Some of their statements of fact are quite erroneous, and the data are often in direct contradiction to one another. The evangelists made it clear that they wrote with a “lack of concern for historical precision.” The imperfection of the Gospel accounts is everywhere manifest. Even if His ministry lasted only a few months, He must have said a thousandfold more, and repeated His sayings with many variations. The text must not be taken as a trustworthy guide to His original meaning. It merely shows us what the evangelists or their predecessors believed him to mean. The situations in which the words of Jesus are said to have been spoken cannot be implicitly accepted.

Both St. Matthew and St. Mark seem to have read into the utterances of Jesus details borrowed from subsequent facts or controversies. The historical value of the third Gospel is lowered by evidence of the writer’s errors and misunderstandings. It has been widely assumed that it was written by the physician Luke, and that Luke was a companion of Paul. This view of its Pauline character, however, can now be maintained only in a very limited sense. It is clear that the third Gospel and the Acts are by the same author, but that author was not Luke. In the fourth Gospel we find more ambiguities than in all the other three together. The story of the raising of Lazarus cannot be considered historical. The common-sense view of the Synoptic omission of the raising of Lazarus is that earlier authors omitted the tradition because they did not accept it, and probably had never heard of it. “Is, then, the record of the raising of Lazarus a fiction?” asks Dr. Abbott. “Not a fiction, for it is a development. But it is non-historical, like the history of the Creation in Genesis, and like the records of the other miracles in the fourth Gospel, all of which are poetic developments.”17

Lastly, we are plainly warned that “it is vain to look to the Church fathers for trustworthy information on the subject of the origin of the Gospels.”18 This is an exceedingly grave admission when we remember that these same untrustworthy fathers of the Church did the work of sifting the wheat from the chaff—settling what was and what was not canonical.

It need hardly be said that these general conclusions, which are supported by evidence that has satisfied numerous Christian scholars, entirely do away with the idea that the Gospels are credible and trustworthy narratives.

The Acts of the Apostles.—The sections of this book in which the narrative is written in the first person plural (says Professor Schmiedel) can be implicitly accepted; but it is equally certain that they are not by the same hand as the rest of the book. Apart from the “we” sections, no statement merits immediate acceptance on the mere ground of its presence in the book. The speeches are constructed by the author in accordance with his own conceptions. This book does not come from a companion of St. Paul; its date may be set down as between A.D. 105 and 130.

The Epistles of St. Paul.—The genuineness of the Pauline Epistles does not appear to be so clear as was once universally supposed. Advanced criticism, Professor van Manen19 tells us, in his elaborate article on “Paul,” has learned to recognise that none of these Epistles is by him, not even the four generally regarded as unassailable. Van Manen’s position, however, is exceptional. In the article on “Epistolary Literature” the Epistle to Philemon and the Epistles to the Philippians, Thessalonians, Galatians, Colossians, Ephesians, and even the Epistle to the Romans, are recognised as real letters written by St. Paul. The genuineness of four of the Epistles is, in any case, generally accepted. As these include the first Epistle to the Corinthians, this conclusion is of the greatest importance. The Bishop of London is “content to rest his case, for not being intellectually ashamed of the documentary evidence, on the four undisputed Epistles of St. Paul.”20

The Apocalypse.—Criticism has clearly shown that the Book of Revelation can no longer be regarded as a literary unit, but is an admixture of Jewish with Christian ideas and speculations. Ancient testimony, that of Papias in particular, assumed the Presbyter John, and not the Apostle, to be its author.


This completes a summary of conclusions, arrived at by eminent Christian scholars of the more advanced school. Though they, or the majority of them, would be the last to make any such admission, the net result amounts practically to a surrender of the Christian dogmas.

§ 3. By Whom the “Higher Criticism” is Accepted.

These criticisms are, I repeat, the work not of anti-Christians, but of Christians, who have devoted themselves to Biblical research, and who are among the greatest living experts in that sphere of knowledge. Canon Cheyne, one of the two editors of the EncyclopÆdia Biblica, has now written a volume on Bible Problems and the New Material for their Solution, in which he appeals to Churchmen and scholars and all who are interested in Bible criticism for thoroughness of investigation. There can be no doubt that there is a crying need for this thorough investigation, which at present is being shirked. While the main results arrived at by the Higher Criticism are, it is true, largely accepted by enlightened divines, the usual policy so far has been not to disseminate such knowledge. On this I shall have more to say in the concluding chapter of this book.

