_THE PERILS OF RATIONALISM AND THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF A LIFELONG
CONTACT WITH TRUTH.--THE PROPERTIES OF INSPIRED WRITINGS._
"But abide thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been
assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them; and that from a
babe thou hast known the sacred writings, which are able to make
thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.
Every scripture inspired of God is also profitable for teaching, for
reproof, for correction, for instruction which is in righteousness:
that the man of God may be complete, furnished completely unto every
good work."--2 TIM. iii. 14-17.
For the second time in this paragraph the Apostle puts his faithful
disciple in marked contrast to the heretical teachers. A few lines
before, after comparing the latter to the Egyptian magicians, he
continues, "But _thou_ (=sy de=) didst follow my teaching." And in the
passage before us, after saying that "evil men and impostors shall wax
worse and worse," he continues, "But abide _thou_ (=sy de mene=) in the
things which thou hast learned." Here there is a double contrast; first
between Timothy and the impostors, and secondly between his abiding in
the truth and their going away from it, and so from bad to worse, first
as deceivers and then as being deceived. They begin by being seducers
and end in being dupes, and the dupes (very often) of their own
deceptions; for deceit commonly leads to self-deceit. Such a result may
well act as a warning to Timothy and those committed to his charge of
the peril of trifling with the fundamentals of religious truth.
The articles of the Christian faith are not like the commodities in a
bazaar from which one can pick and choose at pleasure, and of which one
can take three or four without in any way affecting one's relation to
the remainder, or reject three or four, without in any way affecting the
security of one's hold upon those which one decides to take. With regard
to the truths of religion, our right to pick and choose has very strict
limits. When the system as a whole has presented its credentials to the
reason and the conscience, and these have decided that the bearer of
such credentials must be the representative of a Divine Being, then the
attempt to pick and choose among the details of the system becomes
perilous work. To reject this or that item, as being mere fringe and
setting rather than a constituent element, or as being at any rate
unessential, may be to endanger the whole structure. We may be leaving
an impregnable position for an exposed and untenable one, or be
exchanging a secure platform for an inclined plane, on which we shall
find no lasting resting place until the bottom is reached. And this was
what the men, against whom Timothy is warned, had done. They had left
the sure position, and were sometimes sliding, sometimes running,
further and further away from the truth.
In other words, there is a right and a wrong use of reason in matters of
faith. The wrong use is sometimes spoken of as "Rationalism," and
(adopting that term as convenient) the following clear statement,
borrowed from another writer, will show in a striking way where it was
that St. Paul wished Timothy to part company with the principles of his
opponents. "As regards Revealed Truth," wrote J. H. Newman in 1835, "it
is _not_ Rationalism to set about to ascertain, by the exercise of
reason, what things are attainable by reason, and what are not; nor, in
the absence of an express Revelation, to inquire into the truths of
Religion, as they come to us by nature; nor to determine what proofs are
necessary for the acceptance of a Revelation, if it be given; nor to
reject a Revelation on the plea of insufficient proof; nor, after
recognising it as Divine, to investigate the meaning of its
declarations, and to interpret its language; nor to use its doctrines,
as far as they can be fairly used, in inquiring into its divinity; nor
to compare and connect them with our previous knowledge, with a view of
making them parts of a whole; nor to bring them into dependence on each
other, to trace their mutual relations, and to pursue them to their
legitimate issues. This is not Rationalism. But it is Rationalism to
accept the Revelation, and then to _explain it away_; to speak of it as
the Word of God, and to treat it as the word of man; to refuse to let it
speak for itself; to claim to be told the _why_ and the _how_ of God's
dealings with us, as therein described, and to assign to Him a motive
and a scope of our own; to stumble at the partial knowledge which He may
give us of them; to put aside what is obscure, as if it had not been
said at all; to _accept one half of what has been told us, and not the
other half_; to assume that the contents of Revelation are also its
proof; to frame some gratuitous hypothesis about them, and then to
garble, gloss, and colour them, to trim, clip, pare away and twist them,
in order to bring them into conformity with the idea to which we have
subjected them."[94]
Timothy is to abide in those things which he has "learned and been
assured of." He has experienced the result which St. Luke wished to
produce in Theophilus when he wrote his Gospel: he has attained to "full
knowledge of the certainty concerning the things wherein he had been
instructed" (Luke i. 4). And he is not to allow the wild teaching of his
opponents, thoroughly discredited as it is and will be by equally wild
conduct, to shake his security. Not everything that is disputed is
disputable, nor everything that is doubted doubtful. And if the fruits
of the two kinds of teaching do not fully convince him of the necessity
of abiding by the old truths rather than by the suggestions of these
innovators, let him remember those from whom he first learnt the truths
of the Gospel,--his grandmother Lois, his mother Eunice, and the Apostle
himself. When it comes to a question of the authority of the teachers,
which group will he choose? Those who established him in the faith, or
those who are trying to seduce men away from it?
