school in every part of it, and everywhere to bear in mind the
admonition of the _De Imitatione_ 'that every Scripture must be read
in the same spirit in which it was written.' So far it will not be a
point in dispute among Christians what inspiration means, or what its
purpose is. 'The Councils of Trent and the Vatican,' writes Cardinal
Newman, 'tell us distinctly the object and the promise of Scriptural
inspiration. They specify "faith and moral conduct" as the drift of
that teaching which has the guarantee of inspiration[314].' Nor can it
be denied that the more Holy Scripture is read from this point of
view, the more confidently it is treated as the inspired guide of
faith and conduct, no less in the types of character which it sets
before us than in its direct instruction, the more the experience and
appreciation of its inspiration grows upon us, so that to deny or to
doubt it comes to mean to deny or to doubt a matter plain to the
senses. Indeed what has been said under this head will probably appear
to those practised in the spiritual use of Holy Scripture as an
understatement, perhaps not easy to justify, of the sense in which the
Scripture is the Word of God, and the spiritual food of the soul[315].
5. But here certain important questions arise. (_a_) The revelation of
God was made in a historical process. Its record is in large part the
record of a national life: it is historical. Now the inspiration of
the recorder lies, as we have seen, primarily in this, that he sees
the hand of God in the history and interprets His purpose. Further, we
must add, his sense of the working of God in history, increases his
realization of the importance of historical fact. Thus there is a
profound air of historical truthfulness pervading the Old Testament
record from Abraham downward. The weaknesses, the sins, of Israel's
heroes are not spared. Their sin and its punishment is always before
us. There is no flattering of national pride, no giving the reins to
boastfulness. In all this the Old Testament appears to be in marked
contrast, as to contemporary Assyrian monuments, so also to a good
deal of much later ecclesiastical history. But does the inspiration of
the recorder guarantee the exact historical truth of what he records?
And in matter of fact can the record, with due regard to legitimate
historical criticism, be pronounced true? Now, to the latter of these
two questions (and they are quite distinct questions), we may reply
that there is nothing to prevent our believing, as our faith certainly
strongly disposes us to believe, that the record from Abraham downward
is in substance in the strict sense historical. Of course the battle
of historical truth cannot be fought on the field of the Old
Testament, as it can on that of the New, because it is so vast and
indecisive, and because (however certainly ancient is such a narrative
as that contained in Genesis xiv.) very little of the early record can
be securely traced to a period near the events. Thus the Church cannot
_insist upon_ the historical character of the earliest records of the
ancient Church in detail, as she can on the historical character of
the Gospels or the Acts of the Apostles. On the other hand, as it
seems the more probable opinion that the Hebrews must have been
acquainted with the art of writing in some form long before the
Exodus, there is no reason to doubt the existence of some written
records among them from very early days[316]. Internal evidence again
certainly commends to our acceptance the history of the patriarchs, of
the Egyptian bondage, of the great redemption, of the wanderings, as
well as of the later period as to which there would be less dispute.
In a word we are, we believe, not wrong in anticipating that the
Church will continue to believe and to teach that the Old Testament
from Abraham downwards is really historical, and that there will be
nothing to make such belief and teaching unreasonable or wilful. But
within the limits of what is substantially historical, there is still
room for an admixture of what, though marked by spiritual purpose, is
yet not strictly historical--for instance, for a feature which
characterizes all early history, the attribution to first founders of
what is really the remoter result of their institutions. Now
historical criticism[317] assures us that this process has been
largely at work in the Pentateuch. By an analysis, for instance, the
force of which is very great, it distinguishes distinct stages in the
growth of the law of worship: at least an early stage such as is
represented in 'the Book of the Covenant[318],' a second stage in the
Book of Deuteronomy, a last stage in 'the Priestly Code.' What we may
suppose to have happened is that Moses himself established a certain
germ of ceremonial enactment in connection with the ark and its sacred
tent, and with the 'ten words'; and that this developed always as 'the
law of Moses,' the whole result being constantly attributed, probably
unconsciously and certainly not from any intention to deceive, to the
original founder. This view would certainly imply that the recorders
of Israel's history were subject to the ordinary laws in the estimate
of evidence, that their inspiration did not consist in a miraculous
communication to them of facts as they originally happened: but if we
believe that the law, as it grew, really did represent the Divine
intention for the Jews, gradually worked out upon the basis of a
Mosaic institution, there is nothing materially untruthful, though
there is something uncritical, in attributing the whole legislation to
Moses acting under the Divine command. It would be only of a piece
with the attribution of the collection of Psalms to David and of
Proverbs to Solomon. Nor does the supposition that the law was of
gradual growth interfere in any way with the symbolical and typical
value of its various ordinances.