Dr. Harnack in Germany, and M. Loisy in France, may be cited as types of liberal theologians who proclaim their acceptance of the Higher Criticism. They both detach Christianity from mere narrative, and seek to appreciate it as a spiritual reality, which appeals to the imagination, the emotions, and the soul. Dr. Harnack is the Professor of Church History in the University of Berlin, and member of the Royal Prussian Academy, and a book called What is Christianity? is an English translation of sixteen lectures delivered by him in the University of Berlin, 1899–1900. In this book the effort to prove that the Gospels though unhistorical are yet historical, that Christianity though untrue is yet true, is strongly in evidence to any impartial reader. Take his remark on the “Miraculous Element” in Lecture II.; we find the same kind of specious argument on which I have already animadverted in the chapter on Miracles. He says: “Miracles, it is true, do not happen; but of the marvellous and the inexplicable there is no lack—that the earth in its course stood still, that a she-ass spoke, that a storm was quieted by a word,21 we do not believe, and we shall never again believe; but that the lame walked, the blind saw, and the deaf heard, will not be so summarily dismissed as an illusion.” Why? Because, after all, these may have been accomplished by the operation of a natural law with which we are as yet unacquainted! “Although the order of Nature be inviolable, we are not yet by any means acquainted with all the forces working in it and acting reciprocally with other forces. Our acquaintance even with the forces inherent in matter, and with the field of their action, is incomplete; while of psychic forces we know very much less.” He gives the whole situation away, however, by making excuses for the Evangelists, such as “we know that the Gospels come from a time in which the marvellous may be said to have been something of almost daily occurrence,” and “we now know that eminent persons have not to wait until they have been long dead, or even for several years, to have miracles reported of them; they are reported at once, often the very next day.” Again, speaking of the first three Gospels, he says: “These Gospels are not, it is true, historical works any more than the fourth; they were not written with the simple object of giving the facts as they were; they were books composed for the work of evangelisation.” Such reasoning serves only to confirm one’s suspicions. Here is the unedifying spectacle of an erudite scholar using his intellectual powers to make out a case for a Faith built upon foundations which he has himself destroyed. We do not wish to be told that there is a substratum of truth in the Gospel narratives. The ordinary man feels strongly that the whole should be true if it be God’s Word. That this is, and always will be, the common-sense view of mankind is proved by the fact that it is held by the vast majority of the strictly orthodox, as well as by every Agnostic and every cultured heathen.

M. Loisy writes in much the same strain as Dr. Harnack, and finds adherents in both English and Roman Catholic Churches, as may be seen from the correspondence in the Church Times during April, 1904.

In the Hibbert Journal (January, 1905) an Oxfordshire rector, the Rev. C. J. Shebbeare, presents the same aspect of liberal theology by means of various illustrations. He remarks: “It is evident that the lesson taught by our new teachers must have an important bearing upon popular religious conceptions and upon religious practice. Its chief effect will be to deliver us from the error of identifying religion with belief in the supernatural—an error of which it is not difficult to see the pernicious consequences” (italics are mine). This is all very well for those who can divest the Christian religion of its supernatural element, and yet remain honest believers. To my mind, this is simply non-Christian Theism, and the Theistic Church, Swallow Street, is the place where such persons should perform their devotions.

I crave the reader’s patience while I give one more example of advanced apologetics. The Rev. Arthur Moorhouse, M.A., B.D., Tutor in Old Testament Languages and Literature at Didsbury College, offers, in a lecture22 delivered at Manchester on “The Inspiration of the Old Testament,” “an unhesitating and emphatic denial” to the statement that there is any “untruth in the Old Testament.” Yet he tells us that “the early chapters of Genesis are not historical in our modern and scientific sense,” and asks us to remember that, “in the nature of things, it could not be history, for it deals with facts which are, of necessity, prehistoric”! Such pitiful shifts and evasions seem to many of us wholly unworthy of earnest men. “Our fathers,” says Mr. Moorhouse, “may have thought that this was history miraculously dictated, but the Bible does not say so.” No, and the Bible does not say that it is speaking the truth, but “our fathers” were simple-minded enough to forget that such a guarantee was necessary on the part of a book which they, like Mr. Moorhouse, believed to be the inspired Word of God.

§ 4. Admissions by Orthodox Apologists.

I cannot conclude this review of Bible criticism without an allusion to the opinions of those theologians who agree with the “Higher Critics” to an extent far exceeding anything the pious layman suspects. I shall omit, as being too advanced, the views of Dr. Driver, given in his “Genesis,” or of Canon Henson, as expressed in the Contemporary Review and in his book, The Value of the Bible and Other Sermons, or of Archdeacon Wilson, shown in his various interesting books and pamphlets; and will confine myself to comparatively conservative theology. I select, as representative of this type, The Divine Library of the Old Testament, by Dr. A. F. Kirkpatrick (Master of Selwyn College, Regius Professor of Hebrew in the University of Cambridge, and Canon of Ely Cathedral), and The Study of the Gospels, being a “Handbook for the Clergy,” by Dr. J. Armitage Robinson (Dean of Westminster).