There is a little doubt about the word "of _whom_ thou hast learned
them." The "whom" is probably plural (=para tinôn=); but a reading which
makes it singular (=para tinos=) is strongly supported. The plural must
include all Timothy's chief instructors in the faith, especially the
earliest, as is clear from the nature of the case and from what follows.
If the singular is adopted, we must refer it to St. Paul, in accordance
with "the things which thou hast heard from me ... the same commit thou
to faithful men" (ii. 2). It is possible that the words just quoted have
influenced the reading in the passage under consideration, and have
caused the substitution of the singular for the plural.
But there is a further consideration. There is not only the _character_
of the doctrine on each side, and the _fruits_ of the doctrine on each
side, and the _teachers_ of whom Timothy has had personal experience,
and about whose knowledge and trustworthiness he can judge; there is
also the fact that from his tenderest infancy he has had the blessing of
being in contact with the truth, first as it is revealed in the Old
Testament, and then as it is still further revealed in the Gospel. The
responsibilities of those who from their earliest days have been allowed
to grow in the knowledge of God and of His government of the world, are
far greater than the responsibilities of those who have had no
opportunity of acquiring this knowledge until late in life. Old habits
of thought and conduct are not extinguished by baptism; and the false
opinion and vicious behaviour of many of those who are vexing, or will
hereafter vex, the Church in Ephesus, may be traced to influences which
had become dominant in them long before they came into contact with
God's revealed law. No such allowance can be made for Timothy. He has
had the inestimable privilege of knowing the sacred writings from his
earliest childhood. It will be his own fault if they do not "make him
wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus."
The expression "sacred writings" (=hiera grammata=) occurs nowhere else
in the New Testament. The usual expression is "the scriptures" (=hai
graphai=); and once (Rom. i. 2) we have "holy scriptures" (=graphai
hagiai=). Here both substantive and adjective are unusual. The adjective
occurs in only one other passage in the New Testament, a passage which
throws light upon this one. "Know ye not that they who perform the
sacred rites, from the sacred place get their food?" (_Speaker's
Commentary_, on 1 Cor. ix. 13.) And just as in that passage "the sacred
rites" are the Jewish sacrifices, and "the sacred place" the Jewish
Temple, so here "the sacred writings" are the Jewish Scriptures. It is
utterly improbable that any Christian writings are included. How could
Timothy have known any of these from infancy? Even at the time when St.
Paul wrote this farewell letter, there was little Christian literature,
excepting his own Epistles; and he was not likely to speak of them as
"sacred writings," or to include them under one expression with the Old
Testament Scriptures. The suggestion that Christian writings are
included, or are mainly intended, seems to be made with the intention of
insinuating that this letter cannot have been written by the Apostle,
but by some one of a later age. But would even a writer of the second
century have made such a blunder as to represent Timothy as knowing
Christian literature from his childhood?
With the use of the substantive "writings" (=grammata=) in this passage,
should be compared the use of the same word in Christ's discourse at
Jerusalem after the miracle at the pool of Bethesda, where he shows the
Jews how hopeless their unbelief is, and how vain their appeal to Moses,
who is really their accuser. "But if ye believe not _his_ writings
(=grammata=), how shall ye believe _My_ words?" The Jews had had two
opportunities of knowing and accepting the truth; the writings of Moses,
and the words of Jesus. So also Timothy had had two sets of instructors;
the holy women who had brought him up, whose work had been completed by
the Apostle, and the sacred writings. If the authority of the former
should seem to be open to question, there could be no doubt of the
sufficiency of the latter. They "are able to make him wise unto
salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus."