Once again, the same school of criticism would assure us that the
Books of Chronicles represent a later and less historical version of
Israel's history than that given in Samuel and Kings[319]: they
represent, according to this view, the version of that history which
had become current in the priestly schools. What we are asked to admit
is not conscious perversion, but unconscious idealizing of history,
the reading back into past records of a ritual development which was
really later. Now inspiration excludes conscious deception or pious
fraud, but it appears to be quite consistent with this sort of
idealizing; always supposing that the result read back into the
earlier history does represent the real purpose of God and only
anticipates its realization.
Here then is one great question. Inspiration certainly means the
illumination of the judgment of the recorder. 'By the contact of the
Holy Spirit,' says Origen, 'they became clearer in their mental
perceptions, and their souls were filled with a brighter light[320].'
But have we any reason to believe that it means, over and above this,
the miraculous communication of facts not otherwise to be known, a
miraculous communication such as would make the recorder independent
of the ordinary processes of historical tradition? Certainly neither
S. Luke's preface to his Gospel, nor the evidence of any inspired
record, justifies us in this assumption. Nor would it appear that
spiritual illumination, even in the highest degree, has any tendency
to lift men out of the natural conditions of knowledge which belong to
their time. Certainly in the similar case of exegesis, it would appear
that S. Paul is left to the method of his time, though he uses it with
inspired insight into the function and meaning of law and of prophecy
as a whole. Thus, without pronouncing an opinion, where we have no
right to do so, on the critical questions at present under discussion,
we may maintain with considerable assurance that there is nothing in
the doctrine of inspiration to prevent our recognising a considerable
idealizing element in the Old Testament history. The reason is of
course obvious enough why what can be admitted in the Old Testament,
could not without results disastrous to the Christian Creed, be
admitted in the New. It is because the Old Testament is the record of
how God produced a need, or anticipation, or ideal, while the New
Testament records how in fact He satisfied it. The absolute
coincidence of idea and fact is vital in the realization, not in the
preparation for it. It is equally obvious, too, that where fact is of
supreme importance, as in the New Testament, the evidence has none of
the ambiguity or remoteness which belongs to much of the record of the
preparation.
(_b_) But once again; we find all sorts of literature in the inspired
volume: men can be inspired to think and to write for God under all
the forms of natural genius. Now one form of genius is the dramatic:
its essence is to make characters, real or imaginary, the vehicles for
an ideal presentation. It presents embodied ideas. Now the Song of
Solomon is of the nature of a drama. The Book of Job, although it
works on an historical basis, is, it can hardly be denied, mainly
dramatic. The Book of Wisdom, which with us is among the books of the
Bible, though in the second rank outside the canon, and which is
inside the canon of the Roman Church, professes to be written by
Solomon[321], but is certainly written not by him, but in his person
by another author. We may then conceive the same to be true of
Ecclesiastes, and of Deuteronomy; i.e. we may suppose Deuteronomy to
be a republication of the law 'in the spirit and power' of Moses put
dramatically into his mouth. Criticism goes further, and asks us to
regard Jonah and Daniel, among the prophetic books, as dramatic
compositions worked up on a basis of history. The discussion of these
books has often been approached from a point of view from which the
miraculous is necessarily unhistorical. With such a point of view we
are not concerned. The possibility and reality of miracles has to be
vindicated first of all in the field of the New Testament; and one who
admits them there, cannot reasonably exclude their possibility in the
earlier history. The question must be treated simply on literary and
evidential grounds[322]. But we would contend that if criticism should
shew these books to be probably dramatic, that would be no hindrance
to their performing 'an important canonical function,' or to their
being inspired. Dramatic composition has played an immense part in
training the human mind. It is as far removed as possible from a
violation of truth, though in an uncritical age its results may very
soon pass for history. It admits of being inspired as much as poetry,
or history, and indeed there are few who could feel a difficulty in
recognising as inspired the teaching of the books of Jonah and
Daniel[323]. It is maintained then that the Church leaves open to
literary criticism the question whether several of the writings of the
Old Testament are or are not dramatic. Certainly the fact that they
have not commonly been taken to be so in the past will be no evidence
to the contrary, unless it can be denied that a literary criticism is
being developed, which is as really new an intellectual product as the
scientific development, and as such, certain to reverse a good many of
the literary judgments of previous ages. We are being asked to make
considerable changes in our literary conception of the Scriptures, but
not greater changes than were involved in the acceptance of the
heliocentric astronomy.