In the former, which is among the books selected by the Christian Evidence Society for their Examination in March, 1907, we read: “The lectures do not attempt to deal with many of the graver questions which are being raised as to the Old Testament.” But it is just the more difficult questions, such as those examined with such destructive effect by the Higher Criticism, which specially require to be answered. Why are they neglected? The author goes on to confess that “the books were constructed out of earlier narratives; some were formed by the union of previous collections of poetry or prophecies; some betray marks of a reviser’s hand; and even books which bear the names of well-known authors in some cases contain matter which must be attributed to other writers.” Also we find the following significant admissions. Referring to the important last twenty-seven chapters of Isaiah, he accepts Dr. Driver’s criticisms, and says: “I do not see how we can resist the conclusion that these chapters were not written by Isaiah, but by an unknown prophet towards the close of the Babylonian Exile”; and he owns that “it will inevitably seem to many students of the Bible that, in assigning the prophecy to a date so near to the events which it foretells, we are detracting from its truly predictive character and diminishing its value.” However, he considers that “Isaiah is great enough to share his glory with this disciple, in whom, being dead, he yet spoke; and, paradox as it may seem, the truly prophetic character of the work gains by being referred to the time of the Exile.” By what process of reasoning he arrives at this astonishing conclusion it is exceedingly difficult to comprehend.

Further admissions by Dr. Kirkpatrick must be noticed more briefly. They are: “The first chapter of Genesis is not, as we now know, a scientifically exact account of Creation.” “The account of the Fall is, it may be, an allegory rather than a history in the strict sense of the term.” “The Deluge was not universal in the sense that the waters covered the whole surface of the entire globe.” “The Psalms, like the Proverbs, have a long literary history. They are poems by different authors, and David may be one of them.” “Modern criticism claims, and claims with justice, that the Hexateuch, like so many of the other books, is composite in its origin, and has a long literary history.” “That the Pentateuch was entirely written by Moses is merely a Jewish tradition, which passed into the Christian Church and was commonly accepted until modern times. [Yet how much hangs upon the trustworthiness of this same Jewish tradition, and how much else may not the Church have wrongfully accepted?] Some of the variations of the LXX.23 from the Hebrew text are due, no doubt, to errors and interpolations and deliberate alterations; but after all allowance has been made for these, I do not see how any candid critic can resist the conclusion that many of them represent variations existing in the Hebrew text from which the translation was made.” “It was probably at the very beginning of this period [from the Fall of Jerusalem to the end of the fifth century], towards the close of the first century a.d., that the final settlement of an authoritative text took place.... How came it that all the copies containing other readings have disappeared?... Copies differing from it [the standard text] would die out or be deliberately destroyed.” “The oldest Hebrew MS. in existence of which the date is known was written in 916 A.D.i.e., separated by more than a thousand years from the latest of the works included in the Canon.”

Finally, the following crucial questions are offered (pp. 88–9) and left unanswered: “In what sense, it is asked, can this legislation, which is now said to be Mosaic in elemental germ and idea only, and to represent not the inspired deliverance of a supremely great individual, but the painful efforts of many generations of law-makers; these histories which have been compiled from primitive traditions, and chronicles, and annals, and what not; these books of prophecy which are not the authentic autographs of the prophets, but posthumous collections of such writings (if any) as they left behind them, eked out by the recollections of their disciples; these Proverbs and Psalms which have been handed down by tradition and altered and edited and re-edited; these histories which contain errors of date and fact, and have been, perhaps, ‘idealised’ by the reflection of the circumstances and ideas of the writer’s own times upon a distant past; these seeming narratives which may be allegories; and these would-be prophecies which may be histories; in what sense can these be said to be inspired? The problems raised are grave.” My own thoughts, and the thoughts of many like myself, are here candidly expressed. I have nothing to add, and can only echo this learned divine’s solemn words—the problems raised are grave!

Turning now to the Study of the Gospels, we learn from Dr. Robinson as follows: There is no proof that St. Matthew is the author of the first Gospel. He is unable to fix the date himself, but quotes Dr. Harnack, who says “probably 70–75,” and who also adds the important reservation, “except certain later additions.” St. Mark’s authorship, he thinks, is practically certain, and the year 65 is the probable date. “It is,” he says, “exceedingly probable that St. Peter would not write or preach, even if he could speak at all, in any language but his mother tongue, the Aramaic of Galilee, a local dialect akin to Hebrew. When he wrote or preached to Greek-speaking people, he would use Mark or some other disciple as his interpreter.” What, then, may I ask, had become of the “gifts at Pentecost”?

St. Luke is, according to Dr. Robinson, the fellow-traveller of St. Paul, and the date of his Gospel shortly after 70. Regarding St. John’s, we are informed that Dr. Harnack fixes the date between 80 and 110, and thinks that it was written by another person of the same name—John the presbyter, or elder, of Ephesus. Dr. Robinson, however, in a chapter he devotes to the subject of the fourth Gospel, attempts to show its apostolic authorship.

