[1] The substance of this essay was given as an address before the
Bible Conference in Philadelphia in November, 1887. It has, however,
been revised and considerably changed with reference to its present
use.--T. S. C.
One has to breathe but little of the atmosphere of popular thought
to-day to find how full it is of religious doubt. Parental faiths
count for little. The beliefs of childhood, the teachings of the
sainted dead, the hopes that once brightened the darkness and
mysteries and griefs of life with the light of a cloudless future,
are to multitudes no more. "The eclipse of faith" has come, and souls
are drifting out upon the starless, shoreless sea of unbelief. They
see "the spring sun shining out of an empty heaven to light up a
soulless earth." They take up the wail of despair: "We are all to
be swept away in the final ruin of the earth." This is the deep,
pathetic undertone of the sighing of a thousand hearts to-day.
Has life anything real? Is it worth living? When the little play is
over, and the hour's music is ended, and the lights are out, and
we go forth into the darkness of the final night--what then? Is it
darkness for ever? or is there the light of an eternal day? Who
knows? Is anything certain? Must nations and men and the evening-moth
alike go down and perish for ever under the crush of an inexorable
fate? Is there no rift in this cloud? Have we no anchor that will
hold as the storm drives us on through the blinding mists and gloom
to the eternal shore? Have we no sure word of promise to which we can
cling when everything else around us and under our feet is giving
way?
_Is the Bible true?_ That is the simple but momentous question; it
settles all other questions of most concern to men. To it, therefore,
we find the most intense thought of thoughtful men converging. That
from this there should emerge questions not easily solved is not to
be wondered at: they emerge in every inquiry of human thought. The
only thing to be asked is that these questions be dealt with candidly
and fairly.
To many minds the Bible is still on trial; it is only just that in
its trial those rules and principles shall be observed which men
everywhere expect and demand shall be observed for themselves when
they or their interests are to be tried.
This is the point of this essay. It is not, indeed, a discussion from
the highest ground of inspiration; it does not claim to be. It simply
deals with a certain class--a very large class, however--of alleged
difficulties of the Bible, and it appeals to the candid reader to
deal with them as fairly and by the same rules as he would have his
fellow-men deal with him in a matter of life or death, or of any
worldly interest.
For this object only a few of the common rules of evidence have
been taken. It is believed, however, that their application will
cover a very large portion of the popular objections to the alleged
inconsistencies and contradictions of the Bible.
Undoubtedly, there are difficulties in the Bible; the question is
whether these prove that it is not the work and word of God. On the
other hand, it may be suggested whether they do not confirm it as the
work of God, for they at once put it in harmony with all his other
works. If the Bible were without difficulties, it would, for us,
be out of the line with everything else that God has made or done.
Nature and Providence are full of difficulties. There is nothing in
the Bible harder of explanation and reconciliation than are the facts
that meet us everywhere in God's creative and providential realms. If
these difficulties do not prove that Nature and Providence are not,
from beginning to end, the works of God, they do not on the face of
them prove that the Bible is not such.
In dealing with the difficulties of the Scriptures, therefore, we
have not the least idea that they will all be removed: difficulties
will remain. The Lord of hosts himself is a stone of stumbling and a
rock of offence upon which many stumble and fall and are broken. Isa.
viii. 14, 15. If a man is determined to commit suicide, he can do
it by the very means that God has created to preserve life--by fire
or by water. Spiritual self-destruction is quite possible through
the word of life itself. At the same time, no man has a right to put
needless difficulties in the Bible or to make difficulties where
none exist. More than this, every man is bound to deal as fairly at
least with the Bible as he deals with his fellow-men in the ordinary
relations of life. That which would give him no trouble as a judge
upon the bench or a juror in the box ought not to be urged as a fatal
objection to the Scriptures.
In testing at this time some of the difficulties of the Bible by the
accepted rules of evidence, hardly more can be done than to present a
few of these rules as applicable to these difficulties. But the rules
are of the widest application; the solution of one difficulty by them
is the solution of a hundred.