(_c_) Once again: an enlarged study of comparative history has led to
our perceiving that the various sorts of mental or literary activity
develop in their different lines out of an earlier condition in which
they lie fused and undifferentiated. This we can vaguely call the
mythical stage of mental evolution. A myth is not a falsehood; it is a
product of mental activity, as instructive and rich as any later
product, but its characteristic is that it is not yet distinguished
into history, and poetry, and philosophy. It is all of these in the
germ, as dream and imagination, and thought and experience, are fused
in the mental furniture of a child's mind. 'These myths or current
stories,' says Grote writing of Greek history, 'the spontaneous and
earliest growth of the Greek mind, constituted at the same time the
entire intellectual stock of the age to which they belonged. They are
the common root of all those different ramifications into which the
mental activity of the Greeks subsequently diverged; containing as it
were the preface and germ of the positive history and philosophy, the
dogmatic theology and the professed romance, which we shall hereafter
trace, each in its separate development.' Now has the Jewish history
such earlier stage: does it pass back out of history into myth? In
particular, are not its earlier narratives, before the call of
Abraham, of the nature of myth, in which we cannot distinguish the
historical germ, though we do not at all deny that it exists? The
inspiration of these narratives is as conspicuous as that of any part
of Scripture, but is there anything to prevent our regarding these
great inspirations about the origin of all things,--the nature of sin,
the judgment of God on sin, and the alienation among men which follows
their alienation from God,--as conveyed to us in that form of myth or
allegorical picture, which is the earliest mode in which the mind of
man apprehended truth?
6. In spite of the arbitrariness and the irreligion which have often
been associated with the modern development of historical criticism in
its application to the Old Testament, the present writer believes that
it represents none the less a real advance in literary analysis, and
is reaching results as sure, where it is fairly used, as scientific
inquiry, though the results in the one case as in the other are often
hard to disentangle from their less permanent accompaniments.
Believing this, and feeling in consequence that the warning which the
name of Galileo must ever bring before the memory of churchmen, is not
unneeded now, he believes also that the Church is in no way restrained
from admitting the modifications just hinted at, in what has latterly
been the current idea of inspiration.
The Church is not restrained, in the first place, by having committed
herself to any dogmatic definitions of the meaning of inspiration[324].
It is remarkable indeed that Origen's almost reckless mysticism, and
his accompanying repudiation of the historical character of large
parts of the narrative of the Old Testament, and of some parts of the
New[325], though it did not gain acceptance, and indeed had no right
to it (for it had no sound basis), on the other hand never roused the
Church to contrary definitions. Nor is it only Origen who disputed the
historical character of parts of the narrative of Holy Scripture.
Clement before him in Alexandria, and the mediaeval Anselm in the
West, treat the seven days' creation as allegory and not history.
Athanasius speaks of paradise as a 'figure.' A mediaeval Greek writer,
who had more of Irenaeus than remains to us, declared that 'he did not
know how those who kept to the letter and took the account of the
temptation historically rather than allegorically, could meet the
arguments of Irenaeus against them.' Further than this, it cannot be
denied that the mystical method, as a whole, tended to the depreciation
of the historical sense, in comparison with the spiritual teaching
which it conveyed[326]. In a different line, Chrysostom, of the
literal school of interpreters, explains quite in the tone of a modern
apologist, how the discrepancies in detail between the different
Gospels, assure us of the independence of the witnesses, and do not
touch the facts of importance, in which all agree.