Dr. Robinson admits that the authorship of all four Gospels is doubtful, but thinks that, regarding the second Gospel, we may accept the second-century tradition that it was written by St. Mark, and that St. Mark was the “interpreter” of St. Peter and wrote the Gospel in Rome from information derived from that Apostle. Very good; let us accept this conclusion. We have it, then, that one of the Gospels is from the mouth of an eye-witness. This eye-witness, however, was, after all, an eye-witness of only one year (or, according to conservative criticism, three years) of Christ’s life; he was an illiterate person, and the information he imparted after thirty or forty years had to be written down by another person in another language, and there is no telling how faithful or unfaithful the translation may have been. Besides, as Dr. Robinson points out in his chapters on “The Great Sermon” and “The Non-Marcan Document,” there are very important omissions in St. Mark’s Gospel. Referring to a supposed source for the information furnished by other evangelists, but omitted by St. Mark, he says: “You may gain some general idea of the scope of this document (the Non-Marcan24) by underlining in St. Luke’s Gospel all those portions which are to be found in St. Matthew, but are not to be found in St. Mark.”

Now, what are these omissions in St. Mark? Are they trivial? Let us judge for ourselves by taking a few selections. There is no mention whatever of the story of Christ’s miraculous birth, nor of the other incidents of His childhood which are said to be in fulfilment of prophecy, and there is no mention of the great Sermon on the Mount. The story of the Resurrection is told in a few sentences, and the Ascension in one sentence. Unfortunately, too, these very sentences are admittedly interpolations, and St. Mark really ends at xvi. 8.25 So there is no account of either the Incarnation, Resurrection, or Ascension, and we are left with oral traditions, “lost” documents, and unknown copyists, as the only source from which to obtain any detailed information concerning the very groundwork of our Creed! Could anything be more unsatisfactory, more calculated to arouse suspicion of the “Christian Verities”—the Gospel truths? I am completely at a loss to understand how the Bishop of Gloucester26 can say that the “Higher Criticism” has been a “gain to the Church,” or the Bishop of London26 that “the New Testament stands ten times as strong as it did fifty years ago.” It would seem to be a case of “where ignorance is bliss,” etc., or else of the wish being father to the thought.

There is much more that I should wish to call attention to, did space permit, but I have now, I think, given some insight into modern Bible criticism, and the extent to which it is accepted by Christians. It only remains, in conclusion, to ask for earnest thought on this new aspect of “the Word of God.” In doing so the following additional considerations may be borne in mind.

§ 5. Some Remaining Difficulties.

WE MUST ACCEPT THE WHOLE OR REJECT THE WHOLE.

The orthodox and traditional view of the Old Testament is preserved in the unrepealed “Blasphemy Act,” 9 and 10, William III., cap. 32, which enacts that any person who shall deny the “Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament” to be of “divine authority” shall be incapable of holding any public office or employment, and shall, on a second conviction, also suffer imprisonment for a space of three years. The Vatican Council of 1870, “speaking under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost,” declared that the books of the Old and New Testament “have God for their author, and, as such, have been delivered to the Church.” The Council, therefore, ordained that the man should be anathema who refused “to receive, for sacred and canonical, the books of the Holy Scripture in their integrity, with all their parts.”

Dr. Bayley expressed the opinion of his day when he wrote27: “The Bible cannot be less than verbally inspired. Every word, every syllable, every letter, is just what it would be had God spoken from heaven without any human intervention. Every scientific statement is infallibly correct; all its history and narratives of every kind are without any inaccuracy.”

Listen, again, to the words of a well-known divine of our own Church, spoken but yesterday: “The whole of the teaching of the New Testament is based upon the supposition that God made a covenant with Abraham.”28 “You have our Lord Jesus Christ building His whole life on the Scriptures, and submitting to death in obedience to them.”29 This is the strictly orthodox opinion, and it is consistent with Christian doctrine. Yet, for obvious reasons, the Old Testament is now regarded as an incubus by an increasing number of earnest Christians.

In the New Testament there are many cruel sayings attributed to Jesus. Only the few are to be saved from the eternal torments of the damned (St. Matt. xiii. 10–13, xxii. 14, xxv. 41; St. Mark iv. 11–12, xvi. 16, etc.). Happily, owing to the rise of Rationalism and the consequent subjection of the Bible to criticism, the dogma of eternal torment is disputed on all sides, and the Athanasian Creed will soon no longer be forced upon us. The principle of the “chosen few” is so clearly Christ’s teaching, and furnishes such a convenient explanation for the attitude of the many, that it is commonly adhered to; but liberal theologians no longer hold that “he that believeth not shall be damned,” or that the punishment of the sinner is to be excruciating torture for all eternity. Unbelievers and sinners may all ultimately be saved, or at the worst their existence will end with this life. Good, very good; such views appeal to us as being more humane and rational; but are they compatible with the truth of the Bible? Mark the words of the late Bishop of Manchester: “The very foundation of our Faith, the very basis of our hopes, are taken from us when one line of that sacred volume, on which we base everything, is declared to be untruthful and untrustworthy.” Thus it is that there are many who would still retain the inhuman doctrines ascribed to the Master. Fearful of losing the basis of their hopes, and unconscious, apparently, of their sublime egoism, they reason, and reason with logic: We must accept the whole or reject the whole.

SILENCE OF HISTORIANS.