It must be observed that the Apostle uses the present tense and not the
past (=dynamena=) in expressing the power of the sacred writings in
communicating a saving wisdom to him who uses them aright. This power
was not exhausted when the young Timothy was brought to the ampler
truths of the Gospel. However far advanced he may be in sacred
knowledge, he will still find that they are able to make him increase in
the wisdom which enlightens and saves souls.
But Scripture confers this life-giving wisdom in no mechanical manner.
It is not a charm, which has a magical effect upon every one who reads
it. The most diligent study of the sacred writings will do nothing for
the salvation of a man who does not prosecute his researches in
something more than the mere spirit of curious enquiry. Therefore St.
Paul adds, "through faith which is in Christ Jesus." It is when this is
added to the soul of the enquirer that the sacred writings of the Old
Covenant have their illuminating power; without it, so far from leading
to the salvation won for us by Christ, they may keep those who study
them away from the truth, as in the case of the Jews to this day. The
pillar of fire becomes a pillar of cloud, and what should have been for
wealth becomes an occasion of falling.
"Every scripture inspired of God is also profitable for teaching, for
reproof, for correction, for instruction which is in righteousness."
This is the Revisers' rendering. Besides one or two smaller changes,
they have made two important alterations of the A. V. (1) They have
substituted "every scripture" for "all scripture," without allowing the
old rendering even a place in the margin. (2) They have inserted the
"is" (which _must_ be supplied somewhere in the sentence) _after_
instead of _before_ "inspired by God;" thus making "inspired by God" an
epithet of Scripture and not something stated respecting it. "Every
scripture inspired by God _is also_ profitable," instead of "_is_
inspired of God _and_ profitable:" but they allow the latter rendering a
place in the margin.
This treatment of the passage appears to be very satisfactory, so far as
the second of these two points are concerned. Certainty is not
attainable in either. Yet, as regards the second, the probabilities are
greatly in favour of the Apostle's meaning that "inspired scripture is
also profitable," rather than "scripture is inspired and profitable."
But, with regard to the first point, it may be doubted whether the
balance is so decidedly against the translation "all scripture" as to
warrant its exclusion. No doubt the absence of the article in the Greek
(=pasa graphê=, and not =pasa hê graphê=) is against the old rendering;
but it is by no means conclusive, as other instances both in the New
Testament and in classical Greek prove.[95] Nevertheless, there is the
further fact that in the New Testament "the scripture" generally means a
particular passage of Scripture (Mark xii. 10; Luke iv. 21; John xix.
24, 28, 36, 37; Acts viii. 32, 35). When Scripture as a whole is meant,
the word, is commonly used in the plural, "the scriptures" (Matt. xxi.
42; Mark xii. 24; John v. 39). In the passage before us the meaning is
not seriously affected by the change. It matters little whether we say
"the whole of scripture," or "every passage of scripture."
"Every scripture inspired by God is also profitable for teaching, for
reproof, for correction, for discipline (=paideia=) which is in
righteousness:" _i.e._, is of use both for doctrinal and for practical
purposes, for informing both faith and conduct. It is because it is
"inspired by God," because God's Spirit breathes through the whole of
it, making every passage of it to be a portion of a living whole, that
Scripture possesses this unique utility. And if the Apostle can say this
of the Old Testament, much more may we affirm it of the New Testament.
From the two together, everything that a Christian ought to believe,
everything that a Christian ought to do, may be learned.
But while this declaration of the Apostle assures us that there is no
passage in Holy Writ, which, when properly handled, does not yield
Divine instruction for the guidance of our minds, and hearts, and wills,
yet it gives no encouragement to hard and fast theories as to the
_manner_ in which the Spirit of God operated upon the authors of the
sacred writings. Inspiration is no mechanical process. It is altogether
misleading to speak of it as Divine _dictation_, which would reduce
inspired writers to mere machines. There are certain things which it
clearly does _not_ do.