The Church is not tied then by any existing definitions. We cannot
make any exact claim upon any one's belief in regard to inspiration,
simply because we have no authoritative definition to bring to bear
upon him. Those of us who believe most in the inspiration of the
Church, will see a Divine Providence in this absence of dogma, because
we shall perceive that only now is the state of knowledge such as
admits of the question being legitimately raised.
Nor does it seem that the use which our Lord made of the Old Testament
is an argument against the proposed concessions. Our Lord, in His use
of the Old Testament, does indeed endorse with the utmost emphasis the
Jewish view of their own history. He does thus imply, on the one hand,
the real inspiration of their canon in its completeness, and, on the
other hand, that He Himself was the goal of that inspired leading and
the standard of that inspiration. 'Your father Abraham rejoiced to see
My day:' 'I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.' This, and it is
the important matter for all that concerns our spiritual education, is
not in dispute. What is questioned is that our Lord's words foreclose
certain critical positions as to the character of Old Testament
literature. For example, does His use of Jonah's resurrection, as a
_type_ of His own, depend in any real degree upon whether it is
historical fact or allegory[327]? It is of the essence of a type to
_suggest_ an idea, as of the antitype to _realize_ it. The narrative
of Jonah suggested certainly the idea of resurrection after three
days, of triumph over death, and by suggesting this gave our Lord what
His discourse required. Once more, our Lord uses the time before the
flood[328] to illustrate the carelessness of men before His own
coming. He is using the flood here as a typical judgment, as elsewhere
He uses other contemporary visitations for a like purpose. In
referring to the flood He certainly suggests that He is treating it as
typical, for He introduces circumstances--'eating and drinking,
marrying and giving in marriage'--which have no counterpart in the
original narrative. Nothing in His use of it depends on its being more
than a typical instance. Once more, He argues with the Pharisees on
the assumption of the Davidic authorship of Psalm cx[329]. But it must
be noticed that He is asking a question rather than making a
statement--a question, moreover, which does not admit of being turned
into a statement without suggesting the conclusion, of which
rationalistic critics have not hesitated to avail themselves, that
David's Lord could not be David's son. There are, we notice, other
occasions when our Lord asked questions which cannot be made the basis
of positive propositions[330]. It was in fact part of His method to
lead men to examine their own principles without at the time
suggesting any positive conclusion at all.
It may also fairly be represented, on a review of our Lord's teaching
as a whole, that if He had intended to convey instruction to us on
critical and literary questions, He would have made His purpose
plainer. It is contrary to His whole method to reveal His Godhead by
any anticipations of natural knowledge. The Incarnation was a
self-emptying of God to reveal Himself under conditions of human
nature and from the human point of view. We are able to draw a
distinction between what He revealed and what He used. He revealed
God, His mind, His character, His claim, within certain limits His
Threefold Being: He revealed man, his sinfulness, his need, his
capacity: He revealed His purpose of redemption, and founded His
Church as a home in which man was to be through all the ages
reconciled to God in knowledge and love. All this He revealed, but
through, and under conditions of, a true human nature. Thus He _used_
human nature, its relation to God, its conditions of experience, its
growth in knowledge, its limitation of knowledge[331]. He feels as we
men ought to feel: he sees as we ought to see. We can thus distinguish
more or less between the Divine truth which He reveals, and the human
nature which He uses. Now when He speaks of the 'sun rising' He is
using ordinary human knowledge. He willed so to restrain the beams of
Deity as to observe the limits of the science of His age, and He puts
Himself in the same relation to its historical knowledge. Thus He does
not reveal His eternity by statements as to what had happened in the
past, or was to happen in the future, outside the ken of existing
history[332]. He made His Godhead gradually manifest by His attitude
towards men and things about Him, by His moral and spiritual claims,
by His expressed relation to His Father, not by any miraculous
exemptions of Himself from the conditions of natural knowledge in its
own proper province. Thus the utterances of Christ about the Old
Testament do not seem to be nearly definite or clear enough to allow
of our supposing that in this case He is departing from the general
method of the Incarnation, by bringing to bear the unveiled
omniscience of the Godhead, to anticipate or foreclose a development
of natural knowledge.