That the Bible should be open to criticism at all seems to me inconceivable if it really be God’s gift to mankind. How could God, having determined after Æons of time to make a definite revelation of Himself to His human creatures, permit the account of this revelation to be handed down in such a haphazard fashion that future generations cannot be sure that they possess a reliable record? This, too, when a trustworthy record was the more essential on account of the miraculous nature of the narrative. As Professor Schmiedel remarks, the meagreness of the historical testimony regarding Jesus, whether in canonical writings outside of the Gospels or in profane writers such as Josephus, Tacitus, Suetonius, and Pliny, is most pronounced. Not a single passage can be produced from the writings of the great historians and philosophers who flourished between A.D. 40 and A.D. 140 which makes the slightest allusion to the astounding phenomena connected with the birth, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus of Nazareth.

It was at one time claimed that Josephus spoke of Jesus. That this has been given up by theologians may be verified by a reference to Canon Farrar’s Life of Christ, vol. i., p. 63 (and p. 31 of the cheap edition), where we read that “The single passage in which he (Josephus) alludes to Him is interpolated, if not wholly spurious.” There is also a disputed passage30 in Tacitus, where he speaks of Christians having “their denomination from Christus, who, in the reign of Tiberius, was put to death as a criminal by the procurator, Pontius Pilate.” And that is all! Could anything be more disappointing than this must be to thoughtful Christians who wish to establish the historical accuracy of the miraculous story of God’s life on earth? Eusebius (A.D. 315–340), the celebrated ecclesiastical historian, is apparently reduced to appealing to a Pagan oracle for a proof of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, for he says to the heathen: “But thou at least listen to thine own gods, to thy oracular deities themselves, who have borne witness, and ascribed to our Saviour (Jesus Christ) not imposture, but piety and wisdom, and ascent into heaven.”

The silence of secular historians is accounted for, by certain divines, by falling back on a theory of hostility or contempt. Thus Dean Farrar thinks that Josephus’s silence on the subject of Jesus and Christianity was as deliberate as it was dishonest (see his Life of Christ, vol. i., p. 63). Except that this offers a much-needed explanation, I am not cognisant of any reason for suspecting the famous secular historian, although, of course, the untrustworthiness of the Christian historians is notorious. Eusebius, for example, the gravest of the ecclesiastical historians, confesses, with commendable frankness: “We have decided to relate nothing concerning them [the early Christians] except the things in which we can vindicate the divine judgment.”31

With regard to the prodigy of the darkness, etc., that occurred at the death of Jesus, Gibbon informs us as follows: “It happened during the lifetime of Seneca and the elder Pliny, who must have experienced the immediate effects, or received the earliest intelligence of the prodigy. Each of these philosophers, in a laborious work, has recorded all the great phenomena of Nature—earthquakes, meteors, comets, and eclipses—which his indefatigable curiosity could collect. But the one and the other has omitted to mention the greatest phenomenon to which the mortal eye has been witness since the creation of the globe.”32 Any attempt to explain this away by supposing that the darkness of three hours was local only detracts from the magnitude of the miracle, which was intended, by its very magnitude, to be one of the proofs of the death of a God.

THOUGHTS ON “TRADITION” AS GOD’S METHOD FOR THE TRANSMISSION OF TRUTH TO POSTERITY.

Have you ever, in the days of your early youth, played the game of “gossip”? It is an amusing game, and also points a moral. A number of persons put themselves in a long row, and the first will think of some little incident, which he will carefully whisper to his neighbour, who will then pass it on, and so on, and so on, till it reaches the last person, who will proceed to repeat out loud the story he has heard. The original story will then be divulged, and much amusement is caused by the differences that are found between the two stories. This illustration of what occurs in “gossip” came back to my mind with much misgiving when I first heard how the story of my Saviour’s life on earth was handed down for a long period “by tradition.” Apparently, Christian theologians look quite complacently, and without any misgiving, upon this process for the transmission of the Christian verities; but, for myself, whether it were a century, or whether it were only a matter of thirty or forty years, before the final committal to writing, it was a heartrending discovery, and all my confidence in the truth of the Bible story was shaken. My dismay was not diminished when I learnt also that it was extremely doubtful whether the authors were eye-witnesses of the events, or especially inspired by God for their task; also, that there had been subsequent interpolations by equally unknown and uninspired writers, who, to speak plainly, were nothing more nor less than forgers, actuated, possibly, by pious motives. That the writers of the Gospels were vouchsafed any unusual facilities through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is discredited by the remarks of the apologists themselves. Thus, Dr. Robinson, in his book already referred to, alludes to St. Peter’s illiteracy, St. Mark’s poor literary attainments, and the limitations to which all the evangelists in ancient times were subjected.