Looking upon the Bible as a whole, we may refer for a moment to the
familiar precept that every man is to be presumed innocent until he
is proved guilty. This is emphatically true of a man of good general
reputation. The rule would seem as applicable to a book as to a
man. Now, the Bible is not a new book; it has been before the world
for ages. It has a character. That it is on the whole a good book
the bitterest opposers of its plenary inspiration not only admit,
but assert. It is conceded that it is entitled to its name--the
_Bible_, _the_ Book. It claims to be a truthful book; by every fair
principle this claim must be allowed until it is shown to be false.
Bancroft's _History of the United States_ claims to be a reliable
work; the claim is generally admitted. If a man now comes forward
and asserts that it is false in whole or in details, by universal
judgment he must prove his assertion, and obviously his proofs must
be stronger than the evidences of the truth of the history. If this
is so in reference to a book that has not stood the test of half a
century, emphatically is it true of a book whose character has been
established through the searching scrutiny of friends and foes for
fifteen centuries--ay, for twice fifteen centuries. If a man now
affirms the Bible to be false, wholly or in part, it rests upon
him in all fairness to prove his position, and his evidence must
be stronger than that which supports the book. For three thousand
years a growing mass of testimony to the truth of the Bible has been
rolling up in the face of every objection that ingenuity, learning
and the bitterest hostility could present. Account for it as we may,
that is the fact. There is, therefore, a reasonable presumption in
its favor, and in favor of any specific statement that it makes.
If, then, we find in it a positive statement in regard to any fact,
and that statement is now confronted by another and a contradictory
one, the two do not stand on the same level. The new claimant must
prove his position, and to prove it he must disprove the truth of
the Scripture record. It is not enough to show that his proposition
might be true if we had no other information on the subject: he must
show that the Scripture, with its mass of supporting and cumulative
evidence, is false; and he must support his new proposition by a body
of evidence stronger than this manifold evidence of ages by which the
Scriptures are sustained.
The application of this principle is obvious, yet nothing is more
common than its violation. An hypothesis with certain analogies
perhaps in its favor, but admittedly without a solitary positive
proof to sustain it, is put forward as an established truth without
regard to the fact that the Bible, with its general character of
veracity behind it, gives another and an entirely different account
of the matter. We will not say this is irreverent: it is unfair and
unreasonable.
The character of the Bible may justly claim to sustain its record
till it is proved false. Deal with it as fairly as you deal with the
red-handed anarchist: let the book be innocent till proved guilty;
and if innocent, the written word, like the incarnate Word, stands a
true witness in all things for ever. Condemned, crucified, buried, it
will rise again. It is a perilous thing to condemn the guiltless.
Let us pass to another rule of law; it is this: "The testimony of
a single witness, where there is no ground for suspecting either
his ability or integrity, is a sufficient legal ground for belief"
(_Starkie on Ev._, i. 550). The mere silence of one witness or of
many witnesses cannot set aside the clear, positive testimony of a
single trustworthy witness. That Josephus does not mention events
which Moses records does not affect the truth of the Mosaic record,
and his silence as to the Bethlehem massacre--even if no reason could
be suggested for it, as there can be--cannot, under this rule of
law, affect the positive testimony of Matthew that there was such a
massacre.
The courts go farther than this. They say, "If a witness swear
positively that he saw or heard a fact, and another _who was present_
that he did not see or hear it, and the witnesses are equally
faithworthy, the affirmative witness is to be believed" (_Decisions
of the Supreme Court of Errors of the State of Connecticut_, vol.
vi. p. 188). In the case referred to in that decision the court
set aside a verdict that had been rendered by the lower court on
the negative testimony of eleven witnesses against the positive
testimony of three. The principle recognized by that decision, and
which is universally accepted as law, is that the negative testimony
of witnesses present at any given transaction cannot set aside the
positive testimony of a far less number of witnesses, or even of a
single reliable witness.