1. While it governs the substance of what is written, it does not govern
the language word by word. We have no reasons for believing in _verbal_
inspiration, and have many reasons for not believing in it. For no one
believes that copyists and printers are miraculously preserved from
making verbal mistakes. Is it, then, reasonable to suppose that God
would work a miracle to produce what He takes no care to preserve. Of
the countless various readings, which are the words which are inspired?
2. Inspiration does not preserve the inspired writers from _every_ kind
of mistake. That it guards them from error in respect to matters of
faith and morality, we may well believe; but whether it does more than
this remains to be proved. On the other hand it can be proved that it
does not preserve them from mistakes in _grammar_; for there is plenty
of unquestionably bad grammar in the Bible. Look for instance at the
Greek of Mark vi. 8, 9; Acts xv. 22; xix. 34; Eph. iv. 2; Col. iii. 16;
Rev. vii. 9; etc., etc. And it may be doubted whether inspiration
preserves the inspired writer from all possibility of error as regards
matters of fact, as to whether there were two men healed or only one; as
to whether the healing took place as Christ entered the city or as He
left it; as to whether the prophecy quoted comes from Jeremiah or
Zechariah, and the like. Can there be any reasonable doubt that St.
Matthew has made a slip in writing "Zechariah the son of Barachiah"
instead of "Zechariah the son of Jehoiada"? And is there any honest
method of bringing St. Stephen's speech into complete harmony with
statements in the Old Testament respecting all the facts mentioned? Must
we not suppose that there is error on one side or the other? If, as is
quite certain, inspiration does not make a man a grammatical scholar, or
give him a perfect literary style, ought we to conclude that it will
make him a faultless historian or chronologer? A Divine Revelation
through a series of inspired writers has been granted in order to save
our souls. We have no right to assume that it has been granted in order
to save us trouble. Those saving truths about God and our relations to
Him, which we could never have discovered without a revelation, we may
expect to find set forth without taint of error in the sacred writings.
But facts of geology, or history, or physiology, which our own
intelligence and industry can discover, we ought not to expect to find
accurately set forth for us in the Bible: and we ought to require very
full evidence before deciding that in such matters inspired writers may
be regarded as infallible. St. Luke tells us in the Preface to his
Gospel that he took great pains to obtain the best information. Need he
have done so, if inspiration protected him from all possibility of
mistake?
3. Inspiration does not override and overwhelm the inspired writer's
personal characteristics. There appears to be no such thing as an
inspired style. The style of St. John is as different from that of St.
Paul as the style of Bishop Butler is from that of Jeremy Taylor. Each
inspired writer uses the language, and the illustrations, and the
arguments that are natural and familiar to him. If he has an
argumentative mind, he argues his points; if he has not, he states them
without argument. If he has literary skill, he exhibits it; if he has
none, inspiration does not give it to him. "No inspiration theory can
stand for a moment which does not leave room for the personal agency and
individual peculiarities of the sacred authors and the exercise of their
natural faculties in writing" (Schaff, _Apostolic Christianity_, p.
608).
What inspiration has _not_ done in these various particulars is manifest
to every one who studies the sacred writings. What it _has_ done is
scarcely less manifest, and is certainly much more generally recognized.
It has produced writings which are absolutely without a parallel in the
literature of the world. Even as regards literary merits they have few
rivals. But it is not in their literary beauty that their unique
character consists. It lies rather in their lofty spirituality; their
inexhaustible capacities for instruction and consolation; their
boundless adaptability to all ages and circumstances; above all, in
their ceaseless power of satisfying the noblest cravings and aspirations
of the human heart. Other writings are profitable for knowledge, for
advancement, for amusement, for delight, for wealth. But these "make
wise unto salvation." They produce that discipline which has its sphere
in righteousness. They have power to instruct the ignorant, to convict
the guilty, to reclaim the fallen, to school all in holiness; that all
may be complete as men of God, "furnished completely unto every good
work."
FOOTNOTES:
[94] "Rationalism in Religion," in _Tracts for the Times_, republished
in _Essays Critical and Historical_, vol. i. p. 32.
[95] See the quotations given in Alford's note on =pasa oikodomê= in
Eph. ii. 21, which might be increased, if necessary: _e.g._ =pan sôma=,
in Arist., _Nic. Eth._, I. xiii. 7, which must = "the whole body."