We find ourselves asking the questions, “Did not God know that a time would come when we should discover that nature’s laws were not of the fragile or elastic character which our forefathers had supposed? Did He not know that we should therefore require absolute proof before we could believe that they had been broken in a bygone and credulous age?” Instead of this, the only proofs afforded us are copies of documents concocted from hearsay—we are not sure when or by whom—and from time to time fraudulently manipulated by interested though “pious” forgers. Did He, in His Omniscience, purposely allow events to take their course, and intend the story of His Son’s life upon earth to be handed down to us by the same unsatisfactory process as that of many another ancient tradition now known to be historically worthless? If ever special interference with the course of nature were necessary, surely it would be here—a miracle to prove the miracle on which our hopes are staked. Or, if this be asking too much, if it be argued that it is no longer God’s pleasure to break the laws which He has made, and that He now accomplishes His purposes by means of these laws only, how comes it that, for the safeguarding of this great truth, the most ordinary precautions have been neglected?

We are often asked to consider the yearnings of man as a proof that the thing yearned for is a reality. His yearnings, therefore, are not a negligible quantity. Do not, then, the yearnings of millions of Christians in the Roman Catholic and Greek Churches for miraculous proofs of God’s residence once upon earth count for something? Are not all the “miraculous” relics and “wonder-working” ikons a proof that man feels that God’s revelation ought to be assured to us by the continuance of miracles? In our own Church, Holman Hunt’s painting of “The Light of the World” is being sent round our colonies, to strengthen people’s belief in Jesus Christ. Why, oh why, have we not the real picture of our Saviour, bringing our God nearer to us, and enabling us to focus our thoughts on Him? I once mentioned my feeling on this subject to a clergyman, a doctor of divinity, well versed in Church history. He replied by suggesting that there was a tradition which indicated that the true likeness of our Lord had been miraculously transmitted, and that from this the great Italian painters had caught their inspiration.33 It seems hardly necessary to have recourse to the supernatural when there were natural sources available in the shape of representations of pagan gods. Thus Mercury, attired as a shepherd, with a lamb upon his shoulders, was no infrequent object in ancient art, and this has, in some cases, led to a difficulty in distinguishing between Mercury and Jesus Christ. Similarly we know that the pictures and sculptures wherein Isis is represented in the act of suckling her child Horus formed the foundation for the Christian figures and paintings of the Madonna and child.

THE ALLEGED SINLESSNESS OF JESUS CHRIST.

It may be urged that we have, what is of far more importance, the picture of His character. Have we? The absolute sinlessness of Christ is one of the chief proofs held out to us of His divinity. It is described as being in itself a miracle so great that it furnishes us with sufficient grounds for belief in other miracles. Many pious and learned theists feel that the character of Christ as portrayed in the Gospels betrays imperfections. But let this pass. What do we know of His life? Let us assume that in the Gospel of St. Mark we are put in possession of the impressions of an eye-witness. St. Peter’s personal knowledge of the private life of Jesus was confined to his recollections concerning a beloved Master during the period of His public ministry. And that ministry extended over one year, or at most three years. Have not the disciples of great teachers in the past invariably extolled the perfections of their masters? Have they ever dwelt upon their imperfections? Has not the picture handed down by tradition, and afterwards committed to writing, often been that of a perfect man? That the writers of the Gospels recognised the need for Christ to appear sinless, and adopted questionable methods for their purpose, is only too evident. Dr. Robinson explains34 the disappearance from the other Gospels of St. Mark’s references to “anger,” “grief,” “groaning,” “vehemence,” etc., as being “the result of a kind of reverence which belonged to a slightly later stage of reflection, when certain traits might even seem derogatory to the dignity of the sacred character.” Comment is superfluous.

THE IGNORANCE OF JESUS CHRIST.

There is another difficulty of belief in the divinity of Christ, which it is all the more essential to bring into prominence because it usually receives but scant notice from the pulpit. I refer to the “ignorance” of Jesus Christ. In a review of Le RÉalisme ChrÉtien et l’IdÉalisme Grec, par L. LaberthonniÈre, the Church Times praises the AbbÉ’s conception of Christian realism, and then goes on to say: “Here is found the key to the mystery of the ignorance of Jesus Christ, and of the other limitations attributed to Him in the Gospels. There are two untenable theories—the one that He deliberately kept things back from His disciples; the other that He was Himself ignorant of His own true nature, which afterwards became known to the Church. The truth is that He had to reveal Himself by living among men, and not by giving them an abstract doctrine about Himself—a doctrine which must have been either inadequate because adjusted to their comprehension, or else incomprehensible because adjusted to a reality which was beyond them.” The plain question, however, is—Had He, or had He not, the attribute of Omniscience? Did He, or did He not, know what we now know? Are we to suppose that He pretended to be ignorant? Was He God or was He man? The usual answer is that, as Very Man, He had only the knowledge of His age (or, should we not say, of the very restricted environment selected by Himself for His activities upon earth?), but that as Very God he performed miracles, taught spiritually, as never man taught, and was sinless. This answer, however, would not be accepted by the Venerable W. M. Sinclair, Archdeacon of London, who conjectures that “when our Lord said, ‘Greater works than these shall ye do,’ He was perhaps thinking of the marvellous discoveries of surgeons and physicians in times of advanced science” [!].35 Nor would it be accepted by the Rev. David Smith, who holds that Jesus accommodated Himself to the popular idea, and “after His wont fell in with the delusion” [!].36