The silence of any of the evangelists in reference to an incident
or event at which they may have been present, but which possibly
they may not have noticed or which they do not record, does not
contradict in the least the testimony of _one_ who says such an
incident occurred. The fact of the marriage in Cana is not at all
disturbed because John is the only witness who testifies to it. So
if one writer states a part of an incident or of a discourse which
another writer omits, while the latter gives a part which the first
omits, there is no contradiction. Matthew (xx. 20) says the mother of
Zebedee's children made a certain request which Mark (x. 35) says the
children themselves made. But this is not inconsistent: the children
united with the mother in the request. Matthew calls attention to one
party; Mark, to another. Nothing can be more unreasonable than the
cavil that stumbles at such difficulties.
The rule before us applies to that extraordinary doubt of modern
criticism--whether the Israelites were ever in Egypt, because, as
affirmed, the monuments do not record their presence nor their flight
nor the destruction of the Egyptian host at the Red Sea. Now, leaving
out of the argument the strong probability that the monuments do
refer to their presence in Egypt, and the further probability that
the Egyptians would not be likely to preserve on their monuments
the record of their own ignominy and overthrow, the objection could
not stand for a moment in any court of justice in the presence of
the positive testimony of the record to the history in Egypt--all
the more as this testimony is sustained by an extraordinary weight
of incidental corroborative evidence, and is involved in the whole
subsequent history of the nation.
Grant, if you will, that there are improbabilities in parts of
the history; still, the courts rule that "mere improbability can
rarely supply a sufficient ground for disbelieving direct and
unexceptionable witnesses of the fact where there was no room for
mistake" (_Starkie_, i. 558; see also _Greenleaf on Ev._, i. 1,
14, 15). That canon, fairly applied, sweeps away no inconsiderable
portion of the objections to the Scripture histories. Take the great
decisive fact of the resurrection of Christ--a fact that carries with
it the whole Christian system and the verity of the whole Christian
revelation. It is a fact of testimony--of the testimony of many
witnesses, under a great variety of circumstances, at many times
and places, and extending through so long a period as to preclude
all reasonable or admissible supposition of "mistake." No fact of
ancient history can be proved by testimony if the resurrection of
Christ cannot be. The proof stands by itself, positive, direct,
unexceptionable as to the character and capacity of the witnesses.
It is proof that the law declares cannot be set aside by "mere
improbability;" and if this fact is established, everything essential
to Christianity is established. The seal of the risen Christ is
on the Old Testament; his blood is on the New Testament. It is,
throughout, the living book of the slain and living Lord.
Another very important rule of law is this: "In cases of conflicting
evidence, the first step in the process of inquiry must naturally
and obviously be to ascertain whether the apparent inconsistencies
and incongruities which it presents may not without violence be
reconciled" (_Starkie_, i. 578). "Where there is an apparent
inconsistency or contradiction in the testimony of witnesses, such
construction shall be put upon it as to make it agree if possible,
for perjury is not to be presumed" (_6 Conn._ 189). Nothing is more
remarkable than the constant violation of this rule by many of the
critics of the Bible; their effort is to see, not if the testimony
can be made to agree, but if by any possibility it can be forced to
appear contradictory. It is hardly putting it too strongly to say
that many of these efforts would not be considered respectable, and
would not be tolerated by the critics themselves, if they concerned
any other book than the Bible and any other subject than Christianity.
The courts take even stronger ground on the obligation of harmonizing
apparently conflicting evidence. If the elements of reconciliation
are not found in the evidence itself, they insist on the admission of
any reasonable supposition that will explain the difficulty.
"Where doubt arises," says Starkie (_Ev._ i. 586), "from
circumstances of an apparently opposite and conflicting tendency, the
first step in the natural order of inquiry is to ascertain whether
they be not in reality reconcilable, especially when circumstances
cannot be rejected without imputing perjury to a witness; for perjury
is not to be presumed, and in the absence of all suspicion that
hypothesis is to be adopted which consists with and reconciles all
the circumstances which the case supplies." (See also _Starkie_, i.
578, 582.)
