This work, although composed after the death of Peter, was,
in a sense, the work of Peter; it represents the way in
which Peter was accustomed to relate the life of Jesus (p.
116).
M. Renan goes on to say that, as an historical document, the Gospel of
Mark has a great superiority (p. 116); but Mark has a motive for
omitting the discourses, and he attaches a "puerile importance" to
miracles (p. 117). The Gospel of Mark is less a legend, than a
biography written with credulity (p. 118). It would be rash to say
that Mark has not been interpolated and retouched (p. 120).
If any one thinks that I have not been warranted in drawing a sharp
distinction between "scientific theologians" and "counsels for
creeds"; or that my warning against the too ready acceptance of
certain declarations as to the state of biblical criticism was
needless; or that my anxiety as to the sense of the word "practical"
was superfluous; let him compare the statement that M. Renan has made
a "practical surrender of the adverse case" with the facts just set
forth. For what is the adverse case? The question, as Dr. Wace puts
it, is, "It may be asked how far can we rely on the accounts we
possess of our Lord's teaching on these subjects." It will be obvious
that M. Renan's statements amount to an adverse answer--to a
"practical" denial that any great reliance can be placed on these
accounts. He does not believe that Matthew, the apostle, wrote the
first Gospel; he does not profess to know who is responsible for the
collection of "logia," or how many of them are authentic; though he
calls the second Gospel the most historical, he points out that it is
written with credulity, and may have been interpolated and retouched;
and, as to the author, "quel qu'il soit," of the third Gospel, who is
to "rely on the accounts" of a writer, who deserves the cavalier
treatment which "Luke" meets with at M. Renan's hands.
I repeat what I have already more than once said, that the question of
the age and the authorship of the Gospels has not, in my judgment, the
importance which is so commonly assigned to it; for the simple reason
that the reports, even of eye-witnesses, would not suffice to justify
belief in a large and essential part of their contents; on the
contrary, these reports would discredit the witnesses. The Gadarene
miracle, for example, is so extremely improbable, that the fact of its
being reported by three, even independent, authorities could not
justify belief in it, unless we had the clearest evidence as to their
capacity as observers and as interpreters of their observations. But
it is evident that the three authorities are not independent; that
they have simply adopted a legend, of which there were two versions;
and instead of their proving its truth, it suggests their
superstitious credulity: so that if "Matthew," "Mark," and "Luke" are
really responsible for the Gospels, it is not the better for the
Gadarene story, but the worse for them.
A wonderful amount of controversial capital has been made out of my
assertion in the note to which I have referred, as an _obiter dictum_
of no consequence to my argument, that if Renan's work[99] were
non-extant, the main results of biblical criticism, as set forth in
the works of Strauss, Baur, Reuss, and Volkmar, for example, would not
be sensibly affected. I thought I had explained it satisfactorily
already, but it seems that my explanation has only exhibited still
more of my native perversity, so I ask for one more chance.
In the course of the historical development of any branch of science,
what is universally observed is this: that the men who make epochs,
and are the real architects of the fabric of exact knowledge, are
those who introduce fruitful ideas or methods. As a rule, the man who
does this pushes his idea, or his method, too far; or, if he does not,
his school is sure to do so; and those who follow have to reduce his
work to its proper value, and assign it its place in the whole. Not
unfrequently, they, in their turn, overdo the critical process, and,
in trying to eliminate error, throw away truth.
Thus, as I said, Linnæus, Buffon, Cuvier, Lamarck, really "set forth
the results" of a developing science, although they often heartily
contradict one another. Notwithstanding this circumstance, modern
classificatory method and nomenclature have largely grown out of the
work of Linnæus; the modern conception of biology, as a science, and
of its relation to climatology, geography, and geology, are, as
largely, rooted in the results of the labours of Buffon; comparative
anatomy and palæontology owe a vast debt to Cuvier's results; while
invertebrate zoology and the revival of the idea of evolution are
intimately dependent on the results of the work of Lamarck. In other
words, the main results of biology up to the early years of this
century are to be found in, or spring out of, the works of these men.