Surely an Omniscient God must have known that grave doubts would arise in the future from the real or apparent ignorance of His Son, and, vice versa, that any prescience shown by Him would be hailed with delight as a proof of His divinity. If it be urged that such trials of faith are useful, why should it be the thoughtful of future generations who are chiefly to be so tried? If Christ had chosen His disciples from among the “wise men of the East” (or West), instead of from among men of the lowest order of intelligence and education, there would then have been no necessity for the doctrine to “have been either inadequate because adjusted to their comprehension, or else incomprehensible because adjusted to a reality which was beyond them.” Only a very small and remote corner of the world was favoured by the presence of God when revealing Himself in human form for the benefit of mankind. Only the most ignorant, for the most part, heard His personal teaching. Had He revealed Himself to all, or to a far greater number of persons then living, and satisfied the ardent longings of the wise men and philosophers of those times, would this not have conduced to the rapid recognition of Christianity and to its firm establishment over the whole world for all ages?

The tiny Sea of Galilee, the birthplace of the Gospel, is only about twelve miles long and seven miles in its widest part, and Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum were all situated close together at the northern end. Here Jesus made his permanent home after His fellow-townsmen at Nazareth had rejected Him; here He preached, and here He performed many mighty works. Not till I had visited the spot did I fully realise the insignificance of the area to which the Saviour of mankind confined His ministry. Round the lake stood such important cities as Tiberias and TaricheÆ. They were studiously avoided by Jesus. (This would account, perhaps, for their great men hearing nothing of the new teaching, though hardly for their hearing nothing of stupendous miracles performed at their very door.) The cities of the Decapolis were also flourishing in this neighbourhood at the time of Christ’s ministry, and were the centre of great literary activity. Gadara produced Philodemus the Epicurean, a contemporary of Cicero; Meleager the epigrammatist; Menippus the satirist; Theodorus the rhetorician, the tutor of Tiberius; and others. Gerasa, also, was a mother of great teachers. In the words of George Adam Smith: “Philodemus, Meleager, Menippus, Theodorus, were names of which one end of the Lake of Galilee was proud, when Matthew, Peter, James, and John were working at the other end.”37 If it be argued that for some inscrutable reason God sent His Son only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel and intended His preaching to reach the Gentiles through the medium of His chosen people, why was such a learned and pious Jew as Philo left out in the cold?

Apologists do not explain at all convincingly why the Almighty could not, or preferred not to, make Himself understood. If He could say “Let there be light,” He could also have said “Let there be knowledge.” Besides, after all, what is there in the broad facts of modern science which could not be explained to an intelligent savage to-day? The shape and movements of the earth are explained in the most elementary geography books, and the theory of Evolution can be made quite clear to comparative children (I speak from personal experience). Recent discoveries have revealed to us that ancient nations must have reached an extraordinarily high state of civilisation. Six thousand years ago, in the valley of the Nile, there existed a standard of civilisation incomparably higher than that of the Jews at the time when God is alleged to have selected them as His chosen people. “The Old Testament,” says Canon C. H. Robinson, “is the history of a people insignificant in number, occupying a country about the same size as the county of Yorkshire; remarkable neither for their superior learning, civilisation, nor military power; remarkable, if for anything, for their obstinate, grasping, usurious character; who, nevertheless, were chosen out of all the nations of the ancient world to be the recipients of peculiar blessings and favours.”38 This incomprehensible selection of ignorant Jews to be the special recipients of Revelation only emphasises the contention that we have no right to assume that learned men of two thousand years ago could not have understood plain facts, or that it was necessary for them to believe in purely imaginary explanations of the cosmos, in a flat, stationary earth, in a blue-basin sky, in an “Adam and Eve” origin, in devil-possession, in absurd miracles, etc. Their ignorance, which was natural enough considering their opportunities, could easily have been dispelled when God graciously condescended to come and live among them. What a proof would that not have been of His Divinity!

In any case, we are to understand that the Apostles were inspired by the Holy Ghost, so that they might be able to work miracles and be witnesses unto Christ, even to the utmost parts of the earth. Surely, then, they could and should have been enlightened for their mission work up to the level, say, of some of our twentieth-century theologians? The miracle of an intelligence and knowledge equal to that of the average modern apologist is not, after all, so very inconceivable, and it would, at least, have been more useful than miracle-working in a miracle-believing age. Christians, who glibly admit that Jesus had only the knowledge of His age, cannot, I think, fully realise the force of such an admission. One reason for this may be that their own knowledge is not completely up to date. That Jesus had no knowledge of nature’s inviolable laws and shared many of the gross superstitions prevalent around Him; that He accepted the Scriptures as literally true, and not in the sense now attributed to them by the Higher Critics; that He believed that He would come again “in the clouds of heaven with power and great might, and that the generation in which He lived would not pass away till this had been fulfilled—of all this they may be dimly conscious; but what remain still to be studied by them are the startling disclosures of Comparative Mythology, and of the now fully-established theory of Evolution, and their bearing upon the Christian Faith. The matter is one of the utmost importance, as will be seen by a perusal of the following chapters.