Take the familiar case of the taxing when Cyrenius was governor of
Syria. Luke ii. 2. Everybody knows how confidently it was asserted
that Luke was in error because Cyrenius' government of Syria was
several years later than Luke makes it; equally, every one knows
how that difficulty was met by the supposition, made almost a
certainty, that Cyrenius was twice governor of Syria--once at the
time in question, and once later. Even if the supposition were
not as probable as it is, if there were no other way of solving
the difficulty, we should be justified by the principle of law in
assuming it rather than to assume that a witness as intelligent as
Luke, and with his opportunities of knowledge and with no motive
for misstatement, should either wilfully or carelessly have made so
gross an error. Here the rule fits perfectly: "In the absence of all
suspicion, _that hypothesis is to be adopted which consists with and
reconciles all the circumstances which the case supplies_."
In regard to certain objections to the Mosaic record--for
example, the improbability of the desert sustaining the host of
the Israelites: we select this as an example of a mass of like
objections--Dean Stanley, while holding in general to the historic
fact, says the recorded miracles do not meet the difficulty and we
have no right to add to them; for "if we have no warrant to take
away, we have no warrant to add." If by this he meant we have no
right to add to the inspired word _as a part of it_ what is not in
it, he is quite correct; but if he meant, as he evidently did, that
we have no right to make a reasonable supposition to explain an
apparent difficulty of the word, no utterance can be more groundless.
He might as well object that Moses could not possibly have led the
Israelites through the desert forty years because no man could do
that without sleeping, and the record does not say that Moses slept
during all that time, and "we have no warrant to add" to the record.
The same difficulty is urged by others from the present barrenness
of the desert, which it is contended is substantially as it was in
the time of the Exodus. This is to be met not so much by hypothesis
as by the facts--(1) that the condition of the desert was very
different then from its condition now. Because the country around
Philadelphia cannot now support a tribe of Indians by hunting and
fishing, it does not follow that it could not do this two hundred
years ago. (2) God had undertaken to bring the nation out. If every
miracle necessary to accomplish this end is not recorded, it does not
prove that it was not wrought. As in the life of our Lord, so in the
deliverance of Israel, many miracles may have been wrought of which
no account has come down to us.
This suggests an obvious and a very important consideration: _facts
may now be missing_ which were perfectly well known at the time of
the event, but the record of which has not been preserved. Hence, if
a difficulty can be removed by a reasonable supposition, or even by
any admissible supposition, of a missing fact, we are entitled to
make that supposition.
Webster (_Works_, vol. vi. p. 64) in his address to the jury on the
celebrated trial of the Knapps for the murder of Captain White of
Salem, Massachusetts, says: "In explaining circumstances of evidence
which are apparently irreconcilable or unaccountable, if a fact be
suggested which at once accounts for all and reconciles all, by
whomsoever it may be stated, it is still difficult not to believe
that such fact is the true fact belonging to the case." The missing
fact that was wanted in this case to show a motive for the murder
was the stealing of a will, or the purpose to steal a will, and this
proved the true hypothesis.
To illustrate by a familiar incident of the Old Testament history.
The prophets Jeremiah and Ezekiel foretell the fate of the last king
of Judah, Zedekiah. Jer. xxxii.; Ezek. xii. They declare that he
shall be taken captive by the king of Babylon, that he shall go to
Babylon and that he shall die in Babylon; yet Ezekiel expressly says
that he shall not see Babylon. Now, here is apparently as gross a
contradiction as there can be; and if our information stopped here,
it would be impossible to reconcile it. Fortunately, however, the
explanation is given in the history. From 2 Kings xxv. we learn that
the king of Babylon, when Zedekiah was brought into his presence at
Riblah, ordered his eyes to be put out and sent him blind to Babylon;
so that he saw the king of Babylon, he went to Babylon, he died in
Babylon, and yet he never saw Babylon. But--and this is the point of
this familiar case--if this unexpected and extraordinary fact had not
been stated, how absolutely impossible it would have been to give any
satisfactory solution of the difficulty! It may be doubted whether
any supposition as violent as this needs to be made to reconcile
every alleged contradiction of the Bible.