So, if I mistake not, Strauss, if he did not originate the idea of
taking the mythopoeic faculty into account in the development of the
Gospel narratives, and though he may have exaggerated the influence of
that faculty, obliged scientific theology, hereafter, to take that
element into serious consideration; so Baur, in giving prominence to
the cardinal fact of the divergence of the Nazarene and Pauline
tendencies in the primitive Church; so Reuss, in setting a marvellous
example of the cool and dispassionate application of the principles of
scientific criticism over the whole field of Scripture; so Volkmar, in
his clear and forcible statement of the Nazarene limitations of Jesus,
contributed results of permanent value in scientific theology. I took
these names as they occurred to me. Undoubtedly, I might have
advantageously added to them; perhaps, I might have made a better
selection. But it really is absurd to try to make out that I did not
know that these writers widely disagree; and I believe that no
scientific theologian will deny that, in principle, what I have said
is perfectly correct. Ecclesiastical advocates, of course, cannot be
expected to take this view of the matter. To them, these mere seekers
after truth, in so far as their results are unfavourable to the creed
the clerics have to support, are more or less "infidels," or favourers
of "infidelity"; and the only thing they care to see, or probably can
see, is the fact that, in a great many matters, the truth-seekers
differ from one another, and therefore can easily be exhibited to the
public, as if they did nothing else; as if any one who referred to
their having, each and all, contributed his share to the results of
theological science, was merely showing his ignorance; and as if a
charge of inconsistency could be based on the fact that he himself
often disagrees with what they say. I have never lent a shadow of
foundation to the assumption that I am a follower of either Strauss,
or Baur, or Reuss, or Volkmar, or Renan; my debts to these eminent
men--so far my superiors in theological knowledge--is, indeed, great;
yet it is not for their opinions, but for those I have been able to
form for myself, by their help.
In _Agnosticism: a Rejoinder_ (p. 266), I have referred to the
difficulties under which those professors of the science of theology,
whose tenure of their posts depends on the results of their
investigations, must labour; and, in a note, I add--
Imagine that all our chairs of Astronomy had been founded in
the fourteenth century, and that their incumbents were bound
to sign Ptolemaic articles. In that case, with every respect
for the efforts of persons thus hampered to attain and
expound the truth, I think men of common sense would go
elsewhere to learn astronomy.
I did not write this paragraph without a knowledge that its sense
would be open to the kind of perversion which it has suffered; but, if
that was clear, the necessity for the statement was still clearer. It
is my deliberate opinion: I reiterate it; and I say that, in my
judgment, it is extremely inexpedient that any subject which calls
itself a science should be intrusted to teachers who are debarred from
freely following out scientific methods to their legitimate
conclusions, whatever those conclusions may be. If I may borrow a
phrase paraded at the Church Congress, I think it "ought to be
unpleasant" for any man of science to find himself in the position of
such a teacher.
Human nature is not altered by seating it in a professorial chair,
even of theology. I have very little doubt that if, in the year 1859,
the tenure of my office had depended upon my adherence to the
doctrines of Cuvier, the objections to them set forth in the "Origin
of Species" would have had a halo of gravity about them that, being
free to teach what I pleased, I failed to discover. And, in making
that statement, it does not appear to me that I am confessing that I
should have been debarred by "selfish interests" from making candid
inquiry, or that I should have been biassed by "sordid motives." I
hope that even such a fragment of moral sense as may remain in an
ecclesiastical "infidel" might have got me through the difficulty; but
it would be unworthy to deny, or disguise, the fact that a very
serious difficulty must have been created for me by the nature of my
tenure. And let it be observed that the temptation, in my case, would
have been far slighter than in that of a professor of theology;
whatever biological doctrine I had repudiated, nobody I cared for
would have thought the worse of me for so doing. No scientific
journals would have howled me down, as the religious newspapers howled
down my too honest friend, the late Bishop of Natal; nor would my
colleagues of the Royal Society have turned their backs upon me, as
his episcopal colleagues boycotted him.
I say these facts are obvious, and that it is wholesome and needful
that they should be stated. It is in the interests of theology, if it
be a science, and it is in the interests of those teachers of theology
who desire to be something better than counsel for creeds, that it
should be taken to heart. The seeker after theological truth and that
only, will no more suppose that I have insulted him, than the prisoner
who works in fetters will try to pick a quarrel with me, if I suggest
that he would get on better if the fetters were knocked off: unless
indeed, as it is said does happen in the course of long captivities,
that the victim at length ceases to feel the weight of his chains, or
even takes to hugging them, as if they were honourable ornaments.[100]