1 See, for instance, art. “Moses,” EncyclopÆdia Biblica.

2 Quoted from a sermon by the Bishop of London in Fulham parish, Christmas Day, 1904. Compare this with Dr. Kirkpatrick’s remark, p. 2 of his book, The Divine Library of the Old Testament: “It is true that the critical investigation of the Bible raises not a few questions of grave difficulty.”

3 “The adjective ‘higher’ (the sense of which is often misunderstood) has reference simply to the higher and more difficult class of problems, with which, as opposed to textual criticism, the ‘higher’ criticism has to deal” (see Preface to The Higher Criticism, being three papers by S. R. Driver, D.D., and A. F. Kirkpatrick, D.D.).

4 See Appendix.

5 Exodus xxxi. 18 and xxxii. 16. Or, to be precise, these having been broken and their fragments considered of no value at the time, the duplicates carefully prepared and inscribed to the dictation of God Himself (Exodus xxxix.).

6 Believed to date from about 853 B.C. The inscription records the victories of King Mesha over the Israelites.

7 Erected in honour of Ptolemy Epiphanes, 106 B.C. Famous as having furnished the first key for the interpretation of Egyptian hieroglyphics.

8 EncyclopÆdia Biblica, art. “Messiah,” p. 3058, par. 2.

9 Ibid, p. 3063, par 10.

10 In Studies in the Character of Christ, by Rev. C. H. Robinson, Hon. Canon of Ripon and Editorial Secretary to the S.P.G.

11 Enc. Bib., art. “Nativity,” par. 10, 11, 12.

12 The late Rev. A. B. Bruce, D.D., Professor of Apologetics and New Testament Exegesis, Free Church College, Glasgow.

13 See Enc. Bib., art. “Gospels,” par. 139.

14 See Enc. Bib., art. “Gospels,” par. 138, where the reasons for this conclusion are explained. See also par. 108.

15 Author of various theological works, Hulsean Lecturer, Cambridge, 1876; Select Preacher, Oxford, 1877.

16 The interpolation in the last chapter of St. Mark goes back far into the second century. It is important to bear in mind that none of the dates given by Dr. Harnack and other authorities applies to the Gospels exactly as we now have them. Accounts of miracles have been added subsequently!

17 Enc. Bib., art. “Lazarus.”

18 Ibid, art. “Gospels,” par. 147.

19 W. C. van Manen, D.D., Professor of Old-Christian Literature and New Testament Exegesis, Leyden.

20 Spoken in an address to the St. Paul’s Lecture Society, at the opening of a new session in 1904.

21 The italics in these quotations from Dr. Harnack are mine.

22 Fully reported in the Methodist Times.

23 The Greek version, known as the Septuagint (LXX.), made in Egypt in the third and second centuries B.C. for the use of the numerous body of Greek-speaking Jews and proselytes in that country.

24 A Greek document which is supposed to have existed and then to have been entirely lost (imagine God’s Word lost!), and to contain some of the matter related by St. Matthew and St. Luke, while omitted by St. Mark. N.B.—While the evangelist St. Mark is relegated to the position of a translator only, St. Matthew and St. Luke are taken by orthodox theologians to be mere copyists of St. Mark and a “lost” document!

25 See art. “Gospels,” in the Enc. Bib., and Westcott and Hort, The New Testament in the Original Greek.

26 In his address at the Church Congress held at Weymouth in 1905.

27 In his work, Verbal Inspiration. Quoted by Bishop Colenso in The Pentateuch Examined.

28 The Dean of Canterbury, speaking on the Bishop of Winchester’s paper at the Church Congress, 1903.

29 The Dean of Canterbury, speaking in St. Mary Bredin’s Church, Canterbury, December 4th, 1904.

30 See Appendix.

31 See Bk. VIII., chap. ii., par. 2, on p. 324, vol. i. Eusebius (Oxford: Parker & Co.). His candour here is deserving of all praise; but his methods can hardly be termed scientific; while an impartial perusal of his Vita Constantini, a panegyric on the Emperor Constantine, should be enough to shake the confidence of all but the blindest of his admirers.

32 See p. 179, chap. xv., of Gibbon’s Rome (Oddy, 1809).

33 See Appendix.

34 In note A, pp. 42–3, of his book, The Study of the Gospels.

35 At the discussion on Christian Science during the London Diocesan Conference, May, 1906.

36 See his book, The Days of His Flesh; Hodder & Stoughton, 1906.

37 See chap. xxviii. of The Historical Geography of the Holy Land, by the Rev. George Adam Smith, M.A., D.D., LL.D.; Professor of O. T. Lang., Liter., and Theology, etc.

38 The quotation is from Canon C. H. Robinson’s book, Studies in the Character of Christ.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

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