A remarkable illustration of the power of a missing fact occurs
in the history of the overthrow of Babylon itself. The Scripture
account (Dan. v.) says that Belshazzar was king of Babylon, that he
was in the city, engaged in a feast, at the time of its capture,
and that he was slain. Reliable secular historians give the name of
the king as Nabonnedus or Labynetus, and state that he was not in
the city when it was captured, that he was not killed, but taken
prisoner, kindly treated and allowed to retire to private life. These
different accounts were not only eagerly seized upon by skeptics as
proofs of the error of the Scriptures, but even biblical scholars
admitted them to be incapable of reconciliation. No longer ago
than when the writer was in the theological seminary that prince
of biblical students, Addison Alexander, said that no solution of
the difficulty was known; he was too wise a man to say that no
solution was possible. Kitto, in his _Cyclopedia_, declared that no
hypothesis _could_ harmonize the accounts. Yet the reconciliation
was perfectly simple. A cylinder of historic records discovered by
Sir Henry Rawlinson in the ruins of Lower Babylon showed that there
were at this time two kings of Babylon, a father and a son. One was
occupying a stronghold near the city, the other was defending the
city itself; the latter was taken and slain, the former was spared.
Thus, by the providential bringing to light of a fact buried for
centuries, that which had seemed to be, and which had repeatedly and
triumphantly been proclaimed to be, and which had been given up _as_
being, an irreconcilable contradiction, was shown to be perfectly
harmonious. Yet if the hypothesis of two kings had been suggested as
an explanation before the discovery of the fact, it would have been
hissed out of court by the whole skeptical school.
The two accounts of the death of Judas have not passed out of the
field of popular objection. Matthew (xxvii. 5) says he committed
suicide; Luke (Acts i. 18) says he fell headlong and burst asunder.
He does not say where he fell from or what were the circumstances of
the fall, and it is certainly not impossible, or even improbable,
that both accounts are true. The traitor hung himself, possibly,
on the verge of a precipice--the supposed spot furnishes all the
conditions for this--and afterward (how long is not said) the rope
or the limb of the tree gave way, and he fell, striking first on the
rocks at the foot of the tree and then plunging over the precipice
with the result described by Luke.
The case is not without a parallel. A few weeks since the papers
noticed the death of a gentleman in one of our Western States.
According to one account, he perished in a railroad disaster;
according to another, he committed suicide--a contradiction almost
exactly like that in the case of Judas. Yet there was no real
discrepancy. With his wife and child he was on the fatal train that
met its doom at Chatsworth. His child was killed; he and his wife
were taken from the ruins terribly injured. The wife soon died; in
despair, and with no hope of his own life, he drew his pistol and
sent the ball through his own head. He perished in the Chatsworth
disaster, and he committed suicide.
The application of these principles of law--the admission of
any reasonable hypothesis, or of an hypothesis that may seem
_improbable_, if it removes the difficulty, the supposition of
missing facts known at the time, but now lost--principles of
constant application in our courts of justice,--releases at once the
pressure from a large part of the objections to the inspired record.
The accounts of the healing of the blind men at Jericho and the
resurrection of Christ--two of the most difficult of full explanation
in the New Testament--require no more than this. It is not hard to
present reasonable hypotheses to meet the cases as they stand; and
if all the facts were known to us we believe the harmony would be
as complete and as simple as that of the histories of the siege and
capture of Babylon.
We draw the discussion to a close with the words of the eminent
American jurist and legal authority, Professor Greenleaf: "All that
Christianity [or the Bible] asks of men on this subject is that
they would be consistent with themselves, that they would treat its
evidence as they treat the evidence of other things, and that they
would try and judge its actors and witnesses as they deal with their
fellow-men when testifying to human affairs and actions in human
tribunals."
This, as we have said, is not the highest claim that we can make
for the Bible; but if men will go as far as this, and deal with the
alleged contradictions of the book honestly by the common rules of
evidence, the vast majority of all the difficulties to which these
rules apply will disappear. In the mean time, if there are those
that do not yield to present knowledge, we can afford to wait. Many
objections once supposed to be unanswerable have been answered, and
the process is going on. God is very patient, but we may be assured
that He who just as the occasion has demanded has summoned up the
silent witnesses to his word from the valley of the Nile, from the
stormy cliffs of Sinai, from the plains of Mesopotamia and from the
sullen shores of the Dead Sea, will not fail in the future to give
all the confirmation of his truth that the faith of his Church may
need.