But if we thus plead that theology may leave the field open for free
discussion of these questions which Biblical criticism has recently
been raising, we shall probably be bidden to 'remember Tübingen,' and
not be over-trustful of a criticism which at least exhibits in some of
its most prominent representatives a great deal of arbitrariness, of
love of 'new views' for their own sake, and a great lack of that
reverence and spiritual insight which is at least as much needed for
understanding the books of the Bible, as accurate knowledge and fair
investigation. To this the present writer would be disposed to reply
that, if the Christian Church has been enabled to defeat the critical
attack, so far as it threatened destruction to the historical basis of
the New Testament, it has not been by foreclosing the question with an
appeal to dogma, but by facing in fair and frank discussion the
problems raised. A similar treatment of Old Testament problems will
enable us to distinguish between what is reasonable and reverent, and
what is high-handed and irreligious in contemporary criticism whether
German, French, or English. Even in regard to what makes _prima facie_
a reasonable claim, we do not prejudice the decision by declaring the
field open: in all probability there will always remain more than one
school of legitimate opinion on the subject: indeed the purpose of the
latter part of this essay has not been to inquire how much we can
without irrationality believe inspiration to involve; but rather, how
much may legitimately and without real loss be conceded. For, without
doubt, if consistently with entire loyalty to our Lord and His Church,
we can regard as open the questions specified above, we are removing
great obstacles from the path to belief of many who certainly wish to
believe, and do not exhibit any undue scepticism. Nor does there
appear to be any real danger that the criticism of the Old Testament
will ultimately diminish our reverence for it. In the case of the New
Testament certainly we are justified in feeling that modern
investigation has resulted in immensely augmenting our understanding
of the different books, and has distinctly fortified and enriched our
sense of their inspiration. Why then should we hesitate to believe
that the similar investigation of the Old Testament will in its result
similarly enrich our sense that 'God in divers portions and divers
manners spake of old times unto the fathers,' and that the Inspiration
of Holy Scriptures will always be recognised as the most conspicuous
of the modes in which the Holy Spirit has mercifully wrought for the
illumination and encouragement of our race?
'For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our
learning, that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might
have hope.'
[248] Cyprian, _ad Donatum_ 3. Trans. in _Library of the Fathers_,
iii. p. 3.
[249] Athanasius, _de Incarnatione_, 31, 48-52.
[250] See S. Basil's fine definition of the term in his treatise _on
the Holy Spirit_, ix. 22. This treatise has been translated by the
Rev. G. Lewis for the 'Religious Tract Society.'
[251] See Basil, as above, xvi. 37: 'We must not suppose because the
Apostle (1 Cor. xii. 4) mentions the Spirit first, and the Son second,
and God the Father third, that the order at the present day has been
quite reversed. For he made his beginning from our end of the
relation: for it is by receiving the gifts, that we come in contact
with the Distributor; then we come to consider the Sender; then we
carry back our thought to the Fount and Cause of the good things.' Cf.
xviii. 47: 'The way of the knowledge of God is from one Spirit, by the
one Son, to the one Father: and reversely, the natural goodness of
God, His holiness of nature, His royal rank taking their rise from the
Father, reach the Spirit though the Only-begotten.'
[252] Ambrose, _de Spiritu Sancto_, i. 15, 172.
[253] So Irenaeus, Cyril of Jerusalem, Athanasius, Basil, Didymus,
Victorinus, express the relation of the Divine Persons in Creation.
[254] Ps. xxxiii. 6; Gen. i. 2; Ps. civ. 29, 30.
[255] Huet. _Origeniana, L._ ii. _Qu._ 2. c. xxvii. Cf. Athan. _Epp.
ad Serapion_. i. 23-31; iv. 9-12.
[256] Gen. ii. 7.
[257] Athan. _de Incarn._ xliii. 3.
[258] Athan. _l.c._ xii. 5, xliii. 4.